A Tour Through the Whole Island of Great Britain III

A TOUR THROUGH THE WHOLE ISLAND OF GREAT BRITAIN III

actions have been justly ascrib’d, are to this day Scots Highlanders, or at least most of them are so, but this by the way.

I am now to return to our progress. Leaving the country of Brechin, and the low lands of Strathearn, we went away west; but were presently interrupted by a vast inland sea, rather than a lake called Loch Lomond. It is indeed a sea, and look’d like it from the hills from whence we first descry’d it; and its being a tempestuous day, I assure you it appear’d all in a breach, rough and raging, like the sea in a storm. There are several islands in it, which from the hills we could plainly perceive were islands, but that they are a-drift, and float about the lake, that I take as I find it, for a story, namely, a story call’d a F– as I do also that of the water of this loch, turning wood into stone.

This lake or loch is, without comparison, the greatest in Scotland, no other can be call’d half so big; for it is more than twenty miles long, and generally eight miles in breadth, though at the north end of it, ’tis not so broad by far. It receives many rivers into it, but empties itself into the Firth of Clyde, at one mouth;;near the entrance of it into Clyde, stands the famous Dunbarton Castle, the most antient, as well as the most important castle in

.‘Scotland; and the gate, as ’tis call’d, of the Highlands. It is now not much regarded, the whole country being, as it were, buried in peace, yet there is a garrison maintain’d in it; and the pass would be still of great import, were there any occasion of arms in time to come; ’tis exceeding strong by situation, being secur’d by the river on one side, the Firth of Clyde on the other, by an unpassable morass on the third side, and the fourth is a precipice.

Passing from Dunbarton castle, we enter the territory of Argyle. As to the county of Lenox, the paternal estate and proper-

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ty of the Stuarts, it lyes extended from both sides the Levin, that is, the river, which (as I said before) empties the Loch-Lomon into the Clyde. On this side, or eastward, Lenox joins the Monteith, and runs up for some length on the east side of the loch, and on the west side it extends to the edge of the Loch-Loing, and a great way north, almost to the mountains of Loquhabre.

All our writers of the description of Lenox enlarge upon the family of Stuarts, who proceeded, as by the mother, from the Royal line of Scotland: So by the father, from Henry Lord Darnley, marry’d to Mary Queen of Scots, and afterwards basely murther’d by her, or by her order and direction.

By this Lord Darnley, who was son and heir apparent to Matthew, Earl of Lenox, this whole estate, with the title, devolv’d at last upon King Charles II., who gave the title to one of his natural sons, with the addition of duke.

Beyond this Loch-Loing begins the large extended country of Argyle, or the Western Highlands, whose extent takes in the shire or county of Lorn to the north, and Cantyre to the south, all possess’d by the Campbells, and vulgarly understood by the country of Argyle; for as for Cantyre, which is a chersonese, or peninsula, it belongs mostly, if not wholly to the Campbells; and as to Lorn, ’tis the title of the eldest son of the House of Argyle to this day.

The west side of this country lyes extended along the Irish Sea for a very great length, at least eighty miles (viz.) from the Mull of Cantyre to Dunstaffnage, and the Isle of Stackar and Listnoc, in the water of Loquhaber. On all this shore there is no town eminent for trade, no port or harbour, at least none made use of for shipping; nor are there any ships to require them, except fishing-barks and boats, which are in the season

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