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THE EUROPEAN JOURNALS 



147 



Manchester, but the picturesqueness of the toiite ensemble 

 is wonderful. A high castle here, another there, on to a 

 bridge whence one looks at a second city below, here a 

 rugged mountain, and there beautiful public grounds, 

 monuments, the sea, the landscape around, all wonderfully 

 put together indeed ; it would require fifty different views 

 at least to give a true idea, but I will try from day to day 

 to describe what I may see, either in the old or new part 

 of the town. I unpacked my birds and looked at them 

 with pleasure, and yet with a considerable degree of fear 

 that they would never be published. I felt very much 

 alone, and many dark thoughts came across my mind ; I 

 felt one of those terrible attacks of depression to which I 

 so often fall a prey overtaking me, and I forced myself to 

 go out to destroy the painful gloom that I dread at all 

 times, and of which I am sometimes absolutely afraid. 

 After a good walk I returned more at ease, and looked at 

 a pair of stuffed pheasants on a large buffet in my present 

 sitting-room, at the sweetly scented geraniums opposite to 

 them, the black hair-cloth sofa and chairs, the little cherubs 

 on the mantelpiece, the painted landscape on my right 

 hand, and the mirror on my left, in which I saw not only 

 my own face, but such strong resemblance to that of my 

 venerated father that I almost imagined it was he that I 

 saw ; the thoughts of my mother came to me, my sister, my 

 young days, — all was at hand, yet how far away. Ah ! how 

 far is even the last moment, that is never to return again. 

 Edinburgh, October 27, 1826. I visited the market this 

 morning, but to go to it I first crossed the New Town into 

 the Old, over the north bridge, went down many flights of 

 winding steps, and when at the desired spot was positively 

 under the bridge that has been built to save the trouble of 

 descending and mounting from one side of Edinburgh to 

 the other, the city being mostly built on the slopes of 

 two long ranges of high, broken hills. The vegetable mar- 

 ket was well arranged, and looked, as did the sections for 



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