overcome it was impossible. Her feelings must ever remain the same, but she would confine them to her own breast; and she began to converse with, and even strove to amuse, her kind-hearted companion. Ever and anon, indeed, a rush of tender recollections came across her mind, and the soft voice, and the bland countenance of her maternal friend, seemed for a moment present to her senses; and then the dreariness and desolation succeeded as the delusion vanished, and all was stillness and vacuity! Even self-reproach shot its piercing sting into her ingenuous heart; levities on which, in her usual gaiety of spirit, she had never bestowed a thought, now appeared to her as crimes of the deepest dye. She thought how often she had slighted the counsels and neglected the wishes of her gentle monitress; how she had wearied of her good old aunts, their cracked voices, and the everlasting tic-a-tic of their knitting needles; how coarse and vulgar she had sometimes deemed the younger ones; how she had mimicked Lady Maclaughlan, 'and caricatured Sir Sampson; and 66 even poor dear old Donald," said she, as she summed up the catalogue of her crimes, "could not escape my insolence and ill-nature. How clever I thought it to sing 'Haud awa' frae me, Donald,' and how affectedly I shuddered at everything he touched;" and the "sneeshin mull" was bedewed with tears of affectionate contrition. But every painful sentiment was for a while suspended in admiration of the magnificent scenery that was spread around them. Though summer had fled, and few even of autumn's graces remained, yet over the august features of mountain scenery the seasons have little control. Their charms depend not upon

richness of verdure, or luxuriance of foliage, or any of the mere prettinesses of nature; but whether wrapped in snow, or veiled in mist, or glowing in sunshine, their lonely grandeur remains the same; and the same feelings fill and elevate the soul in contemplating these mighty works of an Almighty hand. The eye is never weary in watching the thousand varieties of light and shade, as they flit over the mountain, and gleam upon the lake; and the ear is satisfied with the awful stillness of nature in her solitude.

Others besides Mary seemed to have taken a fanciful pleasure in combining the ideas of the mental and elemental world, for in the dreary dwelling where they were destined to pass the night, she found inscribed the following lines :

"The busy winds war mid the waving boughs,
And darkly rolls the heaving surge to land;
Among the flying clouds the moon-beam glows
With colours foreign to its softness bland.

"Here, one dark shadow melts, in gloom profound,
The towering Alps-the guardians of the Lake;
There, one bright gleam sheds silver light around,
And shows the threat'ning strife that tempests wake.

"Thus o'er my mind a busy memory plays,

That shakes the feelings to their inmost core;
Thus beams the light of hope's fallacious rays,
When simple confidence can trust no more.

So one dark shadow shrouds each by-gone hour,
So one bright gleam the coming tempest shows;
That tells of sorrows, which, though past, still lower,
And this reveals the approach of future woes."

While Mary was trying to decypher these somewhat mystic lines, her uncle was carrying on a colloquy in Gaelic with their hostess. The

consequences of the consultation were not of the choicest description, consisting of braxy1 mutton, raw potatoes, wet bannocks, hard cheese, and whisky. Very differently would the travellers have fared had the good Nicky's intentions been fulfilled. She had prepared with her own hands a moorfowlpie and potted nowt's head, besides a profusion of what she termed "trifles, just for Mary, poor thing! to divert herself with upon the road." But alas in the anguish of separation, the covered basket had been forgot, and the labour of Miss Nicky's hands fell to be consumed by the family, though Miss Grizzy protested, with tears in her eyes, "that it went to her heart like a knife, to eat poor Mary's puffs and snaps.'

Change of air and variety of scene failed not to produce the happiest effects upon Mary's languid frame and drooping spirits. Her cheek already glowed with health, and was sometimes dimpled with smiles. She still wept indeed as she thought of those she had left; but often while the tear trembled in her eye, its course was arrested by wonder, or admiration, or delight-for every object had its charms for her. Her cultivated taste and unsophisticated mind could descry beauty in the form of a hill, and grandeur in the foam of a wave, and elegance in the weeping birch, as it dipped its now almost leafless boughs in the mountain stream. These simple pleasures, unknown alike to the sordid mind and vitiated taste, are ever exquisitely enjoyed by the refined yet unsophisticated child of nature.

1

1 [Sheep that have died a natural death, and been salted.]

VOL. I.-16

CHAPTER XXXII

"Her native sense improved by reading,
Her native sweetness by good breeding."

DURING their progress through the Highlands

the travellers were hospitably entertained at the mansions of the country gentlemen, where oldfashioned courtesy and modern comfort combined to cheer the stranger guest. But upon coming out, as it is significantly expressed by the natives of these mountain regions, viz., entering the low country, they found they had only made a change of difficulties. In the Highlands they were always sure, that wherever there was a house, that house would be to them a home; but on a fair-day in the little town of G- they found themselves in the midst of houses, and surrounded by people, yet unable to procure rest or shelter.

At the only inn the place afforded they were informed, "The horses were ae baith oot, an' the ludgin' a' tane up, an' mair tu "; while the driver asserted, what indeed was apparent, "that his beasts war nae fit to gang the length o' their tae farrer-no for the king himsel'."

At this moment a stout, florid, good-humoured looking man passed whistling "Roy's Wife" with all his heart; and just as Mr. Douglas was stepping out of the carriage to try what could be done, the same person, evidently attracted by

242

curiosity, repassed, changing his tune to "There's cauld kail in Aberdeen."

He started at sight of Mr. Douglas; then eagerly grasping his hand, "Ah! Archie Douglas, is this you? exclaimed he, with a loud laugh and hearty shake. "What! you haven't forgot your old schoolfellow, Bob Gawffaw?"

A mutual recognition now took place, and much pleasure was manifested on both sides at this unexpected rencontre. No time was allowed to explain their embarrassments, for Mr. Gawffaw had already tipped the post-boy the wink (which he seemed easily to comprehend); and forcing Mr. Douglas to resume his seat in the carriage, he jumped in himself.

"Now for Howffend, and Mrs. Gawffaw! ha, ha, ha! This will be a surprise upon her. She thinks I'm in my barn all this time-ha, ha, ha!"

Mr. Douglas here began to express his astonishment at his friend's precipitation, and his apprehensions as to the trouble they might occasion Mrs. Gawffaw; but bursts of laughter and broken expressions of delight were the only replies he could procure from his friend.

After jolting over half a mile of very bad road, the carriage stopped at a mean, vulgar-looking mansion, with dirty windows, ruinous thatched offices, and broken fences.

Such was the picture of still life. That of animated nature was not less picturesque. Cows bellowed, and cart-horses neighed, and pigs grunted, and geese gabbled, and ducks quacked, and cocks and hens flapped and fluttered promiscuously, as they mingled, in a sort of yard,