This ruined chapel--"abbey" it is generally styled--is about a mile distant from St Helen's. Little remains now but the belfry, with its luxuriant covering of dark ivy, still preserving it from destruction. More than half a century ago, some ruffian hand nearly severed the stem from the root, but happily without material injury, the incision being incomplete. The burial-ground, formerly open, is now enclosed by a stone wall; and on the south side is a stone cross with three steps. The whole area has a reputation of great sanctity; many of those who die in the Romish faith, even beyond the immediate neighbourhood, being brought hither for interment. There are no records, that we can find, of its foundation; but it may be suspected that the place was dedicated to St Thomas; for close by is a well of that name, unto which extraordinary virtues are ascribed. The chapel was but small; not more than twelve yards in length, and about three in width; the tower scarcely eight yards high. Its insignificance probably may account for the obscurity in which its origin is involved. It fell into disuse after the Dissolution; and its final ruin took place during the civil wars of Charles I. Autumn was lingering over the yellow woods. The leaves, fluttering on their shrivelled stems, seemed ready to fall with every breath. Dark and heavy was the dull atmosphere--a melancholy stillness that seemed to pervade and surround every object--a deceitful calm, forerunner of the wild and wintry storms about to desolate and to destroy even these flickering emblems of decay. At times a low murmur would break forth, dying away through the deep woods, like some spirit of past ages wakening from her slumber, or the breath of hoary Time sighing through the ruin he had created. [Illustration: WINDLESHAW ABBEY. _Drawn by G. Pickering._ _Engraved by Edw^d Finden._] There is something indescribably solemn and affecting in the first touches and emblems of the year that has "fallen into the sear and yellow leaf." Like the eventide of life, it is a season when the gay and glittering promises of another spring are past; when the fervour and the maturity of summer are ended; when cold and monotonous days creep on; and we look with another eye, and other perceptions, on all that surrounds us. Yet there is a feeling of gladness and of hope mingling with our regrets in the one case, which cannot exist in the other. Autumn, though succeeded by the darkness and dreariness of winter, is but the womb of another spring. That bright season will be renewed; our own, never! Perhaps it might be feelings akin to these which arrested the footsteps of an individual, who, though little past the spring-tide and youthful ardour of his existence, was yet not disinclined to anticipate another period characterised by the autumnal tokens of decay visible on every object around him.