This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1853 Excerpt: ...on the South-Western and South Coast lines. A minute's chat with the intelligent bookvendor at the station soon makes us acquainted with the localities; and now behold us, gentle reader, jogging along in an omnibus through Landport, and onwards to " dirty Portsmouth." Almost the first object that meets our view during the ride is the Sussex Hotel, a very convenient and withal economical hostelrie, kept by Mr. T. Weston, situated, as shown in our engraving, close to the terminus. It is a very comfortable house, has a noble coffee-room, and every convenience, on a very liberal scale, for those tourists who, like ourselves, are yet in expectancy, rather than possession, of those said nuggets, which, mayhap, will prove after all the evil part of Pandora's box. And now respecting Portsmouth. The approach thereto is extremely interesting to any visitor unaccustomed to the sight of fortified towns. The grass-clothed glacis is first seen with its large embrasures, through which peer forth the mouths of large cannon, while the bristling bayonets of the sentinels are seen in all directions; and then come deep ditches. The omnibus rattles over iron drawbridges, and next, a dark, subterraneous arch admits you beneath the ramparts. Once within the walls, fresh novelties strike the attention. A stalwart Highland soldier, for instance, is standing on guard at the house of the Commander-in-Chief (now General Simpson), and a bevy of the same fine fellows are standing at the barrack-gates, lounging after their morning sweat on the Common. Then, again, a little further on we have groups of middies and A.B. sailors assembled round the door of the George: men with trunks of trousers, bare, brawny necks, fists like an elephant's hoof, inscribed with mysterious symbols ...
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