LANDSCAPES. 107/ 



on the north-west, which rises out of the middle of a low 

 valley, and is washed on two of its sides by the rivers 

 Conon and Contin. It is of a pyramidical shape, and 

 so regularly formed that one might almost deem it a 

 work of art, and regard it not as a little hill, but as an 

 immense pyramid. Farther away, and on the opposite side 

 of the valley, there is a range of steep precipitous moun- 

 tains, barred with rock and speckled with birch, and 

 varying in colour, according to their distance, from brown 

 to purple, and from purple to light-blue. In a corner 

 of the landscape, and at the base of one of these hills, 

 though considerably elevated above the river, we see the 

 old time-shattered tower of Fairburn tall, grey, ghastly, 

 and like a giant eremite musing in solitude. It is five 

 storeys in height, with only a single room on each floor, 

 turreted at every angle, and irregularly perforated by 

 narrow oblong windows and shot-holes. For the first cen- 

 tury after its erection it is said to have been unfurnished 

 with a door, and to have been climbed into by means of 

 a ladder ; but when the times became quieter, and the 

 proprietors more honest, they struck out for themselves 

 the present entrance, a door scarcely five feet in height. 

 The earlier McKenzies of Fairburn (a family now extinct) 

 are famed in tradition as daring freebooters, and men of 

 immense personal strength. I have heard my uncle say that 

 the two strongest men in the allied army of Marlborough 

 and Eugene were Munro of Newmore and McKenzie of 

 Fairburn. The one could raise a piece of ordnance to 

 his breast, and the other to his knee, which no third 

 man of eighty thousand could lift from the ground. But 

 I forget my picture. See, there are the hills steep, 

 abrupt, jagged at their summit, and here and there 

 streaked with snow. Two beautiful Highland streams 

 wind through the plain below, which is partially covered 



