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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77259 ***
+
+
+Transcriber’s notes
+
+Changes made are noted at the end of the book.
+
+
+[Illustration: LANDING AT BEN NEVIS.]
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+    THE
+
+    FLORENCE STORIES,
+
+    BY JACOB ABBOTT.
+
+    EXCURSION TO THE ORKNEY ISLANDS.
+
+    NEW YORK:
+    SHELDON & COMPANY,
+    115 NASSAU STREET.
+
+    1861.
+
+
+Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1860, by
+SHELDON & COMPANY,
+In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for the
+Southern District of New York.
+
+
+STEREOTYPED BY
+Smith & McDougal.
+82 & 84 Beekman-st.
+
+PRINTED BY
+C. A. Alvord.
+15 Vandewater-st.
+
+
+ENGRAVINGS.
+
+I. LANDING AT BEN NEVIS      _Frontispiece_
+
+II. CHOOSING THE STATE ROOMS         23
+
+III. VISIT TO THE ORKNEY ISLANDS     97
+
+IV. ON BOARD THE IONA               127
+
+V. CROSSING THE MICKLE FERRY        195
+
+VI. THE BLACK CRAIGS                225
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER                             PAGE
+
+I. Letter from Singapore             11
+
+II. Taking Passage                   15
+
+III. Preparations                    21
+
+IV. The Letter of Credit             36
+
+V. The Embarkation                   51
+
+VI. Life on board Ship               61
+
+VII. Morning in Liverpool            80
+
+VIII. Plans Formed                   87
+
+IX. The Railway Ride                107
+
+X. The Highland Glens               122
+
+XI. Ben Nevis                       135
+
+XII. The Caledonian Canal           153
+
+XIII. The Vitrified Fort            172
+
+XIV. Night Ride by Daylight         188
+
+XV. The Prince Consort              200
+
+XVI. Kirkwall                       212
+
+XVII. The Stones of Stennis         222
+
+XVIII. The Embarkation              234
+
+XIX. Conclusion                     249
+
+
+
+
+THE ORKNEY ISLANDS.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+LETTER FROM SINGAPORE.
+
+
+On one occasion, when Mrs. Morelle went down to New York with Grimkie
+and her two children Florence and John, while her husband was in the
+East Indies, she heard that a letter had arrived from him that very
+day, and that it had just been sent to the post-office in order to be
+conveyed to her at her house up the North River. The letter, she was
+told, came from Singapore.
+
+Singapore is a large English port situated just about half way round
+the world from America, on the way to the East Indies. It is a sort of
+center and rendezvous for all ships navigating those seas, and letters
+go and come to and from it in all directions.
+
+It is often visited, moreover, by ships of war, cruising in those seas.
+
+Grimkie went down to New York with his aunt and cousins, on this
+occasion, because it was holiday at his school at the Chateau. Every
+Saturday was holiday at the Chateau.
+
+His aunt and also his cousins were always very glad to have him go to
+New York with them when they went, but he never left his school to go
+on such excursions, except upon the regular holidays.
+
+Mrs. Morelle would have been very impatient to reach home if she had
+supposed that her husband’s letter would arrive there before she did.
+But she knew very well that the mail from New York did not get in till
+about eight o’clock, and that the letter would not be brought up to
+the Octagon until about half-past eight. She was, therefore, not in
+any special haste to reach the end of the voyage, but amused herself
+talking with the children very quietly and contentedly all the way.
+
+The steamboat arrived between four and five. Grimkie obtained a
+carriage at the pier, and, after assisting Mrs. Morelle and the
+children to get into it, he bade them good-by, and turned his own steps
+toward the Chateau.
+
+At half-past eight o’clock the letter came. Mrs. Morelle, who had been
+watching for the coming of the boy who brought the mail, took the
+letter from him at the door, and went at once into her little room to
+read it. It was as follows:
+
+  Singapore, August 16.
+
+  “My very dear wife:
+
+ “I have just arrived at this port from Calcutta, on my way to Canton,
+ and in consequence of letters which I have received here I find that
+ next summer I shall have occasion to go to London. I hope to reach
+ there about the first of September.
+
+ “Now I have a plan to propose to you, though I do not know what you
+ will think of it. It is no less than this—that you should take the
+ children and come out to England and meet me. I shall be able to spend
+ four or five weeks in England, and then I must return to Canton again.
+ I might come to America in that time to see you, instead of asking you
+ to cross the Atlantic to see me, but if I were to do so, the voyage
+ would occupy nearly all the time that I should have to spare, and thus
+ leave me only a very few days to spend in your company; whereas, if
+ you come to London, I can enjoy the pleasure of being with you and the
+ children a whole month.
+
+ “Besides, I think it might perhaps be agreeable to you, and also
+ improving to the children, to make a little tour in England and
+ France. The facilities for travelling are such now that I think you will have
+ no difficulty in coming out alone. If you approve of this plan, I
+ would recommend to you to cross early in June, and spend a little time
+ in rambling about England before I come. By sending your address to
+ my bankers from time to time, I could come to you immediately on my
+ arrival. Let me know what you think of this plan.
+
+ “The overland mail is just closing, so I can not write any more at
+ this time, I shall, however, write you again very soon, and in the
+ meantime I am your very affectionate husband.”
+
+  James Morelle.
+
+The children came into the room just as their mother had finished
+reading her letter, and so she read it aloud to them. They were very
+much excited at the idea of making a voyage to England, and they asked
+their mother if she thought she would go.
+
+“Yes,” said Mrs. Morelle. “I _rather_ think I shall.”
+
+The children clapped their hands with delight at hearing this answer.
+
+“I wish that Grimkie could go with us,” said Florence.
+
+“So do I,” said John.
+
+“Ah!” responded Mrs. Morelle, shaking her head, “I am afraid that will
+be impossible.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+TAKING PASSAGE.
+
+
+While Mrs. Morelle was reflecting upon the arrangements which she
+should make for her intended voyage, she thought a great deal of the
+suggestion which Florence had made, namely, that she should take
+Grimkie with her.
+
+“I wish I _could_ take him with me,” said she. “He would be a great
+help to me, and a great reliance. He is so capable, and at the same
+time so considerate; besides, he would be a great deal of company for
+the children, and would make the tour not only doubly pleasant, but
+doubly profitable for them.”
+
+But then there was the difficulty of his studies. He was fitting for
+college; and Mrs. Morelle knew very well that his father was always
+extremely unwilling to allow any thing to interfere with his studies in
+school.
+
+At first, Mrs. Morelle thought that this difficulty was insurmountable,
+and that it was wholly out of the question that Grimkie should
+accompany them on the proposed tour. But on reflecting more fully upon
+the subject, she recollected that it was not usually considered well
+for a boy to enter college until he was about sixteen years of age,
+whereas Grimkie was not yet fourteen. She knew also that he was already
+pretty nearly fitted for college, and she thought it possible that his
+father might think that he could now spare a year from his studies as
+well as not. It would undoubtedly be greatly promotive of his health,
+she thought, and of the strength of his constitution, to spend a year
+in travelling, and thus enable him to enter upon his college course
+with more vigor and energy. He might travel with her and the children a
+year, she thought, and still leave a year for school, to complete his
+preparations for the college examination, before it would be time for
+him to be offered.
+
+So she determined to propose the plan to Grimkie’s father, though she
+did it with great doubt and hesitation.
+
+“It will be exactly what I want for him,” said Mr. Jay, when he heard
+the proposal. “I have been quite at a loss to decide what to do with
+him for the two coming years. I thought seriously of sending him to
+some farmer for a year. A boy ought not to be kept at his studies all
+the time, while he is growing.
+
+“But it seems to me, sister,” he added, after a moment’s pause, “that
+you show a great deal of courage in undertaking the charge of three
+such children, in making the tour of Europe. I should think your own
+two children would be charge enough for you.”
+
+“That is just it,” said Mrs. Morelle. “They are too much of a charge,
+and so I want Grimkie to go with us to help me take care of them.”
+
+Mr. Jay made no further objection, and so it was arranged that Grimkie
+should go.
+
+Mr. Jay made it a condition, however, that Grimkie should have all the
+charge of the baggage and of the accounts during the tour, so as to
+learn to do such business properly.
+
+Grimkie was, of course, greatly pleased when he heard of the plan which
+had thus been formed for him, and it was determined that the very next
+Saturday the whole party should go to New York and take passage in the
+Cunard line of steamers. It was necessary for Grimkie to go, for this
+was a part of the business which he was bound to attend to, according
+to the arrangement. Grimkie wished that Mrs. Morelle should go, in
+order that she might choose the staterooms which the party were to
+occupy, and Florence and John must go for the pleasure of being of the
+party.
+
+“Besides,” said Florence, “we want to go on board the ship and see the
+staterooms.”
+
+“Ah! but we are not going on board the ship,” replied Grimkie: “we are
+only going to the office.”
+
+“Then how is mother going to choose the staterooms that we are to
+have,” said Florence, “if she does not see them.”
+
+“She will see a plan of them,” said Grimkie. “They have plans of
+all the ships at the office, with the plans and shapes of all the
+staterooms laid down upon them.”
+
+“Ho!” said John, in a tone of disappointment; “I don’t care any thing
+about seeing a plan. Nevertheless,” he added, after a moment’s pause,
+“I should like to go.”
+
+So it was agreed that they should all go together.
+
+It was necessary to go immediately, too; for the berths and staterooms
+in the Atlantic steamers are usually engaged long beforehand. Mrs.
+Morelle asked Grimkie to inquire which was the best steamer in the
+Cunard line; for as the precise time of their sailing was not material,
+they could go a little sooner or later, for the sake of having one of
+the best ships.
+
+Grimkie accordingly inquired, and he learned that the _Persia_ was the
+largest of the ships, though in other respects they were all nearly
+equally good. Mrs. Morelle accordingly determined to take passage in
+the _Persia_, provided she found that that ship was going at any time
+near the first of June.
+
+Accordingly, on the first Saturday morning after it was concluded that
+Grimkie should go, the whole party set out together to go to New York
+to engage the passages. They went down by the railroad, and arrived at
+the Chambers-street station about ten o’clock.
+
+“This is just right,” said Grimkie. “The office opens at ten, I
+suppose.”
+
+So Grimkie selected a nice looking carriage from among those that were
+standing at the station, and after assisting his aunt and his cousins
+to enter it, and also getting in himself, he directed the coachman to
+drive to the office of the Cunard Company. The office was situated at
+the foot of Broadway, opposite the lower end of the Bowling Green.
+
+They all descended from the carriage, and went up the steps which led
+to the office. On entering it they found a large room, in the front
+part of which was a counter with a desk at one end of it, and on the
+counter were lying one or two immense books containing plans. The books
+were about a yard long, and perhaps two feet wide, and each leaf
+contained a plan. The leaves were very stiff, as if the plans had been
+pasted upon sheets of pasteboard, in order that they might be turned
+over easily, and also to protect them from injury by constant handling.
+
+In the back part of the room were other desks, where several clerks
+were engaged in writing.
+
+Grimkie accosted the clerk who stood at the desk near the counter,
+saying,
+
+“We came, sir, to engage passages in one of your ships.”
+
+The clerk bowed politely to Mrs. Morelle, and after some conversation
+in respect to the time when she wished to sail, and the steamer which
+she preferred, he looked into his books, and found that the _Persia_
+would be coming to America, instead of going to Europe, about the first
+of June; also that the ship which would sail from New York nearest to
+that time, namely, on the 23d of May, was full. All the staterooms were
+engaged. There were, however, some excellent staterooms at liberty in
+the Boston steamer, which sailed on the following week, namely, the
+30th of May.
+
+And here, perhaps, it is necessary to explain that there are two
+branches to the Cunard line of steamers, one of which connects
+Liverpool with Boston, and the other with New York. A ship of each
+line sails alternately from Boston and New York—one week from Boston,
+and the next from New York.
+
+As soon as Grimkie heard that there were good staterooms disengaged in
+the Boston steamer of the 30th of May, his eye brightened up at once,
+and he proposed that they should go that way.
+
+“But that will make us an extra journey from here to Boston,” said Mrs.
+Morelle.
+
+“Yes, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “that is just the thing. We shall have the
+journey to Boston into the bargain, and without paying anything for it,
+for the price is less from Boston, and a good deal more than enough
+less to pay the expenses of going.”
+
+“Yes, mother,” said Florence, “let us go that way.”
+
+“Besides,” said Grimkie, “the Boston steamers touch at Halifax, into
+the bargain.”
+
+“Is that so?” said Mrs. Morelle, turning to the clerk.
+
+“Yes, madam,” said the clerk, smiling; “but I think the passengers do
+not usually consider the touching at Halifax any special advantage in
+favor of the Boston line.”
+
+“Why? Does not the ship stop long enough for them to go on shore?”
+asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“She stops usually two or three hours,” replied the clerk; “and the
+passengers can go ashore, if they please.”
+
+“Then let us go that way, mother,” said Florence.
+
+“We _must_ go that way for aught I see,” said Mrs. Morelle, “if there
+are no staterooms for us in the New York steamers.”
+
+The clerk looked into his books again, and said that there were no two
+continuous staterooms disengaged in the New York steamers until after
+the middle of June. He, however, then opened one of the big books, and
+showed Mrs. Morelle the plan of the _Europa_, which was the Boston
+steamer that was to sail on the 30th, and pointed out upon the plan two
+staterooms lying contiguous to each other, which were disengaged.
+
+One of them was what was called the family stateroom, being nearly
+square in form, with two berths, one over the other, at the end, and
+a settee along the side, upon which a third person might sleep, if
+necessary.
+
+“_I_ could sleep on the sofa, mother,” said John, “just as well as not.”
+
+“Then what should we do with Grimkie,” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+[Illustration: CHOOSING THE STATE ROOMS.]
+
+“We might give the young gentleman a separate berth in another
+stateroom,” said the clerk; “and then you would have only three
+passages to pay for. But in that case,” added the clerk, “you might
+find it more convenient to let the young lady sleep upon the sofa, as
+the upper berth is pretty high, and her brother could climb up to it
+perhaps more easily than she could.”
+
+“_I_ can climb,” said John, eagerly. “I can climb up to the upper
+berth, just as well as not.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle found, on further conversation with the clerk, that if she
+took only a single berth in the second stateroom, the other berth would
+be occupied by some stranger, who might or might not be very agreeable
+company for Grimkie. So she concluded to take two staterooms herself,
+with a view of letting Grimkie and John occupy one of them, while she
+and Florence occupied the other. The clerk accordingly put down her
+name for two staterooms contiguous to each other, one of the large ones
+for herself and Florence, and a smaller one, next to it, for Grimkie
+and John. Mrs. Morelle paid the money and took a receipt, and then the
+whole party left the office and returned to the carriage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+PREPARATIONS.
+
+
+Many weeks intervened between the time when Mrs. Morelle took her
+passage and the day appointed for sailing. During this interval all
+parties were very much occupied with making the various preparations
+necessary for such a tour. Mrs. Morelle bought three trunks all alike
+and of medium size. One of these trunks was for herself, one for
+Florence and John, and one for Grimkie.
+
+These trunks were all of a medium size, that is, about as large as
+could be conveniently handled when full, by one man. Mrs. Morelle had
+learned by former experience in travelling in Europe, that occasions
+would often occur when it was very inconvenient to have a trunk which
+it required two men to lift and carry away.
+
+Besides these trunks Mrs. Morelle bought a sort of valise as large
+as she thought Grimkie could conveniently carry in his hand, which
+contained a set of night dresses and certain toilet conveniences for
+the whole party. This she called the night valise.
+
+“Because you see,” she said in explaining the arrangement to Florence,
+“we are liable sometimes to be separated from our trunks for a night,
+but this valise we can keep with us at all times. Besides we shall
+sometimes wish to make a little excursion off from our main route, to
+be gone only a single night, and then we shall not wish to take our
+trunks with us. In such cases as this the night valise will be very
+convenient. Then it will be just the thing for me to use as a stool to
+put my feet upon in the railway carriages.”
+
+“I don’t see how we can ever get separated from our trunks,” said
+Florence. “They will always go with us in the same train.”
+
+“But accidents happen,” said her mother. “In travelling, we have not
+only to make arrangements for the ordinary course of things, but we
+must also provide for accidents.”
+
+“What kind of accidents?” asked Florence.
+
+“Every kind that you can imagine,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“But tell me of one kind, mother,” said Florence.
+
+“At one time,” replied Mrs. Morelle, “your father and I arrived in
+Liverpool late in the evening. It was eleven o’clock before we got
+through the custom-house. The ship could not go into dock because the
+tide was so low. So we were obliged to go ashore in a tender, which is
+a small steamer somewhat like a Brooklyn ferry-boat, but not half so
+large. It was dark and rainy, and the wind was blowing a heavy gale.
+We had to go down a long black ladder from the steamer to the tender.
+One of the officers of the ship held a lantern at the top, and a sailor
+held one below. We wished to take our trunks with us, but they said we
+could not do that. We must say what hotel we were going to, and they
+would send them there.
+
+“So we told them that we were going to the Waterloo Hotel, and they
+marked all our trunks with a big W in chalk.
+
+“Then we went down the ladder to the tender, and were sent on shore.
+When we landed we took a cab, and drove to the Waterloo Hotel. But we
+found that we could not have rooms there, for the hotel was full. So we
+were obliged to go to another and another. We went to three before we
+could get in.
+
+“It was now about midnight, and we were very tired, and we would have
+liked very much to go to bed. If we had had night dresses with us we
+might have gone to bed at once, and let our trunks remain at the
+Waterloo until morning. But we had nothing of the kind, and so your
+father had to take a cab and go back to the Waterloo and wait there
+till the trunks came, and he did not get to our hotel so that we could
+undress and go to bed till nearly two o’clock.”
+
+“That was curious,” said John, who had been standing by all the time,
+listening to the conversation. “But I don’t understand very well what
+you mean about not getting into the docks.”
+
+“Ah, you’ll find out all about that,” said his mother, “when you get to
+Liverpool.”
+
+“Tell us some more accidents, then, mother,” said John.
+
+“No,” said his mother. “I can not tell you of any more, but you will
+experience plenty of them, you may depend, if we travel about much in
+Europe, before we meet father.”
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+One of the most important things to be arranged in making a tour in
+Europe is the question of funds. We can not take American money with
+us, for American money is not known, and does not circulate in foreign
+countries. We must have for each country which we wish to travel
+through, the kind of money that belongs to that country, except that
+in some cases we can use the money of a neighboring country, when
+it happens to be well known. We can use the principal gold coins of
+England and France, namely, the sovereign and the Napoleon, almost all
+over Europe, for they are almost universally known. With the exception
+of these, we require always the money of the country which we are
+travelling in.
+
+Besides this, even if American money would circulate in foreign
+countries, it would be very inconvenient to take a sufficient quantity
+of it for a long tour, on account of the weight of it. I speak now, of
+course, of real money, that is, of gold or silver coin. Bank bills, as
+doubtless most of the readers of this book are aware, are not in fact
+money, but only the promises of banks to pay money. They pass as money
+in the country where the bank issuing them is situated, because every
+one knows that he can go with them to the bank and get the coin—that
+is, if he thinks the bank is good, and that it will keep its promises.
+But in foreign countries, where of course the banks issuing the bills
+are beyond the reach of the holders, the bills would be good for
+nothing except to sell at a loss to somebody who could send them across
+the Atlantic, and make arrangements for having the coin sent back to
+him.
+
+The arrangements for furnishing travellers with the money they
+require, are made by the great banking houses. The _banking houses_
+must not be confounded with the banks. They are private establishments,
+conducted by men of great wealth. They have branches of their
+establishments in all the great cities and towns in Europe and America,
+and large supplies of money at all of them. At each branch they
+have money of the country where the branch is situated. An American
+traveller going to Europe, can go accordingly to one of these banking
+houses in New York, and make arrangements there to be furnished with
+any amount of money at any of the great towns in Europe, and of such
+kinds as they require, on condition of repaying the value of it in
+American money in New York, as soon as the news of its having been paid
+can come over.
+
+The document which the banker in New York gives to the traveller,
+instructing the branches in Europe to pay him the money he may require,
+is called a letter of credit. A letter of credit may be given for any
+sum of money, and continue in force for any period of time.
+
+There are several precautions and conditions to be attended to in
+making arrangements for a letter of credit. In the first place, the
+banker requires some security that the money which is advanced to the
+traveller in foreign lands, will be promptly repaid to him in America,
+as soon as notice arrives in this country of his having received it.
+This security is given in various ways. Sometimes the traveller knows
+some responsible merchant in New York, who will guarantee that the
+money will be paid. When he does not know any such person, or does not
+wish to ask any person to become surety for him, he can deposit bank
+stock, or railway stock, or bonds, or any other sure and good titles
+to property which he happens to have, and give the banker authority to
+sell them, and pay himself with the proceeds, in case the traveller
+fails to make other provision for the repayment of the money advanced
+to him.
+
+Another precaution which it is necessary to take, is one to prevent any
+other person than the traveller himself from getting any money with
+the letter of credit, in case he should steal it, or in any other way
+get it into his possession. Otherwise, in case the letter should be
+lost, and any dishonest person should find it, or in case it should
+be stolen, the wrongful holder of it might go with it to one of the
+bankers in foreign countries and ask for some money, and thus either
+the banker or the traveller would be robbed.
+
+To prevent this, it is customary for the banker to send specimens of
+the traveller’s hand-writing to all the branches in Europe where the
+traveller thinks he shall wish to draw money. The traveller writes his
+name on several slips of paper, and the banker in New York sends one
+of the slips to each of the branches in Europe, where the traveller
+thinks he may wish to procure money. The clerks at these branches, when
+they receive these slips, which are sent to them by mail, paste them
+into a big book with a great many other slips of the same kind received
+before. Then, when the traveller arrives and calls for his money, they
+write a paper for him to sign, directing the person in New York who
+is to do the business for him there, to pay the amount to the banker
+in New York as soon as the paper reaches him. This paper is called a
+draft. When the traveller has signed the draft, the clerk at the branch
+in Europe takes it to the big book, and compares the signature with the
+one upon the slip of paper which he had received by mail. If he finds
+the hand-writing is the same, then he knows that all is right, and he
+pays the money. If it is not the same, then he knows that the person
+who has called with the letter of credit is not the person he pretends
+to be, and so he sends out at once for a police officer, and has him
+taken into custody.
+
+In respect to the security to be lodged with the banker for the letter
+of credit, Grimkie had nothing to do, the merchants who had charge
+of Mrs. Morelle’s funds having made arrangements for it; but Mr. Jay
+wished that Grimkie should attend to the business of procuring the
+letter himself, in order that he might learn how to do business at a
+banker’s, and he recommended that Mrs. Morelle should go with him, so
+as to see how the business was done, and also to give specimens of her
+signature.
+
+“You might write the specimens at home,” he said, “and send them to
+the banker’s; but I think it is a little better for you to go to
+the office. I could go with you just as well as not, but if you go
+alone you will see how easily the business is done, and you will have
+more confidence and self-possession in going to the banking houses
+in Europe. So I think I had better not go with you, but leave you
+altogether to Grimkie’s care.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle entirely approved this arrangement; and, accordingly, on
+the morning of the day before she was to set out for Boston, she went
+with Grimkie and obtained the letter. It was on Monday that she did
+this. She had left her home on the North River the Saturday before,
+with a view of spending Sunday in New York, and then, after attending
+to this and some other business in New York on Monday, of proceeding
+to Boston on Tuesday, so as to be ready to sail in the steamer on
+Wednesday, that being the appointed day.
+
+How Grimkie succeeded in doing the business at the banker’s, will
+appear in the next chapter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE LETTER OF CREDIT.
+
+
+Persons who are not much accustomed to travelling, or to doing business
+for themselves in strange places, sometimes feel a good deal of
+solicitude when called upon to act in such cases, from not knowing
+beforehand exactly what they are to do. But there is never any occasion
+for such solicitude. It is not at all necessary when you have occasion
+to go to a bank, or to an office of any kind, or to a railway-station
+where a great many different trains are coming and going, that you
+should know beforehand what you are to do when you get there. All that
+is necessary is that you should simply know _what you want_, and that
+you should be able to state it intelligibly. It is the business of the
+clerks, or of the persons in charge of the establishment, whatever it
+may be, to show you how the business is to be done, when you once tell
+them what it is.
+
+It was about eleven o’clock on Monday morning that Grimkie was to set
+out with Mrs. Morelle to go and get the letter of credit. Florence and
+John were to go too, as they did not wish to be left at the hotel, but
+they were to remain in the carriage while Grimkie and his aunt went
+into the office.
+
+Grimkie’s father was at the hotel at the time that they set out.
+
+“Now, Grimkie,” said he, while Mrs. Morelle was putting on her bonnet
+and shawl, “do you know where you are going?”
+
+“Yes, sir,” said Grimkie, “you gave me the address of the banker, and I
+have got it in my pocket.”
+
+“Very good,” said his father.
+
+“And now do you know how to do the business when you get there?”
+
+“No, sir,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Very good again,” said his father. “It is not necessary that you
+should know how to do the business. It is not your duty to know. It is
+the duty of the clerks there to do the business for you. But do you
+know what the business is that you wish to have done?”
+
+“Yes, sir,” said Grimkie. “To get a letter of credit.”
+
+“In whose name?” asked his father.
+
+“Mrs. Jane Morelle’s,” said Grimkie.
+
+“For how much?” asked his father.
+
+“For five hundred pounds,” said Grimkie.
+
+“How long to run?” asked his father.
+
+“For one year,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Very good,” said his father. “That is all you want to know. And
+remember, in all your travels, that if you have any business to do of
+any kind, in any strange place, all that is necessary for you is to
+know distinctly what you want, and to be able to state it intelligibly.
+The people of the establishment will attend to all the rest.”
+
+“Yes, sir,” said Grimkie. “I will remember it.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle, who had been standing before the glass putting on her
+bonnet and shawl during this conversation, listened to it with much
+interest, and she felt great satisfaction and relief in hearing it. She
+had very naturally felt some uneasiness and apprehension in setting out
+upon such a tour, at the thought of being called upon often, as she
+knew she must be, at railway stations, and public offices of various
+kinds, to transact business without knowing at all how the business was
+to be done.
+
+But if all that is necessary in such places, she said to herself, is
+that I should know what I want, and be able to state it intelligibly, I
+think I shall get along very well.
+
+In fact, Grimkie’s father meant what he said much more for Mrs.
+Morelle than for Grimkie. He knew very well that boys of Grimkie’s
+age were not usually very diffident, or distrustful of themselves, in
+regard to the transaction of business of any kind, and that they did
+not usually stand in need of any special encouragement.
+
+When Grimkie entered the banking-house where he was to procure the
+letter, he was at first somewhat abashed by the scene which presented
+itself to view. He saw a very large room with doors opening in various
+directions into other rooms, all full of desks, and clerks, and people
+going and coming. There was a long counter with high desks, surmounted
+by little balustrades rising above it, and open spaces here and there,
+where people were receiving money, or delivering papers, or transacting
+other business. Grimkie was for a moment quite bewildered, but after a
+moment’s hesitation he recalled to mind the instructions which he had
+received, and he went boldly up to the clerk who was nearest to him and
+said,
+
+“I came to see about a letter of credit.”
+
+“Second desk to the right,” said the clerk, pointing with his pen, but
+without raising his eyes from his work.
+
+Grimkie, followed by Mrs. Morelle, went in the direction indicated. The
+desk was a very large and handsome one, and an elderly gentleman of
+very respectable appearance was sitting at it writing a letter. He went
+on with his work, but in a moment, glancing his eye at Grimkie, he said,
+
+“Well, my son?”
+
+“I came to see about a letter of credit,” said Grimkie.
+
+“What name?” asked the gentleman.
+
+“Mrs. Jane Morelle,” replied Grimkie.
+
+“Ah!” said the gentleman, and looking up from his work his eye fell
+upon Mrs. Morelle, whom he now for the first time saw. He immediately
+rose from his seat and offered Mrs. Morelle a chair.
+
+“It is all arranged about your letter of credit,” said he, as he
+resumed his seat, “except to take your signatures. You will only wish
+to draw in London and Paris, I understand?”
+
+“Yes, sir,” said Mrs. Morelle. “Mr. Jay thought that that would be all
+that we should require.”
+
+The gentleman then called to a handsome-looking young clerk who was
+writing at a desk near by, and asked him if he would be kind enough
+to take Mrs. Morelle’s signature. So the clerk conducted her to a
+table at a little distance, near a window, where there were writing
+materials, and asked her to write her name three or four times, at some
+little distance apart, upon a sheet of paper which he gave her. Grimkie
+followed his aunt to the table, and the clerk, after having given the
+directions, went away and left Mrs. Morelle to write at her leisure.
