painted a shiny brown and of no great merit of design, fills out the vacant dulness of the little square in much the same way as his massive personality occupies with just a margin for Garrick the record of his native place."

Near Lichfield was the little cell of the hermit Saint Chad. Defoe expresses it with naïveté: "He lived an eremitical life here, by the spring, near Stow church, in a little hovel or cell."

Speaking of Lichfield, Edward FitzGerald says, in a letter: "I love a small cathedral town, and the dignified respectability of the church potentates is a part of the pleasure!" Dean Launcelot Addison seemed to come quite close to us at Lichfield, where his arms are carved in stone over the door at the side, which was built during his administration.

CHAPTER XI

T

THE VALE OF CONWAY

AKING a train from Chester to Con. way may in itself be an experience. After chasing up and down the length

of the platform, looking for seats in the train, we had almost decided that we could get no accommodations at all. The first three cars were empty; but it was decreed that they should be removed. They were not to go, so removed they were. Then it was decided that three more cars should be added in place of those already taken off, so a detachment of cars started from the opposite side of the station, backed down the line, went forward to another switch, and finally backed on to the front of the train, exactly to the place whence the three original cars had been taken away. Just what class of cerebration it was that determined upon thus passing twenty minutes in changing cars, I do not pretend to know. At last we obtained seats excellent seats and arrived. in a surprisingly short time at Conway, one of

the most fascinating towns I know. Truly did the fusty old poet, Thomas Churchyard, feel the sentiment which he tried to express, when he wrote:

"Behold but Wales, and note the castles there,
And you shall find no such works anywhere,
So old, so strong, so costly, and so high;
Not under sun is to be seen with eye!"

We began an immediate attack upon the antiquities with which the town is replete. Of course, the " sight" of primary importance is the castle. It is a singularly satisfactory ruin, composing in the most charming manner, with its group of fine grey turrets and imposing battlements. It is just sufficiently broken down to be a defined ruin, and yet every room is there, lacking only the floors and roofs. The colour, a soft rich grey, is in the most delightful contrast to the deep green in which it is set among the hills, rising almost directly from the shore.

The castle was built about 1284, under Edward I, by the architect Henry Elreton, who also built Carnarvon. A great Christmas feast was given in 1291 to celebrate the completion of the castle. The old writer Pennant observes: "A more beautiful fortress never arose." I