gs;
and we return to any favourite amusement with the greater zest, from
being compelled to relinquish it for a season. So, if I shot birds in
winter with my firelock, I caught fish in summer, or attempted so to do,
with my angle. I was not quite so successful, it is true, with the
latter as with the former; possibly because it afforded me less pleasure.
It was, indeed, too much of a listless pastime to inspire me with any
great interest. I not unfrequently fell into a doze, whilst sitting on
the bank, and more than once let my rod drop from my hands into the
water.

At some distance from the city, behind a range of hilly ground which
rises towards the south-west, is a small river, the waters of which,
after many meanderings, eventually enter the principal river of the
district, {146} and assist to swell the tide which it rolls down to the
ocean. It is a sweet rivulet, and pleasant is it to trace its course
from its spring-head, high up in the remote regions of Eastern Anglia,
till it arrives in the valley behind yon rising ground; and pleasant is
that valley, truly a goodly spot, but most lovely where yonder bridge
crosses the little stream. Beneath its arch the waters rush garrulously
into a blue pool, and are there stilled, for a time, for the pool is
deep, and they appear to have sunk to sleep. Farther on, however, you
hear their voice again, where they ripple gaily over yon gravelly
shallow. On the left, the hill slopes gently down to the margin of the
stream. On the right is a green level, a smiling meadow, grass of the
richest decks the side of the slope; mighty trees also adorn it, giant
elms, the nearest of which, when the sun is nigh its meridian, fling a
broad shadow upon the face of the pool; through yon vista you catch a
glimpse of the ancient brick of an old English hall. It has a stately
look, that old building, indistinctly seen, as it is, among those
umbrageous trees; you might almost suppose it an earl's home; and such it
was, or rather upon its site stood an earl's home, in days of old, for
there some old Kemp, some Sigurd, or Thorkild, roaming in quest of a
hearth-stead, settled down in the grey old time, when Thor and Freya were
yet gods, and Odin was a portentous name. Yon old hall is still called
the Earl's Home, {147} though the hearth of Sigurd is now no more, and
the bones of the old Kemp, and of Sigrith his dame, have been mouldering
for a thousand years in some neighbouring knoll; p