+
+“I’m all in a trepidation,” said Mrs. Morelle, taking the pen, “and it
+won’t be written well.”
+
+“That will be just right, then, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “for you will
+be all in a trepidation when you go to draw the money in the foreign
+cities, and so the writing will be the same.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle smiled, and then proceeded to write her name four times,
+in a column on the left hand side of the paper, each signature being at
+the distance of two inches from the other.
+
+By the time that she had finished writing, the clerk came and took
+the paper. He then said to her that if she would remain seated a few
+minutes, he would bring the letter of credit to her.
+
+Accordingly, in a few minutes he returned, bringing with him a letter
+folded and enclosed in a very strong envelope. Mrs. Morelle took the
+envelope, and then bowing to the clerk, and also to the gentleman at
+the desk, she and Grimkie retired.
+
+As soon as they had returned to the hotel, Grimkie was curious to open
+the letter of credit and read it. He found that it was a handsomely
+printed form, covering one side of a sheet of letter paper, with the
+blanks filled up by a pen. It was as follows:
+
+  “New York, _May 28, 1860_.
+
+  “_Messrs. de Rothschild Brothers, Paris._
+
+  “_Messrs. N. M. Rothschild and Son, London._
+
+  “_Gentlemen_:
+
+ “This letter will be presented to you by _Mrs. Jane Morelle_, in
+ whose favor we beg to open a credit with you collectively, for the
+ sum of £500—_say Five Hundred Pounds_, to which extent be pleased to
+ furnish payments in sums as required, without deduction, and against
+ receipts, inscribing the amounts paid on the reverse of this letter,
+ and reimbursing yourselves in accordance with our letter of advice,
+ transmitting receipts at the same time.
+
+ “(Signed) Yours, most respectfully,
+
+  “_August Belmont and Co._”
+
+ “This credit is in favor for _two years from date_.”
+
+The parts of the letter which are printed in Italics, were in
+manuscript in the original. The rest was the printed form. You will
+observe that the parts which were in manuscript comprise all those
+portions of the letter which would require to be varied for different
+travellers applying for letters, while the printed portion consists of
+what would be the same for all.
+
+Besides the letter of credit, Grimkie’s father recommended to Mrs.
+Morelle to take a considerable supply of English gold with her—as much
+as she could conveniently carry—to use when she first landed; for she
+might desire, he said, to travel about England for a while before going
+to London, which was the first place where her letter of credit could
+be made available.
+
+“Besides,” said he, “it is a little cheaper for you to carry gold. The
+gold which you buy here and take with you, does not cost quite so much
+as that which you obtain there, through your letter of credit; for,
+besides being repaid for the actual value of the gold, the bankers
+require something for themselves, as their profit on the transaction.”
+
+“That’s fair,” said Grimkie. “But then why can’t we take it _all_ in
+gold, and so get it all cheaper?”
+
+“Because then you lose in interest money more than you save,” said
+his father. “Suppose, for example, a person is going to spend three
+thousand dollars in a year, in travelling in Europe—fifteen hundred
+dollars the first six months, and fifteen hundred in the second. Now
+the last fifteen hundred, if he leaves it at home, well invested,
+will bring in, during the first half of the year, say forty or fifty
+dollars, which will much more than pay the banker’s commission. So it
+is better for him to leave it invested, and take it from the banker’s
+when the time comes for using it. And then, besides, the danger of
+being robbed is very much greater in taking a very large sum in gold
+with you. It is best, therefore, for you to rely upon your letter of
+credit, except for what you require at the outset, and that it is well
+to take with you in gold.”
+
+So it was arranged that Grimkie should go with Mrs. Morelle to a money
+broker’s in Wall-street, whose address his father gave him, to get some
+sovereigns.
+
+A money-broker is a man who keeps the different kinds of money of
+all the different foreign nations for sale. Merchants, shipmasters,
+travellers and other persons coming home from foreign parts, are always
+bringing home certain quantities of this money. As it will not pass
+current in this country, they usually take it to a money-broker’s and
+sell it. He pays them for it a little less than its intrinsic value. In
+this way he keeps a supply of all kinds of foreign money constantly on
+hand, and in passing by his office you often see these coins in the
+window for sale, just as you see books in the window of a bookstore,
+or toys in that of a toy-shop, and travellers who wish to visit any
+foreign countries, or persons who wish to send money there for any
+purpose, go to these brokers and buy the kind of money which they
+require—though, of course, they have to pay for it a little _more_
+than its intrinsic value, just as those who brought it into the country
+were obliged to sell it for a little less. The difference is the
+broker’s profit.
+
+The coin which Mrs. Morelle wished to buy was sovereigns. The value of
+the sovereign is a pound. It is divided into twenty shillings, which
+are represented by silver coins of nearly the size of an American
+quarter of a dollar.
+
+The sovereign is a gold coin, nearly as large as an American five
+dollar piece. There is gold enough in a new sovereign fresh from the
+mint, to come to four dollars and eighty-six cents, as determined by
+the assaying officers of the United States. The average amount of gold
+in the sovereigns in circulation is, however, only four dollars and
+eighty-four cents. That is, the new ones have two cents worth of gold
+in them more than the average of those in circulation.
+
+How much you have to pay for sovereigns when you go to buy them at a
+broker’s depends upon how many he has in hand, or expects soon to
+receive, and upon the demand for them. When a great many sovereigns
+are wanted and the supply is not large, of course the price rises, and
+in a reverse of circumstances it falls. Grimkie’s father told him that
+probably he would have to pay four ninety, or four ninety-one for them
+on the day when he went with Mrs. Morelle to purchase them.
+
+If, instead of purchasing sovereigns at the broker’s, the traveller
+obtains them of the banker’s through a letter of credit, they cost him,
+on account of commissions and charges, nearly five dollars apiece.
+American travellers, therefore, generally reckon the sovereigns which
+they expend in Europe in their travels, and in the purchases which they
+make, as so many times five dollars.
+
+On entering the broker’s office, Mrs. Morelle and Grimkie at once
+heard a great chinking of coin, as people were counting it out, either
+paying or receiving it. There was a long counter on one side of the
+room, with clerks behind it, and beyond the clerks, against the wall,
+were shelves, with boxes of coin, and little heaps of coin, some in
+piles, and some in rolls, enveloped in paper. A man, who looked like a
+seafaring man, was standing at the counter in one place, with a bag of
+gold which he had just opened, and he was now pouring out the coin from
+it. It was a bag of doubloons which he had brought from some Spanish
+country. Near by was a young man, who was just counting and putting
+into a bag a quantity of sovereigns which he had been purchasing. There
+were various others at different places along the counter engaged in
+similar transactions.
+
+Mrs. Morelle had concluded to reserve about seventy-five dollars, for
+her expenses in going to Boston, and to invest all the rest of the
+money which she had with her in sovereigns. But Grimkie, who seemed
+to want to get hold of as many sovereigns as possible, said to her as
+they were coming in the carriage toward the office that he thought that
+seventy-five dollars was more than would be necessary to take them to
+Boston. But she said that possibly some accident might happen which
+would lead to extra expense, and it was always best to have enough.
+
+“And then if I have anything left over,” said she, “we can purchase
+sovereigns with it in Boston, the morning before we sail.”
+
+Accordingly Grimkie, holding in his hands eight bills of a hundred
+dollars each, went with Mrs. Morelle to a vacant place at the counter,
+and said that he wished to buy some sovereigns, and asked the price.
+
+“How many will you want?” asked the clerk.
+
+“About a hundred and sixty,” said Grimkie. He had previously made a
+calculation that he could have rather more than a hundred and sixty for
+the eight hundred dollars.
+
+“I have got eight hundred dollars here,” said Grimkie, “which I wish to
+change into sovereigns.”
+
+“We can let you have them for four ninety,” said the clerk.
+
+Then taking a little slip of paper and a pencil he made a calculation,
+and presently said,
+
+“You can have a hundred and sixty-three sovereigns, and a little over,
+for the eight hundred dollars.”
+
+“How much will one hundred and sixty-five cost?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+The clerk, after figuring a little more on his paper, said that they
+would come to eight hundred and eight dollars and fifty cents exactly.
+
+“Then let us take a hundred and sixty-five,” said Mrs. Morelle, “and I
+will pay the eight dollars fifty.”
+
+So Mrs. Morelle took eight dollars and fifty cents from her purse, and
+put it with the eight hundred dollars, and Grimkie gave the whole to
+the clerk. He counted it and put it away, and then proceeded to count
+out the sovereigns, laying them in piles, as he counted them, of fifty
+each.
+
+“Would you like a bag to put them in?” asked the clerk.
+
+Grimkie said he would like one very much.
+
+So the clerk gave him a small, brown linen bag, large enough to contain
+the coin. While Grimkie was putting the money into the bag, it occurred
+to him that perhaps it would be well to have a little English silver.
+
+“We shall also have need of a little change, Auntie,” said he, “when we
+first land, for the porters or the cabmen.”
+
+“I can give you silver for one of the sovereigns,” said the clerk, “if
+you wish.”
+
+So Grimkie gave back one of the sovereigns to the clerk, and the clerk
+in lieu of it counted out twenty silver coins not quite so large as a
+quarter of a dollar. He left them on the counter for Grimkie to count
+over after him, and began to attend to another customer.
+
+“That’s right, Auntie,” said Grimkie: “twenty is right. Twelve pence
+make a shilling; twenty shillings make a pound.”
+
+Grimkie wrapped up the twenty shillings in a piece of paper, and put
+them into the mouth of his bag, and then putting the bag in his pocket,
+he assisted Mrs. Morelle into the carriage, and after getting in
+himself, he ordered the coachman to drive to the hotel.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE EMBARKATION.
+
+
+On Tuesday morning, when Mrs. Morelle and her party arrived at Boston,
+they learned from an advertisement in the newspaper that they must be
+on board the next morning at eight o’clock, as the steamer was to sail
+at nine.
+
+“I am glad of that,” said Grimkie; “for now the sooner we are off the
+better. Only,” he added, after a moment’s pause, “we shall not have a
+chance to change the rest of our money.”
+
+“True,” said Mrs. Morelle; “and I think I shall have nearly forty
+dollars over, after I have paid the bill at the hotel.”
+
+“That would get us eight sovereigns more,” said Grimkie.
+
+“I don’t know what I shall do with that money,” said Mrs. Morelle. “It
+is in bank bills, which will be of no use in England, and it will make
+me considerable trouble to carry them with me all the time of my tour.”
+
+“Perhaps we might get five-dollar gold pieces with the money here at
+the hotel,” said Grimkie, “and that would be much better than to carry
+the bills, for we can sell the gold pieces in Liverpool to the brokers
+there, for nearly as much as they are worth.”
+
+“That will be the best thing that we can do,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+So Grimkie took the money and went to the bar of the hotel, and the
+barkeeper said he could change it into gold just as well as not. He
+accordingly gave Grimkie eight half-eagles, and Grimkie, after wrapping
+them up carefully in a paper by themselves, put them into the top
+of his money bag, with the rest of the coin, and then put the whole
+carefully away in his aunt’s trunk.
+
+The next morning, at half-past seven, a coach which Grimkie had ordered
+the night before, came to the private door of the Tremont House, in
+Tremont Place, and took the whole party in, with their luggage, and
+conveyed them to East Boston, where the steamer was lying.
+
+As soon as they arrived upon the pier, they found themselves in the
+midst of a scene of great bustle and excitement.
+
+Carriages were arriving in rapid succession, bringing passengers to the
+ship. Piles of trunks and carpet-bags were lying upon the pier, and a
+line of sailorlike-looking men were engaged in taking them on board.
+As soon as Grimkie’s baggage—for from this time he called it all his,
+since he had now the exclusive charge of it—was set down, Grimkie paid
+the fare, and the coachman, mounting upon the box, wheeled his carriage
+round, and drove away. Very soon one of the porters from the ship came
+and took up one of the trunks to carry it on board.
+
+“Johnnie,” said Grimkie, “you go with Aunt and Florence on board, after
+this man, and see where he puts this trunk, and then come back here.
+I’ll stay in the meantime, and watch the rest.”
+
+So John led the way in following the porter over the plank, while
+his mother and Florence followed _him_. As soon as he got on board,
+he saw the porter put down the trunk in a sort of open space in the
+middle of the deck, with a great many others, and in a moment afterward
+several more were piled up upon it and around it, so that it rapidly
+disappeared from view.
+
+John found a place near by where Mrs. Morelle could stand, a little out
+of the way of the crowd, and then immediately hastened back over the
+plank to where he had left Grimkie on the pier.
+
+“Grimkie,” said he, “they have covered our trunk all up with fifty
+others, and I don’t see how we shall ever get it again.”
+
+“Never mind,” said Grimkie; “we’ll wait and see how the other
+passengers get theirs.”
+
+Just at this moment some porters came and took up the two remaining
+trunks, and heaving them up upon their shoulders, began to walk with
+them on board. Grimkie and John followed, bringing with them the valise
+and several other similar things. When they arrived on board they saw
+the two trunks deposited with the other baggage, and where they soon
+began rapidly to disappear from view.
+
+“Now,” said Grimkie, “we will go down and put the valise in our
+state-room.”
+
+The deck and all the passages leading below, were crowded with people
+going and coming. A large proportion of these people were friends of
+the passengers, who had come to accompany them on board, in order to
+see the ship and the staterooms which their friends were to occupy.
+Grimkie led the way through this crowd, working forward slowly, as well
+as he could, and followed by the rest of his party. Indeed there were
+two lines of people moving in contrary directions, and Grimkie supposed
+that by following the one that was going on, he should sooner or later
+find his way below.
+
+He was right in this calculation. He was soon conducted to a door which
+led into a narrow but very elegant passage-way. In the middle of this
+passage-way was a door to the right, leading into a magnificent saloon,
+with a walk up and down the middle of it, and rows of long tables on
+each side. The aspect of this room was very brilliant, but Grimkie had
+only time to glance at it, for opposite to it, on the other side of
+the passage-way were three other openings, the center one opening into
+a most spacious and elegant china closet, and each of the two side
+ones leading down a flight of winding stairs, with very bright brass
+hand-rails on the sides to take hold of in descending.
+
+On reaching the foot of the stair-case, the party entered a bewildering
+mass of passages and open spaces, all elegantly finished, with highly
+polished woods, and handsomely carpeted, and lighted moreover with
+strangely placed sky-lights and panes of glass placed in rows near
+the ceiling. Grimkie thought that he knew from the plan exactly where
+to look for his aunt’s state-room, but he found himself completely
+bewildered and lost. There were various state-room doors opening all
+around him. He went into one or two of them and looked at the numbers
+inscribed upon the berths, but they were not the right ones.
+
+At length he met a very respectable middle aged woman, who seemed to
+belong on board. She was in fact the stewardess. Grimkie asked her if
+she would show him state-room number twenty-three and twenty-four.
+
+“Ah yes,” said she, “with a great deal of pleasure. This is it. It is
+one of the three best staterooms in the ship.”
+
+Grimkie stood back and allowed his aunt to go into the state-room
+first, and then the other children and finally he himself, followed.
+
+The state-room was in size like what in a house on land would be called
+a large closet, being about seven feet wide and eight feet long. Across
+the end of it, and against the side of the ship, were two berths one
+above another, with pretty curtains before them, and a space underneath
+the lowermost berth, where trunks might be placed. Along one of the
+sides there extended a wide settee, covered with a haircloth cushion,
+and on the other side two wash-stands in the two corners, with a short
+and narrow seat, also covered with a haircloth cushion, between them.
+There was a looking-glass over the settee, and various little shelves,
+with ledges upon the outer edge of them, to prevent the things from
+rolling off in a heavy sea. There were also sundry large brass pins for
+hanging cloaks and dresses upon, and brass rings projecting from the
+walls in the corners to put tumblers into.
+
+Opening into the upper berth was a small, round window, deep set in the
+thickness of the ship’s side, and there was also a very thick piece
+of glass, of prismatic shape, set in the deck above, making a sort of
+window there, six inches by three. Over the door, too, and extending
+along the whole of that side of the state-room, was a row of panes of
+glass, which admitted light from the passage-way, and from other panes
+set in mysterious recesses above.
+
+Mrs. Morelle as soon as she had entered the state-room, drew back the
+curtain of the lower berth, and laid her shawl and her parasol upon the
+bed, while Grimkie placed the valise under the little seat between the
+two wash-stands.
+
+Mrs. Morelle then sat down upon the settee and looked around to take a
+survey of the place, and then at the sky-light above. At the same time
+she drew a long breath and said,
+
+“Ah me! This is rather a small cell to be shut up in as a prisoner fur
+two weeks.”
+
+“Oh mother!” exclaimed Florence, “we shall not be shut up here. We can
+go about all over the ship.”
+
+“You children will do that,” said Mrs. Morelle, “but I shall be shut up
+here. I shall be sick.”
+
+“But mother you will not be sick all the voyage,” said Florence.
+
+“Perhaps not,” said she. “I am sure I shall not be very sick, all the
+voyage. After a day or two I shall be only comfortably sick, and you
+will all be perfectly well I am quite sure, and can run about wherever
+you please.”
+
+Then rising from her seat she said,
+
+“But I need not begin my imprisonment yet. Let us go up on deck and see
+the people come on board.”
+
+So they all left the state-room, and making their way through the
+crowd as well as they could, they went up to the upper deck, where
+they found a great number of ladies and gentlemen assembled in various
+groups—some standing and others sitting upon settees and camp-stools,
+while the pier, which was here in full view, was crowded with other
+parties coming and going, and with porters bringing more trunks and
+baggage on board.
+
+Grimkie found seats for his party, and they all sat down. They remained
+in these places an hour, amusing themselves with the extraordinary
+spectacle which was exhibiting itself around them. As the time drew
+nigh for the sailing of the ship, the excitement of the scene was
+increased by the steam which having now been raised in the boilers to
+its full tension, and not yet being allowed to expend its energies in
+turning the paddles, made its escape through the waste-pipe with a
+thundering roar which made it almost impossible for the friends who
+were taking leave of each other to hear the parting word. From time to
+time the bell was rung, loud and rapidly, to warn those who were only
+on board as visitors to go on shore. A long and crowded procession of
+these visitors poured over the bridge to the pier, and when all were
+gone the bridge itself was raised, and hoisted to the shore, by a
+vast tackle and fall. The noise of the steam now suddenly ceased. The
+hawsers at the bow and at the stern were cast off, the paddle-wheels
+commenced their motion, and the ship began slowly to move away from the
+pier. A moment afterward two guns were fired one after another from the
+bows of the ship, with a deafening sound. The passengers standing along
+the hand-railing of the upper deck waved their hats and handkerchiefs
+to their friends who thronged the pier, and who waved their hats and
+handkerchiefs in return. Many of them were in tears. Mrs. Morelle
+herself might have experienced some misgivings and have felt a little
+homesick and sad, at parting thus from her native land, and setting
+out upon so long a voyage with only three children, as it were, for
+her companions,—but she was going to meet her husband; and when a
+wife is going to meet a husband that she loves, or a mother to her
+son, she rarely experiences any misgiving. Her heart reposes with so
+much confidence and hope, upon the end of her journey, that she seldom
+shrinks very much from any thing to be encountered on the way.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+LIFE ON BOARD SHIP.
+
+
+The party enjoyed a very excellent opportunity, as the ship sailed
+down the harbor, of viewing the scenery of the shores, and of seeing
+the other ships, steamers and sail-boats, that were going in various
+directions to and fro. While Mrs. Morelle remained at this seat,
+Grimkie and John went to take a walk about the ship to see what they
+could see. There was no difficulty now in going where they pleased,
+for since the visitors had left the ship and none but the regular
+passengers remained, there was ample room for all.
+
+Accordingly, Grimkie and John took a long ramble all about the ship.
+They looked down into the engine-room, and there, at a vast depth below
+the deck, they saw half-naked stokers shoveling coal into the furnace.
+They walked along by the ranges of offices which extended on each side
+of the main deck through the whole middle portion of the ship, like
+two little streets of shops in a town. They saw the cow—a monstrous
+one—shut up in a pen, with the sides of it covered with carpeting and
+well padded, like the back of a sofa, to prevent the cow from being
+hurt when thrown against them by the rolling of the ship in a storm.
+They went into the saloon and were much struck with the brilliancy
+and magnificence of it. There was one arrangement which particularly
+attracted their attention. This was a row of hanging shelves extending
+up and down the room over the tables. These shelves were made of some
+highly polished wood and were so ornamented with brass mountings that
+they made quite an elegant appearance. They were all loaded, too, with
+cut-glass and silver-ware—such as decanters, tumblers, wine-glasses
+of different colors, castors, and silver spoons,—which added greatly
+to the brilliance of the effect. The shelves were double, or, as one
+might say, two stories high, the upper story of each having holes and
+openings in it of various forms, suited to the various articles which
+they were to contain. In these openings of the upper board the various
+vessels were placed, while the bottoms of them rested on the lower
+board. Each one had thus its own little nest, where it could rest in
+safety, no matter how much the ship might pitch or roll.
+
+Grimkie found that cards were pinned along the sides of the table to
+mark the places where the different passengers were to sit, and there
+were also in the saloon two or three gentlemen who had cards in their
+hands, and were looking out for vacant places to put them.
+
+“Ah, yes!” said Grimkie, “we must choose our places at the tables.
+Father told me about this and I have got the cards in my pocket all
+ready. I came very near forgetting it.”
+
+So he took out the cards and one of the stewards who was there, helped
+him to choose good places. After he had pinned the cards to the
+table-cloth, opposite the seats which they were intended to secure,
+he and John went up to the upper deck again to where Mrs. Morelle and
+Florence were sitting. Mrs. Morelle asked John how he liked the ship.
+
+He liked it very well he said. Every thing was complete and secure. The
+chairs and tables were all screwed down to the floor, and there were
+nests for all the tumblers, and a sofa for the cow.
+
+The ship was now gradually getting out of the harbor, and coming upon
+the open sea where she met with a gentle swell over which she rose
+and fell in a manner very graceful and charming to the eye, but very
+bewildering and dizzying in its effects upon the brain. Mrs. Morelle
+and Florence soon went below, where, with the help of Mrs. McGregor,
+the stewardess, who was extremely kind and attentive to them, they
+undressed themselves and went to bed. Mrs. Morelle got into the lower
+berth, but as Florence felt a little afraid to climb up into the upper
+one, Mrs. McGregor made a bed for her upon the settee, where she could
+lie very comfortably.
+
+Grimkie and John remained up and about the decks all that day. At times
+they felt sick and uncomfortable, but they were so much excited by the
+new and strange scenes which continually attracted their attention that
+they were extremely unwilling to go to their state-room. From time
+to time they paid Mrs. Morelle and Florence a visit, but they found
+them lying silent and motionless, and very little inclined to talk.
+At twelve o’clock there was a grand luncheon in the dining saloon,
+with nearly all the passengers at the tables. At four a still grander
+dinner, though the places of the ladies were generally vacant.
+
+The ship’s bells tolled the hours regularly through the afternoon
+and evening watches, and at eight o’clock both Grimkie and John were
+very ready to go to bed. Grimkie allowed John to have the lower berth
+because it was so much easier to get into. There was no real difficulty
+however in respect to the upper berth, for Mrs. McGregor, when the
+boys were ready to go to bed, brought in a very nice step-ladder with
+iron hooks at the upper end of it to hook into the edge of the berth.
+She hooked the ladder on the berth and planted the lower end of it upon
+the floor, and then went away, saying that the ladder could remain
+there all night.
+
+“It is a very nice ladder,” said John, “and it must be easy going up.
+But I never saw a ladder with hooks in it before. A ladder will stand
+steady enough without hooks.”
+
+“On _land_ it would,” said Grimkie. “But at sea, when the ship is
+rolling heavily in a gale of wind, the ladder must have claws to hold
+on by.”
+
+“I hope we shall have a good gale of wind,” said John, after a brief
+pause. “I want to see if I can go up that ladder in it.”
+
+John was however evidently not much inclined to talk. He undressed
+himself in silence and crept into his berth. Grimkie also mounted the
+ladder and climbed over from the top of it into his. After covering
+himself up with the bed clothes and getting as well settled as was
+possible in so hard and narrow a bed, he extended his head over the
+edge of his berth so as to look down toward John’s berth below, and
+said,
+
+“Johnnie, are you comfortable?”
+
+“Yes,” said John.
+
+“Are you sleepy?” said Grimkie.
+
+“No,” said John, “but I am sick.”
+
+“Never mind,” said Grimkie. “Say your prayers to yourself, and then
+shut up your eyes and go to sleep, and forget all about it.”
+
+For several days after this time the condition of our party of
+travelers was quite forlorn. Grimkie himself, in fulfillment of a
+positive resolution which he had made, clambered down from his berth,
+and went up to the saloon to all his meals, though frequently without
+being able to eat any thing when he got there. On these occasions
+he always went into Mrs. Morelle’s state-room, to see how his aunt
+and Florence were. He found them generally lying in their beds,
+Mrs. Morelle in the berth, and Florence upon the settee, silent and
+motionless, and not at all inclined to conversation. His aunt opened
+her eyes and smiled faintly when he came in and usually asked him some
+questions about the progress of the ship. The weather was cold, rainy
+and foggy, and although the air was in itself tolerably calm, the
+motion of the ship through the water produced a raw and chilly wind
+across the decks, which made it impossible to remain there long without
+extreme discomfort.
+
+On the second night out, about eight o’clock, the engine stopped.
+Grimkie, who was always ready at a moment’s notice to go into his
+aunt’s stateroom whenever she knocked upon the partition to call him,
+or there was any other occasion for going in to see her, and who for
+this purpose undressed very little during all the first part of the
+voyage, immediately climbed down from his berth, and slipping on a
+great coat which he kept always at hand, in lieu of a dressing gown, he
+opened his aunt’s door.
+
+The moment that he opened it, Mrs. Morelle raised her head suddenly,
+and asked him in a tone of alarm, what was the matter.
+
+“I don’t think any thing at all is the matter, Auntie,” said he. “They
+are always stopping the engine on these voyages—to tighten up a screw
+or something or other.”
+
+“But Grimkie,” said she, “I wish you would go and see if you can not
+find out what is the matter. I am afraid that something has happened.”
+
+There was, indeed, something almost awful in the solemn stillness which
+reigned throughout the ship, now that the engine had ceased its motion,
+and the ship lay rocking upon the waves as if powerless and helpless.
+Grimkie immediately left the stateroom in order to go upon deck, and
+Mrs. Morelle’s alarm was very much increased a moment after he had
+gone, by a burst of steam from the steam-pipe, which suddenly began to
+be heard, occasioned by the letting off of the surplus steam, which, as
+it could now no longer be employed in driving the paddle-wheels, it was
+necessary to allow to escape into the atmosphere.
+
+A moment after this sound began to be heard however, Mrs. McGregor came
+into the cabin, to say to Mrs. Morelle, that she must not be alarmed at
+the stopping of the engine, for there was nothing the matter.
+
+“They have only stopped to sound,” said she. “You see we are drawing
+nigh to Halifax, and it is very thick and dark, and they can not see
+the land. So they have to sound and go on cautiously. We shall go on
+again presently.”
+
+So saying Mrs. McGregor went away in order to convey the same relief
+and reassurance to the ladies in the other staterooms.
+
+Grimkie went up on deck, but he could see nothing. The night was dark,
+and a heavy mist mingled with rain, was driving along the decks. He
+could hear the voices of some of the sailors occasionally, talking in
+ordinary tunes, in the forward part of the vessel, and now and then a
+command given by an officer, but otherwise all was still.
+
+Grimkie returned to the stateroom, and there found how much his aunt
+had been relieved by having learned that they had stopped the ship to
+sound.
+
+“I was sure there could not be anything the matter,” said Grimkie.
+“So you must shut your eyes, Auntie, and go to sleep, and not pay any
+attention after this to any thing you hear. There are ever so many
+things going on in such a ship, and when any thing unusual happens we
+must not mind it. Whenever there is any danger—or at least whenever
+there is any thing for us to do, Mrs. McGregor will be sure to come and
+tell us.”
+
+“That is true,” said Mrs. Morelle, “and I will try not to be afraid
+again.”
+
+“But if you _should be_ afraid at any time, Auntie,” continued Grimkie,
+“just knock at the head of your berth and I shall hear.”
+
+So saying Grimkie bade his aunt good night and went back to his
+stateroom. As for John he heard nothing of all this, having slept
+soundly through the whole.
