Though Glen Eredine seemed the passion of his soul,--though every letter was full of the concerns of his clansmen,--there was nothing theatrical in his plans for their interest or improvement. They were minute and practicable, rather than magnificent. No whole communities were to be hurried into civilisation, nor districts depopulated by way of improvement; but some encouragement was to be given to the schoolmaster; Bibles were to be distributed to his best scholars; or Henry would account to his father for the rent of a tenant, who, with his own hands, had reclaimed a field from rock and broom; or, at his expense, the new cottages were to be plastered, and furnished with doors and sashed windows. The execution of these humble plans was, for the present, committed to Charlotte; and the details which she gave me concerning them described a mode of life so oddly compounded of refinement and simplicity, that curiosity somewhat balanced my regret in leaving Edinburgh. On a fine morning in September we began our journey; and though I was accompanied by all on earth I had to love, and though I was leaving what had been to me the scene of severe suffering, I could not help looking back with watery eyes upon a place which perhaps no traveller, uncertain of return, ever quitted without a sigh. CHAPTER XXVIII _----Every good his native wilds impart Imprints the patriot passion on his heart; And even those hills that round his mansion rise Enhance the bliss his scanty fund supplies. Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms; And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms. And as a babe, when scaring sounds molest, Clings close and closer to the mother's breast, So the loud torrent, and the whirlwind's roar, But bind him to his native mountains more._ Goldsmith. During our first day's journey, the road lay through a country so rich and so level, that but for the deep indenting of the horizon, I could have fancied myself in England. 'That would be thought a fine park even in my country,' said I, as we were passing a princely place. 'Ah, stay till you see the parks of Eredine!' said Charlotte.[20] It is not to be told what superb conceptions I formed of these same parks of Eredine; for my companion did not enter on the description. I thought Blenheim was to be a paddock compared with them!