In our own case, on that particular occasion, the superstition could not have been more completely falsified by the event, for, maugre the magpies, our trip to Oban was in its every circumstance as agreeable and pleasant as it could well be. What a pity it is that these beautiful birds, whose favourite residence, too, if they were only permitted to live in peace, is the immediate vicinity of human dwellings, should be of such evil repute that gamekeepers everywhere consider themselves justified in accomplishing their utter destruction by every means in their power. Their utter destruction we have said; and it is only as to their total extirpation that we would venture on a word of expostulation with gamekeepers and their employers. It is true that the magpie is an enemy to winged game, being a cunning and persistent nest-robber, an adroiter sucker of eggs than the proverbial “grandmother” herself. That the gamekeeper should therefore dislike them is the most natural thing in the world, and that, in gamekeeper’s own phrase, they should “be kept down” is proper enough. But we cannot agree that it is necessary that the bird should be utterly destroyed. Here and there on a wide estate an occasional pair of magpies might surely be tolerated for the sake of their beauty and amusingly lively manners, and on the divine principle of “live and let live.” For our own part, in approaching a gentleman’s residence, the sight of a pair of these birds flitting about “the old ancestral elms” always intensifies our respect for the place and the owner.
Crossing Loch Creran, by the Ferry of Shian, we are in Benderloch—classic ground, and archæologically the most interesting spot, perhaps, in all the West Highlands. “Everything here is beautiful,” says Dr. Macculloch. “The distance between the ferries of Shian and Connel is but five miles; but it is a day’s journey for a wise man.” About half-way is Dùn-Mac-Uisneachain (the Fort of the Son of Uisneach), one of the most interesting of our vitrified forts, quâ such, and supposed to be the Beregonium of Hector Boethius, and the site of the still older Selma, the “Hall of Swords” of Ossianic song. That it was a place of importance long before the time of the Dalriad Scots seems very certain; and, leaving Macpherson’s “Ossian” altogether out of the question, there occur in the old Fingalian ballads, and tales of the Féinne, about the antiquity of which there has never been dispute; numberless local references which seem in a very remarkable manner to point to this spot as the principal stronghold in Scotland (for they were of Ireland also) of the Fingalians at one period, and that the most important, perhaps, in their history. Within a short distance of Dun-Mac-Uisneachain, and commanding it, is a steep, rocky eminence of considerable height, called Dunvallary or Dunvallanry, the etymology of which may be Dùn-bhail’-n-righ, the Fortified Place of the King’s Town; or Dùn-bhail’ n ’fhrìth, the Fort of the Town on the verge of the Hunting Forest. Stretching away towards Connel and Loch Etive is the wide moorland flat of Achnacree, which, with its numerous cairns, Druidical circles, monoliths, and other relics of the olden time, may very well be the ancient “plains of Lora;” Lora itself, frequently mentioned in Ossianic poetry, and meaning Luath shruth, the loud, swift current, par excellence, meeting us face to face, so to speak, in the turbulently impetuous rapids of Connel.
CHAPTER LXII.
Nest-building—Cunningham’s Objection to Burns’ Song, “O were my Love yon Lilac fair”—Birds and the Lilac-Tree—Rivalries of Birds—Birds and the Poets—The Nightingale.
A finer February month from first to last was never known in the West Highlands. With an amount of sunshine that April might be glad of, it was mild and open throughout; the sort of weather, in short, that Thomson must have been dreaming about, when he invoked the season of bursting bud and wildflower as “Gentle Spring, ethereal mildness.” March [1878], too, has come in, not lion-like, as the meteorological proverb would have it, but “like a lamb,” as it is hoped it may continue and end. Everybody is now astir, and “speed the plough” is the order of the day, as well, indeed, it may, for the bud has already opened into leaf, and primroses are plentiful—so plentiful that they may be gathered in handfuls from the hazel copse and woodland glade. As for our wild-bird friends, they are in ecstasies with it all, everywhere in full and fluent song, and making love with an ardour and directness of purpose that rarely fails of its reward. Nest-building, the most important and serious labour of their lives, but a labour of love all the same, is being rapidly proceeded with, the God-taught architects knowing not only to labour, but how best to labour, frequently resting a space to refresh themselves with song:—
“Song sweetens toil, however rude the sound,
All at her work the village maiden sings;
Nor while she turns the giddy wheel around,
Revolves the sad vicissitudes of things.”