Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1891-04-09

ever l entered into Birmingham
towne. This street as | remember
is called Dirtey. In it dwell smiths
and cutters, or there is brooke
that dividith this street from
Bingham and it is Hamlet or
Member belongings to the parish
There is at the end of
Dlrtey a proper chappell and
a mansion house Of tymber hard
and ripe as the brooke runneth
downe, and as | went through the
ford by the bridge the water ran
down on the right hand and few
miles below goeth into Tarne.
ripa dextra. This brooke above
Dirtey breaketh into two armes
that a little beneath the bridge
close again. This brooke risith,
as some say, 4 or ) miles above
Birmingham towards Black Hills.
The beauty Of Birmingham, a
good market toWne, in the extreme
parts of WarWiCkshire, is one
street going out alonge, almost
from the left ripe of the brooke
up a meane hill, by the length Of
d quarter of a mile. I saw but
one Parrock church in the towne
There be many smiths in the
toWne that used to make knives
and all manour Of cutting tooles
and many Ioriners that make
bites and a great many MAYORS.
Soc that a great part of the towne
is maintained by smiths who have
their iron and sea-cole out of
Staffordshire." Such is the quaint
yet truthful picture Of Birming-
ham by Leland nearly 800 years
ago. The mansion house Of
tymber" yet stands with dozens Of
others showing ancient quaintness.
Birmingham is yet an old English
market town and much of Le-
lands picture of dry antiquity
clings TO it and its suburbs. The
present appearance of the town to
an American is that of a host
of low brick houses hnddlcd in to
files with winding crook
ed paths between them. The
houses are low, tWo-story, built Of
red brick and begrimed with
blackened SCOT Ger and DER"
From the slate roofs the chimneys
project and emit volumes of black
smoke which covers the city in d
pail Of bIackness-a night of fog
which steals into ones eyes and
has no respect even for lungs.
Soft coal is burned in open fire
CRATES and people have lived and
died here and never once seen a
stove. The houses are so irreg-
ular and angular that one would
think that every man in Birming-
ham had built his house on a
corner SO that he could watch his
neighbor from every side. The
old court yard behind the house
has not left the city yet. The
modern buildings show new and
splendid architecture which will
stand the test of time. Someone
said that Washington was a city
of "magnihcent distances" but it
can we'll be written OF Birmingham
that it is city Of small spaces.
It's streets-oh what streets, their
number is legion It has probably
the shortest in the world and
some are more than a mile long.
The streets are crooked curved
and angular, They widen out and
narrow at pleasure. Medically
they have structures and
Most Of them are
paved with rough stone and to
speak mildly there is a sound Of
reveIry by night and day from
the ponderous English vehicles
which roll like thunder over them.
Scarcely a park is seen in the city
and the few yards are generally
large enough for two small child
rem to play carefully in. Cabs
and hansoms, omnibusses and
steam street cars carry on the
city traffic. With such an irreg-
city and crooked narrow streets it
is difficult to build street cars,
But the English woman needs not
means of transport but her own
feet. She walks with a vigor
that would put many American
women to shame. A few miles
seems nothing to an English
woman to walk. However she
walks with a real sensible shoe on.
It fits her foot of course but it
does not squeeze every drop of
blood out of her foot and say not
d red gIobuIe shall enter. The
shoe heel does not come to a point
like a needle, exactly, but is at
least as large as the natural heel.
Birmingham is what might be
called a back" town so far as
Americans are concerned. In