ds my father had spoken since we set out from the
inn, seemed to assure my mother that she need have no apprehension as
to the character of his thoughts, for her brow cleared, and she said,
laughing,--

"Only look at poor Primmins, and then at that hill!"

"You may subtract Primmins, if you will be answerable for the remnant,
Kitty. Only I warn you that it is against all the laws of physics."

So saying, he sprang lightly forward, and, taking hold of my arm, paused
and looked round, and drew the loud free breath with which we draw
native air.

"And yet," said my father, after that grateful and affectionate
inspiration,--"and yet, it must be owned that a more ugly country one
cannot see out of Cambridgeshire." (1)

"Nay," said I, "it is bold and large, it has a beauty of its own. Those
immense, undulating, uncultivated, treeless tracts have surely their
charm of wildness and solitude. And how they suit the character of the
ruin! All is feudal there! I understand Roland better now."

"I hope to Heaven Cardan will come to no harm!" cried my father; "he is
very handsomely bound, and he fitted beautifully just into the fleshiest
part of that fidgety Primmins."

Blanche, meanwhile, had run far before us, and I followed fast. There
were still the remains of that deep trench (surrounding the ruins on
three sides, leaving a ragged hill-top at the fourth) which made the
favorite fortification of all the Teutonic tribes. A causeway, raised
on brick arches, now, however, supplied the place of the drawbridge,
and the outer gate was but a mass of picturesque ruin. Entering into the
courtyard or bailey, the old castle mound, from which justice had been
dispensed, was in full view, rising higher than the broken walls
around it, and partially over grown with brambles. And there stood,
comparatively whole, the Tower or Keep, and from its portals emerged the
veteran owner.

His ancestors might have received us in more state, but certainly they
could not have given us a warmer greeting. In fact, in his own domain
Roland appeared another man. His stiffness, which was a little repulsive
to those who did not understand it, was all gone. He seemed less proud,
precisely because he and his pride, on that ground, were on good terms
with each other. How gallantly he extended,--not his arm, in our modern
Jack-and-Jill sort of fashion, but his right hand to my mother; how
carefully he led her over "brake, bush, and scaur," through the low