mind is insensibly carried back to the times of the bowmen of Harold, and the days of Robin Hood.

I was accompanied in one of my frequent visits to this interesting spot by my friend, the Rev. J. Mitford, and am indebted to him for the following beautiful description of it.

BURNHAM BEECHES.

Scathed by the lightning's bolt, the wintery storm,

A giant brotherhood, ye stand sublime;

Like some huge fortress each majestic form

Still frowns defiance to the power of time.

Cloud after cloud the storms of war have roll'd,

Since ye your countless years of long descent have told.

Say, for ye saw brave Harold's bowmen yield,

Ye heard the Normans' princely trumpet blow;

And ye beheld, upon that later field,

Red with her rival's blood, the Rose of Snow;

And ye too saw, from Chalgrove's hills of flame,

When to your shelt'ring arms the wounded soldier came.

Can ye forget when by yon thicket green,

A troop of scatter'd horsemen cross'd the plain,
And in the midst a statelier form was seen,-

A snow-white charger yielded to his rein;

One backward look on Naseby's field he cast,

And then, with anxious flight and speed redoubled, pass'd.

But far away these shades have fled, and now

Sweet change! the song of summer birds is thine;

Peace hangs her garlands on each aged bough,

And bright o'er thee the dews of morning shine;

Earth brings with grateful hand her tribute meet,

Wild flowers and colour'd weeds to bloom around thy feet.

K

Here may, unmark'd, the wandering poet muse,
Through these green lawns the lady's palfrey glide,
Nor here the pensive nightingale refuse

Her sweetest richest song at eventide.

The wild deer bounds at will from glade to glade,

Or stretch'd in mossy fern his antler'd brow is laid.

Farewell, beloved scenes! enough for me

Through each wild copse and tangled dell to roam,

Amid your forest paths to wander free,

And find where'er I go a shelt'ring home.

Earth has no gentler voice to man to give

Than, "Come to Nature's arms, and learn of her to live."

It is impossible to wander amidst these venerable beeches, without being struck with the varied notes and objects which now and then disturb the solemn silence of the wood. Sometimes the wild shriek of the green woodpecker is heard, and then his rapid taps against the bark of some decayed branch. The jay vociferates loudly if his haunts are disturbed, and the blackbird utters his note of alarm which is well understood by the inhabitants of the wood, and causes the rabbits to listen and scud to their holes, and the pheasants to conceal themselves in a neighbouring bush. These sounds are listened to by every lover of nature, and harmonize delightfully with forest scenery, and the wild landscape around us.

Charming, however, as this wood is in the summer, its autumnal beauties are almost equally so. The brown leaves of the beeches contrast agree

ably with the hollies and junipers, and although—

through the ruins of th' autumnal wood,

Sighs the sad gale, or the loud wintry wind

Blows hollow, o'er the bleak and blasted heath

the mind rests complacently on the scene around. But perhaps I have dwelt too long on this favorite spot. It is unique of its kind, and will amply repay a visit to it.

HEDSOR, CLIEFDEN, AND TAPLOW.

With pleasant interchange of sun and shade

Fair grassy lawns and oaken glades were seen,
The upland slopes were deck'd with freshest green,
And all in autumn's richest robes array'd.

The Thames its silver waters roll'd between,
While many a village spire, and hamlet grey,
Along the distant vale in softest beauty lay.

J. M.

It was on a fine morning in October that myself and a friend drove through the beautiful park of Dropmore, on our way to see some places in the neighbourhood, which are situated on the banks of the Thames. The country was still rich in its autumnal foliage, and the oaken woods and beechen hangers were covered with the splendid drapery of their russet leaves, while the brighter crimson of the cherry-orchards gave an additional warmth and brilliancy to the landscape. The southern part of Buckinghamshire is a favorite locality of mine, and, though so near the metropolis, it has, when you leave the great public roads, a primitive simplicity of character, and some of the best elements of rural beauty. Its villages and churches are picturesque, the latter often adorned with ivied

towers and walls, and surrounded with lofty trees suited to the solemnity of the scene. The cottages have each their little porches, and bay windows, and are embowered in large orchards and gardens; while the small retired lanes wind under large umbrageous elm-trees, and often descending through lofty banks of chalk or sandstone, are then overhung with beeches and oaks, either scattered singly by the road side, or standing, as it were, as advanced sentinels of the great body of the forest at their rear. The hedgerows, too, are so rich in the shrubby foliage of hazel and maple, as to be like little coppices surrounding and separating the fields; while occasionally the rough picturesque paling of a park, as it winds among the venerable pollards which it protects, opens the prospect to scenes of brighter verdure, and softer and more cultivated beauty.

After passing through the fine avenue of cedars at Dropmore, which can boast of being formed of nearly two hundred of these magnificent trees, we left the park, and soon found ourselves in the grounds of Lord Boston, at Hedsor. The small park, in which the house stands, is very agreeable in its natural features, and has been laid out with taste and judgment. After passing through some ground pleasingly diversified with groups of oak and remarkably fine thorns, the prospect opens to the right over a beautiful sweep of hanging woods,