"Kenilworth Castle!" says the reader. That and more! The station is reached by a half-hour's ride from Leamington, being about five miles in a direct line from Stratford, Leamington, and Coventry. The country is hilly and abounds with fertile fields, on which are grazing sheep, cows, and horses in countless numbers. Everything has an inhabited look. Elms, oaks, horse-chestnuts, and poplars abound. There are fine groves that might be called woods. The town itself is a small one of 4,250 inhabitants. It has manufactures of ribbons, gauzes, combs, and chemicals, and is a market-town, to whose public square the farmers bring their produce, while traders, from temporary stands, offer for sale all kinds of wares. For centuries these market-days have been a part of the weekly life of the people. There is a very ancient church, and the ruins of an abbey, founded in 1122; but the great object of interest is the ruins of its celebrated castle, made so familiar by Sir Walter Scott's romance. The spot was reached by a pleasant walk of about a mile from the station. When we had passed through a well shaded country road,--through the woods, as we should say in America,--there was presented to view a most enchanting scene. Ahead of us, say five minutes' walk, our road seemed to terminate in a gently rising plain, a miniature common, on which were three or four stone residences, partly public and partly private in appearance. The scene reminded us of a New England common. To the left, bounding the road, was a stone wall; from this, gently sloping, for perhaps two hundred feet, was a grazing pasture. At the upper end of this were the ruins, not of the castle proper, but of some of its outbuildings. These massive and ivy-dressed ruins alone would have satisfied us, and we mistook them for the castle itself, but we went up to the little plateau, and round to the left hand, to get admission to the grounds; for we were now somewhat educated on the ruins question, and believed there was more in waiting for us. Lads and lasses, and some very old women, offered their services and guide-books. They told their story well, but we told ours better. We found the gateway, paid our shillings, and decided to be our own guides.