had been called from the mirror wherein she saw a half-dressed bride, to see a father kill himself by his own hand against her efforts to save him. Her screams were heard by the bridesmaid and bridegroom, as they approached the house; but, before they entered, the struggle was nearly over; they found her bending over the body of her father, which lay on the floor, grasping the open wound with her hands. So spoke the attendants as I dressed the wounds. I took up several arteries; but there was one in the left wrist which, for a long period, defied my efforts, unassisted as I was with professional aid, to stem its torrent. I succeeded at last--so, at least, I thought--in my endeavours to stop all the issues. Vain thought! _Death_ had stopped them! This was the first time I had seen a _dead bride_. THE GHOST OF HOWDYCRAIGS. "_They_ gather round, and wonder at the tale Of horrid apparition, tall and ghastly."--BLAIR. After all that has been written, printed, and circulated, in the way of "Statistical Accounts," "Topographical Descriptions," "Guides to Picturesque Scenery," &c., there are still large tracts of country in Scotland of which comparatively little is known. While certain districts have risen, all at once, into notoriety, and occupied for a time the efforts of the press and the attention of the public, there are others, perhaps little inferior to them in point of scenery, through which no traveller has passed, no writer drawn his pen, and upon which no printer has inked his types. Among other neglected regions, the Ochil Hills may be mentioned--at least the eastern part of them. These, so far as we know, have not been fruitful of battles, and consequently the historian has had nothing to say concerning them. They are traversed by few roads; the few that do exist are nearly impassable, except to pedestrians of a daring disposition; and the novelist, never having seen them, has not thought of making them the home of his imaginary heroes. They have given birth to no poet of eminence--none such has condescended to celebrate them in his songs; and, except to the few scattered inhabitants who nestle in their hollows, they are nearly unknown.