shire is affected in its climate more by relative posi-
tion than by interior declination. Situated in the
zone where the Highlands melt down into the Low-
lands, at nearly equal distances from the German
ocean and the Atlantic, it possesses a medium heat
between the temperatures respectively of the north-
ern and the southern counties, and experiences all the
varieties of climate which belong to both the eastern
and the western coasts. Easterly winds bring rain
and unsettled weather on GowTie, Stormont, Glen-
shee, and Strathardle, while the weather is dry and
serene in Breadalbane ; westerly winds waft the
clouds of the Atlantic over Monteith, Breadalbane,
and Rannoch, while not a drop of rain falls on the
east ; and the two classes of winds so strive for the



mastery in the interior, and are so disburdened of
their loads by the attractive power of mountain-
ranges on the frontier, as very often to have little
dominion, and small moistening influence about the
region of Methven, Monzie, Dull, and Dunkeld. The
climate of extensive localities is powerfully affected
also by the peculiar configuration of the surfaces, and
the mutual positions of adjacent mountain-ranges, and
intermediate valleys. The westerly winds, for ex-
ample, which sail along the Grampians, almost due
east, till they arrive at the bold headland between
Drummond-castle and the house of Braco, instead of
continuing their course in the same direction over
the flat country of Strathearn, for the most part
cross south-east to the Ochils at Gleneagles, or
north-east to the hills behind Crieff and Fowlis;
and, in the same way, the westerly winds, guided
by the mountain-ridge which separates Glenlochy
from Glendochart, and terminates at the village of
Killin, rarely continue their course eastward along
the opening made by Loch- Tay and its vale, but
for the most part assume either a northerly course
toward the hills above Finlarig, or a southerly one
toward those above Achmore. Northerly \\'inds
— which, in most parts of the island, blow with
penetrating and cliilly keenness — are powerfully mol-
lified over a large part of Perthshire by the same
heights which give it a southerly exposure, — the vast
broad alpine range along the northern frontier, the
Ochil hill-screen of the Carse of Gowrie, and the
long ridge which separates from each other the basins
of the Tay and the Forth. According to observa-
tions continued during five consecutive years, wes-
terly winds have been found to prevail during from
165 to 220 days in the year ; fair weather from 189
to 250 days ; rain from 95 to 141 ; and frost from 11
to 66. The mean height of the barometer has been
found, during three consecutive years, to range be-
tween 29'59, and 29'71 ; and the mean height of the
thermometer between 41 and 42h. The annual quan-
tity of rain during five years of observation, varied
between 31 '45 inches and 38"4. The climate, on
the whole, is so mild, that, even in some valleys of
the Grampians, barley has been reaped in good order
nine weeks after being sown. These results were
ascertained partly at Meigle, in the extreme east, and
partly at Coldoch in Menteith, on the south-west.

The mountain-rampart which runs along the north
is a main part, and contains some of the bulkiest
forms, and some of the most towering summits, of
that vast alpine range, the greatest in Scotland, which
extends from Ben-Nevis on the west, to Mount-
Battock on the east, and thence forks off into dimin-
ished lines to the German ocean at Stonehaven and
the mouth of the Dee ; and so stern and resistful is
it, that only at three points over its great extent, —
at the heads respectively of the Shee, the Bruar, and
the Garry, — ^have military roads been drilled through
its high and terrific passes. The rampart which
towers aloft along the west is a chief part of the con-
tinuous range which, second in importance only to
the former, extends from the Moor of Rannoch away
southward by the peaks of Arroquhar to the extre-
mity of the peninsula of Cowal. The Moor of Ran-
noch intervenes between the commencement of the
one range and the transit of the other, and presents
at the boundary on the north-west a lugubriously
waste table-land or huge upland plain, lying about
1,000 feet above sea-level. From the two continu-
ous ramparts along the boundaries, and from the inner
edge of Rannoch Moor, ridges run direct into the in-
terior, going off at right angles with the boundaries,
southward from the north, south-eastward from Ran-
noch, and eastward from the west ; and, in a general
view, they are spreading, and agglomorated, at their



5-28



PERTHSHIRE.



