princely residence within. XXXII Chirk village in summer-time is enlivened by innumerable excursion parties on those days of the week when the Castle is thrown open; otherwise it is a dull little place, its only outstanding features that sometime coaching inn, the “Hand,” and the church. The church is made, by the huge and numerous monuments within, to redound greatly to the honour and the glory of the Myddeltons, and the Myddelton-Biddulphs. Among others, two occupy the place on either side of the altar commonly reserved for the Decalogue, those ordinances being stowed away out of sight. The most amazing memorial of all is that to “Sir Richard Myddelton, Bart.,” described as “great in his descent, great in his possessions,” and, it may be added, greatest in his monument. Here we bear sharply to the left, and, crossing an elevated ridge, come to the fringe of the Denbighshire coal-fields at Black Park toll-house, superseded in 1824 by Whitehurst Gate just beyond, commanding not only the Holyhead Road, but that to Cefn, Ruabon, and Wrexham as well, branching off to the right. The Road Commissioners sold the toll-house at Black Park for £10. Crossing the Holyhead Road, just beyond Whitehurst, is Offa’s Dyke itself, that famous boundary called by the Welsh _Clawdd Offa_, and regarded by them for centuries as an insulting mark of Saxon power. This is the point where the early frontiers marched; and England is English still on the hither side, and Wales Welsh on the other, in almost as striking a degree as when the earthen ditch and rampart were raised eleven hundred and fifty years ago. Chirk is thoroughly English; Vron, the next village, no less thoroughly Welsh. The merest trifles serve to show this. Ask the first person on the road what is yonder great structure straddling in the distance across the valley, and, if he be not actually a Welshman come from that direction, he will tell you it is “The Aqueduct.” At Vron, on the other hand, the reply will be that it is “Pont Cysylltau.” English, too, is the roadside conversation heard; immediately exchanged for Welsh on the other side of that old boundary. Offa’s Dyke, cut through as it is by the road, might very easily be missed in this land, where smooth fields are the exception and rugged pastures the rule. Its site is marked distinctly, however, by a farmhouse, named after it, “Plâs Offa,” standing near the road. On the one hand, the Dyke, very like an ordinary hedgerow, with great trees growing on the embankment, may be seen going uphill towards Chirk Castle; on the other it plunges, straight and resolute, steeply down to the river Dee. It is on this side that the Dyke shows at its best, with an embankment in places over ten feet high, and a ditch on its outer side, six feet deep and twelve broad. Offa here built himself a monument more lasting than many of bronze or marble have proved. [Illustration: OFFA’S DYKE.]