little to the southward, the larger Cumbray lies out in the water; Fairlie Roads intervening. The hills, covered with fine pasturage, gradually lower as they approach the shore; but in some cases stopping with remarkable abruptness, leaving almost perpendicular declivities, of considerable height. "For a mile from the northern boundary, the uplands form at their base what seems an impregnable bulwark, or perpendicular marine breastwork of rock, rising in some places fifty or sixty feet above the road, and seeming to overhang it. When covered with icicles, and lit up by sunshine, in winter, this huge natural wall is a glorious object—a stupendous cabinet of the richest gems." So says Fullarton, in his Gazetteer of Scotland;' and we can well imagine such an effect under such circumstances.

The remains of old castles abound in the neighbourhood, all of which are worthy of a visit. Between one and three miles of the village stands Kelburn House, a seat of the Earl of Glasgow; behind it is a romantic glen, of great beauty; at the head of which, over a wild and lofty precipice, a stream descends. Winding down a narrow path, it again, at but a short distance from Kelburn House, falls over a precipice fifty feet high.

Brisbane House, a residence of the family of that name, stands to the north of Largs, surrounded by tasteful pleasure-grounds and picturesque scenery.

Southward of Largs there is a large plain, said to have been the scene of the contest of the Scots with the Norwegian invaders. Hereabouts there are numerous vestiges of cairns and tumuli; below which, in all probability, lie the dust of many a

"Norwegian warrior grim,

Savage of heart, and large of limb."

A large quantity of human bones which have been found buried under a large mound overlooking the town seem to justify this conclusion: and there are various other memorials of the battle of Largs.

The battle between the Norwegians and the Scots is the great event recorded in the history of Largs. It is seldom that a story loses anything by répetition; but such has been the case with regard to the conflict in question. Tradition represents the force of the former to have been nearly overwhelming, and their defeat well nigh miraculous. The old writers, too, have recorded the event as sufficiently marvellous; and it was not until the sober pen of the modern historian toned down these patriotic imaginings into something quite common-place and practical, that there existed any doubt of 5,000 Scots having defeated 24,000

Norwegians, and driven them ignominiously from the field. The fact, as stated by Mr. Tytler, is that the force of the Danes did not amount to more than 900 men, while that of the Scots was 1,500; and that the discomfiture of the Danes was increased by the inclemency of the weather, which king Haco attributed to witchcraft. It is as well that such points as these should be put in their true light. The fact is sufficiently honourable to our own countrymen as it stands; and even if it were not so, the character of the country could well sustain the loss; for it would require a tolerable amount of even defeat and discomfiture to deprive Scotland of her reputation as a brave and martial nation.

The appearance of the village is very beautiful. Most of the houses are of a superior order, for the accommodation of visitors-from whom the chief support of the place is derived. Villas are scattered here and there at each end of the village, and also on the neighbouring eminences. The scene at the small quay, overlooked by a fine terrace, is, during the summer months, extremely animated. Nor are baths, and a library, and the usual concomitants of a watering-place, found wanting.

The June Fair on St. Columbus day, vulgarly called 'Colms-day Fair,' has fallen off from its former importance, and is now but a miserable remnant of what it was.

The parish church is a neat building, situated at the northern extremity of the terrace facing the sea. At its northern end there is an aisle, constructed in 1636, by Sir Robert Montgomery of Skelmorlie. Its interior is lofty and imposing. "The roof is embowered or vaulted semicircularly with boarding. It is thrown, by pointed Gothic arches, mouldings, and panels, into forty-one compartments of various forms and dimensions-each of which is adorned, with the pencil, with a religious, moral, emblematical, fanciful, or heraldic subject." The family vault of the Montgomeries is under the aisle. It is covered by a fine old monument.

Past Skelmorlie Castle there is a stream, designated Kelly Burn; which forms the northern extremity both of the parish of Largs and the county of Ayr.

Here, then, we bring our wanderings to a conclusion -contented and in good-humour with our restingplace; and, indeed, it would be difficult to find one less exceptionable than the village and neighbourhood of Largs.