commencement, — tliey attenuate in breadth, and di-
minish in altitude, during their progress, — and they
now thin out, or form concentrations, so as to merge
two or even three ridges into one, — now make mu-
tual recessions, so as to enclose ample expanses of
lowland, — and now send off spurs and protuberances,
and oblique elongations, so as to cover a district with
an almost confused assemblage of heights. In a few
instances, also, as in the marked and magnificent one
of Schichallion, mountains tower solitarily up from
the plains formed by the recesses of the ridges. All
these heights, from the boundaries inwards, wear the
general and unmeaning name of Grampians ; and over
the whole of their aggregately slow and sublimely
undulating descent to the interior, they lie within
the Highlands, and form, with their valleys and gorges
and retreats, at once the strongest, the most varied,
and in every respect the most distinctive and fasci-
nating section of that vast and very diversified terri-
tory. Among their very numerous and grand sum-
mits, Ben-Lawers lifts its peak 4,013 feet above sea-
level ; Ben-More, 3,903 ; Schichallion, 3,564 ; Ben-
iglo, 3,724 ; Benledi, 3,009 ; Ben- Venue, 3,000; and
Ben-Chonzie, in Strathearn, 2,922. The mountains
are, in general, enormous lumpish piles, broad in their
bases, and heavy in their features ; yet, in many in-
stances, they are steep in ascent, sharp in outline,
very diversified in form, and both striking and pecu-
liar in the erosions, protuberances, or deep fissures
of their surface. Most of them exhibit bare and
utterly weather-worn summits ; and, in the region
below the crowning one where the rock breaks the
surface, and claims in its nakedness a sturdy and
savage ascendency, they are generally covered with
a moorish soil, so comparatively rich as to be greatly
superior to that of most upland tracts in England,
and three or four times better than that of the east-
ern moorlands of Yorkshire. Their lower declivi-
ties, and, in some cases, even their middle zones, are
very extensively green with emerald sward, or bosky
and warmly tinted with a profusion of copses and
plantation. The valleys which wind among their
lines, and their recesses, though bearing a small pro-
portion to the aggregate measurements of the High-
land area in which they lie, are, for the most part,
both more extensive and more fertile than the valleys
at the foot of the mountains which advance north-
ward from Northumberland into Scotland, along the
eastern border of Dumfries-shire. The contrast
which the luxuriance and the warmth of these recluse
valleys exhibit to the barrenness and the coldness of
the snow-wreathed or cloud-capped elevations which
environ them, flings a charm upward to the chilliest
part of the landscape, renders them extremely re-
freshing to the eye of a stranger, and dresses them
into fine keeping with whatever woods may dangle
in loveliness upon the lower declivities About two-
thirds of the whole county, from Loch-Ericht or the
Moor of Rannoch south-eastward, is comprehended
;n the Grampian or Highland region. But as an ap-
proach is made to the low country, the mountains
lose much of their sternness, the valleys considerably
expand, summits are less generally bare, and decli-
vities more frequently glide off into hanging plains ;
and eventually the Highlands, disclosing themselves
through a long series of vastly magnificent portals,
come exulting out in dresses of opidence and sur-
passing beauty, which well befit the scene and the

occasion of their union with the Lowlands Nearly

at right angles with the opening valleys, and with the
terminating headlands of the ranges which separate
them, runs from south-west to north-east across the
whole of the county, what concurrent geographical
nomenclature describes as Strathmore : see that
article. Yet the notion of a great plain, lying along



