The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1840-06-05 00:00:00

WATERLOO.

This is the largest and most fashionable bathing-place
within a moderate distance of the town. It is a favourite
summer resort of our Healthier citizens and their families,
who find easy access to it in the several omnibuses, or in
their own vehicles. It is delightfully situated at the northern
extremity of Bootle Bay, has a fine smooth sandy beach,
and is annually increasing i❑ size. There is a direct road to
it across the common, from its southern extremity ; but it is
paved on the sandy soil, and has gone so much out of repair, that
carriages proceed toward Crosby, and turn down to it by a
lane at a right angle. The pedestrian may take the nearer
cut by the marsh, which is now partially enclosed within
rails.

The first object of attraction is the new church, built on
the north-west corner of the marsh, and near to the entrance
to the village. The foundation-stone,. was laid in October
last, and the exterior of the edifice is now completed. It is
built of red freestone, and is of gothic architecture. The
principal front is to. the westward, where it has a tower of
three stories in height, rising to an elevation of fifty-six feet.
.The upper story consists of an ornamental belfry, with two
latticed pointed windows abreast on each side. The whole
is surmounted by an embattled parapet. In the middle of
the tower on the west there is a decorative fineal foliated
cross. Diagonal buttresses support the angles both of the
tower and the church. A staircase on one side, and a vesti-
bule on the other, form wings to the tower. There are six
gothic windows on each side the church, and between them
are boldly-projecting buttresses. A plain uniform parapet
finishes the walls. On each side of the chancel are five-
sided erections projecting from it, one of them forming a
spacious lobby, and the other the vestry-room. Each angle
of these is supported by a buttress, giving the whole a massy
and rich appearance. The church is 64 ft. 2 in. in length,
and 43 ft. 4 in. in width ; the extreme length, including the
tower, being 93 ft.
Waterloo can already boast of several streets, besides the
ranges of original houses facing the sea. There are several
large and commodious inns, particularly the Waterloo and
Wellington Hotels. The former, kept by our townsman
Mr. Towers, together with several cottages, and then called
the " Crosby Sea-bank Cottages and Hotel," were conjointly
built in, I believe, 1826-7, and formed the nucleus whence
the place has sprung into importance. Several houses are
built near the shore to the south of it, but the greater por-
tion of the building is to the north. In front of the Water-
loo, and the detached cottages near it, there is a field or
lawn, with gravel walks sloping to the sea. Beyond these,
on the north, there is a row of more modern and more ela-
borately-finished cottage houses, with flower-plots in front.
The next and most conspicuous range is the " Crescent," a
continuous long range of two.story cottage residences, form-
ing a segment of a circle, and also facing the sea, with grass
and flower-plots railed in in front, and a sloping lawn be-
tween them and the sands below. Each of these cottages
has its neat light veranda in various tastes, and the flowers
are beautiful and thriving. This is a public resort of pro-
menaders or children, riding or playing. The air is delight-
fully exhilarating; the sands below are firm and smooth,
and, when the tide is out, afford extensive walks, or rides in
carriages or on horseback.
The views from Waterloo are extensive, particularly to
the seaward. The shore to the north is edged with sand-
hills, on which, however, the habitations of men continue to
creep out. A portion of the marsh or common also extends
to the north of the village. Part of it is already laid out in
streets at right angles. In one of these, behind the Crescent,
there is a small new " Evangelical Presbyterian Chapel,"
not yet interiorly finished.' It is lighted by an octangular
dome or roof-light. When completed it will accommodate
from 400 to 450 individuals. There are in the village seve-
ral shops, libraries, and billiard-rooms, and at the inns hot
and cold baths.

Northward of the Crescent, and across a part of the com-
mon called the " Warren," there are a number of cottage
houses, called " Brighton," built a few years ago, on the
east side of some more elevated land, which has been en-
closed, and converted (from sand-hills) into a tine smooth
field, sloping to the shore. These have flower-plots in front,
and gardens behind ; and are from their elevated position,
as well as being more •retired, preferred by some parties to
the Crescent itself. They have neat latticed porticos, and
the fronts of several of them are entirely covered with ivy,
woodbine, and other decorative wall-plants.
After visiting a valued friend, who has occupied one of
these houses for some years, and finds in it a grateful solace,
during the summer months, from the cares of active life,
I strolled down the field in front, and seating myself on the
grass, to enjoy at leisure the varied and extensive prospect
that lay before me. I lamented that I had no one near use
to share those pleasurable sensations which it was calculated
to excite. Zimmerman might have written on the charms of
solitude to the present time ; but the love of solitude, ex-
cepting on peculiar occasions, when retirement and self-
communion become a virtue, is at best but a churlish passion,
pardonable only in the ascetic anchorite, or the self-con-
demned recluse. For myself, I never, in the course of my
solitary rambles in foreign countries or at home, came upon
an interesting, a 'beautiful, or a sublime picture from the
pencil of nature, (assisted, as it might be, by that of art);
but I felt one regret, and that was that I had not there friends
of kindred spirit arousal me to whom I could express my
feelings, and enjoy a double gratification by blending my ad-
miration of what 1 behold with theirs. Nay, I would not
have even mine enemy denied the gratification, if such it
would be, of gazing upon scenes which, from their magnitude,
beauty, or peculiarity, would have a tendency to elevate the
mind, to soften the rude asperities of our common nature—
to lead us, in tine, to look " from nature up to nature's
God." _ . . •

