The pyramid of Ben Lomond, buttressed by Ptarmigan Hill, is the presiding shape. But a score of other peaks are huddled behind and around it. Below can be traced the folds of the hills that sheltered Rob Roy, and over against it the glens of the Colquhoun country that witnessed the prowess and revenge of the Wild Macgregors. Loch Lomond, the queen of our northern lakes, with its lovely archipelago of islands, is spread between. Loch Lomond, too, is tributary to the Clyde, and all the waters that tumble through its glens, from Ardlui to Balloch Pier, including the fine stream of the Endrick, which drains the heart of the Lennox, and flows past Buchanan House, the seat of the great family of Montrose, are poured by the Leven past Smollett’s old home of Bonhill, and past the busy manufacturing towns of Alexandria, and Renton, to the foot of Dumbarton Rock.
The prospect commanded by the southern side of the Rock is hardly less grand, and has infinitely more of movement and space and variety. Winding into view from out of its coverts of smoke, and under its shadowing heights, comes the great river which in its westward course here opens up into the dimensions of a firth; and beyond it the fertile plains and valleys, the busy towns and villages, and the bare enclosing hills of Renfrew, are spread out like a map. The deep-water channel of the Clyde is marked not alone by the line of red buoys and beacons, but by the craft of all nations and all sizes, from the dredger to the huge floating palace of the ocean-going passenger steamer, that are continually plying up or down on it.
As the eye travels westward the shores expand and grow dim. But the houses, shipping, and shipbuilding yards of Port Glasgow, and the long line of timber lying off its sea front, are well in view, and beyond them the thicker pall of smoke and the more densely packed masses of dwellings, chimney stalks, and masts that proclaim the whereabouts of Cartsdyke and Greenock.
Photo: Fergus & Sons, Greenock.
GREENOCK.
One has to embark and pass this dingy and crowded side of the birthplace of James Watt—the harbour, the docks, and the shipbuilding yards, the custom house, the steamboat quays, the handsome classic façade and tower of its Municipal Buildings, and the bulk of the many spires and steeples that rise among the masses of houses which climb the hillside—before seeing the fairer and more open face which Greenock presents to those approaching it from the west. Beyond Prince’s Pier stretch wide esplanades, lined with trees, lashed with saltwater, and blown upon by salt breezes; and behind and above these are broad and handsome streets and boulevards, ascending to the steeper sides of the Craig and the Whin Hill, on whose airy heights the town has planted its cemetery, golf course, public park, and water works. Beyond Fort Matilda is the semicircular sweep of Gourock Bay, thronged with yachts and lined with villa residences, which stretch on under the base and round the corner of the headland, crowned by a fragment of Gourock Castle, towards the Cloch Light, the beacon of the inner waters of the Firth.