with a bugle turned upwards to receive the eleemosynary pence and
half-pence of the passengers. I gave one of them, the other day, a
silver fourpence, which fell into the vitals of the instrument, and
compelled the man to take it to pieces.

At Rock Ferry there was a great throng, forming a scene not unlike one of
our muster-days or a Fourth of July, and there were bands of music and
banners, and small processions after them, and a school of charity
children, I believe, enjoying a festival. And there was a club of
respectable persons, playing at bowls on the bowling-green of the hotel,
and there were children, infants, riding on donkeys at a penny a ride,
while their mothers walked alongside to prevent a fall. Yesterday, while
we were at dinner, Mr. B. came in his carriage to take us to his
residence, Poulton Hall. He had invited us to dine; but I misunderstood
him, and thought he only intended to give us a drive. Poulton Hall is
about three miles from Rock Ferry, the road passing through some pleasant
rural scenery, and one or two villages, with houses standing close
together, and old stone or brick cottages, with thatched roofs, and now
and then a better mansion, apart among trees. We passed an old church,
with a tower and spire, and, half-way up, a patch of ivy, dark green, and
some yellow wall-flowers, in full bloom, growing out of the crevices of
the stone. Mr. B. told us that the tower was formerly quite clothed with
ivy from bottom to top, but that it had fallen away for lack of the
nourishment that it used to find in the lime between the stones. This
old church answered to my Transatlantic fancies of England better than
anything I have yet seen. Not far from it was the Rectory, behind a deep
grove of ancient trees; and there lives the Rector, enjoying a thousand
pounds a year and his nothing-to-do, while a curate performs the real
duty on a stipend of eighty pounds.