On some of the ancient arches, there were grotesquely carved stone faces.
The old walls have been sufficiently restored to make them secure,
without destroying their venerable aspect. It is a very interesting
spot; and so much the more so because a modern town, with its brick and
stone houses, its flags and pavements, has sprung up about the ruins,
which were new a thousand years ago. The station of the Chester railway
is within a hundred yards. Formerly the monks of this Priory kept the
only ferry that then existed on the Mersey.
At a dinner at Mr. Bramley Moore's a little while ago, we had a
prairie-hen from the West of America. It was a very delicate bird, and a
gentleman carved it most skilfully to a dozen guests, and had still a
second slice to offer to them.
Aboard the ferry-boat yesterday, there was a laboring man eating oysters.
He took them one by one from his pocket in interminable succession,
opened them with his jack-knife, swallowed each one, threw the shell
overboard, and then sought for another. Having concluded his meal, he
took out a clay tobacco-pipe, filled it, lighted it with a match, and
smoked it,--all this, while the other passengers were looking at him, and
with a perfect coolness and independence, such as no single man can ever
feel in America. Here a man does not seem to consider what other people
will think of his conduct, but only whether it suits his own convenience
to do so and so.
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