Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-01-26
oBAN, IONA AND THE OCEAN.

Rev. George Hodges Writes of Points Of
Interest In Northern Britain-The Final
Paper of an Entertaining Series.
The great new bridge which spans the Firth
OF Forth is two miles long. and the queerest-
looking bridge which you will see in q summers
journey; as If some huge antediluvan monster
had left his vast skeleton across that stretch Of
water. Presently Sterling Castle comes in sight,
set upon hill And by-and-by the train stops
and everybody gets out. and there is a hurry
and skurry to get good seats on the top of the
coach-a great coach, with no inside to it, with
all its seats on top and open to the sky, holding
20 or 30 people. sAnc so away over the rolling
hills, among the fields of purple heather, beside
the smiling brooks. and past the little turf
rooted cabins. The big "bens'' loom up against
the sky, and the little MACS" run along beside
the coach with punches of heather, eager for
bargains. You question these little bare-footed
merchants. and you find that every one of them
is named "Mac' something-MacIntosh, Mac
Brayne. MacTavish, MACPHERSON. Macdonald
no end TO it.
The day is perfect Overhead the sun shines
warm and bright This is the fifth pleasant
day which they have had all this summer in
this region Of uncertain skies; Presently you
are among the Trossachs, where the trees
grow-the wooded country" the name means,
notable enough in these parts where the hills
wear nothing thicker than heather. And then
!.
and you board the little steamer. and so away
again. Past Ellen's Isle, and all the fair scenes
OF the Lady of the Lake." At Inversnaid,
oiaS, on the border border OF Loeb Lomond you spend the
pie over the rocks TO discover Rob Roy's
Cave" Then by boat, and coach. and raIl to
ODan. Oban lies upon the seacoast.
Mound Builders There, Too.
One day at Oban I went out between the
heathery moors to a little lake which lies
among the hils-the dark" lake, Loeb Nell.
they call 1t. And beside this lake saw a
snake. $50 feet long, and or 10 feet thick! A
great coiled snake-of stone and turf. Every
body knows about the serpent mound in Ohio;
here is another away across the salt water.
The serpent mound beside Loeb Nell
tradition left about the builders of
II. What hands laid the stone vertebrB of
TINS Dig snake, and set an altar in the head of
IL, and were then clasped in strange prayer here
nobody knows. You stand upon the serpent's
head and look out toward the setting sun, and
there are the three peaks of a Jagged mountain.
toward the three branches Of a river. ' ''' '
Another day at Oban 1 took long walk In
another direction to q ruined castle called
Dunstaffnage. There were shaggy Highland
cattle in the fields; and the queerest old stone
houses one story high, half house and half
stable, with roof of thatch, and compost heap
beside the door, along the road. You cross
ovof q IcdCH Oh SHALLOW wafer on cOnVonlenb
stepping stones which the high tide covers, and
here is the castle. A great square building
built upon crag of solid rock. Year after
year the rain has descended and the floods have
come and beat upon it, but the parable holds
true, the castle stands. There are towers at
the corners; ivy grows over the broken
walls; nobody lives there. Here, in this
their horses in davs h.nn;,ar Inno nast nnd
great fires roared up these cold chimneys, and
the minstrels sang to the sound of the harp.
One day the Dunstaffnage Campbells went out
against their old enemies, the Murrays and
drove them into the church of MOnivaird and
locked the door upon them and burned them
into charred bones. And back they came to
TINS old CASTLE and in this courtyard, with
loud voices and Scotch profanity Gas suited the
occasion) talked that murder oYeri