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PLEASURE EXCURSIONS.

GUILDFORD,

ON THE SOUTH-WESTERN RAILWAY.

[From the Railway Chronicle.]

A whole day is not too long to make this Excursion completely. We therefore advise the tourist to start by one of the earliest trains and breakfast at Guildford. Those who are indisposed to take a loitering walk of three miles, which is involved in adopting the course suggested in this paper, may in that case make a very pleasant acquaintance with the town of Guildford on an afternoon.

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FOR a day's excursion, a week's visit, or a year's residence, Guildford is a perfect spot. Pondering over its merits, after lengthened acquaintance, we are unable to qualify them by a single drawback, except that its river does not flow quite vivaciously enough to satisfy us. paring Guildford with any other market town in England, we know of none which has superior attractions to it. Extreme beauty of sitehills, valleys, leas and foliage, and all the infinite variety of vegetation from its diversity of soil-chalk, sand and clay; a running stream, though its current is sluggish; picturesque buildings; a history respectable in an old age of many centuries, and veritably illustrated with antiquities; a ruined fortress, ruined chapels (fighting and prayers, types of

RAILWAY

TRAVELLING CHARTS;

Or, IRON ROAD-BOOKS,

FOR PERUSAL ON THE JOURNEY:

IN WHICH ARE NOTED

THE TOWNS, VILLAGES, CHURCHES, MANSIONS, PARKS, STATIONS, BRIDGES, VIADUCTS, TUNNELS, CUTTINGS, GRADIENTS, &c.

The Scenery and its Natural History, the Antiquities and their Historical Associations, &c. passed by the Line of Railway,

WITH HUNDREDS OF ILLUSTRATIONS,

CONSTITUTING A NOVEL AND COMPLETE COMPANION FOR THE RAILWAY CARRIAGE.

LONDON TO KINGSTON AND HAMPTON COURT, price 1d.
LONDON TO WOKING AND GUILDFORD, in cover, price 4d.

Also publishing,

PLEASURE

EXCURSIONS,

Being Guides for DAY'S EXCURSIONS to

KINGSTON AND HAMPTON COURT,
ESHER,-GUILDFORD,-WOKING,-WINCHESTER,
SILCHESTER,-PORCHESTER, &c.

On the SOUTH-WESTERN RAILWAY.

REPRINTED FROM THE

Railway Chronicle,

Which is published every Saturday, in time for the Morning Mails, price 6d. stamped to go free by post.

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PLEASURE EXCURSIONS.

GUILDFORD,

ON THE SOUTH-WESTERN RAILWAY.

[From the Railway Chronicle.]

A whole day is not too long to make this Excursion completely. We therefore advise the tourist to start by one of the earliest trains and breakfast at Guildford. Those who are indisposed to take a loitering walk of three miles, which is involved in adopting the course suggested in this paper, may in that case make a very pleasant acquaintance with the town of Guildford on an afternoon.

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FOR a day's excursion, a week's visit, or a year's residence, Guildford is a perfect spot. Pondering over its merits, after lengthened acquaintance, we are unable to qualify them by a single drawback, except that its river does not flow quite vivaciously enough to satisfy us. Comparing Guildford with any other market town in England, we know of none which has superior attractions to it. Extreme beauty of sitehills, valleys, leas and foliage, and all the infinite variety of vegetation from its diversity of soil-chalk, sand and clay; a running stream, though its current is sluggish; picturesque buildings; a history respectable in an old age of many centuries, and veritably illustrated with antiquities; a ruined fortress, ruined chapels (fighting and prayers, types of

pital, old grammar-school, old guildhall, clean streets, with a thoroughly country aspect about them; sufficient bustle to prevent dulness, and not too much to bring back recollections of London; capital inns, and a railway uniting the town with the metropolis-all invest Guildford with attractions which the most fastidious tourist must acknowledge.

An hour's ride by the South-Western takes us thither from the Nine Elms at all hours of the day from 7 in the morning. The town is surrounded with beautiful walks and inviting objects-St. Catherine's and St. Martha's ruins, and the panoramas from both sites; the mansions of Losely and Sutton, the ruins of Newark Abbey, the scenery of the

Sutton Place.

Its own

'Hog's-back-but it needs them not to tempt the stranger. attractions are amply sufficient; and its streets at all seasons yield clean and sheltered walks.

The Guildford Railway branches off southward at Woking Common, from which it is about 6 miles distant. The station is within a furlong of the lower part of the town-a very commonplace, flat-faced brick edifice, wanting altogether feature and expression, symmetry and beauty of form. We cannot say anything commendatory of it. This is to be regretted; because from all the heights about the town-south, west and east-the station and the plot of ground on which it stands are conspicuously seen. It is at present a very blank in the rich scene. At little, if any greater cost, a structure more harmonious with the thoroughly English character of the spot, might have been erected.

The first view of Guildford from the station is full of character. It is essentially the same as that from the towing-path in the river below, which we have preferred to represent rather in lines than in words.

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The visitor should betake himself to the banks of the river on the north of the town before he ascends into it, for the sake of this view, and he will find himself well repaid.

Nearly facing the street which leads from the station into the town is St. Nicholas' Church, certainly not calculated to sustain the good character for picturesqueness which we have attributed to the place. To change the laudatory words of the 'Guildford Guide-book'guide-books must be laudatory-it is a "distasteful and inelegant fabric, constructed on the impurest extant models of the worst era of church architecture." The windows, buttresses and pinnacles, nondescript turrets at the east end, span of the roof with its cast-iron supporters -all are so bad, that we indulge in the hope that some flood of the neighbouring river will, in very scorn, wash it all away at one sweep, as the waters are said to have done, in a series of years, its Norman predecessor. There is nothing tolerable in this church but the old Losely Chapel, into which have been collected all the monuments of the old church. It is the cenotaph of the More and Molyneux families, who were the possessors of the neighbouring Losely. Hall. chapel is worth inspecting when there is plenty of spare time.

The

Before crossing the bridge, opposite the two turretted pinnacles of the church, is the brewery of Messrs. Crooke. In the yard may be seen a low, double-gabled wooden house (figured in Russell's Guildford'), which tradition says was the birth-place, on the 29th of October 1562, of George Abbot, the Archbishop of Canterbury and one of the illustrissimi of Guildford, the founder of Abbot's Hospital at the east of the town.

We should rest awhile on the south side of the bridge to make acquaintance with one of the most characteristic views of the town—a view the features of which will for all time insure Guildford a place among the stores of our memory, and mark it from all other towns.

The High-street of Guildford with its very diversified outline at both sides, ascends steeply and directly before us. Its town-hall and glittering projecting clock are a stamping feature of the scene. On the south we see the grey and picturesque gables of St. Mary's Church, and the square keep of the Castle rising above. The combination is very striking.

We shall at once pursue the walk up the High-street with no divergence. Our course is eastward. On the south we pause at the corner of Quarry-street (the first on the right) to glance at the northern aisle of St. Mary's Church, with its singular rounded apse, reserving a more detailed notice of it until we reach this point again. The old plaster inn, dated 1688, preserving in all probability its contemporary cognomen of the "Jolly Butcher," will not be overlooked. It is well worth a survey inside, and particularly its cellars. On the opposite side is the postoffice, not deficient in picturesque antiquity. Near to it is a rather ostentatious and misplaced, though not inelegant, modern Italian house, which used to be a bank, until its proprietor was found one day a bankrupt suicide in the river. Next to it is the Angel Inn—a modern flatfronted house-belying its antiquity, which is great. It preserves a good repute for comfort. Among the cellars of this inn is an ancient

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