226 THE MOOR AND THE LOCH. 



those desolate precipices. It is not to be inferred, however, 

 that the deer-forest is also a preserve for vermin. There is 

 many a splendid hunt after the marten or the fox, which taxes 

 the mettle both of men and dogs. And although there often 

 are only the hounds and their quarry upon the bare moun- 

 tains, and the echoes of the rocks to cheer them on, yet, to a 

 lover of the pure picturesque, it is worth a hundred Lowland 

 fox-hunts, with their red coats, horns, huntsmen, whippers, 

 and all ! 



It was towards the end of April 1845 that, armed with my 

 duck-gun to storm one of these eagle-fortresses, I sailed in the 

 Loch Goil steamboat, on my way to these favourite haunts. 

 I had also put up two trolling-rods in compliment to the 

 Salmo-feroces of Loch Awe. We left the Broomielaw at seven 

 o'clock on a fresh sunny morning, and paddled merrily down 

 the Clyde. The fat rosy steward, with his quaint face of 

 good-nature, was in high feather, and frequent in his assurances 

 that we might expect " a pleesant sail." Under his auspices 

 we were soon seated at a good breakfast of whitings taken out 

 of the firth the night before. By the time we had discussed 

 them, we were coasting the shingly beach of Loch Long ; and 

 having touched at Ardentinny, and viewed the fairyland of 

 Glenfinart, its emerald lawn, and rampart of brown hill and 

 tangled wood, we struck into the bleak Loch Goil. A short 

 time brought us alongside of its primitive quay, where we 

 deposited ourselves and luggage in the mongrel kind of coach, 

 half boat half omnibus, which was to convey us across the 

 isthmus separating Loch Goil from Loch Fyne. Creeping up 

 one side of the hill at a tortoise pace, we rattled down the 

 other at a gallop, by way of a change. A very small steam- 

 boat plies between St Catherine's and Inverary, and I was in 

 the act of superintending the embarkation of my chattels, when 

 a bustling official assured me that he would see them all safe. 

 I put faith in him, and immediately began a discussion with 

 two fellow-travellers about the whale that had been harpooned 



