Page:A Companion and Useful Guide to the Beauties of Scotland.djvu/296

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278
A DESCRIPTION OF

side, in order to mark the track, in the season of snow. Just at the winding to attain the summit, there is a degree of precipice, but neither perpendicular nor very dangerous, unless for a phaeton in a high wind; as one was actually blown from thence, and turned over and over, down the mountain, the year before I saw Corryarraick. Having arrived at the top, where there is a small plain, of perhaps half a mile, I got out of the chaise, that I might be a judge of the climate there. It was certainly cold enough for my great coat; but I became neither torpid nor frozen. I discharged my plough horses, and began to examine the surprising scene all around me, I had been before on many high mountains, whence I had seen lakes, plains, and far distant objects; but the view from Corryarraick is totally different. No lakes, no glens, no plains; all is a boundless space (except by the sky) of a rough ocean of mountains; whose tops seem to wave, one beyond the other, to the distant sea in the west; and on every other side, as far as the eye can reach. Fortunately, when I was thus high, the day was tolerably clear, but not being bright, the whole scene was cold and dismal;—it was uncommon;—it was astonishing, but not at all terrific. My