The Cruise of the Land-Yacht "Wanderer" Part 32

"Now wound the path its dizzy ledge Around a precipice's edge."

Idem.

Farther and farther on we walk or trot, and wilder and still more wild grows the scenery around us.

Not a tree of any kind is now visible, nor hedge nor fence bounds the narrow road; we are still close to the Garry. Beyond it are heath-clad banks, rising up into a braeland, a hill, or mountain, while the river is far down at the bottom of a cutting, which its own waters have worn in their rush of ages.

The road gets narrower now.

It cannot be more than nine feet at its widest. But the hills and the mountains are very beautiful; those nearest us are crimsoned over with blooming heather; afar off they are half hidden in the purple mist of distance.

All my old favourite flowers have disappeared. I cannot see even a Scottish bluebell, nor a red, nodding foxglove, only on mossy banks the pink and odorous wild thyme-blooms grow among the rocks, tiny lichens paint the boulders, and wherever the water, from some rill which has trickled down the mountain side, stops, and spreads out and forms a patch of green bog land, there grow the wild sweet-scented myrtle, and many sweetly pretty ferns. [The sweet gall, or candleberry myrtle.]

In some places the hills are so covered with huge boulders as to suggest the idea that t.i.tans of old must have fought their battles here,--those rocks their weapons of warfare.

We must now be far over a thousand feet above the sea-level, and for the first time we catch sight of snow-posts, sometimes singly, sometimes in pairs.

The English tourist would in all probability imagine that these were dilapidated telegraph poles. They serve a far different purpose, for were it not for them in winter, when the ground is covered with snow, and the hollows, and even the ravines, are filled up,--were it not for these guiding posts, the traveller, whether on foot or horseback, might get off the path, and never be heard of or seen any more, until the summer's sun melted the snow and revealed his corpse.

Toiling on and on through these mountain fastnesses, we cannot help wondering somewhat anxiously where we can rest to-night Dalwhinnie, that sweetest spot in this highland wilderness, is still seventeen miles away. We cannot reach there to-night. A fall moon will rise and s.h.i.+ne shortly after sunset--this is true, but to attempt so long a journey with tired horses, with so great a weight behind them, and in so rugged a country, would be to court an accident, if not destruction.

There is, about four miles ahead of us, a shooting lodge at Dalnacardoch. Yes, but they who live there may not consider hospitality and religion to be nearly akin. We'll try.

"Pull up, Corn-flower."

"Pull up, Pea-blossom."

Pea-blossom is tired herself. If you but shake the whip over her she angrily nibbles at Corn-flower's nose.

"He," she says as plain as horse can speak, "is in the fault. I am pulling all I can, but _he_ is not doing half the work."

Dalnacardoch at long last.

Dalnacardoch! Why, the name is big enough for a good-sized town, or a village at the very least, but here is but a single house. In the good old coaching days it had been a coaching inn.

I go to the door and knock.

The butler appears.

"Who lives here?"

"A Mr Whitely, sir, from Yorks.h.i.+re has the shooting."

"Ha," I think, "from Yorks.h.i.+re? Then am I sure of a welcome."

Nor was I mistaken. On a green flat gra.s.s plot, near to this Highland shooting-box lies the Wanderer; the horses are in a comfortable stable, knee-deep in straw, with corn and hay to eat in abundance, and I am happy and duly thankful.

It is now past nine o'clock; I have dined, and Hurricane Bob and I go out for a stroll in the sweet moonlight, which is flooding mountain, moor, and dell.

The day has been fiercely hot, but the night is still and starry, and before morning there will be ice on every pool.

How black and bare the hills are, and how lonesome and wild! but what must they be in winter, when the storm winds sweep over them, and when neither fur nor feather can find food and shelter anywhere near them?

"Bob, my boy, we will go to bed."

The stillness of the night is sublime, unbroken save by the distant murmur of the Garry, a sound so soothing that I verily believe it would have lulled even Maecenas himself to sleep.

On August 20th, as fresh as larks, cold though it had been all night, we started on our route for Dalwhinnie. What an appet.i.te the Highland air gives one! I felt somewhat ashamed of myself this morning, as rasher after rasher of bacon, and egg after egg, disappeared as if by legerdemain; and after all, the probability is that a biscuit and cheese at eleven o'clock may be deemed a necessity of existence.

