The Iron Gate begins immediately below the island of Ada Kaleh--a signal station with a rising and falling globe indicates whether the course through is clear--and as we pass down the canal we get but an imperfect impression of the long-formidable barrier, the dangers of which it has lessened. On either side of us rise sloping tree-grown hills, giving way, as we reach the further end, to curious high sandhills on the left or Rumanian side. Borne swiftly along in the steamer, we get but a general effect of the scenery, and may well regret that we have no opportunity of exploring the shores, the wooded hills and inviting valleys. In the past, when even the steamers coming up-stream were aided by bands of sturdy peasants towing, travellers were sometimes given opportunities of “stretching their legs” by walking. Miss Skene, who journeyed up the river in early summer in these old circumstances and wrote descriptive letters of her experiences, may describe for us from the land what we see but vaguely from the water: “On the opposite side, we could only see that it was green, and lovely, and most richly clad, but on the Servian shore where we stood, and feasted our eyes with the details, we might well be enraptured with the scene. We stood on a green lawn, where the short, soft grass looked as though it had been cut daily by some careful hand; and so thickly was it strewn with the sweetest wild flowers, that no English garden ever freighted the wind with a heavier load of perfume. So profuse and inexhaustible were indeed all the productions of Nature in this beautiful solitude that she seemed to have lavished all her powers in embellishing it, and revelling in the wild beauty she produced, till every inch of ground was bursting with life and vegetation. From the summit of the high hills that rose behind us, down to the very edge of the water, the forests of young wood contended with the young shrubberies, and close over the river, the laburnums and wild yellow roses hung in graceful festoons, till their very blossoms were shed into the wave. Then, as we proceeded to walk on over the rocks, and through the thick brushwood, the innumerable birds that burst from every bush, and scarcely seemed startled at our approach, showed how rarely a human foot invaded their green haunts. At times we would catch a glimpse of a deer bounding through the thicket, and they tell us that these woods are full of wild boar and bears, as well as game of every description. The sun continued to shine brightly, and we walked for an hour or more amongst this beautiful scenery--the buzzing of a thousand insects in the warm air, the singing of the birds, the innumerable odours from the hill, all seeming to indicate that this was the very domain of a living summer.”