STRATFORD-ON-AVON 



STRATHMORE 



763 



in 1853, in his negotiations with Prince MenschikofF, 

 the Russian special ambassador, concerning the dis- 

 pute about the Holy Places and the Russian claim 

 for predominating influence on behalf of the Chris- 

 tians of Turkey. His strenuous and unflagging 

 exertions to preserve peace were, however, defeated 

 by the obstinacy of the Czar Nicholas and the vacil- 

 lating weakness of Lord Aberdeen's government ; 

 the war which ensued between Russia and Turkey 

 involved England and France ; and the result was 

 the expedition to the Crimea, and the siege of Sebas- 

 topol. At the close of the war, after obtaining the 

 proclamation of the Charter of Reform, Lord Strat- 

 ford, who had been created a viscount in 1852, 

 resigned his embassy in 1858, at the age of seventy- 

 one, and a diplomatic career of unexampled dis- 

 tinction, lasting over half a century, came to an 

 end. Stratford de Redcliffe was the last of the 

 old style of semi-royal and half-independent am- 

 bassadors : the telegraph-wire has made ministers 

 of his mettle and character impossible if not super- 

 fluous. After his retirement ne occasionally took 

 part in the debates on foreign policy in the House 

 of Lords, and devoted part of his leisure to the 

 writing of poetry, which had been a favourite 

 occupation with him since he wrote a fine poem 

 on Buonitparte, which attracted the admiration of 

 Byron, in 1814. Some articles on the Eastern 

 Question were collected after his death and edited 

 by Dean Stanley. He was created a Knight of the 

 Garter in 1869 at Mr Gladstone's recommendation, 

 and died in the full enjoyment of his mental powers 

 though at the great age of almost ninety-four, 14th 

 August 1880. His statue was erected in West- 

 minster Abbey in 1884. 



See Life of Stratford Canning, Viscount Stratford de 

 Jiedcli/e, by the present writer (2 vols. 1888: 1 vol. 

 1890). 



Stratford-on-Avon, Shakespeare's birth- 

 place, is a pleasant town of Warwickshire, 8 

 miles SW. of Warwick, 22 SSE. of Birmingham, 

 and 1 10 NW. of London. It stands on the right 

 bank of the quiet Avon, which here is spanned by 

 the ' great and sumptuous bridge ' of fourteen 

 pointed arches, 376 yards long, that was built by 

 the Lord Mayor of London, Sir Hugh Clopton, who 

 died in 1496. 'Shakespeare's House,' where the 

 poet was born on 23d April 1564, in Henley Street, 

 u national property, having been bought for 3000 

 in 1847, and restored in 1858-59 ; here are a Shake- 

 speare museum, the 'Stratford portrait,' and the 

 signatures of Byron, Scott, Tennyson, Thackeray, 

 Dickens, &c. King Edward VI. 's grammar-school, 

 where Shakespeare was educated, was founded by 

 Thomas Jolyne in the reign of Edward IV. ; it 

 occupies the upper story of the old guildhall, and 

 was restored in 1892. The 'New Place,' built by 

 Sir Hugh Clopton in the reign of Henry VII., 

 was purchased by Shakespeare in 1597, and 

 here he died on 23d April 1616 ; here, too, Queen 

 Henrietta Maria stayed in 1643. It (or rather its 

 successor, 1703) was wantonly razed in 1759 by a 

 vicar of Stratford, who also felled the poet's mul- 

 berry, beneath which Garrick was regaled in 1742 ; 

 but its site has also become national property since 

 1861. And lastly, uprearing its spire above the 

 lime-trees, there is the beautiful cruciform church, 

 Early English to Perpendicular in style, having 

 been gradually rebuilt between 1332 and 1500 by 

 Archbishop John de Stratford, Dr Thomas Balsall, 

 and Ralph Collingwood. In the chancel, whose two 

 years' restoration was completed in 1892, is Shake- 

 speare's grave, with the portrait bust (1616) by 

 Gerard Janssen or Johnson, Anne Hathaway s 

 grave, and the American stained-glass window of 

 the 'Seven Ages.' 



