Scott's
fictions are like this beautiful ivy, with which all the ruins here are
overgrown,--they not only adorn, but, in many cases, they actually hold
together, and prevent the crumbling mass from falling into ruins.

To-morrow we are going to have a sail on the Clyde.

LETTER V.

April 17.

MY DEAR SISTER:--

To-day a large party of us started on a small steamer, to go down the
Clyde. It has been a very, very exciting day to us. It is so stimulating
to be where every name is a poem. For instance, we start at the
Broomielaw. This Broomielaw is a kind of wharf, or landing. Perhaps in
old times it was a haugh overgrown with broom, from whence it gets its
name; this is only my conjecture, however.

We have a small steamer quite crowded with people, our excursion party
being very numerous. In a few minutes after starting, somebody says,--

"O, here's where the Kelvin enters." This starts up,--

"Let us haste to Kelvin Grove."

Then soon we are coming to Dumbarton Castle, and all the tears we shed
over Miss Porter's William Wallace seem to rise up like a many-colored
mist about it. The highest peak of the rock is still called Wallace's
Seat, and a part of the castle, Wallace's Tower; and in one of its
apartments a huge two-handed sword of the hero is still shown. I
suppose, in fact, Miss Porter's sentimental hero is about as much like
the real William Wallace as Daniel Boone is like Sir Charles Grandison.
Many a young lady, who has cried herself sick over Wallace in the novel,
would have been in perfect horror if she could have seen the real man.
Still Dumbarton Castle is not a whit the less picturesque for that. Now
comes the Leven,--that identical Leven Water known in song,--and on the
right is Leven Grove.

"There," said somebody to me, "is the old mansion of the Earls of
Glencairn." Quick as thought, flashed through my mind that most eloquent
of Burns's poems, the Lament for James, Earl of Glencairn.

"The bridegroom may forget the bride
Was made his wedded wife yestreen;
The monarch may forget the crown
That on his head an hour hath been;
The mother may forget the child
That smiles sae sweetly on her knee;
But I'll remember thee, Glencairn,
And a' that thou hast done for me."

This mansion is now the seat of Graham of Gartmor.

Now we are shown the remains of old Cardross Castle, where it was said
Robert Bruce breathed his last. And now we come near the beautiful
grounds o