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Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 1804-1864

"Passages from the English Notebooks, Volume 2."



ORMSKIRK CHURCH.

It stands on a gentle eminence, sufficient to give it a good site, and
has a pavement of flat gravestones in front. It is doubtless, as regards
its foundation, a very ancient church, but has not exactly a venerable
aspect, being in too good repair, and much restored in various parts; not
ivy-grown, either, though green with moss here and there. The tower is
square and immensely massive, and might have supported a very lofty
spire; so that it is the more strange that what spire it has should be so
oddly stuck beside it, springing out of the church wall. I should have
liked well enough to enter the church, as it is the burial-place of the
Earls of Derby, and perhaps may contain some interesting monuments; but
as it was all shut up, and even the iron gates of the churchyard closed
and locked, I merely looked at the outside.
From the church, a street leads to the market-place, in which I found a
throng of men and women, it being market-day; wares of various kinds,
tin, earthen, and cloth, set out on the pavements; droves of pigs; ducks
and fowls; baskets of eggs; and a man selling quack medicines,
recommending his nostrums as well as he could.


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