+
+The steamer was soon put in motion again, but in the course of an
+hour she stopped anew. Grimkie was asleep, but the stopping wakened
+him. He knew it was not midnight by the stateroom light which was
+still burning. There was a little three-cornered box partitioned off
+in a corner between the two staterooms, with a door opening into
+the passage-way, and ground glass sides toward the staterooms. Into
+this box a lighted candle was placed by a steward standing in the
+passage-way, every evening, as soon as it was dark, and this gave a dim
+and indistinct light in the two staterooms adjoining it, through the
+ground glass panes. This was all the light for the staterooms that was
+allowed.
+
+Moreover, as this light was put out at midnight, it afforded the
+passengers the means of knowing, when they awoke in the night, whether
+it was before or after midnight, by observing whether their light had
+gone out or was still burning.
+
+Grimkie was awakened from his sleep by the stopping of the engine the
+second time, and he remained awake long enough to observe that his
+light was still burning. He, however, soon fell asleep again.
+
+He awoke after this several times during the night and found the ship
+sometimes at rest, and sometimes in motion. On one of these occasions
+he heard a great sound of trampling upon the deck, as of persons going
+to and fro, and a sort of thumping, such as would be occasioned by the
+moving heavy boxes about upon deck. He determined to go up and see what
+was the matter.
+
+So he climbed down from his berth, put on his great coat, his
+overshoes, and his cap, and went up to the deck. He saw lights, and the
+dim forms of many men were going to and fro forward and on the side of
+the ship a long range of black masses which looked so strange that they
+quite bewildered him. The wind blew, and the mist and rain were driven
+into his face so as almost to blind him. As he stood at the head of the
+stairs looking out, a passenger came by to go in.
+
+“What is it?” asked Grimkie.
+
+“Halifax,” said the passenger. “I’m thankful that we have got in at
+last. We lost five hours beating about outside in the fog before we
+could get in.”
+
+Grimkie was determined to see Halifax, so he went out upon the main
+deck and thence along to the foot of a narrow winding stair which led
+up to the upper deck, and thence forward to the great funnel where he
+thought he could find a little shelter. He saw some lights glancing
+about upon the pier, and the dark and indistinct forms of men moving to
+and fro, and a range of black spectral looking roofs extending along
+the shore. But it was so cold, and the mist and rain were driven so
+furiously into his face by the wind, that he was glad to go below,
+saying to himself as he went,
+
+“We may have better luck perhaps when we come back, and get to Halifax
+in the day time.”
+
+When he awoke the next time he knew by the jar, and by the rocking
+motion of the ship, that they were not only on their way again, but
+were once more out upon the open sea.
+
+Everything went on much in this way for a day or two longer. It was
+cold and wet upon the decks, and dreary and silent below. The horizon
+in every direction was obscured by fogs and mists, and the decks were
+kept always wet by driving rains which were continually sweeping over
+the sea. Grimkie went up regularly to his meals, but he was glad to
+come back again as soon as possible to his berth, and the rest of
+the party kept their berths all the time. Mrs. McGregor brought them
+soup, and porridge, and tea and toast, and other things, at regular
+intervals, but often they were taken away again, scarcely touched, and
+during the intervals of these visits Mrs. Morelle and Florence remained
+in their berths, sometimes hour after hour without speaking a word.
+
+The only amusement which they had was to listen for the sound of the
+ship’s bells as they tolled the slow progress of the hours, and to
+hear the news which Grimkie brought in to them from time to time, in
+respect to the progress of the voyage.
+
+During a great portion of this time Mrs. Morelle was kept in a constant
+state of uneasiness, by the blowing of a monstrous steam trumpet
+which was attached to the engine, and which was sounded every two or
+three minutes, when the fog was too thick ahead to allow them to see
+whether any vessels were in the way. The intention in blowing this
+trumpet is, that if there should be any such vessels in the line of the
+steamer’s advance, they may hear the sound and blow horns or fire guns
+in response, and then the steamer might be turned to one side to avoid
+them.
+
+This blowing of the steam trumpet in a fog, is an example of the
+extreme caution and care which marks the whole management of the Cunard
+steamers, and which inspires the public with so great a degree of
+confidence in them. Many steamers in such cases push boldly on, without
+making any signals, trusting to the chance of not meeting anything by
+the way. I once heard the captain of a steamer say, when we were going
+on through a dense fog, on the Atlantic, without taking any of these
+precautions, that there was about as little chance of a steamer’s
+coming into collision with another vessel when pursuing her way upon
+the ocean, as there would be of hitting a bird by firing a gun at
+random into the air.
+
+There is, however, something rather trying to the nerves of timid lady
+passengers, in hearing the unearthly scream of this awful trumpet sound
+its note of alarm, at regular intervals at midnight, while they lie
+sick, miserable and helpless in their berths. When for a time the sound
+ceases, indicating that the horizon has become so cleared ahead that
+the lookout-men can see, their hearts revive within them, only to sink
+again however when a few minutes later perhaps, or perhaps a few hours,
+the frightful sound is heard again, sending its screaming note of alarm
+far and wide over the sea.
+
+In a day or two after leaving Halifax, the ship came upon the banks
+of Newfoundland, a vast area of foggy and stormy sea, the darkest,
+dreariest and most dangerous portion of the Atlantic. Indeed upon these
+banks almost all conceivable dangers of the sea seem to congregate.
+The water is shallow upon the banks and that brings fish, and the fish
+bring fishermen in immense numbers, and the steamers in dark and foggy
+nights and days are in constant danger of running foul of them. The
+gulf stream brings a vast quantity of comparatively warm water here
+from the Gulf of Mexico and the tropics, while at the same time the
+winds and currents from Baffin’s bay float down immense fields and
+mountains of ice, which chill the air and produce fogs, mists, rains
+and driving storms.
+
+The steamer was two or three days in crossing the banks, and during
+almost all this time she was enveloped in thick misty rains, which
+kept the decks continually wet, and covered the surface of the sea in
+every direction, concealing the fishing vessels, and the icebergs, and
+all other dangers entirely from view. The trumpet was kept continually
+blowing, by which means it was probable that fishermen might be
+warned,—but the greatest danger was from icebergs, for which, of
+course, no warning could be of any avail.
+
+At length, on Monday evening, Mrs. McGregor comforted all the ladies,
+by saying, that the next morning the ship would be off the banks, and
+that then in all probability they would find good weather. This proved
+to be the case. Grimkie went up to the deck before breakfast, and he
+found instead of thick mists and rain covering the whole surface of the
+water, only a stratum of clouds in the sky, while the horizon was open
+and clear in every direction around. Mrs. Morelle and Florence too, had
+now become somewhat accustomed to the motion of the ship, and their
+appetites began to return. And when at length, about the middle of the
+forenoon, a sun-beam made its appearance in the little prismatic piece
+of glass which was set in the ceiling of the stateroom, overhead, they
+began to feel quite cheerful and happy. The same effect was produced
+in many other staterooms, occupied by ladies. They began to feel as if
+they could get up and dress themselves, so as to eat their dinners in a
+somewhat civilized manner.
+
+Things improved after this every day. The ladies of the different
+staterooms began to become somewhat acquainted with each other through
+Mrs. McGregor, who informed them of each other’s condition, and
+conveyed messages of politeness and good will to and fro. There were
+a number of children too, who played in the passages, and thus became
+acquainted with each other, and were brought in by each other to visit
+their mothers still lying perhaps upon their settees or in their berths.
+
+Mrs. Morelle became so well acquainted with one of her neighbors who
+occupied the stateroom opposite to hers, across the passage-way, one
+which was quite small and confined, that she often invited her to
+come and dine with her. Sometimes Florence was of the party too, but
+generally from this time Florence preferred to go up to the great
+saloon, and take dinner there with Grimkie and John. In such cases
+she would come after leaving the table and look in at her mother’s
+stateroom, where she usually found her mother and her visitor enjoying
+themselves very well indeed, with nice beef-steaks, fried potatoes, and
+tumblers of iced lemonade.
+
+After this time every thing went on smoothly and prosperously till the
+end of the voyage. After leaving the banks there are no special dangers
+to be apprehended by a Cunard ship, in crossing the Atlantic, and every
+body on board was now in good spirits, looking forward with great
+pleasure to the approaching termination of the voyage.
+
+At length, on Saturday afternoon, about four o’clock, news came down
+to the ladies in the staterooms that land was in sight. The land first
+seen consisted of certain high mountains in the vicinity of the town of
+Killarney, in the southwestern part of Ireland. A few hours later the
+ship passed Cape Clear, which is the southernmost point of Ireland, and
+then bearing a little to the northward followed the coast toward the
+Cove of Cork, where she was to touch in order to land passengers and
+mails.
+
+She reached this place between eight and nine o’clock. A tender
+came off from Queenstown, which is a town situated at the mouth of
+the harbor, to take the mails and the passengers that were to be
+landed here. The other passengers, who were to go on with the ship
+to Liverpool, and who were now all in excellent spirits as they
+considered their voyage substantially over, established themselves upon
+camp-stools and settees upon the upper deck, watching the operation of
+putting the mails on board the tender, or looking upon the green shores
+of Ireland, which as the sun had but just gone down, were brightly
+illuminated by the golden radiance of the western sky.
+
+The passengers all seemed to feel a peculiar pleasure in thus
+approaching the land again; and they watched the shores, until, as it
+grew dark, one after another they went below for the night. Grimkie and
+John remained some time after Mrs. Morelle and Florence had retired.
+
+The next day being Sunday, divine service was held in the saloon, and
+though the ship was out of sight of land for a large part of the day,
+the ladies were nearly all well enough, not only to attend service
+in the saloon, but also to sit upon the upper deck nearly all the
+afternoon, to watch for the reappearance of the land, and to talk about
+what they were to do after their arrival. As for Mrs. Morelle she had
+concluded to postpone forming any definite plan in respect to her
+tour, until she was safe on shore.
+
+The children, who had become acquainted on the voyage, finding they
+were so soon to bid good-by to their new friends, made various projects
+of excursions together, in case they should meet each other in the
+course of their travels.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+MORNING IN LIVERPOOL.
+
+
+Most heartily glad were Mrs. Morelle and Florence to set foot once more
+upon dry land. Grimkie and John, though on the whole well pleased to
+arrive at the end of the voyage, had, nevertheless, found so much to
+amuse them, and to occupy their minds, on board the ship, especially
+during the last few days, that they had not been at all impatient to
+reach the shore. Immediately on landing they all got into a cab and
+drove to the Waterloo Hotel, where rooms had been ordered for them
+beforehand by Mr. Jay, who had written to Liverpool for that purpose,
+the week before the _Europa_ sailed.
+
+They found the rooms all ready for them,—a parlor and two bed-rooms.
+The parlor was on the front of the house, and looked out upon the
+street. The bed-rooms were in the rear. One of the bed-rooms was for
+Mrs. Morelle and Florence, and the other for Grimkie and John.
+
+Of course they all went to bed early. They found it inexpressibly
+delightful to have a good wide and soft bed to get into, and to go
+to sleep without being rocked, though Mrs. Morelle and Florence still
+continued to feel the rocking motion of the ship whenever they shut
+their eyes.
+
+In an English hotel the usages are entirely different from those
+which prevail in America. There are no stated hours for meals, and no
+public room except one for gentlemen. In an American hotel there is
+no objection to a little bustle and life. Indeed one of the charms
+of traveling in America is the pleasure of witnessing the bustle and
+life of the hotels. In England, on the other hand, the hotels are kept
+as still and quiet as possible. The idea is, especially when a lady
+arrives at one, to make it as much as possible like her own private
+house. Often the landlord, the landlady, the porter, the waiter and
+the chambermaid, meet her at the door when she comes, and receive her
+just as if they were her own private servants, and the house was her
+own private house. The porter receives and takes care of the baggage,
+the landlady conducts the guests to their parlor, and from the parlor
+the chambermaid presently shows the way to her chambers. The lady
+establishes herself in these rooms just as if she were at home. She has
+all her meals with her own party, in her own room, ordering just what
+she likes, and fixing the hours to suit her own convenience. The fact
+that there may be other parties in the hotel, living in the same way,
+is kept as much as possible out of view. Thus it happens that a lady is
+sometimes several days at a hotel, and one of her best friends is there
+too all the time, living in another wing or in rooms approached by some
+other passage-way, while she knows nothing about it.
+
+Of course there was a great deal to be done that evening before the
+members of our party were ready to go to bed, but when finally bed-time
+arrived, Mrs. Morelle said that she should not wish to have breakfast
+very early the next morning, but the children might get up, she added,
+as early as they pleased, and if they wished, go out and take a walk.
+
+“Only you must be back by a quarter to nine,” said she, “for I intend
+to have breakfast at nine. And Florence,” she added, “if you are up in
+time, I should like to have you order it.”
+
+“How shall I order it, mother?” asked Florence.
+
+“When you go out into the parlor you will find the table already set.
+The waiters always set all the tables in the different parlors early in
+the morning, when they arrange the rooms. You must then ring the bell
+and the waiter will come. Tell him that your mother will have breakfast
+at nine o’clock, and also tell him what you will have.”
+
+“And what shall we have mother?” asked Florence.
+
+“You may have whatever you please,” said Mrs. Morelle, “only I should
+like a fried sole for one thing.”
+
+The sole is a remarkably fine fish, in some sense peculiar to England.
+It is particularly nice when fried, and the Americans generally count
+a great deal upon having one for breakfast on the morning after they
+arrive in Liverpool from a voyage across the Atlantic.
+
+Liverpool lies so far to the north, that the sun, in the middle of
+June, rises very early,—between three and four o’clock—and it is
+quite light at half past two. Grimkie was deceived by this very early
+dawn, and he got up about three o’clock on the following morning, and
+began to dress himself, but happening to look at his watch he saw how
+early it was, and so he went to bed again.
+
+When he next awoke, it was half past six. So he determined to get up.
+John got up too. They both dressed themselves and went out into the
+parlor, but they found that the shutters were not open.
+
+“John,” said Grimkie, “the waiters are all asleep. We will go out and
+take a walk and come back again by and by.”
+
+So the two boys passed down stairs and went out into the streets. There
+were milk carts and other such things going about, but the shops were
+all shut, and there were no signs of opening them.
+
+“John,” said Grimkie, “the shopmen are all asleep too, and there is
+nothing to see here—but let us go down to the landing. We shall find
+somebody awake there you may depend.”
+
+Now there is something very curious at Liverpool in respect to the
+arrangements made for the shipping, something that is especially well
+calculated to interest such boys as Grimkie and John, and that is the
+system of docks and landings. The tide rises and falls so much that
+the ordinary system of fixed piers for vessels to lie at, and rise and
+fall with the tide, will not answer. Accordingly there have been built
+a range of immense docks, extending along the shore for many miles. The
+ships go into these docks through vast gates which are opened at high
+tide, when of course the river and the docks are both full. Then the
+gates are shut to keep the water in, and thus although the tide in the
+river may go down very low, the ships within the docks, are kept afloat
+all the time—the water there being kept up by the resistance of the
+gates, which are made of immense size and strength, in order to enable
+them to sustain the pressure.
+
+Thus in sailing up the river opposite to Liverpool the voyager sees
+nothing for miles along the shore but a lofty wall, of prodigious size
+interrupted here and there by towers, gateways, and other curious
+structures—and beyond it a forest of masts and steamboat funnels,
+rising above it, in countless thousands. The wall is the outer line of
+the docks, and the masts and funnels seen beyond belong to the ships
+and steamers which are lying within.
+
+Grimkie and John went down to the shore and rambled about for an hour
+or more among these docks. They saw immense numbers of ships floating
+in the basins—which were full of water, although it was low tide in
+the river outside—and the draw-bridge and gates connecting one lock
+with another, and vessels loading and unloading, and men hoisting
+boilers and machinery into steamers by means of prodigious iron cranes,
+and other such spectacles.
+
+They also saw the landing-stage, which is one of the wonders of
+Liverpool. It is an immense floating wharf which rises and falls with
+the tide so as always to preserve the same level in respect to the
+water. Here all the ferry boats, and tug boats, and tenders, and other
+small steamers land, as well as row boats and sail boats innumerable,
+the coming and going of which make the great landing-stage one of the
+busiest places in the world.
+
+The boys were so much interested in what they saw, that instead of
+getting back to the hotel at eight o’clock as they had intended, it
+was a quarter of nine when they arrived. They found that Florence
+had ordered breakfast, and that the table was set. There was also a
+pleasant little coal fire burning in the grate, for the morning was
+cool. In a short time Mrs. Morelle appeared, and soon afterward the
+whole party sat down to breakfast.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+PLANS FORMED.
+
+
+“Now children,” said Mrs. Morelle, while she and the children were at
+breakfast, “since we are safe on shore, we can begin to talk about our
+plans. It is now about the middle of June. Mr. Morelle will not arrive
+in London until September. So that we have two months and a half to
+spend in rambling about. And the question is where we shall go.”
+
+“_You_ must decide that mother,” said Florence.
+
+“Yes,” replied Mrs. Morelle, “I will decide it, but first I wish
+to hear what you all have to say about it. You may all propose the
+plans which you would prefer, and then I will take the subject into
+consideration and decide.”
+
+The children then all began to talk about the different tours which
+they had heard the passengers speak of on board the ship, toward the
+end of the voyage, when they had become well enough to take out their
+maps and guide-books, and to consult together about the tours which
+they were to make. Florence said that there was a beautiful region
+called the lake country, full of mountains and lakes, which lay to the
+north of Liverpool, in the counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland. The
+Isle of Wight was proposed too, which is a very charming island lying
+off the southern coast of England, and a great place of resort for
+parties travelling for health or pleasure.
+
+John said that for his part he would like to go directly to Paris. His
+motive for this was partly the long and rapid journey by railway and
+steamboat which it would require, but chiefly because he wished to
+see the performances at the Hippodrome, a famous place in Paris for
+equestrian shows, of which he had heard very glowing accounts before he
+left America.
+
+When it came to Grimkie’s turn to propose a plan, he said that what he
+should like best, if he thought that his aunt and Florence would like
+it, would be to go to the Orkney Islands.
+
+“To the Orkney Islands!” exclaimed Mrs. Morelle in a tone of surprise;
+“why they are beyond the very northern extremity of Scotland.”
+
+“Yes, Auntie, I know they are,” said Grimkie; “that is the reason why I
+want to go and see them.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle paused a moment, and seemed to be thinking.
+
+“Florence,” said she, at length, “go into our bedroom and get my little
+atlas. You will find it on the table there. I took it out of the trunk
+this morning.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle always carried a small atlas with her, especially when
+travelling with the children, for she found that occasions were
+continually arising in which it was necessary, or at least very
+desirable, to refer to the map.
+
+Florence went out, and in a few minutes returned bringing the atlas
+with her.
+
+Mrs. Morelle took the atlas and opened it at the map of Scotland. After
+examining the map attentively, she turned to the map of North America.
+
+“The Orkney Islands extend as far up as latitude fifty-nine and a
+half,” said she, “and the lower point of Greenland is only sixty. So
+that you would take us to within half a degree of the latitude of
+Greenland.”
+
+“Yes, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “that is just it. To think that we can go
+so far north as that and have good roads and good comfortable inns all
+the way.”
+
+“But we should have to go a part of the way by sea,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+“The Orkneys are islands at some distance from the main land.”
+
+“Only six miles, Auntie,” said Grimkie. “It is only across the Pentland
+Firth, and that is only six miles wide.”
+
+“But are not the seas in that region very stormy?”
+
+“Yes, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “they are the stormiest seas in the world.
+Those are the seas that the old Norsemen used to navigate, between the
+coasts of Norway and Scotland, and the Orkney and Shetland Islands and
+Iceland. The Norsemen were the greatest sailors in the world. They
+lived almost always on the water, and the harder it blew the better
+they liked it. I want to go and see where they used to sail.”
+
+Grimkie had recently been studying history at the Chateau, and it was
+there that he had learned about the wonderful exploits which those old
+sea kings, as they were sometimes called, used to perform in the ships
+in which they navigated these stormy northern seas. They were very rude
+and violent men, and they seemed to consider that they had a right to
+everything that they could find, no matter where, provided they were
+strong enough to take it. The richest or the most daring among them,
+who found means to build or buy one or more vessels, would enlist a
+party of followers, and with this horde make descents upon any of the
+coasts in all those regions, and plunder the people of their cattle,
+or seize their little town. Sometimes they would take possession of
+certain places on the coast and make agreements with the people living
+there, that if they would give them a certain portion of their cattle
+every year, they would protect them from any other marauders who might
+come to rob them. This the people would consent to do, and thus the
+foundation was laid for territorial governments, on the different
+coasts adjoining these northern seas.
+
+In process of time the Norsemen and their descendants extended their
+incursions not only to the islands north of Scotland and to Scotland
+itself, but also to the coasts of England and Ireland, and at last even
+of France, where they settled a country, which, from their occupancy of
+it, received the name of Normandy, which name it retains to the present
+day.
+
+It was among these rude men, and in these boisterous and terrible seas,
+where a dismal twilight reigns almost supreme for half the year, and
+winds and fogs and ice, and sweeping and impetuous tides, have almost
+continual possession of the sea, that the progenitors of the present
+race of British and American seamen had their origin. The case is
+often referred to in history, as affording a conspicuous illustration
+of the effect which the encountering of difficulty and danger produces,
+in stimulating the exertions of men, and developing the highest
+capacities of their nature.
+
+“There is another reason,” said Grimkie, “why I should like to go
+_now_ to the Orkney Islands, and that is because it is so near the
+summer solstice. I have a great desire to get as far north as I can in
+the time of the summer solstice. Even here the sun rises now between
+three and four, and it is quite light at two. In the Orkneys there can
+scarcely be any night at all.”
+
+Grimkie it seems had been studying astronomy as well as history, at
+the Chateau, and so he was quite learned about the summer solstice and
+other such things. It may be well, however, for me to explain, for
+the sake of the younger portion of my readers, that the phrase summer
+solstice refers, for the northern hemisphere, to that portion of the
+year, when the sun, in his apparent motion, comes farthest to the
+north, as the winter solstice relates to that portion of the year when
+the sun declines farthest to the south.
+
+The summer solstice occurs on the twenty-first or twenty-second of
+June, and the winter solstice on the twenty-first or twenty-second of
+December.
+
+In the summer solstice the days are longest and the nights shortest. In
+the winter solstice the days are shortest and the nights longest—that
+is, to all people living in northern latitudes.
+
+Now it is a very curious circumstance, the cause of which it would be
+somewhat difficult to explain without showing it by means of a globe,
+that the difference in length between the days and the nights increases
+greatly the farther north we go. On or near the equator the difference
+is very little, at any part of the year. The days throughout the whole
+year are very nearly twelve hours long, and the nights too. At the
+pole, however, if it were possible for any one to reach the pole, the
+day would continue during the whole twenty-four hours for six months
+in the year, and then the night would continue through the whole
+twenty-four hours during the remaining six months. In the latitude of
+the southern part of Greenland, the days, at the time of the summer
+solstice, are more than eighteen hours long, and the nights not quite
+six.
+
+There is another remarkable phenomenon too, to be observed in high
+northern latitudes, in the time of the summer solstice, which Grimkie
+was very desirous of verifying by his own observation, and that is
+the long continuance of the twilight, and the very early appearance of
+the dawn. The reason of this is that the path of the sun is so oblique
+to the horizon, or in other words the sun goes down in so slanting
+a direction, that it is a long time after sunset before he gets low
+enough to withdraw his light entirely from view.
+
+“I should think,” said Grimkie, “that in the Orkney Islands it would be
+light nearly all night. The sun does not set there now till after nine
+o’clock, and it rises again before three, and so I should think the
+twilight would not be over before the dawn would begin. And I want to
+go and see if it really is so.”
+
+“It would be very curious indeed,” said Florence, “to have it light all
+night, and no moon. I should like to see it myself, if it really is so.
+
+“But then,” she added, after a pause, “we should have to sit up all
+night to see it.”
+
+“No,” said Grimkie. “We might get up from time to time, and look out
+the window. Or perhaps we might be travelling all night somewhere, and
+then we should see it.”
+
+After some farther conversation, Mrs. Morelle said that she would not
+decide at once in respect to Grimkie’s plan, but would wait until she
+had obtained some farther information.
+
+“Or rather,” she said, “until _you_ have obtained some farther
+information for me. After breakfast you may go to a bookstore and buy
+a good travelling map of Scotland, and also a railway guide. Florence
+and John may go with you, if they please. Then some time during the day
+you may study out the different ways of going, and see which you think
+is the best way. You must find out where the steamer sails from too, to
+take us across the six miles of water. Then at dinner to-day you can
+tell me what you have found out, and show me by the map, exactly which
+way we shall have to go, and what sort of conveyances we shall have for
+the different portions of the journey. Then when I have all the facts
+before me I can decide.”
+
+Grimkie accordingly bought the map and the guide book, and he spent
+more than two hours that day in studying them so as to make himself as
+thoroughly acquainted as possible with every thing pertaining to the
+route. Mrs. Morelle did not assist him in these researches. In fact she
+was out shopping during most of the time while Grimkie was making them.
+Besides she thought it best to leave him to investigate the case as
+well as he could himself, in the first instance, without any aid.
+
+Accordingly, when the party were assembled for dinner that day, and
+just before the waiter brought the dinner in, Mrs. Morelle asked
+Grimkie what sort of report he had to make about the way of reaching
+the Orkney Islands.
+
+“I have some bad news for you, in the first place,” said Grimkie. “We
+shall have a great deal more than six miles to go in a steamer.”
+
+“How is that?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“Because there is no steamer that goes across in the shortest place,”
+said Grimkie. “There is a sail boat that goes that way, to take the
+mails, but we could not go in the sail boat very well. The only large
+steamer is one that goes from Edinburgh. The only places where it stops
+are Aberdeen and Wick. Wick is the last place it touches at. And from
+Wick to Kirkwall, which is the town where we land in the Orkneys, it is
+about sixty miles. So that we should have a steamer voyage of five or
+six hours to take.”
+
+“That is bad news indeed,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“But then there is one thing favorable about it,” continued Grimkie,
+“and that is that there is only six miles of the voyage that is in an
+open sea. We should be sheltered by the land on one side all the way,
+excepting for about six miles. We might at any rate go as far as Wick,
+and then see how the weather is. If the sea is smooth and calm, then
+we might go on board the steamer. If not we might wait for the next
+steamer or give it up altogether. All the way from here to Wick
+there will be no difficulty. It will be a very pleasant journey.”
+
+[Illustration: Visit to the Orkney Islands]
+
+Grimkie then unfolded his map in order to explain to his aunt the
+general features of the country so far as they affected the different
+modes of travelling to the north of Scotland.
+
+“Here is Wick,” said Grimkie, pointing to the situation of that town
+on the northwest coast of Scotland. It lies as the reader will see by
+the map, north of a great bay formed by the union of Murray and Dornock
+Firths. Grimkie pointed out the situation of Wick and also that of
+Inverness, which lies in the bottom of the bay, at the head of Murray
+Firth.
+
+“The steamer,” he says, “sails from Edinburgh once a week. She touches
+at Aberdeen, for that is directly in her way, on the eastern coast.”
+
+Here Grimkie pointed out the situation of Aberdeen.
+
+“But she does not go to Inverness,” continued Grimkie, “although that
+is a very large and important town, because that would take her too
+much out of her way. So she steers right across the mouth of the bay,
+where she must be in the open sea for some time, and makes for Wick.
+There she takes in freight and passengers, and then sails again north
+along the coast to the Orkney Islands. The town where she stops in the
+Orkneys is Kirkwall. After that she sails on and goes to the Shetland
+Islands, fifty or sixty miles farther over the open sea.”
+
+“But Grimkie,” said Mrs. Morelle, “why did not you propose to go to the
+Shetland Islands instead of the Orkneys, while you were about it? You
+would be still more among the Norsemen’s seas there, and the nights
+would be still shorter.”
+
+“Ah!” said Grimkie, “that was my discretion, Auntie. I should like very
+much to go on to the end of the route, and to see the Shetland ponies,
+but I knew that you and Florence would not like so long a voyage, and
+so I only proposed going to the Orkneys.”
+
+“That _was_ discretion indeed,” said Mrs. Morelle. “But tell us the
+rest of the plan. How about getting to Wick?”
+
+“The next stage this side of Wick,” said Grimkie, “is Inverness. From
+Inverness to Wick we should go by stage-coach. That we should all like.
+You said the other day, on board ship, that you would like one more
+good ride in an English stage-coach, and here is an excellent chance.
+The road winds in and out to pass round the lochs and firths, and then
+coasts along the sea delightfully. At least so my guide book says.
+There is one splendid pass which it goes through, equal to Switzerland.”
+
+“I should like that very much,” said Mrs. Morelle. “And now how about
+getting to Inverness?”