the base of the frontier rampart of the Highlands,
applies l)etter, or with less violence, to the whole
extent, of what is geographically termed Strathmore,
than to the section of it which lies within Perthshire.
Our description of the low grounds here, or of the
upper frontier of the Lowlands, within the county,
must be more particular. The most southerly of all
the Highland valleys suddenly expands and flattens
down at Gartmore, 18 miles above Stirling, into a
level strath, a broad band of carse ground ; and this
strath, — the luxuriant, wheat-bearing vale of the
Forth, — after quite leaving the overshadowing flank
of any spur of the Grampians, sweeps along all the
remaining part of the southern boundary of tlie coun-
ty, so far as it lies upon the Forth. Strathallan, or
the rich broad vale of the Allan, goes off from this
plain in a north-eastward direction, at points oppo-
site the parish of Stirling ; and till it is closed up by
the long low ridge from east to west, which separ-
ates the basin of the Forth from that of the Tay, it
might very literally be understood as part of the
largely defined Strathmore. Strathearn [which
see] opens from among the Grampians on a line par-
allel with the vale of the Forth, and in a style of
kindred siuldenness and expansion ; and, while the
greatest of the openings which spread out in Low-
land fulness after debouching from the Highlands, — .
while, also, extending due eastward all the way to
the Tay, at a point very near the northern extremity
of the boundary with Fifeshire, — it contributes not
its length, but its breadth, to the continuation of the
alleged great plain along the base of the Highland
frontier. Another low ridge, similar to that which
flanks the south side of Strathearn, at first moun-
tainous and rugged, but afterwards gentle and undu-
lating, now divides the feeders of the Earn from those
of the Almond, and once more interrupts the strict
continuousness of Strathmore. But beyond this
ridge, or from Methven north-eastward to the boun-
dary at Meigle, the undoubted Strathmore, a well
defined plain across the ribs and inlets of the High-
lands, stretches along in richly cultivated luxuriance,
and includes the low grounds of Methven, Perth
Proper, Stormont, and Upper Gowrie. The various '
plains and valleys which, as strung together thus,
compose a broad band of Lowland frontier, are ex-
ceedingly various in the breadth of contribution
which they make to the consecutive ' great strath ;'
and are better and more justly understood, if con-
sidered seriatim as the vale of the Tay, encroach-
ing far on the Highlands, and coming out directly
to the east; the vale of the Teith, coming down
south-eastward, and losing itself in the former,
very soon after becoming Lowland ; the vale of the
Allan, sweeping round south-westward and south-
ward, invaded by Grampian detachments, and com-
pelled by them to have comparatively unexpansive
limits ; the vale of the Earn, making an early con-
quest over the Highlands, and extending away east-
ward in a long broad march of freedom from moun-
tain control ; the vale of the Almond, breaking away
from the choking grasp of the Grampians above
Buchanty, spreading itself out in a sheet of verdure,
around Methven, and extending strictly parallel to
Strathearn ; the vale of the Tay, coming do\\Ti south-
eastward and southward, in extreme magnificence of
landscape, long maintaining dubiousness of character
between Highland grandeur and Lowland amenity,
and eventually sweephig along in undulations, or
otherwise incessant changes of valley contour ; the
vale of the Lunan, the brilliant district of Stormont,
with its chain of fine lochlets, its sheets of forest,
aiul its expanse of tumulated plain, extending south-
eastward parallel to the left bank of the Tay, from
the vicinity of Dunkeld ; and the vale of the Isla,



PERTHSHIRE.



5t29



coming down south-westward rroni the boundary,
and blending the undoubted section of the Strathmore
of Perthshire with the far-extending and distinctly
marked Strathmore district of Forfarshire — Along
the south-east skirt or margin, of this concatenation
of vales, extend the Ochil and the Sidlaw hills, — the
former from the side of the strath of Forth, a little
below Stirling, to the Tay at Abernethy; and the
latter from Kinnoul-hill, O'or 7 miles farther up the
Tay, and on the opposite bank, to the eastern boun-
dary of the county : see Ochils and Sidlaws. The
Ochils have the whole of their water-shed or summit-
range in Perthshire ; they are sectioned off from it
at their south-west end solely by the intrusions of
the counties of Stirling, Clackmannan, and Fife ; they
rear aloft in it some of their grandest summits, and
their most metalliferous piles ; and in their far march
north-eastward, they give but their skirts and their
lower declivities to the shores of Fife and Kinross.
The Sidlaws, till they pass the frontier, into the
conterminous county, are wholly within Perthshire ;
they section off the rich district of the Carse of Cow-
rie from the broad plain of Strathmore ; and they
claim various detached and straggling hills, among
the most noted of which is the celebrated Dunsiniian.
—The Carse of Gowrie, between the Sidlaws and
the frith of Tay, differs from every other part of the
county, except part of Strathearn, and the band of
carse lands along the Forth, in being nearly a dead
level, singularly opulent in its soil, highly fructifer-
ous over every square foot of its surface, and athwart
all its expanse an uninterrupted scene of the most
luxuriant cultivation.