Struck with the magnitude and beauty of the scene before
me, in which
Town, hamlet, homestead—all appeared in view;
Th' extended sea, the distant mountains blue,-
1 became wrapped in listless contemplation, from which I

was roused by the gentle sound of footsteps on the sward be-
hind me, and turning round I recognised my esteemed and
long absent friend, Edward E . He as little expected
to meet me there as I did him, but there was nothing remark-
able in the rencounter beyond the coincidence of his advent
at a moment when I longed for a companion in my ramble.
He had returned from the Isle of Man on the previous day,
and had accepted of the invitation of an old friend to spend
the leisure hours of a few days at Waterloo. After our mu-
tual salutations had subsided, we sat down together on the
grass, and began to scan with more curious eye the scene
befoie us.
Northward, at a distance of about two miles and a'half, lay
the Formby Light-ship, moored at an angle of the new chan-
nel, as a guide to mariners. Many vessels were in motion
near it, under sail or steam—some outward, others inward
bound,—to or from Ireland or Scotland, or foreign parts.
The Horse Channel, along the northern coast of the Wirrall
Peninsula, was even more thronged with vessels, the greater
part steering inward ; and the noble expanse of the sea, to-
wards the Isle of Man, so far as the eye could reach, was
studded with vessels. The smoke of the distant steamers
was seen on the horizon in long horizontal lines, though their
hulls were invisible. The far distant ships appeared motion-
less, while the constant movements and mutations of the
nearer gave variety and animation to the picture,—for though
the water from its great expanse appeared to be comparatively
smooth, there was a breeze outside that furrowed it into
waves, and filled every sail. At one time we counted upwards
of a hundred and thirty sail, including steamers, all visible
without turning the head. Many of these were gallant ships
bound on long and perilous voyages to distant shores, on the
passage to which months might roll, while around them no-
thing would be seen but the tractless ocean. This reminded
my friend of the beautiful lines of Dyer : •
" Glide the tall fleet into the widening main,
A floating forest
.; every sail unfurled,
Swells to the wind—"
" Meantime in pleasing course the pilot steers,
Steady, with eye intent upon the steel,
' Steady before the wind the pilot steers,
While gaily o'er the waves the mountain prows
Dance, like a shoal of dolphins, and begin
To streak with various paths the hoary deep.
Yet steady o'er the waves they steer, and now
The fluctuating world of waters wide,
In boundless magnitude, around them swell,
O'er whose imaginary brim, nor towns,
Nor woods, nor mountain tops, nor ought appears,
But Phcebus' orb, refulgent lamp of light,
Millions of leagues aloft."—
Looking southward from the spot where we sat, the circuit
of Bootle Bay is fully embraced, and the smoke-covered town,
overlooked by Everton, has a truly maritime appearance ;
the houses and buildings forming a dark mass, relieved by
domes and towers, spires and lofty chimneys in commingled
proximity,—and the whole terminating on the west in an
apparent point or forest of masts formed by the northern
docks and shipping, the further extremity or boundary of
the bay. When my friend turned towards this portion of
the scene, and beheld, too, the numerons vessels in the river,
the several ferries, thick with houses on the Cheshire side of
the estuary', and the villages and, villas, stretching north-
ward on the Lancashire shore almost to our feet,—the whole
emanating from the industry, enterprise, and wealth of Li-
verpool, and forming, as it were, part and parcel of that
magnificent town, he quoted from a small manual of manu-
script extracts which he carried with him, the following ob-
servations of the celebrated and eloquent Erskine, when
employed on a trial in which the Corporation of the town was
concerned many years ago.
"If I could describe,' said he, "my own feelings, when I
saw Liverpool not many years ago ; if I were capable of
painting to you in words the impression it made on my ima-
gination, it would make a beautiful picture indeed. I had
before and often been in all the seaports in this island
which we inhabit, and believed that having seen Bristol, and
three other towns that justly pass for peat ones, I had seen
every thing in this nation of navigators on which a subject
should pride himself. I own I was astonished and astounded,
when, after passing a distant ferry and ascending a hill which
overlooks the city, I was told by my guide,—` All that you
see spread out beneath you, that immense city which stands
like another Venice upon the waters ; which is intersected by
these numerous docks, which glitters with these cheerful
habitations of well-protected men, which is the busy seat of
