Warwick, Dec. 26th, 1826.

Dear Julia,

Now, indeed, for the first time, I am filled with real and unbounded enthusiasm. What I have hitherto described was a smiling country, combined with everything that art and money could produce. I left it with a feeling of satisfaction; and, although I have seen things like it,—nay, even possess them,—not without admiration. But what I saw to-day was more than that,—it was an enchanted palace decked in the most charming garb of poetry, and surrounded by all the majesty of history, the sight of which still fills me with delighted astonishment.

You, accomplished reader of history and memoirs, know better than I that the Earls of Warwick were once the mightiest vassals of England, and that the great Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, boasted of having deposed three kings, and placed as many on the vacant throne. This was his castle, standing ever since the ninth century, and in the possession of the same family since the reign of Elizabeth. A tower of the castle, said to have been built by Beauchamp himself, remains unaltered; and the whole stands colossal and mighty, like an embodied vision of former times.

From a considerable distance you see the dark mass of stone towering above the primÆval cedars, chestnuts, oaks and limes. It stands on the rocks on the shore of the Avon, and rises to a perpendicular height of two hundred feet above the level of the water. Two towers of different forms overtop the building itself almost in an equal degree. A ruined pier of a bridge, overhung with trees, stands in the middle of the river, which becoming deeper just at the point where the building begins, forms a foaming waterfall, and turns a mill, which appears only like a low abutment of the castle. Going on, you lose sight of the castle for awhile, and soon find yourself before a high embattled wall, built of large blocks of stone covered by Time with moss and creeping plants. Lofty iron gates slowly unfold to admit you to a deep hollow way blasted in the rock, the stone walls of which are tapestried with the most luxuriant vegetation. The carriage rolled with a heavy dull sound along the smooth rock, which old oaks darkly overshadow. Suddenly, at a turn of the way, the castle starts from the wood into broad open daylight, resting on a soft grassy slope; and the large arch of the entrance dwindles to the size of an insignificant doorway between the two enormous towers, at the foot of which you now stand. A still greater surprise now awaits you when you pass through the second iron gate into the court-yard: it is almost impossible to imagine anything more picturesque, and at the same time more imposing.

Let your fancy conjure up a space about twice as large as the interior of the Colosseum at Rome, and let it transport you into a forest of romantic luxuriance. You now overlook the large court, surrounded by mossy trees and majestic buildings, which, though of every variety of form, combine to create one sublime and connected whole, whose lines now shooting upwards, now falling off into the blue air, with the continually changing beauty of the green earth beneath, produce, not symmetry indeed, but that higher harmony, elsewhere proper to Nature’s own works alone. The first glance at your feet falls on a broad simple carpet of turf, around which a softly winding gravel-walk leads to the entrance and exit of the gigantic edifice. Looking backwards, your eye rests on the two black towers, of which the oldest, called Guy’s Tower, rears its head aloft in solitary threatening majesty, high above all the surrounding foliage, and looks as if cast in one mass of solid iron;—the other, built by Beauchamp, is half hidden by a pine and a chestnut, the noble growth of centuries. Broad-leaved ivy and vines climb along the walls, here twining around the tower, there shooting up to its very summit. On your left lie the inhabited part of the castle, and the chapel, ornamented with many lofty windows of various size and form; while the opposite side of the vast quadrangle, almost entirely without windows, presents only a mighty mass of embattled stone, broken by a few larches of colossal height, and huge arbutuses which have grown to a surprizing size in the shelter they have so long enjoyed. But the sublimest spectacle yet awaits you, when you raise your eyes straight before you. On this fourth side, the ground, which has sunk into a low bushy basin forming the court, and with which the buildings also descend for a considerable space, rises again in the form of a steep conical hill, along the sides of which climb the rugged walls of the castle. This hill, and the keep which crowns it, are thickly overgrown at the top with underwood, which only creeps round the foot of the towers and walls. Behind it, however, rise gigantic venerable trees, towering above all the rock-like structure. Their bare stems seem to float in upper air; while at the very summit of the building rises a daring bridge, set, as it were, on either side within trees; and as the clouds drift across the blue sky, the broadest and most brilliant masses of light break magically from under the towering arch and the dark coronet of trees.

