LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

"YOU'RE TIRED, DEAR HEART," SAID LYDIA

THE DRUID'S STONES.............

(Frontispiece).

to face page 181

STONE EDGE.

CHAPTER I.

THE LONE MOOR.

ON one of the highest, dreariest, coldest and bleakest of theshire hills stands a little old grey "Hall.” When it was built (the date 1630 is over the door) the whole hill-side must have been moorland; but the ugly squares of field surrounded by bare stone walls, with their scanty crops of barley, and oats, and rushy grass, are encroaching fast on the purple heather which constituted its only beauty. The almost interminable ascent which leads to it across the lone moor, never steep,-long, slow, and tiresome-was merely a track with deep ruts, almost impassable in winter. Yet it must have been a house once of some preten

sion: the advancing gables with their stone balls and heavy coping had each its double-mullioned six-light window; there were carved mantelpieces and oak wainscoting within, and without an elaborate balustrade surmounted the irregular old wall and flanked the handsome massive stone pillars with their great globes, which shut in a little paved court opening on the lane.

It was within a stone's-throw of some of the most splendid scenery in that beautiful county. From the top of the Edge was a magnificent view over hill and dale, rock and hanging woods. In a steep cleft a mile or two from the house ran a deep valley, whose cliffs and 'tors' rose sheer from the tumbling river at the bottom, with beautiful foliage fringing the precipitous walls of rock,-a dale which tourists came from all parts to see; but the little grey old house turned its back sullenly on it all, crept sufficiently down the hill on the wrong side as if to shut out the view, and turned savagely to contemplate its own dreary hill-sides, bare and high without grandeur, cold and exposed without gaining anything by its elevation.

In the early days when it was built, it must have been easier than now to maintain a "family of distinc

tion;" for on the estate, by no means very large, to which Stone Edge Hall belonged, there were no less than three of these little old manor-houses, each with its once Catholic chapel attached to it, now turned into a barn or cowshed, possessed once by a family whose pedigree was to be found in county chronicles and old monuments.

It was the end of October, but the wretched little crop of half-ripe oats was still uncarried. In those bleak regions, before the days of draining, the corn was often overtaken by snow before it could be reaped.

"It's a scratting world we live in," said the old farmer who inhabited the Hall, coming in from the vain attempt to rescue the harvest, and throwing himself on the settle by the great open fire. "I wunna fash mysen any longer o' this fashion; if th' ould squire will ha' his rent, happen he may just come and fish it out wi' a ladle, the grun's as fu' o' watter as the pond-head."

"Will ye ha' some parritch, feyther," said a tall, slight woman, with a very sweet sad expression-his wife, though she was some forty years younger than himself.

The only answer was a grunt, but when he had supped" it in a bowl with a wooden spoon on his

2

knee, his humour seemed to improve enough [for

speech.

"Where's Cassandra ?" he said.

"Gone down to fetch some barm from Morehead."

"She's ever gadding, and you're allus o' th' fashion o' abetting on her."

His wife silently turned away to her stirring of the washtub, by means of a sort of churn called a dolly "-a device by which the -shire moun

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taineers had anticipated the idea of the American machine.

The old man's complaints went on almost as satisfactorily to himself, shouted through the open door.

"Lyddy! and where's German? He's off somewhere too, I'll be bound."

"Why, he took the milking-stool and the pail not ten minit back; ye mun ha' met him as ye came in," answered the patient wife. And old Ashford had seen him, and did know perfectly where he was, although he indulged himself in complaints, as some people do in spirits, though he by no means denied himself either in this matter.

There was nothing whatever that indicated gentle blood in him-quite the contrary. Yet he was