A very interesting old city is Rochester, with its Eleventh Century cathedral and massive castle standing on the banks of the river.  Little of the latter remains save the square tower of the Norman keep, one of the largest and most imposing we saw in England.  The interior had been totally destroyed by fire hundreds of years ago, but the towering walls of enormous thickness still stand firm.  Its antiquity is attested by the fact that it sustained a siege by William Rufus, the son of the Conqueror.  The cathedral is not one of the most impressive of the great churches.  It was largely rebuilt in the Twelfth Century, the money being obtained from miracles wrought by the relics of St. William of Perth, a pilgrim who was murdered on his way to Canterbury and who lies buried in the cathedral.  Rochester is the scene of many incidents of Dickens’ stories.  It was the scene of his last unfinished work, “Edwin Drood,” and he made many allusions to it elsewhere, the most notable perhaps in “Pickwick Papers,” where he makes the effervescent Mr. Jingle describe it thus:  “Ah, fine place, glorious pile, frowning walls, tottering arches, dark nooks, crumbling staircases—­old cathedral, too,—­earthy smell—­pilgrims’ feet worn away the old steps.”

Across the river from Rochester lies Chatham, a city of forty thousand people and a famous naval and military station.  The two cities are continuous and practically one.  From here, without further stop, we followed the fine highway to Canterbury and entered the town by the west gate of Chaucer’s Tales.  This alone remains of the six gateways of the city wall in the poet’s day, and the strong wall itself, with its twenty-one towers, has almost entirely disappeared.  We followed a winding street bordered with quaint old buildings until we reached our hotel—­in this case a modern and splendidly kept hostelry.  The hotel was just completing an extensive garage, but it was not ready for occupancy and I was directed to a well equipped private establishment with every facility for the care and repair of motors.  The excellence of the service at this hotel attracted our attention and the head waiter told us that the owners had their own farm and supplied their own table—­accounting in this way for the excellence and freshness of the milk, meat and vegetables.

The long English summer evening still afforded time to look about the town after dinner.  Passing down the main street after leaving the hotel, we found that the river and a canal wound their way in several places between the old buildings closely bordering on each side.  The whole effect was delightful and so soft with sunset colors as to be suggestive of Venice.  We noted that although Canterbury is exceedingly ancient, it is also a city of nearly thirty thousand population and the center of rich farming country, and, as at Chester, we found many evidences of prosperity and modern enterprise freely interspersed with the quaint and time-worn landmarks.  One