Figure this to yourself;—behold the whole of this magical scene at one glance;—connect with it all its associations;—think that here nine centuries of haughty power, of triumphant victory and destructive overthrow, of bloody deeds and wild greatness,—perhaps too of gentle love and noble magnanimity,—have left, in part, their visible traces, and where they are not, their vague romantic memory;—and then judge with what feelings I could place myself in the situation of the man to whom such recollections are daily suggested by these objects,—recollections which, to him, have all the sanctity of kindred and blood;—the man who still inhabits the very dwelling of that first possessor of the fortress of Warwick, that half-fabulous Guy, who lived a thousand years ago, and whose corroded armour, together with a hundred weapons of renowned ancestors, is preserved in the antique hall. Is there a human being so unpoetical as not to feel that the glories of such memorials, even to this very day, throw a lustre around the feeblest representative of such a race?

To make my description in some degree clear, I annex a ground-plan, which may help your imagination. You must imagine the river at a great depth below the castle-plain, and not visible from the point I have been describing. The first sight of it you catch is from the castle windows, together with the noble park, whose lines of wood blend on every side with the horizon.

You ascend from the court to the dwelling-rooms by only a few steps, first through a passage, and thence into the hall, on each side of which extend the entertaining-rooms in an unbroken line of three hundred and forty feet. Although almost ‘de plein-pied’ with the court, these rooms are more than fifty feet above the Avon, which flows on the other side. From eight to fourteen feet thickness of wall forms, in each window-recess, a complete closet, with the most beautiful varied view over the river, wildly foaming below, and further on flowing through the park in soft windings, till lost in the dim distance. Had I till now, from the first sight of the castle, advanced from surprise to surprise,—all this was surpassed, though in another way, by what awaited me in the interior. I fancied myself transported back into by-gone ages as I entered the gigantic baronial hall,—a perfect picture of Walter Scott’s;—the walls panelled with carved cedar; hung with every kind of knightly accoutrement; spacious enough to feast trains of vassals,—and saw before me a marble chimney-piece under which I could perfectly well walk with my hat on, and stand by the fire, which blazed like a funeral pile from a strange antique iron grate in the form of a basket, three hundred years old. On the side, true to ancient custom, was a stack of oak logs piled up upon a stand of cedar, which was placed on the stone floor partially covered by ‘hautelisse’ carpets. A man-servant dressed in brown, whose dress, with his gold knee-bands, epaulets and trimmings, had a very antique air, fed the mighty fire from time to time with an enormous block. Here, in every circumstance, the difference between the genuine old feudal greatness and the modern imitations was as striking, as that between the moss-grown remains of the weather-beaten fortress and the ruins built yesterday in the garden of some rich contractor. Almost everything in the room was old, stately, and original; nothing tasteless or incongruous, and all preserved with the greatest care and affection. Among them were many rich and rare articles which could no longer be procured,—silk, velvet, gold and silver blended and interwoven. The furniture consists almost entirely either of uncommonly rich gilding, of dark brown carved walnut or oak, or of those antique French ‘commodes’ and cabinets inlaid with brass, the proper name of which I have forgotten. There were also many fine specimens of mosaic, as well as of beautiful marquetry. A fire-screen, with a massy gold frame, consisted of a plate of glass so transparent that it was scarcely distinguishable from the air. To those who love to see the cheerful blaze without being scorched, such a screen is a great luxury. In one of the chambers stands a state bed, presented to one of the Earls of Warwick by Queen Anne; it is of red velvet embroidered, and is still in good preservation. The treasures of art are countless. Among the pictures, there was not one ‘mediocre;’ they are almost all by the first masters: but, beyond this, many of them have a peculiar family interest. There are a great many ancestral portraits by Titian, Van Dyk, and Rubens. The gem of the collection is one of Raphael’s most enchanting pictures, the beautiful Joan of Arragon,—of whom, strangely enough, there are four portraits, each of which is declared to be genuine. Three of them must of course be copies, but are no longer distinguishable from the original. One is at Paris, one at Rome, one at Vienna, and the fourth here. I know them all, and must give unqualified preference to this. There is an enchantment about this splendid woman which is wholly indescribable. An eye leading to the very depths of the soul; queenlike majesty united with the most feminine sensibility; intense passion blended with the sweetest melancholy; and withal, a beauty of form, a transparent delicacy of skin, and a truth, brilliancy and grace of the drapery and ornaments, such as only a divine genius could call into perfect being.

