CHAPTER I. 



" Oh, Caledonia ! stern and wild, 

 Meet nurse for a poetic child ! 

 Land of brown heath and shaggy wood, 

 Land of the mountain and the flood." 



Lay of the Last Minstrel. 



HAVING exhausted all reasonable endeavours to obtain 

 the companionship of some friend during rny projected 

 tour, I left London and its " season" by the 9 a.m. 

 train from King's-cross on the brilliant sunshiny 

 morning of the 21st May, 1800. My hopes and 

 anticipations of enjoyment were sanguinely cherished ; 

 and if I laboured under any undue apprehensions 

 as to the time that must elapse ere, in my impatience 

 to reach the far North, the intervening distance could 

 be traversed, they were practically annihilated by the 

 ease and velocity with which my train sped along its 

 metal conductors towards its destination, and which, 

 from being comfortably seated in the "coupe," or 



B 