THE northern part of Derbyshire, especially if Dove Dale be added thereto, is a district hardly to be rivalled in England for varied picturesque scenery and general interest. A pleasanter or more instructive summer or autumn ramble could not easily be elsewhere found. There is something to delight and to amuse almost every kind of traveller. The Peak alone, with its wild craggy moors and mountains, the mines and miners, the caverns, and the several striking geological and mineralogical features, would furnish abundant attraction for one fond of exploring the more impressive and uncommon scenes of Nature, and would reward the researches of those curious in the ways of life exhibited in such localities. But then there are also objects which mark the changes in manners and customs, and the advance of refinement and luxury. Old baronial halls are contrasted with modern mansions of surpassing splendour; rude and secluded villages with fashionable watering-places. Scattered over the hill-tops there are for the antiquarian and the leisurely visitant remarkable if not inexplicable Druidic monuments, and other archæological treasures. And then, again, there is some river scenery which must charm the most phlegmatic: many of the dales are of exceeding beauty, to say nothing of the famous valley of the Dove, while almost all are celebrated among Waltonians as 'trouty streams.' Thus, whether the visitor's tastes lead him to prefer secluded or fashionable spots, unsophisticated or trim and cultivated scenery, places which depend on their natural or their acquired charms, their wealth, their antiquity, or their celebrity; whether he go mainly in pursuit of health, or information, or amusement; of the picturesque or of the antique; or whether, like a proper genial rambler, he go resolved to obtain all the good of every kind he can out of every place he visits, he will here find much to occupy his attention, to reward his inquiries, and to furnish pleasing recollections and comparisons for future hours.

MATLOCK.

These various objects may be best looked at in some measure apart. The order in which they will be actually inspected must depend chiefly on the visitor's own convenience. We shall find it most convenient to select two or three central points and make excursions from them. Like most tourists, we may begin with Matlock. By Matlock we of course mean what is more precisely styled by the residents, Matlock Bath : the village of Matlock is about a couple of miles from its more celebrated namesake.

It was not till near the close of the seventeenth century that the medicinal qualities of the waters of Matlock began to attract attention. Previously it was but a rude hamlet, only known for two or three XXIII.-VOL. III.

unimportant mines, which were worked by a few hands. Buxton had long been highly reputed for its warm springs, and was at that time much resorted to in consequence by the gentry of the surrounding country. It might be expected, therefore, from present experience, that the discovery of nearly similar springs at Matlock would have stimulated some enterprising inhabitants of the vicinity to provide suitable accommodation for those who might be led to make trial of the new claimant; but there seems to have been little anxiety felt to induce strangers to visit the neighbourhood. The plentiful lack of accommodation at Matlock was conspicuous even when it had become an established bathing-place. Defoe, describing, in the first quarter of the eighteenth century,* his visit to Matlock, observes that "the bath would be much more frequented than it is, if a sad stony way which leads to it, and no accommodation when you get there, did not hinder." The roads throughout Derbyshire were then very bad; but those leading to Matlock-and there were none through it-appear to have been even worse than ordinary. Soon after this time, however, the ways were mended, comfortable buildings were erected, and from the middle of the last century the improvements have kept pace with the requirements of the constantly increasing visitants. Matlock has long afforded all that even the delicate and the luxurious could require. The hotels and boarding-houses are abundant and satisfactory; the roads are excellent; the railway is within a distance of a few miles; and now a branch line is in process of construction through Matlock.

At first strangers came hither mainly for their health; afterwards as much for the society which the place afforded; still later for the scenery also, and because it was the fashion. Whatever be the causes which now attract and doubtless all these combine-they still come here, and even more numerously than formerly. But the character of the place is not exactly what it was it has changed much as other watering-places have changed the visitants make a shorter stay, and spend their time after another fashion. A generation or two back families stopped here for three or four months at a time, and lived socially while here; they dined much in common, and filled their evenings with social amusements and parties; knew each other, and were pretty much at home. Now each dines apart, and lives apart; and even the social parties are few and frigid. While many who come to drink of the springs, or to bathe, remain for some time, the greater number do little more than pass through Matlock; but the change has not interfered with the prosperity of the place, which is as flourishing as ever it was.

* His 'Tour of Great Britain' was first published in 1724.

