CHAP, iv.] GLEN SANNOX. 175 



with their granitic scars frown down upon us, and one with a 

 coroneted brow looks kingly among the others, as the mist 

 floats upon their shoulders, like a waving mantle, and with their 

 bold and rugged precipices they seem as if they had just been 

 suddenly shot out from the bosom of the earth. Glen Sannox 

 is sublime indeed ; its magnitude is remarkable, and it is so 

 hemmed in with hills as to look at once, even without any 

 details, or the aid of history, a fitting hiding-place for the 

 gallant Bruce and his devoted followers. About three miles 

 north from this glen we can view and, we venture to say, not 

 without astonishment the falling fragments of the broken 

 mountain ; a stream of large stones that lie crowded on the 

 declivity of the hill, till they in one long trail reach the ocean. 

 But to enumerate a tithe even of the scenic and antiquarian 

 beauties of the island would require nay, it has obtained, and 

 more than once a volume. I could dwell upon the blue 

 rock near Cony, and picture the overhanging cliffs of the 

 neighbourhood mantled o'er with ivy. The visitor might 

 enter some of the caves which have been scooped out by the 

 sea, or wander among the rock pools of the indented shore, 

 rich with treasures wherewith to feed the greedy eye of the 

 naturalist, and view the ladies, with kilted coats, doing their 

 daily lessons from Glaucus, collecting pretty shells, bottling 

 anemones, or gathering sea-weeds wherewith to ornament their 

 botanic albums. At last, after a long day's work of wander- 

 ing and climbing, we long for a quiet seat and a refreshing 

 cup of tea, and by and by, when the night shuts us out from 

 active labour, we hie us to our box bed, in order to stretch 

 our wearied limbs in Miss Macalister's well-lavendered 

 sheets ; and, as we are just attempting to coax the balmy god- 

 dess to close our eyes with her soft fingers, we hear the land- 

 lady in her garret reading her nightly chapter from her Gaelic 

 Bible, with that genuine droning sound incidental to the West 

 Highland voice. 



