The great tower rising massively above the Somerset bank of the Avon bears an inscription carved prominently upon its stonework: a Latin inscription, a belated example of the priggish classicism, beloved by pedants in the eighteenth century, which set up, all over the country, statements wholly unintelligible to ninety-nine out of every hundred wayfarers. “_Suspensa vix via fit_,” says this monumental line—that is to say, rendered into English, “With difficulty can a roadway be suspended.” The thing is self-evident anywhere, and much more so here, when you gaze from this suspended roadway down upon the gulf, and on to the tall masts of some sailingvessel arriving at, or leaving, the port of Bristol. The various attempts made by passers-by at an understanding of the Latin sentence are amusing, but the toll-taker appears to have arrived at the sense of it, by favour, no doubt, of some one learned in the dead languages; for he was observed by the present writer to answer the inquiries of two ladies in this wise: “Well, you see, it’s a bit above me; but I’ve always been given to understand it to mean that this yer bridge was made with great difficulty.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER III ABBOT’S LEIGH TO CLEVEDON IT is a hilly road that leads from Clifton Bridge to Abbot’s Leigh, through the noble Leigh Woods. Nightingale Valley lies down on the right; a beautiful seclusion, well-named from those songsters of early summer. Looking down upon it is the ancient camp of Borough Walls. An enterprising Land Company has acquired building rights here from Sir H. Miles, owner of these woods and of Leigh Court, and has recently built a number of charming detached residences, irregularly disposed among the glades; and far advanced, in disposition, in planning, and in architectural style, beyond the methods in vogue when the suburban villas built nearer the bridge were erected, from about 1870 to 1890. [Illustration: AVONMOUTH, FROM PILL.]