Among the most interesting portraits, both for the subject and the handling, are the following.

First, Machiavelli, by Titian.—Precisely as I should imagine him. A face of great acuteness and prudence, and of suffering,—as if lamenting over the profoundly-studied worthless side of human nature; that hound-like character which loves where it is spurned, follows where it fears, and is faithful where it is fed. A trace of compassionate scorn plays round the thin lips, while the dark eye appears turned reflectingly inward.

It appears strange, at first sight, that this great and classic writer should so long have been misunderstood in the grossest manner. Either he has been represented as a moral scarecrow (and how miserable is Voltaire’s refutation of that notion!); or the most fantastic hypothesis is put forth, that his book is a satire. On more attentive observation, we arrive at the conviction that it was reserved for modern times, in which politics at length begin to be viewed and understood from a higher and really humane point of view, to form a correct judgment of Machiavel’s Prince.

To all arbitrary princes—and under that name I class all those who think themselves invested with power solely ‘par la grace de Dieu’ and for their own advantage,—all conquerors, and children of fortune, whom some chance has given to the people they regard as their property,—to all such as these, this profound and acute writer shows the true and only way to prosper; the exhaustive system they must of necessity follow, in order to maintain a power radically sprung from the soil of sin and error. His book is, and must ever be, the true, inimitable gospel of such rulers; and we Prussians, especially, have reason to congratulate ourselves that Napoleon had learned his Machiavel so ill;—we should otherwise probably be still groaning under his yoke.

That Machiavel felt all the value and the power of freedom, is plain, from many passages in his book. In one he says, “He who has conquered a free city, has no secure means of keeping it, but either to destroy it, or to people it with new inhabitants; for no benefit a sovereign can confer will ever make it forget its lost freedom.”

By proving, as he incontestably does, that such a degree of arbitrary power can be maintained only by the utter disregard of all morality, and by seriously inculcating this doctrine upon princes, he also demonstrates but too plainly, that the whole frame of society, in his time, contained within itself a principle of demoralization; and that no true happiness, no true civilization, was possible to any people till that principle was detected and destroyed. The events of modern times, and their consequences, have at length opened their eyes to this truth, and they will not close them again!

The Duke of Alva, by Titian.—Full of expression, and, as I believe, faithful;—for this man was by no means a caricature of cruelty and gloom;—earnest, fantastical, proud, firm as iron; practically exhibiting the Ideal of an inflexibly faithful servant, who, having once undertaken a charge, looks neither to the right nor to the left in the execution of it; is ready blindly to fulfil the will of his God and of his master, and asks not whether thousands perish in torture; in a word, a powerful mind, not base but contracted, which lets others think for it, and works to establish their authority.

Henry the Eighth and Anne Boleyn, by Holbein.[37]—The King in a splendid dress,—a fat, rather butcher-like man, in whom sensuality, cunning, cruelty, and strength, rule in a frightfully complacent and almost jovial physiognomy. You see that such a man might make you tremble, and yet somehow attach you. Anne Boleyn is a good-natured, unmeaning, almost stupid-looking, genuine English beauty, like many one sees now, only in another dress.

