her glory, dancing, singing, and shrieking like a maniac.

But matters mend towards evening, and when we pause to rest the horses, I dismount and am penning these lines by the side of a hedge. A rippling stream goes murmuring past at no great distance. I could laze and dream here for hours, but prudence urges me on, for we are now, virtually speaking, in an unknown country; our road book ended at Edinburgh, so we know not what is before us.

"On the whole, John," I say, as I reseat myself among the rugs, "how do you like to be a gipsy?" "I'm as happy, sir," replies my gentle Jehu, "as a black man in a barrel of treacle."

GLASGOW AND GRIEF-A PLEASANT MEADOW-THUNDERSTORM AT CHRYSTON-STRANGE EFFECTS-THAT TERRIBLE TWELFTH OF AUGUST-EN ROUTE FOR PERTH AND THE GRAMPIANS.

"O rain! you will but take your flight,

Though you should come again to-morrow,
And bring with you both pain and sorrow;

Though stomach should ache and knees should swell,
I'll nothing speak of you but well;

But only now, for this one day,

Do go, dear rain! do go away."-Coleridge.

N Scotland there are far fewer cosy wee inns with stabling attached to them than there are in England; there is therefore greater difficulty in finding a comfortable place in which to bivouac of a night. In towns there are, of course, hotels in abundance; but if we elected to make use of these, then farewell peace and quiet, and farewell all the romance and charm of a gipsy life.

It was disheartening on arriving at the village of Muirhead to find only a little lassie in charge of the one inn of the place, and to be told there was no

stabling to be had.

And this village was our last hope 'twixt here and Glasgow. But luckily there always has been a sweet little cherub sitting up aloft somewhere who turned the tide in times of troubleluckily a cyclist arrived at the hostelry door. He was naturally polite to me, a brother cyclist.

"Let us ride over to Chryston," he said; "I believe I can get you a place there.

A spin on the tricycle always freshens me up after a long day's drive, and, though I was sorry to leave the poor horses a whole hour on the road, I mounted, and off we tooled. Arrived at the farm where I now lie, we found that Mr. R-- was not at home, he had gone miles away with the cart. But nothing is impossible to the cyclist, and in twenty minutes we had overtaken him, and obtained leave to stable at the farm and draw into his field.

A quiet and delightful meadow it is, quite at the back of the little village of Chryston, and on the brow of a hill overlooking a great range of valley with mountains beyond.

The sky to-night is glorious to behold. In the east a full round moon is struggling through a sea of cumulus clouds. Over yonder the glare of a great furnace lights up a quarter of the sky, the flashing gleams on the clouds reminding one of tropical wild-fire. But the sky is all clear overhead, and in the northern horizon over the mountains is the Aurora Borealis. Strange that after so hot a day we should see those northern lights.

But here comes Hurricane Bob.

Bob says, as plainly as you please, "Come, master, and give me my dinner."

Whether it be on account of the intense heat, or that Hurricane Bob is, like a good Mohammedan, keeping the feast of the Ramadan, I know not, but one thing is certain-he eats nothing 'twixt sunrise and sunset.

Glasgow Glasgow and grief. I now feel the full force of the cruelty that kept my letters back. My cousins, Dr. McLennan and his wife, came by train to Chryston this Saturday forenoon, and together we all rode (seven miles) into Glasgow in the Wanderer. We were very, very happy, but on our arrival at my cousins' house--which I might well call homebehold the copy of a telegram containing news I ought to have had a week before!

My father was dying!

Then I said he must now be gone. How dreadful the thought, and I not to know. He waiting and watching for me, and I never to come!

Next morning I hurried off to Aberdeen. The train goes no farther on Sunday, but I was in time to catch the mail gig that starts from near the very door of my father's house, and returns in the evening.

The mail man knew me well, but during all that weary sixteen-mile drive I never had courage to ask him how the old man my father was. I dreaded the reply.

Arrived at my destination, I sprang from the car and rushed to the house, to find my dear fatherbetter. And some days afterwards-thank God for all

His mercies-I bade him good-bye as he sat by the fire.

No quieter meadow was ever I in than that at Chryston, so I determined to spend a whole week here and write up the arrears of my literary work, which had drifted sadly to leeward. Except the clergyman of the place, and a few of the neighbouring gentry, hardly any one ever came near the Wanderer.

If an author could not work in a place like this, inspired by lovely scenery and sunny weather, inhaling health at every breath, I should pity and despise him.

I never tired of the view from the Wanderer's windows, that wondrous valley, with its fertile farms and its smiling villas, and the great Campsie range of hills beyond. Sometimes those hills were covered with a blue haze, which made them seem very far away; but on other days, days of warmth and sunshine, they stood out clear and close to us; we could see the green on their sides and the brown heath above it, and to the left the top of distant Ben Ledi was often visible.

THUNDERSTORM AT CHRYSTON.

It had been a sultry, cloudy day, but the banks of cumulus looked very unsettled, rolling and tossing about for no apparent reason, for the wind was almost nil.

Early in the afternoon we, from our elevated position, could see the storm brewing-gathering and hickening and darkening all over Glasgow, and to