A PLEA FOR THE WASTES. 9 



lying within tide-water mark ! The landlord of the 

 Argyll Arms, however, obligingly offered to send the 

 ferry-boat and forward them next morning by the post * 

 to Cladich, where I hoped to bivouac for a few days after 

 my eagle campaign. 



Having dined with my two agreeable companions, we 

 hired an open carriage, and drove to Cladich, where we 

 parted, they going on to Oban by Port Sonachan, and I 

 to the Black Mount. After a long, rugged, but enjoyable 

 drive, partly along the banks of Loch Awe, where the 

 cuckoo was heard in every dell, or seen poising himself 

 upon some still leafless patriarchal thorn, and partly 

 through the environs of the forest, I arrived at the 

 solitary little inn of Inveruran. The Forester's house 

 was within a short distance; so I arranged with him 

 that we should start by daylight next morning for the 

 eagle's eyrie, partook of Highland cheer in a snug little 

 Cyclops of a parlour, ornamented with the horns of the 

 red-deer, and then retired to my dormitory. 



Day was just breaking when I crossed the river Tulla, 

 on my way to Peter Robertson's cottage. He was stand- 



* Generally a stout hale carle, of middle age, who walks from ten to 

 fifteen miles and back again in a day, with the mail-bag slung at his 

 back. The first time one of these primitive posts was dignified with a 

 little gig equipage, he came in late, and made excuse that " he was 

 taigled wi' a gig ! " Of course he was turned off. Poor Sandy Bell had 

 walked twenty-seven miles a day for thirty years of his life, and at his 

 dismissal was fresh as May. He bitterly complained that he lost, first 

 his bread, "by thae new-fangled nonsense," and then his health, for 

 want of exercise. He is only an instance among many who have been 

 ruined by cutting a dash. 