Cromwell, by Van Dyk.—A magnificent head: somewhat of the bronze gladiator-look of Napoleon; but with much coarser features, through which, as behind a mask, is seen the light of a great soul: enthusiasm is, however, too little perceptible in them. There is an expression of cunning in the eye, combined with something of honesty, which renders it the more deceptive; but not a trace of cruelty,—with that, indeed, the Protector cannot be reproached. The execution of the King was a cruel act, but one which appeared to Cromwell’s mind in the light of a necessary political operation, and in no degree sprang from a delight in bloodshed. Under this picture hangs Cromwell’s own helmet.

Prince Rupert, by Van Dyk.—Completely the bold soldier! Every inch a cavalier! I do not mean in the exclusive sense of an adherent of the King, but in that of an accomplished gentleman and knight: a handsome face, as dangerous to women as to the enemy, and the picturesque garb and port of a warrior.

Elizabeth, by Holbein.—The best and perhaps the most faithful picture I have ever seen of her. She is represented in her prime, almost disgustingly fair, or rather white, with pale red hair. The eyes somewhat Albino-like, and almost without eyebrows. There is an artificial good-nature, but a false expression. Vehement passions and a furious temper seem to lie hidden under that pallid exterior, like a volcano under snow; while the intense desire to please is betrayed by the rich and over-ornamented dress. Quite different,—stern, hard, and dangerous to approach,—does she appear in the pictures of her at an advanced age, but even then extremely over-dressed.

Mary of Scotland.—Probably painted in prison, and shortly before her death: it has the air of a matron of forty.—There is still the faultless beauty; but it is no longer the light-minded Mary, full of the enjoyment of life, and of her own resistless charms; but visibly purified by misfortune,—with a sedate expression;—in short, Schiller’s Mary,—a noble nature, which has at length found itself again! It is one of the rarest pictures of the unhappy Queen, whom one is accustomed to see depicted in all the splendour of youth and beauty.

Ignatius Loyola, by Rubens.—A very beautifully painted and grand picture; but which immediately strikes one as a fiction, and no portrait. The sanctified expression, common to so many pictures of saints and priests, is unmeaning. The colouring is by far the finest thing about the picture.

But I should never have done, were I to attempt to go through this gallery. I must take you for a minute into the furthest cabinet, which contains a beautiful collection of enamels, chiefly after designs by Raphael, and a marble bust of the Black Prince, a sturdy soldier both in head and hand,—at a time when the latter alone sufficed to secure the highest renown.

Many valuable Etruscan vases and other works of art, besides the pictures and antiques, decorate the various apartments, and with great good taste are arranged so as to appear as harmonious accessories, instead of being heaped up in a gallery by themselves as dead masses.

It was pointed out to me as a proof of the perfect and solid architecture of the castle,—that, in spite of its age, when all the doors of the suite of rooms are shut, you see the bust placed exactly in the centre of the furthest cabinet, through the keyholes, along a length of three hundred and fifty feet;—a perfection, indeed, which our present race of workmen would never think of approaching. Though, as I told you, the walls of the hall are hung with a great quantity of armour, there is also an armoury, which is extremely rich. Here is the leathern collar, stained with blood blackened by time, in which Lord Brook, an ancestor of the present Earl, was slain at the battle of Litchfield. In one corner of the room lies a curious specimen of art, very heterogeneous with the rest,—a monkey, cast in iron, of a perfection and ‘abandon’ in the disposition of the limbs which rivals Nature herself. I was sorry the ‘chÂtellaine’ could not tell me who had made the model for this cast. He must be an eminent master who could thus express all the monkey grace and suppleness with such perfect fidelity, in an attitude of the most enjoying laziness.

