degrees. But it must not be imagined that the very gentle
slope of which I have spoken was uniform, for it was far from that; on
the contrary, I had not advanced much more than half a mile on my way
before I came to, first, a slight dip, then a rather stiff rise of a few
hundred yards to a kind of ridge, upon surmounting which I found myself
upon the edge of a wildly picturesque glen, or ravine, the steep sides
of which consisted of finely broken ground interspersed with outcrops of
lichen--stained rock and thickly overgrown with a tangle of bushes and
flowering shrubs, with here and there a few graceful saplings or a clump
of noble shade trees entwined with strange-looking and beautiful
orchids. The cool, refreshing, musical sound of running water came up
from the depths of the glen, although the stream itself was not visible
from where I stood, while the subdued roar of a distant waterfall
strongly tempted me to swerve from my path and follow the upward course
of the glen. I surrendered myself to the temptation, rather erroneously
arguing that every foot of rise must necessarily take me so much nearer
the summit of the peak, whereas I eventually found that I had diverged
almost at right angles to my proper course. But I was richly rewarded
for my labour and loss of time, for at the end of a somewhat arduous
climb of about twenty minutes I found myself gazing at as romantic and
beautiful a bit of scenery as I had ever beheld.

I was in a deep hollow between two hills, the bottom of the hollow
forming a rocky basin into which poured the water of a small stream,
some ten feet in width, as it tumbled over a broad, rocky ledge some
sixty feet above, and came foaming, lace-like, down the moss-grown face
of the precipice. The pool, or basin, into which the water fell was
some thirty feet in diameter, and apparently about four feet deep, the
pebbly bottom showing with startling distinctness through the crystal-
clear water. The steep sides of the hollow were grass-grown, with
great, rough outcrops of granite rock showing here and there, out of the
interstices of which sprang a great variety of beautiful ferns, and were
overhung by a magnificent tangle of beautiful trees and bushes growing
so thickly together as completely to exclude the sun's rays, bathing the
whole scene in a soft, cool, delicious green twilight.

The water looked so clear, so cool, so altogether tempting, that I
decided there and then to treat myself