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TRAVELS IN MORAYSHIRE.

BY A MOUNTAINEER.

BEFORE proceeding to furnish the world with an account of my peregrinations through Morayshire, it may be proper to advertise the reader that I was born in the year 1800, in one of the most mountainous districts of Argyleshire; in which place I had incessantly vegetated until I set out on my tour to the far-famed county of Elgin. In person I am rather stout: my costume, like that of my ancestors for a score of centuries backwards, is that known by the name of the Highland garb,-in other words, it consists of a Kilmarnoch bonnet, a tartan coat, a tartan vest, a tartan kilt, tartan hose, and a couple of shoes made, as I am told, out of a cow's hide. It is unnecessary to add that I performed the whole of this adventurous journey on my legs.

On the 9th of October, in the year of Grace 1836, I had the gratification of penetrating Morayshire a little southward of Craigellachie Iron

Bridge; but until I came to the latter place I did not observe anything worthy of being "specially exhibited" in these pages. I was struck to admiration with this magnificent bridge over Spey; and stood more than two hours on it, in the course of which time I interrogated every person that passed, on the subject of its origin, erection, &c.; but the whole amount of the information I received is, that it was built within the last twenty years-that the architect was an Englishman and that all the time he was in this country, he evinced a desperate affection for roast beef for dinner.

Having sufficiently feasted my optics with Craigellachie Bridge, I hastened on to the village of Rothes, which, I suppose, is a distance of somewhere about two miles. Rothes is built on a very original plan. It has a long street, or rather two streets, separated by a small river, which extend in nearly a straight line from south to north. Then you have a row of houses which diverges from the High-street in an easterly direction. Altogether the little thriving town of

Rothes has quite a mathematical appearance. I was agreeably struck with the manner of its inhabitants; and not less so with several novelties I saw in the shape of house and shop signs. From certain pieces of boards, with certain disjointed and hunch-backed letters scratched on them, appended to the walls of their dwelling places, I concluded that a reasonable quantum of the inhabitants were publicans. I was allured into an apartment by one of these sign-boards, the inscription on which seemed to me to import, that within was a repository of all the world's good things. On entering I asked to purchase three halfpenny worth of buttermilk; but to my utter astonishment was informed they had not, and never had, such an article for sale.

Left Rothes at five o'clock in the afternoon, for Elgin. Saw abundance of mountains on all hands on the way; but paid little attention to them, as they are sufficiently plentiful in my own county. Reached the burgh of Elgin at eight o'clock precisely; and on entering the town had my ears regaled with the melodious cadences of a nocturnal and auroratical orator: I mean the

article termed the Big Bell. As it was too late, and I was withal too weary to ramble through the town for the purpose of surveying its sights, natural and artificial, I determined on going to bed rather early, and rising in good time next morning to look about me. As I was an entire stranger in the place, I asked a woman whom I met in the streets, where I could get suitable lodgings for the night. After giving me a thorough perusal from head to foot, she directed me to an hotel on the north side of the town. I groped my way to it, though the night was somewhat dark. In my lodgings I met with a great number of public characters, and beheld human life in a greater variety of light and and shade, than I had ever seen it before. One jovial fellow whose enjoyment of himself on this occasion, seemed to be without limits, was a stout blind man, a "traveller," as he designated himself, which translated into plain English, means a ballad singer. He had what the late Cobbett would have called a she companion with him, whom he dignified with the name of wife; but no one but himself seemed to look on her in

that character, as the female personage in question was known to the landlady of the house to have been the nineteenth female that the blind rogue had been led by, under the pretence of being his spouse. The gill-stoup was greatly in vogue on this occasion, and the glass circulated around the company with amazing rapidity. A person called the Kilbady minister* acted in the capacity of president. For a full half-hour this gentleman, who seemed a strange compound of semi-insanity and roguery, preached up the evils of intemperance, while the while the consummate knave was himself unable to retain his equilibrium; and so late as the night before, as I was informed, he had been so far gone in a state of inebriation as to be found lying in the street, apparently considering it a luxury of no common order to be allowed to roll his carcase about among the gutters. In the present instance, Kilbady was also very

* This personage has been known for a great many years throughout the whole of the north of Scotland. He will either sing a song or preach some stolen sermon for a few halfpence; which is the mode in which he gets his living.