They would have been welcomed with a splendid reception from the Mayor and Corporation and inhabitants of the great northern seaport, had not the weather broken, and had not torrents of rain poured down without ceasing, veiling everything and everybody in the densest fog. Still the Queen persisted in proceeding with the appointed programme, and, good-naturedly determined to make the best of the unpropitious elements, she visited the eastern and southern districts of the town, inspected the docks by land, viewed them from the Mersey from the deck of the _Fairy_, and made a return progress through the central and northern streets, which by this time were one sea of mud, where, however, patient and loyal crowds stood waiting to cheer their Sovereign and her family as they passed. “We proceeded,” writes her Majesty, “to the Council Room, where we stood on a throne, and received the addresses of the Mayor and Corporation, to which I read an answer, and then knighted the Mayor, Mr. Bent, a very good man.” What seems to have pleased the Queen most was her visit to St. George’s Hall, a building which she enthusiastically described as “being worthy of ancient Athens.” Here she had to step out on the balcony and stand in the rain bowing her acknowledgments to the vast crowd who stood cheering with undamped ardour in the street below. From Liverpool the Queen and her party, attended by Lady Ellesmere, the Duke of Wellington, Lord and Lady Westminster, and Lord and Lady Wilton, proceeded in a barge along the Bridgwater Canal to Worsley Hall, the seat of Lord Ellesmere. The barge was towed by four horses, and whilst one half was covered in, over that part which was open an awning was stretched. “The boat,” writes the Queen, “glided along in a most noiseless and dream-like manner amidst the cheers of the people who lined the sides of the canal.” At Worsley Hall the Queen met Mr. Nasmyth, the inventor of the steam-hammer, and she seems to have been greatly delighted with his conversation, and fascinated by his drawings and maps explaining his investigations into the geography of the moon. The evening, indeed, was devoted mainly to scientific conversation, this ascetic turn being given to it by the arrival of the news that the first great submarine telegraph cable had been successfully laid between Dover and Calais. Next day, the 10th of October, the weather brightened, and the Royal party visited Manchester, the working people of the town turning out in holiday garb to welcome their Sovereign. “A very intelligent but painfully unhealthy-looking population they all were, men as well as women”--such is the Queen’s description of her hosts. In the Peel Park, Salford, her reception by 82,000 school children of all sects and creeds, and their singing of the National Anthem, appear to have surprised and impressed her profoundly. She also remarked “the beautifully dressed” Mr. Potter, the Mayor of