110 RESULTS OF A RESIDENCE AT FOCHABERS. 



tivated land. Looking up the Strath from the west end of 

 the village, the view being bounded by the river Spey on 

 the south side, the eye first rests upon a piece of table-land 

 nearly encircled by a belt of trees. Thife belt is about two 

 miles distant, and from that point until the view is abruptly 

 choked by a huge mountain, the ground gradually rises, ex- 

 posing as beautiful and varied a piece of country as we could 

 see anywhere, its face bedecked with cottages and steadings 

 occasionally set in a clump of trees. These start forth, now 

 here, now there, until they become mere specks in the dis- 

 tance — now they are lost altogether, and the only evidence 

 whereby they are to be detected is the pale smoke resting 

 amongst the foliage in which they are buried. Then again 

 further up this rising ground, now becoming part of the 

 mountain, such singular gaps are made in the woods which 

 cover it, and these gaps were crowned with corn — waving, 

 waving on, like a mimic sea — now dark — now light, then 

 dark again. Then between these mountains to the left runs 

 the Spey, and at intervals up and down its shores may be 

 seen groups of men, each group comprising seven, engaged 

 in salmon fishing. Now they walk in single file and drag 

 after them- up the water, a boat; now the net is cast off, 

 and now they are all anxiety to haul it to land. A rap on 

 the head is the reward of each fish floundering about in the 

 net, which are then thrown on shore. The net is next gathered 

 into the boat and the same process goes on by day and night 

 for the few months that the fishing lasts. This is one of the 

 most rapid flowing rivers to be found anywhere. It rushes 

 clown in its quiet moments at a sort of mail-coach pace (the 

 descent in the last five miles being about seventy feet) ; and 

 as its bed is composed of a very coarse loose gravel, it keeps 

 continually on the move, and in many places has turned the 

 windings at right angles to each other. It is not navigable, 

 upward at any rate, but large rafts of home-grown timber 



