were pleased to think she had escaped from a world, where she, in particular, had so much to suffer, and so little to enjoy. Full of her remembrance, we followed the course of the stream which led to Culachy, the house of her favourite brother. He was not at home; but his pretty little wife welcomed us with a grace and cordiality that made us regret having only a single hour to spend with her. When we emerged from "the valley of vision," and saw Loch Ness from the eminence on which the house stands, I felt as if time had run back; but that was a mere momentary sensation.

I will not tell you how glad my relations at FortAugustus were to see me, or how the villagers flocked about me, to tell all their intervening history. But, finding it vain to hope for solitude and quiet to perform one of my customary acts of recollection, I rose one morning at five, and went round the boundaries of our old domain and the Fort; then crossed the bridge of Oich, and, from the rocks of Inchnacardach, took a wide survey of the lake, then a perfect mirror, and the noble steep of Sigchurman, decked with fantastic wreaths of rolling mist, that changed their form every moment as the sun broke out upon them. I retired towards Inchnacardach, where I mused, undisturbed, till fancy had her fill. I felt like a person transplanted to the poetical shades, who wanders among myrtle groves and Elysian vales in pensive contemplation, and sees the shadowy forms of those beloved in life, and mourned in death, glide silent by him. The sweet recesses, and sequestered scenes, in the vicinity, are become more beautiful than ever. I took a kind of solemn

delight in thus retracing my wonted paths among them; and, you may well believe, fancy peopled them with the shades of the departed. The gentle spirit of poor Mrs. Newmarch was not absent. Her death, or rather her release from life, I could think of with serenity, when I recollected how much she deserved, and how little she obtained in this state of probation.* Her father, the Governor, whom I have so often looked on with indifference, I regarded with unmixed compassion; anything so forlorn and helpless I have not seen. He seemed pleased to see me for her sake, and tried, in trembling accents, to speak of her. My cousins seemed gratified by our visit, and I was glad we made it. I saw several people to whom I wish well, whom I shall probably never see again. Then my mind was so easy with regard to the family, and the little gemini, as Charlotte had the entire charge of them, who is the very best deputy-matron I ever knew. You see I have made the most of this summer, being the first, since I was married, that I was not very particularly engaged at home.

It will refresh you, after all this tragi-pastoral, to hear that Gwynn† is married quite to his mind, and is the happiest of human beings. Though no one had more the habits and notions of a confirmed bachelor, yet, formed only for domestic life, he languished in tasteless apathy, wanting he knew not what, for he was carefully taught to despise matrimony. He has

*This interesting lady died in England soon after the death of her last surviving child.

†The late Captain Mark Gwynn, Commander of the King's galley at Fort-Augustus. His son is now a surgeon there.-(1845.)

got a very good little woman, with an easy temper, and just as much intellect as he would wish for, who loves him, and has brought him a fine child, in which he takes great pleasure. All this fills the void in his heart, and the vacancy in his time that made him. formerly most deplorably listless, though the best hearted creature imaginable. A brother of his wife, who died abroad, has left her a pretty little fortune; so he has, every way, drawn a prize in the lottery of marriage. Good connexions are not wanting, for the lady is one of Mr. Grant's hundred kinswomen, and, consequently, Mark Gwynn is now allied to us. What a privilege!

Now, that I have given you no brief abstract of my summer campaign since I saw you at our assignation at Kenmore, you must needs do justice to my diligence in recording important transactions. Though you should not hear from me for half-a-year to come, these commentaries will bear witness of my unshaken fidelity. In return for these reveries of solitude, you owe me something from the busy haunts of men. Retirement at the Fairlie is a mere pretence; you go to be merry, and at ease, among your intimates, and then call it retiring.

We found all well at home, and the little gemini the finest and most amusing creatures. How lucky for you that I am near the end of my paper, or they might

"Live in description, and look squat in song;"

for squat they both are, this moment, on the floor. But I cannot "paint, ere they change, the Cynthia of

the minute," though you should take an interest in them as the favourite playthings of your affectionate friend, A. G.

LETTER V:

TO MISS OURRY.

My dear Friend,

Laggan, April 2, 1792.

I know it will give you concern to hear that my silence, for most part of this winter, was owing to illness. This, though not dangerous or alarming, was of such a nature as to throw the most oppressive gloom upon my spirits. I am none of those querulous beings who delight in brooding over evils, and oppressing their friends with all that troubles them. That sanguine turn of mind which you early remarked in me, has accompanied me through all the vicissitudes of health and sickness, all the quick shifting scenes of joy and sorrow, that have occupied the intervening period. I have often, as now, waited months for an interval of health and cheerfulness, to visit an absent friend with the breathings of a mind in some degree composed and cheerful.

Since I have set out so hopefully with egotism, I will even give you the detail of my winter's confinement, and have done with it. All my transactions, nay, my very ideas, are so blended and interwoven with the dear branches that sprout and depend from me, that you must extend the toleration of friendship beyond its usual bounds, before you can truly relish

my correspondence. You must not only indulge egotism in the first person, but you must have patience with egotism once removed, and hear me speak of my children as diffusely as I do of myself. Did I ever tell you of another daughter I have, who, though not born to me, is as dear, and has cost me much dearer than any of the rest? This daughter of my affection is called Charlotte Grant; she is nearly related to Mr. Grant, was left motherless in her tenth year, and cruelly treated by a near relation, whose hand,

"Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away

More worth than all his tribe."

The history of her early and uncommon sorrows, from its singularity, is very deserving of a recital, and would do more than amuse you; it would deeply interest and affect you; but it is so complicated, and requires such a detail of minutiæ and delineation of character to make you thoroughly understand it, that I really have not spirits or resolution to enter into the detail at present, and must defer it to sometime when I have more leisure and am capable of more exertion. Suffice it for the present, that, in the sixteenth year of her age, she was separated from her family, and placed by some relations under Mr. Grant's guardianship; that we then brought her to our family, when I had the pleasure to observe, that though in a great measure neglected and uncultivated, she possessed a strength of intellect, a purity of sentiment and rectitude of principle, that afforded the best foundation for the embellishments which instruction might add to the rich gifts of nature. It was evident that this disposition would richly reward the labour of any one who