have had a portcullis,
and narrow windows in a portion of it, and a cannon mounted upon a
low roof, and an excavation called the moat,--but which was now a
fantastic and somewhat picturesque garden,--running round two sides
of it. In very truth, though a portion of the castle was undoubtedly
old, and had been built when strength was needed for defence and
probably for the custody of booty,--the battlements, and the round
tower, and the awe-inspiring gateway had all been added by one of
the late Sir Florians. But the castle looked like a castle, and was
interesting. As a house it was not particularly eligible, the castle
form of domestic architecture being exigeant in its nature, and
demanding that space, which in less ambitious houses can be applied
to comfort, shall be surrendered to magnificence. There was a great
hall, and a fine dining-room with plate-glass windows looking out
upon the sea; but the other sitting-rooms were insignificant, and the
bedrooms were here and there, and were for the most part small and
dark. That, however, which Lizzie had appropriated to her own use was
a grand chamber, looking also out upon the open sea.

The castle stood upon a bluff of land, with a fine prospect of the
Firth of Clyde, and with a distant view of the Isle of Arran. When
the air was clear, as it often is clear there, the Arran hills
could be seen from Lizzie's window, and she was proud of talking of
the prospect. In other respects, perhaps, the castle was somewhat
desolate. There were a few stunted trees around it, but timber had
not prospered there. There was a grand kitchen garden,--or rather
a kitchen garden which had been intended to be grand;--but since
Lizzie's reign had been commenced, the grandeur had been neglected.
Grand kitchen gardens are expensive, and Lizzie had at once been firm
in reducing the under-gardeners from five men to one and a boy. The
head-gardener had of course left her at once; but that had not broken
her heart, and she had hired a modest man at a guinea a week instead
of a scientific artist, who was by no means modest, with a hundred
and twenty pounds a year and coals, house, milk, and all other
horticultural luxuries. Though Lizzie was prosperous and had a fine
income, she was already aware that she could not keep up a town and
country establishment and be a rich woman on four thousand a year.
There was a flower garden and small shrubbery within the so-called
moat; but, otherwise, the grounds