le. It was ten o'clock when we departed. We had
learned that there was a ferry-boat kept at three miles' distance, and if
the man was at home he would row us down the lake to the Trossachs. Our
walk was mostly through coppice-woods, along a horse-road, upon which
narrow carts might travel. Passed that white house which had looked at
us with such a friendly face when we were on the other side; it stood on
the slope of a hill, with green pastures below it, plots of corn and
coppice-wood, and behind, a rocky steep covered with wood. It was a very
pretty place, but the morning being cold and dull the opposite shore
appeared dreary. Near to the white house we passed by another of those
little pinfold squares, which we knew to be a burying-place; it was in a
sloping green field among woods, and within sound of the beating of the
water against the shore, if there were but a gentle breeze to stir it: I
thought if I lived in that house, and my ancestors and kindred were
buried there, I should sit many an hour under the walls of this plot of
earth, where all the household would be gathered together.

We found the ferryman at work in the field above his hut, and he was at
liberty to go with us, but, being wet and hungry, we begged that he would
let us sit by his fire till we had refreshed ourselves. This was the
first genuine Highland hut we had been in. We entered by the cow-house,
the house-door being within, at right angles to the outer door. The
woman was distressed that she had a bad fire, but she heaped up some dry
peats and heather, and, blowing it with her breath, in a short time
raised a blaze that scorched us into comfortable feelings. A small part
of the smoke found its way out of the hole of the chimney, the rest
through the open window-places, one of which was within the recess of the
fireplace, and made a frame to a little picture of the restless lake and
the opposite shore, seen when the outer door was open. The woman of the
house was very kind: whenever we asked her for anything it seemed a fresh
pleasure to her that she had it for us; she always answered with a sort
of softening down of the Scotch exclamation, 'Hoot!' 'Ho! yes, ye'll get
that,' and hied to her cupboard in the spence. We were amused with the
phrase 'Ye'll get that' in the Highlands, which appeared to us as if it
came from a perpetual feeling of the difficulty with which most things
are procured. We got oatmeal, butter, bread and milk, m