e in England was built near Bristol by
the late Lord Stawell; but it being judged by his heirs to be too big for
the estate, they are pulling it down and selling the materials.

As the weather grows good, I shall proceed through South Wales to
Chester, from whence you shall soon hear from me, who am without reserve,
sir, your most humble, &c.

FROM CHESTER TO HOLYHEAD.

_Chester_.

SIR,

I crossed the Severn at the ferry of Ash, about ten miles above Bristol,
and got to Monmouth to dinner through a rugged, indifferent country. It
is a pitiful old town, and hath nothing remarkable in it; and from thence
through a fat fertile country I got to the city of Hereford at night.

Hereford is the dirtiest old city I have seen in England, yet pretty
large; the streets are irregular and the houses old, and its cathedral a
reverend old pile, but not beautiful; the niches of the walls of the
church are adorned with the figures of its bishops as big as the life, in
a cumbent posture, with the year of their interments newly painted over.
Some of them are in the twelve hundredth year of Christ. Here they drink
nothing but cider, which is very cheap and very good; and the very hedges
in the country are planted with apple-trees. About three miles from
Hereford in my road to Ludlow I saw a fine old seat called Hampton Court,
belonging to my Lord Coningsby. The plantations on rising grounds round
it give an august splendour to the house, which consists of an oval court
with suitable offices, not unlike an house belonging to the Duke of
Somerset near London; and from thence in a few hours I arrived at Ludlow,
the capital of South Wales, and where the Princes of Wales formerly, and
since them the Presidents of Wales, kept their courts.

Ludlow is one of the neatest, clean, pretty towns in England. The street
by which you enter the town is spacious, with handsome houses
sash-windowed on each side, which leads you by an ascent to the castle on
the left of the top of the hill, and the church on the right, from whence
there runs also another handsome street. The castle hath a very
commanding prospect of the adjacent country; the offices in the outer
court are falling down, and a great part of the court is turned into a
bowling-green; but the royal apartments in the castle, with some old
velvet furniture and a sword of state, are still left. There is also a
neat little chapel; but the vanity of the Welsh gentry when they were