y character of the scenery endowed with a sort of
natural fitness to be the theatre of terrible events, or yet again the
union of the two, I know not; but it produced upon my mind a very
powerful influence, amounting to a species of fascination, which
constantly attracted me to the spot, although when there, the weight
of the tradition, and the awe of the scene produced a sense of actual
pain.

The place to which I allude was but a few miles distant from the
celebrated public school, at which I passed the happiest days of a not
uneventful life, and was within an easy walk of the college limits; so
that when I had attained that favored eminence, known as the sixth
form, which allows its happy occupants to roam the country, free from
the fear of masters, provided only they attend at appointed hours, it
was my frequent habit to stroll away from the noisy playing-fields
through the green hedgerow lanes, or to scull my wherry over the
smooth surface of the silver Thames, toward the scene of dark
tradition; and there to lap myself in thick coming fancies, half sad,
half sweet, yet terrible withal, and in their very terror attractive,
until the call of the homeward rooks, and the lengthened shadows of
the tall trees on the greensward, would warn me that I too must hie me
back with speed, or pay the penalty of undue delay.

Now, as the story has in itself, apart from the extraneous interest
with which a perfect acquaintance with its localities may have
invested it in my eyes, a powerful and romantic character; as its
catastrophe was no less striking than un-English; and as the passions
which gave rise to it were at once the strongest and the most
general--though rarely prevailing, at least among us Anglo-Normans, to
so fearful an extent--I am led to hope that others may find in it
something that may enchain their attention for a time, though it may
not affect them as it has me with an influence, unchanged by change of
scene, unaltered by the lapse of time, which alters all things.

I propose, therefore, to relate it, as I heard it first from an old
superannuated follower of the family, which, owning other, though not
fairer demesnes in some distant county, had never more used
Ditton-in-the-Dale as their dwelling place, although well nigh two
centuries had elapsed since the transaction which had scared them away
from their polluted household gods.

But first, I must describe briefly the characteristics of the scenery,
witho