Charles Lamb delighted in Hertfordshire and spent much of his time at the Four Swans Inn at Waltham, a quaint old building just opposite Waltham Cross. We made several pilgrimages here; nor did the abbey grow less interesting upon repeated visits. From here it is only a little distance to St. Albans, a city proud of its great cathedral, whose hoary tower dominates the town. Quite different from the ordinary caretaker was the young clergyman, whose refined, classic face bespoke his intelligence and who showed us every detail of the great church, dwelling upon its many ancient and often unique features. Nor did he omit to call our attention to an epitaph of a very frank citizen of St. Albans, who, after sleeping three hundred years under the marble slab in the nave, still complains of his unhappy fate: "Great was my grief--I could not rest; God called me hence--He thought it best. Unhappy marriage was my fate-- I did repent when 'twas too late." St. Albans is rich in antiquities. Indeed, you can still trace fragments of the Roman wall which surrounded the place when Albanus met his fate, and down near the river at the foot of cathedral hill is another "oldest house" in England. It is a quaint round structure, built, they say, more than a thousand years ago as a fishing-lodge for the monks, for it stands hard by a lakelike dam in the river. But today it has degenerated into a public house, and the broad-shouldered, black-bearded Irishman who kept the bar was well posted on St. Albans' antiquities. He showed us the little house and garden and pointed out the Roman earthworks. Nor did he seem in the least disappointed that our patronage was limited to a few post card pictures, and, strange to say, he declined a gratuity. We returned to the George Inn, which enjoyed great prosperity in the coaching days, being on the main road to Holyhead. For four hundred years it had cheered the passing guest and its excellent dinner belied its generally dilapidated appearance. Its proprietors were just removing to the new and pretentious Red Lion over the way, but we did not learn whether this meant the final abandonment of the George. It was with some difficulty that we located Rye House, which we supposed to be within Broxborne, but which really lies on a byroad two or three miles away. Though in a more or less secluded location, it is apparently the goal of innumerable pilgrims on gala days in the summer, especially Sundays. On the day of our arrival, the grounds were quite deserted and an appropriate quietude hovered over the old manor. Alas, though, we found it shorn of much of its picturesqueness, for it had fallen into the clutches of a large brewer, who was using it as an adjunct to dispose of his product--in fact, the mansion and its beautiful grounds have become little else than a summer beer garden.