THE hill on which Grand Pré Academy was built sloped upwards behind it, in a gentle ascent, for about a mile, when it descended abruptly into the valley of the Gaspereaux. For about a quarter of a mile back of the Academy there were smooth, cultivated meadows, which were finally bounded by a deep gully. At the bottom of this there ran a brawling brook, and on the other side was that dense forest in which the boys built their camps. Here, on the cleared lands just by the gully, was the favorite play-ground of the school. Happy were the boys who had such a play-ground. High up on the slope of that hill, it commanded a magnificent prospect. Behind, and on either side, were dense, dark woods; but in front there stood revealed a boundless scene. Beneath was the Academy. Far down to the right spread away the dike lands of Grand Pré, bounded by two long, low islands, which acted as a natural barrier against the turbulent waters; and farther away rose the dark outline of Horton Bluff, a wild, precipitous cliff, at the mouth of the Gaspereaux River, marking the place where the hills advanced into the sea, and the marsh lands ended. Beyond this, again, there spread away the wide expanse of Minas Bay, full now with the flood tide--a vast sheet of blue water, dotted with the white sails of passing vessels, and terminated in the dim and hazy distance by those opposite shores, which had been the scene of their late adventures--Parrsboro’, Pratt’s Cove, and the Five Islands. Far away towards the left appeared fields arrayed in the living green of opening spring; the wide plains of Cornwallis, with its long reaches of dike lands, separated by ridges of wood land, and bounded by the dark form of the North Mountain. Through all this, from afar, flowed the Cornwallis River, with many a winding, rolling now with a full, strong flood before them and beyond them, till, with a majestic sweep, it poured its waters into that sea from which it had received them. Finally, full before them, dark, gloomy, frowning, with its crest covered with rolling fog-clouds, and the white sea-foam gleaming at its base, rose the central object of this magnificent scene,--the towering cliff--Blomidon.