The picturesque scenery of Cheshire and the fresh air often invited me over the Mersey. One fine afternoon, while admiring the shrubbery in a private park at Birkenhead, the gardener said, "If you will come with me, Sir, I will show what will make you open your eyes." We walked on a couple of miles, and entered St. John's Park. Here Art seems to rival Nature with success. Beautiful diversity! Here were lawns, level, soft and clean, hills, ledges of rock, ponds half seen through openings of rich foliage and pensile boughs, bridges spanning the winding stream, that like a modest maiden, made its beauty more bewitching by seldom displaying its charms; flowering hawthorn, wild hedges, and variegated flowers, making many a luxurious nook for lakelings, that here and there nestled so quietly, bearing on their bosom snow-white swans, and inhabited by multitudes of fish. Every now and then some historic or poetic effigy, at a sudden turn of a winding walk, surprised the sighta shepherd with his dog by his side, and a little way on, a shepherdess and her lamb. One might mistake them for life itself, had he not all the while an indefinable feeling that he is wandering through a place of enchantment. There is a warrior fallen from his horse, struck down, doubtless, by the magician of the place, just as he was about to pass yonder bridge: his face wears a severe expression of pain; but different from the ineffable grief of this beautiful female resting on the knee of another. Do you see yonder jolly fiddler rasping away with all his might upon one string? Well done! He is no doubt the Comus of this garden. And there is a fine statue of Sir William Wallace. All these are in fine marble, and the cost of the whole garden must be enormous. This immense park is free to all.

One day I came suddenly upon an old ruin near Birkenhead. It was an abbey and priory of the thirteenth century. Here was something for Old Mortality. As this was the first ruin I had seen in England, the reader will make some

allowance for my boyish enthusiasm. Ivy as large as a man's wrist had twined through the crumbling old walls and buttresses. In the crypt stone pillars supported arches on which the edifice rested. On an oblong brown stone was an inscription round the border: "Here lyeth Thomas Rainford, the good Prior of this House, who died May, [supposed 1400] on whose soul have mercy, O GOD." The date was scaled off. The stone had been taken from the floor and placed in the outer wall for preservation. Mr. Breresford kindly gave me one of the triangular earthen tiles with which the floor was paved, which he said were much prized. From the tower of the modern Gothic church the view was glorious. Below was the roof of the old abbey covered with tall grass and gooseberry bushes. Over the Mersey, about the width of the Hudson at New-York, is Liverpool, reaching to the utmost point of sight; New-Brighton lighthouse, towers, and windmills; and forty miles off, half veiled in bluish haze, were the pyramid mountains of Wales. The birds were singing responses to the breeze that rustled through the churchyard grove that partly hid the abbey and priory.

In passing through this beautiful town I stopped to look at some excavations, supposing the stone to be the foundation of some immense feudal castle; and was surprised to learn from a gentleman standing at his gate, that it was a quarry. The stone were cut out in vast blocks, so smooth that the remaining part looked like a well built wall. On asking the gentleman if he could direct me to a coffee-house, saying I was an American, he replied, "O yes, there are several but perhaps you can't do better than to take dinner with me?" I assured him I never thought of fishing for an invitation. “I know it,” said he: "but you will be welcome to our roast mutton and rice pudding." So I rested for a pleasant hour with him. The name of my entertainer was Brown, a Scotchman, who said he had been in America.

Having missed the way while wandering over the fields,

I asked a gentleman among the hedges, the way to Oxton, a lovely swell above and beyond Birkenhead. He said he was a bit of a trespasser himself, and would show me. We ascended the highest point of observation, where we remained an hour, drinking in the glorious and exhilarating scene. Parks, wide lawns, gardens, groves, and villages, decorated the boundless landscape. There were the azure mountains of Denbighshire, thirty miles away. On yonder high peak of Moel-Fammah, in Wales, is the Jubilee Column reared in 1814 to commemorate the fiftieth year of the reign of George III. and the French peace after the battle of Waterloo. The sun glows on the Irish Sea, and the Dee, famed in song, winds between Hillbury Island and the main land. The rich estates around belong to the Earl of Shrewsbury, whose ancestors are styled in history "the proud Talbots." The stranger, on our return, asked me to stop at his house and rest; after which, thanking him for his kindness, he said, "Don't go yet-tea is ready in the next room." The fourth invitation in one day!

