RELICS Oi POPULAR SUPERSTPriONS. 



About twenty years ago, a small party, possessec', by what is 

 now called, the spirit of exploring^ arrived to spend a week at 

 Park-gate — not the celebrated place of embarkation well known 

 to Irish travellers, but an obscure spot chosen for the accommoda- 

 tion of sea-bathers in the West of Scotland. There, this fine name 

 is given to a cluster of white huts on the eastern edge of a broad 

 bay, walled almost round with a natural parapet of rocks, broken 

 here and there into columns linked together by garlands of sea- 

 weed, sometimes tufted round their tops like the most elegant Co- 

 rinthian capitals. Above this parapet rose another wall of moun- 

 tains covered with the dark heath peculiar to Galloway, except 

 where a few branches of gold-blossomed broom hung like tassels 

 among their brown drapery. Through the only chasm among 

 these mountains, might be seen the brilliant expanse of the Irish 

 Channel and the outline of the Enghsh coast, as if sketched with 

 a silver pencil on the edge of the blue sky. In the centre of the 

 bay itself, an isle covered with dwarf trees appeared as if a green 

 pavilion had been raised by magic in a lake of diamonds. Such 

 it seemed in the light of a midsummer sun, as the party of ram- 

 blei^ dismounted from their ponies, and demanded the best room 

 contained in the largest white cottage, distinguished by a slated 

 roof and two stone steps at the door. The party consisted of the 

 Provost of K., a tall, active, mihtary-looking man, with a hunter's 

 bag slung over his shoulder ; the capfain of a trading brig in his 

 service, whose long voyages had stored him with the superstitions 

 of all countries ; and the kirk-minister, whose father, as is not un- 

 usual with the Scotch priesthood, had been in that pastoral walk 

 of life which still retains a few legends of our| own. To these 

 were added the Provost's confidential clerk, or amanuensis, a 

 youth under twenty, who listened with a delighted and believing 

 ear to his patron's favourite romances, which were related with 

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