In the fashionable and pleasant watering-place of to-day, which has, indeed, sobered down from those stirring and somewhat uproarious times, it is difficult to trace much of the old town, but although it declined in favour somewhat in the early ’fifties and ’sixties of the last century, from the position of importance and popularity to which it had attained because of the patronage of King George and the Court, it has nowadays become one of the favourite resorts of West of England holiday folk, and is a yachting port of convenience and repute. And even amid the bustle of modern life it seems somehow or other to preserve in its atmosphere and comparative quietude of life many of those old-world characteristics which distinguish so many Dorset towns, whether they be set inland or on the coast. Weymouth possesses a good harbour and an excellent roadstead, and although it has declined of recent years as a trading port, from the position it held in ancient times, it remains popular with yachting folk by reason of its beautiful situation, and the many picturesque and interesting spots which lie in the immediate neighbourhood. Just round the Nothe, the green and jutting headland between which and the pier the entrance to Weymouth Harbour lies, are Portland Roads, the magnificent harbour in which, when not at sea, the Home fleet frequently anchors. To every one who has yachted along the south coast, or gone down the Channel into the outer seas, this roadstead, and the Isle of Portland--which is in reality no island at all, but a peninsula--are perfectly familiar.