LETTER I.

Glasgow, 4th July.

AWEEL, dearest E-, I am "over the border" and safe and sound in the good town o' Glasgow. How strange it appears to be actually in Scotland, so long my land of promise the "Yarrow unvisited" of my childish dreams ever since the days when my old nurse, who had spent her youth in the service of a noble Scotch family, used to tell me of the gloomy lochs, dark fir forests, and ancient castles of our sister nation. The time since I left you is so short and seems so long that there is a queer sort of puzzle in my feelings between wonderment at being here already and surprise that I am not rather at John o' Groat's House. The whirl of mail-travelling is not yet out of my head; and, like the old woman whose petticoats were cut shorter as she slept, I should ask

"Can this be 1?" did not the weather somewhat reassure me of my identity by remaining just as bad as when we left K—. H— is crying out, "Here is another weeping day for aunt S― to moan over, and to call forth the usual question of the breakfast-table, 'Does it always rain in Cumberland?'" You may comfort the dear lady with the assurance that it also rains in Scotland.

But I must give you an account of our proceedings, seriatim. In our way to Penrith, on Tuesday, we saw nothing but dim visions of mountains, looming through "the fog and filthy air;" but between Penrith and Carlisle we actually had a peep of "Dan Apollo" for the first time I forget how many weeks. He looked rather sickly, though, after his long drenching, and there was a good deal of Thomson's "yellow mist, far-smoking o'er the interminable plain." At Carlisle, where we slept, we preferred taking our chance for places in the London and Glasgow mail, to securing berths in the old heavy, which goes 18 miles about, gossips by the way, and does not get into Glasgow till nine or ten at night. We were called at "past vour o'clock," not that I wanted much calling; for, when I know that I must be off at a certain hour, I have one certain-because involuntary-method of being ready, namely, by scarcely sleeping at all. In the present case I heard the watchman every hour convey the pleasing intelligence that it was a rainy night and at last that it was a rainy morning. Luckily we found places in the mail, and then, all anxiety being over, sleep and I made it up together for a time. An exclamation from one of the passengers, "Here we are at Gretna

Green," roused me up, and made me open my eyes to look at this celebrated haven of persecuted lovers. It is a real green, about which are two or three houses, an inn, and a church. The tender couples are not joined together in holy wedlock at the church, but at the inn. Jolly doings truly! I offended one of the passengers, a Scotchman, by asking if the noose-tier was a real blacksmith. "No, sir, tis all gallimawfry. He's a minister o' the Scottish kirk. D'ye think the marriages would hold good, if they were not performed by a regular minister?" "Pooh, pooh!" exclaimed the fourth person of our party (a shrewd-looking man, who had not yet spoken); "he may be ordained in the Scottish Church, but he is a blacksmith." I entered into conversation with this person, who was evidently a man of talent, and by his remarks on politics and the West Indies, whence he was returning to Glasgow after an absence of thirteen months, I began to suspect he was somebody. He then talked of interviews with ministers -Mr. Stanley in particular—and of corresponding with the Duke of Wellington. I almost immediately conjectured that he must be Macqueen, Blackwood's clever correspondent. Soon after, some one on the outside of the mail called out to him by that very name, and put the matter out of doubt. I was much amused and interested by his conversation, particularly (as I am not you know much of a politician) by his really eloquent and beautiful descriptions of West Indian scenery. Just as he had completed a splendid picture of a Barbadian moonlight night, my Scotch friend opposite gravely asked whether

the moon was at the full there all the year round. I really gave Macqueen credit for the corresponding gravity with which he replied, "Not exactly that: I only meant to say that, when it does shine, it is far brighter than in ́our own climate." As for me, I was not so forbearing. To suppress a laugh exceeded my powers both of mind and muscle; and, as I happened to be stowing in a slice of bread and meat that I had bought at the last stage to appease the powerful cravings of appetite, a most unseemly sputtering took place thereupon. The Scotchman looked at me more in surprise than in anger, unconscious, I suppose, that he had said any thing particular. I begged pardon for my explosion, and I hope that all was attributed to a crumb going the wrong way. Macqueen has shown in Blackwood that he has a vein of powerful objurgation. In his conversation I was perhaps a little surprised to find a considerable touch of pathos. This was called forth by the sight of his native village, a small wild-looking hamlet in a bare bleak valley, which extends for miles and miles in treeless desolation. There was something fine, too, and independent in a man avowing a birth-place of such mean appearance. I like the feeling based upon the thought "I have made my way in the world, and I care not who knows from what humble beginnings." There is more true nobility in the pride of talent, than there ever can be in the pride of lineage. I wish I could remember verbatim Macqueen's pathetic descant on his native place, whose very bleakness and wildness had charms for him, and whose russet heaths had so often risen before his eyes when he

was divided from all he loved by "half the convex world;" but, as my memory fails me, I will neither garble the matter, nor follow the example of historians by composing a speech for the occasion.

How charmed aunt S- would have been with the road between Carlisle and Glasgow! There is not a pretence at a hill the whole way. It was to me, however, a little disappointing to find that I had got over the border without knowing it. What Lord Byron says of the absence of a marked boundary between Spain and Portugal would be equally applicable here. England blends into the sister country without any interposition of

"Horrid crags, or mountains dark and rall;"

and, whatever may have been the strength of the old Pictish rampart, there is now no "barrier wall" to be seen. This leads one to wonder why it is that, soon after crossing the imaginary border line, one perceives a marked difference in the physiognomy, general appearance, and dialect of the people. The very circumstance of seeing so many weans and lasses padding and tripping about with naked feet, gives one the idea of being in a stranger land. The lower orders do not here, as in Wales, carry their shoes and stockings in their hands, as if in thrifty care of the most luxurious part of their apparel, but seem to discard these articles altogether. I have not even seen a Cumberland clog in wear.

We reached Glasgow by half past two, having accomplished ninety-five miles in nine hours and a half. I asked my fellow-passengers which was the best inn, and my friend of the perennial moon strenuously recommended