unknown. But there is everywhere an air of comfort, and an aspect of content, which I never saw elsewhere. The fields are highly cultivated, the gardens are tended carefully, the people are well dressed, and "there is not one poor man in all their tribes." Go into the little (quasi) cruciform church. You will see there, probably, as dense and as attentive a congregation as you ever beheld. Ask for a man to do any service for you, and you will fail in procuring one, for all are employed. There is no Union here, for there are no paupers to fill it. In this thought is a charm greater than that of the smiling prospect before our eyes, enchanting though it be. Read Woodley's account of these islands, thirty years ago, and look at them now. It is, under God, the work of one English gentleman, accomplished in seventeen years, in spite of the Celtic spirit, and old inveterate habits, and wrecks, and the Duchy of Cornwall.

Crossing the downs to the left of the Parsonage, you arrive at Charles's walls, consisting but of a few ruins, well and boldly placed. Below it is Cromwell's Castle, so called according to the rule in Theodore Hook's song,

"And then he saved an Emperor, where

No Emperor was near, Sir."

It is still kept in good order by the Board of Ordnance, and, as it commands New Grimsby channel, would be useful in beating off privateers, in time of war. From hence round

The very front of the gallery of the pretty church, at Tresco, is formed of part of a wreck; and the gallery itself, from a mere nautical spirit of imitation, is placed so low, after the pattern of a ship's cabin, that you must stoop in passing under it. Most of the old houses in Scilly have their rooms built like cabins, the ceilings being of wood, and not more than six feet high.

the bluff to "Piper's-hole" is a very pleasant walk, and the cave itself is well worth a visit. Preparation must be made for it, by procuring a boat, in which to cross the pool within, and by taking blue lights to burn,* when there. I wonder what is the foundation of the tradition of the Piper, and his wild music, dying away in the distance, until it is heard, and he is seen, no more. Go where you will, you meet with it. It resembles that tale of the traveller who set out in a boat to explore the reservoir of a thousand columns, at Constantinople, and who never returned. If it were but true, what a life of agony might have been compressed in those short hours! We are reminded of the person who incautiously left his guide, in the imperial vault, at Vienna. The rats are there seen, not by hundreds, but by millions. His fate was only known by the sexton finding a few scattered bones in a corner of the crypt, and some brass buttons, which were recognised as having been his. These dark scenes are terribly oppressive. Let us come out into the open air, and leave the ghost of the Piper in his funeral God's sun-light is glimmering over the calm sea, that breaks, in low, solemn music, upon the rocks at our feet. Listen, for a moment, to a tale of the civil wars, connected with that shattered peel above, and with this dismal subterranean vault below. The incidents mentioned in it took place principally here. We will therefore call it

cave.

A LEGEND OF "PIPER'S-HOLE."

This must be done cautiously. Some sappers and miners lately kindled a fire in the cave, and were in great danger. One of the party was carried out insensible.

A LEGEND OF "PIPER'S HOLE."

N the spring of 1651, there was sorrow and confusion of face at Scilly.

Blake

and Ayscough, the rebel leaders, were approaching with the sea and land forces of the Parliament, to wrest the Islands from the gallant Sir John Grenville, the kinsman of that

Bevill Grenville, who died so nobly for his king, on Lansdowne heath. The remains of the royal army, composed chiefly of officers, and gentlemen of blood, prepared to meet the storm, which they did not hope to resist with success. Had they been, like their enemies, men who preferred their own selfish interests to those of their country, they would have treated with Van Tromp, who made them the most tempting offers, on condition of their ceding the islands to him. But the Cavaliers knew that their duty was to contend against treason, not to imitate it. They refused even to listen to his proposals, or to convey to the stranger any portion of the old realm of England. They looked forward to the last act of that long agony, ready to meet, face to face, a superior force,-ready, if need be, to die in

harness, or, if doomed to be survivors of that dreadful ordeal, ready to endure to the end, to go forth from a country where they could no longer find it in their hearts to abide, and to bear their honourable scars to a land in which they could dwell, until, in the expressive language of Scripture," this tyranny be over-past."

It was in Tresco, as it then began to be called, that the swords of the opposing parties first crossed each other. We well know how many causes had combined to add bitterness to the ordinary fierceness of war. The Puritan, and the Cavalier, not only waged a religious strife, and felt a religious hatred; they had not alone the exasperation of personal motives, of wrong and injury on the one side, and of contempt and loathing on the other, to sting and to urge them on, but there was in both a spirit yet darker and more ruthless than these. Those who murdered the " Charles Stuart" were likely to show scant mercy to the malignants, who wore upon their bosoms a likeness or a bloody relic of the Martyred King. So, with these feelings, both parties made their dispositions for the coming shock. And as Tresco was the first object of attack, Sir John Grenville employed all the means at his disposal to put it into a respectable state of defence.

man

It was protected by a fort, situated on the heights above New Grimsby, and called "Charles's Castle." The principal garrison of the Royalists was there. But the ancient

One of these is in the possession of my family. It was worn by my ancestor, Sir Ralph Whitfeld, of Whitfeld, a faithful servant and minister of King Charles, and is a beautiful miniature of the Martyr, with the axe on the reverse.

Abbey of St. Nicholas was also intrenched and fortified; and batteries were established on all the commanding positions round the coast. There was no lack of volunteers in such a cause. A band of fiery youths, "the full of hope, misnamed forlorn," watched the approach of the hostile fleet; and many a bold passage of arms seemed destined to take place, and many a desperate encounter to occur, ere Tresco should be lost and won.

The command of the whole place was entrusted to a young gentleman, named William Edgcumb, of a noble house in the West of England. His years, indeed, were not many; but those were times when capacity for service was not measured by years. In those trying and terrible days, the boldest and the worthiest came out, involuntarily, from the common herd, and took the lofty place assigned to them, as the nobility of intellect and of mind. The instinct of Heaven's patent was recognized at once; and many a young man, like Graham of Montrose, passed over the heads of white-haired veterans, and was cheerfully followed and obeyed. So was it in this instance. William Edgcumb was but a child, when, a few years before, he had left his home in Devonshire to draw for King Charles a sword almost too weighty for his arm. Since then, he had ridden over well-nigh every field fought between the two parties, and had gained experience, and won distinction, in all. And now, a youth in age, but a leader of high and approved qualities, he was placed, by Sir John Grenville, in the post of honour, and of danger, at Tresco. He was selected to meet the first onset of those bands, whose iron discipline had stemmed, and rendered vain, the dashing and devoted

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