Taking the coast road to Kirkcudbright, we found the scenery to improve as we advanced, and, in our opinion, between Gatehouse and Newton Stewart, it far surpasses the finest parts of the coast scenery between Terracina and Naples. We say "far surpasses," because we leave out of consideration all those classical associations which give such a powerful charm to Italy, and speak merely of agricultural richness and picturesque beauty. As far as these go, there is little to be wished for in the west coast of Scotland, except a superior architecture in the towns, villages, cottages, and country seats. While passing through this tract, and indeed the whole of what we have yet seen of Scotland, we could not help lamenting the want of knowledge or of taste in those men of great wealth who build or plant in the flat, tame, rich levels of England, and who, in struggling to produce effect, lay out immense sums, a tithe of which, properly employed on situations of natural beauty (of which there are thousands to be found in the hilly districts of Scotland), would produce results which all the art of man could never effect in England. This opinion may perhaps be attributed to national prejudice on our part; yet we cannot help thinking that when a railroad, like that between Manchester and Liverpool, shall bisect the island from Dover to John o' Groat's house, Scotland will be the land of country residences, and the flat counties of England will be left to farmers and graziers. Whoever builds or plants in Scotland has generally the gratification of knowing that he is cultivating and appropriating to the use of man what would otherwise be of little value, from its not being adapted to agricultural purposes. For our own part, we should feel far more pleasure in creating a country seat, if only a cottage residence, out of bogs and barren rocks, than in the easy task of destroying rich meadows and corn lands, by covering them with palaces and plantations.
