ntended that they should resemble, as much as
possible, the residence of a great noble.

There were two quadrangles at Vauxe of gray-stone; the outer one of
larger dimensions and much covered with ivy; the inner one not so
extensive, but more ornate, with a lofty tower, a hall, and a chapel.
The house was full of galleries, and they were full of portraits. Indeed
there was scarcely a chamber in this vast edifice of which the walls
were not breathing with English history in this interesting form.
Sometimes more ideal art asserted a triumphant claim--transcendental
Holy Families, seraphic saints, and gorgeous scenes by Tintoret and Paul
of Verona.

The furniture of the house seemed never to have been changed. It was
very old, somewhat scanty, but very rich--tapestry and velvet hangings,
marvellous cabinets, and crystal girandoles. Here and there a group of
ancient plate; ewers and flagons and tall salt-cellars, a foot high and
richly chiselled; sometimes a state bed shadowed with a huge pomp of
stiff brocade and borne by silver poles.

Vauxe stood in a large park, studded with stately trees; here and there
an avenue of Spanish chestnuts or a grove of oaks; sometimes a gorsy
dell, and sometimes a so great spread of antlered fern, taller than the
tallest man.

It was only twenty miles from town, and Lord St. Jerome drove Lothair
down; the last ten miles through a pretty land, which, at the
right season, would have been bright with orchards, oak-woods, and
hop-gardens. Lord St. Jerome loved horses, and was an eminent whip. He
had driven four-in-hand when a boy, and he went on driving four-in-hand;
not because it was the fashion, but because he loved it. Toward the
close of Lent, Lady St. Jerome and Clare Arundel had been at a convent
in retreat, but they always passed Holy Week at home, and they were to
welcome Lord St. Jerome again at Vauxe.

The day was bright, the mode of movement exhilarating, all the
anticipated incidents delightful, and Lothair felt the happiness of
health and youth.

"There is Vauxe," said Lord St. Jerome, in a tone of proud humility, as
a turn in the road first displayed the stately pile.

"How beautiful!" said Lothair. "Ah! our ancestors understood the
country."

"I used to think when I was a boy," said Lord St. Jerome, "that I lived
in the prettiest village in the world; but these railroads have
so changed every thing that Vauxe seems to me now only a second
town-house."

The ladies we