saw of their moral and social relation to the masses of the people. The contrast between the multitudes that now visit them in their season and the boisterous, brutalized squads that used to flock to the Sunday cherry fairs to drink, fight, and carouse; the difference between the Penny Readings in Lord Stamford's temporary ball-room, and the improved diversions which our landlord invented as a substitute for coarser sports, were very impressive, and we dwelt upon them with great satisfaction. Truly few flowering plants in those gardens had been more radically changed by culture than have been the habits of the common people who have walked those perfumed aisles and breathed in their softening influence since they were first opened so generously to the public.
After dinner we took leave of our hospitable and intelligent landlord, and resumed our way to Wolverhampton. The weather was inauspicious for seeing the country, which under the sun of the preceding day must have shown well to the traveller. We passed Himley Park, the family seat of the Ward family, and where the dowager Lady Ward now resides. The first Humble, founder of the family, was buried here. It is a great estate of remarkably variegated surface; indeed the park wall on the turnpike road seemed long enough to make of the sides of one
