* * * * * While a young man I was very fond of field sports, and in the part of England where I then resided, I had frequent opportunities for indulging in them. Not only around my immediate neighborhood did I often saunter with dog and gun, but oftentimes over the preserves of acquaintances in adjoining parishes. In the month of November, 1809, I made a visit, ostensibly for shooting, at the residence of Squire Primrose, of the village of Tremington, in Devonshire. I say the object of my visit was ostensibly to visit the Squire’s fields for pheasant and snipe, but the real object was to see one of the Squire’s daughters. I cared more, dear reader, for a smile from Jane Primrose than for a dozen brace of snipe; and I am sure I would _then_ (for I am old and married to _another_ now!) have given fifty pheasants for a taste of her rosy lips. But matters were not then sufficiently far advanced to avow what is called, in such cases, “my intentions.” I was accompanied by an intimate friend, called Bob Turner, or, as one would now say, (as we style every man from a water-carrier to a millionaire,) Robert Turner, Esquire! Strange to relate, Bob was similarly situated toward Jane’s sister, Elizabeth; and, like me, made the Squire’s love for game a means for making love to his daughter. On the evening of our arrival, we, and the family, assembled in their old-fashioned but comfortable parlor, before a blazing fire. Here we amused ourselves in various ways, as young people are wont to do. After the detail of all the gossip in the neighborhood—how that Dr. Balden’s wife was said to be a little too intimate with the parson—how that Miss Jenkings had been jilted—and that an old maid, named Smith, had offered herself to her coachman, and was about to marry him, and so forth; the Squire took up the newspaper, which weekly made its appearance, and commenced to read aloud a very extraordinary ghost story. As soon as he had finished, and our expressions of surprise had subsided, an old lady in the company—Mrs. Scroggins—exclaimed, “Well, now, this reminds me that my man, William, saw the ‘White Nun’ in the convent grave-yard last night; and she so frightened him, that he declares he will never pass there again after dusk.” The mention of this aroused Bob’s curiosity and mine. We begged her to give us the history, or the legend, if any, connected with this mysterious personage.