.4 NOTABLE SUA'SET. 373 



hue, that for the moment so thoroughly obliterated every trace of 

 their native ruggodnoss, that our companion prettily observed, 

 " Haven't you the idea, sir, as I have, that if one wore only near 

 enough these beautiful mountains to pat them lovingly with the 

 hand, they would fool to the touch soft and warm as a roll of 

 velvet 1" a thought, unconsciously perhaps, tinged with poetry, 

 though the wonum pure and simple oonios out vory unmistakeably 

 in the roforonco to the "roll of volvot." In the far background, 

 thirty miles away, roso the glory and pride of !Mull (Blackio's 

 favourite island of all the Hebrides), the huge mountains of Benmore 

 and Bon-na-Bairnioh, their base and middle zones ink-black, their 

 shoulders dai-k orango, hero and there curiously streaked with 

 threads of pe;irly light, their summits and slopmg ridges fringed 

 with living fu'e. Above, tlie whole western heavens was full of 

 vast continents, peninsulas, isthmuses, and islands of cloud, all afire 

 at their edges, with firtlvs, ferries, and ^Mediterraneans of liquid 

 gold between. As the fvdl-orbed sun, tiory and red, slowly sank to 

 the horizon, the clouds were rent asunder as if by the very 

 excellency of the glory that beat upon them; some of them 

 assuming fant;vstic shapes, in which a lively imagination had no 

 difficvJty in tracing striking resemblances to tlie hugest animals of 

 our own and past agos, a monster sauriaii in sharply defined 

 silhouette, being so marvellously outlined that our fair companion 

 sketched it on the spot, as a memento of a sunset that neither of us 

 is likely ever to foi-get. As tlie sun's lower limb soomed just to 

 touch and rest an instant on the highest peak of the Kingerloch 

 range, a large mass of cloud immediately above him Kipidly assumed 

 a columnar shape, perpendicular to the plane of the horizon, and, as 

 the splendid orb dipped and disappo;u-ed, this huge "pillar of 

 cloud" became a perfect Ionic column, sharply outlined, and 

 admirably correct in all its proportions from base to entabkituixs 

 and all aglow with living fire; shaft and pediment with richest 



