Rock Ferry, August 29th.--Yesterday we all took a walk into the country.
It was a fine afternoon, with clouds, of course, in different parts of
the sky, but a clear atmosphere, bright sunshine, and altogether a
Septembrish feeling. The ramble was very pleasant, along the hedge-lined
roads in which there were flowers blooming, and the varnished holly,
certainly one of the most beautiful shrubs in the world, so far as
foliage goes. We saw one cottage which I suppose was several hundred
years old. It was of stone, filled into a wooden frame, the black-oak of
which was visible like an external skeleton; it had a thatched roof, and
was whitewashed. We passed through a village,--higher Bebbington, I
believe,--with narrow streets and mean houses all of brick or stone, and
not standing wide apart from each other as in American country villages,
but conjoined. There was an immense almshouse in the midst; at least, I
took it to be so. In the centre of the village, too, we saw a
moderate-sized brick house, built in imitation of a castle with a tower
and turret, in which an upper and an under row of small cannon were
mounted,--now green with moss. There were also battlements along the
roof of the house, which looked as if it might have been built eighty or
a hundred years ago. In the centre of it there was the dial of a clock,
but the inner machinery had been removed, and the hands, hanging
listlessly, moved to and fro in the wind.
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