e seen most of the other ruins of the kind in the kingdom. The
French are given to the habit of festooning the monuments and graves
of their relatives and friends with immortelles. Nature has hung
one of hers to Dryburgh Abbey. It is a yew-tree opposite the door
by which you enter the ruins. The year-rings of its trunk register
all the centuries that the stones of the oldest wall have stood
imbedded one upon the other. The tree is still green, putting forth
its leaf in its season. But there is an immortelle hung to these
dark, crumbling walls that shall outlive the greenest trees now
growing on earth. Here, in a little vaulted chapel, or rather a
deep niche in the wall, lie the remains of Sir Walter Scott, his
wife and the brilliant Lockhart. How many thousands of all lands
where the English language is spoken will come and stand here in
mute and pensive communion before the iron gate of this family tomb
and look through the bars upon this group of simply-lettered stones!

From Dryburgh I walked back to Melrose on the east side of the
Tweed. Lost the footpath, and for two hours clambered up and down
the precipitous cliffs that rise high and abrupt from the river. In
many places the zig-zag path was cut into the rock, hardly a foot in
breadth, overhanging a precipice which a person of weak nerves could
hardly face with composure. At last got out of these dark
fastnesses and ascended a range of lofty hills where I found a good
carriage road. This elevation commanded the most magnificent view
that I ever saw in Scotland, excepting, perhaps, the one from
Stirling Castle only for the feature which the Forth supplies. It
was truly beautiful beyond description, and it would be useless for
me to attempt one.

After dinner in Melrose, I resumed my walk northward and came
suddenly upon Abbotsford. Indeed, I should have missed it, had I
not noticed a wooden gate open on the roadside, with some directions
upon it for those wishing to visit the house. As it stands low down
towards the river, and as all the space above it to the road is
covered with trees and shrubbery, it is entirely hidden from view in
that direction. The descent to the house is rather steep and long.
And here it is!--Abbotsford! It is the photograph of Sir Walter
Scott. It is brim full of him and his histories. No author's pen
ever gave such an individuality to a human home. It is all the
coinage of thoughts that have flooded the hemispheres.