HILL OF THE AITNOCH.
Author.—See now how innumerable the stumps of the trees are here. They are peeping up through the moss in every direction. Conceive what a thick pine wood this must have once been.
Grant.—You were certainly guilty of no great exaggeration when you said that a deer could hardly have penetrated it whilst it was standing in all its gloomy grandeur.
Clifford.—It is well for our comfort that we can now pass so easily over its fallen majesty; and methinks the sooner we escape from so dreary a scene the better.
Author.—Let us keep more this way, then. A short walk will now bring us to the southern brow of the hill, whence a new scene will open on us.
Clifford, who first reaches the point.—Ha! what have we here? A dark lake,—its waves rolling sluggishly eastward, and breaking gently on a narrow stripe of yellow gravelly beach,—bare rocky hills without a tree,—and an island covered with the ruins of a very extensive castle. What do you call this wild and lonely scene?
Author.—That is Loch-an-Dorbe, with its ruined castle.
Grant.—The remains of the castle seem to be very extensive.