Page:Three Years in Europe.djvu/80

54 room, when he heard that his wife had given birth to a female child, exclaimed that the kingdom had come with a woman and would go with one, and immediately breathed his last.

The place seems to have had four watch towers, on one of which is the celebrated "Lady's Bower." When the restless and warlike James IV. employed himself preparing for his battles with the English, or was spending his time in frivolous occupations, chatting and toying with the sultanas of his immoral court, it was here that

The lines are inscribed on the walls of the room. We saw the spacious parliament room, the dining hall, and the ruins of the old chapel. Sauntering through these lonely roofless rooms, one almost feels that the shades of departed monarchs and august queens are stalking invisibly across the wide courtyard or along the deserted chapel, or lingering in a thoughtful mood near the ruins of what was once the seat of their splendour and power.

Stirling is a small town containing about 12,000 inhabitants. After we had some tea we went out for a walk which was insensibly prolonged to eight or ten miles! We passed by the old bridge, built on the Forth several centuries ago, which can be very easily distinguished from its more modern neighbour. The Forth which is very broad indeed near Linlithgow is a narrow river near Stirling.