REVIEWS. 
51 
well this holiday. The village is left; and the lane leads us by an abrupt turn, 
down to the rat-rat-rattling mill, all grey and dusty, and quite a picture, with the 
lusty miller leaning on the half-shut door, eying us complacently, while the two 
cats that bask at his feet seem to be half alarmed at the novel route. How hurriedly 
the water runs from beneath that heavy revolving wheel, as it were glad to have 
escaped from thraldom and from beneath the wheel of torture; 
‘ It flows through Alder banks along 
Beneath the copse that hides the hill; 
The gentle stream you cannot see, 
You only hear its melody, 
The stream that turns the mill. 
Pass on a little way, pass on, 
And you shall catch its gleam anon; 
And hark ! the loud and agonizing groan 
That makes its anguish known, 
Where, tortured by the Tyrant Lord of Meal, 
The Brook is broken on the Wheel.’ 
Southey, Works, p. 126. 
The eye seeks relief from the painful image in the caul beyond, over which the 
river rolls itself, in a round and oily wave, into the linn beneath, where, fretted 
by the fall, it ruffles itself into a white foam, and murmurs, not loud and scarcely 
displeased, at the accident and delay! After a short whirling play, the water goes 
on in a smooth and placid flow, that, after a space, quickens into a tumbling, 
brattling stream, as if suddenly become conscious that it had dallied here too long, 
and must make up the lost time. We take the hint, and we start to follow 
the river, leading by a pathway, which the inscription, carved on a rock, in rustic 
fashion, informs us was made by my Lord Frederick Fitzclarence—not for our 
ease, who are all too regardless of a trespass. So onwards we saunter, changing 
companions as whim and chance dictate, now in front—now lost in the rear—now 
plucking a new variety of flower—and now entrapping the gorgeous insects that 
flit about everywhere. The air is full of life, but ’twas unlucky to be so engaged 
just at this particular moment, for I cannot participate in that laugh which some 
story of Douglas’s has provoked, and I lost the fun, too, for the sake of a fly 
that I have not captured. (‘ One should take care not to grow too wise for so 
great a pleasure of life as laughter.’—Addison.) Onwards again; and now the 
wood is passed, when we cross, with a quicker pace, the open fields, and scarcely 
tarry at the queer little house and mill, which is sunk, as it were, in the bank, over 
which the road is carried. But we greet the good woman who stands there, with 
her infant in her arm, all a-wondering at the throng ; and our greeting is returned 
with a cheerful smile that bespeaks the good woman to be happy with her lot. And 
the opposite bank, covered with the bonnie broom, is sunny, and alive, too, with 
yur-yur-yurlings, and chirps, and melody ; and the river is alive with the leaping 
trout and the up-and-down flies—and it plays in its course with alternate streams 
and stills, rapids and circling deep pools ; and the sun shines on all things, living 
and dead, and we know not what to say but that this is beautiful and fine, and we 
say this to one another very often and never dream that we repeat a twice-told 
tale. Now a precipitous rock, partly quarried, and clothed with flowering sloes, 
with a golden whin or two, with hazel and budding hawthorn, with honeysuckle clam¬ 
bering amidst the shrubs, and with ivy that festoons the dark rock, and much varied 
herbage, draws us to remark with what successful art nature has grouped and 
mingled all this heterogeneous furniture, producing a very pleasing and picturesque 
effect with materials, which, separately viewed, are of a mean and regardless 
character. Turned by this rock, the river now runs in a rougher channel, banked 
on one side by a green pasture slope, while the steeper bank, along whose base we 
travel, is wooded with almost impenetrable shrubbery and trees of minor rank, 
where the varied botany that luxuriates in their shelter calls us to frequent admi¬ 
ration. The primrose and violet banks, the trailing ground-ivy with its modest 
flowers, the tall and graceful rush, the starwort with its blossoms of vestal purity— 
are all beautiful, and although often seen before, their beauty comes fresh and new 
