From the battlements of the castle the old man pointed to a distant hill, where, he told us, the home of the Carlyles had been for many years and where Thomas Carlyle, who was born at Ecclefechan, lies buried. Within a few miles of Dumfries is Ellisland Farm, where Robert Burns was a tenant for several years, and many of his most famous poems were written during that period. And besides, there were old abbeys and castles galore within easy reach; and glad indeed we should have been had we been able to make the Station Hotel our headquarters for a week and devote our time to exploring. But we were already behind schedule and the afternoon found us on the road to Ayr. A little more than half the distance from Dumfries to Ayr the road runs through the Nith Valley, with river and forest scenery so charming as to remind us of the Wye. The highway is a splendid one, with fine surface and easy grades. It passes through an historic country, and the journey would consume a long time if one should pause at every point that might well repay a visit. A mile on the way is Lincluden Abbey, in whose seclusion Burns wrote many of his poems, the most famous of which, "The Vision of Liberty," begins with a reference to the ruin: "As I stood by yon roofless tower Where wall flowers scent the dewy air, Where the owlet lone in her ivy bower, Tells to the midnight moon her care--" Ellisland Farm is only a few miles farther on the road, never to be forgotten as the spot where "Tam-O'-Shanter" was written. The farm home was built by Burns himself during what was probably the happiest period of his life, and he wrote many verses that indicated his joyful anticipation of life at Ellisland Farm. But alas, the "best laid plans o' mice and men gang oft agley," and the personal experience of few men has more strikingly proven the truth of the now famous lines than of Robert Burns himself! Many old castles and magnificent mansions crown the heights overlooking the river, but we caught only glimpses of some of them, surrounded as they were by immense parks, closed to the public. Every one of the older places underwent many and strange vicissitudes in the long years of border warfare, and of them all, Drumlanrigh Castle, founded in 1689, is perhaps the most imposing. For ten years its builder, the first Earl of Queensbury, labored on the structure, only to pass a single night in the completed building, never to revisit it, and ending his days grieving over the fortune he had squandered on this many-towered pile of gray stone.