shops, with a row of spreading elms on the opposite side. It is not
uninteresting to notice the humble style of the shops, and the wooden
portico and tiled roofs, in the Engraving, and to contrast them with the
ornamental shop-architecture of our days: yet our forefathers, good old
souls, thought such accommodations worthy of their patronage, and there
was then as much gaiety at Tunbridge Wells as at Brighton in its best days.


[1] Saccharissa, or the Lady Dorothy Sydney, resided at Penshurst, near
Tunbridge.

[2] He prescribed eighteen pints of the water for a morning's dose.

[3] Grammont, in his fascinating "Memoirs," thus describes the Wells at
his period, 1664, when Catherine, Queen of Charles II. was here for
two months, with all the beauties of the court:

"Tunbridge is the same distance from London that Fontainebleau is from
Paris, and is, at the season, the general rendezvous of all the gay
and handsome of both sexes. The company, though always numerous, is
always select; since those who repair thither for diversion, even
exceed the number of those who go thither for health. Every thing here
breathes mirth and pleasure; constraint is banished; familiarity is
established upon the first acquaintance; and joy and pleasure are the
sole sovereigns of the place. The company are accommodated with
lodgings in little clean and convenient habitations, that lie
straggling and separated from each other, a mile and a half round the
Wells, where the company meet in the morning. The place consists of a
long walk, shaded by pleasant trees, under which they walk while they
are drinking the waters. On one side of this walk is a long row of