2i6 NETHER LOCHABER. 



use. Of these cigar stumps " Willie " had at that moment nearly 

 a pound weight in his wallet, the result of his forenoon's labours. 

 We daresay we looked, as we really were, very much puzzled, 

 which, Willie observing, he politely asked us for a Ught for his 

 pipe, and invited us to sit on a ledge of rock by the roadside, and 

 he would " tell us a' aboot it." Our pipes alight, we sat down 

 accordingly, and Willie proceeds as follows : — " Weel, sir, I doubt 

 if ever there was such a number of strangers — tourists, as they ca' 

 them— day after day in Glencoe as there are this year. And a' 

 the gentlemen that goes up the glen smoke, and I have seen some 

 of the la'dies — f orrenders, I suspect — smoking too, the mair shame to 

 them. They a' maistly smoke cigars, and they throw them from 

 them when they're done with them ; sometimes only a short stump, 

 and sometimes almost a hail ane, as I have shown ye ; and I pick 

 them up and sell them in Greenock or Glasgow for three ha'pence 

 or tuppence the ounce, and that's a' aboot it." " But what," we 

 inquired, " do they make of them in Glasgow ?" " Weel, sir," he 

 replied, " I believe some of them, the cleanest, langest, and best 

 bits, are unrolled, and made up anew into cigars, and the shorter 

 and dirtier stumps are dried and broken down to mix with other 

 tobacco, in making the mixtures called ' bird's eye,' ' shag,' exetry, 

 exetry." We ordered Willie a glass of beer at Clachaig, and went 

 on our way with a bit of curious information, till that particular 

 date undreamt of in all our philosophy. 



