282 INTRODUCTION. 



The shelves creaked underneath the loads of learned 

 lumber; there were books of all sorts, including 

 the ancient classics, and the vernacular from the 

 clumsy tomes of antiquarian Dugdale to the dap- 

 per type of the last annual. The ancient and 

 the modern were strikingly contrasted, or rather 

 blended, for there was an union of both of an- 

 cient grandeur and of modern luxury combining 

 at once a baronial, a sporting, and a literary ap- 

 pearance J On the walls were hung the portraits 

 of all the Oakleighs of Oakleigh ! fair ladies ! 

 mailed warriors ! shaven priests ! gallant knights ! 

 and sturdy squires ! amidst an assemblage of 

 hoops, feathers, ruffles, and long swords and perri- 

 wigs and queues of every cut, curl, tie, form, and 

 twist. 



Conviviality reigned at the old Hall of Oakleigh 

 after the good old English fashion. The hills by 

 day, and the walls by night, reverberated the 

 sportsman's voice. As of yore, in that mansion of 

 other days, the song was sung and the tale was 

 told ; Welcome presided ; and Mirth and Modera- 

 tion two fellows who seemed never to grow old 

 were rarely absent. 



Guests from the South, who annually rusticated 

 at Oakleigh in autumn, not so much to partake of 

 the in-door hospitality of 



That pleasant place of all festivity, 



as to share in the sports of the field, the means of 



