n. Steamers run thence to Belfast and Newry, and to Ayr
and Arran and Glasgow.

Let me here remark, as indicating the cultivated character of the
Scotchman, one is surprised at the number of local papers one sees in all
the Scotch towns. They are mostly well written, and have a London
Correspondent. It is beautiful to find how in the Scotch towns there is
still faith left in the London Correspondent. The people swallow him as
they do the Greater and Lesser Catechism, and even the London papers
quote him as with happy audacity he describes the dissensions in the
Cabinet--the hopes and fears of Earl Beaconsfield, the secret purposes of
the garrulous Lord Derby, or the too amiable and communicative Marquis of
Salisbury. When yachting I made a point to buy every Scotch paper I
could, for the express purpose of reading what Our London Correspondent
had got to say. I was both amused and edified. It is said you must go
from home to hear the news. I realised that in Scotland as I had never
done before. On the dull, wet days, when travelling was out of the
question, what a boon was our "Own Special London Correspondent!"

CHAPTER III.
A SUNDAY AT OBAN.

Taking advantage of a fine day, we left Ardrossan, with its coal and
timber ships, early one Saturday, and were soon tossing up and down that
troubled spot known as the Mull of Kintyre. It was a glorious sight, and
one rarely enjoyed by tourists, who make a short cut across a canal, and
lose a great deal in the way of beautiful effects of earth, and sea, and
sky. On our left was the Irish coast, here but fifteen miles across, and
far behind were the dark forms of the mountains of Arran. Islay, famed
for its whisky in modern and for its romantic history in ancient times,
next rises out of the waters. Jura, with its three Paps, as its hills
are called, comes next, and then, in the narrow sound between Jura and
Scarba, there is the terrible whirlpool of Corrybrechan, the noise and
commotion of whose whirling waves are often, writes the local Guide-book,
audible from the steamer. The tradition is, as referred to in Campbell's
"Gertrude of Wyoming," that there a Danish prince, who was foolhardy
enough to cast anchor in it, lost his life. To-day it is silent and at
rest, and it requires some stretch of imagination to believe, as the poet
tells us, that "on the shores of Argyleshire I have often listened with
delight to the sound of the vortex at the distance of