of the High Street and the Trongate, in the centre of the old town, but no longer existing. Its site, adjoining the crowned tower, now or lately, standing there, is occupied by heavy, turreted warehouses. At this prison Mr. Frank gained insight into mysteries that had surrounded and perplexed him. The stranger who had whispered at the kirk, and who had conducted him thither, proved to be Rob Roy, outlawed and hunted, who, for reasons then inexplicable to Mr. Frank, was apparently acting for some friendly being, even for the adorable Diana (who continually was doing him precious service while she happily helped develop evidence of much villany that Rashleigh was perpetrating). Thus it occurred that Mr. Frank was, at the Tolbooth, enabled to meet his father's head clerk, Mr. Owen, confined by the obdurate MacVittie because the reported insolvent house of Osbaldistone and Tresham owed MacVittie and Mac Fin certain unsecured debts. It will be remembered that the London firm had admitted Rashleigh to partnership, to the place declined by Mr. Frank; and it will also be remembered that Diana Vernon had most just and sufficient reason to know and to fully comprehend the ingenuity and baseness of which the accomplished, but thoroughly mean and wicked, Jesuit was capable, and that he was actually exercising, -against her, against Mr. Frank, against the London house, and even against the established government. Thus, in this seemingly ill-omened prison, the hero of the story was started on the right course for circumventing ruinous plots against an admirable young lady's peace and honor; against his father's commercial credit and fortune; and even against his country itself. He had not gained this very valuable knowledge, before the unexpected entrance of a civil magistrate seemed, at first, to threaten confusion to its application; but the incident and the officer eventually proved very beneficial to the whole business, and to the honest persons involved in it; for the magistrate was that good, entertaining character, Bailie Nichol Jarvie,— the very reverse of the captivating MacVittie, come, even on a Sunday night, to ascertain how he might ameliorate the temporal condition of Mr. Owen, though the latter's principals were indebted to him. Rob Roy was evidently at serious disadvantage, confronted as he was within the very town prison by a town Bailie. But the story, besides showing a Scotch relationship between the two, extricated the Highlander completely, properly, and divertingly, to do much good service in the future. Hence, the action of the story leads us to the house of worthy Mr. Jarvie in the "Saut Market" near by, where the English gentlemen breakfasted with him next day. The respectably inhabited portions of cities have always been subject to vicissitudes, and this Salt Market Street shows this fact. In the times of the Bailie, and of his father, the deacon, before him, it was a reputable, quiet street enough; but now, certainly to outward view, it is far from being a desirable place of residence. Sights, sounds, and smells, secular, and even profane, abound. The rather large and old houses do not beguile us into explorations, or to conceptive picturing of snug breakfast parties in them. Still, while noticing this evidence of the mutability of human things, we cannot but always pleasantly associate the "Saut Market" with the entertaining and commendable Bailie Nichol Jarvie. The next scene to which the action of the story leads is farther up town, -the University on the High Street, -a continuation of Salt Market Street. The reader of these pages will hardly be able, probably, to find this old "landmark" of Glasgow; for since the writer visited it, and very recently, it is displaced by a huge Railway Station. It is to reappear in greater splendor out of town. The writer, however, sketches it as he found it, and as it probably was in the times of "Rob Roy." The chief buildings, completed about the year 1662, had not a little of the usual Scotch heaviness, and also picturesqueness. They abutted directly upon the street, and were entered by a low and rather wide archway, within which was a large, quaint court-yard, solemn and quiet as a monastery; and, indeed, on one or two sides cloistered, though in a sort of Doric style. The architecture, partially Jacobean, presented many scroll-crowned window-caps, stacks of clustered chimneys, and ponderous balconies and staircases. Partially, also, in the imported French style of the seventeenth century, it thus presented those turrets with sharp cone or rocket tops, and that tendency to tall roofs and gables distinguishing what may be termed the French Chateau style. Every thing was dingy, yet well kept. Beyond this court-yard was an open enclosure, on the farther side of which was the "classic" Hunterian Museum, containing a large and diversified collection, books, pictures, "antiques," natural-historical matters, and anatomical models. "Descending from these buildings towards the inky waters of the Molindinar Burn" was "a piece of pleasure-ground (says Billings) with a few scattered trees, wofully blackened and blighted by the smoke of surrounding manufactories. This " was "the old College Garden, known to novel-readers as the scene of the picturesque conflict between the Osbaldistones, described in Rob Roy.'" Here, as the story in detail shows, Frank Osbaldistone came upon Rashleigh, and naturally upbraided him for much that he had done towards ruining the London house. The Jesuit resented his cousin's charges, and a quarrel ensued that developed into a sword-fight between the two. At this crisis Rob Roy appeared, opportunely, as he usually did, and averted tragic results by parting the combatants. Soon after this duel evidence was elicited of more and continued mischief that Rashleigh was plotting against his cousin,—and, indeed, almost every one he could affect. From this mischief Mr. Frank's mysteriously inspired but steadfast friend, Rob Roy, advised timely escape; while Rashleigh continued to devote himself to various deadly purposes, and to desperate and extensive schemes of financial and political villany, -purposes and schemes that had brought him, in a manner seeming strange, to Glasgow, and that ultimately became exposed. Again Mr. Frank's affairs, with those of his father, led him northward, and this