Midway between Sandown and Shanklin we pass through LAKE, a pretty hamlet, having a few cottages that let occasionally for lodgings during the summer months.

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BRADING

Consists of one long, ancient street (through which is the chief thoroughfare from Ryde to Shanklin and the Undercliff,) and a few good houses recently built on the outskirts:  it lies about half a mile from the haven; and still retains some of the privileges of an ancient borough.  The Church is considered the oldest in the island; as it was certainly in existence early in the eighth century, though some date its erection so high as the sixth, and contend that the first islanders converted to Christianity were here baptized.  On account of its antiquity, the numerous relics which it contains, together with the many well written inscriptions to be found on the tombstones in the cemetery (the most noted of which perhaps is the one erected to the memory of “Little Jane,”) it is very frequently visited by parties making the southern tour.  The surrounding country too is agreeably varied by wood and water, arable and pasture, and a very fine outline of hill and dale.

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To return to Ryde or Newport over the downs from Brading, will be found exceedingly interesting to those strangers who delight in the contemplation of grand prospects, and a most fertile and well cultivated country:—­having no objection at the same time to a hilly road as the price of their enjoyment, and which we call the most beautiful in the island.

But as artists are often enraptured with passages of scenery that to others prove comparatively uninteresting, we subjoin a sketch by Sir H. ENGLEFIELD, showing the deep interest and pleasure the surrounding landscapes are capable of affording:—­

“To enjoy in all its glory, the complete view of the northern tract, which in detail presents so many separate beauties, we must ascend the chalk range that rises immediately from the woods of Nunwell.  When the weather is clear, it is impossible to describe the magnificent scene which these hills command, from Brading Downs, by Ashey Sea-mark, and soon quite to Arreton chalk-pit.

“To the north, the woodlands form an almost continued velvet carpet of near 10,000 acres, broken only by small farms, whose thatched buildings relieve the deep tints of the forests.  The Wootton River winds beautifully among them, and beyond the whole the Solent Sea spreads its waters, which in clear weather is tinged with an azure more deep and beautiful than any I ever saw.  The Hampshire land rises in a succession of hills quite lost at length in blue vapour.  The inland view to the south is far from destitute of beauty, though less striking than the northern scene.  The vale between the chalk range and the southern