towns and villages in the south of the county are more or less employed in it-Radford, Basford, Stapleford, Arnold, Bulwell, and as far north as Mansfield.

The stockinger can do his work in his own home just as well as in a factory where many frames are engaged. He works at a stocking-frame, making his whole stocking of a single thread, just as a hand-knitter does; but instead of working with four needles, he uses many, as many as fifty needles to an inch if the stocking is very fine.

There are more stockingers in the trade than can be properly paid for their work: it is a business easy to learn; children and women can work the frames as well as men; and there are so many ready to do the work, that perhaps there is no trade at which people have to labour for such long hours and for so little money.

The poor pay he got for his stocking work put it into the head of a rather idle workman named Hammond to invent a way of making lace on his stocking-frame. Up to this time every tiny hole or mesh in lace and net was made by handwork, the work of women who might be seen with pillow and bobbins at their cottage doors. Hammond examined the pillow lace on his wife's cap, and at last did invent a frame, which succeeded so well that the stocking weavers were able to make far cheaper lace than the pillow-lace makers.

In the beginning of this century a Mr. Heathcote invented a bobbin-net machine, which made, at a quick rate, and for little money, net with a beautiful even mesh, as perfect as any hand-worked lace made in France.

Great was the excitement caused by this invention : everybody in Nottingham thought of nothing but ways

Castle, still the splendid home of a great noble, and perhaps the finest which is still remaining of the castles raised by the princely barons of other days. Some of the towers are very old; Domesday Book speaks of the castle as "a special stronghold for the midland part of the kingdom."

Leamington, which stands where the Leam joins the Avon, is a fashionable place with mineral springs, not far from Warwick.

III.

THE "SWAN OF AVON."

A FEW miles lower down the river is the town which makes the Avon famous, Stratford,

"Where his first infant lays sweet Shakespeare sung,
Where the last accents faltered on his tongue."

"The country about Stratford is not romantic, but extremely pleasant. The town stands in a fine open valley. The Avon, a considerable stream, winds past it through pleasing meadows. The country is well cultivated, and about are wooded uplands and more distant ranges of hills. The town itself is a good, quiet, country town; in Shakespeare's time it could be nothing more than a considerable village. Stratford appears now to live on the fame of Shakespeare." *

Wherever you turn, you see the Shakespeare Hotel, or the Shakespeare Theatre, or the statue of Shakespeare in its niche in the front of the town-hall. A large sign informs you that "In this House the Immortal Bard was born," and you go in, and find the walls written all over, from floor to ceiling, and even

William Howitt.

THE BATTLE OF EDGE HILL.

135

upon the ceiling, with the names of the thousands who have come to Stratford to honour the memory of our great poet.

The Avon, which is in Warwick a gentle stream, flowing between wooded, beautiful banks, leaves this shire a little beyond Stratford, and flows through the lovely vale of Evesham. It takes its rise upon the battle-field of Naseby. For Shakespeare's sake this Avon is held dear and famous amongst all British rivers.

IV.

THE BATTLE OF EDGE HILL.

"As I had walked from Stratford," writes Mr. William Howitt, "Edge Hill had gradually risen, as it were, before me, till it filled with its lofty edge the whole of the horizon on that side. A tower near a mill was pointed out to me by the country people as standing just above the scene of the battle. So great is the elevation that it gives you one of the most extensive prospects in the kingdom. The district towards Stratford, Warwick, and Coventry, and across into Gloucestershire and Worcestershire, lies in a grand expanse before you. You seem to take in, on a clear day, the breadth of a kingdom almost. Edge Hill is truly an edge, that is, it is a step, where the country takes an abrupt rise, and when you gain the summit you find yourselves, not so much on a hill, as on the level of a higher country."

The king's army marched hither from Shrewsbury; the army of the Parliament, under Essex, from Worcester. The day was spent before the two armies met.

The fight was fierce, and it was not plain at night-fall on which side the victory lay. All night the two armies lay under arms, and, next morning, found themselves in sight of each other. General, as well as soldier, on both sides, seemed averse to renew the battle; and thus ended the fight of Edge Hill, the first pitched battle of the Civil War. Five thousand men are said to have died on the field.

This is the prayer and charge of Sir Jacob Astley, one of the king's generals, before the battle began:

"O Lord! Thou knowest how busy I must be this day. If I forget Thee, do not Thou forget me. March on, boys!"

Rugby, in the east of the shire, is famous for its Grammar School, one of the great public schools of England, which owes its fame to the late wise headmaster, Dr. Arnold. He taught his boys there was something for each of them to care for beyond his own share of work and play-the good of the school. For the good name of Rugby, every boy must do his best, both in lessons and games; must set his face against mean, underhand ways; must help the young ones to keep straight and do their work. Rugby boys became proud of their school; and felt that any wrong-doing was a disgrace to them all; any well-doing, a credit. And more, they learned from Dr. Arnold that in being thus faithful to their school, they were doing what school-boys could to serve the Highest Master.