The Brighton Road Part 13

The Sutton and Reigate route to Brighton, instead of branching off along the Brixton Road, pursues a straight undeviating course down the Clapham Road, through Balham and Upper and Lower Tooting, where it turns sharply to the left at the Broadway, and in half a mile right again, at Amen Corner. Thence it goes, by Figg's Marsh and Mitcham, to Sutton.

[Sidenote: MITCHAM COMMON]

It is not before Mitcham is reached that, in these latter days, the pilgrim is conscious of travelling the road to anywhere at all. It is all modern "street"--and streets, to this commentator at least, have a strong resemblance to rows of dog-kennels. They are places where citizens live on the chain. They lack the charm of obviously leading elsewhere: and even although electric tramcars speed mult.i.tudinously along them, to some near or distant terminus, they do but arrive there at other streets.

Mitcham is at present beyond these brick and mortar tentacles, and is grouped not unpicturesquely about a village green and along the road to the Wandle. Pleasant, ruddy-faced seventeenth and eighteenth-century mansions look upon that green, notable in the early days of Surrey cricket; and away at the further end of it is the vast flat of Mitcham Common, that dreary, long-drawn expanse which is at once the best ill.u.s.tration of eternity and of a Shakespearian "blasted heath" that can readily be thought of.

"Mitcham lavender" brings fragrant memories, and indeed the only thing that serves to render the weary length of Mitcham Common at all endurable is the scent of it, borne on the breeze from the distillery, midway across: the distillery that no one would remember to be Jakson's, except for the eccentricity of spelling the name.

This by the way; for one does not cross Mitcham Common to reach Sutton.

But there is, altogether, a sweet savour pervading Mitcham, a scent of flowers that will not be spoiled even by the linoleum works, which are apt to be offensive; for Mitcham is still a place where those sweet-smelling and other "economic" plants, lavender, mint, chamomile, aniseed, peppermint, rosemary, and liquorice, are grown for distillation. The place owes this distinction to no mere chance, but to its peculiar black mould, found to be exceptionally suited to this culture.

Folk-rhymes are often uncomplimentary, and that which praises Sutton for its mutton and Cheam for juicy beef, is more severe than one cares to quote on Epsom; and, altogether ignoring the mingled fragrances of Mitcham, declares it the place "for a thief." We need not, however, take the matter seriously: the rhymester was only at his wit's end for a rhyme to "beef."

Mitcham station, beside the road, is a curious example of what a railway company can do in its rare moments of economy; for it is an early nineteenth-century villa converted to railway purposes by the process of cutting a hole through the centre. It is a sore puzzle to a stranger in a hurry.

[Sidenote: SUTTON]

From Mitcham one ascends a hill past the woodland estate of Ravensbury, crossing the abundantly-exploited Wandle; and then, along a still rural road, to the modern town of Sutton.

On the fringe of that town, at the discreet "residential" suburb of Benhilton, is a scenic surprise in the way of a deep cutting in the hilly road. Spanned by a footbridge, graced with trees, and neighboured by the old "Angel" inn, "Angel Bridge," as it is called, is a pretty spot. The rise thus cut through was once known as Been Hill, and on that basis was fantastically reared the name of Benhilton. One cannot but admire the ingenuity of it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE "c.o.c.k," SUTTON 1789. _From an aquatint after Rowlandson._]

"Sutton for mutton": so ran the old-time rhyme. The reason of that ancient repute is found in the downs in whose lap the place is situated; those thymy downs that afforded such splendid pasturage for sheep. Sutton Common is gone, enclosed in 1810, but the downs remain; and yet that rhyme has lost its reason, and Sutton is no longer celebrated for anything above its fellow towns. Even the famous "c.o.c.k" is gone--that old coaching-inn kept by the ex-pugilist, "Gentleman Jackson." Long threatened, it was at last demolished in 1898, and with the old house went the equally famous sign that straddled across the road. The similar sign of the "Greyhound" still remains; the last relic of narrower streets and times more s.p.a.cious.