Before I quitted the princely Warwick, I ascended one of the highest towers, and enjoyed a rich and beautiful prospect on every side. The weather was tolerably clear. Far more enchanting than this panorama, however, was the long walk in the gardens which surround the castle on two sides, whose character of serene grandeur is admirably adapted to that of the building. The height and beauty of the trees, the luxuriance of the vegetation and of the turf, cannot be exceeded; while a number of gigantic cedars, and the ever-varying aspect of the majestic castle, through whose lofty cruciform loop-holes the rays of light played, threw such enchantment over the whole scene that I could hardly tear myself away. We walked about till the moon rose; and her light, as we looked through the darkening alleys, gave to all objects a more solemn and gigantic character. We could therefore only see the celebrated colossal Warwick Vase by lamplight. It holds several hundred gallons, and is adorned with the most beautiful workmanship. We also saw some ancient curiosities which are kept in the Porter’s Lodge; particularly some cows’ horns and wild boar’s tusks, ascribed to beasts which Guy,—a hero of Saxon times, the fabulous ancestor of the first Earls of Warwick,—is said to have destroyed. The dimensions of his arms, which are preserved here, bespeak a man of such strength and stature as Nature no longer produces.

Here at length I took a lingering farewell of Warwick Castle, and laid the recollection, like a dream of the sublime and shadowy past, on my heart. I felt, in the faint moonlight, like a child who sees a fantastic giant head of far distant ages beckoning to it with friendly nod over the summit of the wood.

With such fancies, dear Julia, I will go to sleep, and wake to meet them again in the morning, for another scene of romance awaits me,—the ruins of Kenilworth.

Birmingham, Dec. 29th: Evening.

I must continue my narrative.—Leamington (‘car il faut pourtant que j’en dise quelque chose’) was only a little village a few years ago, and is now a rich and elegant town, containing ten or twelve palace-like inns, four large bath-houses with colonnades and gardens, several libraries, with which are connected card, billiard, concert and ball-rooms (one for six hundred persons,) and a host of private houses, which are almost entirely occupied by visitors, and spring out of the earth like mushrooms. All here is on a vast scale, though the waters are insignificant. The same are used for drinking as for bathing, and yet it swarms with visitors. The baths are as spacious as the English beds, and are lined throughout with earthenware tiles.

Not far from Leamington, and a league from Warwick, is a beautiful enchanting spot called Guy’s Cliff; part of the house is as old as Warwick Castle. Under it is a deep cavern, in the picturesque rocky shore of the Avon, into which, as tradition says, Guy of Warwick, after many high deeds at home and abroad, secretly retired to close his life in pious meditation. After two years of incessant search, his inconsolable wife found him lying dead in his cave, and in despair threw herself down from the rocks into the Avon. In later times a chapel was built in the rock to commemorate this tragic event, and adorned by Henry the Third with a statue of Sir Guy. This has unhappily been so mutilated by Cromwell’s troops, that it is now but a shapeless block. Opposite to the chapel are twelve monks’ cells hewn in the rock, now used as stables. The chapel itself, which has been entirely renovated in the interior, is connected with the dwelling of the proprietor, part of which is Gothic some centuries old, part in the old Italian style, and part quite new, built exactly to correspond with the most ancient part. The whole is extremely picturesque, and the interior is fitted up with equal attention to taste and comfort. The drawing-room, with its two deep window-recesses, struck me as uncommonly cheerful. One of these windows stands above a rock which rises fifty feet perpendicularly from the river, in whose bosom lies a lovely little island, and behind it a wide prospect of luxuriant meadows, beautiful trees, and, quite in the background, a village half buried in wood. At a short distance on the side is an extremely ancient mill, said to have been in existence before the Norman invasion. A little further off, the picture was terminated by a woody hill, also within the enclosure of the park, on which a high cross marks the spot where Gavestone, the infamous favourite of Edward the Second, was executed by the rebellious lords Warwick and Arundel. All these recollections, united with so many natural beauties, make a strong impression on the mind.—The other window afforded a perfect contrast with this. It overlooks a level plain laid out as a very pretty French garden, in which gay porcelain ornaments and coloured sand mingled their hues with the flowers, and terminates in a beautiful alley overshadowed with ivy cut into a pointed arch. In the room itself sparkled a cheerful fire; choice pictures adorned the walls, and several sofas of various forms, tables covered with curiosities, and furniture standing about in agreeable disorder, gave it the most inviting and home-like air.

