104 FOREST OF BADENOCH. 



himself into the Dee, and swim for some distance, rod in 

 hand, after the otter : but unfortunately his tackle failed, 

 and the brute at length got off. Probably, however, he 

 was killed afterwards ; for a tenant of Mr. Skene, whose 

 house was close to the water, was awakened one clear 

 frosty night by screams and extraordinary sounds issuing 

 from the river : he arose quickly under an impression that 

 some one had fallen into the Dee ; when to his relief he 

 descried two otters upon a large mass of floating ice, 

 fighting for a salmon, which they had dragged upon it. 

 They were screeching and yelling in fierce combat. The 

 man loaded his gun and fired at them with success; for 

 when he arrived with his boat, he found one of the otters 

 killed and a beautiful salmon of twenty pounds beside him, 

 with a piece only bit out of his throat : he got a good price 

 for the otter's skin, and fed his family with the salmon. 



" And now, as we are journeying on," said Tortoise, " I 

 will endeavour to lighten the way by giving you a true 

 description of the Badenoch country. I am putting 

 together a short account of the principal forests in Scotland, 

 and I meant to have reserved Badenoch for your perusal 

 with the rest ; but as you have just passed through a large 

 tract of it, and as the Gown-cromb rather libelled his 

 own country, and, moreover, gave you but an apocryphal 

 version of its history, I will take this opportunity of telling 

 mine. 



" The account I am about to relate, as well as I can 

 from memory, was most obligingly given to me by Cluny 

 Macpherson, chief of Clanchattan, a very celebrated and 

 accomplished gentleman and sportsman. Thus then it 

 runs : 



