other notable places of the town mentioned in the guide-book as worthy of a visit is the great factory where the fiery Worcestershire sauce is concocted, but this did not appeal to our imagination as did the porcelain works.  Our early start and the fine, nearly level road brought us to Stratford-upon-Avon well before noon.  Here we did little more than re-visit the shrines of Shakespeare—­the church, the birthplace, the grammar school—­all familiar to the English-speaking world.  Nor did we forget the Red Horse Inn at luncheon time, finding it much less crowded than on our previous visit, for we were still well in advance of the tourist season.  After luncheon we were lured into a shop across the street by the broad assurance made on an exceedingly conspicuous sign that it is the “largest souvenir store on earth.”  Here we hoped to secure a few mementos of our visit to Stratford by motor car.  We fell into a conversation with the proprietor, a genial, white-haired old gentleman, who, we learned, had been Mayor of the town for many years—­and is it not a rare distinction to be Mayor of Shakespeare’s Stratford?  The old gentleman bore his honors lightly indeed, for he said he had insistently declined the office but the people wouldn’t take no for an answer.

It is only a few miles to Warwick over winding roads as beautiful as any in England.  One of these leads past Charlecote, famous for Shakespeare’s deer-stealing episode, but no longer open to the public.  We passed through Warwick—­which reminded us of Ludlow except for the former’s magnificent situation—­without pausing, a thing which no one would do who had not visited that quaint old town some time before.  In Leamington, three miles farther on, we found a modern city of forty thousand inhabitants, noted as a resort and full of pretentious hotels.  After we were located at the Manor House there was still time for a drive to Kenilworth Castle, five miles away, to which a second visit was even more delightful than our previous one.  For the next day we had planned a circular tour of Warwickshire, but a driving, all-day rain and, still more, the indisposition of one of our party, confined us to our hotel.  Our disappointment was considerable, for within easy reach of Leamington there were many places that we had planned to visit.  Ashow Church, Stoneleigh Abbey, George Eliot’s birthplace and home near Nuneaton, the cottage of Mary Arden, mother of Shakespeare, Rugby, with its famous school, and Maxstoke Castle—­an extensive and picturesque ruin—­are all within a few miles of Leamington.

From Leamington to London was nearly an all-day’s run, although the distance is only one hundred miles.  A repair to the car delayed us and we went several miles astray on the road.  It would have been easier to have returned over the Holyhead Road, but our desire to see more of the country led us to take a route nearly parallel to this, averaging about fifteen miles to the southward.  Much of the way this ran through