which the dried furze, and peat, and underwood of the villagers, were to be piled on high ;-and it was to perform that ceremony, that Helen Hartlington led her jocund train through the mazes of the woods, which then stretched far and wide in every direction from Burnsell fell. After the oak had been selected and hewn down, with all due observance of ancient rites, it was suggested by some of the party, that, as they were in the neighbourhood of the Ghastrills, or rills of the Ghosts, it would be treating those spiritual essences with marked disrespect, if they returned home without paying a visit to their abodes. The suggestion was made at a time, when the most enlightened minds were alive to superstitious terrors, and in consequence met with instant approbation. Those, who are acquainted with the localities of Craven, will, I trust, excuse me for informing those who are not, that the scenery, which has acquired so formidable an appellation, is that which surrounds one of the most singular cascades of the rapid and romantic Wharf. Its pellucid waters, which, at a short distance both above and below the fall, expand into a glassy pool, are projected through a cleft of little more than two feet in diameter, which they have rifted in the rock, into an agitated basin of tremendous depth. On their road to this narrow and fearful abyss, Antony Clifford contrived to detach his unreluctant mistress from her companions, and to reiterate his assurances, that, notwithstanding the recent inconsistencies of his behaviour, caused, as he said, by circumstances, over which unfortunately he had no control, he had always been her most devoted and affectionate lover, and that such he should continue, in spite of fate, to the last moment of his existence. There was an earnestness in his words, and a sincerity in his looks, which convinced the anxious maiden, that these protestations were the genuine dictates of his heart, and the effect of them

was visible in the delighted expression of her countenance, when she rejoined her friends on the ledge of rocks, against which the Wharf wildly dashes its foaming battery, in its impatience to escape from the massive barriers, within which it is momentarily imprisoned. They gazed for a time on the deep solitudes from which it was indignantly hurrying like a disgusted anchorite, and on the ancient and majestic woods, which, in Nature's native taste, darkened the hills on each side of it: but their feelings of admiration were suddenly changed into those of the acutest agony by seeing Antony Clifford precipitated into the roaring torrent, as he rashly attempted to step across it. The scream of horror, which burst from the lips of her companions, sounded like the knell of happiness to the afflicted Helen. To descend into such a mighty rush of waters, and to escape from its eddying violence with life, appeared impossible; and, though she neither screamed, nor wept, nor fainted at the calamity, which had thus suddenly bereft her of her dearest hopes, none that witnessed ever forgot the glance of despair which she flung upon the "ruffian billows' which were "curling their monstrous heads" in the boiling gulf at her feet. A momentary reflection convinced all, who beheld the accident, that aid they could administer none. The rugged inequalities of the rocks, which form the sides, and partially run across the bed of the infuriated stream, together with the dangerous rapidity of the different whirlpools, which they create in the stream itself, induced them at once to give him up as irrecoverably lost. But the very circumstances, which led the spectators to despond, unexpectedly proved the means of his preservation.* The water was too violently agitated to permit him to sink; and he was ejected from it in a few minutes on the shallow gravel below the cascade, pale and senseless, it is true, but, to all outward appearance, free from any serious injury. Every

arm was immediately stretched out to his rescue; and he was scarcely dragged on shore, before he was sufficiently recovered from his swoon to allay the anxiety of his betrothed bride, by as suring her that, with the exception of a few bruises on his head, which had stunned and confused him, he felt no inconvenience from the immersion he had sustained. The accident, however, effectually marred the mirth of the party; and the fair Helen and her lover returned to Gamleswall Lodge in a frame of mind much less joyous than that in which they had quitted it for their expedition of the morning.

It was late in the evening of the same day, that Antony Clifford mounted his horse to return to his vaulted chamber in Barden tower. Dark thoughts and dismal fancies,-the offspring of a fevered and distempered brain,-tortured his heart, and unfit ted him for enjoying the gentleness of the scenery, through which his journey lay. He saw not the silver light which the moon was diffusing over the silent landscape, as she sailed amid the stars of heaven, exulting and triumphing in her own superior glory. He felt not the benign and soothing influence, which the calmness of night was flinging over animated creation, as it brought to the ear the "soft and lulling sounds" of "streams inaudible by day," and so conveyed to the mind the conviction, that every thing, even to the foliage of the forest, was quiet and at rest. He rode on, forgetful of the past, and reckless of the future, till he had left Barden tower far in his rear, and had involved himself and his steed in the tangled mazes of Crokerise forest, which, though it now exists but in story, formerly extended all round the grey tower-like projections of Flasby fell. Having dismounted from his horse, he rushed with the speed of delirium through the oaks, which fringed the side of the hill, and stopped not in his career, till he had reached the bonfire, which was then blazing in solitude on its summit. I say in solitude ;-for there were dangerous inmates in Crokerise forest, who might have made the peasantry pay dearly for their revelry, had they protracted it to the same late hour on that hill, as they were accustomed to protract it on every other in the district. Having cast a hasty glance at the fire, which threw a red murky shadow on VOL. XXV.