I returned back to the town of Warwick to see the church, and the chapel containing the monument of the great King-Maker, which he placed there in his life-time, and now reposes under. His statue of metal lies on the sarcophagus; an eagle and a bear at his feet. The head is very expressive and natural. He does not fold his hands as is the case in most statues of knights, but only raises them a little to heaven, as though he would not pray, and could greet even his Maker only with a gesture of courtesy: his head is slightly inclined, but with no air of humility. Round his stone coffin are emblazoned the splendid bearings of all his lordships, and an enormous sword lies threatening by his side. The splendid painted windows, and the numerous well-preserved and richly gilded ornaments give to the whole a stately, solemn character.

A family of the town most unfortunately got permission, about a hundred and fifty years ago, to erect a monument to some country ‘squire or other, immediately under the large central window. It occupies the entire wall, and destroys the beautiful simplicity of the whole by this hideous, disgraceful modern excrescence.

By the side-wall lies another intruder carved in stone, but one of better pretensions;—no less a man than the powerful earl of Leicester: he is represented of middle age, a handsome, high-bred and haughty looking man; but without the lofty genius in his features so strikingly portrayed on the metal countenance of the great Warwick.

A few posts from Leamington, in a country which gradually becomes more solitary and dreary, lies Kenilworth.

With Sir Walter Scott’s captivating book in my hand I wandered amid these ruins, which call up such varied feelings. They cover a space of more than three-quarters of a mile in circumference, and exhibit, although in rapid decay, many traces of great and singular magnificence.

The oldest part of the castle, built in 1120, still stands the firmest, while the part added by Leicester is almost utterly destroyed. The wide moat which formerly surrounded the castle, and around which stretched a park of thirty English miles in circuit, was dried up in Cromwell’s time, in the hope of finding treasure in it. The park, too, has long disappeared, and is now changed into fields, on which are some scattered cottages. A part of the castle, standing isolated and almost hidden under creeping plants, is transformed into a kind of out-work; and the whole surrounding country has a more barren, deserted and melancholy aspect than any part we have travelled through. But this harmonizes well with the character of the principal object, and enhances the saddening effect of greatness in such utter decay.

The balcony called Elizabeth’s Bower is still standing; and the tradition goes, that in moonlight nights a white figure is often seen there looking fixedly and immovably into the depth below. The ruins of the banqueting-hall, with the gigantic chimney-piece, the extensive kitchen, and the wine-cellar beneath, are still clearly distinguishable; and many a lonesome chamber may still be standing in the towers, to which all access is cut off. The fancy delights in guessing the past by what still remains; and I often dreamed, while climbing among the ruins, that I had found the very spot where the infamous Vernon traitorously plunged the truest and most unhappy of wives into eternal night. But equally lost are the traces of the crimes and of the virtues which lived within these walls; Time has long since thrown his all-concealing veil over them; and gone are the eternally-repeated sorrows and joys, the mouldering splendour, and the transient struggle.

The day was gloomy; black clouds rolled across the heavens, and occasionally a yellow tawny light broke from between them; the wind whistled among the ivy, and piped shrilly through the vacant windows; now and then a stone loosened itself from the crumbling building, and rolled clattering down the outer wall. Not a human being was to be seen; all was solitary, awful;—a gloomy but sublime memorial of destruction.

Such moments are really consolatory:—we feel more vividly than at any other that it is not worth while to grieve and trouble ourselves about earthly things, since sorrow, like joy, lasts but for a moment. As an illustration of the eternal mutation of human affairs, I found myself transported in the evening from the mute and lifeless ruins to the prosaic tumult of a multitude, busied but in gain; in the reeking, smoky, bustling manufacturing town of Birmingham. The last romantic sight was the flames which at night-fall illuminated the town on all sides from the tall chimneys of the iron-works. Here is an end to all sport of the fancy till more fitting time and place.

