button to main menu  Gents Mag 1858 part 2 p.480

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Gentleman's Magazine 1858 part 2 p.480
writing is conclusive in a sort of autobiography of some rambles on his own account, at which we shall glance presently. The Captain and the Ensign we find arrayed in Lincoln green, a garb at that time-honoured city involving the party in difficulty, as a Mr. Taylor, who is dubbed for his pains, but with good reason, a "meddlesome coxcomb," suspects them from their forester's livery of being "Clerks of the Board of Green Cloth," (oh! the facetious wag with his Caroline pun,) "come down to inquire about the monopolies."
We remember to have heard of a gentleman in the civilian department of the royal navy going over in his full-dress to the grand reviews at Paris on the occasion of the Queen's visit to our faithful ally, Napoleon III., and returning with great exultation, bursting with self-congratulation, and boasting to all who were so unfortunate as to fall in his way of the respect that was paid to him, for that he never till then knew the value and recommendation that lay in the uniform of a British officer. Our good worthy citizens set out with the same design, their language, if not bellicose, constantly smacks of the military. Having "opportune and vacant leisure to take a view, they hold a parley, and set out with soldiers journeying ammunition;" when they take a long walk they "march;" they are "properly accoutred" when dressed; inspect like general officers forts and garrisons, cavalry and infantry, little thinking, poor souls, of the wars about to burst on their unhappy country, and in which they will be called upon to take their share; and the sight of "the black scarf of the mayor of Sandwich" suggests a suitable ornament for an offending sentinel.
But we are forgetting the main object of their quest, the churches, -

"Whose towers bear heads so high they kiss the clouds,
And strangers ne'er beheld but wondered at:
... ... to satisfy their eyes
With the memorials and things of fame
That do renown each city."
Their route lay across the fens of Lincolnshire, and leaving Sleaford, "we hasten! says our lieutenant, "to LINCOLN, and found the way for the major part thither pleasant, healthy, and champaign, and good sociable way for travellers, but such as notably deceives them, if they be weary; for when we first espied the high towers of the cathedral, we thought it near, but it proved to our pains and patience a full jury of miles ... ...
The next cathedral town is that of YORK ... ...
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