XX BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. 



pleasure of the journey by pointing out to me the interesting 

 objects along our route. At Glen Morrison, a fine old gentle- 

 man with his fishing-basket and tackle was rowed out to 

 the boat by two barefooted Highland lassies, stout girls who 

 plied the oars with as powerful a stroke as any of the fisher 

 lads of Cromarty. I must have eyed the fishing-basket with 

 a longing glance (it reminded me of my childhood days on the 

 bank of the Waveney), for the old laird noticed me and we 

 became quite friendly. He talked of salmon fishing and 

 Highland lochs, and pointed out the wild opening of Lochiel's 

 Glen. Then we spoke of the Camerons and the Macdonells, 

 the Stewarts and Glencoe, the Highland chiefs and Highland 

 feuds and emigration, and I told him we were bound for the 

 far west. Before he left the boat at a point leading to 

 Inverary, he held my hand a few seconds and said : ' If you 

 should ever be near the Highland settlement of Glengarry, 

 and need help or shelter, say that you have seen the Macdonell, 

 and every door will be opened to you, every Highland hand 

 held out in token of friendship.' 



" That night we spent in a clean little public-house within 

 sight of the giant Ben Ness, the hostess of which talked 

 much of Sir Walter Scott, whom she had known well. The 

 illness I had felt coming on when in Inverness was only 

 stayed, and it now overtook me, robbing me of all the 

 pleasure of the lovely scenery of the Clyde, and by the time 

 we reached Greenock I was completely prostrated. Skilful 

 treatment and careful nursing, however, enabled me to 

 recover sufficiently to be carried on board the brig Laurel, in 

 which our passage had been taken and paid for, and which it 

 would have been a serious loss to forfeit." 



Mrs. Traill speaks of this brig as being the last of the 

 season sailing from that port to Quebec. They sailed on the 

 7th of July, a fact and date which bear interesting compari- 

 son with the carrying trade of the present time between the 

 Clyde and Canada. 



