All except Tom, who, generally dull and stupid enough, seemed excited into a kind of perverse and ungainly liveliness, which increased into boisterous folly with every rebuke from those older than himself. At length we arrived at PENNY-BRIDGE, just below Mr. MACHELL’s house, when the stream was then crossed, (I know not how it is now,) not by a bridge, as one might expect from its name, but what are there called ‘hipping-stones,’ large blocks of rock placed at intervals, so that the passenger had to skip from one to another in order to cross the water. Tom challenged his companions to go over on one leg,—a feat which many there could have performed, had they not one and all felt themselves restrained from such a childish frolic by the solemnity of the occasion. Now it is a strange trait in human nature that the very feelings which held back the really brave, seemed to give a momentary courage to the coward; and Tom undertook to perform to-day what nobody would give him credit for ever thinking of on any other day in the year. But the fate of all such rash adventurers—and which every one hoped rather than expected—on this occasion befell Tom Hebblethwaite. Just when he came to the largest stone, and the deepest hole in the river, Tom’s courage and foot gave way together, and down he soused over head and ears into the water, nothing being seen of him, for a moment, but his hat, which, being the lightest part about him, (it was a new one for the occasion,) refused to sink with the rest of his body, and soon commenced a voyage towards PEEL CASTLE and the PILE of FOUDREY,—a voyage which nobody present seemed inclined to interrupt. Tom himself, however, was kindly fished up out of an element which seemed to have been of service neither to his body nor to his mind; for, without staying to thank his deliverers, he immediately commenced a rapid retreat homewards, and, I dare say, remains unconfirmed, (except in his sullenness and obstinate temper,) to the present hour! It was some time before we could recover our composure, which had been ruffled by this ludicrous event; but the sight of the assembly around the church and church-yard of Ulverston effectually sobered the thoughts of even the most volatile of our party; for there can be no sight more solemn than that of a Confirmation in a fine open country, and in a church situated like that of Ulverston, surrounded by scattered and towering hills, with the broad ocean in the distance. There were the rural shepherds at the head of their flocks, hastening to present their young lambs to the LORD, that they might receive His blessing from the hands of His chief minister on earth. Our own beloved pastor was already at his post, standing waiting for us at the church-door in his well-known gown and cassock, and ready to head us up to the rails of the altar. Way was made for him by his younger brethren of the clergy, as he advanced steadily up the aisle,