The villas we saw upon the opposite bank of the Tay looked very pretty—nice home-like places, with their gardens and boat-houses. We voted fair Perth very fair indeed. After luncheon, which was taken in the hotel at Dunkeld, we left our horses to rest and made an excursion of a few miles to the falls, to the place in the Vale of Athol where Millais made the sketch for his celebrated picture called "O'er the hills and far awa'." It is a grand view, and lighted as it then was by glimpses of sunshine through dark masses of cloud, giving many of the rainbow tints upon the heather, it is sure to remain long with us. For thirty miles stretch the vast possessions of the Duke of Athol; over mountain, strath, and glen he is monarch of all the eye can see—a noble heritage. A recent storm is said to have uprooted seventy thousand of his trees in a single night.
The scenery in the neighborhood of Dunkeld is very beautiful. The description of the poet Gray, who visited it in 1766, will do as well to-day. "The road came to the brow of a deep descent; and between two woods of oak we saw, far below us, the Tay come sweeping along at the bottom of a precipice at least a hundred and fifty feet deep, clear as glass, full to the brim, and very rapid in its course. It seemed to issue out of woods thick and tall that rose on either hand, and were overhung by broken rocky crags of vast height. Above them, to the west, the tops of higher mountains appeared, on which the evening clouds reposed. Down by the side of the river, under the thickest shades, is seated the town of Dunkeld. In the midst of it stands a ruined cathedral; the tower and shell of the building still entire. A little beyond it a large house of the Duke of Athole, with its offices and gardens, extends a mile beyond the town: and, as his grounds are intersected by the streets and roads, he has flung arches of communication across them, that add much to the scenery of the place."
Dunkeld Cathedral.
The cathedral, still a noble ruin, stands a little apart from the town, in a grove of fine old trees. It owes its destruction to the Puritans, who sacked it in the sixteenth century, though the order "to purge the kyrk of all kinds of monuments of idolatrye" was directed only against images and altars. But the zeal of men in those days of bigotry was hard to control, and the mob did not desist from its work while a door remained on its hinges or a window was unbroken. Since then tower, nave, and aisles have remained open to sun and storm; the choir alone has been refitted and is now used as the parish church. In the choir is still to be seen the tomb and recumbent statue of the famous Earl of Buchan, better known as the Wolf of Badenoch.
The coachman who drove us to-day interested us by his knowledge of men and things—such a character as could hardly grow except on the heather. He "did not think muckle o' one man owning thirty miles o' land who had done nothing for it." His reply to a question was given with such a pawkie expression that it remains fixed in the memory. "Why do not the people just meet and resolve that they will no longer have kings, princes, dukes or lords, and declare that all men are born equal, as we have done in America?"
"Aye, maan, it would hae to be a strong meeting that!"
That strong was so very strong; but there will be one strong enough some day, for all that. We cannot stand nonsense forever, patient as we are and slow.
Dunkeld is the gateway of the Highlands, and we enter it, singing as we pass upward:
"There are hills beyond Pentland
And streams beyond Forth;