who informed us that he owned the best horse anywhere round the Eildon
Hills, and could make the best cast for a salmon, and catch a bigger fish
than anybody,--with other self-laudation of the same kind. The waiter
afterwards told us that he was the son of an Admiral in the neighborhood;
and soon, his horse being brought to the door, we saw him mount and ride
away. He sat on horseback with ease and grace, though I rather suspect,
early as it was, that he was already in his cups. The Scotch seem to me
to get drunk at very unseasonable hours. I have seen more drunken
people here than during all my residence in England, and, generally,
early in the day. Their liquor, so far as I have observed, makes them
good-natured and sociable, imparting a perhaps needed geniality to their
cold natures.

After breakfast we took a drosky, or whatever these fore-and-aft-seated
vehicles are called, and set out for



DRYBURGH ABBEY,


three miles distant. It was a cold though rather bright morning, with a
most shrewd and bitter wind, which blew directly in my face as I sat
beside the driver. An English wind is bad enough, but methinks a Scotch
one, is rather worse; at any rate, I was half frozen, and wished Dryburgh
Abbey in Tophet, where it would have been warmer work to go and see it.
Some of the border hills were striking, especially the Cowden Knowe,
which ascends into a prominent and lofty peak. Such villages as we
passed did not greatly differ from English villages. By and by we came
to the banks of the Tweed, at a point where there is a ferry. A carriage