It was in the inn at Beaulieu that I found
this book of ships. I read it beside a wood fire blazing in an open hearth, above which a row of burnished copper pans winked and glowed, giving a thousand distorted reflections to the panelled room. A rain-burdened south-westerly wind swirled against the windows all that evening ; but it only increased the sense of comfort inside. Of little inns one asks little—ale, company, and a packet of cheese biscuits : that is about all one gets. But the big English inns should be the most comfortable houses in the world. They were once : they may be again. Here, in Beaulieu, is one of the score or less that now exist in England. The inn-keeper admits that it is still an experiment, but he has great hopes. So we may see an Inn Revival yet.
HAMISH MACLAREN.
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