time, in connection with private business of Mr. Jarvie, and an appointment to meet Rob Roy at the Clachan of Aberfoyle. Thither he, with the Bailie and Andrew Fairservice, journeyed, and there found a dismal public-house at the base of the Highlands, situated over twenty miles north of Glasgow. It is now represented, rather monumentally, by the "Bailie Nichol Jarvie Inn, about seven miles from Bucklyvie Station on the Forth and Clyde railway, and by that line easily reached from Glasgow. This Inn is a pleasant resting-place, from which many delightful spots can be visited, either connected or not, with "Rob Roy." It is only half a dozen miles from the Trosachs Hotel, noticed in the sketch of "The Lady of the Lake" (page 54), and is to be reached from Aberfoyle by a walk across hills and moorlands (mentioned on page 68). The "Bailie Nichol Jarvie" Inn is, or was, a decided contrast to that at the Clachan found by travellers a century and a half ago, especially as illustrated in this story, the trio of which from Glasgow found the public-house then a rude building, probably like those low, thatched, stone-walled houses that yet exist near by. They found it, moreover, occupied by three carousing Highlandmen, of the military or fighting sort, who took decided offence at what they chose to consider the intrusion of the trio. A letter from Rob Roy, delivered by the landlady, informed the latter that "night-hawks abroad" would prevent him from keeping his appointment at Aberfoyle, and that a certain trusty person designated would guide them to a secure place where he could meet them. They were, however, obliged to spend the night at the inn, where, owing to the suspecting unfriendliness of the fighting men, a celebrated conflict was provoked, as every one is supposed to know from youth upward. Indeed, few have not heard how, after one of the warriors drew aside to equalize numbers, and Andrew had hypocritically fled to the stable, the spirit of war became rampant, and each Highlandman, with irrepressible longings for fight, chose his man; how then, Osbaldistone held his ground in usual defensive style; and how the Bailie valorously charged upon his opponent with a red-hot plough-coulter that he seized from the fire; and finally, how the "affair" was soon amicably settled after his tremendous demonstration. Happily the fight hurt only the kilt of the Bailie's opponent. During most of the remainder of the evening the two parties got on quite entertainingly together, until interrupted by the advent of a Captain Thornton with a file of soldiers in the regular service, sent after Rob Roy, and, to the surprise of all, ordered to arrest an old and a young man, the Bailie and Frank Osbaldistone. We can imagine through whose devices this latter commission was directed. As appeared in results, the arrest, that then ensued from it, was not thoroughly sad. Notwithstanding this arrest, the next morning opened invigoratingly, as Highland mornings can, and brought in a day that introduced the Glasgow trio to Highland scenes that may be probably more charming to us now than they were to them, although Mr. Frank Osbaldistone has recorded, by proxy, his appreciation. Following a route that they took, we can now find abundant picturesque beauty, and be thankful for romance that their names yet associate with it without the discomfort to us that seems necessary to create that style of interest. The soldiers in the morning continued on their special service, taking their prisoners with them as they went, along the northern shore of Loch Ard, a beautiful and romantic lake near Aberfoyle. The party was guided by one of Rob Roy's people, and into an effective trap, the regulars found. Sir Walter's description of the opening scene of this march is truly delightful. "I shall never forget" (he makes Mr. Frank write) "the delightful sensation with which I exchanged the dark, smoky, smothering atmosphere of the Highland hut, in which we had passed the night so uncomfortably, for the refreshing fragrance of the morning air, and the glorious beams of the rising sun, which, from a tabernacle of purple and golden clouds, were darted full on such a scene of natural romance and beauty as had never before greeted my eyes. To the left lay the valley, down which the Forth wandered on its easterly course, surrounding the beautiful detached hill, with all its garland of woods. On the right, amid a profusion of thickets, knolls, and crags, lay the bed of a broad mountain lake, lightly curled into tiny waves by the breath of the morning breeze, each glittering in its course under the influence of the sunbeams. High hills, rocks, and banks, waving with natural forests of birch and oak, formed the borders of this enchanting sheet of water; and as their leaves rustled in the wind and twinkled in the sun, gave to the depth of solitude a sort of life and vivacity." - Other descriptive allusion to this scenery after that of Scott is superfluous. Yet it may be noted that these shores of Loch Ard, thus pictured by him, — intricate, wooded, crag-bounded, — present a charming variety of views that continually attract the traveller onward. The road usually followed, that of the story, is along the northern side; at first, through a tolerably open space, bordered by steep, rocky, lofty heights, and then, directly above the lake, by a narrow pass. From several points are picturesque views of Ben Lomond, a grand mountain, having one of the noblest hill-forms in Scotland, rising each side with bold, gracefully curving, sweeping slopes to a sharp, double cone. The atmospheric perspective at a moderate distance often tints it exquisitely. At the pass mentioned occurred a skirmish, described with spirit in the novel, when the captain of the regulars found his progress arrested by a very irregular force of Macgregors posted at the crest of the pass, and headed by Helen, the Amazonian wife of Rob Roy. The natural scene is very interestingly suggestive of the action represented in it. One now may see the old way up which the courageous troops advanced; the thickets whence the Highlanders fired upon them; the height on which Helen Macgregor stood, demanding why the country of her clan was invaded; the rocks up which the recently made prisoners fled; and the identical gnarled oak stump overhanging a lofty rock, whereon the |