472 THE MOOR AND THE LOCH. 



fox, with measured, swaggering pace, making for my ambush. 

 His chuckling, self-confident air spoke contempt for the noisy 

 and distanced enemy in the rear, but he had evidently never 

 calculated on an ambuscade so far to the front. It was a fine 

 cross shot, and he fell dead. The drive was nearly two miles 

 behind, and an hour elapsed before they brought up the roes. 

 The frost and snow seldom last long in Mull, but the winter 

 tempests of the Sound are frequent and sublime. The follow- 

 ing sketch from the ' Mountain of the Two Winds ' l is not in 

 the least overdrawn : " The wind was high yesterday, and the 

 waterfalls of Morven, ascending and spreading in blue curled 

 vapours, looked like the smoke of glowing subterranean fur- 

 naces all along the edges of the cliff. I never saw the like in 

 any picture. On the sea, too, the effect was very fine. There 

 was all the clear chill of the northern climates, the colour dark 

 blue ; and as the wind caught the surface, it was, as it were, 

 shivered, and the spray, like pounded ice, blown along with a 

 rattling noise, and whirled into shifting, spiral, waterspout 

 columns, to fall when the gust that supported them sank from 

 exhaustion. When I got to the top of the hill, there was a 

 most terrific gale and snowstorm. The clouds rolled furiously, 

 and one felt as in a chariot of rolling vapour. I sat for ten 

 minutes enjoying it, when all of a sudden the mist cleared 

 away as quickly and majestically as it came. In the thick of 

 it I heard Tom and his dogs a thousand feet below, although 

 I could see nothing but vapour ; literally, a voice from the 

 clouds. My dog put up two single ptarmigan, and soon after 

 a pair, all of snow-white hue with black tips, but I only fired 

 one very long shot with No. 7. So it sent out a few feathers, 

 and I hope did little other harm. I then walked along the 

 top to the head of Garmony Burn, which I followed down, and 

 killed three cocks, letting off one, at which the first barrel 

 snapped. To-day all is sunk in gloomy stillness, the reaction 

 of yesterday's fury." 



* By my eldest son 



