III.] THE SAGA OF CLAN CAMPBELL. 7 



speaking, the heir to all these noble reminiscences, the 

 young chief of this princely line, had already won, at the age 

 of twenty-nine, by the manly vigour of his intellect and his 

 hereditary independence of character, the confidence ot 

 his fellow-countrymen, and a seat at the council board of 

 his sovereign. 



Having thus duly indoctrinated Sigurdr with the Sagas of 

 the family, as soon as we had crossed the lake I took him 

 up to the Castle, and acted cicerone to its pictures and heir- 

 looms, — the gleaming stands of muskets, whose fire wrought 

 such fatal ruin at Culloden ; — the portrait of the beautiful 

 Irish girl, twice a Duchess, whom the cunning artist has 

 painted with a sunflower that turns from the sun to look at 

 her ; — Gillespie Grumach himself, as grim and sinister-look- 

 ing as in life ; — the trumpets to carry the voice from the hall 

 door to Dunnaquaich ; — the fair beech avenues, planted by 

 the old Marquis, now looking with their smooth grey boles, 

 and overhanging branches, like the cloisters of an abbey ; — 

 the vale of Esechasan, to which, on the evening before his 

 execution, the Earl wrote such touching verses ; — the quaint 

 old kitchen-garden ; — the ruins of the ancient Castle, where 

 worthy Major Dalgetty is said to have passed such uncom- 

 fortable moments ; — the Celtic cross from lone Iona : — all 

 and everything I showed off with as much pride and pleasure, 

 I think, as if they had been my own possessions ; and the 

 more so as the Icelander himself evidently sympathised with 

 such Scald-like gossip. 



Having thoroughly overrun the woods and lawns of 

 Inverary, we had a game of chess, and went to bed pretty 

 well tired. 



The next morning, before breakfast, I went off in a boat 

 to Ardkinglass to see my little cousins ; and then returning 

 about twelve, we got a post-chaise, and crossing the boastful 

 Loch Awe in a ferry-boat, reached Oban at nightfall. Here 

 I had the satisfaction of finding the schooner already arrived, 

 and of being joined by the Doctor, just returned from his 

 fruitless expedition to Holyhead. 