Leaving Sutton "town," as we call it nowadays, the road proceeds to climb steadily uphill to the modern suburb of "Belmont," where stands an old, but very well cared-for, milestone setting forth that it is distant "XIII.

miles from the Standard in Cornhill, London, 1745," from the Royal Exchange the same distance, and from Whitehall twelve miles and a half.

The neighbourhood is now particularly respectable, but I grieve to say that the spot is marked on the maps of 1796 as "Little h.e.l.l," which seems to indicate that the character of the people living in the three houses apparently then standing here would not bear close inspection. With the "Angel" placed at one end, and this vestibule into Inferno situated at the other, Sutton seems to have been accorded exceptional privileges.

"Cold Blow," which succeeds to Little h.e.l.l, is a tremendous transition, and well deserves its name, perched as it is on the shivery, bare, and windy heights that lead to Burgh Heath and Banstead Downs "famous," says an annotated map of 1716, "for its wholesome Air, once prescribed by Physicians as the Patients' last refuge." The feudal-looking wrought-iron gates newly built beside the road here, surmounted by a gorgeous shield of arms crested with a helmet and enveloped in mantling, form the entrance to Nork Park, the seat of one of the Colman family, who have mustered very strongly in Surrey of late years.

At the right-hand turning, in midst of a group of fir-trees, stands the prehistoric tumulus known to the rustics as "Tumble Beacon." "Tumble" is probably the rural version of "tumulus."

Beyond this point, on a site now occupied by a cottage, stood the once-famed "Tangier" inn. Originally a private residence, the seat of Admiral Buckle,[10] who named it "Tangier," in memory of his cruises on the north coast of Africa, it became a house of call for coaches, and especially for post-chaises. Here, we are told, George the Fourth invariably halted for a gla.s.s of Miss Jeal's celebrated "alderbury"--that is to say elderberry-wine--"roking hot," to keep out the piercing cold, and Miss Jeal brought it forth with her own fair hands. Other travellers, who were merely persons, and not personages, had to be content with the less fair hands of the waiter.

The "Tangier" was burnt down about 1874. For some years after its destruction a platform that led from the house to the roadside, on a level with the floors of the coaches and post-chaises, survived; but only the cellars now remain. The woods at the back are, however, still locally known as "Tangier Woods."

Burgh Heath, at the summit of these downs, is a curious place called usually "Borough" Heath: it is in Domesday "Berge." As its name not obscurely hints, and the half-obliterated barrows show, it is a place of ancient habitation and sepulture; but nowadays it is chiefly remarkable for the descendants of the original squatters of about a century ago, who, braving the cold of these heights, settled on what was then an exceedingly lonely heath and stole whatever land they pleased. That was the origin of the hamlet of Burgh Heath. The descendants of those filibusters have in most cases rebuilt the original hovels, but it is still a somewhat forlorn place, made sordid by the tumbledown pigsties and sheds on the heath in which they have acquired a prescriptive freehold.

[Sidenote: RUSSELL OF KILLOWEN]

Pa.s.sing Lion Bottom, or Wilderness Bottom, we come to Tadworth Corner, past the grounds of Tadworth Court, late the seat of Lord Russell of Killowen, better known as Sir Charles Russell. He was created a Baron in 1894, on his becoming Lord Chief Justice: but the t.i.tle was--at his own desire--limited to a life-peerage, and consequently at his death in 1900 became extinct. At Tadworth, in the horsey neighbourhood of Epsom, he was as much at home as in the Law Courts, and neither so judicial nor restrained, as those who remember his peppery temper and the objurgatory language of his "Here, you, where the ---- -- are you ---- -- coming to, you ---- ----, you!" will admit. There seems, in fact, an especial fitness in his residence on this Regency Road, for his speech was the speech rather of that, than of the more mealy mouthed Victorian, period.

At Tadworth Court, where the ways divide, and a most picturesque view of long roads, dark fir trees, and a weird-looking windmill unfolds itself, formerly stood a toll-gate. A signpost directs on the right to Headley and Walton, and on the left to Reigate and Redhill, and a battered milestone which no one can read stands at the foot of it. The church spire on the left is that of Kingswood.

