November 5th.--We all, together with Mr. Squarey, went to Chester last
Sunday, and attended the cathedral service. A great deal of ceremony,
and not unimposing, but rather tedious before it was finished,--occupying
two hours or more. The Bishop was present, but did nothing except to
pronounce the benediction. In America the sermon is the principal thing;
but here all this magnificent ceremonial of prayer and chanted responses
and psalms and anthems was the setting to a short, meagre discourse,
which would not have been considered of any account among the elaborate
intellectual efforts of New England ministers. While this was going on,
the light came through the stained glass windows and fell upon the
congregation, tingeing them with crimson. After service we wandered
about the aisles, and looked at the tombs and monuments,--the oldest of
which was that of some nameless abbot, with a staff and mitre half
obliterated from his tomb, which was under a shallow arch on one side of
the cathedral. There were also marbles on the walls, and lettered stones
in the pavement under our feet; but chiefly, if not entirely, of modern
date. We lunched at the Royal Hotel, and then walked round the city
walls, also crossing the bridge of one great arch over the Dee, and
penetrating as far into Wales as the entrance of the Marquis of
Westminster's Park at Eaton. It was, I think, the most lovely day as
regards weather that I have seen in England.
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