wrought iron gate, with link extinguishers to the side posts, and a small but overgrown garden of shrubs, behind which lurks a thatched cottage where lives a widow--Lady This or That, the mother of the present baronet who resides three miles off at the park. There is the rectory, with its back to the street, and windows so low that the passers-by can see in--or could till they were furnished with twisted cane screens. But then the other side of the parsonage looks into the most charming of gardens, on what was the city wall, whence a glorious view is obtained. But the space would fail me were I to describe, or merely indicate, the various houses of people, some professional, some retired gentry, some retired tradespeople, in a country town, all speaking of comfort, ease, and peace. Thus wrote Horace Walpole in 1741, on his return to England from Italy--"The country-town (and you will believe me, who you know am not prejudiced) delights me; the populousness, the ease, the gaiety, the well-dressed everybody amaze me. Canterbury--which on my setting out I thought deplorable--is a paradise to Modena, Reggio, Parma, etc. I had before discovered that there was nowhere but in England the distinction of _middling people_; I perceive now that there is peculiar to us _middling houses_;--how snug they are!" [Illustration: House at Launceston: Queen Anne Town House.] How sleepy the dear old country town is on all days of the week save market-day. The shopkeepers do not think it necessary to remain behind their counters, but run across the street or the square to have a chat with each other, and should a purchaser appear, it interrupts a gossip where two or three tradesmen are together; or if the purchaser goes into a deserted shop, he has to wait whilst the owner is fetched from some neighbour's, whither he has gone to discuss the new scheme for water supply, or the bad quality of the gas. Every squire's carriage, every parson's trap of the neighbourhood is known to every one in the town; and should one come in on a day that is not market-day, the reason of its appearance is a subject of much conjecture and discussion.