The summit of this mountain is well chosen by Cowley as the scene of the ‘Vision,’ in which the spectral angel discourses with him concerning the government of Oliver Cromwell.  ‘I found myself,’ says he, ’on the top of that famous hill in the Island Mona, which has the prospect of three great, and not long since most happy, kingdoms.  As soon as ever I looked upon them, they called forth the sad representation of all the sins and all the miseries that had overwhelmed them these twenty years.’  It is not to be denied that the changes now in progress, and the passions, and the way in which they work, strikingly resemble those which led to the disasters the philosophic writer so feelingly bewails.  God grant that the resemblance may not become still more striking as months and years advance!

404. Eagle in Mosaic. [Sonnet XXV.]

    ‘On revisiting Dunolly Castle.’

This ingenious piece of workmanship, as I afterwards learned, had been executed for their own amusement by some labourers employed about the place.

405. *_In the Frith of Clyde_.—­Ailsa Crag during an eclipse of the sun, July 17, 1833. [XXIII.]

The morning of the eclipse was exquisitely beautiful while we passed the Crag, as described in the sonnet.  On the deck of the steamboat were several persons of the poor and labouring class; and I could not but be struck with their cheerful talk with each other, while not one of them seemed to notice the magnificent objects with which we were surrounded; and even the phenomenon of the eclipse attracted but little of their attention.  Was it right not to regret this?  They appeared to me, however, so much alive in their own minds to their own concerns that I could not but look upon it as a misfortune that they had little perception for such pleasures as cannot be cultivated without ease and leisure.  Yet, if one surveys life in all its duties and relations, such ease and leisure will not be found so enviable a privilege as it may at first appear.  Natural philosophy, painting, and poetry, and refined taste, are no doubt great acquisitions to society; but among those who dedicate themselves to such pursuits it is to be feared that few are as happy and as consistent in the management of their lives as the class of persons who at that time led me into this course of reflection.  I do not mean by this to be understood to derogate from intellectual pursuits, for that would be monstrous.  I say it in deep gratitude for this compensation to those whose cares are limited to the necessities of daily life.  Among them, self-tormentors, so numerous in the higher classes of society, are rare.

406. *_On the Frith of Clyde_.—­In a Steamboat, [XXIV.]

The mountain outline on the north of this island [Arran], as seen from the Frith of Clyde, is much the finest I have ever noticed in Scotland or elsewhere.

407. ‘There, said a Stripling.’ [XXXVII.]