FAIRFAX AND THE COUNTESS OF DERBY AT LATHAM-HOUSE.

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in the undertaking, nor any inclination to the Scots; who, he thought, had too much guilt upon them, in having depressed the crown, to be made instruments of repairing and restoring it. He was a man of great honour and clear courage; and all his defects and misfortunes proceeded from his having lived so little time among his equals, that he knew not how to treat his inferiors, which was the source of all the ill that befell him, having thereby drawn such prejudice against him from persons of inferior quality, who yet thought themselves too good to be condemned, that they pursued him to death. The king's army was no sooner defeated at Worcester, but the parliament renewed their old method of murthering in cold blood, and for a commission to erect a high-court of justice to persons of ordinary quality—many not being gentlemen, and all notoriously his enemies-to try the Earl of Derby for his treason and rebellion; which they easily found him guilty of; and put him to death in a town of his own, (Bolton,) against which he had expressed a severe displeasure for their obstinate rebellion against the king, with all the circumstances of rudeness and barbarity they could invent. The same night, one of those who was amongst his judges sent a trumpet to the Isle of Man, with a letter directed to the Countess of Derby, by which he required her to deliver up the castle and island to the parliament; nor did their malice abate till they had reduced that lady, a woman of very high and princely extraction, and of the most exemplary virtue and piety of her time, and that whole most noble family, to the lowest penury and want, by disposing, giving, and selling all the fortune and estate that should support it."

Through the failure of the siege of Latham-House the reputation of Fairfax suffered considerably. The summons to surrender was answered by the countess in a manner worthy of the earl, whose memorable answer to a similar proposal to surrender the Isle of Man deserves a place in our pages. "I received your letter with indignation, and with scorn return you this answer: that I cannot but wonder whence you should gather any hopes that I should prove, like you, treacherous to my sovereign; since you cannot be ignorant of my former actions in his late majesty's service, from which principles I am no whit departed. I scorn your proffers; I disdain your favour; I abhor your treason; and am so far from delivering up this island to your advantage, that I shall keep it to the utmost of my power to your destruction. Take this for your final answer, and forbear any further solicitations; for if you trouble me with any more messages of this nature, I will burn the paper and hang up the bearer. This is the immutable resolution, and shall be the undoubted practice of him who accounts it his chiefest glory to be his majesty's most loyal and obedient subject, DERBY."

VOL. II.

2 E

THE FORD.

To the reflecting mind the busy hum of men, the ceaseless strivings of the mighty mass of human beings who congregate in giant cities, afford food for serious contemplation. The wonderful economy with which hundreds of thousands, nay, millions, congregated into one narrow space, are provided with their daily wants, noiselessly, and with a precision which the most laboured efforts of the government would fail to attain, fill the mind with admiration. But in the populous city all our feelings partake more or less of the excitement that pervades the thronging hive; we long at length for repose, and seek repose for some short period amidst the stillness of rural retirement. In the city, even pleasure itself is tinged with the uneasy restlessness of the place; and in our moving times, when towns grow into vast leviathans it behoves all who wish to retain the freshness of the mind to cultivate a taste for the simple pleasures of the country. What a rich variety of innocent and delightful enjoyment has kind nature still reserved for all whose feelings are not quite deadened in the pursuit of wealth, or the scarcely less engrossing feelings of a London season! Earth and sky and air, the rippling streamlet and the passing cloud, the sunshine casting its magic light on the fresh green of wood and field, prepare never-failing sources of delight, the purer and the more deeply felt that they need no reflection to enjoy them; they spring up unasked, a single glance comprises them. We pass them by, perhaps, apparently unheeded; yet they do their allotted service of good by stealth, and instil into the mind that feeling of quiet enjoyment that strengthens us for the coming contests of civil life. Think us not vain enthusiasts, gentle reader: we take the goods a bounteous Providence provides us with a grateful mind, whether in town or country; but we should be sorry to pass our whole life in the turmoil of a great city; and willingly wend our way from time to time to retirement and solitude, if that can justly be called solitude which is but a temporary absence from a few friends, many kind and valued acquaintances, and a relief from the innumerable herd of eager, pushing, striving, hardfeatured, money-making countenances.

These reflections arose in our minds as we beheld the plate before the reader, who, doubtless, like ourselves, has often beheld the scene therein represented, although, perhaps, he was not aware of its simple beauties; for a certain degree of exercise is necessary to enable the spectator to withdraw his thoughts from the diffusiveness with which such scenes, especially in full sunshine, are surrounded in real nature. The play of the sunbeams, the rippling of the stream, the song of the birds, the hum