242 Kintail and Glcnelg, ivith Notices of the Brocks. [Sess. 



peared, but an excellent idea of the gallery and window 

 arrangement is yet presented. Eoughly speaking, the base- 

 ment walls of both towers average 11 to 12 feet in thickness, 

 the internal diameter 30 to 33 feet, so that they must have 

 been about the same size as Grugaig, although the stones used 

 in their construction are not nearly so large as those in the 

 last-mentioned. This difference is noticeable all over the 

 districts where brochs once abounded, and may be accounted 

 for simply enough by inferring that the founders used the 

 materials readiest to hand ; and the conjecture might perhaps 

 be added, that in localities where greater danger was to be 

 apprehended, the towers would be built in more massive form, 

 so as successfully to resist attack. Concerning this broch, 

 Pennant makes a remark very difficult to comprehend and 

 still more to believe, to the effect that at the east end there 

 was an aperture, " once of such extent that the goats which 

 sheltered in it were often lost." One would conclude from 

 this that something resembling the " pit of Tophet," on a 

 diminished scale, existed in this now peaceful and smiling 

 vale : if it ever did, it certainly cannot be discovered now, 

 happily for the resident population.^ There is one row of 

 internal windows running from the bottom to the top, and a 

 smaller duplicate at the east side, beginning about 18 to 20 

 feet from the ground, and this would give light to the upper 

 galleries only. Like its neighbour, the hand of the Goth has 

 pressed heavily here also. But not to prolong description of 

 those two well-known examples, we will push on to the third, 

 which, as already indicated, has attracted such comparatively 

 trifling notice from antiquaries. 



About a mile to the east stands the farmhouse of Baile 

 Braghad, where the road ends ; and striking up the rough slope 

 at a distance of another half mile, Caisteal Chonil is descried 

 crowning the top of a precipitous knoll formed largely of solid 

 rock. From its position this broch in olden times must have 

 been absolutely impregnable, as on the south side it rests on 

 the brink of a steep declivity washed at the foot by a brawl- 

 ing mountain - torrent. Access from that quarter would be 

 attended with considerable danger, while the other sides, more 



1 Tradition says that a passage existed leading from the tower to the river, 

 this aperture being the entrance to the same. 



