s. This party consisted of a handsome man of
fifty-odd, a lady some three or four years his junior well preserved and
still exceedingly attractive; a young man of twenty-six, and two lovely
girls, that looked like twins; though one was really twenty-one, and the
other but nineteen. These were Sir Wycherly and Lady Wychecombe,
Wycherly their only son, then just returned from a five years'
peregrination on the continent of Europe, and Mildred and Agnes, their
daughters. The rest of the family had arrived in England about a
fortnight before, to greet the heir on his return from the _grand tour_,
as it was then termed. The meeting had been one of love, though Lady
Wychecombe had to reprove a few innocent foreign affectations, as she
fancied them to be, in her son; and the baronet, himself, laughed at the
scraps of French, Italian, and German, that quite naturally mingled in
the young man's discourse. All this, however, cast no cloud over the
party, for it had ever been a family of entire confidence and unbroken
love.

"This is a most solemn place to me," observed Sir Wycherly, as they
entered at the Poets' corner, "and one in which a common man unavoidably
feels his own insignificance. But, we will first make our pilgrimage,
and look at these remarkable inscriptions as we come out. The tomb we
seek is in a chapel on the other side of the church, near to the great
doors. When I last saw it, it was quite alone."

On hearing this, the whole party moved on; though the two lovely young
Virginians cast wistful and curious eyes behind them, at the wonders by
which they were surrounded.

"Is not this an extraordinary edifice, Wycherly?" half whispered Agnes,
the youngest of the sisters, as she clung to one arm of her brother,
Mildred occupying the other. "Can the whole world furnish such another?"

"So much for hominy and James' river!" answered the young man,
laughing--"now could you but see the pile at Rouen, or that at Rheims,
or that at Antwerp, or even that at York, in this good kingdom, old
Westminster would have to fall back upon its little tablets and big
names. But Sir Wycherly stops; he must see what he calls his land-fall."

Sir Wycherly had indeed stopped. It was in consequence of having reached
the head of the _ch[oe]ur_, whence he could see the interior of the
recess, or chapel, towards which he had been moving. It still contained
but a single monument, and that was adorned with an anchor and other
nautical emble