The ancientest house, and the best for housekeeping in this county or the next, and though the master of it write but squire¹, I know no lord like him.  
MERRY BEGGARS.
 
 
 
The reader, if he has perused² the volumes of the Sketch³ Book, will probably recollect⁴ something of the Bracebridge family, with which I once passed a Christmas. I am now on another visit at the Hall, having been invited to a wedding which is shortly to take place. The squire's second son, Guy, a fine, spirited young captain in the army, is about to be married to his father's ward⁵, the fair Julia Templeton. A gathering⁶ of relations and friends has already commenced, to celebrate the joyful⁷ occasion; for the old gentleman is an enemy to quiet, private weddings. "There is nothing," he says, "like launching a young couple gaily⁸, and cheering them from the shore; a good outset is half the voyage."
 
Before proceeding⁹ any farther, I would beg that the squire might not be confounded with that class of hard-riding, fox-hunting gentlemen so often described, and, in fact, so nearly extinct in England. I use this rural title, partly because it is his universal appellation¹⁰ throughout the neighbourhood, and partly because it saves me the frequent repetition of his name, which is one of those rough old English names at which Frenchmen exclaim in despair.
 
The squire is, in fact, a lingering specimen¹¹ of the old English country gentleman; rusticated¹² a little by living almost entirely¹³ on his estate, and something of a humourist, as Englishmen are apt to become when they have an opportunity of living in their own way. I like his hobby passing well, however, which is, a bigoted¹⁴ devotion to old English manners and customs; it jumps a little with my own humour, having as yet a lively and unsated curiosity about the ancient and genuine characteristics of my "fatherland."
 
There are some traits about the squire's family also, which appear to me to be national. It is one of those old aristocratical families, which, I believe, are peculiar¹⁵ to England, and scarcely understood in other countries; that is to say, families of the ancient gentry¹⁶, who, though destitute¹⁷ of titled rank, maintain a high ancestral pride; who look down upon all nobility of recent creation, and would consider it a sacrifice of dignity to merge¹⁸ the venerable name of their house in a modern title.
 
This feeling is very much fostered by the importance which they enjoy on their hereditary¹⁹ domains²⁰. The family mansion²¹ is an old manor-house, standing²² in a retired²³ and beautiful part of Yorkshire. Its inhabitants have been always regarded through the surrounding country as "the great ones of the earth;" and the little village near the hall looks up to the squire with almost feudal²⁴ homage²⁵. An old manor-house, and an old family of this kind, are rarely to be met with at the present day; and it is probably the peculiar humour of the squire that has retained this secluded²⁶ specimen of English housekeeping in something like the genuine old style.
 
I am again quartered in the panelled chamber²⁷, in the antique wing of the house. The prospect²⁸ from my window, however, has quite a different aspect from that which it wore on my winter visit. Though early in the month of April, yet a few warm, sunshiny days have drawn²⁹ forth³⁰ the beauties of the spring, which, I think, are always most captivating on their first opening. The parterres of the old-fashioned garden are gay with flowers; and the gardener has brought out his exotics, and placed them along the stone balustrades. The trees are clothed with green buds and tender leaves; when I throw open my jingling³¹ casement³² I smell the odour of mignonette, and hear the hum of the bees from the flowers against the sunny wall, with the varied³³ song of the throstle, and the cheerful notes of the tuneful little wren³⁴.
 
While sojourning in this stronghold of old fashions, it is my intention to make occasional sketches³⁶ of the scenes and characters before me. I would have it understood, however, that I am not writing a novel, and have nothing of intricate plot, or marvellous adventure, to promise the reader. The Hall of which I treat has, for aught I know, neither trap-door, nor sliding-panel, nor donjon-keep: and indeed appears to have no mystery about it. The family is a worthy³⁷, well-meaning family, that, in all probability, will eat and drink, and go to bed, and get up regularly, from one end of my work to the other; and the squire is so kind-hearted an old gentleman, that I see no likelihood of his throwing any kind of distress³⁸ in the way of the approaching nuptials³⁹. In a word, I cannot foresee a single extraordinary event that is likely to occur in the whole term of my sojourn³⁵ at the Hall.
 
I tell this honestly to the reader, lest when he find me dallying⁴⁰ along, through every-day English scenes, he may hurry ahead, in hopes of meeting with some marvellous adventure farther on. I invite him, on the contrary, to ramble⁴¹ gently on with me, as he would saunter out into the fields, stopping occasionally to gather a flower, or listen to a bird, or admire a prospect, without any anxiety to arrive at the end of his career. Should I, however, in the course of my loiterings about this old mansion, see or hear anything curious, that might serve to vary the monotony of this every-day life, I shall not fail to report it for the reader's entertainment.
 
For freshest wits I know will soon be wearie
Of any book, how grave so e'er it be,
Except it have odd matter, strange and merrie,
Well sauc'd with lies and glared all with glee.1