The town was alive with the bustle of an election; flags and streamers were floating over every tavern-sign and public building. Men, women and children crowded the streets, flushed with the excitement of party rivalry, while the continual pealing of the bells added a vivacity and liveliness to the scene, of which an American, who has never heard the merry ding-dong of a full peal of bells, can form no adequate conception. By five o’clock that afternoon, the polls closed, and the ceremony of chairing the successful candidates took place. First came a band of music, playing lively airs; next followed the members elect, richly dressed, with ribbons on their hats, and seated on chairs wreathed with flowers and ribbons, and surrounded with banners bearing various devices. These chairs were borne on men’s shoulders, who proceeded through the streets, amid immense cheering from the crowds who followed, and from the ladies and citizens, who appeared waving their handkerchiefs from the windows; the members, meanwhile, bowing, with their hats in their hands, until they reached the spot where their chaises waited to convey them to their respective homes. The sight was one of great interest to a stranger, and I advise every American who visits England, by all means, to witness an election day if possible.
We remained with my brother-in-law about a week, visiting the various places and buildings whose antiquity or public character clothed them with especial interest. The town itself contains about eleven hundred inhabitants, and is the shire town of the county of Staffordshire. Its chief business is the manufacture of shoes. Among its ancient buildings, are the remains of a baronial castle, whose moss-covered battlements insensibly conduct the meditations of the beholder back to the days of feudal grandeur and knightly chivalry. St. Mary’s Church is also a venerable Gothic structure, of solid masonry, whose walls have withstood the storms and changes of about ten centuries. They were about to expend £10,000 in repairing the dilapidations of time. I heard one discourse from the curate, and was especially delighted with the grandeur and sublimity of the music from its magnificent organ, as it pealed along the aisles of the time-worn building, with an effect never witnessed in our smaller and more modern structures in America.