n the ascent,
as if the Great Architect of nature had intended thereby to secure the
foundation of the superstructure which he was about to rear above. It
then rises into frowning eminences, on which nothing seems to vegetate
except coarse heath, a few stunted whin-bushes, and, here and there,
an _astrogalus_, a _lotus carniculatus_; or a white _orchus_. Those,
however, with the exception of the first, are too scanty to produce
any effect upon the colouring of the landscape; and the whole looks
withered, brown, and, in some instances, even black, in the distance.
But, on passing these barren altitudes, or on penetrating one of the
gorges by which the central district communicates with the country
around, and of which there are several, the eye is saluted with
extensive tracts of plantation--some composed of the light-green
larch, others of the sombre-looking Scottish pine; and, where the soil
is more favourable to the growth of corn, portions of cultivated land,
interspersed with streams, giving a fresher green to their banks,
clumps of trees standing in sheltered positions, and the isolated
habitations of men.

The last of these may be said to constitute a sort of _little world_,
enclosed by a mountain rampart of its own--holding little or no
communication with the great world without; and consequently escaping
all the contamination which such intercourse is supposed to imply.
But, if its inhabitants had escaped the contamination, it were
reasonable to infer that they had missed that stimulus which mind
derives from mind, when brought into close contact; and also many of
those improvements and more correct modes of thinking which almost
every passing year brings forth. In such a region, children must
travel far for education; and men, not unfrequently, live and die in
the prejudices in which they were nursed. To conclude this imperfect
sketch, it may be observed that the scenery of these hills is bleak,
rather than bold; barren, rather than wild; and though some parts of
them possess a sort of dreary interest, in general they can lay no
claim to that quality which has been denominated the _sublime_.

The particular district of Fifeshire in which the following incidents
occurred lies between the villages of Strathmiglo and Auchtermuchty on
the south, and those of Newburgh and Abernethy on the north. From the
last of these places, which is still known as the metropolis of the
ancient Pictish empire, a deep and narrow g