sent occasion entering his house, for the sun had been
some time declining, the farmer, calling one of his labourers to take
Egremont's horse, hastened into the house to fill the brimming cup.

"And what do you think of this fire?" said Egremont to the hind.

"I think 'tis hard times for the poor, sir."

"But rick-burning will not make the times easier, my good man."

The man made no reply, but with a dogged look led away the horse to his
stable.

About half a mile from Marney, the dale narrowed, and the river took
a winding course. It ran through meads, soft and vivid with luxuriant
vegetation, bounded on either side by rich hanging woods, save where
occasionally a quarry broke the verdant bosom of the heights with its
rugged and tawny form. Fair stone and plenteous timber, and the current
of fresh waters, combined, with the silent and secluded scene screened
from every harsh and angry wind, to form the sacred spot that in
old days Holy Church loved to hallow with its beauteous and enduring
structures. Even the stranger therefore when he had left the town about
two miles behind him, and had heard the farm and mill which he had
since passed, called the Abbey farm and the Abbey mill, might have
been prepared for the grateful vision of some monastic remains. As for
Egremont, he had been almost born amid the ruins of Marney Abbey; its
solemn relics were associated with his first and freshest fancies; every
footstep was as familiar to him as it could have been to one of the
old monks; yet never without emotion could he behold these unrivalled
remains of one of the greatest of the great religious houses of the
North.

Over a space of not less than ten acres might still be observed the
fragments of the great abbey: these were, towards their limit, in
general moss-grown and mouldering memorials that told where once rose
the offices and spread the terraced gardens of the old proprietors; here
might still be traced the dwelling of the lord abbot; and there, still
more distinctly, because built on a greater scale and of materials still
more intended for perpetuity, the capacious hospital, a name that did
not then denote the dwelling of disease, but a place where all the
rights of hospitality were practised; where the traveller from the proud
baron to the lonely pilgrim asked the shelter and the succour that
never were denied, and at whose gate, called the Portal of the Poor,
the peasants on the Abbey lands, if in want, migh