I did prefer them; and
they were stewed or fried chops, instead of broiled, and were very
savory. There was household bread too, and rich cheese, and a pint of
ale, home brewed, not very mighty, but good to quench thirst, and, by way
of condiment, some pickled cabbage; so, instead of a lunch, I made quite
a comfortable dinner. Moreover, there was a cold pudding on the table,
and I called for a clean plate, and helped myself to some of it. It was
of rice, and was strewn over, rather than intermixed, with some kinds of
berries, the nature of which I could not exactly make out.
I then set forth again. It was still sunny and warm, and I walked more
slowly than before dinner; in fact, I did little more than lounge along,
sitting down, at last, on the stone parapet of a bridge.
The country grew more pleasant, more sylvan, and, though still of a level
character, not so drearily flat. Soon appeared the first symptom that I
had seen of a gentleman's residence,--a lodge at a park gate, then a long
stretch of wall, with a green lawn, and afterwards an extent of wooded
land; then another gateway, with a neat lodge on each side of it, and,
lastly, another extent of wood. The Hall or Mansion-house, however, was
nowhere apparent, being, doubtless, secluded deep and far within its
grounds. I inquired of a boy who was the owner of the estate, and he
answered, "Mr. Scarisbrick"; and no doubt it is a family of local
eminence.
Along the road,--an old inn; some aged stone houses, built for merely
respectable occupants; a canal, with two canal-boats, heaped up with a
cargo of potatoes; two little girls, who were watching lest some cows
should go astray, and had their two little chairs by the roadside, and
their dolls and other playthings, and so followed the footsteps of the
cows all day long.
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