ARRAN. METEOROLOGY. 325 



the water, or on some small island at a short distance 

 from the shore; the warfare of those days having been 

 carried on by sea, and the usual incursions being of a 

 piratical nature. In the interior, they are often situated 

 in a similar manner in lakes. Their present situation, 

 compared with that which they have evidently occupied 

 at first, often indicates to a geologist the changes which 

 the shores and which the lakes have undergone ; the 

 island having been often converted into a peninsula, and 

 that building which was surrounded by water being now 

 situated on an alluvial flat of shingle, or of moory or mea- 

 dow land. Kilchurn, in Loch Awe, and Carrick castle, in 

 Loch Long, present, among many others, examples of 

 these revolutions. The poverty, no less than the insen- 

 sibility to convenience, of even the most powerful chieftains, 

 is strongly exemplified in the meanness of these buildings, 

 whether strong houses or fortresses; and it is scarcely 

 an exaggeration to say that Caerphilly alone would 

 contain all the castles of the maritime Highlands , 



HAVING, in the description of Rum, given a slight 

 account of the formation of those clouds called parasitical, 

 one of the most instructive meteorological phenomena to 

 be seen in mountainous countries, I may here add another 

 example, differing in some circumstances sufficiently re- 

 markable to merit description. Leaving Loch Ransa at 

 six in the morning, with a light air from the westward, 

 a thick fog with a dead calm came on, and the vessel 

 was unable to make any way. Being desirous to reach 

 Goatfell at an early hour, the boat was rowed along the 

 shore, with the intention of ascending from Corry. Before 

 arriving there, a fresh breeze sprung up from the eastward 

 and the fog around us disappeared. On ascending the 

 mountain however, I perceived that the place in which the 

 vessel had been left, was covered with a dense round 

 cloud which rested on its surface, occupying a space of 



