the wreck of the crags above. They are finely coloured with a yellow or ochrey lichen, which predominates there, to the exclusion of the lichen geographicus: its colour may best be compared to that of beaten or unburnished gold; it is richly blended with the white or silvery kind, and interspersed with the stone-fern or mountain-parsley, the most beautiful of all our wild plants, resembling the richest point lace in its fine filaments and exquisite indentations.

The wall ends at the ravine; just at its termination part of it has been thrown down by the sheep or by the boys, and the view is thus opened from a point which, to borrow a word from the Tourist's Vocabulary is a remarkable station. The stream, which in every other part of its course has worn for itself a deep and narrow channel, flows here for a few yards over a level bed of rock, where in fine weather it might be crossed with ease, then falls immediately into the ravine. A small ash tree bends over the pavement, in such a manner that, if you wish to get into the bed of the stream, you must either stoop under the branches, or stride over them. Looking upward there, the sight is confined between the sides of the mountain, which on the left is steep and stony, and on the right precipitous, except that directly oppo

site there are some shelves, or rather steps of herbage, and a few birch, more resembling bushes than trees in their size and growth; these, and the mountain rill, broken, flashing, and whitening in its fall where it comes rapidly down, but taking in the level part of its course a colour of delightful green from the rock over which it runs, are the only objects. But on looking back, you behold a scene of the most striking and peculiar character. The water, the rocky pavement, the craggy sides, and the ash tree, form the foreground and the frame of this singular picture. You have then the steep descent, open on one side to the lake, and on the other with the wood, half way down and reaching to the shore; the lower part of Derwentwater below, with its islands; the vale of Keswick, with Skiddaw for its huge boundary and bulwark, to the North; and where Bassenthwaite stretches into the open country, a distance of water, hills, and remote horizon, in which Claude would have found all he desired, and more than even he could have represented, had he beheld it in the glory of a midsummer sunset.

This was to be our resting-place, for though the steepest ascent was immediately before us, the greater part of the toil was over. My young

companions seated themselves on the fell side, upon some of the larger stones, and there in full enjoyment of air and sunshine opened their baskets and took their noon-day meal, a little before its due time, with appetites which, quickened by exercise, had outstript the hours. My place was on a bough of the ash tree at a little distance, the water flowing at my fleet, and the fall just below me. Among all the sights and sounds of Nature there are none which affect me more pleasurably than these. I could sit for hours to watch the motion of a brook and when I call to mind the happy summer and autumn which I passed at Cintra, in the morning of life and hope, the perpetual gurgling of its tanks and fountains occurs among the vivid recollections of that earthly Paradise as one of its charms.

When I had satisfied myself with the prospect, I took from my waistcoat pocket an Amsterdam edition of the Utopia, given me for its convenient portability by one of my oldest and most valued friends. It is of the year 1629, and is the smallest book in my possession, being not four inches long, and less than two in breadth.. Mr. Dibdin would shudder to see how some nefarious binder has cut it to the quick. Brief as this little work is, it has intro