Part 4 (1/2)
From the Newark, in a lane opposite to which called Mill-Stone lane, is a Meeting-House of the Methodists, we proceed along South gate or
HORSEPOOL-STREET,
At the end of this street, situated on a gentle eminence affording the desirable advantages of a dry soil and open air, we perceive one of those edifices which a country more than nominally christian must ever be careful to erect, a house of refuge for sick poverty. The Infirmary, which owes the origin of its inst.i.tution to W. Watts, M. D. was built in 1771, nearly on the scite of the antient chapel of St. Sepulchre, and is a plain neat building with two wings, fronted by a garden, the entrance to which is ornamented with a very handsome iron gate the gift of the late truly benevolent Shuckbrugh Ashby, Esq. of Quenby. The house is built upon a plan which for its convenience and utility received the approbation of the great Howard, whose experience and observation qualified him for a competent judge. It is calculated to admit, exclusive of the fever ward, 54 patients, without restriction to county or nation. Its funds, notwithstanding the exemplary liberality it has excited, are, owing to the pressure of the times, scarcely adequate to its support. Adjoining the Infirmary is an Asylum for the reception of indigent Lunatics.
At the distance of a quarter of a mile from the Infirmary, are some remains of a Roman labour, called the _Raw Dikes_, these banks of earth four yards in height, running parralel to each other in nearly a right line to the extent of 639 yards, the s.p.a.ce between them 13 yards, were some years ago levelled to the ground except the the length of about 150 yards at the end farthest from the town. It was a generally received opinion that they were the fortifications of a Roman camp, till the supposition of their having been a _cursus_ or race course, was started by Dr. Stukely. If it is to be admitted that they formed an area for horse races, of which the Romans are known to have been extravagantly fond, we may imagine that the sport here practiced consisted in horses running at liberty without riders between the banks; traces of such a race run in an enclosed s.p.a.ce may be found in the _Corso dei Barberi_, now practiced in the streets of Florence; {125} the Italians having in many instances preserved the original customs of the Romans. But the question must still hang in a balance whether the Raw d.y.k.es were the scene of Roman games, or
_The ma.s.sy mound, the rampart once_ _Of iron war in antient barbarous times_.
From the Infirmary, if the visitor wishes to close his walk, he may enter the town by the Hotel; if he feel inclined to extend it, he will find himself recompensed by the pleasure his eye may receive from a lengthened stroll up the public promenade, called the _New Walk_. This walk three quarters of a mile long, and twenty feet wide, was made by public subscription in 1785; the ground the gift of the corporation.
Following the ascent of the walk, we gain on the left a pleasing peep up a vale watered by the Soar, where the smooth green of the meadows is contrasted and broken by woody lines and formed into a picture by the church and village of Aylestone, and the distant tufted eminances decorated by the tower of Narborough. A little imagination might give the scene a trait of the picturesque, by placing among the meadows near Aylestone, the white tents and streaming banners of king Charles' camp, there pitched a few days before his attack on the garrison of Leicester; or it might advance the royal army a little nearer to its station in St.
Mary's field, from whence the batteries against the town were first opened. Still continuing to ascend, the walk affords along its curving line many stations from which the town with its churches appears in several pleasing points of view.
Returning by the London toll-gate if the traveller wishes to obtain a full view of a fine prospect, he will turn aside from the road, and mount the steps of one of the neighbouring mills. From such a station the cl.u.s.tered buildings of the town extend before the eye in full unbroken sweep; beyond it the grounds near Beaumont Leys varied in their tints by tufted hedge-rows, and streaky cultivated fields, blend into the grey softness overspreading those beautiful slopes of hill into which the eminences of Charnwood forest, Brown-rig, Hunter's hill, Bradgate park, Bardon and Markfield knoll, rise and fall. These hills, running from hence, in a northern direction compose the first part of the chain or ridge, that, from the easy irregularity and elegant line it here displays rises at length into the more grand and picturesque hills that form the peak of Derbys.h.i.+re. The abbey and the adjacent villages pleasingly vary the scene on the right, from whence it melts away into the blue distance of the neighbourhood of Melton, the north-east part of the county.
As we descend along the London road, watching the hills more and more hid by the town, the road bends into a curve, and here takes the name of Granby Street; many ranges of buildings having been here erected within the last fifteen years. Turning to the left, we again arrive at the town by the entrance into _Hotel Street_.
