It was under the influence of excessive fatigue, perhaps, and the relaxation of the will generally consequent thereon, that my resolution now at length seemed on the point of giving way; nay, the very attachment to life itself, on my own individual account, seemed fading, and a disinclination to continue the struggle farther appeared to be gradually creeping over me. I was becoming reconciled to what appeared inevitable, and could look upon my own probable fate almost as calmly as if it had been that of a stranger. I believe something very similar not unusually takes place, under the merciful disposition of Providence, in the death-bed, where debility is the chief feature of the case. After a few moments of repose and dreamy reverie, however, I roused myself from this state of apathy, and, influenced by a sense of duty, as well as by a sympathy for the feelings of those dearer than life itself, sprang to my feet once more, and struggled manfully out of the mesh of branches in which I had been entangled, till, after a few more violent efforts, I found myself getting into a rather opener and more advanced growth of wood, and at length succeeded in working my way out—almost to the very spot in the meadow I had started from!
Whilst still within the wood, I had been favoured with some novel experiences there—novel, at least, to me, as it was my first night in such a position. Thus, almost every branch I grasped in the dark to help me onward seemed crowded with snails, which smashed slimily under my shuddering hand! Glowworms were sparkling in the underwood in such myriads as I never witnessed before, save once in an evening-walk near Salerno. The sense of utter solitude and unbroken silence within these gloomy woods was truly awful. From time to time, as I advanced, a casual opening in the branches exhibited a momentary glimpse of the sky, with all its thousand twinkling fires; and shooting-stars of intense brilliancy were darting across its dark, blue depths in almost as great frequency as in those celebrated days of August and November, when the path of our earth crosses the thickest showers of these celestial fireworks.
On regaining the meadow, I felt quite at a loss whither to turn, or what to attempt next. I had already been floundering about for some half-dozen hours, and been ignorant all the while whether each additional step were not only taking me a step further, not from home alone, but from the very habitations of men. Almost done up at length, and hopeless of extricating myself from my labyrinth till daylight should come to my aid, I was again for a moment inclined quietly to resign myself to what seemed my inevitable fate, and drop down to sleep on a bank of earth under a hedge by which I was standing, and so await the dawn. But the dank grass, the trees dropping with dew, the creeping autumnal fog, and increasing cold, made me pause, and feel that to sleep in my light summer dress under such circumstances was, if not to die, at least to contract, during the night, such disease as would render existence not worth the having—racking rheumatism for life, or fever, or inflammation, in some of their many forms, and endless consequences. So I resolved to keep moving as long as I had power to stir a limb, as this would give me a chance of maintaining the circulation and animal heat throughout the remaining hours of the night, if my strength would but hold out so long. Like a drowning man, I struck out once more for life; again I tried the field-road I had lately too rashly abandoned; floundered once more through its pools and its ruts; clambered again on its high banks, or moved along under the shadow of the wood by its side. At length, after scarcely half an hour's additional walking, my perseverance had its reward, as I found myself at the entrance of a village, and heard, not far off, the busy clatter of some industrious flaxdressers, who were turning night into day, at their work. This proved to be the termination of my mishap; for the instructions I received enabled me to find my way home by three o'clock.
It was my amusement during several subsequent days, to endeavour by daylight to retrace accurately my midnight wanderings. I found I could not have walked less than twenty miles, though never at any time more than three distant from home. I had been incessantly in motion during nearly eight hours; and was at least thrice on right tracks, which, if they had been followed up steadily only a little longer, would have brought me to my quarters. The chiming of the old convent-bells, which I had mistaken for those of our own pretty little church, came really from the very opposite direction to what I fancied—the sound I heard being merely their echo, reflected to my ear from the wooded hill-side.
Thus, the proposition with which I started—namely, that German woods are not to be trifled with, or rashly entered without a guide or compass—is fully sustained by my own luckless experience. Much of the surrounding country was already well known to me, and in my various walks I had skirted along and even intersected some of these very woods; but the way in which they are parcelled out, for the supply of neighbouring, but unconnected villages with firewood, and the puzzling manner in which they are shuffled together when the estates of several proprietors run into one another at a given point, render it singularly difficult to steer through them even by day, and to the uninitiated, quite impracticable by night.
AN A.D.L.L. ADVENTURE IN LIVERPOOL.
Liverpool has perhaps fewer relics of an archæological nature than any other town in the United Kingdom; and this at first seems a little singular, when we remember that it is not without its place in the more romantic eras of our history, and that a castle of considerable strength once lent it protection. Its old castle, its towers, and the walls by which it was surrounded, have all been swept away by the busy crowds that now throng its thoroughfares. Even the former names of places have in most instances been altered, as if to obliterate all recollections and associations connected with its early history. Thus a row of houses, which a few years ago bore the not very euphonious name of Castle Ditch, from its having followed a portion of the line of the moat by which the fortress which once stood near it was surrounded, was changed into St George's Crescent, and many others underwent similar transmutations. But if the physical aspect of the place holds out few or no attractions to the antiquary, the moral one of its inhabitants, in so far as his favourite subject is concerned, is equally uninviting; for, taken as a whole, it would be difficult to find a population less influenced by, or interested in, such studies.
The only relic of the olden times which Liverpool has for a long time past retained, was a long, low, picturesque-looking thatched cottage in the small village of Everton (of toffee notoriety), which went by the name of Prince Rupert's Cottage, from its having been the head-quarters of that fiery leader when he besieged the town from the ridge on which the village is situated. But even this was swept away about six years ago by the proprietor, to allow a street which he had mapped out to abut upon the village at the point it occupied. The project did not succeed, and the outline of the contemplated street is all that as yet marks out the spot where this interesting object stood.