Among the principal sea-ports of the United Empire, Greenock is justly entitled to a distinguished place. Although of comparatively modern date, it has left many of its ancient predecessors and modern rivals in the background, and at this moment continues to advance rapidly in commercial enterprise and prosperity.

The recent formation of quays and docks of corresponding dimensions, affords to this harbour every facility for vessels of heavy burthen. The town possesses several handsome buildings, the principal of which are the church, the Tontine, or great hotel, and the Custom-house. Of the latter, with the immediate scene of commercial activity and forest of masts by which it is surrounded, the engraving opposite presents a vivid and faithful representation. It is a structure of great elegance, and, as an illustration of the chastest style of Grecian architecture, it would be difficult to point out a finer specimen either at home or abroad. The quality of the materials too is every way worthy of so fine a monument of national prosperity; and a fair estimate may be formed of the superiority of the workmanship, when we state that a sum of not less than twenty thousand pounds was expended in its erection; a fact which evinces at the same time the high importance attached to Greenock as a depot of the national revenue. The river Clyde is here about three miles broad; but, as also at Port-Glasgow, the navigable channel is little more than three hundred yards across. The bay is formed by an expansion of the Clyde, into which several bold points of land project from the northern bank, over which the mountains of Argyll, gradually receding till their summits are lost in the sky, present a landscape of almost Alpine beauty and magnificence.

In conjunction with the native grandeur of the scenery, the spirit of commercial enterprise, which is everywhere visible on the banks, as well as on the bosom of the water—transforming the one into a garden, and the other into a "high road" to prosperity,—impresses every spectator with the strongest evidence of its magical influence. Industry and activity pervade and animate everything around, and extend their influence into the remotest parts of the country. For several years past, Greenock has been the principal port in immediate connexion with America, to which the annual tide of emigration from the Highlands still flows, though with abated force, and a divided stream, since the golden hills of Australia have offered to thousands the vision of wealth to be acquired in a few months, and an independence to be realized in a single year. Here, grouped on the quay, sauntering along the streets, or viewing the distant mountains to which they are soon to bid adieu, the voice and features of the GaËl awaken a lively interest and attention on the part of every stranger. They have left their humble dwellings in those mountains, which still look invitingly in the distance, and which through innumerable generations had afforded shelter and sustenance to their ancestors, but whence they are driven at last, not by choice, but imperious necessity.

When tired or satisfied with the tumultuous scene on the quays, the traveller may ascend in half an hour the heights above the port, and there behold one of the finest views in Scotland. The gigantic screen of Argyllshire mountains, rising peak over peak till they vanish in the sky, forms a magnificent distance to the picture; while the middle ground is occupied by the broad expanse of the Clyde, gay and studded with shipping in every direction. Still nearer, the port of Greenock itself, crowded with masts and sails, and steam chimneys and buildings, forms an appropriate foreground to a panorama as variegated as it is picturesque.

That generous spirit of enterprise which characterises the merchants of Greenock has given birth to one of the most remarkable efforts of science and art which have been accomplished in modern times. This is the admiration of every stranger, and well known to the public under the name of Shaw's Water-works. By a singular combination of ingenuity and skill, a small stream of water is made to travel along the faces of mountains, and across ravines, for the space of six miles and a half, till it reaches the brow of a hill about a mile above Greenock, at an elevation of more than five hundred feet above the level of the sea. Here it is received into a small reservoir, and managed in such a manner as to produce, by this stupendous fall, a two-thousand-horse power, greater, says Mr. Brown, than that produced by all the united steam-engines in Glasgow. This splendid scheme was designed and completed under the personal superintendence of Mr. Thom, of Rothesay, to whose scientific and inventive genius it is a noble and lasting monument. The immense power thus provided is rendered more secure and certain than that of steam, because there exists no doubt whatever that a full supply of water commensurate with the power, can be had at all times and seasons.