Page:First impressions of England and its people.djvu/53

Rh shone: but York is essentially an ancient city still. One may still walk round it on the ramparts erected in the times of Edward the First, and tell all their towers, bars, and barbacans; and in threading one's way along antique lanes, flanked by domiciles of mingled oak and old brick-work, that belly over like the sides of ships, and were tenanted in the days of the later Henrys, one stumbles unexpectedly on rectories that have their names recorded in Doomsday Book, and churches that were built before the Conquest. My first walk through the city terminated, as a matter of course, at the cathedral, so famous for its architectural magnificence and grandeur. It is a noble pile,—one of the sublimest things wrought by human hands which the island contains. As it rose gray and tall before me in the thickening twilight,—for another day had passed, and another evening was falling,—I was conscious of a more awe-struck and expansive feeling than any mere work of art had ever awakened in me before. The impression more resembled what I have sometimes experienced on some solitary ocean shore, o'erhung by dizzy precipices, and lashed high by the foaming surf; or beneath the craggy brow of some vast mountain, that overlooks, amid the mute sublimities of nature, some far-spread uninhabited wilderness of forest and moor. I realized better than ever before the justice of the eulogium of Thomson on the art of the architect, and recognized it as in reality

It was too late to gain admission to the edifice, and far too late to witness the daily service; and I was desirous to see not only the stately temple itself, but the worship performed in it. I spent, however, an hour in wandering round it,—in marking the effect on buttress and pinnacle, turret and arch, of the still