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226 sensible pieces in the volume, congratulating Dover on his good work without ridiculous extravagance. Marmion was soon after to die miserably of a sickness brought on by marching as a soldier in Sir John Suckling's troop on the ill-starred expedition to Scotland. "A goodly, proper gentleman," as Anthony à Wood calls him, to whose merits posterity has scarcely been just. Finally, in return for all the kind wishes expressed, Robert Dover himself essays "A Congratulatory Poem to my Poetical and Learned Friends, Compilers of this Book," in which, with considerable humor, he defends his love of athletic sports against the Puritans, who are so ready to see "wicked, horrid sin" in every kind of innocent pastime. Such are the contents of a volume of unusual interest, adorned with many illustrious names, and destined to preserve the memory of an interesting public movement which, but for the existence of these verses, we should scarcely have heard of; for it was the accident of Anthony à Wood's possession of the book in his library that led him to turn aside into pleasant gossip about the person celebrated in it.

Captain Robert Dover did not long survive the apotheosis and the destruction of his games. The one occurred in 1636, the other probably in 1638, and in 1641 he died at Stanway. He had a nephew or a grandson, who became a small dramatist during the Restoration. The scenes of the Cotswold games were left intact, and, according to a MS. in the possession of the late Sir Thomas Winnington, the sports themselves were revived in the reign of Charles II. It was probably very soon after this second revival that their neighborhood was the scene of a most lurid and mysterious event, which I may be permitted to recount as a foil to the joviality of the games themselves. Mr. William Harrison, the steward of a wealthy lady of Chipping Campden, riding out from home one day in 1676 to collect the rents of his mistress at Charringworth, did not return at night. A servant of the house, John Perry, was sent to search for him in the morning, and when he returned without any news, a general examination of the neighborhood began. In a lonely spot there were found a hat, a band, and a comb, which were recognized as having belonged to Mr. Harrison, and which were covered with blood. The body itself was not discovered, but the trial for murder began, and suspicion fell upon John Perry. This was increased by his confusion, and at last, cross-examined before the magistrates, he confessed that his mother and his brother had murdered Mr. Harrison, after robbing him of his effects. Circumstantial evidence was so strong against the prisoners that, although the dead body had not been discovered, the Perrys were found guilty of the murder, and all three were hanged, John Perry protesting with his last breath that he had made a mistake, or been deluded by his fancy. Every one in the district, however, was satisfied with the justice of the sentence, when, after two years were passed, one day Mr. Harrison came quietly riding into Chipping Campden, with the story that he had been met on the wold by a party of men, who, after a violent struggle, had secured him, had ridden hard with him to the sea, had sailed to Turkey with him, and had sold him as slave to a Moslem physician. He declared that in the course of time he had escaped and fled on board a vessel bound for Portugal, whence he had found his way home again. What part of this romantic tale was true we know not; the horrible circumstance is the execution of the family of the Perrys on the strength of an hallucination.

The Cotswold games, in a hueless and debased form, continued to be celebrated during Whitsunweek almost all through the last century; but they were vulgarized, and all the charming air of distinction that Captain Dover had given them vanished with his death. But in their original form they were well worthy to be remembered. These humane and innocent sports, with their graceful mingling of antique revival with plain, homely English merriment, are characteristic of the very best side of the royalist party in the seventeenth century, and they are not unimportant in helping us to realize the every-day life of gentry and peasantry in distant country places.

 

 From The Cornhill Magazine.

who had returned to Geneva the day after his excursion to Chillon, went to Rome towards the end of January. His aunt had been established there for several weeks, and he had received a couple of letters from her. "Those people you were so devoted to last summer at Vevey have turned up here, courier and all,"' she wrote. "They seem to have