Hear an illustration，reader.

A lover finds his mistress asleep on a mossy bank; he wishes to catch a glimpse of her fair face without waking her. He steals softly over the grass，careful to make no sound; he pauses- fancying she has stirred: he withdraws; not for worlds would he be seen. All is still: he again advances: he bends above her; a light veil rests on her features: he lifts it，bends lower; now his eyes anticipate the vision of beauty- warm，and blooming，and lovely，in rest. How hurried was their first glance! But how they fix! How he starts! How he suddenly and vehemently clasps in both arms the form he dared not，a moment since，touch with his finger! How he calls aloud a name，and drops his burden，and gazes on it wildly! He thus grasps and cries，and gazes，because he no longer fears to waken by any sound he can utter- by any movement he can make. He thought his love slept sweetly: he finds she is stone dead.

I looked with timorous joy towards a stately house: I saw a blackened ruin.

No need to cower behind a gate-post，indeed!- to peep up at chamber lattices，fearing life was astir behind them! No need to listen for doors opening- to fancy steps on the pavement or the gravel-walk!

The lawn，the grounds were trodden and waste: the portal yawned void. The front was，as I had once seen it in a dream，but a shell-like wall，very high and very fragile-looking，perforated with paneless windows: no roof，no battlements，no chimneys- all had crashed in.

And there was the silence of death about it: the solitude of a lonesome wild. No wonder that letters addressed to people here had never received an answer: as well despatch epistles to a vault in a church aisle. The grim blackness of the stones told by what fate the Hall had fallen- by conflagration: but how kindled? What story belonged to this disaster? What loss，besides mortar and marble and woodwork had followed upon it? Had life been wrecked as well as property? If so，whose? Dreadful question: there was no one here to answer it- not even dumb sign，mute token.

In wandering round the shattered walls and through the devastated interior，I gathered evidence that the calamity was not of late occurrence. Winter snows，I thought，had drifted through that void arch，winter rains beaten in at those hollow casements; for，amidst the drenched piles of rubbish，spring had cherished vegetation: grass and weed grew here and there between the stones and fallen rafters. And oh! where meantime was the hapless owner of this wreck?