22 TOUR IN SUTHERLAND. CH. II. 



picturesque dwelling-places, or rather, I suppose, 

 they choose such spots as being better suited for 

 placing their curious-shaped nest in than any other. 



While I was examining a kind of simple but 

 most serviceable stone-mill, used for grinding the 

 stone of which these excellent roads are made, 

 the carriage came up, and we proceeded. Coming 

 to a road leading off the main one, and going straight 

 up a hill northwards, Dunbar assured us that this 

 was our route ; so with rather an envious look at 

 the straight, level road before us, which we were 

 leaving, we turned our faces to the hill. After going 

 about two miles, not quite perpendicularly (the way 

 gradually getting worse), we suddenly came to an 

 abrupt termination of the track. Through the 

 driving mist, which had now become quite thick, 

 we saw a most desolate-looking house some few 

 hundred yards off, and there found that we had 

 turned off the road too soon, and had to retrace our 

 steps. 



The next turning off was the right one, and we 

 laboured again up the hill, northwards, but with a 

 better road. The higher we ascended the denser was 

 the mist ; and though we occasionally heard the 

 grouse-cock crow pretty near us, M^e could see 

 nothing, absolutely nothing, except the road under 

 our feet. 



