United States or Honduras ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Glens, waterfalls, stream, torrent, mountain and valley, with their romantic histories, make this a very attractive region to thousands of summer travellers from England and other countries. The railway from Perth to Inverness via Dunkeld and Blair Atholl, has just opened up this secluded Scotch Switzerland to multitudes who never would have seen it without the help of the Iron Horse.
When at length, at the end of the tour in Germany, our travellers were approaching Cologne on the Rhine, Rollo began to look out, some miles before they reached it, to watch for the first appearance of the town. He had been riding in the coupé of the diligence with his uncle; but now, in order that he might see better, he had changed his place, and taken a seat on the banquette.
The nice landau which Miss Tredgold had purchased met the travellers at Lyndhurst Road, and the first piece of news which Briar, who had come to meet them, announced was that the ponies had arrived. "Peas-blossom and Lavender are so sweet!" she said. "They came yesterday. We are quite longing to ride them. As to Peas-blossom, he is quite the dearest pony I ever looked at in my life."
Their suspicions are not so wild as one might suppose, for the neighbouring jungle, called the Addo Bush, swarms with these and other wild animals. The distance travelled on this first day was not great; the travellers were not much fatigued, but were greatly excited by novelty, which rendered them wakeful.
The travellers soon passed the cultivated lands of Egypt, and entered on an expanse of sandy waste, such as the bottom of the ocean might exhibit, if the waters were to retire. This desert was covered with the fragments, as it were, of a petrified forest; large trunks, branches, twigs, and even pieces of bark, being scattered over it.
They were proud hard men, and uttered no entreaty for grace. They had hung too many travellers upon these same branches not to expect their own turn, and they were no cravens to abase themselves. That act of justice ended, Henry mounted his warhorse and rode in at the gates.
"I did not call to you, indeed," said the Thin Woman; "but why do you sit in the path so that travellers to the House of the Dagda are halted on their journey?" "There are no paths closed to us," he replied; "even the gods seek us, for they grow weary in their splendid desolation saving Him who liveth in all things and in us; Him we serve and before His awful front we abase ourselves.
But the travellers never paused in their onward march. Although they had been on the way since early morning, they showed no sign of fatigue. Their strong athletic bodies, bent somewhat forward, swayed in rythmic motion, and their feet beat a silent tatoo upon the well-worn trail.
"But, Mother, when you tell that story again, you must not say little throats, or any one will know who your travellers are quick enough; but do please tell us more about them." "Yes, Frank, you have caught me; these travellers are martins; and, if you wish, I will tell you more about them. Mr. Wilson, whom I have been reading to-day, calls them birds of passage." "What does that mean, Mother?"
So, with kisses, they separated, and Miss Inches went back to her old life, feeling that it was rather comfortable not to be any longer responsible for a "young intelligence," and that she should never envy mammas with big families of children again, as once she had done. "So we've got our Curly Locks back," said Katy, fondly stroking Johnnie's hair, the night after the travellers' return.
Word Of The Day