ills," she said, "were higher and more magnificent than those of
Breadalbane--Ben Cruachan was but a dwarf to Skooroora. The lakes
were broader and larger, and abounded not only with fish, but with the
enchanted and amphibious animal which gives oil to the lamp. [The seals
are considered by the Highlanders as enchanted princes.] The deer were
larger and more numerous; the white-tusked boar, the chase of which the
brave loved best, was yet to be roused in those western solitudes; the
men were nobler, wiser, and stronger than the degenerate brood who lived
under the Saxon banner. The daughters of the land were beautiful, with
blue eyes and fair hair, and bosoms of snow; and out of these she would
choose a wife for Hamish, of blameless descent, spotless fame, fixed
and true affection, who should be in their summer bothy as a beam of the
sun, and in their winter abode as the warmth of the needful fire."

Such were the topics with which Elspat strove to soothe the despair of
her son, and to determine him, if possible, to leave the fatal spot,
on which he seemed resolved to linger. The style of her rhetoric was
poetical, but in other respects resembled that which, like other fond
mothers, she had lavished on Hamish, while a child or a boy, in order
to gain his consent to do something he had no mind to; and she spoke
louder, quicker, and more earnestly, in proportion as she began to
despair of her words carrying conviction.

On the mind of Hamish her eloquence made no impression. He knew far
better than she did the actual situation of the country, and was
sensible that, though it might be possible to hide himself as a fugitive
among more distant mountains, there was now no corner in the Highlands
in which his father's profession could be practised, even if he had not
adopted, from the improved ideas of the time when he lived, the opinion
that the trade of the cateran was no longer the road to honour and
distinction. Her words were therefore poured into regardless ears, and
she exhausted herself in vain in the attempt to paint the regions of her
mother's kinsmen in such terms as might tempt Hamish to accompany her
thither. She spoke for hours, but she spoke in vain. She could extort no
answer, save groans and sighs and ejaculations, expressing the extremity
of despair.

At length, starting on her feet, and changing the monotonous tone
in which she had chanted, as it were, the praises of the province of
refuge, into the short,