THE LIONS OF SCOTLAND.

The 'restoration' mania which now pervades Great Britain, however much it be declaimed against by certain hypercritical architects, is yet certain to have at least one favorable result, in preserving to the future tourist the noblest monuments of the past. The abbeys and castles and tombs of England and Scotland are now so well cared for, that, ruins though they be, they will last for centuries. And yet the observant traveller can note, year by year, little changes, trifling alterations, which, though without great importance, are not destitute of interest; for he who has once visited Melrose, will be interested to learn that even one more stone has fallen from the ruin.

It is intended, in the following pages, to review the present condition, and state the recent changes in the 'Lions of Scotland,' and particularly in the localities with which the memories of Burns and Scott—memories so dear, both to the untravelled and travelled American—are most closely associated. Of the thousands of visitors who yearly flock to do mental homage at the tomb of Shakespeare, one out of every ten is from the United States; and so a large minority of the tourists in Scotland, and particularly of those most deeply interested in Scotland's greatest bards, hail from the New World. The conclusion of the war will probably be the signal for an unusual hegira from America to Europe; and these notes of the actual condition, in A.D. 1863, of Scotland's famed shrines, may serve to whet the increasing appetite for foreign travel.

'Bobby Burns' is buried at Dumfries, a rather dull town, which, fortunately for the tourist, has no notable church or ruin to be visited nolens volens. The place has, however, a Continental air, caused principally by the very curious clock tower in the market place; a quaint spire, in the background, adding to the effect of the architectural picture.

At one end of the town is St. Michael's church—a huge, square box, pierced by windows, and guarded by a big sentinel of a bell tower, surmounted by another quaint spire. The graveyard is one of the oddest in the kingdom, presenting long rows of huge tombstones, twelve or fifteen feet high, usually painted of a muddy cream color, each one serving for an entire family, and recording the trades or professions as well as the names and ages of the deceased. One of these enormous stones is in commemoration of the victims of the cholera in 1832.

In one corner of the cemetery is the tasteless mausoleum of Burns—a circular Grecian temple, the spaces between the pillars glazed, and a low dome, shaped like an inverted washbowl, clapped on top. The interior is occupied by Turnerelli's fine marble group of Burns at the plough, interrupted by the Muse of Poetry. At the foot of this group, and covering the poet's remains, is the freshly painted slab, bearing these inscriptions:

IN MEMORY OF
ROBERT BURNS,
WHO DIED THE 21ST OF JULY, 1796,
IN THE 37TH YEAR OF HIS AGE:
AND
MAXWELL BURNS,
WHO DIED THE 25TH APRIL, 1799,
AGED 2 YEARS AND 9 MONTHS;
FRANCIS WALLACE BURNS,
WHO DIED THE 9TH JULY, 1803,
AGED 14 YEARS—HIS SONS.
THE REMAINS OF BURNS,
REMOVED INTO THE VAULT BELOW
19TH SEPTEMBER, 1815—AND HIS TWO SONS.
ALSO THE REMAINS OF
JEAN ARMOUR,
RELICT OF THE POET,
BORN 6TH FEBRUARY, 1765,
DIED 26TH MARCH, 1834;
AND ROBERT, HIS ELDEST SON,
DIED MAY 14, 1857,
AGED 70 YEARS.

Visitors are allowed to enter the cheerful, if not elegant mausoleum, though all it contains can be seen through the windows. All the memorials of Burns, by the way, seem to be of the same tasteless style—the same wearisome imitation of the antique. The monument at Ayr, and that on Calton Hill, Edinburgh, are but additional examples.

Before leaving Dumfries, let me allude to a very curious custom, observed only in St. Michael's church, and even there beginning to fall into desuetude. The Scotch, who are alike noted for snuff and religious austerity, are equally devoted to footstools. In many families, where economy is the rule, one footstool—they are mere little wooden benches—serves both for the fireside and the kirk. To facilitate transportation, these benches are provided with little holes perforating the centre of the seat, large enough to admit the ferule of an umbrella or cane; and thus, borne aloft on these articles, the little benches are carried proudly above the shoulders of the bearers, like triumphant banners. In order to avoid the noise arising from the clatter of these benches as they are lowered into the pews, the congregation are accustomed to assemble some time before divine service begins.

A similar custom once prevailed in the cathedral at Glasgow. In 1588 the kirk session decided that seats in the church would be a great luxury, and certain ash trees in the churchyard were cut down, and devoted to the then novel purpose; but ungallantly enough, the women of the congregation were forbidden to sit on the new seats, and were ordered to bring stools along with them. Tradition, however, fails to record whether the Glasgow ladies carried their stools on the tops of umbrellas, like their sisters of Dumfries.