CHAPTER XXIII 



WHERE IZAAK WALTON DIED 



r I "HERE is a peculiar fascination about an old 

 A house in which a great man has lived or died. 

 It is akin to the charm of a rare volume with an inter- 

 esting biography. The London County Council has 

 done well in placing tablets on certain houses associated 

 with distinguished citizens. We like to be reminded of 

 Dr Johnson in Fleet Street and of Thomas Carlyle at 

 Chelsea. The custom has been followed in other 

 places. It is not unusual, even in country villages, to 

 see a tablet affixed to a dwelling-house commemorating 

 some former occupier. 



The same association gives an additional interest to 

 many official residences. How full of biographical 

 reminiscences is Lambeth Palace, or the Deanery of 

 Westminster. How many pilgrimages have been made 

 to George Herbert's home at Bemerton, to Keble's 

 Vicarage at Hursley, to Charles Kingsley's rectory at 

 Eversley. So with many prebendal residences which, 

 in cathedral cities, often cluster together beneath the 

 shelter of the old minster. It is probable that the 

 greater number of the more famous figures in English 

 Church history since the Reformation were, at some 

 period of their career, canons of a cathedral. But, 

 strange as it may seem, it is not often possible to con- 

 nect a prebendary with any particular residence. It 



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