28 WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS. [CHAP. in. 



in the broken ground near the water. Our next cast took us up 

 a slope of hill, where we found a wild covey of grouse. Right 

 and left at them the moment they rose, and killed a brace ; the 

 rest went over the hill. Another covey on the same ground 

 gave me three shots. From the top of the hill we saw a dreary 

 expanse of flat ground, with Loch A-na-caillach in the centre 

 of it, a bleak cold-looking piece of water, with several small 

 grey pools near it. Donald told me a long story of the origin 

 of its name, pointing out a large cairn of stones at one end of it. 

 The story was, that some few years ago " Not so long either, 

 Sir (said Donald) ; for Rory Beg, the auld smuggler, that died 

 last year, has often told me, that he minded the whole thing 

 weel" there lived down below the woods an old woman, by habit 

 and repute a witch, and one possessed of more than mortal power, 

 which she used in a most malicious manner, spreading sickness 

 and death among man and beast. The minister of the place, who 

 came, however, but once a month to do duty in a building called 

 a chapel, was the only person who, by dint of prayer and Bible, 

 could annoy or resist her. He at last made her so uncomfortable 

 by attacking her with holy water and other spiritual weapons, 

 that she suddenly left the place, and no one knew where she 

 went to. It soon became evident, however, that her abode was 

 not far off, as cattle and people were still taken ill in the same 

 unaccountable manner as before. At last, an idle fellow, who 

 was out poaching deer near Loch A-na-caillach late one evening, 

 saw her start through -the air from the cairn of stones towards 

 the inhabited part of the country. This put people on the look- 

 out, and she was constantly seen passing to and fro on her unholy 

 errands during the fine moonlight nights. Many a time was she 

 shot at as she flew past, but without success. At last a pot- 

 valiant and unbelieving old fellow, who had long been a Serjeant 

 in some Highland regiment, determined to free his neighbours 

 from the witch ; and having loaded his gun with a double charge 

 of gunpowder, put in, instead of shot, a crooked sixpence and 

 some silver buttons, which he had made booty of somewhere or 

 other in war time. He then, in the most foolhardy manner, laid 

 himself down on the hill, just where we were then standing when 

 Donald told me the story, and, by the light of the moon, watched 

 the witch leave her habitation in the cairn of stones. As soon as 



