ncreased by the extreme solitude which reigned around.
This, however, was presently relieved by a cackling sign of life
which issued from a brood-hen as it flew from the sill of a
side-parlour window. On casting my eyes further into the landscape,
I also perceived a very fat cow lazily browsing on the rich pasture
of a paddock.

On turning round to view the house, new tokens of desolation were
visible. Its shattered casements and worm-eaten doors, with tufts of
weed growing at each corner, showed that for many years the front of
the mansion had not been inhabited or its doors opened. One evidence
of fallen grandeur was highly characteristic--over the porch the
family-arms had been carved in stone, but was now scarcely
distinguishable from dilapidation: a sparrow had established a
comfortable nest in the mouth of the helmet, and a griffin 'rampant'
had fallen from his place beside the shield, and tamely lay
overgrown with weeds.

These observations were interrupted by the light step of my cousin,
who came to inform me that the lady of the house, after much,
persuasion, had consented to receive me. Conducting me to the back
of the mansion, my fair guide took me through a dark passage into a
sort of kitchen. A high and ample 'settle' stood, as is usual in
farmhouses, before the hearth. In one corner of this seat reclined
a figure bent with age, her face concealed by a thick veil. In the
other corner was an old cheerful-looking woman, busily knitting, and
mumbling rather than singing a quaint old ballad.

The mistress of Coote-down made a feeble attempt to rise when my
cousin presented me; but I entreated her to keep her seat. Having
procured a chair for my fellow-visitor (for the old domestic took
not the smallest notice of us, but went on with her work as if we
were not present), I established myself beside the hostess, and
addressed to her a few common-place words of greeting. She replied
in a voice far less feeble than I had expected to hear from so
decrepit a person; but what she said was no answer to my salutation.
She went on with surprising clearness, explaining to me the degree
of relationship which we bore to each other, and traced my pedigree
till it joined her own; continued our mutual genealogy back to the
Damnonii of Cornwall, hinting that our ancestors of that period were
large mining proprietors, who sold tin to the Phoenicians! At first
she spoke with doubt and hesitation, as if she feared to make some