roduction, condemned to spend a
few hours here with nothing to do, may easily pass the time pleasantly in
hunting out picturesque bits of river scenery, or even in chucking pebbles
into the stream, instead of drinking sherry negus he does not want, or poking
about the dull streets of a modern town, while all the respectable
inhabitants are lost in wonder "who that strange man in the white hat is."
The manufactures of Shrewsbury are not very important; thread, linen, and
canvas, and iron-works in the neighbouring suburb of Coleham; a considerable
and ancient trade is carried on in Welsh flannel and cloths from the
neighbouring counties of Denbigh, Montgomery, and Merioneth, and markets and
fairs are held for the benefit of the rich agricultural district around, in
which, besides fine butter, cheese, poultry, and live stock, a large
assemblage of the blooming, rosy, broad-built Shropshire lasses show the
advantage of a mixture of Welsh and English blood.

But Shrewsbury is most famous for its school, its cakes, its ale, and the
clock mentioned by Falstaff, for which on our last visit we found an
ingenuous Frenchman industriously searching.

The royal free grammar school, endowed by Edward VI., was raised, by the
educational talents of the late Dr. Butler, afterwards Bishop of Lichfield
and Coventry, to a very high position among our public schools; a position
which has been fully maintained by the present master, Dr. Kennedy.

As for the cakes and ale, they must be tasted to be appreciated, but not at
the same time.

In the history of England and Wales, Shrewsbury plays an important part.

It is supposed that the town was founded by the Britons of the kingdom of
Powis, while they were yet struggling with the Saxons, or rather the Angles,
for the midland counties, and, it is probable, was founded by them when they
found Uttoxeter (the Uriconiam of the Romans), no longer tenable. On the
conquest of the town by the Anglo-Saxons it received the name of Scrobbes-
byrig; that is to say Scrub-burgh, or a town in a scrubby or bushy district,
and, in the Saxon Chronicle, Scrobbesbyrig-scire is mentioned, now corrupted
or polished into Shropshire. Ethelfleda, whose name we have so often had
occasion to mention as the builder of castles and churches, founded the
collegiate church of St. Alkmund; and Athelstan established a mint here. It
is evident that the "Athelstan the Unready," mentioned in Ivanhoe, must have
very much dege