fifty wide, lighted by noble windows with lofty arches, ornamented with rich tracery, and now most exquisitely festooned with ivy. The two bayed recesses, the three light Gothic window mullions, and fine arched doorway, so appropriately and elegantly sculptured with vineleaves, and clustered with the richest draperies of ivy, have a very picturesque appearance. The trunk of some of this ivy is of great thickness, and it is so old that in some places the branches are sapless and leafless, while the gray stalks seem to crawl about the ruins in sympathy. Nature has been the upholsterer here, and hung these ancient walls, that once reëchoed to the merry song, the banquet's mirth, and the light step of the resounding dance, with tapestry more cunning and exquisite than the far-famed Gobelin. The old carved fire-places are still distinctly visible, and the entire outline of the chamber almost perfect. As I stood in the deep recess of one of its noble windows, and looked out upon the scene, on a branch of ivy above my head, a beautiful bird was pouring out all the melody of his soul through his goldenhued throat. Never had I listened to any thing half so exquisite. The sound seemed to fill those deserted chambers with relody. The princely home of mighty chiefs' had become

'A SHELTER for the bird who stays,

His weary wing to rest,'

and from the ivy that mantled the chamber, where often human revelry had awakened its echoes into song, was carolling forth his sweetest lays.

Nothing can describe the sense of perfect desolation as you stand within this ruined hall: it falls with crushing force upon the spirits, and brings before you with startling effect the complete emptiness of all worldly state and grandeur. After lingering about the ruins for an hour or more, the descending sun warned us to depart, and we turned away, lingering, loth to leave.'

A few days after our visit to Kenilworth, we drove over to Stratford, passing through the old town of Warwick, with its curious, antiquated little houses, and its ancient hospital, founded by Leicester during the reign of Elizabeth. The little town of Stratford is like any other country town, with a street directly through it, and others deviating to the right and left. The houses and shops on either side are of the usual character, many very old-fashioned. Some of the shops were ornamented with modern plate-glass, and many stored with a very excellent assortment of goods. The Shakspearian part of Stratford is quite of an antique character. The house itself where it is said the bard first saw the light, is a most forlorn-looking structure. The front has no glazed casement, but is protected from the rain and sun by a drooping shelf, like a flap to a table. Above that is a kind of signboard, jutting out into the street, on which is inscribed: The immortal Shakspeare was born in this house.' Above is a window in four compartments, with small cottage-like panes of glass. This window lights the scene of the poet's nativity. You enter the little shop below, guarded by a rustic half-door, and soon find yourself on sacred ground. The shop is very small, at the back of which is a kitchen smaller still,

where the boy Shakspeare is supposed to have passed many a happy hour. The walls, windows, and even the ceiling abound with inscriptions, snatches of poetry, names of visitors, etc. You feel eager to ascend the tottering stair-case, and find yourself in the chamber where the idol of your adoration is believed to have been ushered into the world. On arriving there, you instinctively advance with head uncovered, for you feel that you are treading a spot hallowed by the birth of the greatest genius the world has ever known. The room is so small that a man of medium stature can easily touch the ceiling with his hand. The chamber else is rather large for the building. You go to the front window, and there upon one of the panes in very minute letters, written with a diamond, is the name of Walter Scott: on a pane above, in large characters, that of one of the numerous family of Smith, the veritable John. There is now in fact no space on any one of the panes for the minutest letter. The ceiling and walls are so filled with inscriptions, lines of poetry, etc., that the appearance presented from the middle of the room is that of a large spider's web. These inscriptions, objectionable as they are in other public places, here betoken a feeling of a praiseworthy character. They tell of the universality of the poet's fame, inasmuch as there is scarcely a spot on the civilized globe that has not its representative here. After remaining a short time in conversation with the old crone who had been given the charge of the building by the Shakspearian committee, who are now the owners, we left for the church, where the remains of the great dramatist rest. The church is situate on the Avon, fringed by willows, whose branches entangle with the stems of the water-lilies that grow along its banks. The tower, transepts, and some other portions are of the early English style, and very perfect; the remainder belongs to a later period, but is not less graceful. The approach to the church from the town is by a curious avenue of old lime-trees, forming a perfect arbor over-head, by the interlacing of their branches. As you enter, the first glance reveals to you the sacredness of the place. The anxious eye is not long in discovering the poet's grave. On the left-hand side, near the great window, may be discerned, set in the wall, his monument, and right beneath it, a short distance removed, a small gray slab covers all of the poet that could die, with the well-known inscription, which they tell you has served more than any thing else to preserve sacred his bones; but I very much doubt if the poet himself ever composed such vile doggerel.

The bust in his monument looks placidly down upon you, and whether the resemblance be true or not, you get reconciled to the hope that it is an exact likeness. They all say at Stratford that it was taken from a cast made of his face after death, and I believe that was always the opinion of the famous sculptor Chantrey. The rest of the Shakspeare family lie side by side on the elevated step close to the rails of the altar.

