t ower fast--and so we made but slow progress--little more
even than walking; yet, as I told him, it gave a man leisure to use his
eyes, and make observation to the right and the left; and so we had a
prime look of Eskbank, and Newbottle Abbey, and Melville Castle, and
Dalhousie, and Polton, and Hawthornden, and Dryden woods--and the powder
mills, the paper mills, the bleachfield--and so on. The day was bright
and beautiful, and the feeling of summer came over our bosoms: the
flowers blossomed and the birds sang; and, as the sun looked from the
blue sky, the quiet of nature banished from our thoughts all the poor and
paltry cares that embitter life, and all the pitiful considerations which
are but too apt to be the only concerns of the busy and bustling, from
their awaking in the morning to their lying down on the pillow of evening
rest. Peter and myself felt this forcibly; he, as he confessed to me,
having entirely forgot the four pan-soled loaves that were, that morning,
left by his laddie, Peter Crust, in the oven, and burned to sticks; and
for my own part, do what I liked, I could not bring myself to mind what
piece of work I was employed on the evening before, till, far on the
road, I recollected that it was a pair of mouse-brown spatterdashes for
worthy old Mr Mooleypouch the mealmonger.

Oh, it is a pleasant thing, now and then, to get a peep of the country!
To them who live among shops and markets, and stone-walls, and
butcher-stalls, and fishwives--and the smell of ready-made tripe, red
herring, and Cheshire cheeses--the sights, and sounds, and smells of the
country, bring to mind the sinless days of the world before the fall of
man, when all was love, peace, and happiness. Peter Farrel and I were
transported out of our seven senses, as we feasted our eyes on the beauty
of the green fields. The bumbees were bizzing among the gowans and
blue-bells; and a thousand wee birds among the green trees were
churm-churming away, filling earth and air with music, as it were a
universal hymn of gratitude to the Creator for his unbounded goodness to
all his creatures. We saw the trig country lasses bleaching their
snow-white linen on the grass by the waterside, and they too were lilting
their favourite songs, Logan Water, the Flowers of the Forest, and the
Broom of the Cowdenknowes. All the world seemed happy, and I could
scarcely believe--what I kent to be true for all that--that we were still
walking in the realms of