Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/248

 proprietor some years after. Into the root of their title I do not inquire. It might be as good or even better than many other titles to Church property. Lord Byron was very proud of the possession of Newstead Abbey, and seems to have got into his head with much poring over his pedigree, some touch of the confusion which he ascribes to the Polish Count Palatine in Mazeppa, and to have satisfied himself that the Byrons of the sixteenth century were identical with the Buruns of the thirteenth century, of which identity there is no evidence.

This Scottish village afforded much matter, both from observation and reflection to any observing and reflecting Englishman. The first thing that naturally struck an Englishman was the contrast between it and the English villages—particularly the villages of the southern and south-western counties of England. The most striking contrast that first presented itself was the monotonous regularity of this Scottish village, as compared with the picturesque irregularity of many English villages. I will explain what I mean by monotonous regularity by stating that this village, though situated in a most picturesque country, was merely a collection of cottages, built of a sort of red