“Well said, young man, and now come and partake of our homely fare, seasoned with a hearty welcome,” said the Colonel, cordially. Nor loth was Alfred Bernard to do full justice to the ample store before him. A ride of more than thirty miles had whetted an appetite naturally good, and the youth of “right rare merit,” did not impress his kind host very strongly with his conversational powers during his hearty meal. The repast being over, the little party retired to a room, which the old planter was pleased to call his study, but which savored far more of the presence of the sportive Diana, than of the reflecting muses. Over the door, as you entered the room, were fastened the large antlers of some noble deer, who had once bounded freely and gracefully through his native forest. Those broad branches are now, by a sad fatality, doomed to support the well oiled fowling-piece that laid their wearer low. Fishing tackle, shot-pouches, fox brushes, and other similar evidences and trophies of sport, testified to the Colonel's former delight in angling and the chase; but now alas! owing to the growing infirmities of age, though he still cherished his pack, and encouraged the sport, he could only start the youngsters in the neighborhood, and give them God speed! as with horses, hounds, and horns they merrily scampered away in the fresh, early morning. But with his love for these active, manly sports, Colonel Temple was devoted to reading such works as ran with his prejudices, and savored of the most rigid loyalty. His books, indeed, were few, for in that day it was no easy matter to procure books at all, especially for the colonists, who cut off from the great fountain of literature which was then just reviving from the severe drought of puritanism, were but sparingly supplied with the means of information. But a few months later than the time of which we write, Sir William Berkeley boasted that education was at a low ebb in Virginia, and thanked his God that so far there were neither free schools nor printing presses in the colony—the first instilling and the last disseminating rebellious sentiments among the people. Yet under all these disadvantages, Colonel Temple was well versed in the literature of the last two reigns, and with some of the more popular works of the present. Shakspeare was his constant companion, and the spring to which he often resorted to draw supplies of wisdom. But Milton was held in especial abhorrence—for the prose writings of the eloquent old republican condemned unheard the sublime strains of his divine poem. CHAPTER V. “A man in all the world's new fashion planted, That hath a mint of phrases in his brain; One, whom the music of his own vain tongue, Doth ravish like enchanting harmony; A man of compliments.” _Love's Labor Lost._