Scots’ mists, like Scots’ men, are proverbial for their penetration;
Plymouth showers for their persevering frequency. The father of Mr.
Haydon, the artist, relates that in the latter portion of 1807, and the
first three or four months of 1808, there had been more than 160
successive days in which rain, in more or less quantities, had fallen in
that neighbourhood. He adds, indeed, by way of consolation, that in
winter it only _rained_ there, while it _snowed_ elsewhere. It has been
remarked that in this opinion he might be correct; at least if he
compared the climate of Plymouth with that of the western highlands. A
party of English tourists are said to have stopped for several days at
an uncomfortable inn, near Inverary, by the unremitting rains that fall
in that country about Lammas, when one of them pettishly asked the
waiter, “Does it _rain_ here ALWAYS?” “Na! na!” replied Donald, “it
_snaws whiles_,” i. e. sometimes.
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