+
+“There are three ways,” said Grimkie. “We can go by the railroads on
+the eastern side of the island, or by coaches and posting up through
+the center, or by inland steam navigation on the western side.”
+
+Grimkie then went on to explain what he had learned by long study of
+the maps and guide books during the day. The information which he
+communicated was substantially as follows:
+
+The western part of Scotland north of Glasgow is so mountainous, and
+so intersected in every direction with long and narrow bays setting in
+from the sea, and also with inland lakes, that no railroad can well
+be made there. By connecting these lakes, however, and by cutting
+across one or two narrow necks of land, and making canals and locks
+along the sides of some rapid rivers, a channel of inland navigation
+has been opened, by which steamers can pass all the way from Glasgow
+to Inverness, through the very heart of the country. The route of the
+steamers in taking this voyage, for some portion of the way, lies
+along the shore of the sea, but it is in places where the water is so
+sheltered by islands and by lofty promontories and headlands, that the
+ocean swell has very little access to it in any part of the way.
+
+On the eastern coast, on the other hand, the country is comparatively
+smooth and well cultivated, and a line of railroad extends on this
+side all the way from Edinburgh to Inverness. Thus the party might,
+as Grimkie explained the case to them, either go, up to Inverness
+from Edinburgh by railroad, on the eastern side, through a smooth and
+beautiful country filled with green and fruitful fields, and with
+thriving villages and towns,—or by steamboat from Glasgow on the
+western side, among dark mountains and frowning precipices, and wild
+but beautiful solitudes. Florence voted at once and very eagerly in
+favor of the mountains.
+
+“Then there is a third course still that we can take,” said Grimkie;
+“we can go up through the center of the island.”
+
+“And how shall we travel in that case?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“There is no railroad yet through the center,” said Grimkie, “and no
+steamboat route. So we should have to go by coach, or else by a hired
+carriage.”
+
+“And what sort of a country is it?” asked Florence.
+
+“Some parts of it are very beautiful,” said Grimkie, “and some parts
+are very wild. We should go through the estates of some of the grandest
+noblemen in Great Britain. The guide book says that one duke that lives
+there planted about twenty-five millions of trees on his grounds, but I
+don’t believe it.”
+
+“It _may_ be so,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“Twenty-five millions is a great many,” said Grimkie.
+
+“I don’t see where he could get so many trees,” said John.
+
+“Probably he raised them from seed in his own nurseries,” said Mrs.
+Morelle.
+
+“He could not have nurseries big enough to raise so many,” said John.
+
+“Let us see,” said Grimkie. “Suppose he had a nursery a mile square
+and the little trees grew in it a foot apart. We will call a mile five
+thousand feet. It is really more than five thousand feet, but we will
+call it that for easy reckoning. That would give us five thousand rows
+and five thousand trees in a row—five thousand times five thousand.”
+
+Grimkie took out his pencil and figured with it for a moment, on the
+margin of a newspaper, and then said,
+
+“It makes exactly twenty-five millions. So that if he had a nursery a
+mile square, and planted the trees a foot apart, he would have just
+enough.”
+
+“Never mind the Duke of Athol’s trees,” said Mrs. Morelle. “Let us
+finish planning our journey.”
+
+But here the door opened and two waiters came in bringing the dinner.
+So the whole party took their seats at the table. Afterward, while
+they were sitting at the table, Mrs. Morelle asked Grimkie what he
+had concluded upon as the best way for them to take of all the three
+which he had described, in case they should decide to go to the Orkney
+Islands.
+
+“You see, Auntie,” said he, “we shall of course go by railway from here
+to Glasgow, and it will make a pleasant change to take the steamboat
+there. It is a beautiful steamboat and excellently well managed. It
+is used almost altogether for pleasure travelling, and every thing
+is as nice in it as a pin. Then it must be very curious to see the
+green glens and the sheep pastures, and the highland shepherds on the
+mountains, as we are sailing along. Then when we got to Inverness we
+shall change again into the stage-coach, to go to Wick, and at Wick we
+shall take the deep sea steamer. So we shall have a series of pleasant
+changes all the way.”
+
+“I am not sure how pleasant the last one will be,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“If we have pleasant weather and a smooth sea, I think it will be very
+pleasant indeed,” said Grimkie. “It will be amusing to think how far we
+are going away, and also to see what kind of people there will be going
+to the Orkney and Shetland Islands.”
+
+“But suppose it should not be pleasant weather and a smooth sea.”
+
+“Then we will not go,” said Grimkie. “We will stop at Wick and come
+back again, if we do not wish to wait for the next steamer. It will be
+a very curious and interesting journey to Wick, even if we do not go
+any farther at all.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle said that she would consider the subject, and give her
+decision the next morning.
+
+The next morning she told the children that she had concluded to go,
+and to follow the plan which Grimkie had marked out for the journey.
+
+“But there is one thing that we must not overlook,” said she. “We must
+be sure that we have got money enough. So you must make a calculation
+how long it will take us to go, and how much it will cost. Of course
+you can not calculate exactly, but you can come near enough for our
+purpose. When you have made the calculation, put down the items on
+paper and show it to me.”
+
+Grimkie made the calculation as his aunt had requested. He did not
+attempt to estimate the expense of each day precisely. That would have
+been impossible. He reckoned in general the hotel expenses, all the
+way, at so much a day, from the number of days which it would require,
+and then from the railway guide and other books he found what the fares
+would be for the travelling part of the work. He also made a liberal
+allowance for porterage, coach hire, and other such things. When he had
+made out his account he gave it to Mrs. Morelle, and she showed it to
+the keeper of the hotel, and asked him if he thought that was a just
+estimate. Mr. Lynn, after examining it carefully, said that he thought
+it was a very good estimate indeed, and that the allowances were all
+liberal; and as the total came entirely within the amount which Mrs.
+Morelle had with her in sovereigns, she concluded that it would be safe
+to proceed.
+
+The party accordingly went to the station that very afternoon and took
+passage for Carlisle, a town near the frontier of Scotland, and on the
+way to Glasgow.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE RAILWAY RIDE.
+
+
+“Now, Florence,” said Grimkie, when the cab arrived at the station,
+and stopped for the party to get out, “now we shall see which is the
+best—an English railroad ride, or an American one.”
+
+A man in a peculiar velveteen dress of a bronze green color, and with a
+badge upon his arm to mark his official character, came with a barrow,
+and in a very respectful manner asked where the party were going.
+
+“To Carlisle,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Very well,” said the man. “If you will follow me to the platform I
+will show you where to get the tickets.”
+
+So saying the porter put the trunks and all the parcels carefully upon
+his barrow, and led the way through an arched passage into the interior
+of the station. Grimkie paid the cabman, and then, with the rest of the
+party, followed the porter.
+
+When they entered the station, a remarkable scene presented itself
+to view. Florence looked about with great surprise and admiration.
+She saw an immense space covered with a glass roof, with platforms
+flagged with stone along the sides, and great numbers of trains on the
+different tracks in the center. Great hissing locomotives were moving
+to and fro, on these tracks, and parties of travellers, with porters
+wheeling their trunks and parcels on their barrows, were moving in
+various directions along the platforms. There were doors opening into
+pretty rooms, with signs over them, marked, First Class Waiting Rooms,
+and Second Class Waiting Rooms, and First Class Refreshment Rooms, and
+the like. One of the objects which most strongly attracted Florence’s
+attention, was a very elegant little book stall, with a great variety
+of entertaining books displayed on the shelves of it, together with
+prints, newspapers and periodicals, all neatly arranged on open
+shelves, or behind glass sashes.
+
+But there was not time to stop and look at these things, for the porter
+went on, and it seemed necessary to follow him. He took the barrow near
+to one of the trains which was standing upon the track, and stopping
+there, he said to Grimkie,
+
+“You have plenty of time, sir. The train does not go for twenty
+minutes. Your luggage will be quite safe here, and if you will come
+with me I will show you the waiting-room, and then I will come and tell
+you when it is time to get the tickets.”
+
+“Can’t I get the tickets now?” asked Grimkie.
+
+“Not quite yet, sir,” said the porter. “The ticket office for this
+train will be open in about ten minutes.”
+
+So saying, the porter led the way to the first class waiting room, and
+the whole party went in. They found a spacious and handsomely furnished
+room, with a great table in the center, and very comfortable-looking
+sofas and arm-chairs against the walls. On one side was a door opening
+into the refreshment room, where they saw a large table elegantly
+set, as if for a sumptuous dinner. Beyond was a counter loaded with
+decanters, plates of fruits, tarts, pies, and all sorts of delicacies,
+and with one or two very tidy-looking girls behind it, ready to wait
+upon customers.
+
+“What nice rooms!” said Florence.
+
+“Yes,” said Grimkie. “These are for the first class passengers.”
+
+“How did the porter know that we were going first class?” asked
+Florence.
+
+“He knew by our looks,” said Grimkie; “besides, he knew by our being
+Americans. Americans always take the first class. They don’t go for
+marking themselves publicly as second rate people, and so whether they
+are rich or poor, they all rush into the first class carriages.”
+
+“Who told you that?” asked Florence. Florence knew very well that
+Grimkie was quoting what somebody else had said, for the language did
+not sound at all as if it were original with him.
+
+“A gentleman on board the steamer,” said Grimkie, coolly.
+
+“Mother,” said Florence, turning to Mrs. Morelle, who had seated
+herself comfortably upon one of the sofas, “let us go out on the
+platform again. It is a great deal more amusing there than here.”
+
+“I think so, too,” said Mrs. Morelle. So saying, she rose from her
+seat, and they all went together out upon the platform, and began to
+walk up and down, amusing themselves with observing what was going on.
+Grimkie and John began to read the placards and notices which were
+posted up along the walls. Some of them were adorned with pictures
+printed in colored inks, and were mounted in handsome frames.
+
+While they were looking at these things, the porter came again and told
+Grimkie that the ticket office was now open, and he proceeded to show
+him the way to it. Grimkie bought the tickets, and then the porter led
+the way toward the night train. Mrs. Morelle and John went on together
+after him, and Grimkie and Florence followed.
+
+“This is very nice,” said Florence, “to have a man wait upon us in this
+way, and show us exactly what we are to do.”
+
+“Yes,” said Grimkie, “but then we have to pay for it.”
+
+“No,” replied Florence, “for I saw a notice posted up that the men were
+not allowed to receive anything whatever from the passengers. If they
+do take anything they are to be dismissed.”
+
+“I don’t mean that we have to pay the _men_,” said Grimkie, “but
+the _company_. The fares are a great deal higher in England than in
+America. Here they have plenty of servants to wait upon us at the
+stations, and they charge accordingly. In America every man takes care
+of himself and saves his money.”
+
+“Not all of it,” said Florence.
+
+“No, not all of it,” replied Grimkie, “but all that part which the
+company would require to employ servants at all the stations to take
+care of him. Besides, this porter will expect a sixpence from me, and I
+have got one all ready to give to him. You will see how he will manage
+to get it slily. The gentleman on board the steamer told me all about
+it.”
+
+By this time the porter had come to the train. The train was not
+composed, as in America, of a few long cars, but of a larger number of
+carriages, each of which contained three separate compartments, with
+doors at the sides. The porter went to one of these carriages, marked
+First Class, and opened the door. Grimkie put in some of the small
+parcels of the luggage, and the porter put the trunks upon the top. He
+kept one bag in his hands and told Grimkie that he would hand it to him
+after he got in. So Grimkie got into the carriage and took his seat,
+and the porter, after he had put up the trunks upon the top, within the
+railing which had been made there to keep them from falling off, and
+had covered them with a tarpaulin, took the bag and put it into the
+carriage, contriving at the sane time, when he shut the door, to hold
+his hand inside of it a moment, in such a way that Grimkie could give
+him the sixpence.
+
+“You will not change carriages, sir,” said he to Grimkie, “until you
+get to Carlisle, and then you will find your luggage on the top quite
+safe.”
+
+“Grimkie,” said Florence, as soon as the man had gone. “You ought not
+to have given that man a sixpence. He is liable to lose his place for
+taking it.”
+
+“Yes,” said Grimkie. “Provided any body saw him take it.”
+
+“That makes no difference,” said Florence, “whether any body saw him
+take it or not. It makes not the least difference in the world. You
+have broken the law.”
+
+“No,” said Grimkie. “_I_ have not broken any law. There is no law
+against the traveller’s giving the sixpence, but only against the
+porter’s taking it. _He_ may have broken a law, but I have not.”
+
+“Oh Grimkie!” said Florence.
+
+Florence was no match for Grimkie in the logical management of an
+argument, and she did not know exactly how to reply to his reasoning
+in this instance, though she felt very confident that he was wrong.
+Her thoughts were, however, for the present, at once diverted from
+the subject, for the train began to move, and in a very few minutes
+it appeared that it was entering a dark tunnel. The interior of the
+carriage, however, did not become dark, for in proportion as the
+day-light faded away the illumination which it had produced was
+replaced by a lamp-light which gradually began to appear. Where this
+lamp-light could come from was at first a mystery, but, on looking
+up, the children saw a lamp burning brightly in a glass which was set
+into the top of the carriage over their heads, with a reflector above
+it which threw the light down. This light made it very cheerful and
+pleasant within the car while the train was passing the tunnel.
+
+On emerging from the tunnel at the other end a marvelous picture of
+verdure and beauty met the view of the travellers, and filled them
+with delight. Florence particularly was charmed with the aspect of the
+scene. She looked out first at one window and then the other, scarcely
+knowing which way to turn in her fear that something would escape her.
+The rich and deep green of the fields, the hawthorn hedges, in full
+flower, the gardens, the beautiful villas, the charming cottages,
+half covered with eglantine and ivy, the little railway stations,
+which the train passed from time to time, built substantially of
+stone, in very picturesque and endlessly varied forms, and with the
+prettiest ornamental gardens which can be imagined surrounding them, or
+extending from them each way along the sloping banks which bordered the
+track—these and a hundred other objects which came into view in the
+most rapid and ever changing succession, kept her in a continual state
+of excitement.
+
+It was about one o’clock when the train left Liverpool, and it reached
+Carlisle about half past five. The distance was about a hundred and
+thirty miles. The time passed, however, very rapidly. A short time
+before the train arrived, Mrs. Morelle asked Grimkie what he was going
+to do about a hotel.
+
+“You know,” said she, “that the agreement is that you are to take the
+whole care of the party, just as if you were my courier.”
+
+A courier is a travelling servant, who is employed by a gentleman
+travelling, or by a lady, or a family, to conduct them wherever they
+wish to go on their journey. He takes care of all the luggage, knows
+which are the good hotels, makes bargains with the keepers of them,
+and settles the bills, makes arrangements for horses and carriages
+when travelling, and in a word relieves his employers of all trouble
+and care, and enables them to make their journey with as much ease and
+quiet of mind as if they were merely taking a morning’s drive on their
+own grounds at home.
+
+That is to say, this is the case when the employer of the courier
+understands how to manage properly. It is with travelling couriers as
+with all other servants; every thing depends upon the principles of
+management adopted by the master or mistress. A courier is a means of
+great convenience and comfort in travelling, or a source of continual
+vexation and trouble, according to the tact or want of tact displayed
+by the traveller himself, in employing and directing him.
+
+Grimkie looked a little at a loss when his aunt asked him what hotel he
+was going to. He said he had intended to have asked some gentleman in
+the cars, supposing that the cars would be large, as in America, and
+that there would be a great many people in them. But in fact there had
+been no one in their compartment of the carriage all the way. He had
+looked into his guide book, and the guide book gave the names of two or
+three of the hotels in Carlisle, but did not say which was the best.
+
+“Read us the names, Grimkie,” said Florence. “We can judge something by
+the sound of them.”
+
+So Grimkie opened the book and began to read.
+
+“There’s the Royal Hotel,” said he.
+
+“We won’t go there,” said John, “at any rate. We are republicans.”
+
+“And there’s a hotel called the County Hotel,” continued Grimkie. “It
+is in the station.”
+
+“In the station?” repeated Florence; “let us go there. It will seem
+very funny to be at a hotel that is in the station. May we go to any
+hotel that we choose, mother?”
+
+“You may go to any one that Grimkie chooses,” replied Mrs. Morelle. “He
+is responsible for finding us comfortable quarters for the night.”
+
+“I’ll see how the station hotel looks when we get there,” said Grimkie
+to Florence, “and if it looks pleasant we will stop there.”
+
+This plan for deciding the question in respect to the Station Hotel
+seemed to be in theory a very good one, but it proved unfortunately
+impracticable, for when the train stopped, and Grimkie had helped his
+party out from the carriage to the platform, he found no signs of the
+hotel to be seen, except two or three porters who wore the badges of
+the hotel upon their caps, and one of whom stood ready at once to take
+charge of Grimkie’s luggage and to show the way to the hotel. Grimkie,
+who had no time for reflection, decided at once to accept the offer,
+and as soon as the trunks were handed down and put upon the hotel
+porter’s barrow, he followed with Mrs. Morelle and the children where
+the porter led.
+
+They went for some distance along the platform, and then turned to a
+side door which led to a long passage gently ascending. At the end of
+this passage they ascended some steps and entered a door, and there
+turning to the left they came into another long passage which looked
+like the entry of the hotel. Apartments of various kinds opened from it
+on each side, and waiters were seen carrying dinners and suppers to the
+different rooms. At the end of this passage was a sort of office, and
+turning round the corner an elegant stair-case came into view, leading
+to the stories above. A pretty looking young woman met the party at the
+office door. Grimkie said they wanted a sitting-room and two bed-rooms.
+The young woman led the way up stairs to show the rooms.
+
+In about half an hour after this time the whole party were sitting
+down, in excellent spirits, and with great appetites, to a very nice
+dinner, in an elegant little room, with windows looking out upon a
+great area filled with omnibuses and cabs that were waiting for the
+arrival of the next train, and upon a street which passed by a spacious
+castle-like building that seemed to stand at the entrance to the town.
+
+After dinner they all went out to take a walk, On entering the town
+they found themselves in a narrow street with very ancient but very
+solid and substantial looking buildings on either side of it, the
+whole entirely unlike any thing which they had ever seen in America.
+They passed by several inns which were so quaint and curious in
+their structure, and looked so snug and so neat, and so much like the
+representations of English inns which they had seen in pictures and
+drawing-books, that Florence began to be sorry that they had stopped
+at the Station Hotel, which was modern and new, and the rooms in which
+were very much like those of a nice hotel in America.
+
+“Grimkie,” said she, “we made a mistake. We ought to have come to one
+of these little old fashioned inns here in the town. See what nice
+curtains at the chamber windows. If we had only known about these.”
+
+“Ah yes,” said Grimkie. “If we could only manage when we are coming
+into a strange town, to have a chance to see all the hotels and inns
+beforehand, we could choose a great deal better.”
+
+“You made a great mistake this time,” said Florence.
+
+“Next time then _you_ shall choose,” said Grimkie.
+
+Florence was prepared for some sort of tart reply from Grimkie, to her
+finding fault with him, but when she heard so kind and polite a reply,
+it produced a reaction in her own feelings. After a moment’s pause she
+said,
+
+“Grimkie, it was _I_ that chose this time. Going to the Station Hotel
+was my plan, after all.”
+
+“Was it?” said Grimkie; “well you shall choose the next time too, if
+you like.”
+
+The principal object of the walk which our party were taking at
+this time, was to visit the Cathedral of Carlisle. It was the first
+cathedral which the children had had an opportunity of seeing. They
+found a very ancient and venerable pile, with ruins around it, and
+several little streets, and open spaces, with pretty houses fronting
+them, all of which seemed to belong to the cathedral, for they were
+enclosed with it in a wall which separated the whole precinct from
+the rest of the town. This precinct is called the cathedral close. It
+pertains exclusively to the cathedral, and is under ecclesiastical
+jurisdiction, in a measure, and contains the dwellings of the various
+clergymen and laymen that are attached to the cathedral service.
+
+There was a certain air of solemn stillness and repose reigning about
+the precincts of the cathedral, when our party entered the close,
+which was very impressive. The venerable walls of the cathedral itself
+crumbling with age, the old inscriptions and sculptured images, now in
+some cases almost wholly effaced by the decay of the stone,—the masses
+of ruined walls, the remains of ancient cloisters or chapels which
+were seen here and there rising from the patches of greensward,—the
+smooth and solitary walks—and above all the mournful chirping of the
+rooks and swallows and daws that were flying about among the turrets
+and parapets far above, or in the tops of the ancient trees—combined
+to impart a peculiar expression of solemn and melancholy grandeur to
+the scene, which was wholly indescribable.
+
+After rambling about the town and the environs till after ten o’clock,
+the party returned to the Station Hotel, where they all went to bed
+without candles, for it was not yet dark.
+
+The next morning, soon after breakfast, Grimkie paid the bill, and
+they all went down to the platform to take the train which was to
+leave about half-past eight o’clock for Glasgow. They were soon all
+comfortably seated in the carriage, and five minutes afterward the
+train was in motion. They had a delightful journey to Glasgow, where
+they arrived safely a little after noon.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+THE HIGHLAND GLENS.
+
+
+“Now,” said Grimkie, when the party arrived at the hotel in Glasgow,
+“we have come to the end of the first stage of our journey, that is the
+railway stage of it. The next is the steamboat stage.”
+
+“I am glad of that,” said Florence. “The railway ride was very
+pleasant, but I am ready for a change.”
+
+Grimkie had learned in the course of the conversations which he had
+held with his fellow-passengers on board the ship at sea, that it was
+best, in travelling in Scotland, especially among the Highlands, to
+take as little baggage as possible.
+
+“On whichever side of Scotland you go up,” said one of these gentlemen,
+“you will be likely to come down on the other side, so that your
+journey will either begin at Glasgow and end at Edinburgh, or it
+will begin at Edinburgh and end at Glasgow. You will find it better
+therefore, when you are ready to set out from either of those towns,
+to put all that you will want for the journey in one trunk, and send
+all the rest of your baggage across to some hotel in the other town, to
+wait there for you till you come back.”
+
+Grimkie explained all this to his aunt, at the breakfast table at
+their hotel in Glasgow. Mrs. Morelle looked at her travelling map of
+Scotland, and she saw that Edinburgh and Glasgow were in fact situated
+as is represented above.
+
+“We shall probably come down from the Orkneys on that side of the
+island,” said she, “and I think it would be convenient to have our
+trunks go there, all except one—but then, Grimkie, we don’t know how
+to send them there. I suppose there is some kind of express, if we only
+knew where the office was.”
+
+“Ah, but you remember, Auntie, that father told us that all we had to
+do was to be able to tell distinctly what we wanted, and the people
+here would find out how it was to be done.”
+
+“That was in the public offices,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“It will do just as well in the hotels I expect, Auntie,” said Grimkie.
+“May I ring the bell and try?”
+
+Mrs. Morelle gave the required permission, and Grimkie rang the bell.
+Very soon the waiter appeared.
+
+“I want to see about sending some baggage to Edinburgh,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Yes, sir,” said the waiter. “I’ll send up Boots directly.”
+
+Boots is the familiar name by which the porter is designated in the
+English inns. In these inns moreover every servant has his own definite
+duties to perform, and these are never on any account intermingled. It
+is the porter’s duty to know about railway trains, and conveyances of
+all kinds, and about baggage, and sending letters and parcels, and all
+such things. The waiter’s duty, on the other hand, is confined entirely
+to the service of the table, and to acts of personal attendance upon
+the guests within the hotel. If any question arises pertaining to
+transportation or conveyance of any kind, he has but one answer—“Yes,
+sir, I’ll send Boots.”
+
+In a few minutes the porter appeared, cap in hand.
+
+“We want to inquire about sending some of our luggage to Edinburgh,”
+said Grimkie. “We are going to make a tour in the north of Scotland,
+and we thought it would be best to send most of our luggage to
+Edinburgh to wait there till we come.”
+
+“Yes, sir,” said the porter, “that will be much the best way for you.”
+
+“And how shall we manage it?” asked Grimkie. “What have I to do?”
+
+“You have nothing at all to do,” said the porter, “except to tell me
+the name of the hotel where you will go—or put it upon your luggage,
+and leave it in your room here when you go away. I will attend to it
+all, and you will find it quite safe at the hotel when you arrive
+there.”
+
+“And how about paying?” asked Grimkie. “Shall we pay you?”
+
+“No, sir,” said the porter, “you will have nothing to pay here. It will
+not be much, and they will pay at the hotel in Edinburgh and put it in
+your bill.”
+
+“That will be exactly the thing, Auntie,” said Grimkie. “Only,” he
+added, “we do not know what hotel we shall go to.”
+
+On being asked by Mrs. Morelle, the porter gave them the address of a
+good hotel in Edinburgh, which he said was in a pleasant situation, and
+a well kept house. He also brought Grimkie a package of gum labels,
+such as are used in England for labelling baggage. Grimkie wrote Mrs.
+Morelle’s name on several of these labels, and also the name of the
+hotel which the porter had given him, and then, after his aunt had
+selected from all the trunks what she thought would be required for the
+whole party during the tour in Scotland, and had put them in the one
+which she was to take, Grimkie with the assistance of the porter locked
+and strapped the others, and put the labels upon them.
+
+The party spent the rest of the day in rambling about Glasgow, and in
+amusing themselves with the various objects of interest which met their
+view in the streets and in the environs, and the next morning before
+breakfast, they went on board the steamer Iona, which was to take them
+to Inverness.
+
+They enjoyed the voyage exceedingly although at first Florence was
+somewhat disappointed in respect to the steamer, which she had expected
+would be as much superior, in respect to its size, and its decorations,
+to those plying upon the North River, as Europe is generally considered
+superior to America. Instead of this, the Iona was comparatively
+quite small, but it was very neatly arranged, and there was a small,
+but richly furnished cabin below, which looked exceedingly snug and
+comfortable.
+
+After rambling about the steamer until they had explored it in every
+part, the children went with Mrs. Morelle and chose a place upon the
+deck at a corner near the companion-way, where they could enjoy the
+views on every side, and at the same time, could be comfortably seated
+all the time, if they chose, on camp-stools and benches.
+
+[Illustration: ON BOARD THE IONA.]
+
+Here they remained for several hours enjoying the most charming
+succession of views of mountain scenery that can be imagined. Grimkie,
+by means of the maps and guide books, followed the course of the
+steamer, and found out the names of all the villages, and castles, and
+country seats, which came successively into view, and pointed them out
+to his aunt and Florence who examined them attentively, especially the
+old castles, by means of the opera glass.
+
+The course of the steamer lay through a succession of channels, lakes
+and sounds, most of which were connected with the sea, but they were
+so hemmed in by the promontories and islands which bordered them, as
+to make it seem to the party as if they were navigating inland waters
+altogether. The channels of water were so narrow too, in most cases,
+that the land was very near. It was generally more like sailing upon
+a river, than upon an arm of the sea. The land was everywhere very
+mountainous too, and seemed to rise very abruptly from the water’s
+edge, though often it was bordered near the margin of the water, by
+villages and towns, and elegant country seats with green fields and
+beautiful gardens adjoining them, and parks and pleasure grounds, all
+of which presented a succession of most charming pictures to the view.
+
+In other places the shores of the _loch_, as the Scotch call such
+sheets of water as these, were wild and solitary,—immense sheep
+pastures extending up the mountain sides to a great height, with
+flocks of sheep, and dogs, and Highland shepherds seen here and there,
+standing motionless to gaze upon the steamer as it glided swiftly by.
+
+As this line of steamers was intended almost exclusively for the
+accommodation of tourists, journeying for health or pleasure, the
+arrangements on board were all made with reference to rendering
+the voyage as comfortable and as agreeable as possible. One of the
+arrangements made with this view was to stop at night, half way between
+Glasgow and Inverness, at a place situated in the midst of some of the
+grandest and most romantic scenery, in order to give the passengers
+a quiet night’s sleep, at a spacious and elegant hotel, built there
+expressly for the purpose. The steamer was to touch too at a great many
+different places along the route, wherever there was a pretty village
+on the margin of the water, or any grand or picturesque scenery at a
+little distance in the interior. When Mrs. Morelle and her party came
+on board, they had not determined whether to proceed directly to
+Inverness, or to stop at Rothsay, or Oban, or Fort William, or at some
+other interesting point, with a view of continuing their journey on a
+subsequent day.
+
+“We will not decide,” said Mrs. Morelle, “until we get on board the
+steamer, and see how we like it, and what the weather is.”
+
+When, however, the party had embarked and the voyage was begun, they
+were all for the first hour so much interested in the wonderful beauty
+and grandeur of the scenery which everywhere met their view, that they
+did not think of the question how far they should go, until Grimkie saw
+the man coming round among the passengers to receive their money, and
+give them tickets. Before he had time to say anything about it, the man
+came to where Mrs. Morelle was sitting and said he would take the fare.
