Whether this 'frisk' in good society included the passage of the Dark Walk, the chronicler has not related. But the Dark Walk, also known as the 'Druid's,' or 'Lovers' Walk,' is almost the only feature of the gardens which now needs to be described. Its position has already been roughly indicated. It was formed by tall overarching trees meeting at the top, in which, in the place's palmiest days, blackbirds, thrushes, and nightingales made their nests. A visit to this _selva oscura_ was the prime ambition of the more inquiring visitor to Vauxhall, either upon the simple ground put forward by the elder Miss Rose in the 'Connoisseur' that it was '_solentary_,' or upon the more specious excuse, advanced by the generality, that the music of the Orchestra sounded better through the thick foliage of the trees. But the pretexts for seeking these attractive shades were probably as inexhaustible as Dean Aldrich's reasons for drinking, the last of which was 'any other reason.' In Miss Burney's 'Evelina,' that delightful heroine is decoyed into the Dark Walk by her vulgar friends, the Branghtons. There she is insulted by a gang of rakes, and is rescued by Sir Clement Willoughby, who, apparently under the influence of the genius of the place, proceeds, after certain impertinences, to make her a spasmodic declaration, plentifully punctuated with dashes in this wise,--'O Miss Anville,--loveliest of women,--forgive me,--my--I beseech you forgive me;--if I have offended--if I have hurt you,--I could kill myself at the thought!' etc. Thus this 'most impetuous of men;' and thus did they make love in Vauxhall's 'green retreats' 'when George was king.' Nor love alone, apparently; for if the old descriptions are strictly accurate in representing some of its frequenters as yelling 'in sounds fully as terrific as the imagined horrors of Cavalcanti's bloodhounds,' there must have been a considerable amount of more than questionable horse-play besides; and the licensing magistrates who, in 1763, bound the proprietors to do away with the 'dark walks,' and to appoint proper watchmen, were no doubt well advised.