CHAPTER VI.
INSTITUTIONS AND PUBLIC BUILDINGS AND PUBLIC SPIRIT OF BIRMINGHAM—KING EDWARD'S SCHOOL—THE TOWN HALL—HOSPITALS, CHURCHES, AND CHAPELS.
AS Birmingham is a young town, growing within the memory of present residents from 50,000 to 300,000 inhabitants, it cannot boast of any monuments of antiquity of impressive date or character. The two or three churches whose inner walls or towers could show a goodly roll of centuries, have been so rebuilt or renovated that they present no venerable aspect. Indeed, excepting a few brick-and-timber buildings of the Elizabethan period, or houses that show their bones flush with their flesh, the town looks almost as American as Chicago. It has only one building that may be called a speciality in the way of architecture—that is the Town Hall. This is the most symmetrical and classical building in England; and looks like one of the grand edifices of ancient Greece transported in all its grace and glory to stand up in the
