30 MEMOIR OF DR. HARVEY. 



study of the natural orders. It is an excellent opening to the 

 root of the subject. 



As to my tour — this is likely to be the most stupid part of my 

 letter, for I hate journals unless they be written in piquant 

 style, to which I have no pretensions. E. D. W. is the best 

 journalizer I wot of. I wrote from Edina of my visits to Hooker 

 and Greville, and that I was to start by Kinross for Arlary, the 

 seat or farm of my excellent friend Arnott, known before only by 

 fame — not even as a correspondent. I found him very pleasant, 

 and most generous of his specimens, and I liked him much. 

 The road to Kinross bleak and dreary — a heavy Scotch rain 

 right in our teeth, which obscured Loch Leven ; but next 

 morning being clear, we saw the castle pretty well — interesting 

 rather from the fate of poor Queen Mary and Scott's " Abbot " 

 than from natural beauty. From Kinross to Glasgow in com- 

 pany with Dr. Wight, an East Indian botanist, who is about to 

 publish on East Indian plants. At Glasgow mounted the coach 

 for Stirling. Arrived at dark, wrote letters till tired, and snored 

 till six in the morning. Climbed the famous Castle Hill, from 

 which we had an extensive and magnificent view. Imagine a 

 vast valley stretching from Stirling to Edinburgh (whose castle 

 is seen on the horizon) bounded by cultivated and planted hills, 

 those in the foreground bold and rocky, with the Forth visible 

 throughout its whole course, forming the most beautiful curves 

 and glittering in the morning sun. I never saw a more ex- 

 quisitely serpentine river — one so beautifully independent of its 

 banks. Verily I could say with the worthy " Bailie," " That is 

 the Forth." But this was not all. In the other direction we 

 had the Highland mountains, Ben Lomond, Ben Ledi, Ben 

 Voirlich, Ben Venu, and many other Bens stretching across 

 half the horizon, thrown out by a foreground of a very quiet 

 and placid character, through which also the Forth could be 

 traced, properly relieved by woods and hills. Shall I go on 

 after leaving Stirling's " tower and town," and entering the 

 Lady of the Lake's country ? Of course it is expected I should 

 write the remainder in verse. Very well. 



Here followed doggerel rhyme. 



