* * * * *


NOTES.

FOLK LORE.

_The First Mole in Cornwall; a Morality from the Stowe of Morwenna, in
the Rocky Land._--A lonely life for the dark and silent mole! She glides
along her narrow vaults, unconscious of the glad and glorious scenes of
earth, and air, and sea! She was born, as it were, in a grave, and in
one long living sepulchre she dwells and dies! Is not existence to her a
kind of doom? Wherefore is she thus a dark, sad exile from the blessed
light of day? Hearken! Here, in our own dear Cornwall, the first mole
was a lady of the land! Her abode was in the far west, among the hills
of Morwenna, beside the Severn sea. She was the daughter of a lordly
race, the only child of her mother, and the father of the house was
dead. Her name was Alice of the Lea. Fair was she and comely, tender and
tall; and she stood upon the threshold of her youth. But most of all did
men wonder at the glory of her large blue eyes. They were, to look upon,
like the summer waters, when the sea is soft with light! They were to
her mother a joy, and to the maiden herself--ah! benedicite--a pride.
She trusted in the loveliness of those eyes, and in her face, and
features, and form: and so it was that the damsel was wont to pass the
summer's day, in the choice of rich apparel, and precious stones, and
gold. Howbeit this was one of the ancient and common customs of those
old departed days. Now, in the fashion of her stateliness, and in the
hue and texture of her garments, there was none among the maidens of old
Cornwall like Alice of the Lea. Men sought her far and nigh, but she was
to them all, like a form of graven stone, careless and cold. Her soul