, like that of the hermit in the
ballad, with a latch; but, unlike that of the hermit, it was not because
there were no stores within to demand the care of the master, but
because at that comparatively recent period the crime of theft was
unknown in the district.

I rose early next morning, when the dew was yet heavy on grass and
lichen, curious to explore a locality so new to me. The tract, though a
primary one, forms one of the tamer gneiss districts of Scotland; and I
found the nearer hills comparatively low and confluent, and the broad
valley in which lay my uncle's cottage, flat, open, and unpromising.
Still there were a few points to engage me; and the more I attached
myself to them, the more did their interest grow. The western slopes of
the valley are mottled by grassy tomhans--the moraines of some ancient
glacier, around and over which there rose, at this period, a low
widely-spreading wood of birch, hazel, and mountain ash--of hazel, with
its nuts fast filling at the time, and of mountain ash, with its berries
glowing bright in orange and scarlet. In looking adown the hollow, a
group of the green tomhans might be seen relieved against the blue hills
of Ross; in looking upwards, a solitary birch-covered hillock of similar
origin, but larger proportions, stood strongly out against the calm
waters of Loch Shin and the purple peaks of the distant Ben-Hope. In the
bottom of the valley, close beside my uncle's cottage, I marked several
low swellings of the rock beneath, rising above the general level; and,
ranged along these, there were groups of what seemed to be huge boulder
stones, save that they were less rounded and water-worn than ordinary
boulders, and were, what groups of boulders rarely are, all of one
quality. And on examination, I ascertained that some of their number,
which stood up like broken obelisks, tall, and comparatively narrow of
base, and all hoary with moss and lichen, were actually still connected
with the mass of rock below. They were the wasted upper portions of vast
dikes and veins of a grey, large-grained syenite, that traverse the
fundamental gneiss of the valley, and which I found veined, in turn, by
threads and seams of a white quartz, abounding in drusy cavities,
thickly lined along their sides with sprig crystals. Never had I seen
such lovely crystals on the shores of Cromarty, or anywhere else. They
were clear and transparent as the purest spring water, furnished each
with six sides,