242 THE DOVER ROAD 



The weight was estimated at fifty-six tons. The 

 contractor was to have forfeited a great part of his 

 price if the removal and replanting caused the tree to 

 die ; but the work was done skilfully, and the old yew 

 seems actually to have become more flourishing for its 

 change. 



Henceforward are streets, first suburban, but 

 presently continuous and crowded, for the two miles 

 that remain. Dover is reached, and the road is done. 



XLI 



Ix the London Road approach to Dover, one mile from 

 the centre of the town, there used to stand an old inn 

 called " The Milestone.'' A hatter's shop now occupies 

 the site ; but two old milestones are yet there. One 

 says " 70 miles to London ; 14 miles to Canterbury," 

 and the other proclaims it to be " 1 mile to Dovor." 



This old spelling of " Dover " was common until the 

 opening of the railway era ; and the coach-bills of the 

 great Dover Road coach-proprietors, Home, Chaplin, 

 and Gray, sj^elt the place-name " Dovor," with two 

 " o's," instead of an " o " and an " e." 



It will be expected of me that I should say something 

 of Dover, and I do not intend to disappoint so very 

 reasonable an expectation, although the Dover Road 

 having been traversed, the object of this book is 

 accomplished ; and, therefore, any remarks I may have 

 to offer must be informed, not with the prolixity of the 

 local history, nor with the stodgy statistics of the 

 Guide Book, but with conciseness and something of the 

 sympathy which shows that to which but few Guide 

 Books ever attain — the true inwardness of the place. 

 It is quite easy to be contemptuous of Dover, from the 

 visitor's point of view ; from other vantage-grounds it 

 is a great deal more easy to acquire a certain enthusiasm 

 for the old Cinque Port, its streets, its piers, its Castle, 



