in the fine old border city.  As we had previously visited Carlisle, our stay was a short one, but its remarkable history, its connection with the stories of Walter Scott, its atmosphere of romance and legend and the numerous points of interest within easy reach—­all combine to make it a center where one might spend several days.  The Romans had been here also, and they, too, had struggled with the wild tribes on the north, and from that time down to the execution of the last adherents of the Stuarts in 1759 the town was hardly at any time in a state of quietude.  As described by an observant writer, “every man became a soldier and every house that was not a mere peasant’s hut was a fortress.”  A local poet of the Seventeenth Century summed it up in a terse if not elegant couplet as his unqualified opinion

    “That whoso then in the border did dwell
    Lived little happier than those in hell.”

But Carlisle is peaceful and quiet enough at the present time, a place of considerable size and with a thriving commerce.  Its castle, a plain and unimpressive structure, still almost intact, has been converted into military barracks, and its cathedral, which, according to an old chronicle, in 1634 “impressed three observant strangers as a great wild country church,” has not been greatly altered in appearance since that period.  It suffered severely at the hands of the Parliamentary soldiers, who tore down a portion of the nave to use the materials in strengthening the defenses of the town.  But the story of Carlisle could not be told in many volumes.  If the mere hint of its great interest which I have given here can induce any fellow tourist to tarry a little longer at “Merrie Carlile,” it will be enough.

Leaving Carlisle, we crossed “Solway Tide” and found ourselves in the land of bluebells and heather, the “Bonnie Scotland” of Robert Burns.  Shortly after crossing the river, a sign-board pointed the way to Gretna Green, that old-time haven of eloping lovers, who used to cross the Solway just as the tide began to rise, and before it subsided there was little for the paternal ancestors to do but forgive and make the best of it.  But we missed the village, for it was a mile or two off the road to Dumfries, which we hoped to reach for the night.  An unexpected difficulty with the car nearly put this out of the range of possibility, but by grace of the long Scotch twilight, we came into Dumfries about ten o’clock without finding it necessary to light our lamps.  Our day’s journey had been a tiresome one, and we counted ourselves fortunate on being directed to the Station Hotel, which was as comfortable and well managed as any we found.  The average railway hotel in America is anything but an attractive proposition, but in Scotland and in England conditions are almost reversed, the station hotels under the control of the different railway companies being generally the best.

[Illustration:  Entrance to loch tyne.