December 30th.

Birmingham is one of the most considerable and one of the ugliest towns of England. It contains a hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants, of whom two-thirds are doubtless workmen, and indeed, it presents only the appearance of an immeasurable workshop.

Immediately after breakfast I went to the manufactory of Mr. Thomasson, our consul here,—the second in extent. The first,—where a thousand workmen are daily employed, and an eighty-horse power steam-engine is applied to innumerable uses, even in the manufactory of livery buttons and pins’ heads,—has been hermetically sealed to all foreigners ever since the visit of the Austrian princes, one of whose suite carried away some important secret.

I passed several hours here with great interest, though in hideous, dirty, and stinking holes, which serve as the various workshops; and made a button, which R—— will deliver to you as a proof of my industry.

In a better room below are set out all the productions of the manufactory, in gold, silver, bronze, plated, and lackered wares, the latter surpassing their Japan originals in beauty; steel wares of every kind;—all in a profusion and elegance which really excite amazement. Among other things, I saw the copy of the Warwick Vase, of the same size as the original. It is cast in bronze, and cost four thousand pounds. I saw also magnificent table-services in plated ware, brought to such perfection that it is impossible to distinguish it from silver. The great people here often mix it among their plate, as the Paris ladies mix false stones and pearls with their real ones.

I made acquaintance with a multitude of new and agreeable inventions of luxuries in great and small, and could not quite resist the temptation to buy, which is here so powerful. The trifles I bought will soon reach you in a well-packed box.

The iron-works, with their gigantic steam-engines, the needle manufactory, the steel works,—where you find every article from the most delicate scissars to the largest grate, polished like mirrors, with all the intermediate ‘nuances,’—afford agreeable occupation for a day:—but pardon me any further description of them; ‘Ce n’est pas mon mÉtier.’

December 31st:—Sunday.

As the manufactories are at rest to-day, I made an excursion to Aston Hall, the seat of Mr. Watt, where, indeed, there is little to be seen in the way of gardening, but the old house contains many curious portraits. Unfortunately an ignorant porter could give me but little information about them.

There was an extremely fine picture of Gustavus Adolphus, as large as life. The good-nature, dignity and prudence; the clear honest eyes, which yet express much more than honesty; and the gentle, but not the less firm, assurance in his whole aspect,—were in the highest degree attractive. Near to it stood an excellent bust of Cromwell, which I should think a better likeness than the picture at Warwick. It is more consonant with his historic character;—coarse, and, if you will, vulgar features; but a rocky nature in the whole countenance, clearly allied to that dark enthusiasm and demoniac cunning which so truly characterize the man. Two cannon-balls which Cromwell threw into the house, then fortified, and which broke the banisters in two places, are carefully left on the very spot where they fell, and the railing not repaired,—though it has since most stupidly been painted white even in the broken part.

Not to lose a day, as there is nothing to see here but workshops, I intend to set off this evening and travel through the night to Chester. There we shall spend to-morrow in seeing Eaton, Lord Grosvenor’s celebrated seat, of which I wrote you word that Bathiany gave me such a magnificent description, and which, according to all I hear, contains whatever gold can procure. The day after to-morrow I shall return hither, visit some more manufactories, and then go back to Oxford, in the neighbourhood of which are two of the largest parks in England, Blenheim and Stowe.

Chester, January 1st, 1827.

Another year gone! None of the worst to me, except for the separation from you. I lighted the lamp in the carriage and read Lady Morgan’s last novel with great pleasure, while we rolled swiftly over the level road. As soon as the hand reached twelve o’clock, R—— congratulated me on the new year, for myself and for you. In twelve hours more we reached Chester, an ancient ‘baroque’ city.

