84 



EXCURSION III. 



TO THE SUMMIT OF GOATPELL. 



43. GOATFELL is an unmeaning corruption of the native 

 name of this mountain. Gaoth (ga.5) is the Gaelic word for 

 wind; this may be the origin of the first part of the name; 

 with the animal indicated the mountain has no sort of con- 

 nection. Then, Fell is not a Scottish word; it belongs to 

 the North of England, and to Scandinavia in its form of 

 fjeld or field, .applied appropriately to the wide flat mountain 

 plateaux of South Norway. Bein, or with the aspirate 

 Bhein (ban or ben, ven), is a mountain. Pen is the English 

 form, as in Penyghent, Pendle Hill ; and hence the Latin 

 term Pennine for a principal range. Thus the name would 

 be Gaoth-bhein, or Bein-gaoth the hill of the winds not 

 very expressive or special as regards this hill more than 

 others standing prominent. But those who gave the name 

 perhaps knew no higher hill; and there is a peculiar effect 

 often seen here to which the name may perhaps have 

 reference. The Ben-Ghnuis or western ridge first arrests 

 the vapours ascending from the western sea, and condenses 

 them along its winding summit into a dark sinuous bank, 

 from whose shattered edge masses float away when the breeze 

 gets up, and dashing against the flat side of the ridge of 

 Goatfell, are driven in rapid eddies round its south end or 

 over its upper edge. To one looking up from the quiet 

 depths below, this would suggest the existence of a furious 

 gale upon the summit. As the weather thickens and the 

 clouds accumulate, the cone gets completely hidden, and the 

 rolling vapours pass even lower than the mill-dam, veiling 

 the edge of the great waterfall, which then seems to issue 

 directly from the clouds. 



