EEMINISCENCES OF THE LEWS. 227 



Very, very few are devoid of it, and there was 

 a peculiar spot not far from me whicli was tlie 

 dread of the whole country. It was a rock on 

 the road to Stornoway, said to be haunted by 

 the ghost of a boy murdered there some years 

 ago, the particulars of which I shall here 

 relate. 



In days of yore, two boys of Stornoway, 

 instead of going to school, amused themselves 

 with going out egg- stealing in the grouse- 

 hatching time. They quarrelled about the 

 division of the spoil, and one of the young 

 gentlemen hit the other rather too hard on the 

 head with a stone and killed him. He was 

 horridly frightened; but when he found his 

 companion dead, he kept his wits, and dug a 

 hole in the muir under this rock by the burn- 

 side, in which he buried the body. He then 

 betook himself to Harris, got on board a 

 fishing-boat in Tarbet, whence he made his 

 way to the mainland, became a sailor, and 

 wandered about the world for many years. At 

 last, in the course of his voyages, the ship — in 

 which, I think, he had become mate — went into 

 the port of Stornoway for repairs. When 

 there, instigated by an almost supernatural 

 anxiety and curiosity, he went on shore. He 

 could find no traces of the cabins where his 



Q 2 



