There lay a thicket of thorns skirting a sand-bank, burrowed by
rabbits, on this hand grew a dense and Druid-like grove, into whose
intricacies the slanting sunbeams pierced; on that extended a long
glade, formed by a natural avenue of oaks, across which, at intervals,
deer were passing. Nor were human figures wanting to give life and
interest to the scene. Adown the glade came two keepers of the forest,
having each a couple of buckhounds with them in leash, whose baying
sounded cheerily amid the woods. Nearer the castle, and bending their
way towards it, marched a party of falconers with their well-trained
birds, whose skill they had been approving upon their fists, their jesses
ringing as they moved along, while nearer still, and almost at the foot of
the terrace wall, was a minstrel playing on a rebec, to which a keeper,
in a dress of Lincoln green, with a bow over his shoulder, a quiver of
arrows at his back, and a comely damsel under his arm, was listening.
On the left, a view altogether different in character, though scarcely
less beautiful, was offered to the gaze. It was formed by the town of
Windsor, then not a third of its present size, but incomparably more
picturesque in appearance, consisting almost entirely of a long
straggling row of houses, chequered black and white, with tall gables,
and projecting storeys skirting the west and south sides of the castle,
by the silver windings of the river, traceable for miles, and reflecting the
glowing hues of the sky, by the venerable College of Eton, embowered
in a grove of trees, and by a vast tract of well-wooded and well-
cultivated country beyond it, interspersed with villages, churches, old
halls, monasteries, and abbeys.
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