1936 On the Continent

honest sonsie face,
    Great chieftain o’ the pudding race!
    Aboon them a’ ye tak your place,
    Painch, tripe, or thairm:
    Weel are ye wordy of a grace
    As lang’s my arm.
    The groaning trencher there ye fill
    Your hurdies like a distant hill,
    Your pin wad help to mend a mill
    In time o’ need,
    While thro’ your pores, the dews distil
    Like amber bead.
    His knife see rustic labour dight
    And cut you up with ready slight,
    Trenching your gushing entrails bright
    Like onie ditch.
    And then: O what a glorious sight,
    Warm—reeking, rich!
Try Scotch Porridge
    Scotch porridge is very good. Ask to be served with it in the true Scotch manner, with a bowl of cold milk served separately. If you’ve never liked porridge before, try it here, and you’ll find it quite different from the pasty stuff that goes by the name of porridge elsewhere.
    Also investigate the twenty or thirty different sorts ofdried, smoked, cured, salted, pickled, spiced and savourily glorified fish; also potted hough: if you get this, homemade, it’s excellent, like a good beef brawn, very spicy and sustaining. But poor potted hough can be like bad glue.
    There are two ways of seeing Scotland—if you sweep round in a car, the large hotels are good; and in a car, you must to a great extent follow the main road and use these hotels. For many of the mountain passes are no more than one wide road, crossing and re-crossing the mountain torrent, that creeps through beside it. There are not many small side-roads, especially in the north, so you cannot rove as you do in England.
The Best Way to Travel
    The other way to go is by train and on foot, for then you can reach the inaccessible spots and cross the hills. And you must, of necessity, go to smaller places and penetrate into the wilds if you are going to meet the people, and learn of Scotland.
    So, plan a combination of the two. Use the car to follow these routes, or train to reach places. But then stay, leave the car or train, and go on foot.
    If you go by rail, coach, or steamer, or by car and steamer, ask for the connections—for many rail lines run in connection with the boats and the railway station and quay adjoin.
    This is especially so in the West Highlands. In the routes I have planned for the motorist, I have avoided Glasgow and the Clydeside—but it is a good point of departure or arrival by several steamer routes.
    It is also possible to go by boat direct from London to Edinburgh.
Weather Conditions Important
    The communications in the Highlands vary so much each month, according to the weather conditions, that it’s always worth asking for the latest supplementary list before starting.
    In the English tours, we suggested that you went over the border from Carlisle to Edinburgh. It is a lovely run, either by Moffat or Selkirk, over rounded rolling hills, north of the Roman Wall. E DINBURGH should be enteredat dusk. From Prince’s Street, when the sky is a wash of pale lemon colour, with the grey skyline high over head, pierced with primrose lights, Edinburgh is one of the most beautiful towns in the world.
    In the public gardens they grow white lilies and heliotrope. The cobbled streets are awful noisy, but the shops are fine. Whatever you do, or not, in Edinburgh, you must go to H OLYROOD . Don’t hurry it, have time to loiter and explore thoroughly.
Fife: “The Begar’s Mantle with a Fringe of Gold”
    From Edinburgh, S TIRLING can be reached, and there you may read Walter Scott and follow the Links of the Forth from the Castle Rock, and visit Doune Castle and Bannockburn, and see the sword of The Bruce.
    Here again I would like you to walk, for up Alloa and Dollar Glens and over the Ochills need you to go on foot.
    You may motor through the T ROSSACHS where there are good roads, and though this district caters for visitors it remains unspoilt, and E LLEN’S I SLE and L OCH K ATRINE are so beautiful you must not miss them, even if it is rather a hackneyed tour.
    If you are for the Highlands, turn north, from Stirling. You can give Perth a miss and drive straight up to A BERFELDY and P ITLOCHRY , but if you have time, and love peace, drive round Fife. It’s worth stopping the car, and walking and exploring the Carse of Gowrie on the border of Forfar. Now it is extremely old-fashioned, but at one time it was the pioneer farming district, from which ground many of the finest Scotch farmers emigrated and carried their speech, customs and character to the far ends of the