CHAPTER XII.

LICHFIELD-STAFFORDSHIRE POTTERIES-CHESTER-AN OLD FRIEND-PRESTON, ETC.

FROM Birmingham to Lichfield, is a distance of twenty miles, and, as the last-named town is celebrated for being the birthplace of Dr. Johnson, I wended my way thither.

It contains one of the finest cathedrals in England, and a statue of the celebrated essayist, both of which are sufficient attractions for the stranger, and draw hundreds to the town who would never think of visiting it without some such objects of interest were there. The building is very large, being 491 feet by 151, and surrounded by a splendid close, or inclosure. It was erected in the year 1130, and suffered much during the civil wars, at which time it was garrisoned by the royalists and besieged by the parliamentary forces. The front is elaborately ornamented, and adorned with a great number of effigies in stone of saints and kings, and exquisitely chiselled scrolls and devices. Some repairs have recently been made, but as they are only partial they rather destroy than add to the beauty of the edifice. The interior is really magnificent, and contains several statues of great beauty, among which are those of Dr. Johnson, Garrick, and Lady Mary Wortley Montague, and others less distinguished. The finest statuary is a work of Chantrey, erected over the tomb of two children. The statue of the great lexicographer is neither a fine piece of sculpture nor an attractive one. It is placed in the marketsquare, not far from the birthplace of the Doctor, and represents him in a recumbent position and thoughtful mood. The panels of the pedestal are ornamented with bas-reliefs, illustrating events in the life of Johnson, and an inscription setting forth that the statue was presented to the town by the chancellor of the district. Lichfield was once the residence of Dr. Darwin, and the house in which he lived and wrote his "Zoonomia" is shown to visitors. At St. John's Free School, Dr. Johnson, Addison, Garrick, and other eminent men, received the rudiments of their education.

The town is quiet, and contrasts strongly with its neighbors, Wolverhampton, Wednesbury, and Walsall, which are under a cloud of black smoke, while the former is open to the clear light of day. As I pursued my way into the country, I turned to look at its fine cathedral, and a glorious scene burst upon my sight. It is a massive and grand pile, soaring above the surrounding buildings in majestic splendor. The distant prospect of the noble edifice alone should be a sufficient inducement for making a visit to Lichfield.

I left the birthplace of the great scholar with feelings akin to regret, strolled along under the shade of the hedges to the station, and took passage to Colwich, in Staffordshire, at which there is a branch railway leading into the Potteries. The village is small, and presents no attractions beyond its church and the walls of a nunnery near by. While waiting for the train, I paid a visit to the place of worship, and gazed around the interior upon the tablets and memorials which the friends of deceased relatives have raised to commemorate the virtues of the dead. In one part is a monument to Sir Thomas Wolsey, who was drowned some hundreds of years ago, and whose family has been extinct for ages. The effigy is sadly mutilated, and the face is divested of its nasal appendage, which gives it a comical and ludicrous expression. In the chancel there are several really beautiful tablets to the memory of different members of the Anson family, and a number of memorials to other individuals less distinguished, and lower in England's classification of men. The nunnery is a short distance from the church, situate on a hill, and surrounded by high walls and shrubbery. It was founded about twelve years ago, and its occupants have the name of being kind to the poor and attentive to the sick and friendless.

The village lies a short distance from the station, and is principally built upon one street. The houses are humble places, hundreds of years old, mostly covered with ivy, or festooned with clambering jessamine and other flowers, and look the very reality of the cottages of English poetry, and, for aught I know, are. They did not detain me long, and taking the train, I was soon carried away, through rural scenery, to the potteries of Staffordshire. Stoke-upon-Trent, a forbidding town, and its sister villages, Burslem and Lane-End, both of which share its characteristics, constitute the principal part of the earthenware and Chinaware district, and are mean, filthy places, although exhibiting great activity and bustle.

The pottery business is a disagreeable and laborious one in nearly all its branches, and furnishes work to men, women, and children. The ornamental designs which adorn the ware are put on by transferring pictures printed from copperplate engravings. The process is simple, and, when a person sees it applied, there is no mystery as to the manner in which the accurate drawings and exquisite designs are produced on China and other earthenwares. I conversed with numbers of workmen, and all of them appeared very well satisfied with their wages; but they informed me that it was a bright time for them, and they were fearful it would not last.

