SECTION III.

RIVER-BASINS OF SCOTLAND.

I. GENERAL VIEW.

1. You remember what we said, last year, about river-basins and water-partings. It may be well for you to go over it again, before we set out to see the river-basins of Scotland.

2. If you were looking at a house, you might first look round the outside, to see its size, and shape, and walls, and windows, and the grounds it stood in; but, after this, you would wish to go in, and find out how many rooms there were in it, how large they were, how they were arranged, and how they were divided from each other. Now, Great Britain is our house! The grounds it stands in are the seas on all sides of it; its walls are the cliffs, and capes, and promontories; its windows are the bays, and creeks, and firths, and rivermouths, through which it looks out to the ocean.

3. All these we have seen; and it is now time to go inside, and look through the rooms or divisions

of our house. You should be able to tell me what these are, if you remember last year's lessons. The river-basins of a country are its natural divisions, or what I have called its rooms: the hills and mountains, which form the water-partings, are the walls between room and room. So the first thing we have to do is to trace out the lines of the water-partings, and thus settle the boundaries of the river-basins. But how shall we trace these? We want still to fancy that we are going along the real outlines on the land itself, not merely drawing our finger along lines on the map. But we cannot sail on solid land: even if we could suppose ourselves walking or riding, we could hardly in this way really see the 'lie' of the different bits of country. There is but one way in which we can fancy that we are following the courses of these hills and mountains: we must go in a balloon! We must of course be able to guide it as we please, and make the wind blow, from time to time, exactly as it suits us! We may then skim through the air, a little above the tops of the hills, and so trace out the lines of the water-partings.

4. So now let us mount our balloon again, and sail across the hills to Carter Fell, the best startingpoint for our trip to trace the water-partings of

Scotland, as we did those of England, and try to the river-basins in sections according to the way the rivers flow.

group

5. One little group we have already disposed of those which find their way to the northern shores of the Solway. Leaving these behind us, we turn our balloon northwards, between the sources of the Tweed and Clyde. Soon we find that the hills part eastward and westward; before us is a high plain or table-land, all the country on our right hand being the basin of the Tweed, and all on our left the basin of the Clyde. North-eastward are the Pentland and Lammermuir Hills, from which flow feeders to the Tweed.

6. Beyond them, our 'eagle eyes' catch sight of a wide opening in the coast; and once more we recognise the face of an old friend-the Firth of Forth. This tells us that the table-land over which we are passing, like the central table-land of England, forms an important water-parting: we turn away from the Tweed; and, as we still follow the Clyde, the basin of the Forth lies northward on our right. We find the sources of the Forth in Ben Lomond; and, when we have reached that point, the great Highland range is before us, stretching without a break to Cape Wrath and Duncansby Head. Running along the central line to the northward,

we see that, like the Pennine Chain in England, it lies much nearer to the Atlantic than to the German Ocean: a narrow strip, with short mountain streams, is on our left; while the great rivers are all on our right.

7. Shall we say, then, that Scotland, north of the Lowther Hills, may all go into two divisionsa very large one on the east, and a long narrow one on the west? This would be true. Yet I think that, as you look down on the great masses (too large to be called spurs) which branch off to the north-eastward from our central line, you will feel that they must be main water-partings, and must cut the country into more than two parts. We might really make twenty divisions if we chose. But let us break off from the northward line at Ben Nevis, and follow the Grampians eastward, reaching the coast a little to the south of Aberdeen. We have now three divisions, bounded by the two seas, the main chain, and the Grampians: viz. the South-eastern, between the Grampians and the Cheviots the South-western, between Ben Lomond and the Solway; and the Northern, including both sides of the main Highland range. If you add the little strip on the south, you have four divisions, answering very nearly to the four in England and Wales. Trace these lines carefully on the map,

and I think you will see that they serve as well as any we could have taken, to describe the real face of the country.

8. Perhaps you may wonder why I stop at Ben Lomond for the south-western section, but go as far as Ben Nevis for the south-eastern. And And you may say, if you are looking out from our balloon,

Why not turn off at Ben Lomond, along the western side of Loch Tay? I should be very glad if you thought enough to ask this question, but still more glad, if, by thinking a little longer, you could find out the answer to it. Look! Don't you see that if you took the line you speak of, you would be crossing several streams-the Tay itself,