STAINES 8 I 



ill Holborii, on Thursday, 19tli October, in the 

 Southampton coach : — 



We took one coach, two coachmen, and four horses, 



And mei'rily from London made our courses, 



"We wheel'd the top of the heavj^ hill calFd Holborn 



(Up which hath been full many a sinful soul borne). 



And so along we jolted to St. Giles's, 



Which place from Brentford six, or nearly seven, miles is, 



To Staines that night at five o'clock we coasted. 



Where, at the Bush, we had bak'd, lioil'd, and roasted. 



XIII 



Staines, where the road leaves Middlesex and crosses 

 the Thames into Surrey, is almost as commonplace a 

 little town as it is possible to find within the home 

 counties. Late Georgian and Early Victorian stuccoed 

 villas and square, Ijox-like, quite uninteresting houses 

 struggle for numerical superiority over later buildings 

 in the lono- Hioii Street, and the contest is not an 

 exciting one. Staines, sixteen miles from London, is, 

 in fact, of that nondescript — ' neither fish, flesh, fowl, 

 nor good red-herring' — character that belongs to places 

 situated in the marches of town and country. Almost 

 everything of interest has vanished, and although the 

 railway has come to Staines, it has not brought with 

 it the life and bustle that are generally conferred by 

 railways on places near London. But, of course, 

 Staines is on the London and South-AYestern Railway, 

 which explains everything. 



G 



