HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS,
SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN,

13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.

1857.

[The right of Translation is reserved.]

249.x.26.

I DEDICATE THIS HISTORY

ΤΟ

NELL G. H.

BECAUSE, IF MY HEROINE HAS NO OTHER MERIT,

SHE AT LEAST BEARS A NAME

THAT WILL BRING BEFORE THOSE WHO KNOW

Sweet Nell,

THE IMAGE OF ONE OF WHOM IT CAN SURELY BE SAID,

"If two Gods should play some heavenly match,
And on the wager lay two earthly women,
And Nellie' one, there must be something else
Pawn'd with the other; for the poor rude world
Hath not her fellow."-Shakspeare.

THE LADY OF GLYNNE.

CHAPTER I.

"Morn,

Waked by the circling hours, with rosy hand
Unbarred the gates of life."-MILTON.

It was four o'clock in the morning of the 22nd of June, that I opened our cottage door, and ran across the lawn, towards a large old beech tree, whose mighty branches swept towards the ground. Steadying myself upon the lowest, with the ease of constant habit, I passed up from one great bough to another, until I seated myself at last, in a natural sort of throne,

formed by the quaint growth of the tree.

VOL. I.

B