110 KERRERA. GENERAL DESCRIPTION. 



KERRERA.* 



THE island of Kerrera skirts the neighbouring coast 

 of Argyllshire in a direction, as far as it extends, nearly 

 parallel ; being separated from it by a strait about half 

 a mile in breadth, which affords excellent harbours for 

 ships under any wind and weather. That known by 

 the name of the Horseshoe, on the Kerrera side, is one of 

 the most secure on this coast. This island is about four 

 miles in length and two in breadth ; its form being 

 irregularly oval and but little indented by bays or 

 diversified with headlands. At the northern extremity, 

 it assists, with the small island called the Maiden's 

 island, in forming the harbour of Oban ; a part of the 

 coast well known to mineralogists as well as tourists, 

 and of which descriptions have often been published. 

 Independently of its mineralogical interest, the neigh- 

 bouring castles of Dunnolly and Dunstaffnage, and the 

 more distant plain of the supposed Beregonium, give 

 it a value in the eyes of the antiquary to whom the 

 power of the former chieftains of Lorn is still an object 

 of fond remembrance ; while the grandeur of the mountain 

 screen that encircles the Linnhe Loch, together with 

 the scattered islands that diversify its wide expanse, 

 render it equally attractive to the lover of picturesque 

 beauty. 



The reader who is acquainted with this coast, can 

 scarcely fail to have taken some interest in the history 

 of DunstafFnage castle, and in that of the plain which 

 is supposed to contain the remains of the very prob- 

 lematical, or rather, visionary Beregonium. Notwith- 

 standing all that has been said on this subject, it does 

 not appear that any ruins of buildings here exist to indicate 



* Sec the Map of the Slate isles. 



