It is a large village, or townlet, situate at the foot of the Mendip Hills, in Somersetshire, and lying pleasantly sheltered on the south-west side of that bleak and naked chain. The noble tower of its fine old church is richly adorned with double buttresses, pinnacles, and pierced parapets, and in the open space, which forms the centre of its few irregular streets, is an ancient hexagonal market cross, where the wayfarer may find a shelter from the hot suns of July, or from the heavy rains of winter. The neighbourhood of Cheddar is romantic: it commands a fine view, in one direction, over a rich and extensive level; and it is immediately surrounded by rich, well-watered pastures, always verdant. Within a mile of the market cross before mentioned, on the road to Wells, there is a narrow, but a stupendous pass, or chasm, by which the chain of the lofty hills of Mendip is cleft, as it were, in sunder. The road winds through the bottom of this strange defile; the cliffs rise on either side--ragged, scarped, and terrific in their aspect--presenting, in many places, a sheer fall of four hundred feet. Nothing can more sublimely impress the spirit of a lonely traveller than the passage of this wild ravine, on a day of cloud, and gloom, and rushing winds. In the sunny calm of summer, when the wild pink, springing from the crevices of the rocks, adorns the scene with something of gentleness, it is still of uncommon grandeur. Black yews project from the larger fissures: here is a narrow ledge covered with verdure; there a thick mantle of ivy clothes the summit: here the mountain ash slants forward in its fantastic growth; while yet, in many places, the craggy front is naked and dazzling as a wall of stone. By this road, once a week, the quiet parson ambled on an old grey horse to the fair city of Wells to refresh and recreate his spirit at a private music meeting in the Close; nor did he ever omit on these occasions to pass one hour of joy and praise in its magnificent cathedral. Upon the breezy summits of the Mendip hills, which bordered this road, he spent many serene and healthful hours. His life was most even in its tenour; and the scenes around him, though daily before his eyes, were as dear to him, or more so, than when, first entering on residence, he had surveyed them with grateful rapture. Villages, however, like kingdoms, have their revolutions; and the chronicles of them are preserved in chimney-corners with more or less of fidelity, according to the interest of the events and the worth of the characters who figured in them.