The towns in this district are straggling places, or rather a continuation of villages. The houses of the operatives have no particular charms, and as the same black coal is used in the furnaces that serves for fuel throughout the kingdom, the atmosphere is filled with smoke, and the dwellings are dingy with soot. The rustics are a clownish set, and mostly dressed in a costume unknown in the United States. Knee-breeches are common, and coarse boots, with soles full three-quarters of an inch thick, filled with heavy nails, are the usual coverings for the feet. The dialect is broad and unintelligible, and unless a stranger has had some previous acquaintance with the jargon of the natives, he is likely to be as far from understanding their outrageous language as he would be the speech of a Kickapoo or Pottawatomie Indian.

Wet weather did not improve the appearance of the villages, nor was there anything to detain me after examining the manufactories. So, once more taking train, I proceeded on my journey to Chester, an ancient city, situate on the River Dee, about eighteen miles from Liverpool. It is walled round, and the houses on several of the streets are so built as to form an arcade of the second stories for a considerable distance, which affords a convenient promenade and protection to pedestrians in stormy weather. The walls are nearly three miles in length, and pass through the new part of the city, and around the old. They are a fashionable resort, and present many fine views of the valley of the river, and the surrounding country. At one point is a tower whereon Charles I. stood and witnessed the defeat of his army on a neighboring moor in 1645.

Chester is, properly considered, a remarkable town, and it is one that defies description. The traveller may write about the footwalks of the main avenues being in the second stories of the houses, but he cannot convey to the minds of his readers a picture of the reality. To say that you can walk a considerable distance under cover, one story above ground, will give perhaps the best idea of the arcades of Chester to a person who has never seen them. In Trinity Church, in a street called the Watergate, in the lower part of the town, near the walls, are the graves of Parnell, the poet, and Matthew Henry, the commentator. The sexton conducted me through the edifice, and pointed out the tombs I sought. The tablet to the memory of the bard has been broken, and now lies as rubbish in the vaults beneath the floor; that to the memory of the divine bears a slight inscription, and is a very plain affair.

The most interesting building is the cathedral, a noble Gothic edifice, once used as an abbey. One of the entrances is through an arched way, formerly the garden gate of the ascetics, which leads to the walks connected with the religious establishment. The interior of the structure is adorned with carvings and ornamental devices, and has a triforium, where, it is said, the nuns of yore were accustomed to sing the praises of the Deity, and bow their sacred heads. Tombs are numerous; but the inhabitants are neither famous nor remarkable for anything but the monuments to their memories, and therefore not worth naming. I visited the silent cells, where of old the Eremites were wont to offer up their orisons, and trod the cloisters with a step solemn and slow, reflecting upon the ancient day, and the revolutions made by time. The hoary walls, the crumbling fane, and the sacred gloom of the inner court, invested the venerable pile with a charm irresistible in its influences to lead the mind captive to pleasing contemplation and divine melancholy.

For some weeks I had been a solitary wanderer in lonely places, without the company of friends, or the gratification of seeing a familiar face. Wherever my wanderings led, there was I alone, until reaching Liverpool, where I unexpectedly met with one of my fellow-passengers, whom I had not seen since we crossed the great deep together. He had been to Italy and through other continental countries since we parted, and bore the effects of foreign travel upon his face, in the shape of a pair of well cultivated mustaches, which he became admirably. Our meeting was one of sincere pleasure and mutual happiness, and riveted the chain of friendship stronger than before. There was nothing of cold indifference in his manner, and when he grasped my hand a gleam of uncontrolled delight shot across his manly face, and lit up his cheerful countenance. There was a sincerity in that welcome that will cause me ever to remember my worthy friend and fellow-voyager, Andrew McMakin, Esq., of the Philadelphia "American Courier," and esteem him while life lasts. We compared notes, asked a thousand questions of each other, and parted once more to pursue our respective journeys.

The great port was, as usual, wet and gloomy, and by no means attractive. I left it for Preston, in Lancashire, a town situate on the River Ribble, a stream of considerable size and great beauty. It is the cleanest of the English manufacturing towns, and presents an appearance entirely different from its sister cities. There is a walk of a mile or more in extent along the river, which affords some fine prospects and much pleasure to the denizens of the place. An arbor of trees forms a promenade on an eminence overlooking the pensive Ribble, and no town of the same size has so many facilities for the rational enjoyment of its inhabitants as Preston. The streets, in the upper part, are kept in excellent condition; and although the cotton-mills are numerous, still the black smoke of their chimneys does not discolor the houses to the extent that those of Manchester and Sheffield suffer from the sooty