+
+“How much is it, sir?” asked Grimkie.
+
+The man replied by asking how far they were going. Grimkie looked to
+his aunt, not knowing himself exactly what to say.
+
+“We are going to Inverness,” said she, “but we had not fully decided
+whether to go directly through, or to stop somewhere, for a day.”
+
+“You can pay through, madam,” said the man, “and take a ticket, and
+then you can break the journey where you please. The tickets are good
+for a month.”
+
+“Ah,” said Grimkie, “that will be just the thing for us.” So he took
+out his purse and counted out the number of sovereigns which the man
+required, and received the tickets.
+
+The tickets were made in a very curious manner. They were printed upon
+thin paper, and lined upon the back with green morocco, and were then
+folded in three, that is, the upper part was folded down, and the lower
+part up, and in this condition they looked like so many little green
+wallets. Florence and John were very much interested in examining their
+tickets, and they wished to have the custody of them themselves. But
+Grimkie said no. He was responsible for all the payments, and he must
+take charge of the tickets himself—but they might have them to look at
+as often as they pleased.
+
+John was very much taken with the ticket man’s phrase “break the
+journey,” and he began to be quite desirous that _their_ journey should
+be broken at some point or other along the route. His mother said that
+she had no objection to that. So she commissioned Grimkie to look over
+the map and the guide books, and read the descriptions of the different
+places along the route, and of the objects of interest to be seen in
+the vicinity of them, and so select a place where in his opinion it
+would be best to stop.
+
+Grimkie immediately set himself to this work, and after a good deal
+of patient investigation and research, he came to the conclusion to
+recommend that they should stop at Ben Nevis. Ben Nevis, he found, lay
+close upon their course.
+
+Ben Nevis has usually been considered as the highest mountain in
+Scotland. It is any rate altogether the most celebrated. There is a
+little village at the base of it, named Fort William, where travellers
+land who wish to ascend the mountain. This village is at the head of a
+loch, and all the environs of it are romantic and beautiful. Grimkie
+found a picture of Fort William in one of the guide books, and showed
+it to his aunt, and to Florence and John. He also read what the guide
+book said about the place, and the environs of it, and the mode of
+ascending the mountain.
+
+“I have only one objection to stopping there,” said Mrs. Morelle, “and
+that is that I do not like climbing mountains very well.”
+
+“But, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “we need not go up the mountain unless we
+choose to do it.”
+
+“True,” said Mrs. Morelle, “but I am pretty sure you children will want
+to go up, and I shall not like to have you go, unless I go too.”
+
+“Then, Auntie, how would you like to stop at Oban?”
+
+“What is there remarkable at Oban?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“It is a pretty little town on the western coast, built along the curve
+of a bay, under high hills,” said Grimkie, half reading from his guide
+book. “It is a sort of central point and rendezvous for travellers
+in the western Highlands, being the place of departure for many
+excursions.”
+
+“What sort of excursions?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“The principal are steamboat excursions among the outlying islands,”
+said Grimkie, “such as to Fingal’s cave on the island of Staffa, and
+the old monastery in Iona.”
+
+“Should we be exposed to the swell of the sea in going to those
+islands?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“I think from the map that we should,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Then,” said Mrs. Morelle, laughing, “I would rather stop at Ben Nevis.
+I would rather take the mountain than the sea.”
+
+“I thought so, Auntie,” said Grimkie.
+
+And so it was decided that the party should land at Fort William, at
+the base of Ben Nevis.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+BEN NEVIS.
+
+
+Mrs. Morelle was charmed with the appearance of Ben Nevis and its
+environs when the steamer drew near. The slopes of the mountain seemed
+to commence almost at the margin of the water, and they rose in solemn
+grandeur to a vast height, the portions near the summit being covered
+with great patches of snow. Lower down, the mountain sides were rounded
+and smooth, and covered with rich green and brown vegetation, which
+glowed in the setting sun and seemed as soft as the richest velvet.
+Along the margin of the water were extended the buildings of the town,
+with vessels of various size lying at anchor near.
+
+The steamer stopped at some distance from the shore, just as Grimkie
+and John, who had been forward to see about getting out the trunk,
+came back to see if Mrs. Morelle and Florence were ready. Mrs. Morelle
+looked alarmed.
+
+“Why, Grimkie!” said she, “are they going to land us in a boat. I
+thought they would go up to the pier. I am afraid to land in a boat.”
+
+“Then we can go on,” said Grimkie, “to the end of the sail. It is not a
+great deal farther.”
+
+“But I should like to stop and see Ben Nevis, too,” said Mrs. Morelle
+hesitating—“if it were not for landing in a boat—going down such a
+steep and narrow ladder.”
+
+“There can’t be any real danger, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “but still we
+will go on if you prefer. They land by boats at half the places where
+we stop.”
+
+This was very true, and Mrs. Morelle had taken great interest in
+watching the progress of such landings, several times during the day.
+It was very curious to see the boat in such cases come out from the
+land, and lie upon its oars on the water in the track of the steamer,
+until the steamer came up, and the paddle-wheels were backed. Then
+the man standing on the guard would throw a rope to the boat, which
+would be caught by a man at the bows of it, and immediately made fast,
+by which means the boat would be drawn on through the water, by the
+steamer which was not yet entirely at rest.
+
+The boat was soon pulled in under the little step-ladder leading from
+the deck, which had previously been let down, and then the passengers
+who were to land would descend, guarded carefully, by strong boatmen
+reaching up from the boat to the outer side of the ladder, to prevent
+the possibility of their falling into the water, in case of any misstep.
+
+As fast as the passengers reached the boat, they stepped over the
+thwarts and took their seats in the stern. Then the trunks and other
+parcels of baggage were passed down. Then the boatmen would take the
+oars again, the rope was cast off, the boat was pushed away, the
+paddle-wheels recommenced their motion, and the steamer went on,
+leaving the boat behind to struggle with the waves as best it could,
+and make its slow way to the shore.
+
+All this had been very interesting to see, as it appeared to the
+passengers who stood leaning over the bulwarks and looking down upon it
+from the deck above, but Mrs. Morelle thought that it would not be very
+agreeable to go through. She was afraid, in the first place, to go down
+such a steep and narrow ladder, especially when the resting place was
+so unstable and insecure at the bottom. Then she was still more afraid
+of the pitching and tossing of the boat, in the surges made by the
+paddle-wheels when the steamer moved away.
+
+She did not, however, hesitate long, for a moment’s reflection
+convinced her that these fears were imaginary. There could not possibly
+be any real danger in the mode of landing adopted, as the ordinary and
+usual method for such a class of travellers as those on board this
+steamer. So she banished her fears, and rising from her seat, said that
+she would go.
+
+By this time the boat had made fast along side the steamer, and the
+passengers who were to go on shore were going down the ladder. Mrs.
+Morelle found no difficulty in following them, Florence and John
+followed her. Grimkie remained at the head of the ladder to the last.
+When all had descended that were going, the trunks were put down, and
+then the boat pushed off, and the steamer resumed her voyage.[1]
+
+[Footnote 1: See Frontispiece.]
+
+The next morning, while at breakfast at the inn at Fort William,
+Grimkie proposed to his aunt that they should all make an excursion up
+the mountain.
+
+“Not to the top of it, Auntie,” said he, “but only so far as you find
+you will like to go. We will get a guide and set off together. We
+will ride to the foot of the mountain. Then we will begin to walk up.
+You shall go first and we will follow you, and we will not ask to go
+any farther than you like. We will go as slowly, and stop to rest as
+often, as you please; and then when we get high enough for a good view,
+we can turn about and come back again.”
+
+There could of course be no objection to so exceedingly reasonable a
+proposal as this, and Mrs. Morelle said at once that she should like
+to make an excursion up the mountain, on those conditions, very much
+indeed.
+
+“If I walk slowly,” said she, “I can walk two hours.”
+
+“That will take us up pretty high,” said Grimkie. “It only takes two
+hours and a half to get to the top. So you and Florence may get ready
+Auntie, and John and I will go down and see about a carriage and a
+guide.”
+
+The usual mode would have been for Grimkie to have rung the bell and
+called for Boots, and so have made the arrangement for the carriage and
+the guide through him. But there were some preparations that he wished
+to make secretly, and so he left his aunt and Florence, and went down
+to the coffee-room of the hotel. He took his seat there at one of the
+tables, near a window, and asked the waiter to send Boots in to him.
+
+When Boots came, Grimkie told him that they were going a little way up
+the mountain, and made an arrangement with him to have a dog-cart got
+ready immediately, to take them as far as they could go in a carriage,
+and also to engage a guide, and to send the guide in to the coffee-room
+to see him. In a few minutes the guide came.
+
+He was a nice tidy-looking young man, with a frank and good-humored
+countenance, and a broad Scotch accent in his speech. Grimkie explained
+the case to him.
+
+“We are going up the mountain a little way,” said Grimkie. “We want
+to go as far as we can, but my aunt is not used to climbing mountains
+much, and so we must go very slowly.”
+
+“Oh, aye,” said the guide, “the slower ye gang, the higher oop y’ell
+get.”
+
+The guide had had great experience with travelling parties attempting
+to ascend the mountain, and he had known many ladies to become tired
+and discouraged before reaching the top, just because they could not be
+contented to go slowly enough at the beginning.
+
+After some further discussion and consultation, the plan for the
+excursion was matured in all its details. The guide was to go forward
+on foot, carrying with him a supply of provisions which Grimkie was
+to have made ready, and to wait at the end of the carriage road until
+the party in the carriage should come up. The provisions—which the
+waiter at the coffee-room subsequently made ready under Grimkie’s
+directions—consisted of a bottle of coffee, another of milk, a cold
+roast chicken, some sandwiches, two buttered rolls, a little paper of
+salt, one plate, one knife, four forks, and a tumbler. All these the
+waiter packed carefully in two round wooden boxes, and put the boxes
+in a bag. That was the way he said that the guides liked to have their
+burdens packed.
+
+The bag thus arranged was to be put into the dog-cart, to be carried in
+that way as far the cart could go, with a view of being taken by the
+guide there, and carried by him over his shoulder for the rest of the
+ascent.
+
+When Grimkie had completed these arrangements he went up to his aunt’s
+room again, and there he found John who had gone up a moment before
+him, remonstrating in a somewhat urgent manner with Florence against
+a plan which she entertained of carrying a large guide book up the
+mountain, to press flowers in.
+
+“You can’t carry such a big book as that,” said John. “It’s ridiculous.
+We must have every thing as light as possible, in going up a mountain,
+Grimkie says so.”
+
+“But this is the only book I have got,” said Florence, “and I must take
+some book. It is very important for me to get some specimens from Ben
+Nevis, to carry home for souvenirs.”
+
+“Then you must bring them down in your hand,” said John. “We can’t
+possibly take such a big book as that; can we Grimkie?”
+
+“I will see about that presently,” said Grimkie. “Come with me, John. I
+want you to go somewhere.”
+
+So John laid down the big book and followed Grimkie down stairs.
+Grimkie led the way into the street.
+
+“Where are you going, Grimkie?” asked John.
+
+“I am going to see if I can find a bookseller,” said Grimkie. “But you
+should not contradict a young lady in that short way. That’s boyish.”
+
+“How boyish?” said John.
+
+“Why boys fly in their sisters’ faces in that way sometimes, but no
+gentleman ever does.”
+
+“But Grimkie,” said John, “it is perfectly ridiculous to think of
+carrying such a big book as that up a high mountain.”
+
+“That’s the very reason why you ought to be more gentle in setting her
+right,” replied Grimkie. “Do you think a lady likes to have it made to
+appear to her face that any thing she says or does is ridiculous?”
+
+“Then what shall I do?” asked John.
+
+“You must be more gentle,” said Grimkie. “A lady is like a steamboat;
+you can’t turn her short about, by a sudden twitch, when she is going
+wrong. You must bring her round by a sweep—in a grand circle—gently
+and gracefully. I’ll show you how.”
+
+By this time the boys arrived at the door of a small bookstore, and
+Grimkie immediately went in. John followed him. Grimkie asked a young
+woman who stood behind the counter if she had any blotting paper. She
+immediately produced half a quire, and Grimkie bought six sheets of it.
+These sheets he cut in two with a paper knife, and then after folding
+them, cut them again. He then folded them again, thus bringing them
+into a snug compass for carrying, that is, as the bookbinders would
+say, into an _octavo_ form. The paper as it was when he bought it, was
+in a folio form. After he had cut and folded it the first time, it was
+in a quarto form, and now after a second folding, by which means each
+sheet formed eight leaves, it was put into the octavo form. Another
+folding still, which would have made sixteen leaves to the sheet, would
+have produced what is called the sixteenmo form.
+
+Grimkie and John immediately returned to the hotel, carrying the paper
+with them. As soon as they arrived, Grimkie went to his room and took a
+small portfolio off his table. This portfolio was simply the cover of
+a blank book Grimkie had used at the Chateau for some of his exercises.
+When it was full and he had no further occasion to use it, he had cut
+out the inside neatly, in order to save the cover, which was quite a
+pretty one, being made of green morocco. He thought it would make a
+nice portfolio. He had accordingly stocked it with small note papers
+and envelopes, and had made it serve the purpose of a stationery case,
+for his travels.
+
+He now took out the note paper and his envelopes from it, and then
+compared the blotting-paper in its octavo form with the size of
+the cover. He found that by folding it once more, that is into the
+sixteenmo form, it would fit the cover very well. So he cut it open at
+the octavo folding, and then after folding it again he slipped it into
+the cover and went to find Florence.
+
+“Florence,” said he, “how do you think this will do to put your little
+flowers in up the mountain? It is made of blotting paper, and that is
+much better than the paper of books to press plants in, for it absorbs
+the moisture, and so dries the plants quicker, and that makes them
+preserve their colors better.”
+
+“That will be excellent,” said Florence, taking the book and looking at
+it with great interest. “But how did you know about that?”
+
+“Our professor of botany at the Chateau,” said Grimkie, “told us that
+it is better to have a book made of blotting paper. Only this book is
+not sewed. Could you sew it?”
+
+“I can sew it in a moment,” said Florence.
+
+“Then it will do nicely,” said Grimkie. “If you can sew the leaves
+together so as to make a book of them, then we can slip them into the
+book cover, and that will be all we shall want. I can carry it in my
+pocket. You see you don’t want large specimens. The smaller and more
+delicate they are the better. Our professor told us that.”
+
+“Your professor?” repeated Florence.
+
+“Yes,” replied Grimkie; “he lectured us about it. ‘Young gentlemen,’
+said he, ‘the mode of procedure is very different both in the selection
+of flowers and in the method of preserving them, according to the
+object you have in view, whether to procure botanical specimens for
+purposes of science, or souvenirs and tokens for purposes of sentiment
+and love.’”
+
+Grimkie repeated these words in a tone and manner imitative of a
+lecturer making a discourse before an audience, producing thus a very
+comical effect, so that both John and Florence laughed outright.
+
+“Oh, Grimkie!” exclaimed Florence.
+
+“I don’t believe he said any such things,” added John.
+
+“We verily did,” replied Grimkie. “‘Young gentlemen,’ said he, ‘when
+you have advanced a little farther along the verdant and flowery path
+of life, you will sometimes have occasion, in your various wanderings,
+to prepare plants and flowers as tokens of remembrance, or of other
+sentiments, or as souvenirs of travel. In such cases, gentlemen, select
+small and delicate specimens—of graceful forms and pretty colors.
+Press them till they are dry between leaves of blotting paper. If
+necessary, separate the leaves and stems so as to press and preserve
+them separately. You can recompose your flower afterward. Examine the
+specimens from time to time while they are drying, and see that the
+stems lie in natural and graceful curves, and that the leaves and
+petals are smooth, and fully extended. Then when they are thoroughly
+dry, arrange the parts anew, and gum them delicately upon a small piece
+of white paper, with a suitable inscription beneath, and enclose the
+paper in a tinted envelope of the right size to contain it,—and then
+when you present it to the Mary, or the Lucy, or the Ellen, for whom it
+is intended, she will perceive that you are a young gentleman of taste
+and skill, as well as of science.’”
+
+Grimkie finished this recitation of a portion of the professor’s
+lecture with such an air of mock gravity, that Florence and John both
+laughed louder than ever.
+
+“Oh, Grimkie!” said John, “did the professor really say that?”
+
+“Yes,” said Grimkie, “and we all clapped him.”
+
+“It seems to me you have pretty funny doings at the Chateau, Grimkie,”
+said Florence.
+
+“We do sometimes,” said Grimkie. “But hark!” he added, “I thought I
+heard wheels coming. No they are not coming yet, but we must not waste
+any more time. We must get ready. The dog-cart will be here very soon.”
+
+“Good!” said John, at the same time cutting a caper, to express his joy.
+
+“But what kind of dogs will they be?” he added, turning to Grimkie.
+“Will they be Esquimaux dogs?”
+
+“There they come,” said Grimkie; “run to the window and see.”
+
+John supposed that a dog-cart was a cart made to be _drawn_ by dogs.
+In this idea he was greatly mistaken, a dog-cart being made to _carry_
+dogs, and not to be drawn by them. It is quite a curious vehicle,
+having its origin in the wish of sportsmen to provide some means
+of transporting their dogs, as well as themselves and their guns,
+when going into the field, so that the dogs may be fresh and in good
+condition for their work, when they arrive there.
+
+It is a very handsomely made vehicle, in the form of a cart. The seat
+is double, there being places for two persons to sit on the front
+part, facing the horse, and two directly behind them, with their backs
+against those of the first two. Underneath this double seat is a box
+or recess, for the dogs. The lid which shuts this box, is behind, and
+is made to open down in such a manner that when it is opened it is
+sustained by a support which holds it in nearly a horizontal position,
+where it forms a foot-board for the two persons riding behind to rest
+their feet upon.
+
+The children were all very much interested in examining the form and
+construction of the dog-cart when they went down to the door. The
+coachman took the right hand front seat. Mrs. Morelle took the other
+front seat. John and Florence and Grimkie took the seat behind, where
+they were so much crowded at first, that John said he had a great mind
+to play that he was a pointer or a setter, and crawl into the box
+below.
+
+After having been shaken together a little while by the jolting of the
+carriage—for a dog-cart moves, even upon a smooth road, with a very
+jerking and jolting motion—they found themselves quite comfortable,
+and they had a very amusing ride.
+
+When they reached the end of the carriage-road, they found a guide
+there ready for them. He took the bag containing the provisions, from
+the fore part of the dog-cart where the coachman had put it, and threw
+it over his shoulder, in such a manner that one of the boxes hung down
+before him, and the other behind. The coachman then took the dog-cart
+to a farmer’s near by, to put up the horse, to wait until the party
+returned, while the guide, followed by his party, commenced his ascent
+of the mountain.
+
+The path was very good, although rather rugged and steep, but the
+country was open, there being in general no trees, but only furze,
+broom, whinbushes, and other such shrubs as grow upon the Scottish
+Highlands. Grimkie wished very much that his aunt should ascend to the
+top of the mountain, but he knew very well that the only hope of her
+being able to do so, must depend upon their going very slowly at first.
+John and Florence who both felt very fresh and agile, were eager to
+press forward, but Grimkie kept them back, stopping continually to
+gather flowers, and to look back at the prospect. Whenever he found
+a flat stone with a smooth and clear surface, he persuaded his aunt
+to sit down, and when she was once seated, he detained her as long as
+possible, by talking with her, and amusing her mind with the objects
+around her. Then he would point to the next elevation above, and ask
+his aunt if she thought she could go up to it; and she would say, “Oh,
+yes! I am not tired at all yet.”
+
+In this way the party sauntered along for more than three hours,
+advancing all the time, but in a slow and unconcerned manner, without
+thought or care, as if they were out for a walk, without any definite
+plan in respect to the end of the excursion. At last, however, about
+noon, Mrs. Morelle took out her watch, and expressed surprise to find
+how late it was, and said that it was time for her to begin to think
+about going home.
+
+“Look up there, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “where that shepherd is standing
+with his dog. There must be a grand lookout from there. Let us go up
+as high as that, and there we will have our luncheon, and then, if you
+please, we will set out for home.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle made no objection to going up to the point which Grimkie
+had indicated, and they soon attained it. Here they found a spring of
+water coming out from under a great rock. Grimkie brought some flat
+stones and made seats for the party in a shady and sheltered place, and
+then the guide opened the bag and took out the provisions. Mrs. Morelle
+was quite surprised to see so abundant a supply of provisions coming to
+view.
+
+“I did not know that we were going to have even a luncheon on the
+mountain,” said she, “and here you have got enough, almost, for a
+dinner.”
+
+The party remained at the spring for more than half an hour, and then
+Mrs. Morelle found herself so much refreshed by the chicken and the
+sandwiches, and especially by the tumbler of cold coffee which Grimkie
+mixed for her, that she said she was almost inclined to go on farther;
+and when the guide told her that an hour more of easy walking would
+bring her to the very top, she said she had half a mind to try to go
+there.
+
+“Do you think I could do it, Grimkie?” said she.
+
+Grimkie said it was a great thing for a lady to get to the top of Ben
+Nevis, but if she felt strong enough to try it, he should like it very
+much indeed. She might go on for half an hour more at any rate, and
+then if she felt tired she could turn.
+
+Mrs. Morelle determined to follow this suggestion, and the result was,
+that she persevered until she reached the top.
+
+The wind blew very fresh and cool upon the summit, and the party could
+not remain there long. While they did remain, however, they were filled
+with wonder and delight at the extent and sublime magnificence of the
+view. The mountains lay all around them, clothed with a velvet-like
+covering of the softest green, and between them lay an endless number
+and variety of lakes and rivers—all sleeping apparently in the
+sun—and green fields, and pretty villages, and charming glens, in
+endless variety.
+
+After remaining upon the mountain for about fifteen minutes, they all
+set out upon their return. They of course came down the path very
+easily, and getting into the dog-cart, when they reached the foot of
+the descent, they were driven very rapidly back to the inn.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE CALEDONIAN CANAL.
+
+
+The route of the steamer from the foot of Ben Nevis to Inverness,
+lies along a remarkable chain of lakes, that occupy a long and narrow
+valley extending through the very heart of Scotland, in a direction
+from southwest to northeast, and reaching from the base of Ben Nevis to
+Inverness. The line of these lakes is easily to be seen upon the map.
+In a state of nature the lakes were connected by rapid streams flowing
+from the center lake, which is the highest, down through the others
+each way to the sea. But though the lakes themselves were navigable,
+the streams were not. Many years ago, however, as has already been
+intimated, deep channels were cut along these streams, and locks made
+whereever there was an ascent or descent, so as to form a navigable
+communication through the whole distance, which received the name of
+the Caledonian canal.
+
+Mrs. Morelle and her party, remained a day or two at the foot of Ben
+Nevis, taking little excursions in the environs, and exploring for
+a few miles, in various directions, the glens which open around the
+mountain. On the morning of the third day, they took the steamer again,
+at a place called Banavie, where there was a large and beautiful hotel,
+standing almost by itself in a wild and beautiful place, and surrounded
+by gardens and ornamental grounds. A great many of the best inns and
+hotels in Scotland, stand thus in secluded places, entirely apart from
+the towns, being intended altogether for the accommodation of tourists
+journeying for pleasure, and being placed accordingly in the localities
+where it is supposed to be most convenient or most agreeable for such
+travellers to stop.
+
+By having rested from the steamer two days, the children were well
+prepared to return to it again, and they had a delightful passage
+along the canal. Sometimes they found themselves sailing in a very
+narrow channel which had been excavated artificially, to connect one
+lake with another. Next they would come to a chain of locks, by means
+of which the steamer was to be raised up, or let down, from one level
+to another; and while the lockmen were engaged in this operation,
+which always required some time, the passengers would step out upon
+the embankment, and ramble about the neighborhood, or walk on to the
+next lock, with a view of getting on board again when the steamer came
+to it. Then at length, suddenly the steamer would emerge from the
+narrow and artificial channel into one of the lakes, and would glide
+swiftly on from one end of it to the other, between the lofty ranges of
+mountains which bordered it on either hand.
+
+In all cases, the course of the steamer was so near to the shore, that
+all the features of the scenery could be very distinctly seen, and it
+was an endless source of amusement to the children to watch the changes
+which were continually taking place, and to explore every hidden recess
+of the landscape, and examine every detail with the glass. They saw the
+sheep feeding on the mountain sides, watched by the shepherd and his
+dog, and the cottages, with Highland children, dressed in the kilt,
+playing at the doors, and now and then an elegant travelling carriage
+moving along the road at the margin of the water.
+
+There were a great many mists and clouds floating over the mountain
+tops, and these increased toward the middle of the day. For a time
+the effect of these clouds was only to add an additional feature of
+grandeur to the scenery, by the magnificent forms which the stupendous
+masses of vapor assumed on the summits of the mountain chains, and the
+mysterious and solemn gloom which they seemed to impart to the deep
+valleys, by hanging over them in heavy folds, like those of a curtain,
+and diffusing through the recesses which they half concealed, a dark
+and impenetrable gloom. Florence said that she could not decide whether
+she liked the mountains best when full in view, or when half covered
+with clouds.
+
+“Nor I,” said Grimkie. “Only it is raining from some of those clouds.
+All I am afraid of is, that one of them may come and rain upon us.”
+
+Grimkie’s fears were destined to be realized. In a short time it
+began to rain upon the deck of the steamer. Some of the passengers,
+especially the ladies, hastily gathering up their maps, and guide
+books, and travelling bags, went below. Others drew themselves into as
+compact a mass as possible, and spreading an umbrella over their heads,
+kept their seats. Some gentlemen put on India rubber coats, which they
+seemed to have ready at hand, and went on walking up and down the deck
+just as before. One of the men belonging on board the steamer came up
+from below, and took up all the cushions which were not in use, and
+carried them down. He also gathered together all books, bags, shawls
+and other such things as any of the passengers had left exposed, and
+putting them upon the end of a seat he covered them with a tarpaulin.
+He also gathered together all the camp-stools which were not in use,
+and put them under cover.
+
+Mrs. Morelle went below as soon as the first drops of the shower began
+to fall, leaving the children to remain if they chose. Grimkie found a
+place which was in a good degree sheltered from the wind and rain, and
+there, placing Florence upon one camp-stool in the middle, and John
+upon another at the side of her, while he took his place upon the other
+side, and then after spreading a large travelling shawl, or rug as the
+English call it, over their knees, and tucking it in well all around,
+he opened his umbrella, which was very large, and looking out from
+under it at the shower, he said,
+
+“Now let it rain.”
+
+For some time the children seemed to enjoy the scene and the novelty of
+their situation, but before long they began to get tired, and at length
+they determined to avail themselves of the first opportunity, when the
+rain should slacken a little, to go below.
+
+“I have got something for us to do there,” said Grimkie. “We shall get
+the benefit of Mr. Twig’s advice.”
+
+“Who is Mr. Twig?” asked Florence.
+
+“He is the gentleman on board the steamer,” replied Grimkie, “that told
+me about travelling in Scotland. He said that one of the most important
+things, was to provide plenty of employment for rainy days. It rained,
+he said, in Scotland about half the time.”
+
+“Oh, Grimkie!” exclaimed John.
+
+“Among the Highlands, he meant,” said Grimkie. “He said that the
+Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic Ocean, and the Highlands and islands of
+Scotland formed one great distilling apparatus. The Gulf of Mexico was
+the boiler, and the mountains in Scotland the condenser.
+
+“But come,” added Grimkie, interrupting himself, “it does not rain much
+just this moment. Let us go below.”
+
+So they rose from their seats, and taking every thing with them they
+hurried along the deck to the companion-way and went below.
+
+They found a very pretty cabin, handsomely carpeted, with four long
+tables in it, two on each side, and cushioned seats behind them. There
+was also a row of small windows, with sliding sashes, above, from which
+they could look out over the water. Groups of passengers were sitting
+here and there at the tables. Some were looking over their maps and
+guide books, and others were lounging on the seats with a listless air,
+as if they had had no one to forewarn them, as Mr. Twig had done for
+Grimkie, of the necessity of providing work for rainy days.
+
+Grimkie found seats for his party at one of the tables. He placed his
+aunt and Florence at the back side of it, upon one of the cushioned
+seats, and set camp-stools for himself and John in front. He then went
+for his knapsack.
+
+This knapsack Grimkie always kept with him in travelling. He bought
+it in Liverpool. It was made of morocco, of a bronze-green color, and
+was provided with a strap which was arranged in such a way that the
+knapsack could be suspended from the shoulder, or carried in the hand
+like a bag. In it Grimkie carried his portfolio, his writing apparatus,
+Mrs. Morelle’s opera-glass, the map, the guide book, and other such
+things as it was necessary to have always at hand.
