“When Guy,” resumed the old man, “found what sort of treasure he had gotten, he was ready to throw himself into the old chest, to be put under ground with it again; but I said there was no need of that; so we took out some of the best of the books, but none of the others had pictures; and Guy took the old staff, and then we did lay the trunk in the earth again.” Willoughton made many inquiries concerning the parchments with the seals, and the seals themselves, and whether his informant could find again the spot where they were deposited. “Come, come,” said Mr. Simpson; “let us leave this place; it is almost dark.” The old man said he thought he could find the spot; but that would be of no use; for it had lain so deep in the ground, that there had been depth over it for graves, and it was now beneath them. Willoughton, shocked at this circumstance, said no more on the subject; but the old man proceeded. “Among other things in the book, Sir, is a view of this old hall. I should never have found it out myself; for it was no more like what it is now than nothing: but Timothy Crabb, our school-master, knew it at once by this very window—and he read something about this window, too,—and by a door-way in the wall, yonder.” “How does it appear in the drawing?” asked Willoughton. “Why, Sir,—but you shall see the book, if you like. The hall had a high roof, like a church there, and a gallery ran all along the bottom of it, and such a chimney!”— “Ay! like the remains of what we see here now, I suppose,” said Mr. Simpson. “No, Sir, as different as can be.” “O! perhaps,” turning to Willoughton, “it was such an one as we saw at Penshurst; a raised hearth, with irons to hold wood, in the middle of the hall.” “No; that style,” observed Willoughton, “was of later date than chimneys in English halls. It came in, I apprehend, with the castellated mansion, of which style is Penshurst, the more ancient part of the building at least. In the hall of the older castle, a chimney sloped back from the line of the wall into the thickness of it, and let out the smoke through a loop above. Thus, the raised hearth, on which the wood fire blazed, projected into the chamber, and was sometimes overhung by a canopy of stone-work supported by pillars, that gave it a resemblance to a gothic porch, such as adorn some of our finest cathedrals.” “Yes, Sir, this in the book looks like something like a church porch without the sides, the top comes so far over the hearth. Then all down the hall are rows of tables, with gentle-folk and ladies sitting at them, and—” “I must see this manuscript,” interrupted Willoughton; “it appears to be a curious one.” “Come,” said Mr. Simpson, “it is already so dark, we can hardly see our way hence. There is scarce a gleam of light left on the horizon.” “No, Sir, but the moon is rising yonder, and some gentry have a fancy to see this place by moonlight.” “O! we have seen enough of it.”