The next morning, May 8th, I rose and breakfasted early, and took the
rail soon after eight o'clock, leaving Mr. Bowman behind; for he had
business in Newcastle, and would not follow till some hours afterwards.
There is no use in trying to make a narrative of anything that one sees
along an English railway. All I remember of this tract of country is
that one of the stations at which we stopped for an instant is called
"Washington," and this is, no doubt, the old family place, where the De
Wessyngtons, afterwards the Washingtons, were first settled in England.
Before reaching York, first one old lady and then another (Quaker) lady
got into the carriage along with me; and they seemed to be going to York,
on occasion of some fair or celebration. This was all the company I had,
and their advent the only incident. It was about eleven o'clock when I
beheld York Cathedral rising huge above the old city, which stands on the
river Ouse, separated by it from the railway station, but communicating
by a ferry (or two) and a bridge. I wandered forth, and found my way
over the latter into the ancient and irregular streets of
YORK,
crooked, narrow, or of unequal width, puzzling, and many of them bearing
the name of the particular gate in the old walls of the city to which
they lead. There were no such fine, ancient, stately houses as some of
those in Shrewsbury were, nor such an aspect of antiquity as in Chester;
but still York is a quaint old place, and what looks most modern is
probably only something old, hiding itself behind a new front, as
elsewhere in England.
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