CHAPTER XIV 



CHICHESTER 



Chichester at a distance and near — Smells and sights — Public-house 

 signs — Habits of the people — Brewers' policy — The church 

 and the clergy — In the cathedral — A wood-carving — Market- 

 day — Early associations — The Market Cross and a mystery — 

 Visit to Midhurst — Decaying inns — Increase of temperance 

 and the cause — Chichester mud — Caging owls — The owl at 

 Alfriston — A miserable daw — A white owl's tie du Liable — 

 An ideal home for an owl — A prisoner without hope. 



To those who know not Chichester, that same tall, 

 star-ypointing spire in a green level land with round 

 blue hills beyond, is not only a thing of beauty, a 

 symbol and remembrancer ; but seen at a distance, day 

 by day, from many points, may come to be even more 

 than all these to the mind. An ancient town, re- 

 mote and rural; the sights and sounds and quietude 

 of nature, as in a village, around and in it, where men 

 may lead cleaner, saner, less strenuous lives than in 

 the great centres of population, and have other and 

 better ideals. 



But it is not so; for Chichester is not in itself 

 sacred, nor pleasant, nor fragrant to the nostrils. On 

 the contrary, I am here always conscious of an odour 

 not easily described. Perhaps it comes nearest in 

 character to an effluvium ascending in warm and damp 



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