Within easy walking distance, not far from the tantalizing glimpse of the Rufford Avenue, a road turns eastward, passes a small wayside inn dignified with the name of Robin Hood, and soon reaches what was known as the King's House at Clipstone--to-day a lamentable ruin with no trace of its former magnificence. Here the Plantagenet kings held their Courts and rested after their days of hunting, and the rising ground about the house, nowadays devoted to the growing of oats, must once have blazed with all the colours of pageantry. What remains of the palace might be naught but the broken wall of an old kiln, or the fragment of some burned-out factory. The most fatal blow was dealt to this relic by a Duke of Portland, who, in 1812, had the foundations dug up and used for the drainage of the surrounding country. Clipstone Park, which Mad Madge of Newcastle described as a chase in which her lord took great delight (it being richly wooded, and watered with a stream full of fish and otters--in short, an ideal place for hunting, hawking, coursing and fishing), is now a placid pastoral district without distinction, such as may be found in any gently undulating country. RUFFORD Rufford Abbey, which is within easy walking distance of Ollerton, surpasses in interest and beauty the other great houses of the neighbourhood. The view from the pelican-crowned gateway, with its avenue of limes (some of which are considered the finest in all England) and beeches and elms, terminating in a glimpse of the facade of reddish stone, reminds one of the palace of the Sleeping Beauty in the days before briers and brambles barred the way. Separated from this avenue by a gravelled space, where in summer great hydrangeas blossom in green tubs, a fine staircase leads to the main entrance. [Illustration: RUFFORD ABBEY] The house, which is not open to the public, and which for several centuries has been a favourite resting-place of kings, possesses a singular atmosphere of beauty and charm. The walls are hung with priceless old tapestry and marvellous portraits by the great English masters. There is much wonderful needlework--an eighteenth-century lady of the Savile family was as devoted to her embroidery frame as Mary Stuart herself. On screens and quaint chairs are seen her masterly copies of Hogarth's pictures.