CALDER ABBEY. 169 



its hills. From this eminence, the road descends 

 through an avenue of beech, ash, and other trees, 

 to Calder Bridge. 



Here the travellers will leave the carriage, which 

 will meet them within an hour at Captain Irwin's 

 gate, on their quitting the Abbey. They must 

 now step into the inn garden at the bridge, and 

 see how beautifully the brown waters swirl away 

 under the red bridge and its ivied banks, while the 

 waving ferns incessantly checker the sunshine. It 

 is a mile to the Abbey, through the churchyard, 

 and along the bank of the Calder, where again the 

 most beautiful tricks of light are seen, with brown 

 water and its white foam, red precipitous banks, 

 and the greenest vegetation, with a wood crowning 

 all. The scene is thoroughly monastic. There is 

 no sound at noon-day besides the gushing water, 

 but the woodman's axe and the shock of a falling 

 tree, or the whir of the magpie, or the pipe of the 

 thrush : but at night the rooks, on their return to 

 roost, fill the air with their din. The ruins are 

 presently seen, springing sheer from the greenest 

 turf. Relics from the abbey are now placed beside 

 the way ; and the modern house appears at hand. 

 The ruins should be approached from 

 the front, so that the lofty pointed 

 arches may best disclose the long perspective be- 

 hind of grassy lawn and sombre woods. The 

 Abbey is built of red sandstone of the neighbour- 

 hood, now sobered down by time (it was founded 

 in A.D., 1134,) into the richest and softest tint 

 that the eye could desire. But little is known of 

 it beyond its date, and the name of its founder, 

 Ranulph, son of the first Ranulph de Meschines, 



