"AULD SCOTIA." 345 



in this estimate, and that no other people are so completely 

 carried away with, or live more in, an ideal world. My 

 first recollections are of sitting on an old nurse's lap 

 under whose fostering care two generations of our family 

 had been nurtured and listening to the tales she told, 

 still vividly remembered. I am satisfied she did not depend 

 on her memory, as the infinite variety of tales, from which 

 she always selected the one most appropriate to the mood 

 of her auditors, was beyond human recollection. Fairies, 

 brownies, goblins, water-kelpies, and all spirits ever sup- 

 posed to have an existence in any element, were at her 

 will ; the dramatis personae of romances that would take 

 the nights of a winter month to bring to a conclusion. 

 There were ghost stories that, in the horrid ghastliness of her 

 minute descriptions, fairly curdled the blood ; legends of 

 castle, town, and lonely cot, and histories of every " ruin- 

 ed wa " in the neighborhood were faithfully recounted ; 

 old battles, in which some ancestor had taken a prominent 

 part, were told so heroically that even the child was a mimic 

 soldier, and felt his heart swell in the hopes of imitating 

 those deeds of high devoir ; love tales, where the suitor 

 went away in poverty, to dwoll in foreign lands, returning 

 rich and distinguished, to find the lassie that had been the 

 magnet which attracted him to conquer every obstacle, 

 some of them seemingly insurmountable was "aye leal" 

 always true 



" ' Away wi' beguiling, cried the youth, smiling, 

 Off went the bonnet, the lintwhite locks flee ; 



The belted plaid fa'ing, her white bosom shawing, 

 Fair stood the loved maid wi' the dark rolling e'e." 



The history of " Auld Scotia," so much like a romance, 

 lost none of the brightness of coloring in her hands. 

 From the time the victorious Romans builfc the celebrated 

 wall to assist in protecting themselves from the valor of 



