While looking at the house said to have been inhabited by this "_femme d'esprit par la grace de Dieu_!" we vowed a pilgrimage to Sandford Manor House, at Sandy End, Fulham,--to the dwelling where there is no doubt she spent many summer months. Near as it is to our own, we were doubtful of the way, and determined to inquire of our opposite neighbor, who keeps the old Brompton tollbar. "Sandford Manor House," repeated he, "I never heard tell of such a place in these parts. Whereabouts is it?" "Exactly what we want to know. It is a very old dilapidated house, by the side of a little stream that runs into the Thames somewhere by Old Chelsea. I think you must have heard of it. It was once inhabited by the famous Nell Gwynne." I might almost as well have talked Hebrew to our neighbor, who seemed born to lay in wait for market-carts, and pounce upon them for toll. [Illustration: SANDFORD MANOR HOUSE.] "Old house! Nell Gwynne!" he again repeated, and something like an expression of life and interest moved his features while he added--"It's the Nell Gwynne public-house you're after, I'm thinking; that was in Chelsea; but whether it's there now or not, is more than I can tell." "No, no," we answered, perhaps, sharply, "it is the house she lived in we want to see--Sandford Manor House." "Perhaps it's the madhouse," he suggested. We walked on. "Please," said a little rosy-faced boy, "if you want to find out any thing about old houses, Hill, the rat-catcher, knows them all, as he hunts up the rats and sparrows about; and you have only to go down Thistle Grove, into the Fulham road--straight on. His is a low house, ma'am--his name in the window--you can't pass it, for the birds and white mice." And is there no one left, we thought, to tell where the witty, light-hearted, true-hearted Nelly lived--she who was the friend of Dryden and Lee, the favorite of Lord Buckhurst, the rival of the Duchess of Cleveland, the protector of the soldiers of England--the one unselfish friend of the selfish Charles? Is there no one in a district that once echoed with the praise of her charities--no one to tell where she resided, but Hill, the old rat-catcher? We proceeded through the prettily-built, but gangrened-looking, cottages located in Thistle Grove, once called Brompton Heath, (or Marsh, we forget which,) until the sounds of traffic reminded us that we were in the Fulham road. Presently the sharp voice of a starling, just above us, attracted our attention. "Poor Tom!" said the bird--"Tom!--poor Tom!"