THE FORTH AND DAMYAT. 115 country. The rock is a greenstone, with so peculiarly lustrous and hard a crystalline fracture, that it has often been used for mill stones. The Ochils furnish a rich field to the geologist and mineralogist. Of the mountain range of the Ochils, the nearest and most picturesque is Damyat, in form more resembling the Highland mountains than its flat-topped neighbours. To one of these, however, very flat and round, called Ben Cleuch, belongs the palm of height-it is 2400 feet above the sea level. The general character of the range is that of a great igneous mound, developing itself in amygdaloid felspar and porphyry, and occasionally in fine pentagonal columns of basaltic greenstone. Its structure used to be well seen to the traveller in the deep romantic valley of Glen Farg, through which the old post road to Perth winded. The clinkstone might there be seen in curved beds; and Professor Nicol enumerates among the minerals obtainable, analcime, mesotype, stilbite, prehnite, and konilite. On the metaliferous character of the range, the same writer says "Some metallic veins are found in these rocks, particularly in the clinkstone. From one in the Woodhill, near Alva, £50,000 or £60,000 worth of silver is said to have been extracted, and it also contained peach-blossom coloured cobalt ore. In the hills near this, not less than fourteen or fifteen veins, containing ores of silver, cobalt, lead, copper, or iron, are known. In the Gloom Hill, near Castle Campbell, a vein was formerly wrought, the ores being lead, copper, and silver, along with heavy spar. Copper has also been found at Blair Logie and Airthrey, in a dark-coloured tufa-the vein at the latter being from four to five feet wide, and, besides the copper, also furnishes ores of lead, cobalt, and silver." The scenery of the Ochils is peculiar, and unlike any other in Scotland. At a distance they look like steep mounds running in a straight line, as uniform as if they were artificially raised and smoothened, and thus seem to be destitute of breaks and variety of scenery. But they are cút by deep clefts, so narrow as not to be visible at a distance, and all the more striking from that characteristic. The sides of these clefts are very steep and precipitous, and the banks, with precipices between, so close that it would seem no great feat to throw a stone across from hill to hill. In the lowest level of these cavities there generally runs a brook on its brawling course, struggling among great boulders fallen from the impending rocks, leaping over stony shelves, or sweeping, scarcely visible, between cliffs which almost overarch it. These glens are silent and uninhabited; indeed, they are too narrow and steep to be dwelt in; yet, as the manufacturing villages of the plain below, such as Tillicoultry, are brought close up to the sudden rise of the hills, for the sake of getting the advantage of the water-power, one is sometimes startled, in these narrow secluded glens, by the distant snort of a steam-engine. STIRLING TO DOLLAR AND CASTLE CAMPBELL. ITINERARY AND DISTANCES. 3 Blairlogie on left. 101 Hervieston House. 12 Dollar. Castle Campbell is about 1 mile from Dollar. The Devon Water runs almost all the way on the right. The old-fashioned, irregular house and estate of Menstrie, was the original possession of the Earl of Stirling, already mentioned; and in the house was born at a much later period (1734), a greater man still, Sir Ralph Abercrombie, the first British general to check the conquering progress of Napoleon; and one who, to the greatest bravery and military skill, united a simple humane heart and honest purposes. Castle Campbell.-This old fortress of the Argyle family looks down on the village of Dollar. (Inn: Campbell's.) To reach the Castle a considerable ascent has to be made. Unless a very toilsome and even dangerous scramble is attempted up the projecting rock on which it stands, it is necessary to keep the upper level of the hill, and to descend on it by the neck of land leading to its projecting cliff. The Castle of Gloom, as it was called of old, is altogether peculiar. Unlike any other Scottish castellated ruin, it resembles more the stronghold of some Italian chief. All around stretches on the hill sides a deep dark forest line, to which Thomson's description in the Castle of Indolence may be applied CASTLE CAMPBELL. Full in the passage of the vale, above, A sable, silent, solemn forest stood; Where nought but shadowy forms was seen to move, And up the hills, on either side, a wood Of blackening pines, aye waving to and fro, 117 The forest coating of the hill sides is broken by a precipitous gulf on either side of the castle, which makes the rock on which it stands a sort of peninsula. At the foot of each is a stream, and the two, meeting in front, rush united to join the Devon. The precipitous descent on either side, amid broken rocks, creeping wild flowers, and the mouldering remains of ancient trees, has its charms for the adventurous scrambler. One very remarkable feature of the rock is a narrow cut into its face, clean and sharp as if it had been just made with a gigantic hatchet. It is called Kemp's score, and tradition says that John Knox made it a place of abode, but with what rational view he can have done so, it is not easy to conceive. The architecture of the castle is almost as remarkable as its site. Part of it has an air of grim strength, but the other portions are light, elegant, and highly decorated. There is a noble hall with ribbed vaulting, where the visitor is sometimes startled when his eye incidentally catches two grim faces cut in stone seeming to glare down upon him. This castle was a possession of the great Argyle family, distant from their semi-regal territories in Argyleshire. It suffered, along with the neighbouring village, for its ownership in the great civil wars; and Montrose, on his way from the north to the field of Kilsyth, attacked and burned it. Perhaps it never was restored as a feudal residence after that time. The Devon rises in the Ochils in the parish of Alva, and directs its course eastwards through Glendovan, till it reaches what is called the Crook of Devon. Here it suddenly turns to the south-west, and flows by Dollar, Tillicoultry, and Alva. Including its windings, it runs a course of about forty miles, although the distance in a straight line from its source to where