The oldest part, Sir Thomas Birch told us, is a tower of
the time of Henry VII. Nevertheless, the effect is not overwhelming,
because the edifice looks low in proportion to its great extent over the
ground; and besides, a good deal of it is built of brick, with white
window-frames, so that, looking at separate parts, I might think them
American structures, without the smart addition of green Venetian blinds,
so universal with us. Portions, however, were built of red freestone;
and if I had looked at it longer, no doubt I should have admired it more.
We merely drove round it from the rear to the front. It stands in my
memory rather like a college or a hospital, than as the ancestral
residence of a great English noble.
We left the Park in another direction, and passed through a part of Lord
Sefton's property, by a private road.
By the by, we saw half a dozen policemen, in their blue coats and
embroidered collars, after entering Knowsley Park; but the Earl's own
servants would probably have supplied their place, had the family been at
home. The mansion of Croxteth, the seat of Lord Sefton, stands near the
public road, and, though large, looked of rather narrow compass after
Knowsley.
The rooks were talking together very loquaciously in the high tops of the
trees near Sir Thomas Birch's house, it being now their building-time.
It was a very pleasant sound, the noise being comfortably softened by the
remote height.
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