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famed as the retreat of Cardinal Woolsey; and gave a passing look at the house in which Richard III. is said to have slept, the night preceding the battle of Bosworth.

The ride from Leicester to Ashby is more undulating, and more varied, by hill and dale, than any section of the country, through which we have passed since leaving London. From an observatory, erected on Barton Hill, seen from the road, the coachman informed us, that twenty counties, and one hundred and fifty parish churches, could be numbered on a clear day. Not far from this, we had a distant sight of the field of Bosworth; and afterwards passed over a part of Charnwood forest, famed as a huntingground of Robin Hood.

Ashby-de la-Zouch, is a picturesque and pretty town, having a fine ruin, a venerable old church, in which the good Countess of Huntington is buried; and a range of bath-houses, at its mineral springs, among the most splendid in Europe. A principal object in taking Ashby in our route, was to call upon the lady of the Rev. Mr. Tait, the dissenting clergyman of the place, whom I had known as Miss Adam, a daughter of my friends of Marshgate, and whom 1 now had the pleasure of meeting for an hour. It was necessary for us, however, to proceed almost imme diately to this place, which we reached, much fa tigued, early this evening.

REMEMBRANCE OF A PROMISE.

233

LETTER XXVI.

ARRIVAL AT NEWSTEAD, AND DESCRIPTION OF THE ABBEY. The fulfilment of a promise-Letters from Lord Byron to Col. Wildman-Reception at Newstead-Former and present condition of the mansion and estate-Grand entrance-Stair-caseBanqueting hall-Breakfast parlour-Library-Drawing-room —Principal bed-rooms-Haunted chamber-and Byron's Tower.

DEAR VIRGINIA,

Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire,
July 14th, 1832.

ERE this, you must be so weary of attempting to make intelligible the crude sketches 1 transmit to you, that I fear a date even from NEWSTEAD, and from the "haunted room" of the Abbey itself, will scarce excite interest sufficient to call in exercise your inventive powers in discovering what may be scribbled beneath it.

Seven years ago, at the Sandwich Islands, Lord Byron promised me, on one occasion, when BYRON his cousin, and the Abbey were the topics of conversation, that if I ever visited England, he would take pleasure in accompanying me to Nottinghamshire and showing me the estate. When first in the kingdom, the year following, it was under circumstances to interdict my leaving London for a sufficient time to make the journey; and, now, his Lordship's connection with the household of the Queen, and other duties forbade a visit by him to this section of the

234

LETTERS TO NEWSTEAD.

country. He was unwilling, however, that I should travel through England without seeing a mansion so interesting in many respects, and so universally famed; and kindly furnished Captain Bolton and myself with letters to his friend, Col. Wildman, the present proprietor of the Abbey, and of the estates attached to it...

The morning we were leaving London, Captain Bolton very unexpectedly received a second letter to Col. Wildman, from an American gentleman of Baltimore, who had made the acquaintance and friendship of himself and Mrs. Wildman, beneath their own roof. And we were thus doubly provided with an introduction to them.

But though assured of the generous hospitality of those who are now our hosts, we thought only, in leaving Nottingham on Wednesday for the drive of ten miles to the Abbey, of a morning call and a survey of the mansion; and left our luggage at the hotel till we should return in the afternoon to pursue our travel to the north. But this arrangement, Col. Wildman said, on being informed of it in answer to an inquiry for our trunks, after having handsomely welcomed us, was entirely out of the question. And permitted us to take leave again, after a delightful morning in viewing the mansion and grounds, only on condition that we should return to dinner the following day, prepared for as long a sojourn as should be agreeable to ourselves.

It is but candid to confess that the cordiality of the invitation, and the handsome manner in which it was proffered, was exceedingly grateful to us, and the

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temptation in every point of view, especially after meeting the accomplished inmates of the Abbey, too great to be resisted. At an early hour, therefore, the next day, we, for a second time, alighted, "bag and baggage," at its portals.

Col. Wildman is an officer in the Hussars; and though apparently not more than thirty-five years of age, served with Wellington in the Peninsular war, and shared in the conflict and honours of Waterloo. He was an aid-de-camp of the Marquess of Anglesea, in the battle, and received a slight wound himself where his general lost a leg. An heir to great wealth, he, shortly after that period, upon his marriage, fixed upon Newstead, then offered for disposal, for the investure of a portion of his monied inheritance.

Byron had been a school-fellow, on an older form, for several years, at Harrow. And his friend, an admirer of his genius and his works, himself a person of taste and accomplishments, chose Newstead in preference to any other estate open to his purchase, though then in a most neglected and wretched condition. So much so that many of his friends thought him mad. That which had been one of the noblest and most venerable parks in England, had been dispoiled of its timber till not a tree remained; its enclosures were all prostrate; scarce an apartment in the Abbey was inhabitable; the farms returned no rent; and the whole property appeared as if just swept by the besom of destruction.

Col. Wildman, however, believed it to be recoverable; and with his resources it was so. And now,

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at the end of fourteen years of unremitted expenditure, like the Phoenix, it is rising into a more than primeval magnificence and splendour. The estate is covered with young and thriving plantations, around which, more than six miles of high and substantial brick wall has been built. The farms with new dwellings and out-houses, are productive and valuable in their rents. And the Abbey, which the architect, who inspected it after the purchase, declared would have been one wide ruin, with every roof fallen in, at the end of another heavy winter, is restored in every part to more than primitive strength and durability, and equals in its attractions and magnificence, the most splendid residences of the kingdom.

No alteration has been suffered in the walls or original apartments; but the whole has been newly roofed, many parts refaced, and decayed and mouldering material substituted by that which is solid and sound. And all in such perfect keeping with the primitive architecture, that not only the Byron's of the last three or four hundred years, but the old monks of the twelfth century themselves, could they rise from their graves, would find Newstead still their old and well known home.

Byron's own description of the Abbey

"An old, old monastery once, and now
Still older mansion of a rich and rare
Mixed Gothic-"

is throughout, beautifully true and graphic. The situation is low; chosen as, in the same lines the poet sarcastically says, by the monks,

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