XXII. 



Akdrishaig, ls^ May 1860. 



It is a good while since I last addressed you. The fact is that 

 very little of mutual interest has come under my observation here 

 since the Widgeon and Wild Duck have flown away. 



I am glad that my effusion on Ducks and mud interested you. 

 I dare say that to a correspondent in town it bore with it some 

 odour of the seaside ; some of the aroma of low water mark, that 

 invigorating and mysterious smell made up of brine, seaweed, 

 stranded whelks, and other strange, ancient fishy smells peculiar to 

 the venerable bed of Old Ocean when its outer edges are hung out 

 to dry. I do not doubt you know it and admit it as much as I. 

 To my mind, or rather to my nose, it is more precious and 

 refreshing than the breeze off the meadows with its breath of 

 furze bloom and tedded hay — that is, of course, when it is quite 

 pure and without any of those hateful perfumes marking the 

 nuptials of Cloaca with Neptune, which happily our loch is as 

 yet innocent of. When the tide is out I feel that I am lord of 

 this manor for at least four hours out of the twenty-four. 

 " My right there is none to dispute " in this muddy realm. " Our 

 farm of four acres " is not so valuable as this neutral ground, 

 where lairds are not, and where gamekeepers do not extend. 

 Even Canute, the only king who ever attempted to encroach upon 

 its liberties, signally failed ; and though his royal successors in 

 time came to rule the waves of the ocean, yet they never attempted 

 to rule them quite straight round the edge of Great Britain ; 



