The wanderer or walker in London will find a district close by the Palace very welcome and pleasing--the well-known Campden Hill. For a spot so embedded in town it has a curious _rural_ note of its own, an old-fashioned air, as though it declined altogether to go with the times. The air, too, is tempered and softened; there are numbers of pretty places, with their spreading grounds, old trees, and older villas. Those persons who have been fortunate enough to secure ground here in good time are to be envied. The curious part is that it is bounded all round by the most uninviting prosaic districts--on one side by the frowsy Notting Hill Gate, on the other by the common high road to Hammersmith, all crowded with omnibuses and carts. But ascend the gentle hill, from whatever direction, and you find yourself puzzled by the antique simplicity and suburban air of the place. Of course there are eyesores and blemishes--the dreadful waterworks in the very centre, to say nothing of numerous modern “Follies,” fantastic freaks in the way of enormously tall houses, and other monstrosities. Coming up the broad cross road which joins Notting Hill and Kensington, we ascend a sort of sheltered lane, with all sorts of ancient tenements, somewhat “shaky,” each with its garden and enclosing wall, such as one might encounter at Kew or Chiswick. Many of these have been judiciously adapted and added to by the thriving artist or _littérateur_. This portion may be called the _town_ side of Campden Hill; and here are also the modern builders’ terraces. [Illustration: ALMA TADEMA’S FORMER STUDIO.] Here stands the modern Campden House; but a far more interesting structure is the old, “Little Campden House,” with its heavy roof and eaves, and old-fashioned air, but with an abandoned look, presenting no tangible idea to the present generation, yet in its day it and its enterprising owner furnished much talk and speculation in artistic circles. Mr. Wooler was passionately fond of theatricals, and the private theatre in his house became celebrated, the owner himself gravitating towards the genuine stage.