24 Jottings on a Ramble in Wester Ross. [Sess. 



however, will be laid before the Botanical Society ; and the 

 object of this paper is mainly to give you a short account 

 of the place, and of some of the incidents which came under 

 our observation while in that locality. 



We left Edinburgh about 5 o'clock on a July morning, 

 travelling by the Highland railway to Inverness, and thence, 

 by the Dingwall and Skye section, to Strathcarron station, 

 where we arrived about 5 p.m. Having dined at Strathcarron 

 Station Hotel, we drove to Shieldaig, a distance of twenty miles, 

 where we found a sailing-boat waiting to take us to Arrin-a- 

 chruinach, the last stage of our journey, and at a distance of 

 nearly seven miles, wliere we arrived about 11 p.m. 



The route as far as Inverness is too well known to need 

 description. On leaving that place, the railway skirted the 

 flat shores of the Moray Firth to Beauly, and thence through a 

 fertile and well-cultivated country to Dingwall, a neat, well-to- 

 do county town at the head of the Cromarty Firth. The town 

 seemed to be well stocked with churches, judging from the 

 number of steeples visible from the railway. The branch to 

 Skye diverges here, and this was our route. We soon com- 

 menced a long ascent by the base of Ben Wyvis, which was 

 some distance off on our right hand, obtaining a very fine view 

 of the neat little watering-place of Strathpeffer, situated in a 

 fine fertile strath about two miles to our left, and to which a 

 branch railway was lately made. The picturesque old mansion 

 of Castle Leod, a seat of the Duchess of Sutherland, who is the 

 owner of Strathpeffer, lies between the town and the railway. 

 Continuing our ascent, we got into the valley of the Black- 

 water, along which we went in a westerly direction through a 

 chain of straths interspersed with lochs, the largest of which is 

 Loch Luichart. W^e reached the summit about Achnasheen, 

 where the road to Loch Maree diverges on our right. The 

 country is here very bleak and bare, but the scenery improves 

 as we reach Strathcarron station, which is at the head of the 

 sea-loch of the same name. The post-office village of Janetown, 

 through which we passed, is on the north-west shore of the loch, 

 three miles distant ; and after passing it we crossed over a high 

 neck of land till we reached the head of Loch Kishorn, a 

 branch of Loch Carron. After passing Courthill, a gentleman's 

 seat at the head of the loch, the road to Applecross diverges. 



