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My route for a part of the way lay in sight of the Avon, which
made a variety of the most fancy doublings and windings through a wide
and fertile valley; sometimes glittering from among willows, which
fringed its borders; sometimes disappearing among groves, or beneath
green banks; and sometimes rambling out into full view, and making
an azure sweep round a slope of meadow land. This beautiful bosom of
country is called the Vale of the Red Horse. A distant line of
undulating blue hills seems to be its boundary, whilst all the soft
intervening landscape lies in a manner enchained in the silver links
of the Avon.
After pursuing the road for about three miles, I turned off into a
footpath, which led along the borders of fields, and under hedgerows
to a private gate of the park; there was a stile, however, for the
benefit of the pedestrian; there being a public right of way through
the grounds. I delight in these hospitable estates, in which every one
has a kind of property- at least as far as the footpath is
concerned. It in some measure reconciles a poor man to his lot, and,
what is more, to the better lot of his neighbor, thus to have parks
and pleasure-grounds thrown open for his recreation.
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