Though we had gone nineteen German miles in thirteen hours, I find that in England, as well as in France, as you go further from the metropolis you find a general deterioration;—the inns are less excellent, the post-horses worse, the postilions more dirty, the dress of the people generally less respectable, and the air of bustle and business less. At the same time, the dearness increases, and you are subjected to many extortions which, nearer to London, are prevented by the great competition.

The new year set in with unfavourable weather. It rained the whole day. As soon as we had made a little toilet, we hastened to see the wonders of Eaton Hall, of which, however, my expectations were not very high. Moderate as they were, they were scarcely realized. The park and the gardens were, to my taste, the most unmeaning of any of their class I had seen, although of vast extent; and the house excited just the same feeling in me as Ashbridge, only with the difference that it is still more overloaded, and internally far less beautiful, though furnished still more expensively, in patches. You find all imaginable splendour and ostentation which a man who has an income of a million of our money can display; but taste not perhaps in the same profusion. In this chaos of modern Gothic excrescences, I remarked ill-painted modern glass windows, and shapeless tables and chairs, which most incongruously affected to imitate architectural ornaments. I did not find one single thing worth sketching; and it is perfectly inconceivable to me how M. LainÉ, (to whose merits in the embellishment of his country all must do justice,) could, in the Annals of the Berlin Horticultural Society, prefer this to any he had seen; at which indeed his English critics have made merry not a little. M. LainÉ imitated this garden in the one in front of the palace at Potsdam. In his place I should, I confess, have chosen another model; though this style is certainly far better suited to the palace in question than to a Gothic castle. Treasures of art I saw none: the best was a middling picture by West. All the magnificence lay in the gorgeous materials, and the profuse display of money. The drawing-room or library, would, for size, make a very good riding-school. The large portraits of the possessor and his wife, in the dining-room, have little interest, except for their acquaintances. A number of ‘affreux’ little Gothic temples, deface the pleasure-ground, which has, moreover, no fine trees: the soil is not very favourable, and the whole seems laid out in comparatively recent times. The country is rather pretty, though not picturesque, and too flat.

As we had time to spare, we visited the royal castle of Chester which is now converted into an excellent county gaol. The whole arrangement of it seemed to me most humane and perfect. The view from the terrace of the ‘corps de logis,’ in which are the Courts of Justice, down upon the prisoners in their cells, is extremely curious and surprising.

Imagine a high terrace of rock, on which stands a castle with two wings. The ‘corps de logis’ is, as I said, dedicated to the courts, which are very spacious; and the wings, to the prisoners for debt. The court-yard is laid out as a little garden, in which the debtors may walk. Under the court are cells in which the criminals are confined; the further end on the right is appropriated to the women. The cells are separate, and radiate from a centre; the little piece of ground in front of each is a garden for the use of the prisoner, in which he is permitted to walk; before trial his dress is gray; after it, red and green. In each division of the building behind the cells is a large common-room, with a fire, in which the prisoners work. The cells are clean and airy; the food varies with the degree of crime,—the lowest is bread, potatoes and salt. To-day, being new-year’s-day, all the prisoners had roast-beef, plum-pudding, and ale. Most of them, especially the women, became very animated, and made a horrible noise, with hurrahs to the health of the Mayor who had given them this fÊte.

The view from the upper terrace, over the gardens, the prison, and a noble country, with the river winding below, just behind the cells;—on the side, the roofs and towers of the city in picturesque confusion; and in the distance, the mountains of Wales,—is magnificent, and ‘a tout prendre’ our country counsellors of justice (Oberlandes gerichtsrathe) are seldom lodged so well as the rogues and thieves here.

Thank Heaven, we set out on our return to-morrow, for I am quite weary of parks and sights. I am afraid you will be no less so, of my monotonous letters; but as you have said A you must say B, and so prepare for a dozen parks before we reach London.

Meanwhile I send my epistle thither, to afford you at least an interval, and pray God to have you in his merciful and faithful keeping.

Your ever devoted L——.