the
"Life" of his hero, no doubt spent some happy days in contemplation of
the clear waters of the Nadder. Charles I was another visitor, and by
him certain suggestions are said to have been made for some of the
alterations and additions of the seventeenth century. The original
building which followed the dismantled Abbey was designed by Holbein,
but this has almost disappeared except for the central portion over
the gateway. Wyatt was allowed to stick some of his sham Gothic
enormities over the older work about the time he was designing
Fonthill, but an era of better taste soon got rid of these and the
present fronts are Italian in style and very lordly and imposing. The
great hall contains the Vandyck portraits for which Wilton is
preeminently famous, but there are other great masters, including
Rubens, Titian and del Sarto to be seen by those interested, besides a
collection of armour hardly to be surpassed in the country. These
treasures are shown at certain times.

[Illustration: BEMERTON CHURCH.]

Although a pleasant and retired little place, Bemerton would not be of
much interest were it not for its associations with the "singer of
surpassing sweetness," the author of _The Temple_. George Herbert
became rector here in 1630 and died two years later, aged 42. He lies
within the altar rails of the church and the tablet above is simply
inscribed G.H., 1633. The lines on the Parsonage wall and written by
the parson-poet were originally above the chimney inside. They run
thus:--

"If thou chance for to find
A new house to thy mind,
And built without any cost,
Be good to the poor
As God gives thee store
And then thy labour's not lost."

In the garden that slopes down to the river there was quite recently,
and may be still, an old and gnarled medlar planted by Herbert. The
well-known painting "George Herbert at Bemerton" by W. Dyce, R.A., in
the Guildhall Art Gallery, gives an excellent picture of the calm
grace of the surroundings and of the heavenly spire of the Cathedral
soaring up into the skies a mile away. The fine new memorial church at
Bemerton is used for the regular Sunday services and Herbert's little
old church for worship on weekdays. It is pleasant to think that the
bells which sound so sweetly across the meadows, as we take the
footpath way to Salisbury, are those that were rung by Herbert when he
first entered his church.

The City of Salisbury, or officially, New Sarum, is a regular