tions. A neat library, lined entirely with oak, is a remnant of the original mansion; but the entrance front, which includes the diningroom, hall, and drawing-rooms, exhibits a specimen of elegant and convenient modern architecture. The name of the mansion is derived from the circumstance of its situation, in a combe or hollow, and the family of its remote proprietors, the De Hayes, who were its lords in the twelfth century; from them it became a part of the widely-extended possessions of the De Esterlings, or Stradlings. Since that tenure it has experienced the usual mutations of property, and after belonging successively to the families of Dyve and Bennet, vested at length by marriage in Robert Smith, esq; the father of the present possessor.

The road to Midford, winding through a wooded bottom, affords occasional rural scenes of much beauty, till it opens into the great turnpike leading from Bath to Warminster. Here a very different mansion to that of Combhay discovers itself, a striking contrast to the example of chaste design we have been just admiring-Midford Castle, as it is called, an anomaly in building, equally at war with taste and comfort. This edifice, without back or

front, beginning or end, would form a triangle, were not the corners rounded off into towers, which, with its embattled top, Gothic windows, and bastion on the lower side, suggested, with sufficient impropriety, the proud name which it at present bears. Much money has doubtless been expended on its erection, and it would be difficult to find an instance where expence has been so injudiciously bestowed; since its plan at once excludes beauty and convenience. Every advantage of situation it may fairly boast; a broad extent of valley spreads itself to the right, bounded by distant hills; a river and a village lie immediately below it; and to the left the eye wanders with rapture through a deep winding dale, darkened with woods, and diversified with rock and precipice. How may we lament, that when Art attempted any thing in a scene for which Nature had done so much, she did not work with the tools of Taste!

The canal, cut along the side of the hill, runs nearly parallel with the river a considerable distance down the vale, and will soon afford a ride for some miles of exquisite beauty; amongst the little rural scenes and interesting objects it offers, is Tucker-mill, a cottage crouching under

the high bank that rises above it, and seen from the Midford road, the residence of Mr. Smith. Professing to point out every thing remarkable in our route, it would be unpardonable in me to pass by the mansion, though it be a lowly one, of a man, like Ofellus, abnormis sapiens crassdque Minerva, whose invincible industry and indefatigable perseverance, unaided by the advantages of fortune or situation, have furnished him with a degree of geological and mineralogical knowledge which few, if any, of his contemporaries possess. Patient observation and practical experience, blended with great natural sagacity, have enabled him to form a system of geology equally new and satisfactory, which, you will hear with pleasure, is intended for the world, when properly digested and arranged.

The tedious hill above Midford brings us at length to a level, a higher ground than we have trodden since we left Bath, and opens an extensive prospect to the right quite into the county of Wilts. Proceeding to the fivemile stone, we reach the village of Hinton, and turn to the left, in order to survey the ruins of its abbey, and the remains of FarleyCastle in its neighbourhood; a rich treat to

the antiquary, and not undeserving the attention of those who prefer the beauties of nature to the vestiges of former magnificence. Indeed, did the deviation afford us nothing but dilapidated cloisters and mouldering turrets, I should still think our trouble repaid; for lightly as the antiquarian taste is esteemed, and much as it is ridiculed, it notwithstanding opens no mean sources of gratification to the man who cultivates it rationally, and leads to consequences interesting to society, and beneficial to the individual. Did the enjoyment of the antiquary consist in the unmeaning contemplation of unintelligible fragments, and timeeaten stones, it would be fair to consider him as senseless as the objects to which he directs it: but when the remains of ancient days awaken curiosity, and excite research; when they induce inquiries into the manners and customs, opinions and practices, of former times; when they lead to a comparison between the state of the arts amongst our fore fathers, and with us their descendants; when they are brought to the illustration of historical difficulties, or distant events; above all, when they entice the mind to sober reflection, and to a fair estimate of our present state, the evanes

cence of all human labours, and the vanity of all human schemes, the pursuit then assumes a more dignified aspect; it asserts the praise of contributing not only to the entertainment, but to the information, of the community; it strengthens the religious principle, and makes the man better and wiser than he would be without it.

William Longope, the puissant Earl of Salisbury, who died in the reign of Henry III. directed by his will that a monastery of Carthusian monks should be founded on some part of his extensive possessions. The direction was carried into execution by his widow Ela, who erected the abbey at Hinton, stocked it with cowls, and placed it under the united protection of the Virgin Mary, All Saints, and Saint John the Baptist. But this powerful tutelage could not shield it from the violence of Henry VIII. who involved it in the general wreck of monasteries, in the 37th year of his reign; the destruction of the buildings, however, did not follow; for the chapel, anti-chapel, and other parts, still remain; and the present manorhouse was entirely indebted for the materials with which it is erected, to the walls of the old abbey.