400 NETHER LOCHABER. 



these beautiful birds, whose favourite residence, too, if they were 

 only permitted to live in peace, is the immediate vicinity of human 

 dwellings, should be of su"ch evil repute that gamekeepers every- 

 where consider themselves justified in accomplishing their utter 

 destruction by every means in their power. Their utter destruction 

 we have said ; and it is only as to their total extirpation that we 

 would venture on a word of expostulation with gamekeepers and 

 their employers. It is true that the magpie is an enemy to winged 

 game, being a cunning and persistent nest-robber, an adroiter sucker 

 of eggs than the proverbial " grandmother " herself. That the 

 gamekeeper should therefore dislike them is the most natural thing 

 in the world, and that, in gamekeeper's own phrase, they should 

 " be kept down " is proper enough. But we cannot agree that it 

 is necessary that the bird should be utterly destroyed. Here and 

 there on a wide estate an occasional pair of magpies might surely 

 be tolerated for the sake of their beauty and amusingly lively 

 manners, and on the divine principle of " live and let live." For 

 our own part, in approaching a gentleman's residence, the sight of 

 a pair of these birds flitting about " the old ancestral elms " always 

 intensifies our respect for the place and the owner. 



Crossing Loch Creran, by the Ferry of Shian, we are in Bender- 

 loch classic ground, and archaeologically the most interesting 

 spot, perhaps, in all the West Highlands. " Everything here is 

 beautiful," says Dr. Macculloch. " The distance between the 

 ferries of Shian and Connel is but five miles ; but it is a day's 

 journey for a wise man." About half-way is Dun-Mac-Uisneachain 

 (the Fort of the Son of Uisneach), one of the most interesting of 

 our vitrified forts, qua such, and supposed to be the Beregonium of 

 Hector Boethius, and the site of the still older Selma, the " Hall 

 of Swords " of Ossianic song. That it was a place of importance 

 long before the time of the Dalriad Scots seems very certain ; and, 

 leaving Macpherson's " Ossian " altogether out of the question, 



