y morning, however, it blew such a strong gale that the landlord
of the inn, where we had paid for horses all the way to Oban (thirty
miles), honestly came up-stairs just as we were starting, with the money
in his hand, and told us it would be impossible to cross. There was
nothing to be done but to come back five-and-thirty miles, through
Glencoe and Inverouran, to a place called Tyndrum, whence a road twelve
miles long crosses to Dalmally, which is sixteen miles from Inverary.
Accordingly we turned back, and in a great storm of wind and rain began
to retrace the dreary road we had come the day before. . . . I was not at
all ill pleased to have to come again through that awful Glencoe. If it
had been tremendous on the previous day, yesterday it was perfectly
horrific. It had rained all night, and was raining then, as it only does
in these parts. Through the whole glen, which is ten miles long,
torrents were boiling and foaming, and sending up in every direction
spray like the smoke of great fires. They were rushing down every hill
and mountain side, and tearing like devils across the path, and down
into the depths of the rocks. Some of the hills looked as if they were
full of silver, and had cracked in a hundred places. Others as if they
were frightened, and had broken out into a deadly sweat. In others there
was no compromise or division of streams, but one great torrent came
roaring down with a deafening noise, and a rushing of water that was
quite appalling. Such a _spaet_, in short (that's the country word), has
not been known for many years, and the sights and sounds were beyond
description. The post-boy was not at all at his ease, and the horses
were very much frightened (as well they might be) by the perpetual
raging and roaring; one of them started as we came down a steep place,
and we were within that much (----) of tumbling over a precipice; just
then, too, the drag broke, and we were obliged to go on as we best
could, without it: getting out every now and then, and hanging on at the
back of the carriage to prevent its rolling down too fast, and going
Heaven knows where. Well, in this pleasant state of things we came to
King's House again, having been four hours doing the sixteen miles. The
rumble where Tom sat was by this time so full of water that he was
obliged to borrow a gimlet and bore holes in the bottom to let it run
out. The horses that were to take us on were out upon the hills,
somewhere within ten m