the neighbouring trees, as if it were indignant at the absence of other worshippers, he stood for one moment irresolute by its side;-and then, brushing away a tear, which had stolen uninvited to his cheek, flung himself upon the burning embers, a victim, as he exclaimed, to the malevolence of fate! But there are some men, over whose safety a special providence seems always to be watching. At the very moment when his destruction again appeared inevitable, a band of gipsies burst from an adjacent thicket, and tore him, in spite of his struggles, from the violent death, which he had so madly courted.

But how was she, the fair maiden of Gamleswall, employed, whilst this struggle was going forward for her lover's life? She had retreated to her chamber, soon after his arrival at her father's mansion, in order that she might express in private her gratitude to Heaven for his strange and wonderful preservation; and she pleaded, as a reason for not withdrawing from it during the evening, the shock which her feelings had experienced during the excursion of the morning. It was unfortunate for Antony Clifford, that she was not present at her father's board to mark his heavy and bloodshot eye, his absent and distracted air, and his confused and petulant answers to the questions casually addressed to him. She would have discovered the fever that was lurking in his veins, and would have prevented him from leaving the roof of her father, "where charity was landlord," till he had taken some simple remedy to allay it. But destiny will have its way; and he left Gamleswall Lodge in a state of melancholy excitement, which added severe aggravation to the dreadful reflection, which had long embittered his repose. Of all this his fair mistress was ignorant till the next morning, when a messenger from Barden tower brought the disastrous intelligence to Gamleswall, that Antony Clifford had been conveyed home on a litter of broken branches, by a band of gipsies, who had found him wandering in the woods in all the delirium of a burning fever. There was a mysterious message, he added, delivered at the same time to Lord Clifford, by a singular looking female, who acted as leader of the party, and claimed as the only reward which she would deign

B

to accept for her services, a short conversation with his lordship in private. With the import of that conversation the messenger was of course unacquainted; but he stated that it had been such as to draw tears even from the pitiless bosom of a Clifford. His lordship, after dismissing the gipsy, remained for some time in a state of great agitation, and then sent him to acquaint Sir Walter Hartlington of the alarming state of young Clifford's health, and to request him to break the afflicting tidings as gently as he could to his daughter. I shall not pretend to describe the anguish which they excited in her mind. Those, whom the same calamity has pierced with a true sense of misery, will be able to conceive it; and to those, whom it has not, the most powerful description would shew but faintly.

The unaccountable vicissitudes in the temper and behaviour of Antony Clifford, during the previous six months, had gradually generated suspicions in the breast of Sir Walter Hartlington, that he was liable to temporary aberrations of intellect; and the inquiries, which the old knight felt it to be his duty to institute into the cause and nature of the sudden illness under which his daughter's lover was labouring, gave confirmation of the strongest character to those suspicions. Need I mention what was the result? A direct command to his daughter to break off all intercourse, both by word and by writing, with the unfortunate Clifford, as the most efficacious method of eradicating a passion, which it was no longer possible for him as a parent to view with approbation; and à distinct avowal to Lord Clifford of the actual causes, which led him to form so painful, yet so necessary, a determination. The dangerous symptoms, which marked the progress of his malady, rendered it for some time impossible to convey even a hint of this bitter intelligence to the youthful sufferer, whom it interested so deeply; and it was not until he had made a considerable advance to recovery, and had begun to question his attendants respecting the family at Gamleswall, that Lord Clifford, ventured in the mildest and most considerate terms, to communicate to him the stern and immutable resolution of Sir Walter Hartlington. The communication struck home to his very heart :-a

ghastliness, like that of death, settled upon his countenance,-and one deep and protracted groan proclaimed the intense agony of his spirit. The amendment of many days was destroyed in a single moment; a relapse of his disorder ensued; and life and death again contended for the mastery over him. But death, which cuts short the career of the happy, when they least desire it, shrinks from the em brace of the wretched, who anxiously court it. A strong constitution bore him triumphant over the combined assaults of mental and bodily disease, and restored him, a tardy convalescent, to struggle with the dismal consciousness of carrying about him a hopeless, endless, and unrelievable sorrow.

