For weeks I have sat in pyjamas, And found even these were _de trop_, And envied the folk of Bahamas Who dress in a feather or so; But now there's an end to my grilling, My Inferno's a thing of the past; Hurrah! there's the whistle a-shrilling-- We are off to the Highlands at last!
The dull leaden skies are all clouded In the gloom of a sad weeping day, The desolate mountains are shrouded In palls of funereal grey; 'Mid the skirl of the wild wintry weather The torrents descend in a sheet As we shiver all huddled together In the reek of the smouldering peat.
A plague on the Highlands! to think of The heat that but lately we banned; Oh! what would we give for a blink of The bright sunny side of the Strand! To think there are folk that still revel In Summer, and fling themselves down, In the Park, or St. James? What the d---- Possessed us to hurry from town?
"OUT OF TUNE AND HARSH."--_First Elder_ (_at the Kirk "Skellin'"_). "Did ye hear Dougal? More snorin' in the sermon?"
_Second Elder_, "Parefec'ly disgracefu'! He's waukened 's a'!"
[Illustration: OVERHEARD IN THE HIGHLANDS
_First Chieftain._ "I say, old chap, what a doose of a bore these games are!"
_Second Chieftain._ "Ah, but, my dear boy, it is this sort of thing that has made us Scotchmen _what we are!!_"]
_Tourist_ (_of an inquiring and antiquarian turn_). "Now I suppose, farmer, that large cairn of stones has some history?"
_Highland Farmer._ "Ooh, aye, that buig o' stanes has a gran' history whatever!"
_Tourist_ (_eagerly_). "Indeed! I should like to----What is the legend----?"
_Farmer._ "Just a gran' history!" (_Solemnly._) "It took a' ma cairts full and horses sax months to gather them aff he land and pit them ther-r-re!!"]
Smith being shut out from the Continent this year, takes a cottage ornée on Dee-Side. Scotland. The children are sent up first. The house is described as "conveniently furnished"--they find it so!]
[Illustration: IN THE WILDS OF THE NORTH.
_Hungry Saxon_ (_just arrived, with equally hungry family_). "Well, now--er--what can you give us for dinner, as soon as we've had a wash?"
_H. S._ (_rubbing his hands in anticipation_). "Ah! Now we'll have a nice juicy steak."
_Lassie._ "A--weel. We'll be haein' some steak here maybe by the boat i' the morn's morn!"