British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car - Being A Record Of A Five Thousand Mile Tour In England, - Wales And Scotland by Thomas Dowler Murphy
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page 22 of 271 (08%)
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his body a short distance to the east of Waltham Church. The abbey gate
still stands as a massive archway at one end of the river bridge. Near the town is one of the many crosses erected by Edward I in memory of his wife, Eleanor of Castile, wherever her body rested on the way from Lincoln to Westminster. A little to the left of this cross, now a gateway to Theobald Park, stands Temple Bar, stone for stone intact as it was in the days when traitors' heads were raised above it in Fleet Street, although the original wooden gates are missing. Waltham Abbey is situated on the River Lea, near the point where King Alfred defeated the Danes in one of his battles. They had penetrated far up the river when King Alfred diverted the waters from beneath their vessels and left them stranded in a wilderness of marsh and forest. Another pleasant afternoon trip was to Monken Hadley, twenty-five miles out on the Great North Road. Hadley Church is intimately associated with a number of distinguished literary men, among them Thackeray, whose grandfather preached there and is buried in the churchyard. The sexton was soon found and he was delighted to point out the interesting objects in the church and vicinity. The church stands at the entrance of a royal park, which is leased to private parties and is one of the quaintest and most picturesque of the country churches we had seen. Over the doors, some old-fashioned figures which we had to have translated indicated that the building had been erected in 1494. It has a huge ivy-covered tower and its interior gives every evidence of the age-lasting solidity of the English churches. Hadley Church has a duplicate in the United States, one having been built in some New York town precisely like the older structure. We |
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