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35G REMINISCENCES OF A EUNTSMAN. 



I had to fish in these waters, it was evident that the 

 artificial pectoral fin minnow made of horn, was the 

 best of all baits, and with it I killed several of the 

 salmo ferox, as well as the sea and common trout, 

 but none of them, save the monster described, above 

 four or five pounds. 



Setting all sports aside, the lover of nature is well 

 repaid for his long and tedious journey in reach- 

 ing these wilds — these lands of rich lights and 

 shadows; for there is scarce a change in the day, 

 or in his position, that does not offer to his obser- 

 vation some fresh beauty. Wild, wet and cold though 

 the day was, our drive after the monster stag of 

 Corrie Vortght disclosed to me much to admire. 

 Having mounted our ponies. Lord Malmsbury, Lord 

 Edward Thynne, Mr. Dashwood and myself, began 

 to ascend the foot of the hills on the side of Loch 

 Lochy; for we had to make a long detour, to ap- 

 proach the sacred precincts of the king of the waste, 

 who had chosen this extraordinary corrie as the place 

 of his resort ; and new to the locality as I was, my 

 eyes were as often turned to look at the opening 

 prospects behind and around me, as they were to 

 mind the dangerous nature of the path. Beyond us 

 and to the left, towering above his subject mountains, 

 Ben Nevis reared his monarch brow, crowned with a 

 diadem of snow, and bearing to heaven that myste- 

 riously awful sign of the cross by which he is known 

 to the eyes of strangers ; the cross that, though on 

 the mountain only traced in snow, is impervious to 

 the beams of the summer sun ; and reigns through 

 summer and winter, a living imperishable em- 

 blem of that which in the lighter as well as the 

 heavier hour, man would do well never to forget. 



