In the autumn of 1802, Mr. and Mrs. Radcliffe took a journey to Leicester and Warwick, and returned by Woodstock and Oxford. From the journal kept during that tour, the following descriptions of Kenilworth, of one or two scenes in Warwick Castle, and of Blenheim, are perhaps most worthy of selection. Both Warwick Castle and Blenheim are described with great minuteness; but both these mansions are so generally known, that it is thought sufficient to extract such portions of the accounts of them only, as are most characteristic of the writer’s feelings and tastes. KENILWORTH. “Left Coventry at half past twelve, and passed through a pleasant well-wooded country to Kenilworth. Almost every village over-topped with lofty trees. Passed for some miles over Kenilworth Chase, by a straight road of noble breadth, bordered with forest. Part of this forest was, in former times, cut down, in order to dislodge robbers. The gate of the castle, to which we drove up, is in the grey square tower, built on a high rock, by Leicester. This gate being now a residence, the former entrance by it to the court of the Castle is stopped up, and we passed through the garden, at its side, into the green and open area, that was once the grand court of the castle. Hence we looked up to the noble masses of ruin, that still stand proudly, and form three broken and irregular sides of what was once the inner court. Of the buildings that formed the fourth side, there are now no vestiges, except the _knolliness_ of the ground, where they once stood, may be called such, and except part of the buildings still called Leicester’s, these having been built by him. These are a fine mass of ruined walls, covered with thickest ivy, on the left; on the right, stands a more noble mass, with three lofty arches in a row, going the whole depth of the wall, sixteen feet: this is called Cæsar’s Tower, and, though the oldest part of the Castle, appears, on the outside, the freshest and newest. It is of a greyer and more solid stone than the rest. This, too, is finely hung with ivy. Between these masses, in perspective, forming the third side of the court, is the most picturesque remainder of the castle, though Cæsar’s Tower is the grandest. This was once the great hall, or banqueting-room. Its three beautiful pointed window-frames are there still; and the arch of a Gothic door, most elegantly twined with vine-leaves, all now hung and clustered with the richest drapery of ivy. The trunk of some of this ivy is of great thickness, and it is so old, that in some places, the branches are sapless and leafless, and the grey stalks seemed to crawl about the ruin in sympathy. Other remains of buildings partly connect the three sides of the court, and are intermingled and crowned with alder and ash plants. This view of the ruin was very striking; the three chief masses great and solemn, without being beautiful. They spoke at once to the imagination, with the force