of the Garter; it is surrounded with the tombs of his
descendants. It was into Stamford that Nicholas Nickleby rode through
the snowstorm, and the coach stopped at the George Inn, which was a
popular hostelrie in the days of Charles II., as it still remains.

North of Stamford, on the river Witham, is the interesting town of
Grantham, containing the quaint grammar-school founded by Bishop Fox of
Winchester in 1528 where Sir Isaac Newton was educated. It is recorded
by tradition that his career here was not very brilliant as a scholar--a
circumstance which may be told, if for nothing else, at least for the
encouragement of some of the school-boys of a later generation.

LINCOLN.

[Illustration: LINCOLN CATHEDRAL, FROM THE SOUTH-WEST.]

[Illustration: "BITS" FROM LINCOLN.]

Continuing northward down the river Witham, we come to a point where the
stream has carved in a limestone-capped plateau a magnificent valley,
which, changing its course to the eastward, ultimately broadens on its
route to the sea into a wide tract of fenland. Here, upon a grand site
overlooking the marshes and the valley, stands the city of Lincoln, with
its cathedral crowning the top of the hill, while the town-buildings
spread down the slope to the riverbank at Brayford Pool, from which
the Witham is navigable down to Boston, near the coast, and ultimately
discharges into the Wash. The Pool is crowded with vessels and bordered
by warehouses, and it receives the ancient Fosse Dyke Canal, which was
dug by the Romans to connect the Witham with the more inland river
Trent. This was the Roman colony of Lindum, from which the present name
of Lincoln is derived, and the noble cathedral crowns the highest
ground, known as Steep Hill. William the Conqueror conferred upon Bishop
Remigius of Fecamp the see of Dorchester, and he founded in 1075 this
celebrated cathedral, which, with its three noble towers and two
transepts, is one of the finest in England. Approaching it from the
town, at the foot of the hill is encountered the Stonebow, a Gothic
gateway of the Tudor age, which serves as the guild-hall. The centre of
the western front is the oldest part of Lincoln Cathedral, and the
gateway facing it, and forming the chief entrance to the Close, is the
Exchequer Gate, an impressive structure built in the reign of Edward
III. The cathedral arcade and the lower parts of the two western towers
and the western doorway were built in the twelfth century. Subse