SEPTEMBER, 1882. 223 



leaves on the birch, or bronzed bunches on the oaks. 

 Elsewhere the hillsides have been more severely handled, 

 and as we yesterday traversed the shores of Lochiel and 

 the road up Glen Nevis, the sharp winds from the King 

 of Bens had spread a golden hue over the bracken-covered 

 slopes, and everywhere a wealth of gold and bronze on 

 the sward and amid the tree tops evinced the immediate 

 vicinity ot royalty. 



Not a sloe in our district, says one observer, and 

 the hazel nuts are nil. But we shortly come upon 

 a blackthorn-covered bank, and to our delight, in spite 

 of the seasonal dearth of wild fruits, we discover 

 this to be covered with the richest clusters of sloes we 

 remember to have seen. The delicious bloom on the 

 sloe berries, with their rich blue ground, contrasts beauti- 

 fully with the dark-green leaves, not too numerously 

 spread, and the fine, almost black, stems, of the bushes ; 

 so, as we gaze our eye-hunger increases, and a prickly 

 bough is carefully detached and borne to " our special 

 artist," with the request to transfer it as it stands to an 

 imperishable canvas. Once inside the door it still looks 

 lovely, but no longer has it the glory of the hillside, and 

 we soon "accept the situation," and acknowledge that 

 no art can give the surroundings, with the sun playing 

 bo-peep among the bushes, and the young oak-trees 

 nodding overhead, and the lowly brambles underneath 

 (whose coherts are even now " gleaming in purple and 

 gold," like the levelled hosts of the Assyrians). In our 

 hands, also, the treasures of the waning year have been 

 fast accumulating. The seedling birches have yielded 

 delicious lemon-colour leaves without a speck upon them ; 

 the young oaks are liberal with their treasures of delicate 

 bronze, running into a sober yellow ; while before and 



