Читать книгу The History of Oswestry онлайн

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—“Shoot folly as it flies,

And catch the living manners as they rise.”

Mr. Robert Cruikshank, pleased with the rich and diversified scenery of the neighbourhood of Oswestry, undertook to illustrate the present book. To be thus pictorially aided was a distinction, and I therefore cheerfully complied with the wish of the respectable publisher, to try my “’prentice hand” at a History of the Borough. Mr. Cruikshank has well executed his task. What may be my portion of merit will be determined by the judgment, not critically severe, I hope, of my readers.

The History of Oswestry and its neighbourhood is, however, worthy of a more elaborate and carefully-wrought volume than that which I now send forth; and I should have been glad had some pen, abler than my own, been employed in the completion of so desirable a work. Oswestry is not deficient in the talent or learning necessary to produce a voluminous history; but until the historic mantle fall upon some kindred spirit, that can evoke with magic skill the dramatis personæ and chequered incidents of bye-gone ages, and beguile his readers with beautiful delineations of his native hills and vallies, the good citizens of Oswestry must, I fear, content themselves with the present volume, whose chief excellence, if it possess any, may be found to consist in supplying a collection of interesting facts, connected with the town and district, hitherto dispersed through many publications.