RAMBLES OF A GEOLOGIST. 253 



One day at noon, a year after her first appearance, the old 

 nurse was surprised to see her enter the cottage ; as all her 

 previous visits had been made early in the morning or late 

 in the evening; whereas now, though the day was dark and 

 lowering, and a storm of wind and rain had just broken out, 

 still it was day. " Mammie," she said, " I cannot open 

 the heart of the laird, and I have nothing of my own to give 

 you; but I think I can do something for you now. Go 

 straight to the White House [that of a neighbouring pro- 

 prietor], and tell the folk there to set out with all the speed 

 of man and horse for the black rock in the sea, at the foot of 

 the 'crags, or they'll rue it dearly to their dying day. Their 

 bairns, foolish things, have gone out to the rock, and the tide 

 has flowed round them ; and, if no help reach them soon, 

 they'll be all scattered like sea-ware on the shore ere the fall 

 of the sea. But if you go and tell your story at the White 

 House, mammie, the bairns will be safe for an hour to come, 

 and there will be something done by their mother to better 

 you, for the news." The woman went, as directed, and told 

 her story ; and the father of the children set out on horse- 

 back in hot haste for the rock, a low, insulated skerry, 

 which, lying on a solitary part of the beach, far below the 

 line of flood, was shut out from the view of the inhabited 

 country by a wall of precipices, and covered every tide by 

 several feet of water. On reaching the edge of the cliffs, he 

 saw the black rock, as the woman had described, surrounded 

 by the sea, and the children clinging to its higher crags. But, 

 though the waves were fast rising, his attempts to ride out 

 through the surf to the poor little things were frustrated by 

 their cries, which so frightened his horse as to render it un- 

 manageable ; and so he had to gallop on to the nearest fish- 

 ing village for a boat. So much time was unavoidably lost 

 in consequence, that nearly the whole beach was covered by 

 the sea, and the surf had begun to lash the feet of the pre- 



