Within, an avenue wide enough for a high-road led through a park of great extent, dotted with trees single or in groups, and bounded by a vast wood, whose waving tops were seen for miles of distance. If a landscape-gardener would have deplored with uplifted hands the glorious opportunities of embellishment which neglect or ignorance had suffered to lie undeveloped within these grounds, a true lover of scenery would have felt delighted at the wild and picturesque beauty around him, as, sometimes, the road would dip into a deep glade, where the overhanging banks were clothed with the dog-rose and the sweet-brier, still and hushed to every sound save the song of the thrush or the not less sweet ripple of the little stream that murmured past; and again, emerging from the shade, it wound along some height whence the great mountain might be seen, or, between the dark foliage, the blue surface of the sea, swelling and heaving with ever-restless motion. All the elements of great picturesque beauty were here, and in that glorious profusion with which nature alone diffuses her wealth,--the mountain, the forest, and the ocean, the greensward, the pebbly shore, the great rocks, the banks blue with the violet and the veronica,--and all diversified and contrasted to produce effects the most novel and enchanting. Many a road and many a pathway led through these woods and valleys, some grass-grown, as though disused, others bearing the track of recent wheels, still, as you went, the hares and the rabbits felt no terror, the wood-pigeon sat upon the branch above your head, nor was scared at your approach; for though the Knight was a passionate lover of sport, it was his fancy to preserve the demesne intact, nor would he suffer a shot to be fired within its precincts. These may seem small and insignificant matters to record, but they added indescribably to the charms of the spot, completing, as they did, the ideas of tranquillity and peace suggested by the scene. The approach was of some miles in extent, not needlessly prolonged by every device of sweep and winding, but in reality proceeding by its nearest way to the house, which, for the advantage of a view over the sea, was situated on the slope of the mountain. Nor was the building unworthy of its proud position: originally an abbey, its architecture still displayed the elaborate embellishment which characterized the erections of the latter part of the sixteenth century.