The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 | Page 7

responded to the look.
"Let me see,--Cromwell was a terrible Catholic, wasn't he?" gravely
inquired our fellow-traveller, as if in this way, and this way only, could
the sacrilege be accounted for,--one blue eye, as he spoke, full of sage
earnestness, the other twinkling with fun.
The stolid face of our guide now became a study. He had no
instructions for such an emergency as this. The question had made war
with his poor wits. For a moment they staggered, felt themselves
defeated, and were about to surrender. But, resolute Briton that he was,
the old man soon rallied his forces. True servant both of Church and
State, he saw that there was no consistent course for him but to consign
the enemy of royalty and the contemner of sacred monuments to the
abominable Scarlet Lady. He gave one appealing look at his
interrogator, but the side of the face turned towards him was
immovable. It gave no positive discouragement to an affirmative reply;
it even feigned ignorance. Seeking enlightenment, and taking heart of
faith, the verger assented in the words, "Y-e-e-e-s,--I be-e-e-lieve so!"

Then, his courage rising as he felt himself committed to the fact, he
continued, with emphasis and a dictatorial nodding of the head,
"Yes,--yes, he was."
Many and laughable are the instances of such perplexity and mistake
among the aged pieces of mechanism who have for years been
sounding the same tune to generations of unquestioning ears, and who,
not having an extra note in their gamut, can by no means bear to be
played upon by strange hands. Age has its exemptions and immunities,
however; might makes right, and one who has long been a dictator
comes to be deemed an infallible authority. So they whine on, and are
oftener believed than otherwise. As they constitute a class, and those
whom I have to do with are chiefly the exceptions, I will forbear to
dwell on stereotyped specimens, and turn to one so unlike the
generality of her tribe, so utterly lawless, so completely at variance
with all her surroundings, that I must beg leave to introduce her
precisely as she introduced herself.
* * * * *
There is an old place in England (there may be many such, but I know
there is one) which is consecrated to imagination, romance, and
memory. Abandoned by its owners as a residence, it is nevertheless
maintained in sufficient repair to prevent its walls from crumbling or its
beauty of outline from being marred, and stands forth a living epic,
written in stone and oak, and meriting a place among the classics of the
land.
The favorite of tourists, artists, and antiquaries, it can well dispense
with anything like an accurate description from a traveller who went
thither, not to study, but to muse; so, putting in a plea, beforehand, for
possible failures in observation and memory, I propose to myself
nothing more than a re-indulgence of the reverie which took possession
of me on my visit to Haddon Hall.
We had spent the middle hours of the day at Chatsworth, that palace
and museum of modern art, and, with senses bewildered and eyes
dazzled by the magnificence of a ducal residence unparalleled, perhaps,

in the world for its wealth and culture, we had set off, in the latter part
of the afternoon, to view its antipodes. The circumstances and the hour
were not inappropriate. Sated with the most perfect display of luxury
and taste which the present age can boast, and somewhat weary with
the toil of sight-seeing, a six-mile drive, the gradual decline of the
summer day, the shadows gathering over the landscape, all acted as a
gentle narcotic, and were a fit preparative for our approach to that old,
deserted homestead, the first glimpse of which set my fancy roaming,
and carried me away into a world of dreams.
Hitherto I had been the contented occupant of an old yellow coach, and
had been satisfied with the pace of two jaded post-horses. But, as I
crossed the drawbridge and climbed the steep hill which led to the
principal gateway, I found myself mounted on rapid wings, and
whirling through the centuries. Not that I was rushing on in advance of
the age. No,--the wings flapped backwards, they careered disdainfully
over and beyond the region of reality; as we flew, the present became
merged in the past, the actual gave place to the ideal.
I am approaching a feudal fortress. The deep moat, the turreted walls,
the old gray towers, the lattice of my lady's bower, the sentry pacing
the battlements, the warder stationed at the gate, the severe exterior of
the grim pile, the smoking hospitality that reigns within,--I recognize
them all. Much that I have taken on faith from my childhood has
already been realized