his custom on Easter Monday to make his
appearance in this manor, clad in black
armour, and mounted on a black charger
(whence he got the name of The Black Lad);
and, attended by a numerous train of
followers, he rode through the town and over
the lands called the Carr-guld roads, levying
the fines against all who had not cleared their
lands from carr-gulds (or corn marygolds),
and until the penalties were paid, punishing
the unfortunate tenants by putting them in
the stone-rings, or stocks; or in prison, or
worse. The name of the Black Lad has been
handed down, associated with nothing but
traditions of cruelty and horror. An old
doggrel verse is still preserved containing
fervent ejaculations for deliverance from his
yoke:

"Sweet Jesé for thy mercy's sake,
And for thy bitter passion,
Save us from the axe of the Tower,
And from Sir Raph of Assheton."

Sir Rauf must, however, have been a
man of energy and talent, as may be judged
from the great trusts reposed in, and the
honours bestowed upon him by successive
sovereigns.—

He was Knight Marshal of England,
Lieutenant of the Tower of London, Sheriff of
Yorkshire in the reign of King Edward the
Fourth. He was made Knight Banneret at
Hutton Field, in Scotland, whither he had
accompanied the Duke of Gloucester to
recover Berwick.

In the first year of Richard the Third he
was made Vice-constable of England, with the
same authority as Constable, and was one of
the knights mentioned by Hollinshed who
rode at the coronation of Richard the Third,
whom he did not long survive; and now, in
this year of grace, 1853, he still exists as the
Easter show for the holiday folks at Ashton,
who parade the Black Lad in effigy, and
shoot and burn it in the market-place. So
does " the whirligig of time bring about its
own revenges."

Upon the death of Sir Rauf the
"Carr-guld roads " reverted to the lord of the manor
of Ashton, who abolished the practice of
"guld-riding " for ever; and a small sum of
money was set apart from the estate to
perpetuate in an annual ceremony the dreaded
yearly visits of the Black Lad.

The mother of Sir Rauf of Ashton was
Margaret, daughter of Sir John Byron of
Clayton in Lancashire, one of Lord Byron's
ancestors. Sir Rauf's elder brother, Thomas,
the lord of the manor of Ashton, was much
addicted to the occult sciences, and to the
practice of chemistry, in which he was so
skilful that he obtained, as was natural in
those times, the reputation of being a
magician, and in compact with evil spirits. He
and Sir Edward Trafford obtained a patent
in the third year of Henry the Fifth for
"making " alchemy, or translating imperfect
metals into gold and silver. He would appear
to be the original of the hermit gentleman in
black velvet.

FOUR-LEGGED AUSTRALIANS.

I HAVE settled in a large manufacturing
town after a residence of some years in
Australia, and since my return had been enjoying
life as well as any of my neighbours, until I
was made miserable by the gold discoveries.
From that time, until this hour, I have been
surrounded by intending emigrants or curious
inquirers, among whom I am known no longer
as the quiet Mr. Spettigue, who drives a pony
chaise, but as the gentleman who was a
long time in Australia, and will be happy to give
anybody any information upon any subject
that is in any way related to any part of the
Australian colonies.

Some of the questions asked of me are most
ridiculous. A plain speculator wanted my
opinion the other day as to the chance there
was of establishing a railroad between Sydney
and Hobart Town, so that the agricultural
produce of Tasmania might be more easily
conveyed to New South Wales. I was
obliged to remind him that the two towns
are a little farther apart than London and
Lisbon, and that the two countries are parted
from each other by a strait a little wider than
the Irish Channel.

But the commonest and fairest questions
asked of me are zoological? What sort of
animals are there in those parts besides
kangaroos? In most of the books studied
by emigrants the accounts given of Australian
quadrupeds are very meagre. As I lived
long in the bush and wandered far and wide
over the new land of promise, I scraped
acquaintance with very nearly all its known
four-legged inhabitants—there are not many
—and I suppose that I shall do a civil thing,
as well as save myself much trouble by making
public what I know about them.

In the first place, I think that I tell news to
nobody in stating that the number of these
animals is small, and is confined almost
entirely to creatures belonging to an order
unknown in the old world, marsupials or
pouch-bearers. The small number of species
may be estimated by comparison. Cuvier
described one thousand two hundred and
seventy-two distinct species of mammals. Of
these there are not so many as the odd
seventy-two found in New Holland; there are only
sixty-two, and nine of those are not found in the
bush, for they are members of the tribe of seals.
Of the fifty-three species of four-legged animals
known to exist in Australia, not one is to be
found anywhere else; they are all residents
of New Holland exclusively, or of the
adjacent islands. On the other hand, the very
commonest of old-world quadrupeds are not to
be met with otherwise than as colonists like
ourselves in Australia. The horse is no more
native to the country than the Englishman.