372 NETHER LOCHABER. 



passing shower ; the gloom has given place to cloudless blue ; you 

 have been cheated, so to speak. But what matters it 1 Your crop is 

 safely stacked or housed, and were it not for the passing shower 

 and temporary mid-day gloom, your stocks were still afield, running 

 a risk there was no reason they should run ; and so, good reader, 

 you will understand how a slight shower in the season of ingather- 

 ing may not always be an evil, but a very good thing indeed ; and 

 only a few such passing, labour-inciting showers have we known 

 here for a whole month, and that is much to say when the month 

 is to be counted from mid-September to mid-October. 



And, gentle reader, we only wish you were with us here to 

 see for yourself, propriis oculis, for no pen can describe it, one or 

 more of the many magnificent sunsets we have had in the course of 

 this same bypast month of fine weather. The sunsets of the 

 equinoctial seasons, both vernal and autumnal, are almost always 

 beautiful, more particularly those of the autumnal equinox; but 

 never before, we think, have we seen them so startling, gloriously 

 beautiful, so gorgeously magnificent, as on several occasions lately. 

 A few evenings ago, as we were busy in our study, a young lady 

 burst in upon us in a state of great excitement, begging us to throw 

 aside our pen for a little, and come out to see the exceeding glory 

 of the setting sun. We readily complied of course, and taking the 

 young lady by the hand we made a race of it till we reached our 

 " coigne of vantage," a grassy green knoll, a favourite standpoint 

 when any celestial phenomenon of importance to the W. or S.W. 

 of us is to be observed. The scene, in truth, was indescribably 

 beautiful, and we stood in speechless admiration, not unmingled 

 with awe, in sight of the most glorious sunset our eyes ever beheld. 

 Before us lay the whole expanse of the Linnhe Loch, shimmering 

 as if gently aboil in a flood of pale golden light. Beyond, rose 

 what seemed the one vast unbroken range of the mountains of 

 Ardgour, Kingerloch, and Morven, bathed in a rich dark purple 



