The attache
is a credible and honorable fellow, and talks of these matters as if he
positively believed them. But Ghostland lies beyond the jurisdiction of
veracity.
In a garden near Chester, in taking down a summer-house, a tomb was
discovered beneath it, with a Latin inscription to the memory of an old
doctor of medicine, William Bentley, who had owned the place long ago,
and died in 1680. And his dust and bones had lain beneath all the merry
times in the summer-house.
December 1st.--It is curious to observe how many methods people put in
practice here to pick up a halfpenny. Yesterday I saw a man standing
bareheaded and barelegged in the mud and misty weather, playing on a
fife, in hopes to get a circle of auditors. Nobody, however, seemed to
take any notice. Very often a whole band of musicians will strike up,--
passing a hat round after playing a tune or two. On board the ferry,
until the coldest weather began, there were always some wretched
musicians, with an old fiddle, an old clarinet, and an old verdigrised
brass bugle, performing during the passage, and, as the boat neared the
shore, sending round one of their number to gather contributions in the
hollow of the brass bugle. They were a very shabby set, and must have
made a very scanty living at best. Sometimes it was a boy with an
accordion, and his sister, a smart little girl, with a timbrel,--which,
being so shattered that she could not play on it, she used only to
collect halfpence in.
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