HIGHLAND LIVING.

407

meal, that is, of meal separated from the husks, and roasted by the fire, instead of being threshed and kilndried.

Milk also yields a principal source of subsistence. They milk not only cows, but goats and ewes. It has been said, but I doubt the fact, that oatmeal is sometimes supped dry, undressed, or baked, by putting a handful in the mouth, and washing it down with water. I was told that the very poor Highlanders boil the blood of their cattle, when killed, with a quantity of salt, and that, when it becomes cold and solid, they cut it in pieces, and use it for food. At Inverness I saw some poor people in the act of carrying blood in bowls, and, upon my asking what they intended to do with it, they said, "To make puddings with it." The Highlanders have had wisdom sufficient to see and feel the value of cultivating the potatoe, a vegetable which Nature seems to offer as the bread-fruit of every country. The memory of Sir Walter Raleigh deserves more from his country by having brought the potatoe from America than if he had conquered Guiana. I saw few Highland huts which had not an adjoining little potatoeplot, and I think the Highland potatoe little inferior to the Irish. A very favourite Highland dish, of the higher class, is composed of sour cream, sugar, whisky, curds, fresh milk, and flummery, a paste produced from a pre

paration of oats steeped in water. The affections of the peasant are easily engaged by humouring his prejudices and conforming to his habits. It is recorded, in the

romantic accounts of the escapes of Prince Charles Edward, that when he effected his retreat to the Hebridean Island of Rasay, in consequence of almost all the houses having been burnt by the soldiers under the command of the Duke of Cumberland, he was obliged to repair to a little but, recently built by some shepherds, where a fire was kindled, and a bed of heath prepared. When the provisions which had been brought with him from Kingsburgh were opened, he was presented with wheat-bread and brandy, which he declined, declaring that he would not taste them whilst oat-bread and whisky lasted, "for these," said he, 66 are my own country's bread and drink."--These expressions greatly increased the affection of the Highlanders for him.

Although society is so widely scattered in the Highlands that the natives have not frequent opportunities of assembling on convivial occasions, yet with social improvement the use of whisky has increased amazingly, although the duty upon it has increased too. It appears that the duty on spirits distilled in Scotland, exclusive of the duty on malt and malt liquor, imported spirits and wine, did not produce in the year 1777 the sum of 8,000l., whereas in 1806 it produced 250,000l.

FIR-SLIP CANDLES.

409

In some of the remote parts of the Highlands, a candle would produce as much sensation as a Chinese lantern. On account of the difficulty and expense of procuring tallow, they substitute dried slips of the birch and fir-tree, the stumps of which they find in the peat-bogs when they cut for fuel. The care of attending to these rude tapers, which burn quickly and brightly, is confided to those of a family who are too aged or too young to perform any very serviceable labour. This substitute was not unknown to me. In the course of my rambles in other countries I have met with the fir-slip candle. It is frequently used in mountainous regions. On the borders of Wetteravia, a country not far from Franckfort on the Maine, rises a chain of mountains called Der Vogelsberg, the produce of which is chiefly potatoes. On the summit of this mountain the snow defies the summer sun. In this elevated region also the lower class of peasantry, in their long winter evenings, use, instead of candle, slips of fir, a tree which, as well as the oak, flourishes there in great abundance. These slips are put in the middle of the room, round which the girls of the family assemble to spin, whilst their lovers stand behind, to claim the privilege of a kiss, if their mistresses make an error in slipping the knot.

LAND SHOWER, WHAT FINE WEATHER UNWHOLESOME BEN NEVIS-CATTLE FAIRS-A CHURCH-INN-THE CONA OF OSSIAN HORRIBLE MASSACRE-MACDONALD OF GLENCOE

APPIN-HOUSE-OBAN.

IN my progress thus far amongst the Western Highlands, I had sufficient opportunity of observing their eminent pretensions to be ranked amongst the sublime and beautiful of nature. The Highlands may be said to commence from Dumbarton, near the mouth of the Clyde, and comprise the mountainous parts of Scotland from thence to the north and north-west, including the Hebrides. Their length is about two hundred miles, and their breadth varies from fifty to one hundred, yet they have no ascertained. boundary coinciding with the limits of any civil jurisdiction. It is worthy of observation that the ridges of the mountains which characterize this part of the country run nearly west and east, and that they exhibit evidences highly corroborative of the deluge, which, it is fair to suppose, poured in from the south-west to the north-east, and produced those

vast and astonishing inequalities which are visible in this direction upon the summits of these and of every other known mountain of the earth. The shepherds in the Highlands constantly observe, that, whilst the south-west side of the hill is sterile, the north-east side is rich in soil and pasture, and exhibits traces of alluvial earth.

The summits of the mountains have seldom any other covering than moss, upon a bed of stones and gravel; and where these have been washed away by storms, the bare rock appears. The sides of these mountains, which are generally clad with heath, and other hardy northern plants, can never become arable land: it is only in vales and sheltered situations that tillage can be tried with success; in these spots barley, oats, potatoes, flax, pease, rye, turnips, and some foreign grasses, are cultivated, but not in a sufficient degree to render the importation of grain and meal unnecessary.

The butter in the Highlands is much improved: it used to be full of hairs, and it was a common saying, that, if the butter had no hairs in it, the cow that gave the milk would not thrive. The butter of Scotland is in general, I think, inferior to that of England, and perhaps a consciousness of this circumstance led to the introduction of honey, marmalades, and preserves, upon the Scottish