trade, and the gay scene of elegant amusements growing out
of its prosperity, where there is the most cheerful face of in-
dustry ; where there are rivers flowing and everything that
can delight a man who wishes to see the property of a great
community, and a great empire ;—all this has been created by
the industry and well-disciplined management of a handful of
men, in a corner of this island, since you were a boy !'—l
must have been (continued Erskine) a stone not to have been
affected by such a picture. This quondam village, which is
now fit to be a proud capital for any empire in the world, has
started up like an enchanted paiace, even in the memory of
living men."
" Such," said my friend, " were the feelings of that dis-
tinguished speaker and scholar, long before the hand of
modern improvement, and the application of additional
wealth had given new and even more imposing features to
our town and its suburbs. What would Erskine have ex-
claimed," he inquired, " had he stood where we now are—
had he seen this noble mercantile fleet, propelled by sail or
steam, covering the extended sea like swans ;—the increase
of the town spreading like a huge Leviathan along the shore,
her numerous new and splendid public: and private edifices,
her widened streets full of gorgeous shops, her noble
steam and sailing ships of increased size, her additional docks,
her railway,—in fine, her general advancement in population
and opulence ! If a man of such susceptibility were astonished
then, he would assuredly be struck dumb now."
The objects of interest before us were not yet exhausted.
To the south-west were seen the several ferries and villages
on the Cheshire shore, from the " Royal Rock" to the Rock
Lighthouse,—Brighton being the nearest, with its houses
perched on the top of a hill or promontory. The eye, ranging
thence westward along the Wirrall coast, descried the Lea-
sowe and Hoylake Lighthouses, and beyond them Hilbre
Island, and the misty embayment, formed by the estuary of
the Dee, between it and the Point of Ayr. If the more im-
mediate view was beautiful, the back-ground partook in a
proportionate degree of the sublime. The whole of the Welsh
mountains, from Mod Fainma'southward, with its monument
commemorative of the battle of Waterloo, to the Ormsheads,
which form a bold headland on the north,—including Pen-
manmaur and other of the Snowdonian range,—rise abrupt
and majestic in the haze of distance, and, by their bulk and
sombre placidity, present a striking contrast to the ships in
the offing, which, though huge as specimens of art, appear
comparatively but as specks. In very clear weather, the
Isle of Man, it is said, is distinctly visible. The rich coun-
try on the east—from the ridge of high ground near Orms-
kirk to Everton, generally undulated and wooded, with vil
!ages, seats, churches, windmills, and other objects—meets
the eye of the spectator, completing a panorama of rural and
commercial life, of sea and land, of natnre and of art, which
it is impossible to behold without feelings of admiration and
delight.
The climate of Waterloo, as indeed of the whole of the
western coast of our county, is remarkably mild, when its
northern latitude and exposure to the sea-breeze are consi-
dered, and it is proverbially salubrious. The soil being light
and friable, the rays of the sun have their full effect, and
flowers and vegetables are here more early than in many of
the interior districts.

We rose to depart. The breeze had considerable fallen,
and the declining sun shone with less intense, but with bril-
liant ruddy ray, gilding in vivid streak the gently rippling
sea. The vessels that had appeared like "white and sheeted
giants," while the sun shone upon their sails between them
and the eye of the spectator, now became dark in the distance,
that luminary shining on the opposite side of them, and
throwing them into the shade. The sea, too, assumed a dif-
ferent aspect, and the mutations we had.witnessed recalled,
as we took a final and lingering view of it, the beautiful lines
of Crabbe

" Turn to the watery world !—but who to thee
(A wonder yet unviewed) shall paint the sea !
Various and vast, sublime in all its forms,
When lulled by zephyrs, or when roused by storms
Its colours changing when the clouds and sun,
Shades after shades upon the surface run ;
Embrowned and horrid now, and now serene,
In limpid blue, and evanescent green ;
And oft the foggy banks on oceanilie,
Lift the far sail, and cheat the experienced eye.
Then the broad bosom of the ocean keeps
An equal motion swelling as it sleeps ;
Then slowly sinking, curling to the strand,
Faint lazy waves o'ercreep the ridgy sand,
Or tap the tarry boat with gentle glow,
And back return i►► silence, smooth and slow.
Ships in the calm seem anchored, for they glide
On the still sea, urged solely by the tide :
Art thou not present this calm scene before,
When all between is sandy length of shore."
CROSBY.

