lusion of his bothy, as "blessed" as were ever
those of that earlier mysterious beverage beloved of our Pictish
ancestors:

"From the bonny bells of heather
They brewed a drink long-syne,
Was sweeter far than honey,
Was stronger far than wine.
They brewed it, and they drank it,
And lay in a blessed swound
For days and days together
In their dwellings underground."

Donald M'Donald had formerly been a smuggler, but he had wearied of that
too active life, and he had longed for an occupation more sedentary and
less strenuous. Distilling suited his temperament to a nicety. It was
what he had been used to see as a boy when his parents were alive, for
his father before him had been a "skeely" man in that line. So Donald
built to himself a kind of hut in a wild, unfrequented glen. A little
burn, clear and brown, ran chattering past his door; on the knolls
amongst the heather grouse cocks crowed merrily in the sunny August
mornings, and the wail of curlews smote sadly on the ear through the
long-drawn summer twilights. Seldom did human foot tread the heather of
that glen in the days before Donald took up his abode there; to the
raven and the mountain-fox, the muir-fowl and the whaup, alone belonged
that kingdom.

From afar you might perhaps smell the peat reek as he worked his
primitive Still, but unless the smoke of his fire betrayed him, or you
knew the secret of his whereabouts, it had been hard to detect the
existence of Donald's hut, so skilfully was it constructed, so gently
did it blend into the surrounding landscape. Even if it were
accidentally come upon, there was nothing immediately visible which
could excite suspicion. At a bend in the stream, where the banks were
steep, and the burn tumbled noisily over a little linn, dashing past the
rowan trees that clung there amongst its rocks, and plunging headlong
into a deep black pool, stood Donald's hut. Little better than a
"lean-to" against a huge rock, it seemed; at one end a rude doorway,
filled by a crazy door that stood ajar, walls of turf, windowless and
heather-thatched, innocent of chimney, but with an opening that allowed
the smoke of his fires to steal up the face of the rock before it
dispersed into the air. That was all that might be seen at first
glance--that and a stack of peat near the door. Inside, there were a
couple of rough tables, made of boards, one or two even rougher seats, a
quantity of heather