A battle there was, that I saw, man;
And we ran and they ran, and they ran and we ran,
And we ran, and they ran awa’, man.
It was in connection with this battle that we heard of a Highlander who had lost at it his “faither and twa brithers, and a gude black belt that was mair worth than them a’.” Half a mile north of the base of Dunmyat there is a very fine well, which issues from more than sixty springs, and bears the name of the Holy Well, and is said to have been anciently an object of superstitious veneration and crowded resort on the part of Roman Catholics. And this reminds us that over yonder, across the wonderful valley that separates this range of hills from its nearest neighbour, are the Touch Hills, and that there, amid the sweet air of May, early in the morning of the first Sunday of the month, crowds used to assemble to drink the water of St. Corbet’s spring, and believed that by so doing they would secure health for another year. Old persons were alive about half a century ago who remembered having in their young days joined the health-seekers on these occasions.
Dunmyat, like the rest of the Ochils, is a rich field to the geologist and mineralogist. But for this it must be examined where it abuts on the highway. Its general character, however, is that of a great igneous mound developing itself in felspar and porphyry, and occasionally in fine pentagonal columns of basaltic greystone. It is penetrated by large workable veins of barytes.
Having once more feasted our eyes on the fair prospect, and recalled to mind those and other historical associations, we proceed to descend on the east side towards the beautifully wooded glen of Menstrie. This can be done in less than half the time we took to reach the summit from Logie. It is as well to proceed for the first 50 or 60 feet with caution, for the freshness and abundance of the grass is apt to conceal the steepness of the hill at that part. Crossing a cart track which leads to a shepherd’s house up the glen of Menstrie, the only house that is visible looking northward from the summit, and keeping to the right, we soon reach the first house of the village, which is styled by the natives “Windsor Castle.” From its elaborate coat of arms, it seems to have belonged to some noble family, but, miserabile dictu, it is now tenanted by quite a host of the great unwashed. A popular rhyme assumes some spirit of fairyland to have formerly loved Menstrie for its rural beauty, but to have been driven away from it by the introduction of its manufacturing mills, and represents the phantom as sometimes saying pathetically at dead of night—
Oh, Alva woods are bonnie,
Tillicoultry hills are fair,
But when I think o’ Menstrie,
It maks my heart ay sair.