but the tide for Watergate Street has ebbed away, and now flows in other and more favoured channels. Still, as we shall presently see, this Street is not behind any of its neighbours in absorbing interest. You will perceive that, like Eastgate Street, it has the Cestrian characteristic on either side,—its high-level Row. The one upon the right hand, adjoining St. Peter’s Church, is, perhaps, as good a specimen as we have now left to us of the “Rows” of the last century. Had we the time to spare, a ramble along this Row, and a hole-and-corner visit to the numerous alleys that intersect it, would convince the most sceptical that there is more in Chester than meets the eye. But we must away,—for see! here is an odd-looking tenement, on the other side the street, inviting our attention. Two hundred years ago that house was in the pride of youth, and the residence of a family of “some rank and standing,” as is evidenced by the armorial bearings carved on one of the beams; but, as somebody or other (Longfellow, we believe), has justly enough observed, “it is not always May!”, in proof of which this house has of late years been occupied as a sausage shop, and now shelters the defenceless head of a barber. Small and low are the rooms of this house—absurdly so to the critic of the present generation; and so contracted is the ceiling of the Row at this point, that no man of ordinary stature can pass along without stooping. Is it not a quaint old spot? Look up at yon inscription on the cross-beam. Tradition avers that this house was the only one in the city that escaped the plague, which ravaged the city during the seventeenth century. In gratitude for that deliverance, the owner of the house is said to have carved upon the front the words we are now reading— 1652. GOD’S PROVIDENCE IS MINE INHERITANCE. 1652. [Picture: God’s Providence House, Water Gate Street]