thusiastic _trio_ who looked from the
brow of Hambleton on that memorable morning. But our object was not
attained, and we set forward with replenished vigour, to cross the
heather-heath, whose bleak aspect prepared us for the paradise which
smiled below the other side of the hills. The first prominent object
which met our view, was the terrace, with its classical temples at each
of its terminations; and next, the wood encircled hamlet of Scawton, at
whose little alehouse we enjoyed a hearty breakfast; and then set
forward to explore our beloved region of Rievaulx; our path being
through a mountainous wood, which nearly kissed the sky, and obscured
the rustic road which divided it: after several windings through this
leafy labyrinth, we arrived at a point where the wood was more open, and
the dell considerably wider. It was after passing a picturesque cottage
and bridge, that the first view of Rievaulx Abbey broke upon us. It was
then that the first outline of its "Gothic grandeur" was displayed to
us. Crossing the little bridge of Rieval, we proceeded along the banks
of the Rye, which morosely rolled along, scarcely deigning to murmur its
complaints to the woody hills which skirted it, as if in pique for the
ruin of its sublime temple, and the disappearance of its monastic lords.
The village of Rieval, constructed out of the wreck of the spacious
abbey, displays some reverence for the preservation of inscriptions dug
out of the building; and the little windows which lit the cells of
studious monks five hundred years ago, now grace the cottages of
illiterate peasants. We took a facsimile of one inscription, in Saxon
letters, merely denoting the name of the monastery.

The rustic beauty of the hamlet has been copiously eulogized by
antiquarians and provincial historians. The beautiful foliage of its
trees, varying in colour, appears like fleecy clouds of verdure, rising
one above the other, over which a still deeper shadow is cast by the
towering woods on each side of the valley; and in the midst of this
fairy region, as if conscious of its proud pre-eminence, rises the
sacred edifice, clothed in mourning of nature's deepest shade:[5]

Oh! many an hour of ecstasy
I past within its fading towers;
When life, and love, and poesy,
Hung on my harp their sweetest flowers.

To indulge a little in reverie--"how are the mighty fallen!"--Here was
once worshipped the virgin amidst the glittering pomp of monkish
sole