RAMBLES OF A GEOLOGIST. 375 



tion of a medicine to sick cattle, that did harm in no case, 

 and good at times. The lively comment of one of the young 

 ladies on the remark amused us all. If an infusion of stone 

 had cured, in the last age, cattle that were bewitched, the 

 Strathpeffer water, she argued, which was, it seems, but an 

 infusion of stone, might cure cattle that were sick now ; and 

 so, though the biped patients of the Strath could scarce fail 

 to decrease when they knew that its infused stone contained 

 but the strainings of old mud and the juices of dead unsalted 

 fish, it was gratifying to think that the poor Spa might still 

 continue to retain its patients, though of a lower order. The 

 pump-room would be converted into a rustic, straw-thatched 

 shed, to which long trains of sick cattle, affected by weak 

 nerves and dyspepsia, would come streaming along the roads 

 every morning and evening, to drink and gather strength. 



The following morning was wet and lowering, and a flat 

 ceiling of gray cloud stretched across the valley, from the 

 summit of the Knock Farril ridge of hills on the one side, to 

 the lower flanks of Ben Wyvis on the other. I had pur- 

 posed ascending this latter mountain, the giant of the north- 

 eastern coast, and one of the loftiest of our second-class Scot- 

 tish hills anywhere, to ascertain the extreme upper line at 

 which travelled boulders occur in this part of the country. 

 But it was no morning for wading knee-deep through the 

 trackless heather ; and after waiting on, in the hope the 

 weather might clear up, watching at a window the poorer 

 invalids at the Spa, as they dragged themselves through the 

 rain to the water, I lost patience, and sallied out, beplaided 

 and umbrellaed, to see from the top of Knock Farril how the 

 country looked in a fog. At first, however, I saw much fog, 

 but little country ; but as the day wore on, the flat mist-ceil- 

 ing rose higher, till it rested on but the distant hills, and the 

 more prominent features of the landscape began to stand out 

 amid the general gray, like the stronger lines and masses in 



