ing almost an entire harquebuss, the remains of a pair of boots, and the relique of a buff jerkin?'
"What answer to this unceremonious attack on ancient things committed to her keeping the portress might have made, I had not an opportunity to learn; her darkening brow indicated little meekness of reply; a voice, however, much sweeter than the dame's, intruded on the debate. In the vicinity of the Hall, at the foot of a limestone rock, the summer visitors of Haddon may and do refresh themselves at a small fount of pure water, which love of the clear element induced one of the old ladies to confine within the limits of a large stone basin. Virtues were imputed to the spring, and the superstition of another proprietor erected beside it a cross of stone, lately mutilated, and now removed, but once covered with sculptures and rude emblems, which conveyed religious instruction to an ignorant people. Towards this fountain a maiden from a neighbouring cottage was observed to proceed, warbling, as she went, a fragment of one of those legendary ballads which the old minstrels, illiterate or learned, scattered so abundantly over the country:
DORA VERNON.
It happened between March and May Day,
When wood-buds wake which slumbered late,
When hill and valley grow green and gaily,
And every wight longs for a mate;
When lovers sleep with an open eyelid,
Like nightingales on the orchard tree,
And sorely wish they had wings for flying,
So they might with their true love be.
A knight all worthy, in this sweet season
Went out to Cardiff with bow and gun—
Not to chase the roebuck, nor shoot the pheasant,
But hunt the fierce fox so wild and dun.
And by his side was a young maid riding,
With laughing blue eyes and sunny hair;
And who was it but young Dora Vernon,
Young Rutland's true love and Haddon's heir.
Her gentle hand was a good bow bearing;
The deer at speed, or the fowl on wing,
Stayed in their flight when the bearded arrow
Her white hand loosed from the sounding string.
Old men made bare their locks and blessed her
As blithe she rode down the Durwood side;
Her steed rejoiced in his lovely rider,
Arched his neck proudly, and pranced in pride.
