February  21,  1901. 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
157 
were  occupied  by  tuberous  Begonias,  including  good  plants  of  fine 
varieties.  Other  small  houses  were  taken  up  by  Dracaenas,  Palms,  a 
few  Orchids,  and  odds  and  ends.  The  vineries  aie  mostly  occupied  by 
Vines  rather  past  their  best,  but  the  bunches,  though  small, 
were  good  in  berry  and  all  well  finished.  One  house  of  young  Muscats 
was  making  good  progress,  the  bunch  or  two  each  Vine  carried  being 
nicely  finished  and  the  wood  strong  and  hard. 
The  mansion — a  new  one — is  nearly  two  miles  from  Dunkeld,  and 
perhaps  one  and  a  half  from  the  gardens.  It  stands  close  by  the  river 
ide,  in  a  beautiful  undulating  park — a  noble  pleasure  ground,  ready 
made  all  but  the  approach.  Much,  however,  has  been  done  to  improve 
it  by  Mr.  Fairgrieve  and  his  noble  employer,  which  improvements  have 
since  been  going  on  under  the  careful  supervision  of  Mr.  McGregor,  the 
present  gardener.  An  enormous  amount  of  soil  shifting  and  other  work 
has  been  done,  and  no  expense  spared.  The  place  is  well  worth  the 
study  of  anyone  interested  in  landscape  gardening,  with  its  fine  flowing 
noble  in  proportions  and  architecture,  mellowed  by  the  hand  of  Eld, 
its  lofty  walls  crowned  with  stray  wild  flowers  and  sprays  of  climbers, 
its  roof  the  vault  of  heaven,  its  floor  green  graves  and  mossy  tombstones. 
Such  would  be  an  imposing  pioture  anywhere;  here  beside  the  sweeping 
river,  on  the  green  lawn  with  the  great  trees  round  and  Craigybarns  as 
background,  we  can  imagine  nothing  finer  Had  we  crossed  the  river  by 
a  ferry  boat  about  half  way  from  the  mansion,  we  should  see 
Inver  and  the  house  of  famous  Neil  Gow  the  fiddler  and  “crony”  of 
Burns.  Following  up  the  Braan,  a  tributary  from  G'enqueioh,  we  come 
in  about  half  a  mile  to  the  beautiful  hermitage  perched  on  a  rock  in 
front  of  a  fine  waterfall.  By  means  of  mirrors  the  foaming  water 
seems  reproduced  on  every  side,  and  ever  goes  soaring  upwards  from 
the  ceiling  to  be  gathered  into  a  frothy  pool  high  overhead.  Another 
grass  walk,  called  the  Bishop’s,  leads  from  the  Cathedral  along  the  top 
of  the  Holly  bank  already  mentioned.  It  is  bordered  by  fine  smooth 
trunked  Beeches  and  other  trees,  including  a  few  foreign  Conifers,  and 
DUNKELD  CATHEDRAL. 
curves  and  soft  lines.  All  the  fine  trees  and  other  amenities  of  the 
place  have  been  carefully  preserved.  At  the  east  side  of  the  house 
stands  an  exceedingly  fine  ornament — a  quaint  old  Larch,  with  the 
strangest  great  twisted  rootstock  high  above  grounu  level.  Another 
curiosity  of  a  different  kind  is  not  many  yards  distant — a  large  slab  of 
stone,  with  the  figure  of  a  horse  and  its  rider  clad  in  armour  cut  into 
its  surface  near  the  one  end.  The  work  is  well  prawn,  but  roughly 
cut  ;  the  rider  nearly  obliterated  by  time,  or  perhaps  having  been  less 
deeply  cut.  We  could  glean  nothing  of  its  history.  A  few  geometrical 
beds  close  to  the  house,  and  several  informal  ones  filled^with  shrubs, 
and  annuals  farther  back  oomprise  the  flower  garden. 
A  walk  down  the  waterside  leads  through  the  American  garden,  a 
pleasant  retreat  in  warm  early  summer  or  on  any  fine  day.  A  large 
collection  of  the  usual,  and  some  unusual,  oooupants  of  suoh  a  place 
are  here  quite  at  home.  Then  along  a  green  drive  fringed  by  the 
grandest  of  Soots  Firs  and  other  native  trees,  the  steep  bank  on  the 
left  olothed  with  an  undergrowth  of  the  greenest  of  Holly.  At  the  end 
we  come  to  the  Cathedral,  a  fitting  terminus  to  suoh  a  | promenade, 
ends  near  the  American  garden.  About  half  way  across  the  park 
between  the  gardens  and  Cathedral,  are  two  Horse  Chestnuts,  surely 
the  largest  for  many  a  mile  round.  Looking  over  their  heads  to  the 
left  towers  Craigybaras,  wooded  to  the  crest  with  dark  green  Pine.  A 
legend  tells  that  the  seeds  of  part  of  that  forest  were  shot  up  or  down 
(I  know  not  which)  from  a  cannon’s  mouth.  Whether  true  or  not  we 
cannot  say,  but  only  steeple  jacks  could  sow  it  otherwise. 
Close  to  the  Cathedral  one,  if  not  more,  of  the  first  Larches 
introduced  to  Britain  in  1728,  or  earlier  still,  flourishes  vigorously. 
Tradition  tells  they  were  first  carefully  grown  in  pots  in  a  glass  house, 
but  suoh  coddling  must  have  had  no  injurious  after  effects.  Long  may 
they  wave  their  graceful  boughs  over  the  dust  of  the  wild  Highlanders 
sleeping  beneath  (the  Wolf  of  Badenoch  among  them).  Suoh  are  a  few 
imperfect  notes  on  a  place  on  which  a  volume  could  be  written.  Long  may 
the  noble  proprietor  and  his  three  brave  sons,  who  have  been  fighting 
the  Boers,  enjoy  the  princely  domain  banded  down  by  their  ancestors, 
is  the  wish  of  all  who  know  that  a  courageous  and  loyal  aristocracy 
adds  redoubled  strength  to  a  courageous  and  loyal  people. — 0.  M. 
