The Land of the Hills and the Glens 



awhile, digesting his meal, before sailing out on broad, 

 motionless wings over the rocky corrie where a few 

 ptarmigan have their home. 



At length the shoulder of the hill was reached, from 

 where I could see, spread before me, the sister lochs, 

 Loch vScridain and Loch nan Ceall, reflecting the blue 

 of the sky, and many islands on which the surf broke 

 lazily. Here the ground was carpeted with plants of the 

 cushion pink (Silene acaulis), and I was interested to note 

 that the vertical limit of their growth was at least five 

 hundred feet lower than on the more land-locked Cairngorm 

 Hills. 



Stretching away to Loch nan Ceall lay a broad grassy 

 corrie well loved by the deer, and where, buzzards circled 

 and ravens croaked. From the shoulder to the cairn is 

 a climb of some seven hundred feet over very rough 

 boulder-scarred ground with only here and there a small 

 grassy patch. Near one such patch I watched a cock ptar- 

 migan, who ran up the hill ahead of me, and whose mate 

 may have had her nest in the vicinity, but a careful 

 search of that part of the hillside revealed nothing. The 

 tracks of the deer were numerous here, and indeed led 

 right across the summit of the hill, and I could see 

 where stags had been lying, perhaps to catch the warmth 

 of the evening sun as he sank towards the north-west horizon. 

 In the shelter of the stones, plants of a certain mountain 

 saxifrage probably Saxifraga nivalis were putting forth 

 their buds, but no other flower grew here. 



I think the summit of these far western hills must in 

 fine summer weather have a temperature considerably lower 

 than the Cairngorms. On the latter hills, after days of 

 summer sunshine the great plateaux become so heated that 

 the temperature is at times actually higher than in the glens 

 beneath. Even on Ben Nevis I have known this to be 

 the case. But with Ben More, and indeed all hills stand- 

 ing out into the Atlantic, the heat of the sun almost 



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