+
+When he had brought the knapsack he laid it down upon the table, and as
+soon as he had taken his seat, he opened it and took out his portfolio,
+containing Florence’s flowers.
+
+“Ah!” said Florence, “here are my flowers.”
+
+Grimkie had collected a large number of delicate Alpine flowers,
+for Florence, during their ascent of Ben Nevis, and had put them all
+carefully between the leaves of the blotting paper book, which he had
+made for her. On the evening of the same day, on his return from the
+mountain, he had looked over all these flowers and rearranged them. In
+doing this, he cut off with the point of a pair of scissors, all the
+superfluous parts, smoothed out the little leaves, bent the stems into
+graceful forms, and put them into fresh places between the leaves. When
+he had done all this, he placed the book under a small piece of board
+which he found in the yard of the hotel, and put the whole beneath one
+of the legs of the bedstead in his room, which of course subjected the
+book, and the plants between the leaves of it, to a heavy pressure.
+
+The next morning, when the party were about to leave the hotel, Grimkie
+took out the book, and after winding a long tape round it a great many
+times, and tying the ends, he crowded some wedges in on both sides,
+between the tape and book covers. This produced a pressure upon the
+plants which, though not so great as before, was sufficient at this
+stage of the process.
+
+It was this book, thus tied up and wedged, that Grimkie now took out
+from his knapsack.
+
+“That’s a nice way to press the flowers,” said Florence.
+
+“Yes,” replied Grimkie, “only the sides of the book are not stiff
+enough to wedge against. I ought to have two thin pieces of board, just
+the size of the book covers, to put upon them, one on each side.”
+
+Grimkie opened the book and looked at the flowers. They were pressed
+very nicely, and the colors of the flowers were well preserved. He
+also took out from his knapsack some sheets of white note paper, which
+he proceeded to fold into quarters and then to cut them open at the
+foldings with a knife, so as to make a number of little sheets of paper
+of about the size and shape of visiting cards, each one, however,
+having, like the original sheet of note paper, two leaves. He gave
+these to Florence as fast as he made them, that she might trim the
+edges with her scissors. These sheets were to gum the little flowers
+upon.
+
+He also took from his knapsack, a small bottle of gum arabic. This
+bottle was very small, being not much bigger than a large thimble, and
+it was very strong, so as not to be in any danger of breaking, by being
+carried in a knapsack.
+
+Grimkie took out the cork from this bottle, and then proceeded
+to select from his stock of flowers, two or three of different
+kinds, such as could be arranged together prettily in the form of a
+bouquet. These he proceeded to gum upon one of his little sheets of
+paper. He would take out a very small quantity of the dissolved gum
+arabic,—which was very thick,—being of about the consistence of
+honey, and then touch a very little of it, delicately at different
+points on the under side of the flower. Then he would lay down the
+flower upon the inside page of one of his little sheets of note paper,
+taking care to place it in exactly the position in which he meant it to
+lie.
+
+Presently Florence and John after seeing how Grimkie managed the work,
+undertook it themselves, each selecting flowers from among those which
+had been pressed, and gumming them upon the paper. In this manner, in
+the course of half an hour, quite a number of very pretty specimens
+were prepared.
+
+The flowers were in all cases gummed upon what may be called the third
+page of the little sheet of note paper: that is, upon the right hand
+page of the second leaf, on the inside. The first leaf then, when laid
+down, covered and protected the flower.
+
+“When we stop at the next hotel,” said Grimkie, “we will write upon
+these little sheets what the flowers are, and where they come from,
+and then put them all up for you Florence in a package, and so when you
+get back to America you can distribute them among your friends.”
+
+Just at this time the attention of the whole party was suddenly
+attracted to a gleam of sunshine, which came in through one of the
+windows and fell upon the floor. John immediately abandoned every thing
+and hurried away to go on deck. Grimkie after putting all his apparatus
+carefully away in his knapsack, followed him, saying to his aunt and
+Florence that he would come back in a moment and tell them whether it
+was dry enough for them to come up too.
+
+In a few minutes Grimkie came down and said that the steamer was going
+to stop pretty soon in a certain place on the border of the lake, in
+order to allow the passengers to go on shore to see a waterfall.
+
+“To see a waterfall!” exclaimed Mrs. Morelle. “I never heard of such a
+thing as a steamer’s stopping for the passengers to see a waterfall.
+You don’t mean that she is going to wait for us.”
+
+“Yes, Auntie,” said Grimkie. “That is it. She is going to wait here
+while we go up and see it, and then come back. It is only a little way.”
+
+“Let us go, then, by all means,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+Mrs. Morelle decided to go at once, without stopping to make any
+inquiries. Cases of this kind often occur in which an experienced
+traveller is safe in taking things upon trust, without making
+inquiries. Mrs. Morelle saw at a glance that a steamer would not stop
+for such a purpose unless the fall was really remarkable, and well
+worthy the attention of the tourists on board, nor without having
+proper arrangements made, in respect to guides, paths, and all other
+necessary facilities for going to and from the place. So when, on
+ascending to the deck, she found the ladies and gentlemen generally
+preparing to go on shore, she determined at once to join them,
+especially as it was plain that there was no time for obtaining any
+information, as the steamer was now close to the pier.
+
+It was a small pier, projecting out a little way from the shore, in a
+very wild and solitary place.
+
+The mountain-side rose quite abruptly from the surface of the water,
+half covered with forests, and there was no town, nor even any house in
+sight. There was nothing but a small building at the end of the pier
+near which a kind of cab, or short omnibus without any covering over
+it, was standing.
+
+The steamer was soon made fast and the passengers went on shore. Most
+of them began at once to walk up a road which was seen ascending in a
+diagonal manner through the trees. Some of the ladies were getting into
+the cab.
+
+“Auntie,” said Grimkie. “They are going to ride up. You had better ride
+too.”
+
+“How far is it?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“I don’t know at all,” said Grimkie. “Only it must be far enough to
+ride, or else they would not have a carriage.”
+
+This reasoning seemed very conclusive, but Mrs. Morelle turned to a
+gentleman who was walking near her with a lady upon his arm, and asked
+him if he knew how far it was to the fall.
+
+“No madam,” said he with a smile, “we don’t know any thing about it. We
+are only following the multitude.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle might perhaps have asked half or two thirds of the whole
+company without receiving any other answer than this.
+
+“I think you had better ride, Auntie,” said Grimkie. “That will be the
+safest way.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle acceded to this proposal and Grimkie helped her into the
+cab, and then he followed Florence and John up the road.
+
+The road was a most excellent one. It was not very wide, but it was
+perfectly made, and the borders of it on each side were finished as
+nicely as if it had been a walk in a gentleman’s private grounds.
+The land was very steep, both above and below it, and the slopes were
+covered with forest trees. The road ascended in a zigzag direction, in
+long reaches, though the children soon came to places where there were
+short cuts by a foot-path from one angle of the road to another, which
+they found that most of the people who were walking took, and so they
+took them too.
+
+They went on in this way for nearly half an hour, ascending all
+the time, and at length they seemed to have left the carriage road
+altogether. At last, however, they came out into it again at a place
+where they could hear the roar of the waterfall in a deep ravine below
+them. The tourists seemed to find out by some sort of instinct that
+this was the place where the carriage was to come, and so those who had
+ladies in the carriage stopped here, to wait for the carriage to come
+up, while the others began to go down a steep zigzag path which led
+into the ravine.
+
+“We will wait here,” said Grimkie, “until Auntie comes.”
+
+It was not long before the carriage came, and all the ladies who had
+rode up in it got out. They then all began to go down the zigzag path
+into the ravine. The scenery in the chasm was grand beyond description.
+The path, as it changed its direction at the different turns, brought
+continually new portions of the vast chasm into view, and revealed
+awful depths which it made one dizzy to look down into. At the same
+time the thundering of the cataract, reverberating from the rocky
+precipices which formed the sides of the chasm filled the air with a
+deafening sound.
+
+At length the path came to an end on a pinnacle of rock, where there
+was room for only one or two to stand at a time, and where the fall
+itself was in full view. It was an immense torrent coming down through
+a vast fissure in the rocks above, and falling with the noise of
+thunder, eighty or ninety feet, into an awful abyss below.
+
+It was fearful to stand upon the dizzy pinnacle where the path
+terminated, and attempt to look down into the gulf half hidden by mist
+and spray into which the cataract descended. Only one or two could
+stand there at a time, and the visitors were consequently obliged to
+take turns. Mrs. Morelle allowed the children to go, one at a time,
+while she held them nervously to prevent their falling, and right glad
+she was when they all had seen it and she could go away.
+
+The company lingered a little while at the different turns of the path
+to look down into the chasm. It was of a very irregular form, and it
+presented new and striking aspects at every new point of view. It was
+very impressive to survey the precipitous rocks, the trees clinging to
+the crevices on the sides, and the foaming torrents forcing their way
+furiously through the devious and rocky channels at an immense depth
+below.
+
+After a time all the passengers had ascended to the place where the
+carriage had been left. The ladies who had rode up took their places in
+it again, and began to descend the hill by the road, while the rest of
+the party went down more rapidly by the short cuts which the foot-path
+followed.
+
+Grimkie waited at the bottom until the carriage came down, and then,
+after helping his aunt to descend, and paying the driver of the
+carriage the shilling fare, they all went together again on board the
+steamer.
+
+The name of this cataract is the Fall of Foyers. It is on the shore
+of Loch Ness, the last of the lakes which lie on the line of the
+Caledonian canal; and not many hours from the time of resuming the
+voyage, after visiting the fall, the steamer arrived at its destination
+at Inverness.
+
+As the party went into the town from the place of debarkation, they
+all gazed about them with great curiosity and interest. They saw the
+river Ness flowing rapidly along between green and beautiful banks,
+and a long and massive stone bridge leading across it, and a grand
+looking castle on the brow of a hill bordering the town overlooking the
+river, and a compact mass of grey stone houses, ancient and venerable
+in appearance, but snug, tidy, and all in excellent order. Nothing
+was imperfect or unfinished. There was no building going on, nor any
+improvements of any kind in progress. Florence said it looked as if
+the town had been completed fifty years before, and that thenceforth
+nothing had been done, and nothing was ever to be done but to keep
+everything in it in the nicest order.
+
+There were the neatest and prettiest little graveled roads extending
+along the banks of the river on either side, which promised to be
+charming walks, and ornamented grounds here and there which seemed to
+be open to the public, and high craggy summits of hills seen in the
+environs that Grimkie said he must ascend. On the whole the aspect of
+the town and of its environs was charming. But the party could only get
+occasional glimpses of the view, for they were driven along rapidly in
+their carriage, and at length stopped in the middle of a street, at
+the door of a very snug, compact, and quiet-looking hotel, called the
+Union Hotel. Grimkie had chosen it from its name, partly on account
+of the American associations connected with that word, and partly for
+the sake of variety. The other principal hotel in the town was the
+Caledonian; and as it was the Caledonian canal on which they had been
+travelling all day, Grimkie said it would make an agreeable change, he
+thought, to take some other name for the hotel.
+
+After the party became settled at the hotel, John, on reflecting
+upon the name, wondered at first that one of so peculiarly American
+a meaning should be given to an inn in so remote a part of Scotland.
+He concluded that it must have been given out of compliment to the
+Americans, in hopes of attracting their custom; just as he had seen
+“New York Hotel” at Glasgow. He at length ventured to ask a respectable
+looking gentleman who was standing at the door what the name denoted.
+The gentleman answered him as follows, in broad Scotch:
+
+“It is joost to commemorate the union of the two kingdoms of England
+and Scotland,” said he. “Ye ken that in former days they were separate
+altogether, but at length by marriages and intermarriages atween the
+twa royal hooses, they baith descended to the same heir, who was James
+Sixth of Scotland and First of England. But still the twa kingdoms
+were separate, each with its own parliament and its own laws, although
+they were ruled over by one and the same king. This was found in the
+end not to be convenient, and so finally an act of union was passed by
+which the twa realms themselves were moulded and merged into ane, with
+ane only parliament at London to make laws for the whole. This was the
+famous union, and ye will larn all aboot it, when ye get a little older
+and study Scottish history.”
+
+On hearing this, John went in and told Grimkie that he had missed it in
+coming to that hotel, for the union of it was not the American Union at
+all.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+THE VITRIFIED FORT.
+
+
+The party arrived at the hotel about the middle of the afternoon. After
+getting somewhat settled in their rooms, Grimkie ordered dinner at five
+o’clock, and then, while Mrs. Morelle and Florence were occupied in
+their chamber, he and John went out to take a walk.
+
+They spent their time during their walk in rambling along the principal
+streets of the town, occupying themselves with looking at the curious
+dresses of the people, hearing the little children talk broad Scotch in
+their play, and examining the objects displayed in the shop windows.
+Many of these objects were very curious, especially the bracelets, and
+pins, and brooches, made of Scotch pebbles, many of which were of the
+most singular forms, being made after the fashion of the different
+clans of Highlanders, as they wore them in ancient times.
+
+“You may depend upon it my mother will buy some of these pins,” said
+John.
+
+There were also a number of curious articles made of wood painted in
+tartan, according to the fashion of the different clans, such as boxes,
+card-cases, needle-books, pen-holders, paper-folders, and many other
+such things.
+
+When the time drew near which had been appointed for dinner, the boys
+went home, and very soon after they arrived the dinner was brought in.
+While they were at table, Grimkie asked his aunt, whether she was not
+glad, so far, that she had come.
+
+“Yes,” said she, “very glad indeed. We have had a delightful voyage
+among the mountains and lakes, but I feel tired and I have a great idea
+of going into lodgings here for a week to rest and recruit.”
+
+“Oh, mother!” exclaimed Florence, “we have not had anything to tire
+us. We have had nothing to do but to sit quietly on the deck of the
+steamer, and look at the scenery.”
+
+“It is not my body that is tired,” said Mrs. Morelle, “but my mind. I
+have been continually wondering and admiring for four or five days,
+and I am tired of wondering and admiring. I want to be quiet a little
+while, to rest my mind, and get ready to begin again. And the best way
+to do that is to go into lodgings. I see lodgings to let on several of
+the houses along the street.”
+
+The English system in respect to accommodations for strangers at
+private houses, as well as that of the hotels, is entirely different
+from the usage which prevails in America. Instead of boarding houses,
+they have what is called lodging houses. In one of these houses, the
+party travelling, if they wish to remain some days in any place, and
+to spend the time in a more quiet and domestic way than by remaining
+at a hotel, take apartments and keep house, precisely as if they were
+in their own home. After looking at the different rooms, and hearing
+the prices of each, they select as many as they require, and take
+possession of them, paying so much a day for them. The price which they
+pay for the rooms, includes the necessary service, and the _cooking_ of
+the food, but not the purchase of it. The lodger may either purchase
+the food for himself, going to the market for it every day, just as
+if he were keeping house at home, or he may request the landlady to
+purchase it for him. In case he adopts the latter plan, the landlady
+keeps an account of what she expends, and brings him in the bill every
+morning.
+
+In a word, at an English lodging house a lady stopping to rest for a
+week, finds herself keeping house, just as if she were at home, with an
+experienced, capable, and motherly woman to act as her housekeeper,
+and to do every thing that she requires. She can arrange the expenses
+too just as she pleases, for every thing except the price of the rooms,
+which is agreed upon beforehand, is under her immediate control.
+
+English ladies when they take lodgings in this way, usually go out
+themselves to the grocers and to the markets, to purchase their
+provisions and supplies—but American ladies, not being so well
+acquainted with English marketing, usually give the landlady a
+memorandum in the morning of what they would like during the day, and
+the landlady then makes the purchases.
+
+In addition to the domestic quiet and repose which the traveller
+obtains by taking lodgings, when he wishes to remain in any town for
+several days, there is a great advantage in the arrangement, in point
+of economy. The expense is only from one-third to one-half, for the
+same rooms and style of living, at the lodging-houses of what it costs
+at the hotels.
+
+Mrs. Morelle had often experienced the advantage of stopping
+occasionally for a week, and going into lodgings, when she had been
+travelling in Europe before. But the children knew nothing about the
+system. They were, however, always ready for any new plan which was
+proposed, and in coming into Inverness they had seen so much to
+attract their attention that they were perfectly willing to remain
+there a week. So it was determined that they should remain at the hotel
+that night, and the next morning go and look out for lodgings.
+
+But the next morning Mrs. Morelle found herself so well rested, by a
+good night’s sleep that she began to feel inclined to go on.
+
+“The next portion of our journey is by the stage-coach, Grimkie, is it
+not?” said she.
+
+Grimkie said that it was. They were to go by a circuitous route,
+following the indentations of the shore to Wick, and there to wait for
+the Edinburgh steamer.
+
+“And I believe,” said Grimkie, “that the steamer only goes once a week,
+and it touches at Wick every Friday night, at midnight.”
+
+“At midnight,” repeated Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“Yes, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “but that will not make any difference. It
+will be as light as day.”
+
+“That will be funny,” said John.
+
+“Let us send for Boots,” said Mrs. Morelle, “and ascertain exactly how
+it is.”
+
+So Grimkie rang the bell and asked the waiter to send up Boots, and
+when he came they obtained from him all the necessary information.
+He said that the coach left Inverness every evening at eight
+o’clock—that it travelled all night—that about two o’clock it crossed
+a wide ferry called the Mickle Ferry—a mile wide—that it arrived at
+Wick about ten o’clock on the following day, and that the steamer would
+arrive from Edinburgh in the course of Friday night, and they would
+have to go on board early on Saturday morning.
+
+The children were all very much pleased to learn that they were to ride
+in the stage-coach all night, and even Mrs. Morelle did not object to
+it on the whole. She concluded, however, not to remain at Inverness,
+as she had at first intended, but to go directly on as far as Wick. It
+was on Wednesday, when the party arrived at Inverness, and in order to
+be in time for the steamer of that week, it would be necessary to leave
+that very evening, and this she determined to do.
+
+“And then,” said she, “when we arrive at Wick, in case the weather is
+favorable we will go on board the steamer and accomplish our voyage.
+If it is not favorable then we can go into lodgings and spend our week
+there.”
+
+“Yes, Auntie,” said Grimkie, “John and I will like that very much,
+for then we can see the fishing boats go out and come in. Wick is the
+greatest place in the world for the herring fishery. The guide book
+says there are fifteen hundred large fishing boats that belong there.”
+
+The plan being thus arranged, Grimkie and John went to the coach to
+“book” as they called it, for Wick. They were very desirous, of taking
+outside seats for themselves, and inside seats, which are much dearer,
+for the two ladies; but Mrs. Morelle was afraid to have the boys sit
+outside all night, for fear that they might get asleep and fall off.
+So she requested them to take the four inside seats for the party,
+promising that if there was room outside, and the coachman had no
+objection, they should ride there a part of the time.
+
+Accordingly, Grimkie went to the coach office, and took all the four
+inside seats and paid the fare. The clerk said that the travellers must
+be at the office, with their luggage at a quarter before eight.
+
+When the two boys returned to the hotel, they found a large open
+carriage before the door, and Mrs. Morelle and Florence preparing to
+take a drive around the environs of Inverness to see the scenery. Mrs.
+Morelle invited the two boys to join the party, which invitation they
+were of course very ready to accept. Grimkie proposed, too that, in
+the course of the ride the carriage should stop at the foot of Craig
+Phadric, and that they should all go up and see the remains of a
+vitrified fort that he said existed there.
+
+In furtherance of this suggestion, he opened one of his books and read
+an account of the vitrified forts.
+
+These forts are objects of great curiosity to tourists and
+antiquarians. They exist in various parts of the country, and are so
+ancient that not only all records, but even all traditions of their
+origin is lost. They are referred to in the very earliest accounts
+of the country that exist, as ruins and remains exhibiting the same
+appearance then as they now present, and enveloped in the same mystery
+in respect to their origin.
+
+There are a great many of these old forts in different parts of the
+country, and the thing which chiefly characterizes them, and the one
+from which they derive their name, is that the stones of which the
+walls are composed instead of being cemented together by mortar, are
+fused, or vitrified, as if by the action of great heat, into one
+continuous mass. It is not possible to ascertain the exact nature
+of this vitrification, for the walls of these forts have nearly
+disappeared, leaving only long ridges of ruins, covered in the main
+with earth, and turfed over; and in many cases immense trees are
+growing upon them. Portions of the old walls, however, appear here and
+there above the ground, and by a little digging they may be uncovered
+at any point along the line, when the stones, melted together, are
+brought to view.
+
+A great many different suppositions have been advanced by antiquarians
+to account for the origin of these works. Some suppose that they were
+erected in times before the use of cement was known, and that the
+people of those days resorted to this mode of consolidating their
+masonry, not knowing any other. They think that they laid up the wall
+first in the usual way, selecting such stones as would vitrify by heat,
+and then built immense fires against them, and kept up the heat by
+replenishing the fires continually until the effect was produced.
+
+It has been supposed that in order to concentrate the heat, and
+economize fuel, the builders were accustomed to build a second wall
+outside the first, and very near it, leaving only interval enough for
+the fuel to be laid in.
+
+It must be confessed, however, that some persons who have examined
+these remains, have suggested that perhaps the vitrification was not
+produced purposely at all, but was an accidental effect, resulting
+from the building of great beacon fires on the hills where the forts
+stand, perhaps long after the forts themselves fell to ruin. It is
+a fact that the vitrified forts are generally situated on commanding
+elevations. It is also a well-known fact that in ancient times it was
+the universal custom, in all this region, to extend the alarm through
+the country in case of war, by immense beacon fires built upon the
+hills; and it has been suggested accordingly, that it might have been
+in some accidental way like this, and not by any special design and
+process of art, that the vitrification was produced.
+
+Grimkie had read accounts of these forts in the different books that
+he had consulted, and was very desirous of visiting one of them. He
+was influenced in this desire, not only by a wish to see the fort, but
+he also wished to procure a specimen of the stones fused together to
+carry home, and add to the museum at the Chateau. And thus it was that
+he proposed to his aunt, when they were getting into the carriage to go
+and take their ride, that they should drive first to the foot of Craig
+Phadric, and so go up and see the fort.
+
+“How high is Craig Phadric?” asked Mrs. Morelle. “Is it as high as Ben
+Nevis?”
+
+“Oh no, Auntie,” replied Grimkie. “It is only two or three hundred feet
+high.”
+
+“Because I don’t feel quite able to undertake a second Ben Nevis just
+yet,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“It will be nothing like Ben Nevis, Auntie,” said Grimkie. “They never
+would make a fortification on such a mountain as that. Besides you
+will not be obliged to go any farther than you like. If we find it too
+steep, or too high, we can turn back again at any time.”
+
+“Ah!” replied Mrs. Morelle, laughing, “that is the way you got me up to
+the top of Ben Nevis, by pretending that I could turn about whenever I
+pleased.”
+
+“Oh no, Auntie! I did not _pretend_,” said Grimkie. “You really _could_
+turn about whenever you pleased. I think I was very honest about it.
+Though I confess I hoped all the time that you would get to the top.”
+
+“Yes,” said Mrs. Morelle, “you were honest, and I am very glad that you
+managed as you did, and that it ended in my going to the top of the
+mountain. And we will go to Craig Phadric now. I won’t promise to go
+up, but on the way you shall tell us about the vitrified fort, as you
+call it, that we are to see there.”
+
+So they all got into the carriage, and directed the coachman to drive
+to the foot of the Craig Phadric.
+
+On the way Grimkie gave his aunt an account of the particulars in
+respect to vitrified forts, which have been stated above. His aunt
+was very much interested in what he said, having never heard of the
+vitrified forts before. She became still more interested in the idea
+of making the ascent, when she came to see the hill itself, which was
+in full view as the carriage crossed the bridge. It was a high hill,
+well wooded except upon one side, where the rocks were exposed to view,
+naked and precipitous.
+
+After ascending by a winding road for some time, the coachman stopped
+the horses near a small farm house, close under the hill, and on
+getting down from the carriage the party saw a small path leading
+through the woods up the ascent. They took this path and after
+following it for about ten minutes through various meanderings and
+windings they found themselves upon the summit.
+
+Here the remains of the fort lay before them, though they were all
+somewhat disappointed in the appearance of them. They had expected
+to see some solid walls with the outside surface of them fused into
+a black and glass-like slag. Instead of this, however, there were
+only long embankments of earth, forming an immense parallelogram
+which occupied the whole top of the hill. These embankments as well
+as various detached mounds which were connected with them in various
+places in the form of outworks, were almost entirely grassed over,
+and from the firm and compact turf which enveloped them, immense trees
+were growing everywhere. Indeed, the whole of the ground occupied by
+the fort was covered with a forest of ancient and venerable-looking
+trees, the effect of which was to impart an air of strange solitude
+and solemnity to the scene, which made it extremely impressive. Mrs.
+Morelle said that though she was a little disappointed in what she saw,
+she was far more than repaid by what she _felt_, in walking over the
+ruins, or rather the remains, and that she would not on any account
+have failed of visiting the spot.
+
+After rambling about for some time, Grimkie at length found several
+places where portions of the old wall were exposed to view, and though
+they were mere shapeless masses of stones that he thus found, they
+appeared to be fused together by heat. After pounding among them for a
+while he succeeded in obtaining several good specimens of the curious
+conglomerate, to carry with him to America. He selected also a very
+pretty specimen, the smallest that he could find, for Florence, and
+others similar to it for Mrs. Morelle and John.
+
+After satisfying themselves with an examination of the fort, Grimkie
+led the way out of the wood toward the brow of the precipice, which
+formed the side of the hill next the town. Here they enjoyed a
+magnificent prospect of the whole valley, with the river Ness flowing
+through the center of it, the bridge over it, leading into the town,
+the town itself, and the castle by its side. Florence thought that this
+view was far more worth seeing than the fort.
+
+“So do I,” said John. “In fact I don’t think much of the fort. I’ve
+seen just such banks as those on the Heights of Dorchester once, when I
+was in Boston.”
+
+“True,” said his mother, “only those were not a hundred years old, and
+these are probably two thousand.”
+
+“That does not make any difference in the looks of them,” replied John.
+
+“No,” said his mother, “but it makes some difference in the _feelings_
+with which we regard them.”
+
+“It does not make much difference in mine,” said John.
+
+Just then John saw something alive running off through the woods.
+
+“It is a rabbit,” said he, and he darted off at full speed, taking aim
+at the same time with his specimen of the vitrification. Grimkie called
+him to come back, but before he had time to obey the stone flew from
+his hand through the air, and at last struck the trunk of a tree very
+near where the rabbit had disappeared, and rebounded from it with great
+force.
+
+“Johnnie!” said Grimkie, speaking in a very stern voice. “It is very
+lucky for you that you did not hit that rabbit.”
+
+“Why so?” asked John.
+
+“If you had hit him and killed him, you would have been a poacher. Any
+body that kills any kind of game in this country, unless the owner of
+the land gives him leave, is a poacher. Did not you ever read the story
+of Black Giles the Poacher?”
+
+“Yes,” said John; “but he did things a great deal worse than killing
+rabbits out in the woods. I tell you these rabbits don’t belong to any
+body. I don’t believe the _land_ here belongs to any body. It is _wild_
+land.”
+
+“We should find that it belonged to some body,” replied Grimkie, “if
+people should catch us killing rabbits here.”
+
+John had a sort of instinctive feeling that Grimkie was right, but he
+consoled himself for his discomfiture in the argument by saying that at
+any rate he came within one of hitting the rabbit.
+
+The subject here dropped, as the reporters in Parliament say, and the
+whole party returned down the hill.
+
+“Now, Auntie,” said Grimkie, as they rode back to the hotel, “the clerk
+said we must be at the stage office at a quarter before eight. Would
+you like to ride there?”
+
+“If it is not far,” said his aunt, “we can walk just as well, and so we
+shall see more of the town.”
+
+“Yes,” said Grimkie, “I should like that, and Mr. Boots will carry our
+luggage for us.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+NIGHT RIDE BY DAYLIGHT.
+
+
+A little before eight o’clock that evening, the whole party proceeded
+on foot from the hotel to the stage office. The porter of the hotel
+went with them, taking the trunk and some smaller parcels. The coach
+soon came out in front of the office, the trunk and the parcels were
+put upon the roof. Mrs. Morelle and Florence took their places inside,
+while Grimkie and John mounted to the top, and established themselves
+upon a long cushioned seat, which extended from one side of the coach
+to the other, directly behind the coachman.
+
+Instead of a rack behind, as in American stage-coaches, there was a
+sort of box, with a door opening into it, for the mail bags, and seats
+above, over the back part of the coach. One of these seats is occupied
+by the man who has care of the mails, and who is called the guard. The
+other seats are for such passengers as choose to ride there. Grimkie
+and John, however, chose to ride on the forward seat, so that they
+could see before them as they rode along.
