I record this circumstance as milestones, we found to be exceedingly rare upon our journey, and when existing to have generally their lettering completely worn away. A generation that travels by railway has little care or need of milestones or finger-posts, which is unfortunate for the wise few who journey for pleasure along the forsaken highways and pleasant byways of beautiful England.

But

Entering Gunton Park, we drove along a wellkept road as smooth almost as a billiard table, with mighty sweeps of greenest sward on either side, bounded far away by many-tinted woods. beautiful though Gunton Park was, we preferred the common road. The park was too well ordered to please us, too trim and neat; it seemed tame after our wanderings through the wilds of Norfolk, and we were not sorry to get once more upon the old highway, with its tangled hedges, its picturesque cottages, changeful scenes, and varying incidents.

One

The country now became actually hilly; glorious prospects of wooded heights and sheltered vales opened out before us, and great was the contrast with our level wanderings of the last few days. rural hamlet that we came upon at the foot of a hill, with its little common, ancient trees, and pond (in which latter some sunburnt children were intently fishing with crooked sticks and strings for lines, and possibly bent pins for hooks), will long linger in our memory as a bit of true wayside poetry. It was as though one of Birket Foster's charming paintings had been given life. Rural England abounds in such pictures.

Uphill then our way led us to a vast stretch of gorse-clad land; from the phaeton we looked down upon acres and acres of glowing gold. Never before had we beheld the gorse in such perfection or in such abundance. It was a glorious sight, a miracle of colour; even Italy can show nothing more gorgeous than a common spread with gorse in the fulness of its bloom, when the sun shines thereon.

Now on through a hilly and wooded country, past pretty thatched cottages, and cottages pretty without being thatched, till after a time Cromer came in sight. As we were on high ground, our horizon was high before us, and so from the top of this our last hill we had a grand panoramic view of this quiet watering-place and the far-reaching, ship-dotted sea beyond. It was a grand prospect, and our eyes rejoiced to range over it unrestrained; very different this from the limited horizons of the Broads. Then a long descent of a mile or more brought us to our destination. Like Essex, Norfolk is not wholly level; it is certainly hilly in parts.

CHAPTER XII.

Cromer-Flint Building-A Wasting Shore The Poorer ClassesAlong the Norfolk Coast-Old Fishing Villages-A Bygone Relic -The Gift of Age-A Hilly Road-The Glamour of the Unknown -Ingworth Church-An Ancient Hour-glass Holder-An Old Clerk and his Story-Aylsham-An Old Posting House-Country Shops-Chat with a Farmer-A Rose Garden in a ChurchyardLightning Conductors.

ARRIVING in Cromer, we drove up to Tucker's Hotel, not so many long years ago a genuine coaching inn, and one that still retains the formerly familiar legend of Posting House.' In spite of the changing times, Tucker's Hotel has manifestly changed but little. It has an unmistakable old-fashioned look; a flavour of the past seems to linger around its ancient walls; it is the very antithesis of the modern fashion · able watering-place hotel. This building faces inland, and even turns its back to the sea, for it was raised in the days before the value of the sea-front was recognised. It would seem that the architect of this old hostel thought rather of shelter than of marine views and sea winds. It is the same at Yarmouth; the old inns wherein the travellers of old took their ease do not face the Marine Parade, and it may be noted that they are none the less comfortable for that.

Securing our rooms, and having refreshed the

inner man for driving across country is hungry work -we strolled out to have a look at the place. The first thing that struck us upon our arrival was the most marked change of temperature. From North Walsham, and until the top of the hill above Cromer was reached, we had been oppressed with the heat of the day; here, by the side of the sea, we found it almost chilly, and were glad of a light overcoat. Cromer has the repute of being a bracing place; it certainly seemed to us to deserve the reputation. The town has the advantage, for a summer resort, of facing due north; we have, from the necessity of our geographical position, few seaside resorts with such an aspect.

Cromer, before the railway came to it, was a quiet, secluded spot, beloved by the seekers after rest and by those who delight not in fashionably dressed crowds, for then excursionists were unknown in these parts. The only way to reach it was by road, and this form of travel does not suit the cheap daytripper. Even now, for a watering-place that sets itself up for being at all fashionable, Cromer is delightfully unsophisticated. But it is progressing; the speculative builder has his eye upon the place, and indeed has already begun operations. In a few years, in all probability, what remains of its pleasing primitive simplicity will be no more, and all of its ancient quiet and most of its quaint picturesqueness will have vanished away.

The old church of Cromer is a grand specimen of flint work. This fine structure is the outcome of the piety and prosperity of the former merchants of

A GOTH-LIKE ACT.

219

the place, or rather of a Cromer that lies now mostly beneath the sea; for here, as all around the eastern coast, the ocean is gradually gaining upon the land. The soft sandy shore is being washed away at the rate of a yard or more a year, and villages and prosperous shipping towns that had once a place upon the map are now no more, and vessels anchor to-day upon their former sites. Even where the low sand dunes rise into cliffs, the process of wasting goes merrily on. Summer rains and winter frosts in turn disintegrate portions of the soft land, the waves quickly wash these fallen masses away, and so the work of destruction goes on unceasingly.

When we were there the old ruined chancel of the church was being restored and, moreover (a rare moreover, alas!) the work was being well done in reverent imitation of the old. Would that all restorations were undertaken in the same right spirit! Strange it reads, how it was that this chancel came to be ruined thus. It appears that when the merchants left the place and its prosperity vanished, the church proved to be too large for the lessened congregation, and in the year 1681, to save the expense of keeping so large a structure in repair, the chancel was actually, by order, blown down by gunpowder, and the nave built off! Surely there never was such a Goth-like proceeding as this! Now, when Cromer as a watering-place is regaining something of her ancient prosperity, the church is being restored to its former size, if not beauty.

We found the company gathered within our hotel very sociable, and a most enjoyable evening we spent