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and might well have suited for such a scene. As we swept 

 past the imagination conjured it up : the steel-clad 

 knights, with their drooping plumes and long lances, 

 bestriding the snorting war horses ; the galaxy of proud 

 beauties in the grand stand, flashing sunbeams from their 

 eyes on their devoted champions, who were risking 

 life and fame for a smile. We could almost fancy we heard 

 the herald cry and the trumpet sound, and see the rush, 

 the shock, and the rearing horses, and in the background 

 Ancient Fenwick on his nag. Tis a pity the nineteenth 

 century is so practical. A little farther up the river is 

 the Heronry, so called from the number of herons that 

 used to build there. Crows, however, envied the herons 

 their beautiful retreat. They also founded a colony. By de- 

 grees the herons lost ground, got disgusted, and latterly left 

 the spot altogether. A new rival to the crows has appeared 

 in the shape of a detachment of pioneering jackdaws, 

 but whether they will manage to oust the crows remains 

 to be seen. Between the Heronry and Sluie the view is 

 of surpassing loveliness, but it is a beauty which words fail 

 to describe. One must see it, and even then the mind 

 fails to grasp the vastness and magnificence of the 

 scene. On the left bank of the Findhorn there stretches 

 away for miles the trackless and almost primeval forest 

 of Darnaway, where, as described by Wintoun, Ran- 

 dolph, Earl of Moray, baffled the forces of Edward 

 the Third. On the occasion of our visit the tree 

 tops were gilded with a mellow light that failed to 

 pierce the deeper gloom. Downwards the country broad- 

 ened out into plains of deep green, mingled with woods 

 where pine trees bent their graceful heads to the 

 breeze. Farther down the bleak solitary sandhills of 

 Culbin reared their bald ungainly crowns, grinning as if 

 in mocking irony at the paradise around. Farther back 



