TEMPERATURE OF SCOTTISH LAKES 
141 
It may be of interest to compare the information given in Mac- 
farlane's Collections with later data. 
Loch Dun na Seilcheig, in Inverness-shire, is said never to freeze in 
winter, but to freeze with a night or two's sharp spring frost. This 
is curiously similar to information recently received from natives of 
the district, and is considered reliable. 
" Our famous Loch Ness never freezes."' The reason has already 
been explained. Dwellers on the shores of great lakes are as a rule 
greatly puzzled to account for the fact that the lakes do not freeze, 
and still more by the fact that water removed from the lakes freezes 
readily. One boatman, wishing to keep his boat from getting dry 
while laid up for the winter, filled it with Loch Ness water. The 
result was not what he anticipated, for the water in the boat froze 
solid, and burst his boat to pieces. 
Samuel Johnson was much interested to hear that Loch Ness never 
froze, but had hardly a proper appreciation of the cause. " If it be 
true,'*' he wrote, " that Loch Ness never freezes, it is either sheltered by 
its high banks from the cold blasts, and exposed to those blasts which 
have more power to agitate than congeal ; or it is kept in perpetual 
motion by the rush of streams from the rocks that enclose it. Its 
profundity, though it be such as is represented (140 fathoms), can 
have little part in this exception, for though deep wells are not frozen, 
because their water is excluded from the external air, yet where a 
wide surface is exposed to the full influence of a freezing atmosphere, 
I know not why the depth should keep it open. Natural Philosophy 
is now one of the favourite studies of the Scottish Nation, and Loch 
Ness well deserves to be diligently examined." 
Loch Katrine is said never to freeze, and this agrees with reports 
recently received from the district. 
Andrew Symson, writing in 1684 of the White Loch of Myrton 
(Luce basin), says it is " very famous in many writers who report that 
it never freezes in the greatest frosts ; whether it had that vertue of old 
I know not, but sure I am it hath not now, for this same year it was 
so hard frozen that the heaviest carriages might have carried over it." 
Curling has taken place on the loch on several occasions. 
Loch Maree is said never to freeze. The only information obtained 
at this time was that an old gentleman, who had lived on the shores 
of Loch Maree for thirty-five years, never saw the loch frozen but on 
one occasion, very early in the morning, when he fancied a mouse might 
run across on the film of ice formed from Ardblair to the islands. 
" That Intelligent Knight Sir George Mackenzy," in a letter written 
about the year 1674, makes the following remarks : — " I had notice of 
a Phenomenon that I judged odd, and considerable searching into the 
nature of cold, which is, — A little lake in Stratherrick which never 