+
+The coach drove first through the village and stopped at the
+post-office to take the mails, where quite a little crowd of men and
+boys assembled to witness the setting off. The horses were soon in
+motion again, the coachman cracking his whip with a very smart air, as
+the wheels ran rapidly over the pavement. From their elevated seat,
+Grimkie and John could look down with great advantage upon every thing
+around them. They soon came to the end of the pavement, and then the
+horses trotted and cantered swiftly along over a hard and smooth road,
+across the canal by a beautiful bridge, and then on among green fields,
+through turnpike gates, and along the walls of gardens, and parks, and
+pleasure-grounds, while pretty cottages, and porters’ lodges, and green
+hedges, and milestones, and peasant girls, going or returning from
+milking, and a thousand other such objects as mark the rural scenery of
+Scotland in a summer evening, glided by them in rapid succession.
+
+In the distance all around them lofty mountains were seen, the summits
+of some of them covered with snow, and the sun still high in the sky
+in the northwest, though half concealed by golden clouds, promised to
+accompany and cheer them on their journey for a long time.
+
+“It is after eight o’clock,” said Grimkie, “and see how high the sun
+is!”
+
+“Very high,” said John. “I don’t believe the sun will set before ten
+o’clock.”
+
+“Yes, the sun sets here a little after nine,” said Grimkie.
+
+“How do you know?” asked John.
+
+“I looked in a Glasgow almanac,” replied Grimkie. “The sun sets in
+Glasgow one or two minutes after nine to night, and here it must be
+some minutes later, for we are two or three degrees farther north.”
+
+“I don’t see why that is any reason,” said John.
+
+“Oh that is very plain,” rejoined Grimkie. “Don’t you see that we are
+going round over the curvature of the earth toward the north?”
+
+As he said this, Grimkie made a gesture with his hand, pushing it out
+before him in a manner to denote a motion in advance over the curved
+surface of a ball.
+
+“Yes,” said John.
+
+“And don’t you see that the sun is going down over the roundness of the
+earth in the same direction?”
+
+“Yes,” said John, “almost in the north—in the north_west_.”
+
+“Then don’t you perceive,” added Grimkie, “that the farther we go, on
+the same course that he is going, the longer we can see him?”
+
+“Ah yes,” said John. “And that is the reason why we shall see the sun
+longer here to-night than they will in Glasgow.”
+
+“Exactly,” said Grimkie.
+
+In the meantime the horses, having been now trotting and galloping for
+about an hour over the hard and smooth road, were brought up by the
+coachman somewhat suddenly at the door of an inn in a small village,
+in order to be changed. The coachman descended from his seat, the
+post-boys led out the fresh horses from the stable of the inn, and the
+guard took the mail bags which were to be left at that place out of his
+box, and threw them down into the road.
+
+Grimkie availed himself of this opportunity to inquire after the
+welfare of his aunt and cousin. He leaned over as far as he could on
+one side, toward the coach window below, and called out:
+
+“Auntie, are you getting along pretty well?”
+
+Immediately Florence’s head appeared at the window.
+
+“Grimkie,” said she, “where are we?”
+
+“We have stopped to change horses,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Already?” said Florence.
+
+“Yes,” said Grimkie. “When the horses go so fast they have to be
+changed very often. Have you got a good seat?”
+
+“An excellent seat,” said Florence. “I have got a window all to myself.”
+
+“And can you see the country?” asked Grimkie.
+
+“Oh, yes!” said Florence, “I can see it beautifully, I have got one
+window and mother has got the other.”
+
+“And mother says,” she added, after turning her head a moment, “that
+you and Johnnie must be careful not to fall off.”
+
+“There is no danger, tell her,” replied Grimkie. “We have good safe
+seats, with an iron railing at the two ends to keep us in.”
+
+By this time the fresh horses were put in, and the coachman having
+mounted to his place again, the coach was soon rolling on along the
+road, faster even than before.
+
+Soon after this the sun went down, but the clouds which he left behind
+him in the western sky, were for a time almost as bright as he himself
+had been, so that at half past nine there seemed to be no sensible
+diminution of the light of day. The track of the sun too, in going
+down, was so oblique to the horizon, that even at half-past ten his
+distance below it was very small, and Grimkie and John could see the
+country all about them, and the time by their watches, and the places
+through which they were passing, just as well almost as ever.
+
+From half-past ten to eleven there was still very little change. The
+children were all playing in the streets of the villages that they
+passed, and groups of men and boys had collected at the doors of the
+inns where they stopped, as they would have done at half-past seven
+or eight o’clock in a summer evening in America. Even the hens did
+not seem to know that it was night, for they were rambling about, and
+scratching at every unusual appearance on the grounds, as briskly as in
+any part of the day.
+
+“I don’t see how the children know when to go to bed,” said John.
+
+“Or the hens either,” said Grimkie. “A Connecticut rooster I should
+think would be greatly mystified here. He would not lead his hens off
+to roost until he saw it growing dark,—and then if he began to crow
+again as soon as he saw any light, he would not give them any time to
+sleep at all.”
+
+After eleven o’clock the boys found that at each succeeding village
+or hamlet that they came to fewer and fewer people appeared, until
+at length at twelve, and between twelve and one, the country seemed
+deserted, and yet the light continued. It was a strange thing, the
+boys thought, to drive into a village in broad day-light, and to find
+the streets silent and solitary, and without a person being visible
+at any door or window; and still more sometimes, when they stopped to
+change horses, to see that the coachman was obliged to knock upon the
+stable-door to wake the ostlers up, while by the aspect of the whole
+scene around, there was nothing that betokened night.
+
+It was not much after midnight when the coach arrived at the Mickle
+Ferry. The Mickle Ferry means the _great_ ferry. It is so called to
+distinguish it from another smaller one in the neighborhood called
+the Little Ferry. The Mickle Ferry passes across a narrow part of the
+Dornoch Firth, as may be seen by the map. The firth is a mile or two
+wide, at the ferry, and is crossed in a large flat-bottomed sail-boat,
+sufficient to convey the passengers and their luggage in perfect
+safety,——but not large enough for the coach.
+
+The coach was accordingly to be left on the hither side of the ferry,
+another being provided on the farther side, to receive the passengers
+at the landing and take them on.
+
+[Illustration: CROSSING THE MICKLE FERRY.]
+
+The company in the coach, accordingly, on arriving at the margin of
+the water, descended from the coach and walked down the sloping pier to
+the boat, and went on board. Mrs. Morelle had felt some apprehension
+at the idea of crossing a wide ferry in an open boat at midnight,
+but she found, on arriving at the spot, that there was no occasion
+for alarm. The boat was very wide, and appeared very steady; and as
+to midnight,—it might as well have been eight o’clock of a bright
+summer evening at home. It is true that the sun was entirely below the
+horizon, but the whole northern sky was brightly illuminated by his
+beams, and so light was it upon the water, that Grimkie said that if he
+had a newspaper, he would amuse them during the passage by reading the
+news.
+
+The boat was wafted very rapidly, but yet with a very smooth and gentle
+motion, across the water. The passengers landed on the farther side,
+and the luggage was taken out, and in a few minutes the new coach was
+seen coming rapidly down the road toward the landing place in order to
+receive the travellers and convey them onward.
+
+Mrs. Morelle now proposed that the two boys should get inside, but they
+were extremely desirous to continue upon the top, and as the coachman
+assured Mrs. Morelle that the seat was perfectly safe for them, even
+if they should fall asleep, she consented that they should remain.
+Besides it was now after one o’clock, and it was growing lighter quite
+fast. In a little more than an hour, as Grimkie calculated, it would be
+nearly sunrise.
+
+The country now became very picturesque and wild, the sea being brought
+continually into full view as the horses trotted swiftly round the
+curves of the road, following the undulations of the coast. At one
+place it descended by a winding and zigzag way into an immense ravine a
+mile or two across. The sides of the ravine were covered with forest,
+and there was a river and a village at the bottom of it.
+
+After traversing this ravine, the road followed the line of the
+coast, passing by many great castles, and presenting here and there
+magnificent views of the sea. Mrs. Morelle and Florence lost some of
+these views, for they fell asleep; and even John, upon the top, nodded
+several times, though he insisted, whenever Grimkie asked him about it,
+that he was not in the least sleepy.
+
+At length, toward noon of Friday, the coach arrived safely at Wick.
+
+The passengers were all very glad to reach the termination of their
+ride, for though it was a very delightful one, it was long, and the
+fact that the night was not dark made it seem longer even than it
+was. At least, so John thought. He said it seemed like two long days
+together, without any night between.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE PRINCE CONSORT.
+
+
+Grimkie and John had both been very curious to see how Wick would look,
+and they watched for the first appearance of it with great interest. It
+proved to be a small and ancient looking town, built very compactly of
+gray stone, and situated at the bottom of a small bay which here sets
+in from the sea. In front of it was a little port formed by two piers
+built out into the water, and curved in such a manner as to enclose a
+considerable space of smooth water, with a small opening between the
+two ends of them, to allow the fishing boats to pass in and out. As
+usual in such cases there was a light-house on the end of one of these
+piers.
+
+“The very first thing we will do, Grimkie,” said John, “will be to go
+down to the piers and see the fishing boats.”
+
+“After breakfast,” said Grimkie.
+
+It was now nearly noon and the party had had no breakfast, excepting
+some cakes and oranges which Grimkie had brought in his knapsack, and
+which they ate very early in the morning.
+
+The coach drove rapidly into the town, and stopped at the door of a
+snug and neat-looking inn, where Grimkie soon engaged rooms and ordered
+breakfast. The weather was cool, too, and Mrs. Morelle requested the
+waiter to have a good fire made in their sitting-room. In half an hour
+the breakfast was ready, and about the same time all the members of the
+party, having in the meanwhile been occupied, in their several rooms,
+in making their toilet, were ready to eat it. Of course their appetites
+were very eager, and as the breakfast was an excellent one, consisting
+of fresh herring nicely fried, beef-steaks, eggs, hot rolls, toast,
+coffee with plenty of hot milk and cream, fresh butter, and other such
+niceties, they all enjoyed the repast exceedingly.
+
+“What a nice thing a really good breakfast is,” said Florence, “when we
+have waited long enough for it to get completely hungry.”
+
+Pretty soon after breakfast they all went out to take a walk to see
+the town, and the pier. They first walked along through the principal
+street, looking into the shops to see if there was anything new or
+curious in them which it would be well to buy as souvenirs. Then they
+went down to the water, in order to see the pier. It was rather to
+please the two boys that they did this, but still Mrs. Morelle was very
+willing to go, for she was curious to see what the accommodations were
+for going on board the steamer in case she should conclude to embark
+the next morning.
+
+They found that the piers were each very wide. On the inside of the
+enclosure formed by them was a range of vessels and fishing boats,
+which were moored to rings, and massive piles, on the margin of the
+pier, and near them were cranes and other such fixtures used for
+discharging cargoes. Then came a broad space to land goods upon, and
+beyond a road for carts and wagons. All this was upon the top of
+the pier, and on the outside was a high parapet wall to protect the
+platform and road-way, above described, from the wind and the sea.
+
+Thus in walking along the road-way upon the piers, one could see
+the fishing boats and vessels within the port, and witness all the
+operations going on there, but the view seaward was intercepted by the
+parapet wall.
+
+Mrs. Morelle was well satisfied with the appearance of the port, and
+with the probable facilities for going on board the steamer, which she
+supposed would come inside, so as to allow the passengers to go on
+board by means of a broad plank.
+
+The weather, too, was very fine, and she presumed that the sea was
+smooth. She had an opportunity soon of ascertaining this point, for on
+arriving at the end of one of the piers there were steps leading up to
+a lookout upon the top of the parapet wall, and she asked Grimkie to go
+up there and look out to sea, and make a report of the appearance of
+things.
+
+Grimkie did so and reported that the surface of the water was smooth as
+glass, as far as he could see.
+
+“Then,” said she, “if there is no change before night we will go.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle and Florence soon returned to the hotel, but the boys
+spent most of the afternoon in rambling about the pier, examining the
+fishing boats, talking with the fishermen, and watching the various
+operations which were going on in the port. When they went home to tea,
+Grimkie asked what time the steamer would come the next morning, and
+the porter informed him that she was due about two o’clock, but that
+there was some uncertainty in respect to the time of her arrival. He
+said, however, that she would remain some hours at Wick, and that he
+would call them an hour before it would be time for them to go on board.
+
+The whole party went to bed in good season, both because they had so
+little sleep the night before, and also because they were to be called
+up so early the following morning.
+
+It was about half-past one when the porter knocked at their doors to
+waken them. It was light enough to dress without candles, and they were
+all soon ready. When they came down to the door they found the porter
+there with a barrow. The baggage was put upon the barrow, and the
+porter set forward, followed by the party of travellers on foot. It was
+a bright and pleasant morning, and the air was calm. Mrs. Morelle was
+greatly pleased by the prospect before her.
+
+After walking through several streets, they came to the pier but Mrs.
+Morelle looked in vain for the steamer.
+
+“Why, Grimkie!” she exclaimed in surprise, “where is the steamer?”
+
+“She must be out _there_,” said Grimkie, pointing as he spoke to a
+column of smoke which was seen rising into the air over and beyond the
+parapet wall.
+
+“And how are we going to get on board?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“It must be that we are going in a boat,” said Grimkie, “but you won’t
+mind that, Auntie.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle saw at a glance that it was too late now to retreat, and
+she had the good sense to go forward boldly, acting upon the excellent
+principle, that when there is anything disagreeable before us which
+must be done, it is just as well to do it with a good grace.
+
+Mrs. Morelle found, moreover, as we often do in such cases, that the
+difficulties which she anticipated disappeared as she approached them.
+At a certain part of the pier, not far from the entrance, there was
+a flight of stone steps leading down to the water. The boat which
+was to take the passengers to the steamer lay at the bottom of these
+steps. There was a small party of passengers immediately preceding Mrs.
+Morelle and her company. Seeing them go down at once, Mrs. Morelle
+followed, and all were soon safe on board the boat, seated in the
+stern. The trunks and other packages were then handed down and placed
+in the bows.
+
+After waiting some little time for other passengers who were seen
+coming along the pier, the boat put off and was rowed easily out
+through the opening, and there the steamer came into full view. They
+were soon alongside of it, and without any difficulty ascended to the
+deck.
+
+It was now nearly sunrise, but everything was very quiet on board the
+steamer. The children seemed quite inclined to remain on deck to see
+what would take place, but Mrs. Morelle wished first to go below and
+find her berth or her stateroom. So they all went down.
+
+They descended a short and winding stair-way, and at the bottom of it
+entered the cabin. On each side of the cabin, near the entrance to it,
+there was a row of three or four staterooms partitioned off, which
+made the cabin itself in this part, comparatively narrow. It was wide
+enough, however, for two long tables which stood here, with comfortable
+cushioned seats on each side of them.
+
+Beyond the staterooms the cabin widened to the whole breadth of the
+ship, and was terminated toward the stern in a great semicircular
+sweep, with two tiers of wide and soft sofas, covered with crimson
+plush. The two tiers were parallel to each other, one above and back of
+the first, like the seats of an amphitheatre, and almost all the sofas
+were occupied by passengers, more or less covered with blankets and
+fast asleep. There were also some sleepers lying upon the sofas near
+the tables in the narrow part of the cabin, The sleepers seemed all to
+be men, except that there were one or two whose faces had a feminine
+expression, and Grimkie could not tell whether they were young women,
+or very pretty boys.
+
+“Where is the ladies’ cabin?” asked Mrs. Morelle, turning to the
+stewardess, who had met the party at the foot of the stairs and
+followed them into the cabin.
+
+“Here it is, madam,” said the stewardess. “But it is pretty full.”
+
+So saying, the stewardess led the way to a passage behind the stairs,
+and there, pulling aside a certain screen before a door, she disclosed
+a room in the sides of which were berths, and on the floor sofas,
+cots, and beds made of cushions, all of which were filled with female
+sleepers lying in all imaginable attitudes. Mrs. Morelle and Florence
+turned back immediately. It was evident that there was very little room
+for them there.
+
+“Is not there any stateroom for us?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“Oh yes,” said the stewardess. And she at once led the way back to the
+main cabin, and there, opening one of the doors on the side, not far
+from the entrance, she ushered Mrs. Morelle and Florence into a very
+nice and bright-looking stateroom.
+
+“Ah!” exclaimed Mrs. Morelle, the moment that she saw the interior of
+it, speaking in a tone of great satisfaction. “This is exactly what we
+want. Here is a berth for you and one for me. It is _exactly_ what we
+want.”
+
+“I suppose there is something extra for the stateroom,” she added,
+turning to the stewardess.
+
+“Four shillings each,” said the stewardess.
+
+“We will take it,” said Mrs. Morelle. “And as for you, boys, you must
+find places to sleep on the sofas in the cabin. We can’t afford a
+stateroom for you.”
+
+“We don’t _want_ any stateroom, mother,” said John. “I would a great
+deal rather sleep in the cabin.”
+
+So the boys went to the cabin, and all four of the party were soon in
+their several berths or upon their sofas sound asleep. The steamer was
+quiet and still, except the slight jarring sensation produced by the
+paddles after she began to move through the water, and the passengers
+all continued to sleep after this for several hours, for although it
+was near sunrise when Mrs. Morelle and her party came on board, still,
+in respect to the time for sleeping, it was not much past the middle of
+the night.
+
+There began to be a movement for getting up in the gentleman’s cabin
+about seven o’clock, and soon after this time Grimkie and John rose
+and went on deck. There they took out their maps and endeavored by
+calculation of the distance which they had run, and the bearing of the
+land which was in sight, to find out where they were.
+
+One of the passengers who saw what they were doing, came and informed
+them that a certain large island which they were passing was Ronaldsay,
+one of the Orkneys, and that the land beyond it which extended in both
+directions as far as they could see, was another of the islands, and
+that the steamer would arrive at Kirkwall in about two hours. They
+found out the name of the steamer too,—the _Prince Consort_. She was
+named thus in honor of Prince Albert, the consort of the queen.
+
+The boys remained on deck watching the land as cape after cape and
+headland after headland came into view, for an hour more, and then
+Grimkie sent John down to knock at his mother’s stateroom door, and
+tell her that they were drawing near to Kirkwall.
+
+In about half an hour after receiving this summons, Mrs. Morelle and
+Florence came upon deck.
+
+The steamer had turned in now among the islands, where the water was
+sheltered and smooth as in a river, and the views on every side were
+enchanting. The principal islands were so large that they looked like
+portions of the main land, and they presented an appearance of verdure
+and beauty impossible to describe. Great fields of the richest green,
+separated from each other by hedges neatly trimmed, or by substantial
+walls, extended in every direction as far as the eye could reach,
+while elegant villas, and spacious farm-houses, and rows of cottages
+appearing here and there, diversified the scene. The fields in many
+cases sloped down smoothly and beautifully to the water’s edge. In
+other places the line of the coast was formed of rocky cliffs with the
+surf of the sea rolling in at the base of them, and far in the interior
+lofty mountains were seen marking their dim blue outline upon the sky.
+
+“Well, Grimkie,” said Mrs. Morelle, “what do you think of the Orkneys?”
+
+“I don’t think much of them,” said Grimkie, with an air of
+disappointment. “The sea is as smooth, and the country is as beautiful,
+as any where in England. I don’t believe the Norsemen had very hard
+times after all.”
+
+“Ah!” said Mrs. Morelle, “you ought to be here in January, when there
+is as little day as there is night now.”
+
+The cabin and the deck of the steamer was soon all in a bustle in
+consequence of the preparations which were made by the Orkney
+passengers to land. The steamer turned in more and more among the
+islands, until at last she approached Kirkwall, which was situated,
+like Wick, at the bottom of a small bay, and had a port formed of two
+piers for the protection of fishing boats and other small vessels. The
+steamer came to anchor outside this port. Boats came out to receive the
+passengers and their luggage. In these boats they were all conveyed
+within the port, and landed at a small pier sloping down to the water’s
+edge.
+
+Here a number of porters were assembled to take the luggage of the
+passengers into the town. There were no carriages. A group of islands
+is not the region in which carriages are likely to be multiplied.
+Grimkie selected from among the porters one who had an honest face,
+and giving him the trunk asked him to lead the way to the hotel. The
+porter went on into a very narrow street—the width of it being barely
+sufficient for a single carriage—between ancient stone buildings
+which had more the appearance of prisons than houses—so few were the
+windows, and so deep were they sunk into the massive walls—and thus
+they arrived at the hotel.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+KIRKWALL.
+
+
+The hotel at Kirkwall, when it first came into view, presented a very
+unpromising appearance. It was built upon a little paved court, the
+front, containing the entrance being at the back side of the court, and
+two wings one on each side extending forward to the street. A low wall,
+with two gateways through it, extended along the line of the street
+from one of these wings to the other.
+
+The building itself, like all the buildings in the town, was formed
+of very thick and massive walls of stone, with windows set in so far
+back in the wall, that the sashes scarcely appeared in view. Indeed in
+looking along the street the windows of the houses appeared only as
+openings in the wall, as if the buildings were so many stone barns.
+
+On entering the hotel, however, the scene was entirely changed. The
+waiter conducted the party up to the second story, and ushered them at
+once into a large and handsomely furnished room. There was a bright
+fire blazing in the grate, and a polished mahogany dining-table in
+the middle of the floor, and arm-chairs, and sofas, and carpets, and
+curtains to the windows, and tables in the corners covered with books,
+and stands of flower-pots with flowers in full bloom, and many other
+nameless conveniences and elegancies which are comprised in the idea of
+a comfortable parlor in an English inn.
+
+“Ah, Florence!” exclaimed Mrs. Morelle. “This is just the place for us.
+How glad I am to see the fire. I did not know I was so cold.”
+
+The chambermaid came soon to show the ladies their chamber, and Mrs.
+Morelle when she went into hers, asked Grimkie to order the best
+breakfast that he could get for them. In half an hour the breakfast was
+ready, and very soon after breakfast the whole party set out to take a
+walk and see the town.
+
+They found that the town consisted chiefly of a very long and narrow
+street, which followed the curvature of the shore. It was very narrow,
+and seemed intended almost exclusively for foot-passengers. There was
+only a narrow track in the center of it—about two feet wide, that
+is, just wide enough for one horse—that was paved like a street.
+The rest of the space on each side was covered with flag stones for
+foot-passengers. Thus the street was almost all sidewalk.
+
+“We may know by the narrowness of the streets and by the looks of the
+houses that they have dreadful gales of wind and storms here in the
+winter,” said Grimkie. “See what thick walls, and what little windows
+and how few! See how deep the windows are set in the walls, so that the
+gales may not get at them to burst them in!”
+
+The party walked on for some time, following the windings of the
+street, and looking in at the shop windows to see what sort of things
+there were to sell. At one place they saw some views in the Orkneys,
+hanging at the window of a print shop. There was a view of some of the
+coast scenery, with lofty mountains rising abruptly out of the sea, and
+tremendous precipices. There was a view also of the town of Kirkwall,
+and one of Stromness, a place upon the opposite side of the island.
+But the picture which most attracted the attention of Mrs. Morelle and
+Florence, was one of the Stones of Stennis. It was a view of an open
+plain in a wild and desolate country, with a range of gigantic stones,
+like immense tombstones, set up in the ground.
+
+“What is this?” asked Mrs. Morelle; “what are the stones of Stennis?”
+
+“Ah, that is something very curious,” replied Grimkie. “I read an
+account of them. They are on the road to Stromness. We must go to see
+them.”
+
+“They look like the pictures I have seen of Stonehenge,” said Florence.
+
+“They are like Stonehenge,” said Grimkie.
+
+After going along a little farther, the party came to a sort of open
+space in which there was an immense cathedral, old and ruinous, though
+it bore marks of having been recently repaired. Mrs. Morelle was much
+surprised to see this edifice. She wondered how there could ever have
+been any occasion for a structure of such magnitude in so remote a
+region, and still more how it could ever have been built. But the truth
+is that the earls of Orkney, who formerly ruled over the islands like
+sovereign princes, were at one time very wealthy and powerful, and
+there was a time moreover, during the period in which the Catholic
+religion was in the ascendency in these countries, when the cathedrals
+and abbeys, and monasteries which were built in the north of Scotland,
+and in the islands adjacent, were of the grandest and most gorgeous
+description.
+
+“Would you like to go in and see the cathedral, Auntie?” asked Grimkie.
+
+“Do they have service in it on Sunday?” rejoined Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“In one end of it,” said Grimkie. “One end is finished off for a
+church. The rest of it is empty.”
+
+“Then we shall see it to-morrow when we go to church,” replied Mrs.
+Morelle, “and that will be better. I like to see such places better
+when the people are in them.”
+
+The stones with which the cathedral had been repaired were of a red
+color, which gave them the appearance of monstrous bricks. They were
+really of sandstone, though of a bright color. John said that he read
+in a guide book that they were obtained from a quarry in a cliff which
+was named Red Head.
+
+Near the cathedral were the ruins of two ancient palaces, the bishop’s
+and the earl’s. These ruins were very ancient and venerable, and Mrs.
+Morelle and Florence were greatly interested in walking about them, and
+looking up to the ivy covered battlements and towers. It was melancholy
+to look upon these utterly abandoned ruins. The air of desolation and
+solitude which reigned around them was greater than Mrs. Morelle had
+ever observed in any ruins before. In England there are many remains
+of ancient edifices, but they are all objects of great interest to
+tourists, and are visited by great numbers of people, for whose
+benefit the grounds are kept in order, and a certain degree of life
+is imparted to the scene. But these old palaces seemed not only to
+have outlived their possessors and occupants, but to have been utterly
+forsaken and forgotten by all the world, and an air of solitude and
+desolation reigned around them that it would be impossible to describe.
+
+After passing by the ruins of the palaces, Mrs. Morelle and the
+children found themselves coming out into the country at a place where
+the road ascended a hill. They concluded to continue their walk until
+they reached the summit, in order to take a survey of the situation of
+Kirkwall, and of the surrounding country. So they walked slowly on,
+stopping occasionally to look at objects of interest, or to talk with
+the peasant women whom they met in the road, or found standing at their
+cottage doors.
+
+They asked one of these women about their mode of life in the winter.
+Among other questions they asked her if the days were not very short at
+that season of the year.
+
+“Yes,” said she, “very short. In fact there is not much of any day
+in the winter, and it is always snowing, or blowing, or raining, or
+something else, so that there is not much chance to work upon the
+land. So the men stay in the barns a great deal, and thrash the grain,
+and do other such things, by the light of lanterns.”
+
+“But I should think the ground would be frozen up in the winter,” said
+Grimkie, “and that that would prevent working on the land.”
+
+“No,” said the woman. “The ground does not freeze much. We can always
+work on the land when it is good weather.”
+
+“That’s very strange,” said Grimkie, “so far north as this.”
+
+“And is not the ground covered with snow?” asked Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“Not much,” said the woman. “It snows very often, but the snow does not
+lie on the ground much.”
+
+“And don’t you travel in sleighs here in the winter then?” asked John.
+
+“Sleighs?” repeated the woman, looking puzzled, “what are they?”
+
+“Sledges perhaps you call them,” suggested Mrs. Morelle.
+
+“No,” replied the woman. “We never use sledges. But they do in some
+countries I’ve heard tell.”
+
+After reaching the top of the hill, the party stopped to take a survey
+of the country around, and a very magnificent spectacle presented
+itself to view. The land extended in every direction farther than
+they could see, but it was divided and separated into so many portions
+by bays, straits, inlets, and channels formed by the sea, that the
+view exhibited as charming a combination of land and water as could
+possibly be imagined. The islands which were near were formed of green
+and fertile slopes of land, of marvelous beauty, with pretty dells and
+vales opening here and there among them, and hamlets and villages,
+and farm-houses, and gentlemen’s seats, dotting the country in every
+direction. Toward the west ranges of lofty mountains were seen.
+Grimkie took out his map and a little pocket compass which he had, and
+endeavored to ascertain the names of some of the highest peaks, by the
+bearings and distances of them. He pointed out in what direction they
+would go in their ride to Stromness, and where the Stones of Stennis
+were,—though the spot was not actually in view, being concealed by an
+intervening mountain.
+
+They saw great numbers of cattle and sheep feeding on the hill sides
+in every direction. Indeed cattle and sheep are the staple productions
+of the Orkney Islands. The climate is so wet that the grass grows
+luxuriantly, and notwithstanding the high latitude the air is so
+tempered by the influence of the surrounding seas that it continues
+green nearly all the year.
+
+To the west and south, lofty mountains were seen, in the distance.
