"Galt, John - The Ayrshire Legatees" - читать интересную книгу автора (Galt John)

the road, we saw the cloistered ruins of the religious house of
Southenan, a nunnery in those days of romantic adventure, when to
live was to enjoy a poetical element. In such a sweet sequestered
retreat, how much more pleasing to the soul it would have been, for
you and I, like two captive birds in one cage, to have sung away our
hours in innocence, than for me to be thus torn from you by fate,
and all on account of that mercenary legacy, perchance the spoils of
some unfortunate Hindoo Rajah!

At Largs we halted to change horses, and saw the barrows of those
who fell in the great battle. We then continued our journey along
the foot of stupendous precipices; and high, sublime, and darkened
with the shadow of antiquity, we saw, upon its lofty station, the
ancient Castle of Skelmorlie, where the Montgomeries of other days
held their gorgeous banquets, and that brave knight who fell at
Chevy-Chace came pricking forth on his milk-white steed, as Sir
Walter Scott would have described him. But the age of chivalry is
past, and the glory of Europe departed for ever!

When we crossed the stream that divides the counties of Ayr and
Renfrew, we beheld, in all the apart and consequentiality of pride,
the house of Kelly overlooking the social villas of Wemyss Bay. My
brother compared it to a sugar hogshead, and them to cotton-bags;
for the lofty thane of Kelly is but a West India planter, and the
inhabitants of the villas on the shore are Glasgow manufacturers.

To this succeeded a dull drive of about two miles, and then at once
we entered the pretty village of Inverkip. A slight snow-shower had
given to the landscape a sort of copperplate effect, but still the
forms of things, though but sketched, as it were, with China ink,
were calculated to produce interesting impressions. After
ascending, by a gentle acclivity, into a picturesque and romantic
pass, we entered a spacious valley, and, in the course of little
more than half an hour, reached this town; the largest, the most
populous, and the most superb that I have yet seen. But what are
all its warehouses, ships, and smell of tar, and other odoriferous
circumstances of fishery and the sea, compared with the green
swelling hills, the fragrant bean-fields, and the peaceful groves of
my native Garnock!

The people of this town are a very busy and clever race, but much
given to litigation. My brother says, that they are the greatest
benefactors to the Outer House, and that their lawsuits are the most
amusing and profitable before the courts, being less for the purpose
of determining what is right than what is lawful. The chambermaid
of the inn where we lodge pointed out to me, on the opposite side of
the street, a magnificent edifice erected for balls; but the
subscribers have resolved not to allow any dancing till it is
determined by the Court of Session to whom the seats and chairs
belong, as they were brought from another house where the assemblies