From London to Reigate, through Sutton, is, according to Cobbett, "about as villainous a tract as England contains. The soil is a mixture of gravel and clay, with big yellow stones in it, sure sign of really bad land." The greater part of this is, of course, now covered by the suburbs of "the Wen," as Cobbett delighted to style London; and it is both unknown to and immaterial to most people what manner of soil their houses are built on; but the truth of Cobbett's observations is seen readily enough here, on these warrens, which owe their preservation as open s.p.a.ces to that mixture, worthless to the farmer, and not worth the stealing in those times when land could be stolen with impunity.

[Ill.u.s.tration: KINGSWOOD WARREN.]

[Sidenote: REIGATE HILL]

Past the modern village of Kingswood, almost lost in, and certainly entirely overshadowed by, the wild heaths of Walton and Kingswood Warren the road comes at last to Reigate Hill, where, immediately past the suspension bridge that overhangs the cutting, it tilts very suddenly and alarmingly over the edge of the Downs. The suddenness of it makes the stranger gasp with astonishment; the beauty of that wonderful view from this very rim and edge of the hills compels his admiration. It is the climax up to which he has been toiling all these long, ascending gradients from Sutton; and it is worth the toil.

The old writers of road-books do more justice to this view than any modern writer dare. To them it was "a remarkably bold elevation, from whence is a delightful prospect of the South Downs in Suss.e.x. But near the road, which is scooped out of the hill, the declivity is so steep and abrupt that the spectator cannot help being struck with terror, though softened by admiration. The Sublime and the Beautiful are here perfectly united; imagination is fully exercised, and the mind delighted."

How would this person have described the Alps?

A milestone just short of this drop--one of a series starting at Sutton Downs and dealing in fractions of miles--says, very curtly: "London 19, Sutton 8, Brighton 32-5/8, Reigate 1-3/8."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SUSPENSION BRIDGE, REIGATE HILL.]

The suspension bridge, carried overhead, spanning the cutting made through the crest of the hill, is known to the rustics--who will always invent simple English words of one syllable, whenever possible, to take the place of difficult three-syllabled words of Latin extraction--as the "Chain Pier." It does not, as almost invariably is the case with these bridges, connect two portions of an estate severed by the cutting, but forms part of a public path which was cut through. It is very well worth the traveller's attention, for it joins the severed ends of no less a road than the ancient Pilgrims' Way, and is a very curious instance of modernity helping to preserve antiquity. The Way is clearly seen above, coming from Box Hill as a hollow road, crossing the bridge and going in the direction of Gatton Park, through a wood of beech trees.

The roadway of Reigate Hill is made to wind circuitously, in an attempt to mitigate the severity of the gradient; but for all the care taken, it remains one of the steepest hills in England, and is one of the very few provided with granite kerbs intended to ease the pull-up for horses. None but a very special fool among cyclists in the old days attempted to ride down the hill; and many, even in these times of more efficient brakes, prefer to walk down. Only motor-cars, like the Gadarene swine of the Scriptures, "rushing violently down a steep place," attempt it; and those who are best acquainted with the hill live in daily expectation of a recklessly driven car spilling over the rim.

XIX

Reigate town lies at the foot, sheltered under this great shoulder of the downs: a little town of considerable antiquity and inconsiderable story.

It is mentioned in Domesday Book, but under the now forgotten name of "Cherchefelle," and did not begin to a.s.sume the name of Reigate until nearly two hundred years later.

Churchfield was at the time of the Norman conquest a manor in the possession of the widowed Queen, and was probably little more than an enclosed farm and manor-house situated in a clearing of the Holmesdale woods; but it had not long pa.s.sed into the hands of William de Varennes, who had married Gundrada the Conqueror's daughter and was one of his most intimate henchmen at the Battle of Hastings, before it became the site of the formidable Reigate, or Holm, Castle. The manors granted to William de Varennes comprehended nearly the whole of Surrey, and included others in Suss.e.x, Yorkshire, and Norfolk. Such were the splendours that fell to the son-in-law and the companion-in-arms of a successful invader. He became somewhat Anglicised under the t.i.tle of Earl of Warenne, and the ancestor of a line of seven Earls, of whom the last died in 1347, when the family became firstly merged in that of the Fitzalans, then of the Mowbrays, and finally in that of the alternately absorbent and fissiparous Howards.

