och
Katrine. We landed, and proceeded--the men on foot and the women on ponies
--through a wild craggy valley, overgrown with low shrubs, to Inversnaid,
on Loch Lomond, where a stream freshly swollen by rains tumbled down a
pretty cascade into the lake. As we descended the steep bank, we saw a man
and woman sitting on the grass weaving baskets; the woman, as we passed,
stopped her work to beg; and the children, chubby and ruddy, came running
after us with "Please give me a penny to buy a scone."

At Iversnaid we embarked in a steamboat which took us to the northern
extremity of the lake, where it narrows into a channel like a river. Here
we stopped to wait the arrival of a coach, and, in the mean time, the
passengers had an hour to wander in the grassy valley of Glenfalloch,
closed in by high mountains. I heard the roar of mountain-streams, and
passing northward, found myself in sight of two torrents, one from the
east, and the other from the west side of the valley, throwing themselves,
foaming and white, from precipice to precipice, till their waters, which
were gathered in the summit of the mountains, reached the meadows, and
stole through the grass to mingle with those of the lake.

The coach at length arrived, and we were again taken on board the steamer,
and conveyed the whole length of Loch Lomond to its southern extremity. We
passed island after island, one of which showed among its thick trees the
remains of a fortress, erected in the days of feudal warfare and robbery,
and another was filled with deer. Towards the southern end of the lake,
the towering mountains, peak beyond peak, which overlook the lake, subside
into hills, between which the stream called Leven-water flows out through
a rich and fertile valley.

Coaches were waiting at Balloch, where we landed, to take us to Dumbarton.
Near the lake we passed a magnificent park, in the midst of which stood a
castle, a veritable castle, a spacious massive building of stone, with a
tower and battlements, on which a flag was flying. "It belongs to a
dry-goods merchant in Glasgow," said the captain of the steamboat, who was
in the coach with us; "and the flag is put up by his boys. The merchants
are getting finer seats than the nobility." I am sorry to say that I have
forgotten both the name of the merchant and that of his castle. He was, as
I was told, a liberal, as well as an opulent man; had built a school-house
in the neighborhood, and being of the Free Chur