hidden in others where it rolled betwixt deep and wooded banks. The spire of a church, and the appearance of some houses, indicated the si

ation of a village at the place where the stream had its junction with the ocean. The vales seemed well cultivated, the little enclosures into which they were divided skirting the bottom of the hills, and sometimes carrying their lines of straggling hedge-rows a little way up the ascent. Above these were green pastures, tenanted chiefly by herds of black cattle, then the staple cominodity of the country, whose distant low gave no unpleasing animation to the landscape. The remoter hills were of a sterner character; and, at still greater distance, swelled into mountains of dark heath, bordering the horizon with a screen which gave a defined and limited boundary to the cultivated country, and added, at the same time, the pleasing idea, that it was sequestered and solitary. The sea-coast, which Mannering now saw in its extent, corresponded in variety and beauty with the inland view. In some places it rose into tall rocks, frequently crowned with the ruins of old buildings, towers, or beacons, which, according to tradition, were placed within sight of each other, that, in times of invasion or civil war, they might communicate by signal for mutual defence and protection. Ellangowan castle was by far the most extensive and important of these ruins, and asserted from size and situation the superiority which its founders were said once to have possessed among the chiefs and

nobles of the district. In other places, the shore was of a more gentle description, indented with small bays, where the land sloped smoothly down, or sent into the sea promontories covered with wood.

A scene so different from what last night's journey had presaged, produced a proportional effect upon Mannering. Beneath his eye lay the modern house; an awkward mansion, indeed, in point of architecture, but well situated, and with a warm and pleasant exposure. «How happily,» thought our hero, « would life glide on in such a retirement! On the one hand, the striking remnants of ancient grandeur, with the secret consciousness of family pride which they inspire; on the other, enough of modern elegance and comfort to satisfy every moderate wish. Here then, and with thee, Sophia!»

We will not pursue a lover's day-dream any farther. Mannering stood a minute with his arms folded, and then turned to the ruined castle.

Upon entering the gateway, he found that the rude magnificence of the inner court amply corresponded with the grandeur of the exterior. On the one side ran a range of windows lofty and large, divided by carved mullions of stone, which had once lighted the great hall of the castle; on the other were various buildings of different heights and dates, yet so united as to present to the eye a certain general effect of uniformity of front. The doors and windows were ornament

ed with projections exhibiting rude specimens of sculpture and tracery, partly entire and partly broken down, partly covered by ivy and trailing plants, which grew luxuriantly among the ruins. That end of the court which faced the entrance had also been formerly closed by a range of buildings; but owing, it was said, to its having been battered by the ships of the Parliament under Deane, during the long civil war, this part of the castle was much more ruinous than the rest, and exhibited a great chasm, through which Mannering could observe the sea, and the little vessel (an armed lugger) which retained her station in the centre of the bay. While Mannering was gazing round the ruins, he heard from the interior of an apartment on the left hand the voice of the gypsey he had seen on the preceding evening. He soon found an aperture, through which he could observe her without being himself visible; and could not help feeling, that her figure, her employment, and her situation, conveyed the exact impression of an ancient sybil.

She sat upon a broken corner-stone in the angle of a paved apartment, part of which she had swept clean to afford a smooth space for the evolutions of her spindle. A strong sunbeam, through a lofty and narrow window, fell upon her wild dress and features, and afforded her light for her occupation; the rest of the apartment was very gloomy. Equipt in a habit which mingled the national dress of the Scottish comnon people with something of an eastern cos

tume, she spun a thread, drawn from wool of three different colours, black, white, and grey,by assistance of those ancient implements of housewifery now almost banished from the land, the distaff and spindle. As she spun, she sung what seemed to be a charm. Mannering, after in vain attempting to make himself master of the exact words of her song, afterwards attempted the following paraphrase of what, from a few intelligible phrases, he concluded was its purport:

Twist ye, twine ye! eveu so

Mingle shades of joy and woe,
Hope, and fear, and peace, and strife,

In the thread of human life.

While the mystic twist is spinning,
And the infant's life beginning,

Dimly seen through twilight bending,.
Lo, what varied shapes attending!

Passions wild, and follies vain,

Pleasures soon exchanged for pain;
Doubt, and jealousy, and fear,

In the magic dance appear.

Now they wax, and now they dwindle,
Whirling with the whirling spindle.
Twist ye, twine ye! even so,
Mingle human bliss and woe.

Ere our translator, or rather our free imitator, had arranged these stanzas in his head, and while he was yet hammering out a rhyme for spindle, the task of the sybil was accomplished, or her

wool was expended. She took the spindle, now charged with her labours, and, undoing the thread gradually, measured it, by casting it over her elbow, and bringing each loop round between her fore-finger and thumb. When she had measured it out, she muttered to herself<< a hank, but not a haill ane-the full years o' the threescore and ten, but thrice broken, and thrice to oop, (i. e. to unite); he'll be a lucky lad an he win through wi't.»

Our hero was about to speak to the prophetess, when a voice, hoarse as the waves with which it mingled, halloo'd twice, and with increasing impatience « Meg, Meg Merrilies! Gypsey-hag-tousand deyvils!» « Iam coming, I am coming, Captain,» answered Meg; and in a moment or two the impatient Commander whom she addressed made his appearance from the broken part of the ruins.

He was apparently a sea-faring man, rather under the middle size, and with a countenance bronzed by a thousand conflicts with the northeast wind. His frame was prodigiously muscular, strong, and thick-set; so that it seemed as if a man of much greater height would have been an inadequate match in any close personal conflict. He was hard-favoured, and, which was, worse, his face bore nothing of the insouciance, the careless frolicsome jollity, and vacant curiosity of a sailor on shore. These qualities perhaps, as much as any others, contribute to the high popularity of our seamen, and the general good