unpretending and affectionate manners.

The eldest daughter of this Minstrel of the Mountains was called
_Edith May_, (the name of May having been given because she was born
in the month of blossoms.) This lady (now Mrs. Warter,) was the bard
himself with a different sex and complexion. "Her features his, but
softened." Her gentle, graceful deportment was in perfect harmony with
flaxen hair tinted with gold; and the outline of her father's face
was embellished by the blue eyes and other delicate colors of her too
sensitive mother, (named, also, Edith,) who had been chosen for love
alone. The second daughter, Birtha, as I have said, was absent. The
third, Catherine, "between the woman and the child," had hazel eyes
and fine features, altogether with a delicate shape and complexion.
Cuthbert, the only son, was a boy of eleven or twelve, with an open,
expressive countenance.

I could not help remarking that in the names of each individual of
this pleasing group was heard that sound produced by the letter T
followed by its companion H, which is so difficult to the organs of
foreigners, but which, when tenderly pronounced, brings to mind
the down of a swan or the wing of a dove. Edith, Birtha, Catherine,
Cuthbert, Southey. If affection and innocence can insure felicity on
earth, the course of their lives must be smooth as waters where the
swan reposes; for certainly all their movements seemed innocent as
those of the dove.

The month of March was nearly half gone, when I reached Keswick,
by the road from Edinburgh; having passed, in my way, an old stone
building, pointed out to me as "Branksome Tower," known by the "Lay of
the Last Minstrel," who has sung the achievements of Scottish knights