Ravenshoe. By Henry Kingsley.

CLOTHO, LACHESIS, AND ATROPOS. 129
a glance at the flat meadows, the gleaming river, and the dim,
gray distance. Then the wood again, denser and darker than
ever. Then a sound, at first faint and indistinct, but growing
gradually upon the ear until it could be plainly heard above the
horse's footfall. Then suddenly the end of the wood, and broad,
open sunlight. Below, the weirs of Casterton, spouting by a
hundred channels, through the bucks and under the mills. Hard
by, Casterton town, lying, a tumbled mass of red brick and gray
flint, beneath a faint, soft haze of smoke, against the vast roll in
the land called Marldown. On the right, Casterton Park, a
great wooded promontory, so steep that one can barely walk
along it, clothed with beech and oak from base to summit, save
in one place, where a bold lawn of short grass, five hundred feet
high, stoops suddenly down towards the meadows, fringed at the
edges with broom and fern, and topped with three tall pines,the landmark for ten miles along the river.
A lodge, the white gate of which is swung open by a pretty
maiden; a dark oak wood again, with a long vista, ended by the noble, precipitous hill on which the house stands; a more open park,
with groups of deer lying about and feeding; another dark wood,
the road now rising rapidly; rabbits, and- a pot-valiant cockpheasant standing in the middle of the way, and " currucking,"
under the impression that Charles is in possession of all his domestic arrangements, and has come to disturb them; then the
smooth gravel road, getting steeper and steeper; then the summit; one glimpse of a glorious panorama; then the front door
and footmen.
Charles sent his card in, and would be glad to know if Lady
Hainault could see him. While he waited for- an answer, his
horse rubbed its nose against its knee, and yawned, while the
footmen on the steps looked at the rooks. They knew all about
it, too. (The footmen, I mean, not the rooks); though I would n't
swear against a rook's knowing anything, mind you.
Lady Hainault would see Mr. Ravenshoe, - which was lucky,
because, if she would n't have done so, Charles would have been
obliged to ask for Adelaide. So Charles's horse was led to the
stable, and Charles was led by the butler through the hall, and
shown into a cool and empty library, to purge himself of earthly
passions, before he was admitted to The Presence.
Charles sat himself down in the easiest chair he could find,
and got hold of " Ruskin's Modern Painters." That is a very
nice book: it is printed on thick paper, with large print; the
reading is very good, full of the most beautifil sentiments ever
you heard; and there are also capital plates in it. Charles
looked through the pictures, - he did n't look at the letter-press, I
know; for, if he had, he would have been so deeply enchained
6+ I