SAIL UP THE CLYDE.

29

on a little pony, with a long brown cloak and hood drawn over her bonnet as protection against the rain, and her gay velvet dress peeping out through the openings of the cloak. And they would have been pleased, too, with the sheep in this romantic region, the fleeces being very thick and white, while their heads, tails and legs were very black. On the side of this rugged road are the ruins of Inversnaid fort, built to keep the McGregors in awe. At Inversnaid mill, where we leave our ponies, is a small waterfall-the scenery wild and beautiful, and the scene of Wordsworth poem, the “Highland Girl," &c. Here we took a steamer to sail up and down Loch Lomond, (a lake, an expanse full of islands of every varying form,) and the pride of Scottish lakes, its northern extremity narrowing until it is lost among the retreating mountains, and gradually widening as it extends southward. Its scenery resembles our own Highlands and other portions of the Hudson. There are some beautiful country seats, and at Balloch we land. At this southern extremity of the lake are three or four fine castellated buildings on each side, and very near each other, the ruins of Balloch Castle, Castle Lenox, and Tallaquean Castle, the seat of Sir William Campbell.

We took coach to Dumbarton, about eight miles, where a steamer is in readiness to proceed up the Clyde to Glasgow, Dumbarton Rock, on which the Castle is situated, seems like those on which the Castle of Edinburgh and Stirling are built, to have been made by the Almighty for the purposes of fortification and defence, and the mind of man, or the necessity of the times, have caused them to be applied to the express purpose for which they were created. The sail up the Clyde is very beautiful, and the scenery, too, if we may judge by the glimpses we had between the showers of rain which poured almost incessantly. The river at Glasgow, Mr. B. says, when he was a child, was

so narrow and so shallow that he could wade across by holding up his kilt, and now it has been so deepened and widened that it is a port and harbor for ships of the largest class. Glasgow is altogether a commercial and manufacturing city; there is not much here to interest the stranger. We have in a handsome square in front of our hotel, a column eighty feet high, with a statue of Scott on the top, and some smaller ones scattered around. There is a fine old Cathedral, back of which is the "Bridge of Sighs," leading to a beautiful cemetery called the Necropolis of Glasgow. It is laid out on the side of a steep hill, in terraces and walks, one above the other, like an an amphitheatre, and embellished with innumerable beautiful statues and monuments; among the most conspicuous is a tall column with a statue of John Knox on the top. I will take my leave of you at Glasgow, leaving our tour through Ireland and Wales for my next. With much love for yourself and a blessing for my little ones-Farewell.

The letters I have as yet written, like a guide book, have been mostly filled with landmarks, finger-posts, and the statistics of the country. I will endeavor to have this upon a different plan, with desultory remarks upon the people of these parts their manners and customs-a thing of "shreds and patches." In my last from Newcastle-upon-the-Tyne, I asked you, (if I did not, I will,) to look at us seated in a small parlor of our inn, about as large as M's. bedroom, with a blazing coal fire, (for though the 25th of June, however warm with you, it was cold there, and I have had all my winter clothes in requisition ever since I left New York,) by which Mr. C. was seated in an arm-chair, reading a calender of the Newcastle races, that were to take place on the morrow; myself writing on the other side by the window, scribbling as fast as pen could go. And I invited you to make yourself at home, and take a seat at the tea-table with us; in which is comprised a good part of the comfort of an English inn. The tea and breakfast are about alike. You have always a server with the necessary china, a teacaddy, out of which a lady of the party makes the tea, with the aid of a copper tea-kettle on the hob of the grate, singing most merrily-a plate of muffins, hot and buttered—a plate of thin bread and butter—a stand of dry toast-as far north as this, a dish of orange marmalade, and at the end of

the table, one of cold roast beef. All these being placed on the table a right, the waiter retires, and you are left to enjoy your tea and your own society. If you want any thing more, a bell near, soon brings back the waiter. There, seated at the table, distributing the fragrant tea, I feel quite at home. I might now add to these comforts the splendor with which in the first part of our tour, our table was always graced. The china used here, is generally, very beautiful. The cups and saucers, plates, dishes, and egg-cups, are of the old fashioned parti-colored ware, in imitation of the Dresden. The urn, tea and coffee-pot, sugar dish, milk-pot, spoons and forks, castors and salt-cellars, are all of silver, generally beautifully chased.

In our bedroom we have always handsome curtains to bed and windows-the window drapery of moreen, and the falling curtain each side of white tamboured muslin. The bed upon which Mr. C. is now reading, is garnished with moreen curtains, sky-blue and white; the valence of the same, with a drapery at the top trimmed with handsome bullion fringe of blue, and a border of handsome curtain lace, of blue silk round the whole. The bedstead is a square high post, of beautiful mahogany, and the foot-board has a cushion nearly 'as thick as the board is high, covered with the same blue moreen. In the morning when the bed is made, the curtains are drawn to the head of the bed, to display the white counterpane and pillows, the ends being placed in neat folds across them; at night when you retire, the clothes are turned down on either side, and curtains closely drawn, so that your slumbers may not be disturbed by the long twilight or the early dawn. Indeed, at this season of the year, they have scarce three hours' darkness.

The butter here is brought to market in rolls about the diameter of a Bologna suasage-a foot long-and then cut into little pats, and stamped in divers shapes, and placed in

a deep glass dish filled with water, and a cover placed over it. It looks very nice, and is always fresh, in one sense— it is never salted. The chambermaids in the inns, no matter how young, all wear caps, with such wide frill borders, that their faces are almost concealed. The ladies universally have their bonnets filled with flowers, at least a box of them on each side of the face.

Crossing the Cheviots, from Newcastle, the hills and mountains were covered with sheep, clothed with thick soft wool, looking beautifully white, except the tips of the legs, head and tail, which were jet black, giving them quite a grotesque appearance. Fifty thousand in a flock, we were told, was not an unusual thing. We saw many shepherds with their plaid scarfs and caps, crooks and dogs; and peat fields in great extent, with the turf cut up in squares, like brick, and piled in stacks to dry.

Ballycastle, North of Ireland, July.

It is now late, but before retiring, I must give you an account of what we have seen to-day, which, I think, will interest you. We left Glasgow in the evening at ten. You will remember that it is no darker here at ten than with you at half-past seven. We sat round the table in the cabin of the steamer Londonderry, and finished a quart of fine strawberries, and then betook ourselves to the berths, and were soon asleep, passing down the Clyde, and up the Irish Channel. We awoke early in the morning, finding ourselves in the Atlantic, on the north coast of Ireland, with a heavy swell, and very sea-sick. We landed, however, at ten, at Porte Rush, passing on the way the Giant's Causeway-the object of our visit here. The Giant's Causeway is some nine miles from Porte Rush. For ten or twelve miles before our landing-place, the sea beats against a very high perpendicu