_outlandish_ place, Malta, where he was
quartered; so she lived and died unmarried. Steam has changed our ideas
of distance since that time.

My uncle's house--the manse--in which I was born, stands in a pretty
garden, bounded by the fine ancient abbey, which, though partially
ruined, still serves as the parish kirk. The garden produced abundance
of common flowers, vegetables, and fruit. Some of the plum and pear
trees were very old, and were said to have been planted by the monks.
Both were excellent in quality, and very productive. The view from both
garden and manse was over the beautiful narrow valley through which the
Jed flows. The precipitous banks of red sandstone are richly clothed
with vegetation, some of the trees ancient and very fine, especially the
magnificent one called the capon tree, and the lofty king of the wood,
remnants of the fine forests which at one time had covered the country.
An inland scene was new to me, and I was never tired of admiring the
tree-crowned scaurs or precipices, where the rich glow of the red
sandstone harmonized so well with the autumnal tints of the foliage.

We often bathed in the pure stream of the Jed. My aunt always went with
us, and was the merriest of the party; we bathed in a pool which was
deep under the high scaur, but sloped gradually from the grassy bank on
the other side. Quiet and transparent as the Jed was, it one day came
down with irresistible fury, red with the debris of the sandstone
scaurs. There had been a thunderstorm in the hills up-stream, and as
soon as the river began to rise, the people came out with pitchforks and
hooks to catch the hayricks, sheaves of corn, drowned pigs, and other
animals that came sweeping past. My cousins and I were standing on the
bridge, but my aunt called us off when the water rose above the arches,
for fear of the bridge giving way. We made expeditions every day;
sometimes we went nutting in the forest; at other times we gathered
mushrooms on the grass parks of Stewartfield, where there was a wood of
picturesque old Scotch firs, inhabited by a colony of rooks. I still
kept the habit of looking out for birds, and had the good fortune to
see a heron, now a rare bird in the valley of the Jed. Some of us went
every day to a spring called the Allerly well, about a quarter of a mile
from the manse, and brought a large jug of its sparkling water for
dinner. The evenings were cheerful; my aunt sang Scotch songs prettily,
and told