192 THE SALMON. 



upon the rocks and are captured. It is, indeed, said, 

 that one of the wonders which the Frasers of Lovat, 

 who are lords of the manor, used to show their guests, 

 was a voluntarily cooked salmon at the falls of Kil- 

 morac. For this purpose a kettle was placed upon the 

 flat rock on the south side of the fall, close by the 

 edge of the water, and kept full and boiling. There 

 is a considerable extent of the rock, where tents were 

 erected, and the whole was under a canopy of over- 

 shadowing trees. There the company are said to have 

 waited until a salmon fell into the kettle and was boiled 

 in their presence. We have already mentioned the 

 avidity with which the wild cats watch the salmon at 

 this fall, and we need hardly add that the otters com- 

 mit great depredations. The salmon are remarkably 

 abundant in that river ; and as the fall confines them 

 to the space below, they are found in good condition. 

 We have seen as many as eighty taken in a pool lower 

 down the river, at one haul of the seine, and one of 

 the number weighed more than sixty pounds. 



The Keith of Blairgowrie is a still more singular 

 place. It is at the junction of the hard mountain 

 breccia, with the soft red sand-stone which is found 

 along a great extent of the southern edge of the 

 Grampians. All the rivers in that quarter have cut 

 deep channels in the sandstone : but the breccia being 

 in many places very hard, it offers interruptions. Its 

 hardness is, however, not uniform ; so it is hollowed 

 into very singular cavities. Some of these are circular 

 pits of regular figure and considerable dimensions and 

 depth ; often deeper than the adjoining bed of the 

 river, and unconnected with it, save during floods. 



