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A good supper and a comfortable bed made amends for the bad dinner and the cold ride, and in the morning I arose much refreshed, and sallied forth to view the town.

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Walk to Montford Bridge—The Severn—An agreeable companion—Delights of a Tourist—Histrionic Ambition—Wittington—The Castle—The Church—Curious Epitaphs.

“Oh Wittington, among thy towers

Pleas’d did my early childhood stray,

Bask’d on thy walls in sunny hours

And pull’d thy moss and pluck’d thy flowers

Full many a truant day.”

FITZ-GWARINE.

After breakfasting at the inn, I, like the honorable Dick Dowlass, with my wardrobe on my back, and a light heart, proceeded on the road to Chirk.

The Severn, to the right, winded beautifully towards the ancient town I left behind. Bees hummed—birds sang—and blossoms sent forth their fragrance to delight the traveller as he gaily trudged “the footpath way.” Cheerfulness was above, beneath, around me, and in my heart. I paused upon the bridge at Montford, to take a lingering farewell of the sweet flowing Severn, its wooded banks and meadows gay; and was about to commence a sublime soliloquy, when I was accosted by an elderly personage in a straw hat, fustian shooting coat, knee-breeches, gaiters and shoes. He had a stout cudgel in his hand, and a knapsack, more capacious than mine, strapped across his shoulders. He appeared to be about fifty-five years of age, and being furnished like myself, it struck me that a passing traveller might naturally enough take us for father and son.