Audubon to Edward Harris
Edinburgh, 14 Sep'., 1838.
My Dear Friend:
Not having heard anything from you in answer to my last, I suppose that you may yet be away from Glasgow, but as we ourselves are going off tomorrow to the "Highlands," with a view to be at Glasgow on Thursday next, I write to you now, with the hope of meeting you then. Nothing of importance has occurred here since my last, but the book has considerably swollen in its progress towards completion.
We all unite in best wishes to you and I remain as ever your most truly attached and sincere friend,
John J. Audubon
We intend being home again on Saturday next.
[Addressed] To Edward Harris Esqr.
Comrie's Royal Hotel,
Glasgow.
With MacGillivray as guide, Audubon and his family visited Stirling, Doun and Callander, where they "marched in a body to the Falls of Bracklin, guided by a rosy-cheeked Highland lassie, stopping now and then by the way to pick up a wild flower,—a blue-bell, a 'gowan,' or a dog-rose, or to listen to the magpies and titmice." From Callander they ascended to Loch Katrine, and explored the Trossachs, "admired by many, chiefly or entirely on account of Scott's description of them"; at the tavern there, said Audubon, "with that most curious innate desire which there is in us of becoming older, for the purpose of enjoying the morrow, I went to rest, anxious to see the morn, and discover what existed beyond the crags that had bounded my view."
From the wild and beautiful scenes about Loch Katrine, which stirred the naturalist's emotions and evoked the desire to remain until the curtain of night had gradually and peacefully closed the landscape from their view, they proceeded to the rocky shores of Loch Lomond, where they found "a few small stone cabins, some fat bairns, abundance of ale, and a sufficiency of capital whisky." After crossing to Tarbet and examining both the head and the foot of the lake, they went on from Balloch to Dumbarton by stage, and thence by steamer to Glasgow; there they spent a few days, and returned to Edinburgh by way of Dumbarton and Lanark. Steamers and coaches, slow as they then were, were all too fast for Audubon on this journey, and he declared that if ever again he visited the Highlands, it should be on foot, "for no man, with nerve and will, and an admirer of the beauties of nature, can ever truly enjoy the pleasures of travelling, unless he proceed in this manner."