THE HOUSE OF THE LOCHIEL. 349 



cestor — Sir Ewen Cameron, wlio, proud of the gifts of 

 Nature, offered to bet that he would shoot a stag and 

 kill a salmon from the window of his tower, on the 

 banks of the Arkeg. At present a greenly painted 

 iron fence, put up at great cost, keeps the deer away 

 from the house, and wooden pales along the graceful 

 and leaping river, if Naiads really existed, would 

 make them need every drop of water from the fall to 

 restore them from a fainting fit, the effects of mortal 

 enormity. What has the lawn of Lochiel to do with 

 flower-pots and flowers, or the entrance at his gate 

 with barns or wooden sheds ; or his grounds with 

 little laurel bushes, or his lands with fences ? While 

 Loch Lochy, Glengarry, Loch Quoich, Knoidart, and 

 Cameron of Morar, Mac Lean of Ardgour, and the 

 Caledonian Canal,which form his natural boundary, are 

 " to the fore," they are the only limits by which his 

 steps should be guided, and he should have no other 

 bounds than " the march " he shares with them. 

 Flowers ! the blossoms of the mountain heather are 

 his roses; his waterfalls and cataracts his singing 

 birds ; and the stag, and the various denizens of his 

 wilds, maintain the hospitality of his larder. 



There is a situation on which the house might 

 have been built, on the opposite side of the river, its 

 windows to the south ; and availing itself of the 

 avenue of trees, whence might have been enjoyed the 

 view of both lakes, the waterfall and river; and it 

 then would have commanded the whole of the little 

 valley between the hills. I yesterday, the 6th of 

 November, 1853, crossed the lesser fall, and climbed 

 to the island, and sat for some time on a rock close 

 on the brink of the cataract ; summoned the spirits 

 around me — dreamed that 1 was Lochiel — and re: 



