THE 



MOOR AND THE LOCH 



COKKACH-BAH; OE, A PLEA FOE THE WASTES 



How shrunk are Scotland's rugged untamed desolations ! 

 We see those mushroom larch-plantations skirting the 

 steeps of our brown mountains, with their luxuriant 

 verdure. The subsoil-plough, tile-draining, and all the 

 ingenious etceteras of modern invention, have reclaimed 

 many a bleak and barren moor, which once only served for 

 pasture to the hardy black cattle the unhoused hirsel of 

 the hills. Thriving fields of yellow grain, and glancing 

 sickles, and merry voices swelling the autumn gale, now 

 enliven those wastes, once the chosen haunts of the bittern 

 and the whaup. Many of the lords of the heather them- 

 selves have caught the improvement mania, and either 

 modernise their " own grey tower," or pull it down ; 

 building a splendid mansion in its honoured stead. The 

 wild feudo-Highland grounds and scenery must, of course, 



