ent squirrel peeps down upon you from a bough of the
canopy, and, hoisting his tail, glides into the obscurity of the
loftiest umbrage. You still continue to see and hear; but the sight is a
glimmer, and the sound a hum, as if the forest-glade were swarming with
bees, from the ground-flowers to the herons' nests. Refreshed by your
dream of Dryads, follow a lonesome din that issues from a pile of wooded
cliffs, and you are led to a Waterfall. Five minutes are enough for
taking an impression, if your mind be of the right material, and you
carry it away with you further down the Forest. Such a torrent will not
reach the lake without disporting itself into many little cataracts; and
saw ye ever such a fairy one as that flowing through below an ivied
bridge into a circular basin overshadowed by the uncertain twilight of
many checkering branches, and washing the rook-base of a Hermitage, in
which a sin-sickened or pleasure-palled man might, before his hairs were
grey, forget all the gratifications and all the guilt of the noisy
world?

You are now all standing together in a group beside Ivy-cottage, the
river gliding below its wooden bridge from Rydal-mere. It is a perfect
model of such architecture--breathing the very spirit of Westmoreland.
The public road, skirted by its front paling, does not in the least
degree injure its character of privacy and retirement; so we think at
this dewy hour of prime, when the gossamer meets our faces, extended
from the honey-suckled slate-porch to the trees on the other side of the
turnpike. And see how the multitude of low-hanging roofs and gable-ends,
and dovecot-looking windows, steal away up a green and shrubberied
acclivity, and terminating in wooded rocks that seem part of the
building, in the uniting richness of ivy, lichens, moss-roses, broom,
and sweet-brier, murmuring with birds and bees, busy near hive and nest!
It would be extremely pleasant to breakfast in that deep-windowed room
on the ground-floor, on cream and barley cakes, eggs, coffee, and
dry-toast, with a little mutton-ham not too severely salted, and at the
conclusion, a nut-shell of Glenlivet or Cognac. But, Lord preserve ye!
it is not yet six o'clock in the morning; and what Christian kettle
simmereth before seven? Yes, my sweet Harriet, that sketch does you
credit, and it is far from being very unlike the original. Rather too
many chimneys by about half-a-dozen; and where did you find that steeple
immediately over th