The scenery of Perthshire, as has been partially
hinted, and as can scarcely fail to be inferred from
the general contour of the country, is surprisingly
varied, and almost iniiformly rich ; and, in its gross
amount, if estimated by the number of first-rate pic-
tures, or distinctive and individualized groupings
which it contains, is probably quite equal to that of
all the rest of gorgeously scenic Scotland. In close
landscapes, especially, or in those which concentrate
a thousand attractions within the winding of a glen,
or the recess of a hill-range, it is peculiarly rich. In
extensiveness of view, too, combined with surpassing
beauty, and with all those properties which produce
the most exquisite thrills of delight, what can surpass
the visions from the hills of Moncrieff and Demyat ?
Scenery occurs of every extent, from the largest
panorama which can be intelligently surveyed, to the
smallest miniature which can be compressed into a
nook, — of every class, from the sublimely wild or
romantic, to the softly champaign and beautiful, —
and of every style, from the sternest or most nakedly
magnificent, to the fullest of amenities and luscious-
ness and ornament. Though all such striking combina-
tions of marine and mountain landscape are awanting,
as form the grand attraction of the western High-
lands, they are very abundantly, and somewhat in
their own style, compensated by large lacustrine, and
rsometimes isleted sheets of water, screened by heights
which, for alpine altitude and boldness of contour, and
romance of dress, may challenge comparison mth any
ill the west. Excepting only that of Loch-Lomond,
nearly all the really fuie lake-scenery of Scotland oc-
curs in Perthshire ; and without any exception what-
ever, the county's aggregate blendings of mountain
and wood and water, into pictures of magnificence and
romance, are quite unmatched, as to either extent or
effect, in any other district of Britain. Who that
gazes upon the type of all glorious things which
bursts upon the eye at Killin, or at the debouch
from the Trosachs, will ever again speak in superla-
tives of the brilliantly pretty Derwent-water, or the
calmly beautiful Windermere, or the sullenly pleas-

II.



ant inies-water, or any select sheet or point what-
ever of the Westmoreland lakes ? Then, as to river
scenery, where but in Perthshire shall be found such
tumultuous assemblages of rocky eminences, all of
whimsical and fantastic form, shagged over with trees
and shrubs, and grouped in the very confusion of
boskiness and romance, with wondrous overshadow-
ing hill-screens, as occurs at the Trosachs, at the
head of Strathearn, and on the river Rannoch ? or
such closely approaching and sheer alpine descents,
bringing down sheets of forest from the clouds, and
standing with their bases on the margin of rapids and
catfiracts, as in the glens of the Tummel and the
Tilt ? or such uninterrupted series of distinctive
landscape, ever varying, in all styles, now close and
now expanding, playfully and almost whimsically
various, in the disposal of a profusion of wood at first
Highland, afterwards and long debateably Highland
and Lowland, and eventually subsiding into the most
luscious and ornate champaign, as occur along Strath-
tay ? or such tremendous defiles, such protuberances
of hill almost in contact with hill, lifting a passenger
into mid-air, sending down walls of rock tufted \vith
scanty shrubs, to a dark chasm below, and suspend-
ing objects in dreadful giddiness over an impetuous
rush and a deafening roar of a wild stream careering
in darkness below, as occur at the passes of Killie-
crankie, Leney, Spittal of Glenshee, Coheilg, and
Aberfoil ? But to go on specifying even classes of
singular and arresting landscape, and especially classes
of all that scenery which finely blends the grand and
the beautiful, would be to write very far beyond our
disposable limits. We shall, however, present the
reader with the remarks of a most intelligent but
anonymous tourist on the Highland scenery of this
county : — " We have visited many parts of Scotland,
but if we were to select a district to which we would
give the name of the Scottish Arcadia, it would be
the Highlands of Perthshire. We beg to remind our
readers that Arcadia was not only a pastoral, but
generally a rugged country, whose charms consisted
in sweet wooded valleys, enclosed among lofty moun-
tains and precipices ; and such, precisely, is the coun-
try we allude to. From the one extremity of the
journey to the other, the traveller will find an un-
broken line of ornamental plantations, with the ex-
ception of 5 or 6 miles in the pass of Glen Ogle, which
leads from Earn to Loch-Tay. The form and ap-
pearance of a Highland valley is pretty generally
knowai. The bottom consists of an alluvial plain, a
quarter or half-a-mile broad, with a surface which is
almost a dead-level, and with its margin not melting
insensibly into the slopes of the heights, but sharp
and well-defined. Through this plain, the river flows
sometimes along the side, rarely along the middle,
but often winding across it in many a meander. Above
the first or lowest bottom, at some places may be
seen the remains of a second, a third, and even a
fourth, in the form of terraces, with the same flat
appearance, the one terrace rising sometimes six feet,
and sometimes twenty, forty, or sixty, above the
other. The lowest of these plains has the appear-
ance of a meadow, and as the subsoil is entirely gra-
vel, it is generally dry, and bears good crops of corn.
The hills above partake of the same character, and
in the very deep valleys these comprise the whole
of the arable land. But when the declivities of the
mountains are moderate, the alluvial soil, that is to say,
the coating of gravel, sometimes extends 100 to 200
feet (of perpendicular height) above the river bottom,
and the plough generally follows it to its upper ex-
tremity. When standing on one side of a valley, the
eye can trace with ease the boundary of the alluvial
soil on the other, both by the smoothness of its sur-
face, and the crops of corn or hay which it bears.
2 L



530



PERTHSHIRE.



