CHAP, xv.] ROCKS OF CROMARTY. 125 



ance. I was much pleaded on the whole with my day's excur- 

 sion the beautiful scenery of the rocks, with the harbour of 

 Cromarty, and the distant hills of Ross-shire and Inverness-shire, 

 forming altogether as magnificent and varied a view as I have 

 ever seen. 



On an excursion along these same rocks I was once nearly 

 drowned. I had just killed a pigeon that had dropped in the 

 water in a recess between the rocks. We rowed in after it, 

 and just as I was leaning over the bow of the boat to pick it up, 

 a rolling swell of the sea lifted the boat nearly upright, grating 

 her keel on the edge of the rock. I was hoisted with the bow 

 of the boat into the air, and holding on looked round to see 

 what had happened, the day being perfectly calm ; the boatmen 

 were pale with fright as we appeared for a moment balanced 

 between life and death, the chances rather in favour of the 

 latter. The same wave, however, as it receded, took us twenty 

 or thirty yards out to sea, and the men immediately rowed as 

 hard as they could to get a good offing. The wave that had 

 so nearly upset us was the forerunner of a heavy swell and wind 

 from the east, which was coming on unobserved by us, for we 

 had been wholly intent on our sport. I never could understand 

 how our boat could have righted again after the position s-he 

 was in for a few moments. The face of the rocks was too per- 

 pendicular at the place to admit of our making good a landing 

 hat! we been upset. Once away from the rocks we were safe 

 enough, and rigging out a couple of strong lines with large 

 white flies, we caught as many fish of different kinds as we 

 could pull in during our way over to Cromarty. A large gull 

 made two swoops at one of the flies, and had not a fish fore- 

 stalled him, we should probably have hooked him also. I do 

 not know a day's sport more amusing than one along these rocks 

 on a fine summer day, what with the variety of birds and the 

 beauty and grandeur of the scenery, taking good care, however, 

 to avoid the rocks when there is the least wind or swell from the 

 east or north. 