That ingenuity of improvement not only in the conveniences, but the recreations of life, which has lately advanced so rapidly as well in the provincial towns as in the capital, led the inhabitants of Leicester into a plan for the erection of new edifices appropriated to the purposes of public amus.e.m.e.nt. The considerable buildings, which in this place arrest the stranger's eye were accordingly erected by J. Johnson, Esq.
architect, on subscription shares.
The front of the
HOTEL,
which name it bears, having been originally designed for that purpose, may from the grandeur of its windows, its statues, ba.s.si relievi, and other decorations, be justly considered as the first modern architectural ornament of the town. Here a room, whose s.p.a.cious dimensions, (being seventy-five feet by thirty-three,) and elegant decorations, adapt it in a distinguished manner for scenes of numerous and polished society, is appropriated to the use of the public b.a.l.l.s. Its coved ceiling is enriched with three circular paintings of Aurora, Urania, and Night, from the pencil of Reinagle, who has also graced the walls with paintings of dancing nymphs. Beside the eight beautiful l.u.s.tres, branches of lights are held by four statues from the designs of Bacon.
Uniting under the same roof, every convenience for the gratification of taste, and the amus.e.m.e.nt of the mind, a coffee room handsomely furnished and supplied with all the London papers, affords the gentlemen of the town and country as well as the stranger, to whom its door is open, an agreeable and commodious resort, while on the opposite side a s.p.a.cious bookseller's shop furnishes the literary enquirer with a series of all the new publications.
Adjoining the hotel, a small theatre built also by Mr. Johnson, neatly and commodiously fitted up, nearly on the plan of the London houses, furnishes the inhabitants of Leicester with a more complete display of the dramatic art than they had before enjoyed, and has been the means of gratifying them by the talents of several performers of the first rate excellence. The popular pieces of the London stage, are here every season represented in a manner pleasing to the town and honorable to the manager.
Proceeding thro' a street which now only nominally retains a trace of the monkish establishments that formerly occupied its ground, being called Friar Lane, we observe a charity school, for 35 boys and 30 girls, erected 1791, belonging to the parish of St. Martin. At the farther and less handsome end of this street is the Meeting House of the General Baptists. Pa.s.sing down the New Street, part of the scite of the monastery of the Grey Friars, we arrive at
ST. MARTIN'S CHURCH,
At what period after the demolition of Leicester in the reign of Henry the second, the church of St. Martin, antiently St. Crosse, was rebuilt, cannot be accurately stated. The chancel, which is the property of the king, rented by the vicar, and was erected after the main fabrick, is ascertained to been have built in the reign of Henry the fifth, at the expense of 34l. And as the addition of spires to sacred edifices was not introduced into England from the east till the beginning of the reign of Henry the third, the date must be fixed between the two intervening centuries, and if the spire was built with the church not very early after the introduction of that ornament of our churches, as the handsome, solid form of St. Martin's bespeaks considerable practice and expertness in the art.
The church originally consisted only of a nave and two aisles; the south aisle, where the consistory court is held, which is formed by a range of gothic arches whose cl.u.s.tered columns unite strength with lightness, was added after the erection of the others. In contemplating the inside of this church, it is curious to draw a brief parallel between its present plain yet handsome appearance, and its catholic magnificence before the zeal of the reformation, justly excited, but intemperate in its direction, had, during its career against Romish absurdities destroyed almost every trace of ornament in our churches. And whilst we survey its present few decorations, its bra.s.s chandeliers depending from the elegant cieling of the nave, the beautiful oak corinthian pillars of its altar piece, which is ornamented with a picture of the ascension by Francesco Vanni, (the gift of Sir W. Skeffington Bart.) and its excellent organ, we can scarcely forbear lamenting the violence with which the magnificent range of steps was torn from its high altar, then hung with draperies of white damask and purple velvet.
Its two other altars, {135} its chapels of _our Lady_ and _St George_, one at the east, the other at the west end of the south broad aisle, were also destroyed; the sculptured figures that adorned the pulpit, the tabernacles, and brazen eagles demolished, and, as the parochial records testify, 20d. was paid for ”cutting the images heads, and taking down the angels wings.” In the succeeding century after this sacred structure had exhibited this scene of demolition, it became a theatre of war. Hither fled part of the Parliamentary garrison, after being driven by the royalists from their fortress in the Newark; making a citadel of a church, which, on the arrival of the enemy to storm the hold was polluted with the bleeding bodies of Englishmen slain by Englishmen, who pursued their victory by chacing the defeated into the Market-Place, where the stragglers were slaughtered.