50 ANGLING & ART IN SCOTLAND 



stream of the two, flows hard by the village of 

 Carsphairn, ten miles from Dairy, forming many 

 pretty pools as it threads its course through scattered 

 copses of natural birch, until its waters dash down 

 into a deep, narrow chasm, spanned by a bridge — 

 a wild picturesque spot, which has been christened 

 the Tinkler's Loup. The cliffs on either bank 

 seem almost to meet ; the straitened water, far 

 beneath, appearing, in a gloomy twilight, sullen 

 and black. And, as usual when a river is pent 

 up in a narrow cleft, a tradition is handed down 

 of a daring jump made across the gulf — in this case 

 a mythical tinker escaping from his foes, with the 

 river in high flood. It is an awsome leap, but 

 practicable if a man's footing did not fail on the 

 farther side, but with the greater likelihood of 

 falling back into the boiling abyss. 



This Tinkler's Loup is a lovely and blissful 

 spot at which to spend a day. The country all 

 around is bleak, and wild, and wind-swept ; but 

 here the river lies in a richly-wooded and rocky 

 glen, affording shade from the scorching sun of 

 summer, or warmth in the early spring and winter 

 months when the bitter winds sweep the grassy 

 moorland, bending the hardy birches that find a 



