The National tribune., 1883-11-22
Y0RkSBIRET0L0ND0N
A Cathedral TOwn---A Black Country
Indeed---An Ancient Charity.
Special Correspondence National Tribune.

Special Correspondence National Tribune.
LONDON, ENGLAND, October 10, 1888
Since leaving Bradford I have crossed Eng
land from Yorkshire to London via Chester
and Gloucester, with passing glance at Mer-
thyr-Tydvil and a Sunday ia quaint old Here
ford. As write this hasty resume of my recent
travels a quick vision of each place mentioned
rises before my minds eye, and / see Chester
with its disappointing cathedral that has been
made famous in America because it is on the
way between Liverpool and London, and is,
therefore, usually the first cathedral which
Americans see in England. The ancient Ches-
ter wall, too. is not easily forgotten, on which
yon may walk, overlooking the city, the valley,
and the river Dee, until you come to the little
tower whence poor King Charles watched the
rout of his army by Cr0mwells men. In
Chester CITY it is hard to think with respect of
the Puritans, for to them is due the destruction
of mnch of the cathedrafs beauty. And the
single little episode of the kings watching his
own defeat, in the defeat OF his soldiers, appeals
keenly to the imagination and enlists short
lived sympathy with the royalist SIDE Ches-
ters narrow Streets lined with shops in queer
two-storied verandahs, are like nothing else.
Chester light-cakes for sale in dark little holes
of shops, look tempting, and smell more so;
and | have a vivid recollection Of a group OF
gypses who sat drinking tea in the cayernous
half-undergrouBd shop In which l waited
while my light-cake was Drowned on grid
die over glowing Goals that lighted the broad,
dusty, low -ceiled place far more than its one
small window could do. Perhaps the shop
was built in the days of the window-tax. 1t
looked quite old enough for that. Chester
light-cakes are made of muiiin batter-Engllsh
muffin batter-and baked as we bake buck
wheats But, properly, they are not Drowned
G.+T4nIoyy tbaf fa
neat maid should carry them home and give
them final toasting before 5 o'clock tea
Chester is rich IN houses which look so old, so
roomy and COSY and full of unpretentious COM
fort that to think of o'clock tea is to suffer a
momentary pang of regret at not being a COM
Portable old maid, with an open fire, a tea kettle,
| a neat maid and sleek cat in such Chester
/ house.
| Very different is the memory of Merthyr-
! Tydvil, where nothing is quaint but the head
waiter of the Castle Inn. This yhite-hared,
rosy-faced kind old man is the only CHEEKY
/ person whom / could find III region so desc
/ late that it haunts me most painfully, though
! / would gladly Danish it, not from my memory
only, but from all earthly existence.
THE WELSH MINING DISTRICT
Merthyr is in the heart of the Welsh mining
district. and all the surface of the surrounding
country is buried under mountains of Stag
and cinder waste from vast works that stand
! in the midst of the mines There are to be
seen all the horrors of the Black country, but
none of its better features. Tye-Waste Grad
/ ley and Halesowen are passing away under an
| administration of the school law which is
putting the children upon better plane than
the plane Of their parents, but in Merthyr the
! compulsory law is dead letter. Children
play in the street through school hours unmo
| Tested. The factory act is more valuable, for
it has been enforced and made to reduce the
number of women employed in the Dowlai:
| works to one thousand and 70 keep these above
/ ground. The position of this army of women
! however, IS still most degraded. All the uu
skilled kinds of labor Ito their lot in thi;
tremendous establishment The weather wher
| we visited the Dowlais works was weather
which emphasized the misfortunes of tht
women who work in the open air through al
the inelemency Of the English year. A heavy
rain was failing-a steady, RELENTLESS rain
! which gave no promise of speedy clearing;
dirty rain, moreover, for the sky which it lef
was soiled with the smoke of thousand chin
! neys, and the air through which it fell wa!
| heavy with SCOT and CRIME, and the soil int
! which it sank formed greasy, Shiny mud
| black with the refuse OF mines and forges, ani
sticky because its chief normal ingredient i
brick clay. It was a day TO spend before
| bright wood fire in a CHEEKY room, with book
| at hand, aud fancy work, and friend to cha
| with. But the women that we saw in tht
| Dowlais works know no bright wood fires, ~
cheery rooms, no fancy work; they have no
learned the restfulness of friendly chat. Al
day long through rain and mud and cold
they stand in open cars throwing heavy fire
brick into great heaps; they shovel iron ore
they carry steel rails on their shoulders; thei
clothes are black with coal DUST or red will
iron rust, or stiff with heavy brick-clay soils
their faces are bold, or suilen, or so dejectet
that to look upon them is to carry away a deel
and lasting sorrow for them. They are il
paid, i'll clothed, i'll housed i'll fed, i'll taught
They look back upon drudgery, they look for
ward to toll. There is no brightness in thei
lives. If they drink heavily and steadily, it i
not easy to believe that the blame of thei
brutal lives rests, in Gods eye with them
selves. In Merthyr there is no good Sir Titus
Salt building schools aud baths and wash
houses. opening play grounds, founding insti
| tutes. There is no Manchester Museum pro
ject, no cheap music movement We drove 70
miles between monotonous rows of squalit
houses, where no plants grew in the windows
where puny children swarmed on the side
walk, not playing lively as healthy children
should, but dawdling about, needless of TIL
rain, Indifferent to our inspection, without tn
usual curious interest of children in watchin.
strangers. 1t is horrible blot upon the mem
oAJ vi a i1fippJ spGlib III
visit to Merthyr. The last episode in the visi
was an attempt to talk with haIfstarye
little girl who was walking along the road i
school hours. She would not confess to speak
. ing English, but answered my questions i
Welsh. Keeping her engaged, however, i
this unintelligible conversation, succeeded i
! escorting her through a tangled network Of ii
smelling courts to her home, which was No
the wretched cabin / expected to find, but tn
fever hospital.
PLEASING CONTRAST
, Where in the civilized world are such cor
trasts to be found as here in England, th
bonniest summer land in all the world u
! Carlyle, writing to Emerson from Yorkshir,
! called his temporary dwelling place Thi
a most beautiful and very ugly country" H
! might have included the whole island in h
: phrase Nothing more hideous than the Mel
! thyr and Dowlais region can be conceived nc
3 anything more quantity charming than Her,
ford, quaintest of English cathedral town
Yet two hours ride by rail brought us fror
!, Merthyr to Hereford, which we reached on til
D first day of autumn, autumn, with stron
f autumnal wind blowing, a clear sky spreadin
v above us, feel1ed with swiftly sailing cloud
9 tie traces of the recent storm visible only
/, the first fallen leaves that strewed the cath'
l,n1 .tx Nlzs II