curious little
republication was issued. It is illustrated by George Cruikshank and
with pleasant prints of old pencilled drawings, and besides a poem,
contains a number of descriptions of the chief houses of the
neighbourhood. Here is one of them:--

"CHART'S EDGE.

On inquiring of a native, we were told that this place was the
residence of "Mr. _Antiquary Streatfeild_." We doubt, however, if he
has any just pretensions to that designation, a divine across the
border assuring us that he is skilled in glamoury, and illustrating
his account by stating that 'where there was a hill, there he would
have a hollow, where there was a dell, there we should find a
mound'; and, indeed, we ourselves experienced the delusion, for the
spot which we had known for many years as a bleak desert, appeared
sheltered and decorated with thriving plantations, a house new from
the kiln, cheated us with its Elizabethan air; neither was the spell
broken when we found ourselves in the interior; there we saw, or
thought we saw, one of Raphael's loveliest easel pictures, one of
Rembrandt's deep toned yet brilliant interiors, and a goodly row of
ancestors in flowing wigs and ample ruffles; whilst, in fact, the
former were no more than a foxy Italian copy of the divine Urbino,
and a modern English attempt to mimic the glorious Fleming, and the
latter, Cockneys and Kentish Yeomen."

Such a concatenation of studied insults might be supposed to have
finished with a libel action. But it is the only description of a
neighbouring house which has a hint of raillery, and a pencilled note in
a copy I found of the little old book adds the explanation. Chart's Edge
belonged to the author of _Lympsfield and its Environs_. I imagine,
also, that Mr. Antiquary Streatfeild was the author of _The Old Oak
Chair_, republished in the same volume by his friend "H.G.," and
described as a ballad "sung at an anniversary dinner of the Westerham
Amicable Benefit Society, to which the author has proved a steady
friend." This is the ballad of _The Old Oak Chair_:--

My good sire sat in his old oak chair,
And the pillow was under his head,
And he raised his feeble voice, and ne'er
Will the memory part
From my living heart
Of the last few words he said.

"When I sit no more in this old oak chair,
And the green grass has grown on my grave,