+Grimkie and John were greatly taken with the view of these mountains.
+They concluded that they must lie at the south of Stromness.
+
+“When we go to Stromness we will go up to the top of them, Johnnie,”
+said Grimkie.
+
+John very readily assented to this proposal, and Florence said that
+they must take her too.
+
+After remaining upon the top of the hill until they were satisfied
+with studying the localities which were in sight, and with admiring
+the different views, they all descended again, and returned to the
+hotel. Instead, however, of going back through the main street, they
+took another course which led them along the margin of the water.
+Here they saw the piers which formed the little port, and the fishing
+boats lying inside of them, and many other curious things. Among other
+objects that arrested their attention was a small hut near the shore,
+the roof of which was made of an old boat turned upside down. The boat
+was supported by walls of stone which formed the sides of the hut, and
+there was a door in front to go in by. John was so much pleased with
+this curious hut that he took paper and a pencil out of his pocket in
+order to draw it, and he remained behind, to make his sketch, while the
+rest of the party went on; so that he did not return to the hotel until
+some time after the others arrived.
+
+He had, however, made a very pretty drawing—so pretty that Florence
+asked him to copy it in ink in her journal book, which John readily
+promised to do.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE STONES OF STENNIS.
+
+
+Mrs. Morelle and her party remained many days at the Orkney Islands,
+and during this time they made a number of excursions, some in a
+carriage and some on foot. The only carriage, however, which they
+could obtain was a dog-cart, which was anything but a comfortable
+vehicle for ladies going out upon an excursion for pleasure. Indeed
+Florence expressed the opinion, that however well adapted it might be
+for the conveyance of dogs, it was the worst contrived vehicle for
+human beings that she ever saw. The only redeeming quality which it
+possessed was that in case it rained one umbrella would cover the whole
+company—after a fashion.
+
+In this dog-cart they went to visit the Stones of Stennis. The road
+was most excellent all the way, being macadamized in a most perfect
+manner, so that it was as smooth as a gravel walk in a gentleman’s
+park. The country, however, through which it passed, after a few miles
+from Kirkwall, was an almost boundless expanse of moorland, wild and
+desolate. After going on for some miles through this dreary country,
+the carriage left the main road and passed by a sort of cart track
+through the fields and over a long causeway between two lakes, till it
+came to the place where the stones were situated.
+
+The stones could be seen for a distance of many miles, standing like so
+many gigantic posts on a vast plain. When the party came to the spot,
+they found that each stone was from twelve to twenty feet high, and
+about five feet wide and one thick. They were of a somewhat irregular
+form, being evidently slabs taken from the natural strata in the
+neighborhood, and set up just as they came from the quarry. They were
+arranged in an immense circle with the remains of an embankment and
+ditch all around the circumference. The circle was not complete, the
+stones being wanting in many places. In some cases they had fallen
+and still remained upon the ground. In other places where it would
+seem stones must have stood, the fragments had been taken away, it was
+supposed, after they had fallen, to be used for buildings or walls, by
+generations that lived in ages subsequent to that in which the stones
+were set up, but which have still in their turn long since passed away.
+
+A great many conjectures have been made in respect to these stones,
+and to the nature of the structure of which they formed a part, but
+all is uncertainty in respect to them. At the very earliest periods of
+which there is any account of the country, they stood as they stand
+now, solitary and in ruin—an inexplicable wonder to all who saw them.
+
+The party went also to Stromness, a town at the western side of the
+island on which Kirkwall stands, and here, while Mrs. Morelle and
+Florence remained at the inn, Grimkie and John engaged a sail boat and
+a man to manage it, and made a cruise of four or five hours along the
+neighboring shores. There they saw some stupendous cliffs, called the
+Black Craigs, and great numbers of birds flying about them, and among
+other birds they saw an eagle perched upon a lofty summit, where he
+stood silent and solitary, looking far and wide over the sea. Grimkie
+and John had an excellent view of him through their opera glass.
+
+[Illustration: THE BLACK CRAIGS.]
+
+At one time while the party remained at Kirkwall, they were imprisoned
+nearly a whole day by a pouring rain. Mrs. Morelle, when she found,
+as she did after breakfast, that there was no prospect that any of
+them could go out, asked the waiter if they had any books in the hotel
+relating to the Orkney Islands. The waiter said he would inquire,
+and pretty soon he came in bringing a number of books of different
+sizes, some old and some new; some with pictures in them and some
+without. Mrs. Morelle directed that a good fire should be made, and the
+table cleared, and then placed these books upon the table and said that
+she was going to have a school.
+
+“We will begin at ten o’clock,” said she. “You can take your seats at
+the table, or at the windows, or where you please, and for two hours
+we will all look over these books and see how much we can learn about
+the Orkneys. Then we will have a luncheon. After luncheon we will each
+of us take a sheet of paper and a pen and ink and write down the most
+interesting thing that we have learned.”
+
+This plan was entered into by all the children very cordially. They
+spent two hours in studying the books and looking at the pictures.
+Then came the luncheon which consisted of some slices of cold roast
+mutton very tender and nice, with some flat rolls of bread, sweet fresh
+butter, strawberry preserves and cold coffee.
+
+After the luncheon all spent an hour in writing, and by that time
+it had stopped raining. So it was concluded to postpone reading the
+compositions until the evening.
+
+In the evening they were read. Florence’s was as follows:
+
+
+“THE POISONED SHIRT.”
+
+ “In former times there was an earl of Orkney, named Hacon. He married
+ a wife and had a son named Paul. After this his wife died, and then he
+ married a princess of Caithness, named Helga.
+
+ “Caithness is the northern part of Scotland. It was a kingdom in those
+ days, now it is a county.
+
+ “After his second marriage Hacon had another son named Harold.
+
+ “Harold and his mother hated Paul because he was the oldest son,
+ and was entitled to the succession, and they did all in their power
+ to supplant him in his father’s affections. They succeeded so far
+ that the old king finally agreed that Paul should not have the whole
+ kingdom, but should share it with Harold. Accordingly, when the old
+ king died the two sons were joined in the government of the islands.
+
+ “But they did not agree together at all. Helga was continually
+ maneuvering with her son Harold to gain for him more than his share of
+ the power. At length the two brothers came to open war, and the whole
+ country was desolated by their dreadful fights.
+
+ “At last, after becoming weary of this, they agreed to make a treaty,
+ and become reconciled, and as a pledge of the reconciliation, it was
+ agreed that after the ratification of the treaty, each brother should
+ invite the other to a grand feast, about the time of Christmas.
+
+ “When it came to Paul’s turn to be invited to Harold’s feast, Helga,
+ the mother, determined to poison him. Her plan was to make a beautiful
+ embroidered garment for him, as a present, in token of her entire
+ reconciliation to him, and then before giving him the garment to
+ poison it, so that it should kill him when he put it on. She kept this
+ plan a profound secret from all but a sister who was living with her,
+ named Franquart, to whom she confided her design. Franquart aided her
+ in embroidering the garment, and in applying the poison.
+
+ “At length, on the morning of the feast, Harold, happening to come
+ into his mother’s room, saw the beautiful garment lying there, all
+ ready to be given to Paul when he should arrive, and asked what it
+ was. His mother told him that it was a present that she and Franquart
+ had been making for Paul. Harold was much enraged to hear this,
+ and said that he would not allow of their offering Paul handsomer
+ presents than they made for him. So he seized the garment and declared
+ that he would keep it for himself. His mother and Franquart were
+ dreadfully alarmed. They begged and implored him to put the garment
+ down. But they could not tell him that it was poisoned without
+ betraying their own guilt. In the end Harold went away with the
+ garment, leaving his mother and Franquart, in the utmost distress and
+ terror.
+
+ “Harold immediately put on the garment, and he died that very night in
+ great agony.
+
+ “The consequence was that Paul regained his whole kingdom, and when he
+ discovered the treachery which Helga and Franquart had attempted to
+ practice upon him, he drove them out of the islands.”
+
+Grimkie’s composition was as follows:
+
+
+“THE EAGLE AND THE BABY.”
+
+ “In one of the Orkney Islands named Hoy, where there are a great
+ many high mountains and lofty precipices near the sea, there lived a
+ fisherman named Halco. He had a small hut on the rocks, and a boat.
+ There was a little green spot near his hut where he used to dry his
+ nets, and where his little child, whose name was Halco too, used to
+ lie sometimes, and roll in the grass, and play.
+
+ “There are a great many eagles among the rocks of Hoy, and they often
+ carried off the farmers’ lambs, but as Halco had no sheep or lambs he
+ did not pay much attention to the eagles.
+
+ “One day when Halco was coming home in his boat, just before he
+ reached the shore he saw a monstrous eagle hovering over his hut, and
+ after wheeling round and round several times in the air, he made a
+ fell swoop toward the ground, and disappeared behind the hut. A moment
+ afterward Halco saw him come up again, and to his amazement and horror
+ he saw that he had little Halco in his claws.
+
+ “The eagle rose slowly with the child, and passing directly over
+ Halco’s head soared to a great height, and then sailed away to his
+ nest on the summit of a cliff.
+
+ “Halco was almost stupefied by the terrible shock which he had
+ received. He pulled like a madman to get to the shore. When he entered
+ his hut he found his wife in a swoon. He paid no attention to her but
+ seized his gun and rushed out of the hut. He climbed up the mountain
+ side, and after great labor he came near enough to the nest to see the
+ eagle perched upon the edge of it. He crept up a little nearer, and
+ then took aim and fired. The eagle, after balancing and tottering a
+ moment on his perch, fell heavily over, down the face of the cliff,
+ and disappeared. Halco climbed out to the place of the nest, and there
+ he found his little child, safe and sound, and playing with the young
+ eagles.”
+
+“Why, Grimkie!” said John, as soon as Grimkie had finished reading his
+narrative, “I found a story a little like that, about an eagle carrying
+off a child, but there was not half as much in it as you have told.”
+
+“I thought I would embellish it a little,” said Grimkie. “I presume it
+is just as true after I embellished it, as it was before.”
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+John’s composition was very short. It was as follows:
+
+
+“THE HOLE IN THE STONE.”
+
+ “In one of the stones of Stennis, is a round hole passing directly
+ through the stone, not far from the edge. Nobody knows what this hole
+ was made for by the people who set up the stone, but for a great many
+ ages past it has been considered sacred for engagements. Whenever two
+ persons wish to make any solemn agreement they go to Stennis and
+ put their hands through this hole, and clasp them together in the
+ center of it and then make the promise. If they do this they consider
+ themselves solemnly bound.
+
+ “Lovers used to do this when they engaged themselves to each other.
+ And it is said they do so now sometimes. Grimkie and I wanted to try
+ it, but we could not think of anything to promise each other.”
+
+Instead of a composition Mrs. Morelle wrote a letter to America, giving
+an account of the journey and voyage to the Orkney Islands. She read
+this letter to the children after they had finished reading their
+compositions, and then, though it was yet very light, they all went to
+bed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+THE EMBARKATION.
+
+
+After remaining for some time in the islands, and making many
+excursions, sometimes by land and sometimes by water, in one of which
+Grimkie and John went out in one of the fishing boats, and had an
+excellent time fishing, the party began to look forward with some
+interest to the time for setting out on their return. The question
+arose _how_ they should return. John was very eager to go by the mail
+boat across the Pentland Firth, instead of returning by the steamer, as
+they came.
+
+The steamer made the trip only once a week. It started from Edinburgh,
+touched at Aberdeen and at Wick, then, after going to Kirkwall in the
+Orkneys, proceeded to the Shetland Islands, sixty miles or more farther
+north. Then returning by the same way, she went back to Edinburgh. This
+voyage, with the necessary detentions at the different ports, occupied
+six days, so that there was no opportunity of returning to Scotland by
+the _Prince Consort_, except once a week.
+
+It was necessary to send the mail to the Orkneys, however, every day,
+and John had found out that a special service had been organized
+for this purpose over the islands toward the south by some sort of
+mail-cart, and thence across the Pentland Firth, at the narrowest
+place, to the coast of Scotland, in a sail boat. Thence by coach or
+mail-cart to Wick, and so south toward England.
+
+There were three reasons why John wished to go by this route. First,
+he wished to see what sort of travelling riding in a mail cart would
+be. Next he had a great desire to see the Pentland Firth, and to cross
+it in a sail boat. He had heard wonderful accounts of this famous
+channel—of the furious tides and currents that swept through it,
+producing whirlpools, and boiling surges, and roaring breakers of the
+most wonderful character, and he was very curious to see them. Then,
+lastly, by this route he had hoped to go and see John O’Groat’s house.
+
+John O’Groat’s house, the name of which has become so famous all
+the world over, stands, or rather stood, upon the very extremity of
+Scotland, toward the northeast, and as the opposite corner of the
+island toward the southwest, is called Land’s End, there arose the
+expression from the Land’s End to John O’Groat’s, to denote the whole
+territory of Great Britain.
+
+But inasmuch as the British territory extended to the southwest to
+several islands the most remote of which in that direction is Jersey,
+and as it also includes on the north the Shetland Islands, the most
+northern point of which is called Ska, the expression would more fully
+comprehend all that is intended, if instead of being “from Land’s End
+to John O’Groat’s,” it was “from Jersey to Ska.”
+
+The story of John O’Groat is, that he had six relatives or friends
+who when they came to see him quarreled in respect to which should
+take precedence in going out at the door, and in order to settle the
+question, he built a six-sided house, with a door in each side, and
+made a six-sided table within, with a side toward each door, so that
+each of his guests might have a seat of honor, and seem to be first in
+going out when the feast was over.
+
+John O’Groat’s house is now nothing but a name, as all traces of the
+building—if any such ever existed—have long since disappeared.
+Nothing marks the spot but a little green mound, which tradition says
+is the one which the building formerly occupied.
+
+It was found on inquiry, that John’s plan for returning to Scotland,
+was wholly impracticable. It was very inconvenient and very expensive,
+for a single individual to go by the mail route, over the islands and
+across the firth, but for a party as large as Mrs. Morelle’s, it was
+impossible. There was no alternative but to take the steamer.
+
+“We must take the steamer, too, whatever the weather is,” said Mrs.
+Morelle, “unless we are willing to remain here another whole week, with
+the chance of finding worse weather still at the end of it.”
+
+In fact, however, when the morning arrived for expecting the _Prince
+Consort_ on her return from Shetland, the weather proved to be very
+fine. The steamer was expected to come into port at eight o’clock, and
+to remain there several hours.
+
+“So that you need be in no hurry,” said the porter, who gave Grimkie
+this information. “You can take your breakfast quietly, and then go
+on board at your leisure. The steamer will not sail before eleven or
+twelve.”
+
+“Why does she remain here so long?” asked Grimkie.
+
+“It takes some time to get the cattle on board,” said the porter. “You
+see they have to take them all out in boats, and then get them on
+board.”
+
+“Cattle!” exclaimed John. “Do the cattle go a sailing in the steamboat?”
+
+“Oh yes,” said the porter, smiling, “great numbers of them. There’s no
+other way to get the cattle, and sheep, and other animals, that are
+raised on these islands to market. They can’t get to England by land,
+and so the steamer takes them. That is the main business of the steamer
+in fact.”
+
+As soon as Grimkie and John heard this they were both eager to go on
+board the steamer as soon as possible after she came into port, as they
+were extremely desirous of witnessing the operation of getting cattle
+and horses up to her deck from a boat out in the middle of the harbor.
+
+“In the first place,” said John, “I don’t see how they’ll get them into
+the boats—and then when they get the boats to the side of the steamer,
+I can’t imagine how they are going to make them go up such a steep and
+narrow ladder.”
+
+John had seen no other mode of ascending and descending to the deck of
+the steamer, from boats alongside, but by the step-ladder used by the
+passengers, and he did not think of there being any other mode.
+
+Grimkie, with Mrs. Morelle’s consent, ordered breakfast at half past
+seven, and he told the porter that they should wish to go on board as
+soon as the steamer came in. Mrs. Morelle had no objection to this,
+for they knew that the steamer being in harbor, would be at rest, and
+though they expected to have to wait on board for several hours they
+thought that they should be likely to find more to amuse them there
+during that time than at the hotel, where they had become entirely
+familiar with every thing that was to be seen.
+
+Grimkie and John also took pains to have every thing packed and ready
+before the breakfast came upon the table, so that they might be all
+prepared to go on board immediately after breakfast, in case the
+steamer should arrive so soon. It was not, however, till about nine
+o’clock that the porter came to call them.
+
+There are no cabs or hackney coaches of any kind in the Orkneys, and
+so every body walks to the landing when they are going on board the
+steamer. When the time arrived the porter came for the trunk, and
+steadying the trunk on his shoulder with one hand, and carrying the
+night valise in the other, he led the way out through the court of the
+hotel. As soon as they entered the street, Mrs. Morelle and Florence
+were both alarmed at the sight of a monstrous bull, which a man was
+leading before them, and which was followed by a troop of men and boys.
+
+“Let us go slowly,” said she, “till that bull gets out of the way.”
+
+“I verily believe he is going on board the steamer,” said Grimkie.
+
+“No,” said John; “It can’t be. They might possibly get him into a
+boat and row him out there, but if they think that they can get such
+a fellow as that up that little narrow black step-ladder, they will
+find themselves very much mistaken I can tell them. _I_ know more about
+bulls than that, myself.”
+
+Mrs. Morelle did not gain much advantage by keeping back and walking
+slowly, for when at length she reached the landing place, she found
+the bull standing there surrounded by people. There were also some
+curious-looking boxes there, of the form of stalls for cattle, but Mrs.
+Morelle did not stop to look at them, being in haste to go past the
+bull and get into the boat. She effected this object safely. A number
+of other passengers went on board the boat at the same time. Their
+luggage was also put in, and then the boatmen pushed off, and rowed out
+to the steamer.
+
+Mrs. Morelle and Florence, who were beginning to be somewhat accustomed
+to going on board a steamer from a boat, found no difficulty in going
+up the step-ladder, however difficult such a feat might be expected to
+prove for a bull. As for the boys, they liked much better embarking in
+this way than to walk over a plank from a pier. As soon as they were
+all on board they went below to choose a stateroom for the two ladies.
+Mrs. Morelle offered also to take a stateroom for the boys, but they
+preferred to be in the cabin they said, so as to see and hear what was
+going on.
+
+As soon as the stateroom was chosen they all went up to the deck
+again, and after Grimkie and John had found seats for Mrs. Morelle
+and Florence, where they could see all around, and especially on the
+side toward the little port, where sail boats and fishing boats were
+continually coming and going, John took the opera glass, and began to
+watch the boats as they came in succession out from the opening between
+the two piers, which formed the entrance to the port, in order to see
+when the bull came, if he could.
+
+After scrutinizing a number of boats, which proved to be only fishing
+boats going out to sea, or passage boats belonging to private
+individuals going away to some of the other islands, John saw a very
+broad and heavy boat coming propelled by oars. After gazing at it a
+moment with great attention through his glass, he exclaimed, in a very
+excited manner,
+
+“Yes, Grimkie! he is coming! Here he is! I can see his horns!”
+
+Then after a moment’s pause he added,
+
+“There are a great many of them,—bulls and oxen, or something. I can
+see a great many horns. Look! Grimkie. Look!”
+
+So saying, he gave Grimkie the glass, and by the time Grimkie had got
+the boat into the field of view it had come so much nearer that he
+could see very plainly that it was very large and that it had a sort
+of floor in the bottom of it which was completely filled with oxen and
+cows. The animals stood together as close as they could be packed, and
+Grimkie could just see their heads and necks above the gunwales of the
+boat.
+
+“I don’t understand how they got them into that boat,” said John, “and
+we will see pretty soon how they make out in driving them up this
+little stair.”
+
+“They won’t drive them up there,” said Grimkie. “That is the gangway
+for the passengers. They won’t take them into this part of the steamer
+at all.”
+
+“Where will they take them in then?” asked John.
+
+“Forward,” said Grimkie.
+
+“Then let us go forward and see,” said John.
+
+“Very well,” said Grimkie. “This is the way.”
+
+There was a broad bridge extending across from one paddle-wheel to the
+other, at some distance above the main deck, and a walk, with railings
+on each side, extending fore and aft from this bridge to the quarter
+deck where Mrs. Morelle and Florence were sitting. The boys went along
+the walk to the bridge, and there, as they looked down upon the forward
+deck, an extraordinary spectacle met their view. The space was divided
+into pens,—made by small iron posts set up in the deck, and strong
+bars connecting them—and these pens were filled with animals of all
+kinds, cows, sheep, horses, ponies, oxen, and even pigs. These animals
+had all been taken on board at Shetland,—the produce of the farms
+there, which the farmers were sending to market.
+
+Among all these animals those which most attracted the attention of
+the boys, were the Shetland ponies. They stood together in a pen by
+themselves. They were of various sizes, and although they all had the
+general form and appearance of the horse, some of them were very
+small. There was one that John said would be _too_ small even for _him_.
+
+These ponies were going to England to be sold there to gentlemen who
+were willing to buy them for their boys, to ride about upon over the
+smooth gravel roads made in their parks and pleasure-grounds. Such
+ponies are used too by ladies to drive over the same kind of roads in a
+small and light open chaise, called a pony-chaise.
+
+Before the boys had satisfied themselves with looking at the ponies,
+their attention was suddenly called away by the arrival of the boatload
+of cows, which now came up alongside of the steamer at a place where an
+opening had been made in the bulwarks for the purpose of taking them
+in. They immediately went over to that side of the steamer, and looked
+down from their elevated position upon the bridge, to watch the mode of
+proceeding for getting the cattle on board.
+
+Just beneath them was an iron crane with a small steam engine attached
+to it, by which it was worked. The whole was upon a small round iron
+platform, which moved upon a pivot in the deck, in such a manner that
+the platform could turn in any direction, carrying with it crane,
+engine, and all. There was a boy upon this platform who governed its
+motions by two polished iron handles which were connected with the
+different steam pipes. The boy received his orders from the men who
+had the management of the cattle, pulling and pushing his handles in
+different ways, according as they called out, _Lower! Hoist! Stop!
+Turn!_
+
+There were two men in the boat with the cattle, crowding their way
+about among them, without paying the least attention either to their
+horns or their heels. The people from the deck threw down two broad
+bands, made of canvas or sail cloth, to these men. The men took one of
+the bands and passed it under one the cows, between her fore legs and
+her hind legs, and then brought the edges together over her back. In
+the meantime the boy had been called upon to “lower,” and he turned his
+handles in such a way as to swing the top of the crane out over the
+boat and to lower the chain, which had a hook in the end of it, until
+the men in the boat could reach it and hook it into certain rings in
+the upper edges of the canvas over the cow’s back.
+
+The order was then given to the boy to “hoist,” and immediately
+afterward the little steam engine began rapidly to wind up the chain
+whereupon the poor cow found herself suddenly lifted off from her feet,
+and rising rapidly into the air, her legs hanging down in the most
+awkward and helpless condition imaginable. As soon as she was raised
+fairly above the level of the deck, the men waiting there seized her
+by the head and horns and swung her in on board, and then the boy
+lowered her until her feet touched the planks, when she immediately
+began to spring and scramble to get away. At the same time instant the
+broad belt by which she had been lifted was dropped, and fell upon the
+deck and the cow was free. The men led her away by means of a short
+cord fastened to one of her horns, and put her in a pen with the other
+cattle.
+
+By this process the cows were all hoisted out of the boat and landed
+upon the steamer, in a rapid and unceremonious manner. While one cow
+was coming up, the men in the boat were placing the second band under
+another one, so as to be ready to hook the chain to her, the moment
+it came down, and thus not a moment was lost. The words Lower, Hoist,
+Stop, Turn, followed each other in very rapid succession, and the
+little piston-rod of the engine plied its strokes in the nimblest
+possible manner, as cow after cow came up, until at length the boat
+was wholly cleared.
+
+By the time that the first boat was empty another one came. This second
+one contained the bull, but instead of being free as the cows had been,
+he was secured fast in one of the moveable stalls which Mrs. Morelle
+had seen at the landing. The stall was a narrow box, just wide enough
+for the bull to stand in it. It had a floor, two sides, two ends, but
+no top. Instead of a top, there were two irons passing over from one
+side to the other, above, giving the box the appearance of a monstrous
+oblong pail with two bails to it. When the chain was lowered the hooks
+were attached to these two bails, and the box, bull and all, was run up
+rapidly to the deck, and placed there in a secure position among the
+piers.
+
+As fast as the remaining cattle were brought up, new pens were made
+upon the deck, and when at length the pens were all full, the hatches
+were opened, and a great many cows, after being hoisted up from the
+boat and swung round over the hatchways, were lowered down into the
+hold, to some dark and dismal region there, which the boys could not
+see.
+
+Besides the cows and a load of oxen, there was a boat full of sheep
+that came on board, and also one of pigs. The pigs were hoisted two
+at a time—each of them having a band passed round him, and the hook
+taking hold of the rings of each band. The pigs made a frightful outcry
+at being hoisted in this manner.
+
+There were a great many boxes containing fish, and packages of wool,
+and bags of grain, and other such things, the produce of the islands,
+that were also taken on board. The work of getting all the cargo in,
+and on board, occupied several hours, and it was near noon before the
+steamer was ready to sail.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+
+The sea was very smooth, and the air calm, on the day that Mrs. Morelle
+and her party made the voyage back from the Orkneys to what may be
+called in relation to them, the main land. Mrs. Morelle and Florence
+having some misgivings in respect to the effect which the sea might
+produce upon them, thought it best to remain below, at least until
+the steamer should arrive at Wick, because they could lie down while
+they were below, and a horizontal position is found to be the best
+means, both for guarding against the approach of sea-sickness, and for
+alleviating the sufferings produced by it when it comes.
+
+“But we will not go into our stateroom, Grimkie,” said Mrs. Morelle.
+“We will lie down upon the sofas in the great cabin, and then if we can
+not read we can amuse ourselves with observing what is going on.”
+
+Grimkie accordingly accompanied his aunt and cousin below, and found
+nice sofas for them there. He put two or three soft cushions at the
+head of each sofa, and when Mrs. Morelle and Florence had come down,
+he spread shawls over their feet, and gave them their books. Then
+leaving them to themselves he went upon deck again to join John.
+
+Grimkie and John remained upon the deck all the afternoon, except that
+from time to time they went below to see if the ladies were doing well
+in the cabin. They watched the different islands as the steamer passed
+along their shores on her way to the southward, identifying them one
+after another by means of the map. When at length they came opposite to
+the Pentland Firth, John looked in that direction long and earnestly
+to see if he could discern any signs of the whirlpools, or foaming
+breakers that he read accounts of in the books,—but excepting a white
+line of surf which often appeared along the rocky shores at the margin
+of the water, nothing was to be seen.
+
+In the meantime the coast of Caithness, the northern part of Scotland,
+had come fully into view, and presently the steamer, drawing nearer
+and nearer to the coast began to follow the line of it, at a little
+distance in the offing, toward Wick.
+
+The steamer remained several hours at Wick, and the boys were at first
+very anxious to go on shore during the interval, but Mrs. Morelle
+thought it not prudent for them to do so. They afterward concluded,
+however, that they liked quite as well to remain on board, for a great
+many boat loads of cattle, sheep, and other animals were brought out
+and hoisted on board, and they were very much entertained in watching
+the operations.
+
+At length, about nine o’clock in the evening, the steamer sailed again,
+and now her course led her out quite into the open sea, as will appear
+by an inspection of the map, which shows a great bay entering into the
+land between Wick and Aberdeen, across the mouth of which the track of
+the steamer lay. Mrs. Morelle and Florence determined to go into their
+stateroom at once, and go to bed, hoping to sleep during the whole time
+of passing across this bay. Grimkie and John remained on deck till
+eleven o’clock, and then, though it was still very light, they went
+below and took their places on the couches or sofas where Mrs. Morelle
+and Florence had lain during the afternoon, and were both soon sound
+asleep. They slept without any intermission until morning.
+
+After this brief and prosperous voyage the whole party landed safely
+in Scotland, which seemed to them like a continent in comparison with
+the smaller islands that they had been to visit. There was a railway
+station very near the quay, and after spending a few hours at the hotel
+to take breakfast, and to rest a little from the voyage, they took
+places in the train for Perth and Edinburgh, and set out upon their
+journey about ten o’clock, They met with a great many entertaining
+adventures on the way toward London, but they can not be related in
+this volume.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+Transcriber’s Notes
+
+Page 78—changed Morell to =Morelle=
+Page 80—changed CHAPTER VI to =CHAPTER VII=
+Page 100—changed locks to =lochs=
+Page 158—changed appartus to =apparatus=
+Page 175—changed househeeper to =housekeeper=
+Page 186—changed discomforture to =discomfiture=
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77259 ***