THE FRESH- WATER LOCHS OF SCOTLAND. 395 



13 millions of cubic feet. The basin of Loch Beag is simple, the sides 

 gently sloping, the greatest depth, 29 feet, in the centre of the loch. 

 The channel connecting Loch Beag with Loch Clunie varies in depth 

 from 11 feet to 23 feet. 



Loch Clunie (see Plate XCIX.). Loch Clunie (or Cluanie) is a 

 large loch occupying Glen Clunie, which runs east and west, and is 

 the source of the river Moriston. The lower end is about 16 miles 

 distant from Invermoriston, on Loch Ness. The upper end is some 

 13 miles from Shiel bridge, at the head of Loch Duich, on the west 

 coast, but Loch Hourn is still nearer, only 10 miles as the crow flies. 

 High mountains rise on both sides of the loch, those on the south 

 reaching nearly 2500 feet, while on the north the highest peak, Sgurr 

 nan Conbhairean, 2 miles distant, is 3632 feet in height. 



Loch Clunie is very narrow, 4J miles in length, and its central line 

 has a slight sigmoid curvature. The shore-line is very irregular, and 

 the width varies greatly at different parts. Widest in the upper part, 

 where the maximum breadth of half a mile occurs at two points, at the 

 extreme west end, and 1J miles further east, whence the loch narrows 

 greatly toward the east, till about a mile above the outflow the width 

 is only one-fifteenth of a mile. Beyond this narrow part it expands 

 into a distinct small basin nearly a quarter of a mile in breadth. The 

 mean breadth of the entire loch is just about a quarter of a mile. The 

 superficial area exceeds 1 square mile (about 704 acres), and the drainage 

 area, which includes no other lochs except Lochs Beag and Lundie, is 32 

 square miles. It is fed by the river Clunie and some large burns on the 

 north shore, very little water entering on the south shore, except the 

 surface drainage. The river Moriston flows out from the east end of 

 the loch. Considering the volume of water, which amounts to 1533 

 millions of cubic feet, Loch Clunie comes fourth in point of size in the 

 Ness basin (including Loch Ness). In point of length it comes fifth, as 

 Loch Mhor is about half a mile longer, though in volume about 400 

 million cubic feet less, than Loch Clunie. 



The level of Loch Clunie on September 29, 1903, was 605-2 feet 

 above the sea ; the Ordnance Survey officers on October 5, 1867, found 

 the level to be 605-9 feet. The water might rise 4 feet above the level 

 on the date of the survey. Above the narrows, 1 mile from the east 

 end of the loch, which cut off a small basin exceeding 50 feet in depth, 

 the basin of Loch Clunie is a simple one. The 25 -feet contour closely 

 follows the shore-line, and the 50-feet contour is nearly parallel to it, 

 but much closer on the north, where the slope is steeper. The 100-feet 

 contour is parallel with the others, and encloses a relatively large area, 

 nearly 1| miles long by a quarter of a mile in greatest breadth. It is 

 broken into two parts by an unimportant shallowing of 98 feet. The 

 smaller western portion has a maximum depth of 119 feet; the greater 