We took our way, in the cool of the evening, to Great
Crosby, a village to the N.N.E., and about a mile ttnd a half
distant, on a slightly elevated site. The tower of the church,
and some high trees, mark its position in the surrounding
champaign country. This village, though small, and the sur-
rounding villas, are the frequent summer resort, as is Water-
loo, of our wealthier inhabitants and others, who hither be-
take themselves after the business of the day. Before en-
tering it, the visiter passes several handsome villas and houses
with gardens, including a range called " Stansfield," and
another, " Belle Vue." There is also a small Catholic Cha-
pel. One of the first houses in the village is an ancient stone
house, facing the west, with a lawn or field in front, sur-
rounded by lofty trees. The village itself is somewhat strag-
gling, but is a clean and lively place, consisting of houses and
cottages, ancient and modern, with gardens, shrubberies, and
fruit trees. The church is a small but neat and somewhat
antique brick building, with a small tower, surmounted at
the corners with ornamental balls or globes, and in the centre
by a large and serviceable weather vane. The church has
three round-topped windows on each side. The parsonage
is a neat cottage house, close by, in the middle of a garden,
and almost covered with pear trees, one of which spreads its
branches even on the roof.
There are two inns, at both of which the omnibuses arrive
from, and depart for, the town, almost every hour of the
day. The intercourse thus maintained is, considering the
smallness of the place, truly astonishing. At the north end
of the village the road diverges to the right, and a triangular
area is formed, in which is the ancient pinfold, enclosed by a
circular wall. Several small houses have recently been built,
and though a few of the inferior clay built
cottages are falling'
into
decay, the village appears to .be in a. prosperous con-
di.

LITTLEttiI w CROSBY.ard,
i:ahamlet of one princi-
About a mile to then o
pal street, with nothing peculiarly attractive ' In the middle
of it there is a stone cross erected, on a pedestal el' ,er a well
and bearing date 1738. Close by are the fine groundsand '
mansion of Crosby Hall, the seat of William Blundell, Esq.
Further on in a north-easterly direction, are the hamlets of
Thornton, Poulton, and others, and about a mile and a halt
from the first, is Ince Blundell, the fine seat, and deeply
wooded grounds of the late Charles Blundell, Esq. The ay
was too far advanced to allow us to proceed so far to visit the
hall, where there is a valuable and interesting collection of
statuary and pictures. We purpose, however, to enjoy that
gratification on an early occasion, and I shall probably no-
tice it in some future sketch.
We retraced our steps to Waterloo, where I took leave of
my friend, who promised, on our next meeting, to furnish
me with some particulars of his trip to the Isle of Man.

THE. BISHOPS.—The fatherßoifshthope
English Bench of Bishops, having
E •
his grace is consequently in the fiftieth year of his Episco-
pate. now, therefore, in the eighty-third year of his age. The
been i
consecrateds
' of Carlisle in 1791, and translated to the see of York in 1807 :
pate. This venerable prelate was born in the year 1757, an
health of this amiable and good man is excellent, his facul-
ties are unimpaired, and he continues to discharge the sacred
duties of his holy calling with unabated zeal and vigour. It
is his grace's intention to hold an ordination at Bishopthorpe,
the Episcopal residence near York, in the course of two or
three weeks. The venerable Bishop of Bath and Wells, Dr.
G. H. Law, is the next oldest bishop, having been conse-
crated to the see of Chester in the year 1812; and the pre-
sent Primate of all England, Dr. Howley, Archbishop of
Canterbury, was consecrated to the metropolitan see of
London in 1813. Dr. Howley, like his venerable brother of
York, has exceeded the eightieth year of his age, living in
health and strength to fulfil his duties with energy and zeal.
This eminently amiable and devoted churchman has suc-
ceeded in a remarkable manner in winning the affection and
regard of all who know him, and it is perhaps not too much
to say, that there never lived a man more universally beloved
than Dr. Howley. The Archbishop of Canterbury has
crowned two Sovereigns of England, and performed the
marriage rite for one, and from his regular habits and vigo-
rous health, he may yet live to baptize the future Sovereign
of this country, should her Majesty fulfil the hopes and de-
sire of her people, and be blessed with a successor to the
crown of this realm.