the horse, requesting him to go, and then to follow the refusal by one sudden, sharp cut of the lash; to wait a moment, and then repeat the operation.  The dread of the coming lash after the gentle word will start any horse.  I tried this, and with a certain success.  The horse backed us into the ditch, and would probably have backed himself into the wagon, if I had continued.  When the animal was at length ready to go, Davie took him by the bridle, ran by his side, coaxed him into a gallop, and then, leaping in behind, lashed him into a run, which had little respite for ten miles, uphill or down.  Remonstrance on behalf of the horse was in vain, and it was only on the return home that this specimen Cape Breton driver began to reflect how he could erase the welts from the horse’s back before his father saw them.

Our way lay along the charming bay of the Bras d’Or, over the sprawling bridge of the Big Baddeck, a black, sedgy, lonesome stream, to Middle River, which debouches out of a scraggy country into a bayou with ragged shores, about which the Indians have encampments, and in which are the skeleton stakes of fish-weirs.  Saturday night we had seen trout jumping in the still water above the bridge.  We followed the stream up two or three miles to a Gaelic settlement of farmers.  The river here flows through lovely meadows, sandy, fertile, and sheltered by hills,—­a green Eden, one of the few peaceful inhabited spots in the world.  I could conceive of no news coming to these Highlanders later than the defeat of the Pretender.  Turning from the road, through a lane and crossing a shallow brook, we reached the dwelling of one of the original McGregors, or at least as good as an original.  Mr. McGregor is a fiery-haired Scotchman and brother, cordial and hospitable, who entertained our wayward horse, and freely advised us where the trout on his farm were most likely to be found at this season of the year.

It would be a great pleasure to speak well of Mr. McGregor’s residence, but truth is older than Scotchmen, and the reader looks to us for truth and not flattery.  Though the McGregor seems to have a good farm, his house is little better than a shanty, a rather cheerless place for the “woman” to slave away her uneventful life in, and bring up her scantily clothed and semi-wild flock of children.  And yet I suppose there must be happiness in it,—­there always is where there are plenty of children, and milk enough for them.  A white-haired boy who lacked adequate trousers, small though he was, was brought forward by his mother to describe a trout he had recently caught, which was nearly as long as the boy himself.  The young Gael’s invention was rewarded by a present of real fish-hooks.  We found here in this rude cabin the hospitality that exists in all remote regions where travelers are few.  Mrs. McGregor had none of that reluctance, which women feel in all more civilized agricultural regions, to “break a pan of milk,” and Mr. McGregor even pressed