the rocky wall, and in a storm the sportsman could conceal himself in its slab-roofed chamber, and be effectually shielded from the howling wind, and beating rain. The Egerian nymph would have found here an abiding place, equal in loveliness and quiet sublimity to her immortal haunt. The scene called to our mind the lines of Byron :

« This cave was surely shaped out for the greeting « Of an enamour'd Goddess, and the cell

Haunted by holy love.

Not such however is the origin ascribed to this grotto by the neighbouring peasantry, who call it the cave of a moura encantada » and bold must be the rustic who will pass it after sunset without doffing his hat, and reverentially making the sign of the cross, praying at the same time to his patron saint to preserve him from its mysterious, and dangerous habitant. This superstition is very common in Portugal, where the peasantry generally believe that when the Moors were expelled the country, they buried their treasures in the most solitary places, sacrificing at the same time, with many incantations, a young and spotless virgin, whose spirit hovers round the spot, and occasionally appears in various shapes to the lonely and startled wayfarer. These spirits are always maleficent, and hence the terror attached to places supposed to be haunted by a « moura encantada ».

The brink of the bank, overhanging the bed of the stream was rendered picturesque by shelving

rocks, in the clefts of which immense pines had fixed their everlasting anchorage, forming rude observatories, for the lover of nature to look down upon her wonders beneath. The sunbeams fell with a softened radiance on the scene, tipping the feathery foam, thrown up by the mimic cataract with a mellow, shifting, drapery of gold, and a dreamy autumnal haze hung its blue curtain upon the bills. A single rock, projecting from the side of the hill about two hundred feet above our heads, covered with dwarf evergreens, seemed the look out place of the « Genius loci; » while opposite us on the other side of the stream, and about eighty feet above its bed, a rock of slab like form shot out from the bank, upbearing a natural mound of earth of conical form, overspread with a thick carpetting of pale moss, and from its apex, a small cypress grew in rich luxuriance; seeming like a funereal tree planted by nature on the grave of some perished Dryad. At a short distance from the fall, an immense furrow bad been ploughed from top to bottom of the bank, by some convulsion of the elements, that had borne down trees of vast growth, the mossy skeletons of which lay, like gigantic warriors overthrown in battle: indifferent to the sun which once gleamed on their bark-mailed trunks, and the winds. which sported with their emerald crests.

Leaving with regret this beautiful scene, we continued our walk up the river. which at this season was reduced to a clear shallow stream, brawling

over the rocks, and loose masses of stone, with which its bed is thickly strewed, though in the winter, it rushes down a roaring torrent bearing every thing with it in its furious course. We had yet an hour's walk before us, and had twice to cross the winding stream by means of rude bridges ere we reached the village of Villar da Veiga at the foot of the Gerez mountain. Here we found our horses and servants; who had descended to the valley by an easier path, and stretching ourselves under some trees on the banks of the stream, were quickly regaled with some especially fine trout, which a shoeless-urchin had just lured from the river. Hard was our struggle with the Patroa or keeper of the venda (for inn then was none) to prevent the delicate fish being fried in thick rancid oil, and only by one of the party undertaking the post of cook, were we able to save them from such a desecration,

Here we rested till the moon rose, and then by her light, rode about two miles up the mountain down whose side a torrent was dashing with musical murmur. We halted for the night at the hot springs, to see which was one of the objects of our excursion.

C.

H. Lawson

TO....

Lady! when kneeling at the hour of prayer;
When all they soul to deep devotion given,
Thy pure heart sends its orisons to Heaven;
Then must each, suit of thine be granted there;
Often in times gone by, did one prefer
Pure though impassion'd prayers on high for thee;
And with rash hope, to the Divinity

To join with his, thy hallow'd name did dare.
Think on him now! Since more than morta! love
Could not thy heart with sympathy impress,
Yet in these moments, let soft pity move;

And though with love his lot thou may'st not bless,
Yet ask one mercy for him from above,

(For which he dare not pray) Forgetfulness!

SELECTIONS FROM THE OAKEN CHEST.

N.° 1.

SOME of our Portonian readers may recollect a venerable looking personage, called Father Manoel, who long after the abolition of the monastic orders in Portugal, remained alone, monachus et monos, as he facetiously said himself, in the ancient convent of the Conception near Leça. He stood by his convent, till his convent ceased to stand by him. When the sacred edifice was pulled down, he withdrew to Amarante, where he is now dreaming out his second childhood, amid the Scenes and recollections of the first.

He is now, worthy old man, « in the last scene of all; but we had the good fortune to make his acquaintance, while he was yet in the full enjoyment of all his faculties, relishing jokes, books, wine, and all the other pleasant things which embellish, and abridge the dusty road of life. We loved the man at once, and we flatter ourselves that he was not altogether indifferent to our affection.

His conversation was quaint, but not pedantic, and comprised the whole Scale of causerie from sen