388 A Walk from 



memory of Hugh Miller. The beating rain drove 

 me frequently to the wayside cottages for shelter ; 

 and in every one of them I was received with kind 

 words and pleasant looks. One of these was occupied 

 by an old woman in the regular Scotch cap a vener- 

 able old saint, with her Bible and psalm-book library 

 on her window-sill, and her peat fire burning cheerily. 

 When on leaving I intimated that I was from America, 

 she followed me out into the road, asking me a hundred 

 questions about the country and its condition. She 

 had three sons in Montreal, and felt a mother's interest 

 in the very name America. The cottage was one 

 of a long street of them by the sea-side, and I supposed 

 it was a fishing village ; but I learned from her that the 

 people were mostly the evicted tenants of the Duke 

 of Sutherland, who were turned out of his county some 

 thirty years ago to make room for sheep. I made 

 only eleven miles this day on account of the rain, and 

 was glad to find cheery and comfortable quarters in an 

 excellent inn kept by a widow and her three daughters 

 in Tain. Nothing could exceed their kindness and 

 attention, which evidently flowed more from a dis- 

 position than from a professional habit of making 

 their guests at home for a pecuniary or business con- 

 sideration. I reached their house about the middle 

 of the afternoon, cold and wet, after several hours' 



