EXCURSION IN OUTER HEBRIDES. 307 



of islands denominated the Outer Hebrides or Long Island, 

 perched, like a Ptarmigan, on a craggy and precipitous ridge. 

 The islands of Uist, Harris, and Lewis lay as it were at my 

 feet. Toward the east and south, in the extreme distance, ap- 

 peared the mountains of the counties of Ross and Inverness, with 

 the pointed hills and craggy capes, and sloping plains of Skye. 

 Westward, a long series of summits, commencing with that 

 on which I stood, and forming a broad ridge, intersected trans- 

 versely by deep valleys, extended for several miles. They ap- 

 peared to be much lower than the mountain on which I was, 

 and resembled heaps of sand formed by pouring it from a vessel. 

 The snow lay rather deep on them all, and the whirlwinds that 

 swept along their ridges scattering it in spiral flakes, present- 

 ed an indescribably beautiful and sublime appearance. I was 

 enveloped in one, but it did not prove very boisterous. The 

 Atlantic was covered with huge clouds, that advanced in dis- 

 orderly groups, nearly on a level with my position, but the 

 waving streams of snow and hail that poured from them left 

 no trace on the stormy waters. Toward the north lay the 

 dreary flats of Lewis, covered with lakes, and flanked with the 

 Park and Uig mountains. Having gazed upon the splendid 

 scene until nearly frozen, I descended with considerable diffi- 

 culty into a deep valley, where I encountered a fall of snow so 

 dense as to render me apprehensive of being smothered by it. 

 I felt too, for the first time perhaps, the benumbing effects of 

 cold, my feet and fingers having become almost senseless, and 

 a feeling of faintness having crept over me. However, by 

 walking^ and runninoj I soon recovered heat enough, and after 

 passing the deep glen of Langadale, ascended an eminence in 

 a kind of pass between two mountains, whence I discovered 

 tokens of cultivation at the distance of three or four miles, so 

 that I was assured of being in the proper direction toward the 

 house of a friend whom I had not seen for many years. By a 

 stream in a desolate valley I fell in with a herd of seven deer, 

 w^hich however I did not attempt to molest ; and in the even- 

 ing was welcomed to the cottage of Ewen ^lacdiarmid, at the 

 head of Loch Resort, one of the dreary inlets of this dismal- 

 looking coast. Two days' rambling among the mountains pro- 



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