Holm, or Reigate Castle, had little history of the warlike sort. It frowned terribly upon its sandstone ridge, but tamely submitted in 1216 when the foreign allies of the discontented subjects of King John approached: and when the seventh Earl, who had murdered Baron de la Zouche at Westminster, was attacked here by Prince Edward, he promptly made a grovelling surrender and paid the fine of 12,000 marks (equal to 24,000) demanded. In 1550, when Lambarde wrote, only "the ruyns and rubbishe of an old castle which some call Homesdale" were left, and even those were cleared away by order of the Parliament in 1648. Now, after many centuries of change in ownership, the hill on which that fortress stood is contemptuously tunnelled, to give a more direct road through the town.

[Sidenote: REIGATE HILL]

In this connection, Cobbett, coming to Reigate through Sutton in 1823, is highly entertaining. The tunnel was then being made, and it did not please him. "They are," he vociferates, "in order to save a few hundred yards'

length of road, cutting through a hill. They have lowered a little hill on the London side of Sutton. Thus is the money of the country actually thrown away: the produce of labour is taken from the industrious and given to the idlers. Mark the process; the town of Brighton, in Suss.e.x, fifty miles from the Wen, is on the seaside, and is thought by the stockjobbers to afford a _salubrious air_. It is so situated that a coach which leaves it not very early in the morning reaches London by noon; and, starting to go back in two hours and a half afterwards, reaches Brighton not very late at night. Great parcels of stockjobbers stay at Brighton with the women and children. They skip backward and forward on the coaches, and actually carry on stock-jobbing in Change Alley, though they reside at Brighton.

The place is, besides, a great resort with the _whiskered_ gentry. There are not less than about twenty coaches that leave the Wen every day for this place; and, there being three or four different roads, there is a great rivalship for the custom. This sets the people to work to shorten and to level the roads; and here you see hundreds of men and horses constantly at work to make pleasant and quick travelling for the Jews and jobbers. The Jews and jobbers pay the turnpikes, to be sure; but they get the money from the land and labourers. They drain these, from John o'

Groat's House to the Land's End, and they lay out some of the money on the Brighton roads."

Cobbett is dead, and the Reform Act is an old story, but the Jews and the jobbers swarm more than ever.

[Sidenote: THE CASTLE CAVES]

The tunnel through the castle hill was made by consent of the then owner, Earl Somers, as a tablet informs all who care to know. The entrance towards the town is faced with white brick, in a style supposed to be Norman. Above are the grounds, now public, where a would-be mediaeval gateway, erected in 1777, quite illegitimately impresses many innocents, and below is the so-called Barons' Cave, an ancient excavation in the soft sandstone where the Barons are (quite falsely) said to have a.s.sembled in conclave before forcing their will upon King John at Runnymede. Unhappily for that tradition, the then Earl Warenne was a supporter of the tyrant king, and any reforming barons he might possibly have entertained at Reigate Castle would have been kept on the chain as enemies, and treated to the cold comfort of bread and water.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE TUNNEL, REIGATE.]

There are deeper depths than these castle caves, for dungeon-like excavations exist beside and underneath the tunnel; but they are not so very terrible, exuding as they do strong vinous and spirituous odours, proving that the only prisoners languishing there are hogsheads and kilderkins.

Reigate, dropping its intermediate name of Cherchefelle on Ridgegate, became variously Reigate, Riggate, and Reygate in the thirteenth century.

The name obviously indicates a gate--that is to say, a road--over the ridge of the downs; presumably that road upon which Gatton, the "gate-town," stood. Strongly supporting this theory, Wray Common and Park are found on the line of road between Reigate and Gatton. If we select "Reygate" from the many variants of the place-name, and place it beside that of Wray Common, we get at once the phonetic link.