Dunstable is situated in the centre of the Dunstable Chalk Downs, where the
celebrated Dunstable larks are caught which are made mention of in one of
Miss Edgeworth's pretty stories. The manufactures are whiting and straw
hats. Of an ancient priory, founded in 1131, by Henry I., and endowed with
the town, and the privileges of jurisdiction extending to life and death,
nothing remains but the parish church, of which the interior is richly
ornamented. Over the altar-piece is a large painting representing the Lord's
Supper, by Sir James Thornhill, the father-in-law of Hogarth. In a charity
school founded in 1727, forty boys are clothed, educated, and apprenticed. In
twelve almshouses twelve poor widows are lodged, and in six houses near the
church, called the Maidens' Lodge, six unmarried gentlewomen live and enjoy
an income of 120 pounds per ann. With this brief notice we may retrace our
steps.

On leaving Leighton, within half a mile we enter a covered tunnel, and we
strongly recommend some artist fond of "strong effects" in landscape to
obtain a seat in a coupe forming the last carriage in an express train, if
such are ever put on now, sitting with your back to the engine, with windows
before and on each side, you are whirled out of sight into twilight and
darkness, and again into twilight and light, in a manner most impressive, yet
which cannot be described. Perhaps the effect is even greater in a slow than
in an express train. But as this tunnel is curved the transition would be
more complete.

At Bletchley the church (embowered in a grove of yews, planted perhaps when
Henry VIII. issued his decrees for planting the archer's tree) contains an
altar tomb of Lord Grey of Wilton, A.D. 1412. The station has now become
important as from it diverge the Bedford line to the east, and the lines to
Banbury and Oxford to the west.