The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

THE HEART OF MID-LOTHIAN. 609
three first days, Mrs. Butler thought her sister's manner was completely
contradictory of the desponding tone which pervaded her correspondence.
She was moved to tears, indeed, by the sight of her father's grave, marked
by a modest stone, recording his piety and integrity; but lighter impressions
and associations had also power over her. She amused herself with visiting
the dairy, in which she had so long been assistant, and was so near discovering herself to May Hettly, by betraying her acquaintance with the
celebrated receipt for Dunlop cheese, that she compared herself to Bedreddin Hassan, whom the vizier, his father-in-law, discovered by his superlative skill in composing cream-tarts with pepper in them. But when the
novelty of such avocations ceased to amuse her, she showed to her sister
but too plainly, that the gaudy colouring with which she veiled her unhappiness afforded as little real comfort, as the gay uniform of the soldier when
it is drawn over his mortal wound. There were moods and moments, in
which her despondence seemed to exceed even that which she herself had
described in her letters, and which too well convinced Mrs. Butler how
little her sister's lot, which in appearance was so brilliant, was in reality to
be envied.
There was one source, however, from which Lady Staunton derived a pure
degree of pleasure. Gifted in every particular with a higher degree of
imagination than that of her sister, she was an admirer of the beauties of
nature, a taste which compensates many evils to those who happen to enjoy
it. Here her character of a fine lady stopped short, where she ought to
have
Scream'd at ilk cleugh, and screech'd at ilka how,
As loud as she had seen the worrie-cow.
On the contrary, with the two boys for her guides, she undertook long and
fati'guing walks among the neighbouring mountains, to visit glens, lakes,
waterfalls, or whatever scenes of natural wonder or beauty lay concealed
among their recesses. It is Wordsworth, I think, who, talking of an old
man under difficulties, remarks, with a singular attention to nature,
-- whether it was care that spurr'd him,
God only knows; but to the very last,
He had the lightest foot in Ennerdale.
In the same manner, languid, listless, and unhappy, within doors, at
times even indicating something which approached near t6 contempt of the
homely accommodations of her sister's house, although she instantly endeavoured, by a thousand kindnesses, to atone for such ebullitions of spleen,
Lady Staunton appeared to feel interest and energy while in the open air,
and traversing the mountain landscapes in society with the two boys, whose
ears she delighted with stories of what she had seen in other countries and
what she had to show them at Willingham Manor. And they, on the other
hand, exerted themselves in doing the honours of Dumbartonshire to the
lady who seemed so kind, insomuch that there was scarce a glen in the
neighbouring hills to which they did not introduce her.
Upon one of these excursions, while Reuben was otherwise employed,
David alone acted as Lady Staunton's guide, and promised to show her a
cascade in the hills, grander and higher. than any they had yet visited. It
was a walk of five long miles, and over rough ground, varied, however, and
cheered, by mountain views, and peeps now of the firth and its islands, now
of distant lakes, now of rocks and precipices. The scene itself, too, when
they reached it, amply rewarded the labour of the walk. A single shoot
carried a considerable stream over the face of a black rock, which contrasted strongly in colour with the white foam of the cascade, and, at the
depth of about twenty feet, another rock intercepted the view of the bottom
of the fall. The water, wheeling out far beneath, swept round the crag,
which thus bounded their view, and tumbled down the rocky glen in a
torrent of foam. Those who love nature always desire to penetrate into its
VOL. III.- 39