that already described at Baddesley Clinton, in Warwickshire.

[Footnote 1: This house must not be confused with "the Upper House,"
connected with Charles II.'s wanderings.]

Everything points to the former magnificence of this mansion;
the elaborate gate-house, the handsome stone porch, and even
the colossal sundial, which last, for quaint design, can hold
its own with those of the greatest baronial castles in Scotland.
The arms of the Brooke family are to be seen emblazoned on the
walls, a member of whom, Sir Basil, was he who christened the
hunting-lodge of the Giffards "Boscobel," from the Italian words
"bos co bello," on account of its woody situation. It is long
since the Brookes migrated from Madeley--now close upon two
centuries.

The deadly looking pits occasionally seen in ancient buildings
are dangerous, to say the least of it. They may be likened to
the shaft of our modern lift, with the car at the bottom and
nothing above to prevent one from taking a step into eternity!

A friend at Twickenham sends us a curious account of a recent
exploration of what was once the manor house, "Arragon Towers."
We cannot do better than quote his words, written in answer to a
request for particulars. "I did not," he says, "make sufficient
examination of the hiding-place in the old manor house of Twickenham
to give a detailed description of it, and I have no one here
whom I could get to accompany me in exploring it now. It is not
a thing to do by one's self, as one might make a false step,
and have no one to assist in retrieving it. The entrance is in
the top room of the one remaining turret by means of a movable
panel in the wall opposite the window. The panel displaced, you
see the top of a thick wall (almost on a line with the floor of
the room). The width of the aperture is, I should think, nearly
three feet; that of the wall-top about a foot and a half; the
remaining space between the wall-top and the outer wall of the
house is what you might perhaps term 'a chasm'--it is a sheer
drop to the cellars of the house. I was told by the workmen that
by walking the length of the wall-top (some fifteen feet) I should
reach a stairway conducting to the vaults below, and that on
reaching the bottom, a passage led off in the direction of the
river, the tradition being that it actually went beneath the
river to Ham House."

CHAPTER XII

HIDING-PLACES IN JACOBITE DWELLINGS AND IN SCOTTISH CASTLES AND
MANSIONS

Durin