On returning from Stratford, I could not help reflecting upon the potency of such a fame as Shakspeare's. Pilgrims of all ages and lands go to Stratford to see what? - a little, low, dingy room, inclosed by four mean white-washed walls, and a plain gray slab in a country church,

with an inscription carved thereon. But Shakspeare was born in the one, and his honored dust reposes beneath the other. In that humblelooking chamber did one of the greatest minds the DIVINE BEING ever sent into the world first see the light, first look through its infant eyes upon a fond mother's smiles and tears. There beneath that humble shed lay the winged genius in 'its callow down,' nestling close to the parent bosom, but destined in time to sweep through the regions of thought with the undazzled eye and upon the strong pinion of the eagle. There he was born, and that fact sheds a splendor over the old walls, more dazzling far than tapestries, mirrors, pictures, and all the pomp and pride of king's palaces can bestow. Genius has a kingship of its own it needs no mantle, orb, or sceptre. It is its own regalia, and before its inherent majesty crowned heads, heroes, statesmen, philosophers, and poets have done and will continue to do the most reverent homage. This spell of beauty which genius casts over objects but little interesting in themselves, such as blasted oaks and time-worn, battered cottages, manifests the superiority of time over matter, and proves how the associations of intellect can ennoble the meanest forms of materialism, and create the most interesting memorials out of the lowest things.

On our drive homeward, we passed the seat of the Lacys, whose ancestor arraigned the young Shakspeare for deer-stealing, and whose hated memory the poet has embalmed in ridicule for ever, under the character of Justice Shallow.' So little changed is the place, that fancy may almost unbidden call up the aspect of the scene when he 'who was for all time' wandered along its thick-hedged lanes. You can almost think you hear the voice of Sir Thomas Lacy chiding his keeper for the loss of the fallow deer,' and the half-suppressed chuckle of a youthful by-stander, then all unknown, but who was afterward to fill the world with his fame. The mansion appears quite unaltered; the humbler dwellings of red brick only a little older; the park palings merely made more picturesque by the overgrowing lichen, and the park, as well as the sweet Avon, exactly as they were more than a century and a half ago, the one flowing gently,' and the other supplying as of yore

6

'MANY an oak whose boughs are mossed with age,
And high top bald with dry antiquity;'

while the same deer, dappled fools,' only look more conscious than they did of more perfect safety in their assigned and native dwellingplace. Art and nature here seem to have stopped short of all improvement. There has been no need of the one to disturb the renown which the locality receives from the other. Even the stocks that stand under a group of patrician trees, are suffered to die of natural decay. Charlecotte has a renown given to it by the poet which the present owners and descendants of the ancient Lacys would willingly let die.' The present young Lord of the Manor of Hampton Lacy feels to this day the sting of the poet's sarcasm upon his ancestor. The whole neighborhood around here is full of beauty. The land is passing rich,' while at every moment through some leafy avenue glimpses are caught of the 'gently flowing Avon." Amid these dells, and base verdant

hill-sides was the youth of Shakspeare nourished, and taught of Nature:

'HERE as with honey gathered of a rock
She fed the little prattler, and with songs

Oft soothed his wondering ears with deep delight.'

Every step we trod was hallowed ground. Here in all this neighborhood he passed many a happy hour when a boy, or when he retreated back to his birth-place from the turmoil of busy life, to 'die like the deer where he was roused.' That day at Stratford will long be remembered as the most interesting of my life.

THE DEAD BOY.

BY HENRY A. CLARK.

WITH gentle breezes came the spring,
And earth's first buddings promised bloom,
And hope renewed they seemed to bring,
And half-reclosed the waiting tomb.
A softer light dwelt in those eyes,

That long were sadly on thee cast,
As those who watch the flower that dies,
Whose stem is broken by the blast.

Oh! who may know the mighty power
That Hope builds up within the heart,
That stands until the latest hour,

Until the feeblest fibres part?

It seemed thou wert too young to die! Why should the fearful conqueror DEATH Pass ready age, and weary, by,

To steal thy young and joyous breath? Why choose for his remorseless stroke

The fair young tree, so fresh and new, And spare the old decaying oak,

Whose life had worn a century through?

Alas! we know not: we but know
The oft-repeated lesson taught,

That hope, love, life, and all must go,

While GOD's great mysteries are wrought:

We know that in the stern fixed round

His vast, eternal systems take,

The sum of earthly things is found,

Like waves that beat the shore and break.

And 't is a glorious thought for man,
That in that after-life we dread,

His spirit-mind shall freely scan

Those fearful mysteries, now unread!

And thou art laid to rest, young boy!
The grave-clods press upon thy brow,
And earth has less of love and joy

To those who sadly mourn thee now.
The skies were dark, the storm was wild,
Winter renewed his grasp on Spring,
Sad Nature wept with those, fair child,
Who joined for thee their sorrowing.

But brighter skies shall gladden earth,
And airs more soft and mild shall be,
And brighter hopes shall yet have birth
In hearts that now are torn for thee!