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THE LADIES’ MAGAZINE OF GARDENING. 
and bright, and hung in its proper place. The articles in the cottage are 
in the same order, and I was particularly amused by a pincushion fastened 
against the wall to receive every stray pin. This poor woman was a 
striking lesson to the discontented. She said she had all she could wish 
for, as she knew she would have a comfortable home as long as she lived, 
and she could see from her own door the stone where she should lie when 
she was dead. The walks on the Ochil hills were very fine. 
Keir was the next place we visited, and here we Tound a handsome 
lawn in front of the greenhouse, planted with clipped trees in the old 
style. At this place the dinner-bell is suspended in a large tree. On the 
road we passed through the watering-place called the Bridge of Allan, 
which is evidently in a thriving state, from the number of new houses 
now in progress. Deanston, the residence of Mr. Smith, the inventor of 
the subsoil plough, was the next place we visited; but as we were there 
during a violent thunder-storm, I did not see the grounds. Blair Drum¬ 
mond also I only saw by driving through the park, which is crowded 
with wood. I was much pleased with a tree-guard, of laths wired 
together, which I had often before heard of, but had not before seen 
applied. 
August 9 .—Stirling .—The first place usually visited by strangers at 
Stirling is the Castle, and we accordingly proceeded thither. In the view 
from the esplanade we remarked a curious piece of ground, called the 
King’s Knot, and which is evidently the remains of an old terraced garden, 
with an elevated mound in the centre. On one side of the castle rock are 
some fine walks, planted with trees, with two seats cut in the rock, one 
with the name of the constructor, and the other without any name, but 
bearing the date of 1817* We also saw an old bowling-green, and a very 
curious old garden adjoining the Guildhall at Stirling; the garden having 
two alcove-like seats, and a variety of fantastic figures, cut in holly and 
box. We then went to Messrs. Drummond’s museum, with which I was 
exceedingly delighted. Not only were there an amazing number of agri¬ 
cultural and gardening implements, but a variety of other objects of great 
interest. One of the most ingenious of these was a model of a coal¬ 
mine, by Mr. Peter Mackenzie, of West Plean, formed by nailing some 
laths and boards together, so as to make a long, narrow box, divided into 
compartments by ledges, each division representing a stratum, and being 
filled with a specimen of the real earth or mineral found in a similar 
position in the earth. Nothing could be more easy than to construct similar 
boxes, wherever the strata of a district have been exposed by sinking a 
deep pit, cutting a railway, &c. ; and by forming a collection of these 
models, a student might be enabled to form a clear idea of the geology of 
