DECEMBER, 1881. 103 



entered upon on Monday without the smallest misgiving, 

 but about two miles up we came upon a belt of ice that 

 stretched across the very broadest part of the loch, and 

 impeded further progress without an amount of damage 

 to boat and oars that was not to be thought of. Here 

 we saw quite a number of heads of seals in the loch, along 

 the verge of the ice bank, giving a most Arctic character 

 to the wintry scene. Why they should have deserted the 

 loch lower down to congregate here we do not understand, 

 unless we are to conclude these were properly the ordinary 

 occupants of the portion of water covered by the ice 

 about \\ miles wide by i mile deep ; for once we had 

 landed and journeyed by the Appin shore to Cregan 

 Ferry, we found the water there quite clear of ice, and 

 the dwellers on shore unaware of its vicinity, until the 

 crashing of a steam yacht on its way through drew their 

 attention thereto. We attributed this ice phenomenon 

 to the enormous rainfall of the period preceding the frost, 

 which had found its way with a rush into the loch, there 

 to float and freeze upon the surface. This had already 

 helped to clear the water, by removing the fresh water 

 from the depths for we have rarely seen the loch so 

 clear after so great a rainfall. But the weather was 

 evidently still unsettled, as the seafowl and migratory 

 ducks were excessively wild ; and we peeped down at the 

 sea bottom with the wistful gaze of one who had been 

 long a stranger, and feared to be soon estranged again. 

 Our time was short, and all we did was to bring to the 

 surface a strange crab from a fathom or two that had 

 especially attracted our attention. It proved to be 

 only a hermit, apparently the common Bernhardus, 

 under peculiarly unhappy circumstances ; for he had out- 

 grown his dwelling, the dog-whelk shell which now only 



