1 1 8 RISEN B Y PERSE VERANCE. 



of toil had rendered him sober and thoughtful. He formed a 

 bosom friend in a young house-painter called William Ross. 

 * He was a lad of genius/ writes Miller, * drew truthfully, had 

 a nice sense of the beautiful, and possessed the true poetic 

 faculty ; but he lacked health and spirits, and was naturally of 

 a melancholy temperament, and diffident of himself.' This 

 friendship was of the highest importance to Miller. Ross told 

 him that his drawings and verses were but commonplace, that 

 he would be better employed in cultivating his writing powers, 

 in turning his attention to the cultivation of a good prose 

 style. In the spring of 182 1, work was again resumed. He 

 laboured for a while at Cononside, and was introduced for 

 the first time to the barrack or bothy life amongst a squad of 

 rough masons. Amid this barbarous life he was not entirely 

 unhappy. Their food consisted for the most part of oatmeal 

 porridge or cakes, and milk when it could be got. He was 

 charmed with the scenery of Strathpeffer, about five miles from 

 Cononside ; and during the summer nights, when he had 

 from three to four hours to himself, he could explore the 

 valleys and climb the ridges of the hills with which he was 

 surrounded. He dived into the woods and feasted on the 

 raspberries and gueans to be found there. ' My recollections,' 

 he said afterwards, ' of this rich tract of country, with its woods 

 and towers, and noble river, seem as if bathed in the red light 

 of gorgeous sunsets.' In a letter to William Ross, he thus 

 spoke of this period : ' When the task of the day was over, 

 and I walked out amid the fields and woods to enjoy the cool 

 of the evening, it was then that I was truly happy. Before me 

 the Conon rolled her broad stream to the sea ; behind, I 

 seemed shut up from all intercourse with mankind by a thick 

 and gloomy wood ; while the tower of Fairburn, and the blue 



