creek of Loch Linne, where extensive slate quarries are worked: by means of this public line of road it is accessible to tourists, and the sublimity of its scenery is justly admired. A narrow defile, overhung and enclosed by precipitous hills, that rise often in mural cliffs to a height of 2000 feet, continues its grand scenery for ten miles. A single cottage interrupts the stern solitude during the whole length of the vale; and the murmuring of the waters of Cona, that escape from a small lake in the centre of the valley, and hasten towards a channel more unconfined, alone disturbs the stilly solemn effect.

On the banks of the Cona, Ossian is said to have been born; and allusion is made to this little mountain torrent in several of that bard's poems. "Why bends the bard of Cona," said Fingal, "over his sweet stream?" "The gloomy ranks of Lochlin fell like the banks of the roaring Cona." It was near to this lonely fountain,

“That dark Breadalbin, murder's favourite son,

"With certain aim pronounc'd the race undone,

"When night's dark curtain o'er the world was spread."

The massacre of Glencoe is too remarkable an event not to be generally known and remembered; it will be sufficient, therefore, to mention, that it was within a short distance from the original of our Bally-Brough that Mac Ian, chief of the Macdonalds, and many of his clan, were massacred in cold blood by a party of military, their houses burned, their cattle and effects carried off, and the helpless widows and children of the murdered men turned out naked, in the snow, that was stained with the blood of these victims to a bad man's enmity. The desolation that was caused by the dagger of the assassin continues unchanged, and Glencoe seems scorned and shunned and solitary, as if the deeds of by-gone days were never to be forgotten.

MAC MURROUGH'S CHANT..

The Highland feast in the hall of the chief of Glennaquoich affords a happy opportunity of illustrating graphically those manners and customs of the ancient Scots which the novelist has portrayed with such accuracy and expression. Waverley arriving at the seat of Fergus Mac Ivor, the descendant of "Ian-nan-Chaistel," (John of the Tower,) was invited by the chieftain to partake of a banquet in the hall of his fathers; an invitation, resulting partly from the accustomed hospitality of the times, but in this instance slightly tinged with vanity on the part of the chieftain, to display the number, discipline, and attachment of his clansmen before the Saxon, whom he could not regard without some feeling of rivalry, if not of suspicion.

D

The mansion of Glennaquoich consisted of a high rude-looking square tower, with the addition of a lofted house, that is, a building of two stories, which the chieftain's grandfather had left as a monument of his magnificence: surrounded by scenery wild and desolate, rather than grand and solitary, yet such as it was, no genuine son of "John of the Tower" would have changed the domain for Stow or Blenheim.

"The hall in which the feast was prepared occupied all the first story of the original erection, and a huge oak table extended through its whole length, The apparatus for dinner was simple, even to rudeness; and the company numerous, even to crowding. At the head of the table sat the chief himself, with Waverley, and two or three highland visiters, of neighbouring tribes, the elders of his own tribe, wadsetters and tacksmen, as they were called, who occupied portions of his estate, as mortgagers or lessees, sat next in rank; beneath them, their sons and nephews, and foster-brethren; then the officers of the chief's household, according to their order; and, lowest of all, the tenants who actually cultivated the ground. Beyond this long perspective, upon the green, to which a huge pair of folding doors opened, might be seen a multitude of Highlanders of a yet inferior description, who, nevertheless, were considered as guests, and had their share both of the countenance of the entertainer and the cheer of the day. In the distance, and fluctuating round the extreme verge of the banquet, was a changeful group of women, ragged boys and girls, beggars young and old, large greyhounds, and terriers, and pointers, and curs of low degree: all of whom took some interest, more or less immediate, in the main action of the piece."

The classification of guests and actors in this festive scene, was not more distinct than the arrangement of the dishes that were placed before them, in which due respect seems also to have been paid to feudal and aristocratic separations. "Pains had been bestowed in dressing the dishes of fish and game, which were at the upper end of the table; lower down stood immense clumsy joints of mutton and beef; the central dish, however, was a yearling lamb, ‘a hog in har'st,' roasted whole; lower down still, the victuals seemed of yet coarser quality: broth, onions, cheese, and the fragments of the feast, regaled the sons of Ivor who feasted in the open air."

Nor, in the distribution of the liquor, were the patrician and plebeian prerogatives disregarded: claret and champagne were supplied to the chief's immediate neighbours, whiskey and strong beer refreshed those who sat near the lower end-every one present perfectly understood that his taste must be formed according to the rank he held at table.

The banquet was just drawing to a close, and the satisfied guests about to retire, when the chief made a signal for the piper to cease, and said, aloud, "Where is the song hidden, my friends, that Mac Murrough cannot find it? The Bhairdh took the hint, and began to chant, with low and rapid utterance, a profusion of Celtic verses, which were received by the audience with all the applause of enthusiasm. As he advanced in his declamation, his ardour seemed to increase: he had at first spoken with eyes fixed on the ground; he now cast them around, as if beseeching, and anon, as if