Page:A Companion and Useful Guide to the Beauties of Scotland.djvu/249

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PART OF SCOTLAND.
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man again to Culloden to acquaint him, that he was very happy in having overtaken, and rescued his cattle from the thieves who had driven them away.

The practice of stealing cattle, in that part of Lochaber about Fort William, subsisted so late as the year 1746. An officer, at the time when the regiment he was in was building Maryborough, the small town adjoining Fort William, told me that he, at the head of a band of men, had many sharp encounters with the country people; who came down in the night, and drove away the cattle collected for the provision of the regiment.

To return to Dochfour. One day I walked through the beautiful woods of Dochfour to a burn, running precipitately from one of the large mountains to the north of the house; forming in its way a number of beautiful falls. I only saw the last of them; which, for beauty and concealment, might tempt Diana's self, and favourite nymphs, to cool themselves in it. The access to it is difficult, as it is deeply imbosomed, and almost excluded from light by rocky banks, thick bushes, and trees of fir, oak, birch, maple, mountain ash, &c.; many of which recline over