the sixteenth century, as was evident from the huge stone-work of its
windows, which scarce left room for light to pass through, as well as
from two or three heavy buttresses, which projected from the front of
the house, and exhibited on their surface little niches for images.
These had been carefully destroyed, and pots of flowers were placed in
the niches in their stead, besides their being ornamented by creeping
plants of various kinds, fancifully twined around them. The garden was
also in good order; and though the spot was extremely solitary, there
was about it altogether an air of comfort, accommodation, and even
elegance, by no means generally characteristic of the habitations of the
island at the time.

With much circumspection, Julian Peveril approached the low Gothic
porch, which defended the entrance of the mansion from the tempests
incident to its situation, and was, like the buttresses, overrun with
ivy and other creeping plants. An iron ring, contrived so as when drawn
up and down to rattle against the bar of notched iron through which it
was suspended, served the purpose of a knocker; and to this he applied
himself, though with the greatest precaution.

He received no answer for some time, and indeed it seemed as if the
house was totally uninhabited; when, at length, his impatience getting
the upper hand, he tried to open the door, and, as it was only upon
the latch, very easily succeeded. He passed through a little low-arched
hall, the upper end of which was occupied by a staircase, and turning
to the left, opened the door of a summer parlour, wainscoted with
black oak, and very simply furnished with chairs and tables of the same
materials; the former cushioned with the leather. The apartment was
gloomy--one of those stone-shafted windows which we have mentioned, with
its small latticed panes, and thick garland of foliage, admitting but an
imperfect light.

Over the chimneypiece (which was of the same massive materials with
the panelling of the apartment) was the only ornament of the room; a
painting, namely, representing an officer in the military dress of the
Civil Wars. It was a green jerkin, then the national and peculiar wear
of the Manxmen; his short band which hung down on the cuirass--the
orange-coloured scarf, but, above all, the shortness of his close-cut
hair, showing evidently to which of the great parties he had belonged.
His right hand rested on the hilt of his sword; and in the left he