of the utmost benevolence, "the clouds which now gather round your path, devious and erring as that path assuredly is, shall one day, I predict, and that too not a distant one, be dissipated. It is not in human character, it is not in human nature, that thoughts and feelings such as you have now given utterance to, should dwell with aught that is permanently or greatly wrong. No, to resume the imagery you have just called forth, like yonder beauteous luminary, who is sinking but to rise with renovated healing on his wings, you shall again be blessed and blessing. Suffer not then the sight of this lovely landscape, soothing and tranquil as should be its effect on every mind, to excite in your bosom emotions of such an opposite character!"

"It was not so once," returned the youth, in a voice almost stifled with anguish, and then, after a deep pause, suddenly conscious, as it were, of the agony he had betrayed, he seemed to shake off the load that oppressed him. " Do you mark, my friend," he continued, pointing down the valley, "yonder distant turrets, that, touched as they are by the last rich crimson of the setting sun, seem to start from the wood

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which envelopes them like points of glowing fire? Those turrets rise from Wyeburne Hall, the mansion of the Montchenseys, and beyond them, far as the eye can penetrate, and illumined by one bright gleam of light, you may yet just discern the village spire. Farewell! as I now appear to you, I must not be seen in this beloved valley-but we shall meet again. Your road," he then added, "winds down this steep descent, and through these groups of trees to the waters of the Wye, whose current you can just perceive from this great height, stealing through the bottom of the glen; it will lead you, after passing through a park, whose glades and antique oaks will remind you of your own delightful imaginings, where your exiles wander, and your fairies sport, to the very lawn which fronts the house; and now, once more adieu !" And as he said this he spurred his horse from the verge of the descent, whilst Shakspeare, who felt his interest for this young adventurer increasing every moment, called out to him to stop: he did stop, and as soon as they had again met, the bard asked to be entrusted with his name, and the means of future communication. "I feel most

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honoured by, and grateful for the request," replied the youth," and do promise that ere long you shall be better acquainted with my history and misfortunes; in the mean time you must be content to know me by the name of Roland the Freebooter; it is an appellation,” he added with a smile," that will excite more terror than satisfaction in those who hear it; but I have, nevertheless, been a leader of the lawless spirits whom you have encountered to-day, for good as well as evil;" and again he spurred his horse, and disappeared.

"There is something very extraordinary in all this," thought Shakspeare, as he mused for a few moments on the language and bearing of his late companion; but the necessity of attending to the security of his footsteps, (for both he and his servant had been obliged from the precipitancy of the path, to once more alight from their horses and lead them,) and the singular beauty of the scenery into which they were now descending, soon dissipated his abstraction.

It was a landscape, indeed, worthy of the pencil of a Claude, and was enjoyed by him who now wandered through its mazes, with all that

feeling and enthusiasm to which his unrivalled imagination may be conceived to have given birth. A glow of golden light, which gradually melted off into extensive fields of amber tint, or faintly yellow green, and then of sober gray, yet lingered in the west, and shed over the whole valley that warm, but soft and harmonising hue, which gives to evening scenery its most soothing and delicious effect. Every object was in repose, except that, at intervals, as the unfelt breeze just stirred the lightest leaves, was heard the murmur of remotely dashing water.

Their track was through a thick wood which clothed both sides of the glen from their base to their summit, occasionally, however, receding from the front of some very peculiar formations of projecting cliff, that shooting upwards in a shaft-like or columnar shape, and stained with every hue that moss and creeping plants could furnish, showed like the relics of some shattered temple or monastic fane. Glimpses of the Wye, softly flowing between banks of the greenest turf, were now caught more frequently as they pursued their downward course; the valley became wider, the road less precipitous, and the

poet was delighted by observing on the opposite and more level side of the stream, various openings, through which were discernible small patches or enclosures of corn, which, though springing up in situations so wood-girt and romantic as to look better fitted for the cell of the hermit than the sickle of the husbandman, gave a soft and pastoral air to all around.

They had now reached the bottom of the descent, where the Wye, taking a sudden bend to the left, poured its pellucid waters, with no little spirit and impetuosity, down a shelf of limestone rock, to pursue its sinuous course with augmenting beauty and serenity, through that still more expanded portion of the valley in which stood the mansion of the Montchenseys. And here Shakspeare, remounting his horse, paced gently onwards by the banks of the Wye, through scenery to which his powers of description could alone do ample justice. Twilight

had by this time shed her sober tinting over every object; but the air was balmy and clear, and the evening star had risen. On either side of the stream greensward of the most delicate verdure, interspersed with single oaks, or groups