*** For objects of interest, angling stations, and hotels, see first Route.
CHAPTER I.
Preliminary Observations.—Preparations for a Tour.—Rail to Shrewsbury.—Battlefield Church.—Chirk.—The Castle.—Brynkinalt.—Viaducts and Aqueducts.—A Delightful Walk.—Llangollen.
“Like brethren now do Welshmen still agree
In as much love as any men alive;
The friendship there and concord that I see
I doe compare to bees in honey hive,
Which keep in swarme, and hold together still,
Yet gladly showe to stranger great good will;
A courteous kinde of love in every place
A man may finde, in simple people’s face.”Churchyard.
Various, as the features of human nature, are the sources of human happiness. Some derive their choicest pleasure from historical accounts of men who lived in by-gone ages, and in re-creating events that have long since been engulphed in the abyss of time,—breaking down the barrier of intervening years, and mingling, in idea, with those who were once deemed the glorious of the earth, who now lie blended with its grossest atoms, or are confounded with the purer elements. Some, parching with the thirst of knowledge, seek to slake the fever of their minds with most laborious research; explore the utmost regions of the globe to find a shorter marine passage; or pierce into its depths to seek for treasures which only exist in their heated fancies. The vast ocean is fathomed to satisfy the ruling principle of their natures,—curiosity; and the realms of air traversed with the same motive to insure the universally desired result, self-gratification. While some, leaving the elements to perform the destined changes, are willing to agree with the poet, who in the warmth of his philanthropy exclaims:
“The proper study of mankind is man;”
and among this class of beings the author of these pages may be ranked, although he willingly confesses nature has the power of charming him in her most minute as in her most stupendous works, from the curious and confined instinct of the ant and of the bee to the wonderful and exhaustless energies of the human mind,
“That source
Whence learning, virtue, wisdom, all things flow.”
The court, the city, and the country, present an endless variety of subjects for contemplation; and the latter being the region of delight to those whose business confines them to the metropolis for the winter months, the author of this volume is anxious to be thought a useful and amusing companion to such tourists who, in pursuit of health and the charms of nature, may wander
“In the Welsh vales ’mid mountains high.”