It is a bright sunny morning, but the road is rough and stony; on some parts the _debris_ has been washed from the mountain sides, and left to lie across the road, in others some faint attempts at repairs have been undertaken. The plan is primitive in the extreme. A hole is dug in the hillside, and the earth and s.h.i.+ngle spaded on to the road.

Plenty of sheep are grazing on the boulder-covered mountains, plenty of snakes and lizards basking in the morning suns.h.i.+ne. Some of the snakes are very large and singularly beautiful, and glitter in the sunlight as if they had been dipped in glycerine.

This is a land of purple heath, but not of s.h.a.ggy wood. It would be impossible for any one to hang himself here, unless he requisitioned one of the snow-posts. It is the land of the curlew, the grouse, and the blackc.o.c.k,--the land mayhap of the eagle, though as yet we have not seen the bird of Jove. The road now gets narrower and still more narrow, while we ride close to the cliffs, with--far below us--the turbulent Garry. Were we to meet a carriage now, pa.s.sing it would be impossible, and there is no room to draw off.

Never before perhaps did a two-ton caravan attempt to cross the Grampians. There are heath-clad braelands rising around us at all sides. Some of the banks near Dalnaspiddal are a sight to behold. The heather that clothes them is of all shades, from pink to the deepest, richest red. So too are the heaths. These last rest in great sheets, folded over the edge of cliffs, clinging to rocks, or lying in splendid patches on the bare yellow earth. Here, too, are ferns of many kinds, the dark-green of dwarf-broom, and the crimson of foxglove bells.

When we stop for a few minutes, in order that I may gather wild flowers, the silence is very striking, only the distant treble of the bleating lamb far up the mountain side, and the answering cry of the dam.

Here we drive now, close under the shadow of a mountain cliff about two thousand feet high; and from the top cascades of white water are flowing.

My coachman marvels. Where on earth, he asks, do these streams come from? He knows not that still higher hills lie behind these.

Owing to our great height above the sea-level, the horses pant much in climbing. But the wind has got up, and blows keen and cold among these bleak mountains.

Shortly after leaving Dalnaspiddal, the road begins to ascend a mountain side, amidst a scene of such wild and desolate grandeur, as no pen or pencil could do justice to.

It was a fearful climb, with Bob running behind, for even his weight, 120 pounds, lightens the carriage appreciably; with the roller down behind an after wheel, and my valet and I pus.h.i.+ng behind with all our might, the horses at long last managed to clamber to the highest point.

I threw myself on a bank, pumped and almost dead. So were the horses, especially poor Corn-flower, who shook and trembled like an aspen leaf.

On looking back it seemed marvellous how we had surmounted the steep ascent. To have failed would have meant ruin. The huge caravan would have effectually blocked the road, and only gangs of men--where in this dreary, houseless wilderness would they have come from?--could have taken us out of the difficulty.

Dalwhinnie Hotel is indeed an oasis in the wilderness. It is a hospice, and in railway snow-blocks has more than once saved valuable lives.

Both master and mistress are kindness personified.

Here, near the hotel, is a broad but shallow river; there is a clump of trees near it too. Fact! I do not mean to say that an athlete could not vault over most of them, but they are trees nevertheless. The house lies in what might be called a wide moorland, 1,200 feet above the sea-level, with mountains on all sides, many of them covered with snow all the year round.

I started next day for Kingussie, six hundred feet below the level of Dalwhinnie, where we encamped for the night behind the chief hotel.

My dear cousin, Mrs McDonald, of Dalwhinnie, had come with me as far as this town, accompanied by some of her sweet wee children, and what a happy party we were, to be sure! We sang songs and told fairy tales, and made love--I and the children--all the way.

Honest John, my cousin's husband, came in the dogcart, and showed me all the beauties of this charming village, which is situated among some of the finest and wildest scenery in the Scottish Highlands. Beauties of nature, I mean, but we met some pretty people too. Among the latter is old Mrs Cameron, who keeps a highland dram-shop at the other end of the village, and talked to John as she would to a child. She is far over seventy, but _so_ pleasant, and _so_ stout, and _so_ nice.

I promised to stop at her door next day as I drove past, and though we started before the hills had thrown off their nightcaps, our old lady was up and about. She entered and admired the caravan, then went straight away and brought out her bottle. Oh! dear reader, she would take no denial.

The lady loved to talk, and did not mind chaff. I tried to make it a match between herself and my young valet. But--

"'Deed, indeed, no, sir," she replied, "it is your coachman I'm for, and when he comes back I'll be all ready to marry him."