"The inhabitants to this day," says Mackay, "believe these rocks to be an antediluvian structure, and assert that the traveller, whose curiosity is aroused, will find it impossible to approach them, as the guardian genii of the place transform the walls and battlements into naked rocks when any one draws near." Nothing, in the whole range of mythological fable, could be more beautiful than this popular superstition, which ascribes the disappearance of "the castle," on a near approach, to supernatural agency. Frigid philosophy would say, these fragments of rock, when viewed from afar, bear strong resemblance to an old fortress; but on approaching nearer the illusion vanishes, and they are found to be a shapeless mass of stone. Poetry clothes this fact in beautiful imagery; she warns the intruder to survey the structure at a distance; for should he have the temerity to advance upon it, the incensed genii of the place will, by spells "of power to cheat the eye with blear illusion," transform its fair proportions into a mis-shapen pile of rocks. This pleasing fiction emanated from the same poetical spirit that wrought, in the elder days of Greece, the splendid fable of Aurora, in her saffron-coloured robe, opening the gates of the morning to the chariot of the sun. The genius of Sir Walter Scott has rendered the beautiful Vale of St. John classic ground, by having selected it for the principal scene of his "Bridal of Triermain." This is purely a tale of chivalry of Arthur's days, when midnight fairies danced the maze; and it is at the fantastic Castle Rock that Sir Walter represents King Arthur's amorous dalliance with its fairy inhabitants in their halls of enchantment, when he was on his way to Carlisle. Our limits will not admit the whole of "The Bridal of Triermain." We give, however, such portions as will sufficiently connect the thread of the narrative, in which it will be observed that Sir Roland de Vaux, the Baron of Tremain, is introduced. This branch of Vaux, with its collateral alliances, is now represented by the family of Braddyl, of Conishead Priory, near Furness Abbey. THE BRIDAL OF TRIERMAIN.