“One night the poet chanced to look out of his window, and saw by the vague starlight a figure riding slowly past the mansion. The face could not be distinguished; but the tall, erect person, the cocked hat, the traditional costume, the often-described white horse, all were present. Slowly he paced before the house, and then returned, and then again passed by, after which, neither horse nor rider were seen or heard of.” Miss Mitford does not give us any authority for this anecdote; but the collectors of ghost stories are not very particular about authorities, and will be content to take it upon her own, as we do. There is a sketch of Elizabeth Barrett, and a little biography attached to it, which will be read with interest. Miss Mitford’s acquaintance with her commenced fifteen years ago. “Of a slight, delicate figure, with a shower of dark curls falling on either side of a most expressive face large, tender eyes richly fringed by dark eye-lashes, a smile like a sunbeam, and such a look of youthfulness, that I had some difficulty in persuading a friend, in whose carriage we went together to Chiswick, that the translator of the ‘Prometheus of Æschylus,’ the authoress of the ‘Essay on Mind,’ was old enough to be introduced into company, or, in technical language, was _out_.” It was in the following year that Miss Barrett broke a blood-vessel in the lungs, which consigned her to a long illness, during which she lost a favorite brother by one of those melancholy accidents which leave ineffaceable memories in the hearts of the survivors. He was drowned, with two companions, in sight of her windows at Torquay, whither she was ordered for change of air. This tragedy nearly killed her; and more than a year afterward, when she was removed to London by easy journeys, she told Miss Mitford that, “during that whole winter, the sound of the waves rang in her ears like the moans of one dying.” William Cobbett was one of the notabilities to whom Miss Mitford was introduced by her father, whose intimacy with him was brought about through their mutual attachment to field sports. She describes him in his own house as a man of unfailing good humor and great heartiness; tall, stout and athletic, with a bright smile, and an air compounded of the soldier and the farmer, to which his habitual red waistcoat contributed not a little. His activity was something to be remembered, for he would begin the day by mowing his own lawn, a laborious pastime in which he beat his gardener, who was esteemed, except himself, the best mower in the parish.