From the earliest ages, absence from the beloved object has been always prescribed by physician and philosopher as the most effective cure for disappointed love. The proximity of Barden Tower to Gamleswall Lodge, rendered it an ineligible residence for Antony Clifford, during the first paroxysms of his grief and disappointment. Every dell in the neighbouring hills, every glade in the surrounding forests, almost every bush and copse, and holly tree in the verdant bowers of Barden, mustered up associations, which aggravated his anguish, by reminding him of happier moments, spent in the society of her, whom he was ordered, but whom he found it impossible, to cease to love. He was therefore conveyed, as speedily as his infirm health would admit, to the baronial castle of the Cliffords at Skipton, from which it was intended to remove him, as he acquired strength, to the romantic scenery, which still rises in simple grandeur around their ruined fortalice at Bromeham. At Skipton Castle, which, though shorn of its pristine magnificence, frowns defiance even yet on the impotent torrent, which for ages has been striving to undermine the rocky foundations on which it stands in deathless majesty, he was attended with the most sedulous care, that wealth, and power, and affection could command. Lord Clifford, who was partially infected by the fears, which had gained a complete ascendency over Sir Walter Hartlington, took every precaution to prevent their realization. Individuals, whose apparent object was to wile away by conversation the tedium of his illness, were stationed

in the apartinent of the young Clifford, with strict orders to watch his every motion, and to remove from his sight every object, which had the slightest tendency to exasperate the mental malady, under which it was deemed possible that he might labour. Among these individuals was a female, who excited considerable surprise among the domestics of Lord Clifford, from the singularity of her dress and of her demeanour,-from the striking resemblance which she bore to the mysterious Egyptian, who had conducted Antony Clifford safe home, when he was found delirious in the forest,-from the taciturnity which she preserved on every thing relating to herself, and towards all persons, except the suffering invalid,—and from the almost maternal solicitude with which she endeavoured to anticipate his wants and wishes. They fancied also, that they perceived the existence of some undefined but not unacknowledged connexion between the invalid and this stranger;—a circumstance which irritated their curiosity the more, as it seemed to be known and approved of by their haughty master. Fain would they have questioned her as to the reasons, which had induced her to resign her wandering mode of life for the sake of domiciliating her self as an inmate of a feudal fortress; --but the grave austerity of her manners forbade all approach to familia rity, and so rendered their schemes for worming themselves into her confidence perfectly impracticable. To attend the sick-bed, and to soothe the fevered anguish of Antony Clifford, appeared to be her greatest pleasure; and as this disposition, on her part, lessened the labour of his other at tendants, and afforded them the means of indulging their truant inclinations at a distance from his chamber, they acquiesced in her gradual assumption of dictatorial authority within it, and tacitly installed her in the responsible office of his chief nurse. The vigilance, with which his minutest movements were observed, led him to suspect the motives which had given rise to it; and, unfortunately, inspired him with a desire to deceive it. All his actions were cautiously, yet studiously, made subservient to his design of lulling to sleep the apprehensions which were entertained of his insanity. His efforts were but too successful;-for

men readily believe that, which both their wishes and their interests render them anxious to find true. His attendants, misled by his calm and collected behaviour on all occasions, became every day less vigilant in their superintendence;-and he soon convinced himself that, with one excep tion, he had thrown them all completely off their guard. To deceive her penetrating eye was a task of some difficulty;-but the most affectionate nurse cannot always be with her patient; and he selected the opportu nity of her accidental absence to execute a plan, which he must have had for some time previously in his contemplation.

