I do not remember very particularly what we saw,--time-worn fronts of
famous colleges and halls of learning everywhere about the streets, and
arched entrances; passing through which, we saw bits of sculpture from
monkish hands,--the most grotesque and ludicrous faces, as if the
slightest whim of these old carvers took shape in stone, the material
being so soft and manageable by them; an ancient stone pulpit in the
quadrangle of Maudlin College (Magdalen), one of only three now extant in
England; a splendid--no, not splendid, but dimly magnificent--chapel,
belonging to the same College, with painted windows of rare beauty, not
brilliant with diversified hues, but of a sombre tint. In this chapel
there is an alabaster monument,--a recumbent figure of the founder's
father, as large as life,--which, though several centuries old, is as
well preserved as if fresh from the chisel.
In the High Street, which, I suppose, is the noblest old street in
England, Mr. Hall pointed out, the Crown Inn, where Shakespeare used to
spend the night, and was most hospitably welcomed by the pretty hostess
(the mother of Sir William Davenant) on his passage between Stratford and
London.
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