dangerous errors in respect to popular games and superstitions; a work
to which the squire looks forward with great interest. He is also a
casual contributor to that long-established repository of national
customs and antiquities, the Gentleman's Magazine, and is one of those
that every now and then make an inquiry concerning some obsolete customs
or rare legend; nay, it is said that several of his communications have
been at least six inches in length. He frequently receives parcels by
coach from different parts of the kingdom, containing mouldy volumes and
almost illegible manuscripts; for it is singular what an active
correspondence is kept up among literary antiquaries, and how soon the
fame of any rare volume, or unique copy, just discovered among the
rubbish of a library, is circulated among them. The parson is more busy
than common just now, being a little flurried by an advertisement of a
work, said to be preparing for the press, on the mythology of the middle
ages. The little man has long been gathering together all the hobgoblin
tales he could collect, illustrative of the superstitions of former
times; and he is in a complete fever lest this formidable rival should
take the field before him.

[Illustration: A Bookworm]

Shortly after my arrival at the Hall, I called at the parsonage, in
company with Mr. Bracebridge and the general. The parson had not been
seen for several days, which was a matter of some surprise, as he was an
almost daily visitor at the Hall. We found him in his study, a small,
dusky chamber, lighted by a lattice window that looked into the
churchyard, and was overshadowed by a yew-tree. His chair was surrounded
by folios and quartos, piled upon the floor, and his table was covered
with books and manuscripts. The cause of his seclusion was a work which
he had recently received, and with which he had retired in rapture from