What to See in England. Gordon Home
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Photochrom Co., Ltd.
WINDSOR CASTLE.]
JORDANS AND WILLIAM PENN
=How to get there.=—Train from Baker Street. Metropolitan Railway.
=Nearest Station.=—Chalfont Road (3 miles from Jordans).
=Distance from London.=—22 miles.
=Average Time.=—51 minutes. (Convenient trains, 10.27 A.m., 12.17
and 2.27 P.m.)
1st 2nd 3rd
=Fares.=—Single 3s. 2d. 2s. 4d. 1s. 7d.
Return 4s. 9d. 3s. 5d. 2s. 5d.
=Accommodation Obtainable.=—None at Jordans.
=Alternative Route.=—Train to Uxbridge. Great Western Railway.
Jordans, the burial-place of William Penn, the great English Quaker and philanthropist, lies on a by-road in Buckinghamshire, leading from Chalfont St. Peter to Beaconsfield. The place itself, though full of the typical charm of English scenery in the home counties, does not contain anything of particular interest, and it owes its reputation to the associations with the wonderful man who lived and died there. Jordans is visited by many hundreds of tourists during the summer, mainly Americans. One of these offered to remove Penn's remains to Philadelphia, capital of Pennsylvania, and there build a mausoleum over them; but the offer was declined.
The road runs south-west from the village of Chalfont St. Peter, and after a sharp curve brings the visitor to the Meeting House, a very plain and unobtrusive structure, dating from about the end of the seventeenth century. In the secluded burying-ground surrounded and overhung by great trees lies William Penn. Five of his children also rest among these quiet surroundings; and here are buried two well-known Quaker leaders, Isaac Penington and Thomas Ellwood. At the actual time of burial there were no gravestones, but these have since been added. Though the house as a regular place of meeting has long fallen into disuse, there is still an annual gathering of Quakers there in memory of the great dead.
Penn was the son of Sir William Penn, an eminent admiral, and was born in 1644. His violent advocacy of the Quaker creeds led him into continual trouble and several times into prison. In 1681 he obtained, in lieu of the income left by his father, a grant from the Crown of the territory now forming the state of Pennsylvania. Penn wished to call his new property Sylvania, on account of the forest upon it, but the king, Charles II., good-naturedly insisted on the prefix Penn. The great man left his flourishing colony for the last time in 1701, and after a troublous time in pecuniary matters, owing to the villany of an agent in America, Penn died at Ruscombe in Berkshire in 1718.
[Illustration: H.C. Shelley.
THE JORDANS.
The burial-place of William Penn.]
KNOLE HOUSE AND SEVENOAKS
=How to get there.=—Train from Charing Cross, Cannon Street, or
London Bridge. South-Eastern and Chatham Railway.
=Nearest Station.=—Sevenoaks (Knole House is just outside Sevenoaks).
=Distance from London.=—22 miles.
=Average Time.=—45 minutes.
1st 2nd 3rd
=Fares.=—Single 3s. 10d. 2s. 5d. 1s. 11d.
Return 6s. 8d. 4s. 10d. 3s. 10d.
=Accommodation Obtainable.=—At Sevenoaks—"Royal Crown Hotel,"
"Royal Oak Hotel," "Bligh's Private Hotel," etc.
Sevenoaks is famous for its beautiful situation near the Weald of Kent. It possesses still some old inns, relics of coaching days. The Grammar School was founded in 1432 by Sir William Sevenoke, who, from being a foundling, became Lord Mayor. St. Nicholas' Church is a large building in the Decorated and Perpendicular style, much restored.
The chief charm of Sevenoaks is Knole House, a splendid example of the baronial dwellings that were erected after the Wars of the Roses, when the fortress was no longer so necessary. The demesne of Knole was purchased in the fifteenth century by Thomas Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury, who rebuilt the mansion on it. It was taken from Cranmer by the Crown and granted in 1603 to Thomas Sackville, Baron Buckhurst, afterwards Earl of Dorset, who is now represented by the Sackville-West family, the present owners.
The first Earl of Dorset greatly improved Knole, employing, it is said, 200 workmen constantly. The building surrounds three square courts and occupies about 5 acres. Knole possesses an extremely valuable collection of paintings, and the mediaeval furniture is untouched from the time of James I. There are famous pictures by Flemish, Dutch, Venetian, and Italian painters. In the dressing-room of the Spangled Bedroom are to be seen some of Sir Peter Lely's beauties. The Cartoon Gallery has copies of Raphael's cartoons by Mytens, and in the Poet's Parlour are portraits of England's famous poets—some by Gainsborough and Sir Joshua Reynolds. The banqueting-hall has a screened music gallery. It is said that there are as many rooms in the house as there are days in the year. The drives and walks of the large park are always open, and the house is shown on Fridays from 10 A.m. to 5 P.m., and on Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 to 5 P.m. at a charge of 2s.; there is a reduction for a party. Tickets are procurable at the lodge.
[Illustration: Photochrom Co., Ltd.
KNOLE HOUSE.
One of the finest examples of a baronial residence of the period immediately succeeding the Wars of the Roses.]
GREENSTEAD CHURCH
A SAXON CHURCH WITH WOODEN WALLS
=How to get there.=—Train from Liverpool Street or Fenchurch Street.
Great Eastern Railway.
=Nearest Station.=—Chipping Ongar (1 mile from Greenstead Church).
=Distance from London.=—22–¾ miles.
=Average Time.=—Varies between 1 to 1–½ hours.
1st 2nd 3rd
=Fares.=—Single 3s. 11d. 2s. 10d. 1s. 11–½d.
Return 5s. 9d. 4s. 2d. 3s. 1d.
=Accommodation Obtainable.=—Inn, etc., at Ongar.
Entering Ongar from the railway station one finds on the right a footpath leading into a fine avenue. About ten minutes' walk down this brings one to Greenstead Hall, a red brick Jacobean house, with the church adjoining it. Set among a profusion of foliage, the simple little building would be quite interesting as an ideally situated little rustic church, but when one realises how unique it is, the spot at once becomes fascinating. The walls of the diminutive nave, as one may see from the illustration given here, consist of the trunks of large oak trees split down the centre and roughly sharpened at each end. They are raised from the ground by a low foundation of brick, and inside the spaces between the trees are covered with fillets of wood. On top the trees are fastened into a frame of rough timber by wooden pins. The interior of the building is exceedingly dark, for there are no windows in the wooden walls, and the chief light comes from the porch and a dormer window. This window in the roof, however, was not in the original design, for the rude structure was only designed as a temporary resting-place for the body of St. Edmund the Martyr. It was in A.D. 1010 that the saint's body was removed from Bury to London, its protectors