Published in Scotland Magazine Issue 7 on 7/3/2003.

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Scotland's Land of Diversity

TOM BRUCEGARDYNE REVEALS THE MYSTERY OF A LANDLOCKED COUNTY LINKING LOWLAND SCOTLAND TO THE HIGHLANDS

On the day she returned from Scotland with her husband Prince Albert in 1844, Queen Victoria was already suffering serious withdrawal symptoms.

That night back at Windsor Castle, she wrote emotionally in her journal of how she missed the fine hills and the mountain air “so pure, light and brisk.

“Independently of the beautiful scenery, there was a quiet, a retirement, a wildness, a liberty, and a solitude that had such a charm for us.”

It was only her second visit north of the border but she was clearly hooked, on this occasion by the hills and glens of Perthshire. This large, almost entirely landlocked county sits bang in the middle of Scotland, straddling the Highland line that splits the country in two. For Victorians, inspired by the example of their Queen, the city of Perth was a gateway to the mysterious land to the north.

The cultural differences between the Highlands and the Lowlands have been eroded by ease of travel and the modern media. Today the world has shrunk and is beamed out from every television set. And though these differences still exist, certainly on a subliminal level, they are as nothing to what the Victorians experienced as they bravely headed off into the unknown of the Perthshire hills.

For these early tourists, it was Sir Walter Scott who put the county on the map with his novel The Fair Maid of Perth, having done the same for the Trossachs in his epic poem The Lady of the Lake written in 1810.

In both cases he had been inspired by more than.....

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By Tom Bruce-Gardyne

Section : Regional Focus

Page number : 46