, some of it well grown, but apt to be of a bushy, northern
profile and poor in foliage; by here and there a little river, Esk or
Leith or Almond, busily journeying in the bottom of its glen; and from
almost every point, by a peep of the sea or the hills. There is no lack
of variety, and yet most of the elements are common to all parts; and
the southern district is alone distinguished by considerable summits and
a wide view.

From Boroughmuirhead, where the Scottish army encamped before Flodden,
the road descends a long hill, at the bottom of which, and just as it is
preparing to mount up on the other side, it passes a toll-bar and issues
at once into the open country. Even as I write these words, they are
becoming antiquated in the progress of events, and the chisels are
tinkling on a new row of houses. The builders have at length adventured
beyond the toll which held them in respect so long, and proceed to
career in these fresh pastures like a herd of colts turned loose. As
Lord Beaconsfield proposed to hang an architect by way of stimulation, a
man, looking on these doomed meads, imagines a similar example to deter
the builders; for it seems as if it must come to an open fight at last
to preserve a corner of green country unbedevilled. And here,
appropriately enough, there stood in old days a crow-haunted gibbet,
with two bodies hanged in chains. I used to be shown, when a child, a
flat stone in the roadway to which the gibbet had been fixed. People of
a willing fancy were persuaded, and sought to persuade others, that this
stone was never dry. And no wonder, they would add, for the two men had
only stolen fourpence between them.

For about two miles the road climbs upwards, a long hot walk in summer
time. You reach the summit at a place where four ways meet, beside the
toll of Fairmilehead. The spot is breezy and agreeable both in name and
aspect. The hills are close by across a valley: Kirk Yetton, with its
long, upright scars visible as far as Fife, and Allermuir the tallest on
this side: with wood and tilled field running high up on their borders,
and haunches all moulded into innumerable glens and shelvings and
variegated with heather and fern. The air comes briskly and sweetly off
the hills, pure from the elevation, and rustically scented by the upland
plants; and even at the toll, you may hear the curlew calling on its
mate. At certain seasons, when the gulls desert their surfy forelands,
the birds of sea and