y. In the early part of the
century a pike had been seen basking in the shallows, by eye-measurement
about ten feet long--but fortunately he had never been hooked, or the
consequences would have been fatal. We have seen the Little Loch alive
with wild-ducks; but it was almost impossible by position to get a shot
at them--and quite impossible, if you did, to get hold of the slain. Fro
himself--the best dog that ever dived--was baffled by the multiplicity
of impediments and obstructions--and at last refused to take the
water--sat down and howled in spiteful rage. Yet Imagination loved the
Little Loch, and so did Hope. We have conquered it in sleep both with
rod and gun--the weight of bag and basket has wakened us out of dreams
of murder that never were realised--yet once, and once only, in it we
caught an eel, which we skinned, and wore the shrivel for many a day
round our ankle--nor is it a vain superstition--to preserve it from
sprains. We are willing the Little Loch should be drained; but you would
have to dig a fearsome trench, for it used to have no bottom. A party of
us--six--ascertained that fact, by heaving into it a stone which
six-and-thirty schoolboys of this degenerate age could not have lifted
from its moss-bed--and though we watched for an hour, not a bubble rose
to the surface. It used sometimes to boil like a pot on breathless days,
for events happening in foreign countries disturbed the spring, and the
torments it suffered thousands of fathoms below, were manifested above
in turbulence that would have drowned a school-boy's skiff.

The WHITE LOCH--so called from the silver sand of its shores--had
likewise its rushy and reedy bogs; but access to every part of the main
body was unimpeded, and you waded into it, gradually deeper and deeper,
with such a delightful descent, that up to the arm-pits and then to the
chin, you could keep touching the sand with your big-toe, till you
floated away off at the nail, out of your depth, without for a little
while discovering that it was incumbent on you, for sake of your
personal safety, to take to regular swimming--and then how buoyant was
the milk-warm water, without a wave but of your own creating, as the
ripples went circling away before your breast or your breath! It was
absolutely too clear--for without knitting your brows you could not see
it on bright airless days--and wondered what had become of it--when all
at once, as if it had been that very moment created ou