it empties itself into the Forth is only six miles. Passing up the stream, between two and three miles above Dollar, there is a complete cluster of striking scenes, formed by the Devon cutting its way through the chain of the Ochil hills. To visit these, it is necessary to return to Dollar, and from thence to take the high road westwards to the left; but to the pedestrian, it both saves distance and gives a more interesting journey, to strike off to the right a little beyond the main bridge, and pass by Cowden and Muchart Mill, towards Blair Hill, where he will reach the finest scene of the cluster-the Cauldron Linn. If he prefer keeping the best to the last, he can take the regular road to Rumbling Bridge Inn, as above, and return this way. The Devil's Mill is reached through a footpath among the trees, very close to the edge of the rocks. From a natural basin the water falls here into a cavity below, where it is tossed round with violence and constantly beat up against the sides of the rock. When the water has sufficient force, a sound similar to that made by a mill is heard, and hence the name. The denomination is as probably attributable to a curious propensity for awarding pieces of grand scenery as the peculiar property of the author of evil. He seems to possess something of this kind in every part of the world. It is difficult to classify this phenomenon. It is not properly a waterfall, or properly a rapid, but partakes of both, and of everything else that is confused and noisy and turbulent. The Rumbling Bridge crosses the stream, where it cuts for itself a deep cavernous path through a barrier of the Ochils. Rocks, jet black in their nakedness or white with lichen, or covered with a matting of creeping plants, kept green by the spray; trees, some old and rotting, others in their fresh youth, and at intervals caught here and there deep deep down the white ravings of the furious river-such are the objects seen from the bridge, amid the din of hollow roaring. There are temptations to the adventurous to scramble about here and there to obtain more distinct views of what is going on among all the noise below; but it is nervous work, not fitted for fluctuating heads or unsteady feet. The present bridge, crossed by the road, a goodly stone parapeted arch, is far too steady to deserve the old name of the Rumbling Bridge. That applied to a small narrow arch, without a parapet, which will be seen stuck between the rocks under the expanding arch of the new bridge, as if some one had dropped it into the cleft, and it had stuck there and could not be got out again. It must have been an unpleasant operation to ride or drive across that bridge. The Cauldron Linn is a striking waterfall, and one of the finest in Scotland. At two bounds the river clears its way from the range of the Ochil chain into the vale below. Standing near the edge of the upper fall we look through a narrow opening in the rock sheer into the valley, where the river, snow-white and furious at our feet, as it takes its leap, is seen meandering calm and tranquil, as if it had madly leaped no barriers, and no rocks impeded its dimpled stream. Taking the opposite view, and looking up from the vale below, the white cataract is seen winding its way in indefinite reaches upwards through the black rocks, as if it came from some strange unknown world far behind. The top of the pit above is so narrow that people have been tempted to leap across; distances, however, are deceptive in such places, the senses reel, and footings are slippery. The water has bored many round holes in the black basaltic rock, whence the fall is supposed to have got its name of Cauldron, from the likeness of these holes to great iron cauldrons boiling eternally. One of these, peculiarly large, is at the stage between the two falls, where the water takes an eccentric gyration before taking its second leap. An adven BRIDGE OF ALLAN-DUNBLANE. 119 turous tourist, who attempted the leap at the edge, after being shot down the first fall, was discharged into this cauldron, where his friends above saw him. His position was awfully critical, for the whirling of the waters made the greater part of the contents of the cauldron a sort of quicksand, and there he was gradually settling down beyond human relief. Some one ran to a neighbouring village, and a rope was got at the critical moment, when the water approached close to his lips. Let us now briefly indicate what the tourist may find worthy of a visit along the western declivity of the Ochils. (3) The Bridge of Allan-[Philp's Royal Hotel; Queen's Hotel] -nestles in the sun, behind wooded spurs of the mountain range, which protects it from the north and the east wind-those two terrors of the delicate-lunged in Scotland. This is now the most popular watering-place in Scotland. Its primary attraction is the Airthrey mineral springs, four in number, and with as many divergencies of medicinal character. They were discovered during the working of the Airthrey copper mine. The neighbouring landowners have with wise liberality rendered the place attractive by the free use of their grounds. The river Allan contributes much to the amenity of the place. This water rises in Glen-eagles, on the northern side of the Ochils. It abounds with burn trout and salmon-grilse, and sea trout are also to be had. In the last part of its course it is rapid; its banks steep, and mostly covered with wood. It falls into the Forth a little above Stirling. Airthrey, the seat of Lord Abercromby, and Westerton Park, that of Major Henderson, are contiguous to the village. (51) Dunblane-[Inn: Kinross']-a village picturesquely situated on the banks of the river Allan. It is chiefly remarkable for its cathedral, one of the few specimens of ancient Gothic architecture which escaped the ill-advised fury of the first reformers. It is thus partly used as the parish church, and is in better condition than many of the ecclesiastical remains in Scotland. The nave is in the oldest pointed style, the choir of a period rather later, when mullions were filled into the windows, and decoration was making progress. The tower is evidently the oldest of all, having decided marks of Norman work. Some of the prebends' oaken stalls and other pieces of carved work have been preserved, and there is a recumbent stone effigy of a man in armour, one of the powerful lords of Strathallan. One of the |
