high buttressed walls, and sundry out-houses hanging as it were on
those walls, yet remained. This castle had once been encircled by a moat
which had been suffered to dry itself up, though still the little stream
which used to fill it when the dams were in repair, murmured and
meandered at the bottom of the hollow, and fed the roots of many a water
plant and many a tree whose nature delights in dank and swampy soils.
The verdure, however, which encircled this ancient edifice, added
greatly to the beauty, when seen over the extent of waste and wild in
which it stood. There can be no doubt but that the ancient possessors of
this castle, which, from the single remaining barrier, and the name of
the family, was called Dymock's tower, had been no other than strong and
dangerous free-booters, living on the plunder of the neighbouring
kingdom of Scotland. Every one knows that a vast extent of land, waste
or at best but rudely cultivated, had once belonged to the Lords of
Dymock; but within a few years this family had fallen from affluence,
and were at length so much reduced, that the present possessor could
hardly support himself in any thing like the state in which he deemed it
necessary for his father's son to live. Mr. Dymock was nearly thirty
years of age, at the time our history commences; he had been brought up
by an indolent father, and an aunt in whom no great trusts had been
vested, until he entered his teens, at which time he was sent to
Edinburgh to attend the classes in the college; and there, being a quick
and clever young man, though without any foundation of early discipline,
or good teaching, and without much plain judgment or common sense, he
distinguished himself as a sort of genius.

One of the most common defects in the minds of those who are not early
subjected to regular discipline is, that they have no perseverance; they
begin one thing, and another thing, but never carry anything on to any
purpose, and this was exactly the case with Mr. Dymock. Whilst he was in