ke the grounds, large,
commodious, and uninteresting. It is built of stone, which appears as
if it had been plastered over, is three stories high, and the windows
are all of the same size, and at regular intervals. The body of the
house looks like a huge, square, Dutch old lady, and the two wings
might be taken for her two equally fat, square, Dutch daughters.
Inside, the furniture is good, strong, and plain. There are plenty of
drawing-rooms, sitting-rooms, bed-rooms, and offices; a small gallery
of very indifferent paintings, and a kitchen, with an excellent
kitchen-range, and patent boilers of every shape.

Considering the nature of the attractions, it is somewhat strange that
Lord Cashel should have considered it necessary to make it generally
known that the park might be seen any day between the hours of nine and
six, and the house, on Tuesdays and Fridays between the hours of eleven
and four. Yet such is the case, and the strangeness of this proceeding
on his part is a good deal diminished by the fact that persons,
either induced by Lord Cashel's good nature, or thinking that any big
house must be worth seeing, very frequently pay half-a-crown to the
housekeeper for the privilege of being dragged through every room in
the mansion.

There is a bed there, in which the Regent slept when in Ireland, and a
room which was tenanted by Lord Normanby, when Lord Lieutenant. There
is, moreover, a satin counterpane, which was made by the lord's aunt,
and a snuff-box which was given to the lord's grandfather by Frederick
the Great. These are the lions of the place, and the gratification
experienced by those who see them is, no doubt, great; but I doubt if
it equals the annoyance and misery to which they are subjected in being
obliged to pass one unopened door--that of the private room of Lady
Selina, the only daughter of the earl at present unmarried.

It contains only a bed, and the usual instruments of a lady's toilet;
but Lady Selina does not choose to have it shown, and it has become
invested, in the eyes of the visitors, with no ordinary mystery. Many a
petitionary whisper is addressed to the housekeeper on the subject, but
in vain; and, consequently, the public too often leave Grey Abbey
dissatisfied.

As Lord Ballindine rode through the gates, and up the long approach
to the house, he was so satisfied of the wisdom of his own final
resolution, and of the successful termination of his embassy under such
circumstance