that poetic imagination, unrestrained by contrary facts, should have evolved from that silent couple the pathetic story of Bishop Percy's ballad? It is pleasanter, at any rate, to allow that lovers' story of life-time devotion to fill the mind than to obliterate it in favour of the darksome spirits of evil which may have tormented many a hermit in this narrow cell. Having his mind so much attuned to the past by the hermitage and the castle ruins, the visitor to this quiet northern town will be in fit condition to muse upon the long procession of humanity which has passed over Warkworth bridge since it first spanned the waters of the Coquet. This sturdy structure, by which the town is approached from the north, was erected during the closing years of the fourteenth century. Although the upper story of the gatehouse at the south end of the bridge is somewhat ruinous, the rest of the work of those long dead masons bids fair to resist the assaults of time for many generations. F A HIGHLAND NOBLE'S HOME Fyne a IVE or six miles from the head of Loch small bay indents the west side of the lake, and on a gently-sloping lawn in the centre of that bay stands Inverary Castle, the chief seat of the illustrious family of Argyll. It is a fitting home for the head of a great Highland clan. To the right rises the conical hill of Duniquaich, with its sombre watch-tower on the summit, recalling those lawless days the memory of which contributes not a little to the romance of the Scottish Highlands. On the left, nestling almost under the shadow of the castle, lies the royal town of Inverary, the latter-day reminder of a time when the followers of a great noble were safest within bow-shot of his fortress. The background is shut in by tree-clad hills, which sweep down to the right and left on either side of the river Aray. Bannockburn laid the foundations of the fortune of the Argyll family. Although the bards of this noble house claim for it an antiquity reaching back to the shadowy times of the fifth century, the earliest authentic charter connected with the family belongs to the year 1315. Among the adventurous Scots who sided with Robert the Bruce in his struggles for the Scottish crown was one Sir Neil Campbell, of Lochaw (the modern Loch Awe), and so lively a sense did the king entertain of the services thus rendered, culminating at. Bannockburn, that he rewarded his follower with the hand of his own sister, the Lady Mary Bruce. It was to Sir Colin Campbell, eldest son of this union, that the charter mentioned above was granted, and it secured to the king's nephew the barony of Lochaw on condition that he provided, at his own charges and whenever required, a ship of forty oars for the royal service. It does not appear when the Argyll family took up their residence at Inverary; all that is certain is that it was long prior to 1474, for in that year King James III, "for the singular favour he bore to his trusty and well beloved cousin, Colin, Earl of Argyll," created the "Earl's village of Inverary" a free burgh or barony. Turner's etching of Inverary Castle is most remarkable for its intolerable deal of landscape |