The Shakespeare Fountain (1887) was also 

 erected by an American, Mr George W. Childs 



(q.v.); the red-brick Shakespeare Memorial 

 Theatre, seating 800 spectators, was built in 1877- 

 79 at a cost o? 30,000. In the neighbourhood 

 are Shottery, with Anne Hatha way's cottage ( pur- 

 chased for the nation in 1892 for 3000) ; Ludding- 

 ton, where tradition says she was married ; Cliarle- 

 cote, the seat of the Lucys ; Clopton, with memories 

 of the Gunpowder Plot; and Welcombe Hill, 

 crowned by an obelisk (1876), 124 feet high, to a 

 Manchester M.P. In Stratford itself still remain 

 to be noticed the chapel of the Guild of the Holy 

 Cross (13th century; the chancel rebuilt about 

 1450, and the rest by Sir Hugh Clopton) ; the half- 

 timbered house of the Harvards ( 1596) ; the town- 

 hall (1633; rebuilt 1768-1863), with Gainsborough's 

 portrait of Garrick ; the corn exchange ( 1850) ; the 

 market-house (1821 ) ; the College school ( 1872) ; a 

 Roman Catholic church by Pugin (1866); and a 

 hospital (1884). Before 691 a Saxon monastery 

 stood at Stratford-on-Avon, which was incorporated 

 in 1553. It is an important agricultural centre ; 

 still, its chief prosperity depends on the 30,000 or 

 so pilgrims who visit it yearly. Pop. ( 1851 ) 3372 ; 

 ( 1891 ) 8318, an increase largely due to the exten- 

 sion of the borough boundary in 1879. 



See the ' Shakespeare's Birthplace, &c. Trust Act, 1891 ' 

 (incorporating the Trustees and Guardians of Shake- 

 speare s House, the New Place, &c ), Washington Irving's 

 Sketch Book (1821), Hawthorne's Our Old Home (1863), 

 Wheeler's History and Antiquities of Stratford-on-Avon 

 (1806), nine works by J. O. Halliwell-Phillips (1863-85), 

 S. L. Lee's Stratford-on-Avon from the Earliest Times 

 to Shakespeare (1884), and other books cited at AVON 

 and SHAKESPEARE. 



SI rat li:m*n. a town of Lanarkshire, 1 mile 

 W. of Avon Water, and 16 miles SSE. of Glasgow. 

 On the north side is the picturesque ruin of Avon- 

 dale Castle, and 5 to 7 miles south-west are the 

 battlefields of Drumclog and Loudoun Hill. Pop. 

 (1851) 4274; (1891) 3478. See Gebbie's Sketches 

 ofAvondale (1880). 



Strathclyde. In the 8th century the ancient 

 confederacy of the Britons was broken up into the 

 separate divisions of Wales and English and Scot- 

 tish Cumbria. Scottish Cumbria, otherwise called 

 Strathclyde, thenceforth formed a little kingdom, 

 comprising the country between Clyde and Solway, 

 governed by princes of its own, and having the 

 fortress-town of Alclyde or Dumbarton for its 

 capital. Becoming dependent on Scotland (see 

 BRETTS AND SCOTS), it was annexed to the Scot- 

 tish crown at the death of Malcolm I., on failure 

 of the line of native sovereigns. Edgar bequeathed 

 Strathclyde to his youngest brother David, again 

 separating it from the crown of Scotland, which 

 went to his intermediate brother, Alexander I. 

 David held it throughout Alexander's reign in 

 spite of that king's opposition, and on Alexander's 

 death without issue in 1124, it was permanently 

 reunited to the Scottish kingdom under David I. 



SI ral h li-l<ls;i > . a Hampshire estate, with a 

 Queen Anne mansion, overlooking the Loddon, 7 

 miles NNE. of Basingstoke. Associated ere that 

 with the name of Pitt, it was purchased by 

 parliament in 1817 of Lord Rivers for 263,000, 

 and presented to the Duke of Wellington. A con- 

 spicuous monument, crowned by a bronze statue 

 of the Duke by Marochetti, was erected in 1866 ; 

 and his charger, 'Copenhagen,' is buried in the 

 grounds. See SILCHESTER, and the Rev. Charles 

 H. Griffith's History of Strathfieldsaye (1892). 



Strathmore (Gael. ,' Great Valley'), the most 

 extensive plain in Scotland, is a low-lying tract 

 extending north-eastward across the country from 

 Dumbartonshire to Stonehaven in Kincardineshire, 

 and bounded on the north by the great mountain- 

 rampart of the Highlands, and on the south by the 

 Lennox, Ochil, and Sidlaw Hills. It is 100 miles 