Where the rock consists of chiy-slate, mica-slate, or
limestone, the natnral grasses ascend two, three, or
four hundred feet higher on the sides of the moun-
tain ; and heath, mixed with coarse and \vdry grass,
occupies all above to the summit, except where the
bare rock is exposed. In mountains of granite and
quartz rock, the heath descends a good deal lower.
In the district we have been describing, the wood is
variously distributed along the bottom and sides of
the valley. In the bottom where the ground is valu-
able, it is seen in narrow belts, or running in slender
lines like hedgerows, with here and there an orna-
mental clump covering a few acres. The braes im-
mediately above the bottom, when too steep for the
plough, are sometimes entirely covered by copse-
wood, and at other times by large timber, comprising
most of the trees which succeed in the Lowlands.
The Scotch lir occupies a higher situation, and is
seen disputing the ground with the hardy heath,
sometimes, we believe, at the height of 1,3(X) feet
above the sea. In the bottom lands at Dunkeld and
Taymouth, gigantic limes, elms, and beeches, are to
be found, which we imagine would not yield the palm
of beauty or grandeur to anything that England pro-
duces. Some of the subordinate hills rising 1,000
feet above the valleys, are entirely covered with
pines. It is this abundance of wood, scattered over
the bottoms and sides of the valleys, and often cover-
ing the smaller hills, which constitutes the great
charm of the scenery. It takes away that appear-
ance of bleakness and desolation which naked moun-
tain masses present ; and it adds richness, grace, and
softness, to a landscape whose sole character other-
wise would be that of stern grandeur. The lower
and wooded part of the valley, with its glassy lake
or murmuring stream, breathes the very essence of
rural beauty ; and a new charm is thrown over it by
the rampart of rugged mountains which enclose it,
and suggest at once ideas of shelter, seclusion, and
sublimity. The distance from the top of the one
enclosing ridge to that of the other, is seldom less
than 2 miles, or more than 5 or 6 ; but in nearly all
cases the bends and turns of the mountains also shut
in the valley to the eye in the direction of its length,
and thus give each section of it the appearance of
being a sweet little pastoral world within itself. The
passes where the mountains approach very near to
one another, have a beauty and a grandeur quite pe-
culiar. Dr. Clarke, we think, compares the pass of
Killiecrankie to the celebrated Vale of Tempe."

The waters of Perthshire, both lakes and streams,
are so fully noticed in their respective alphabetical
places, that here we need only name and classify
them. The lakes of the first class as to size are,
Tay, Earn, and Rannoch, in Breadalbane ; Ericht,
on the boundary with Inverness-shire ; and Katrine,
in Monteith. The second class lakes are Lydoch,
on the boundary with Argyleshire ; Garry, between
Rannoch and Athole ; Tummel, in Athole ; Venna-
choir, Monteith, and Lubnaig, in Monteith ; and Voil,
in Balquidder. Of numerous lakes of tliird class
size, the most noticeable are Lyon and Dochart, in
Breadalbane : Tilt, in Athole ; Ard, Achray, and
Chon, in Monteith ; Doine, in Balquidder ; Turret,
in Strathearn ; Freuchie, in Glenqueich ; and Ordie,
Lows, Butterstone, Cluny, and Drumellie, in Stor-
mont. — The Forth, as we have seen, traces much of
the southern boundary, and drains all the territory
lying south of Strathearn. Its oidy noticeable tribu-
taries on the side of Perthshire, are the Goody, the
Teith, the Allan, the Devon, and the South Devon.
— The Tay, as it drains all the country between the
Eouth screen of Strathearn and the northern boun-
dary of the country, draws its waters in numerous
and converging streams toward a great central chan-



nel. The Earn, its tributary along Strathearn, brings
to it the Lednock, the Ruchil, the Turret, the Pow-
afFray, the Machony, the Shaggy, the Ruthven, the
May, and the Farg. The lake whence the main
stream of the Tay issues, and that main stream itself,
receive the Fillan, the Dochart, the Lochy, the Lyon,
the Tunnnel, the Bran, the Isla, the Ordie, the