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Naisi, son of Conor, king of Uladh, had fled with Deirdre, daughter of Phelim, the king's story-teller, to a sea-girt islet on Lough Etive, where they lived happily by the chase. Naisi's two brothers went with them, and thus the three sons of Usnach were all in Alba.
For when we crossed Loch Etive there came behind us from the ruined glens of Lower Lorn hordes of shepherds, hunters, small men of small families, who left their famished dens and holes, hunger sharping them at the nose, the dead bracken of concealment in their hair, to join in the vengeance on the cause of their distress.
I was lost somewhere north of Glen Etive; near me I knew must be Tynrce, for I had been walking for two hours and yet I dare not venture back on the straight route to to-morrow's rendezvous till something of daylight gave me guidance At last I concluded that the way through the Black Mount country to Bredalbane must be so dote at hand it would be stupidity of the densest to go back by Dalness.
But the years have come and the years have gone, and I am older than I was at twenty-five. The Campbells I can never reach: they walk secure, overseas, through Lorn and Argyle, couching in the tall heather above Etive, tracking the red deer in the Forest of Dalness. Forster is dead. Ewin Mackinnon is dead, I know; for five years ago come Martinmas night I saw his perjured soul on its way to hell.
Over Etive and through the Benderloch, and through Appin and even up to Glencoe, by some strange spasm of physique for she was frail and famished the barefooted old cailleach of Carnus came after us, a bird of battle, croaking in a horrible merriment over our operations. The Dark Dame we called her.
On their setting forth again, the sea was like a wild grey lake between Jura on the left and the long headland of Cantyre on their right; and thus they sped forward between long ranks of gloomy hills, growing ever nearer them on both sides, till they passed through the Sound of Jura and rounded into Loch Etive.
No, it will be bad enough passing between Islay and Jura; if we get safely through that I shall try to run into the narrow strait between Colonsay and Oronsay; there we should have good and safe shelter. If we miss that, we must run inside Mull for there will be no getting without it and either shelter behind Lismore island far up the strait, or behind Kerara, or into the passage to Loch Etive."
Alick Murray had not over-praised the Highland home of which he had so often spoken when far away across the wide ocean. The house, substantially built in a style suited to that clime, stood some way up the side of a hill which rose abruptly from the waters of Loch Etive, on the north side of which it was situated.
Very familiar to Deirdré, though at first strange and confusing, grew the arms of Naisi around her in the darkness and his warm lips on her cheek. Happy were those wild days in the great glen of Etive, and dear did the sons of Usnac grow to her heart, loved as brothers by her who never knew a brother, or the gentleness of a mother's watching, or the solace of dear kindred.
After giving mature consideration to another scheme of study, he decided to make careful pen-and-ink topographical drawings of the most striking features of the scenery, such as Ben Cruachan, Glen Etive, Ben Vorlich, Glencoe, etc., and to have them reproduced in large quantities, so that, when upon the scene represented by any of them, he would only have to note the most impressive effects, the sketch having become unnecessary.
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