RISEN B Y PERSE VERANCE. 



had also determined to try his fortune among the stonecutters 

 of Edinburgh, ' perhaps the most skilful in their profession in 

 the world.' On the fourth day after leaving Cromarty, his 

 vessel was threading the waters of the Firth of Forth. * Many a 

 long-cherished association drew my thoughts to Edinburgh. 

 I was acquainted with Ramsay, and Fergusson, and the 

 *' Humphrey Clinker " of Smollett, and had read a description 

 of the place in the Marmioii and the earlier novels of Scott, 

 and I was not yet too old to feel as if I were approaching a 

 great magical city — like some of those in the Arabian Nights 

 — that was even more intensely poetical than nature itself I 

 did somewhat chide the tantalizing mist, that, like a capricious 

 showman, now raised one corner of its curtain, and anon 

 another, and showed me the place at once very indistinctly, 

 and only by bits at a time ; and yet I know not that I could in 

 reality have seen it to greater advantage, or after a mode more 

 in harmony with my previous conceptions. The water in the 

 harbour was too low during the first hour or two after our 

 arrival to float our vessel, and we remained tacking in the 

 roadstead, watching for the signal from the pier-head, which 

 was to intimate to us when the tide had risen high enough for 

 our admission ; and so I had sufficient time given me to con 

 over the features of the scene, as presented in detail. At one 

 time a flat reach of the New Town came full into view, along 

 which, in the general dimness, the multitudinous chimneys 

 stood up like stacks of corn in a field newly reaped ; at another, 

 the castle loomed out dark in the cloud ; then, as if suspended 

 over the earth, the rugged summit of Arthur's Seat came 

 strongly out, while its base still remained invisible in the 

 wreath ; and anon I caught a glimpse of the distant Pentlands, 

 enveloped by a clear blue sky, and lighted up by the sun. 