The enormous cost and solidity of the Liverpool Docks are amazing. Of these there are thirty or forty. A high massive brick wall runs their entire length. Officers are stationed at the several entrances, which are shut at night. They are named after great men and events—Nelson, Wellington, Canning, Clarence, Victoria, Trafalgar, Waterloo. Parliament was in vain petitioned to prevent the building of docks at Birkenhead, which bid fair to eclipse (but not with smoke) those of Liverpool. Birkenhead possesses many advanges for persons trading in Liverpool, being remarkably picturesque and salubrious, the prevailing westerly winds. driving away the Liverpool smoke. Bebbington, Tranmere, Woodside, Liscard, and New-Brighton, stretch along the shore for miles, in beautifully undulating slopes. Numerous powerful iron ferry-boats ply to various points. They look black and smoky; and though the engines are below deck, yet for beauty, are unlike our aquatic palaces on the East River.

CHAPTER III.

Chester.

The shades of time serenely fall

On every brokon arch and ivied wall.

Rogers.

LET us go to Chester. It is only fifteen miles from Monk's ferry, at Birkenhead. The Roman antiquities will delight and astonish you. Step into the railway carriage and take a seat. The porter swings his bell-there is a shrill whistle the stout fire-horse gives a vigorous puff and a snort or two-whiff! phit-phit! and away he goes, at the top of his speed, breathing hot steam, smoke and cinders! We glide beautifully over the iron road; and the iron horse carries all before him. No; I am wrong: he leaves everything behind; for we hardly get a glimpse of the glowing landscape before it is far away out of sight. Why, the railroads in England are almost as good as they are in Yankeedom! Better; for the bed of the road is so hard with small stones, that no dust is raised; and the rails being underlaid with felt, the cars roll as smoothly as over a plank road. This June day is delightfully serene. All England is in full leaf. Hawthorn hedges are in bloom on both sides of the road, or deck the top of a sloping greensward embankment, sprinkled with red poppies and English daisies, for twenty to fifty feet above the road. Glittering towns on romantic slopes, tasteful Gothic churches with pointed spire and turret, villas, windmills, castles, prim and quiet homsteads, gardens, parks, with every feature of luxury and refinement, and every requisite of enchanting landscape, dance toward us and sweep by out of sight.

But here we are in Chester! a short and easy trip from the world of life to the old and buried past. Here, as a

CHESTER CATHEDRAL.

19

Roman pavement answers your tread, disturbing some pagan altar-stone, or some broken tile stamped with the name of an imperial legion, it would be no strange dream, were a tall warrior to start up, and leaning on his spear, gaze wonderingly at one so new and strange to his eyes, seeming by his wild stare to say, "Who are you, without a toga? America! In the name of Cæsar, where is that? America!—in a steamship-three thousand miles in one week! Ye gods! let me return to Pluto's place of realities! I dare not stay in a world of mysteries?" Good bye if you will go !

A gentleman passenger in the railway takes me by the arm, and offers to show me some of the antiquities of Chester. We will therefore make a flying visit through this wonderful spot, and leave the Roman spirits to their meditations. The many natural advantages of Chester, with its water privileges, made it a favourite spot with the Romans. A Roman legion (the XXth) encamped here before the birth of Christ. My courteous friend passed with me through the principal streets, giving the history of whatever was called up on the way. "Look!" said he: "do you see the inscription in large black letters, running across that old house? 'GOD'S PROVIDENCE IS MINE INHERITANCE.' That was the only house in Chester not visited by the plague in 1666." This line is itself a book of history, poetry, and religion! To look was not enough. I entered, to realize more fully its awfully interesting associations.

Our next visit was to the celebrated Chester cathedral, that time-worn fabric that has triumphed over a thousand years; the wonder of ancient and modern times. It is in various styles of Gothic, and is much decayed from the perishable nature of the brown stone, The effect of the light from the large windows is very beautiful. The carved devices in British oak, and the Gothic tracery of the interior, are perhaps unrivalled for beauty of design and deft-like finish. My polite friend copied from the wall, and handed