There was in Skipton Castle, before it was dismantled by order of the Long Parliament, a spacious gallery, which traversed one entire side of it, and which was used for several centuries as an armoury by its martial owners. A family, which, like that of the Cliffords, not only took a decisive part in all the domestic conflicts of the country, but also inherited the honourable distinction of guarding the Western Marches against the destructive incursions of foreign marauders, was compelled, by a feeling of self-preservation, to keep constantly in its possession a large quantity of arms. The existing records of the family inform us, that these instruments of desolation and death were arranged in every uncouth figure which the fantastic imagination of the armourer could devise,-and that they formed a fruitful subject of wonder and admi. ration to the rustic visitors, who, at stated intervals, were permitted to be hold them. In one part of this formidable collection, was deposited the shattered corslet, in which the first Lord Clifford met an honourable death, in a desperate effort to restore the falling fortunes of England, at the disas trous battle of Bannockburn ;—and, in another part, the glittering armour, in which his more fortunate descendant upheld the renown of his ancestry at Agincourt, and carried dismay and ruin into the serried squadrons of the chivalry of France. Here hung the sword, which for years was the surest defence of the house of Lancaster ; and there the dagger, which drunk so deeply of the best blood of the house of York. Around them were stored, in most admired disorder, helmets and

gauntlets and shields, bills and swords and spears, and every defensive and

offensive instrument of ancient warfare, some bright as the stream in which they were first tempered, others dark as the age of which they were the rusty memorials.

On one occasion, when his faithful nurse had resigned her station at his bedside to one of the military tenants of the barony, Antony Clifford, who had obtained permission from his physicians to quit his chamber, and to take a short walk in the corridors of the castle, contrived to lure him into this armoury, and then, after some conversation on the use and advantages of the different weapons it contained, dispatched him to a remote apartment for a curious match-lock, which he knew to be kept there. The man, suspecting no guile, left him to perform his errand; but was fortu nately met on his road by the mysterious female, who had taken so prominent a part in the cure of his master. With the instinctive shrewdness of woman, she immediately suspected the purpose for which her patient had got rid of him, and requested him to return with her in all haste to the armoury. The man assented;-and they had just reached it in time to see Antony Clifford take from its place the dagger, with which "the Butcher" Lord had stabbed the young Earl of Rutland, and direct its point against his own throat. "Fire and water," he muttered to himself, " obey the spell that has been cast upon them, and have lost their power to work me harm :-but I hold fate clasped in my fist. This steel," he added, raising his arm to strike, "never disappointed its possessor, and its stab is sure." The blow fell, but, either from the weakness of the striker, or from the nervousness occasioned by the sound of approaching footsteps, or from some other cause, into which it is immaterial to inquire, failed to inflict a mortal wound. A second time was his arm raised to accomplish his murderous intention; but it was stopped in its descent, and deprived by main force of the weapon, which it was wielding so desperately. The hardy soldier, after he had wrenched the dagger from the frantic youth, flung it to the farther end of the gallery grasped him firmly by the waist, and, before he could recover from his sur

prise, carried him back, and detained him a prisoner in his own chamber. Medical assistance was immediately procured, and to the joy of his friends, his wound, though deep, was declared to be unattended with danger.

Lord Clifford, who had now fully persuaded himself of the lamentable nature of the malady of which his protegé was the victim, displayed such intense solicitude for his recovery, that for some days he scarcely ever quitted his sick room. The presence of his Lordship seemed to overawe his young namesake, and induced him to sub mit to the application of such remedies as his physicians recommended for his cure. To secure similar attention on the part of others, Lord Clifford, whenever he was obliged to leave him, deputed the care of his patient to such of his friends as stood most in need of his influence and support; and by this means rendered it almost impossible for Antony Clifford to retard the closing of his wound by any wayward or refractory conduct. Weeks and months passed away without producing any considerable change in his situation; but towards the commencement of the ensuing spring, his medical attendants began to hold out flattering hopes of his speedy recovery. With the bleak winds of winter his pain of body and tribulation of mind began slowly to depart, and were succeeded, as the milder breezes diffused verdure and beauty over the country, by a calmness and collectedness of demeanour, which led most of those who observed it to conclude, that Antony Clifford had no longer any motion in his will to rebel against his reason, but was again in tune and harmony with himself. The grief, which so long had preyed upon his spirit, appeared to have dissolved in the heat of its own vehemence, as also the fever, which had so long rioted in his veins, and severed him from the enjoyment of health and its concomitant blessings. There were some, however, who conceived, that his composure was more affected than real, from the slight tremor which always came over him upon any accidental allusion to the family of the Hartlingtons; and the consequence of this notion was, that a strict superintendence continued to be exercised over him, long after the period when it was deemed necessary by his physicians. Though a cloud