The situation of Matlock is very striking; it is, indeed, almost unique among English watering-places. "Matlock Dale," says Mr. Jewitt, in the Matlock Companion,'" is naturally a deep narrow ravine, how produced, or by what convulsion, must be left to geologists to determine. One side is formed by lofty perpendicular limestone rocks, the other by the sloping sides of giant mountains; and along the bottom runs the Derwent, sometimes pent up in a narrow channel, and obstructed by the fragments which have, from time to time, fallen from the beetling Tor, and sometimes spreading like a lucid lake, and reflecting as a mirror the beautiful but softened tints of the overhanging foliage." In this fine valley the little gay village is placed. There is hardly what can be called a street: the houses and shops are gathered irregularly along one side of the road, while on the other the river flows at the base of the steep and lofty hills. Before, behind, and on either hand, are other vast heights, some presenting bare masses of rock, others verdant and thickly wooded, while all the lower slopes are spotted over with neat dwellings. The stranger who is incurious enough not to look out of the conveyance which brings him from the railway, gazes around with no little surprise when he quits the vehicle in the midst of the village. Mr. Rhodes, in his admirable work, entitled Peak Scenery,' has described with sufficient animation the impression which the scene produces on the stranger, when beheld under favourable circumstances, and "in the season's height." The visitor will probably admit its truth; and also agree with the concluding sentence: "A more extraordinary, and, to a stranger, a more unexpected and fascinating scene but rarely occurs. At the time we beheld it, it was a vision of enchantment-a prospect into the fairy regions of romance-where all that can delight the mind and excite admiration, seemed to be assembled together. The stream, as it slowly swept round the wooded hill in the front of the Museum, sparkled with the vivid reflections of the white houses and the lofty trees that adorn its banks: carriages rolling along the road, and well-dressed ladies and gentlemen perambulating the dale in various groups, gave animation to this extraordinary scene. We paused instinctively before we proceeded onward, as if we feared to dissolve the charm, by obtruding ourselves upon it. The unexpected novelty of the scene produced sensations of delight; but the hotels, and all the elegant accommodations of Matlock Bath were soon lost in the contemplations of the hills, rocks, and woods, with which they are surrounded. The objects that at first had both surprised and pleased us, now seemed strangely out of place, and we imagined that this sublime dale would have produced a more imposing effect in a wild and savage state, than thus studded with gardens, lodginghouses, and hotels."

Of that there can be little doubt. Gardens, and lodging-houses, and hotels, are very comfortable things (sometimes); but alas for him who associates thoughts of them with his ideas of sublimity, or, indeed, antici

pates finding the sublime anywhere in the vicinity of a watering-place. Sublimity steadily recedes before the approach of fashion: hardly will it even stand a moment against 'the progress of civilization.' It would be idle to complain of what is in the nature of things. We must acquiesce in the inevitable. Learn, if not to look on that as best which is necessary, at least to make the best of it. Let the visitor, therefore, make the most of the gardens, and terraces, and walks, the hotels, and the museums of Matlock, and he will find it a right pleasant cheerful place for a brief abode, and the scenery around very charming: he will be content to look farther a-field for solitude and sublimity. But he may more reasonably complain that much of what would be else agreeable is trimmed into formality, or decorated into insipidity; and above all, that such provokingly absurd names are appended to the objects which on every side engage attention.

This, indeed, appears to be a fault incidental to all places of public resort, and especially to wateringplaces; but of all watering-places, those of Derbyshire are the most extravagant in their nomenclature. Whether Matlock or Buxton be worst it is hard to say. Here you look up at some rather curious crags, and are told they are the Romantic Rocks :' there you see a tawdry cottage, and observe painted up' Cottage of Contentment.' A little further, no doubt, is 'Love Lodge,' or the 'Home of Happiness.' Leaving the sentimental quarters, you come upon the historical or the classic, and are equally charmed with the aptness of the applications, and the graceful associations which they suggest. The higher grounds above the Baths are the Heights of Abraham:' then there are 'Cupid's Cascade,' 'Venus's Bower,' 'Dido's Cavern,' and an infinity of other elegant' titles. Even a new road must be 'Via Gellia.' Matlock folks are far from thinking that

"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." If it were a thing to be exhibited they would prefer to style it the 'flower of loveliness.' Ask them "What's in a name?" and they would reply, in the words of Ben Jonson's Master Medley, (that is, if they could speak in such rude English)

"Indeed there's a woundy luck in names, Sirs,
And a main mystery."

But some of these places are worth visting, in spite of their names. Of the romance of the Romantic Rocks' you may judge after you have paid your sixpence to their keeper. The Heights of Abraham' may be easily ascended when the door is opened which leads to them ("where 6d. will be politely demanded"); and assuredly there is a very fine view from their summit. The Caverns are curious, though rather disappointing after those of the Peak seen first they are very well. That known as Cumberland Cavern is interesting in a geological point of view. The High Tor Grotto, and the New Speedwell Mine, have rather remarkable stalactites, to which no less remarkable