still. The stars shone in their vault of azure, and the dark water, glassy and unruffled, had filled with the returning tide the little harbour, reflecting from its surface the few gas lamps placed at equal distances near its margin. The atmosphere felt as genial and pleasant as in a clear, calm, and summer evening in the south of Spain. Every body was abroad. Many houses, and our own among the rest, had their windows open (8th of November), and the Torquay band, at ten o'clock, came on the Strand to enliven the inhabitants and cheer the invalid to his early couch. During its performance I walked up to the "Higher Terrace," by ascending some steps at the back of the strand, and by following a winding path, which led me in front of that handsome row of lodging houses,—as I wished to judge of the effect of the music at that elevation, in the still atmosphere that surrounded it. Wind instruments, played in the open air, in the stillness of night produce a wonderful effect when heard at a distance; and my present experiment confirmed that notion by the additional delight it procured me.

On the succeeding morning, while on my peregrination through every street and winding path, mounting also each of the three principal hills that form the semi-circlorama, I repeated my visit to the same terrace, and was well repaid for the fatigue of the ascent, and greatly enchanted at the view of the bay from it and the inclosing shores. But it is well for one who has stout lungs, as, thank God, I am blessed with, to scamper, à la chevreuil, from one steep hill to another, and ascend from a lower to a higher terrace. The question is, how can the asthmatic and the pulmonic, and the phthisical, having no breath to spare, master the peculiarities and difficulties of these situations?

This is in reality the great and prominent inconvenience of the place that there is only one level walk for invalids, who may select, according to the quarter from which the wind blows, either the eastern or the western parade, or

again the "Fryingpan-walk" along the strand, filled in general with respirator-bearing people, who look like muzzled ghosts, and are ugly enough to frighten the younger people to death. A lady, with four daughters, whom I had recommended to spend the winter in the place on account of her own delicate chest, had left it in despair after a few days, on account of the want of a level walk a little more varied, and not quite so exposed to the gaze of every idler, as the strand. If Messrs. Carey and Shedden would permit a level road to be made under the rock by the Abbey Torr, Torquay would be delightfully improved.

The peculiar smell of the back water in the little basin, when the tide has been out some hours during sunshine and hot weather, is found particularly offensive to some temporary residents who live down on the level ground. At Teignmouth, I understood, typhoid fevers, from a similar circumstance, were by no means an unfrequent disorder among the poor and the cottagers dwelling close to the water.

The houses on the higher terrace, on the other hand, are exposed to another disadvantage, in having at their back, and in immediate proximity, the rock, with just enough of space between to form a gully or funnel for the north-western or south-eastern winds to sweep down it with concentrated violence. With all these drawbacks, however, the position and the character of some of the houses, whether of those clustered together, or of the detached ones, are very inviting, and must be pleasant to live in. The Castle, on Rock Hill, for example, is said to be a delightful residence. The view from it across the basin, extending from the east end of the "higher terrace" over all the scattered villas on Park Hill as far as its seaward termination, where the Beacon Terrace houses ascend en échellons the steep road which divides them from the Beacon,-is perhaps one of the prettiest side-glances at Torquay. Nor are the detached houses, or those in Park Place, on the acclivity of Park Hill, less desirable, but on the con

trary more so than those just alluded to; for not only is the side-view of Torquay from thence nearly as gay and pleasing, but the aspect is infinitely more favourable.

As for the Braddon Hills villas, their being chiefly monopolized by permanent residents, proves in what estimation they are held; yet money, money will, even here, dislodge a proprietor, and procure to a rich invalid, who is ordered to inhale pure air away from the immediate emanation of the sea, magnificent lodgings. Detached villas, however, seem to be the furore, and the Bishop of the diocese, who usually took up his abode at the Royal, has since, I believe, completed a detached villa for himself.

It is to be expected that house-rent during the season, which begins in September, and extends generally a great way into the month of May, will be any thing but reasonable. We find, accordingly, that a house in the Higher Terrace, with two best bed-rooms, will not be let for less than five guineas a week. The Castle, of which I spoke, lets for thirteen guineas a week, but is well furnished; a remark not equally applicable to the generality of lodging-houses in Torquay. Another detached villa on the Braddon Hills, at the time of my visit, occupied by the family of a noble Earl, was let at ten guineas a week; and they will not let such houses for a shorter term than six months.

These high prices were beginning to frighten people away to other parts on the coast. At Teignmouth, an invalid would get, for two guineas a week, what is charged five at Torquay. Late as it was already in the season at the time of my visit, a great number of houses, which had in former years let well, could not get tenants-people having changed their opinions now-a-days in regard to high rents and high prices.

But to be away from the direct effluvia of back sea-water and sea-sprays, as well as from the relaxing, warm dampness of Torquay, which is balsam to the lungs, and poison to the nerves, I should ensconce myself for the winter, had I a