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Thus we were stumbling on, very weary, very hungry, the man with the want in a constant wail, and Sonachan lamenting for suppers he had been saucy over in days of rowth and plenty, when a light oozed out of the grey-dark ahead of us, in the last place in the world one would look for any such sign of humanity. We stopped on the moment, and John Splendid went ahead to see what lay in the way.

The loch is well provided with bays, of different merit, according to the feeding which they provide; some come earlier, some later into season. Doubtless the most beautiful part of the lake is around the islands, between the Loch Awe and the Port Sonachan hotels.

Sonachan and Ardkinglas and the tacksmen came over to listen, and the man with the want began to weep with a child's surrender. "And what about Argile?" said I, when the humming ceased. "You are very keen on that bit, lad," said the baron-bailie, smiling spitefully with thin hard lips that revealed his teeth gleaming white and square against the dusk of his face.

In the morning early, the steam-launch tows a fleet of boats down the loch, and they drift back again, fishing all the bays, and arriving at home in time for dinner. Too frequently the angler is vexed by finding a boat busy in his favourite bay. I am not sure that, when the trout are really taking, the water near Port Sonachan is not as good as any other. Much depends on the weather.

The baron-bailie and Sonachan and the minister stood spellbound, and I cursed our folly at the weakness of our trap. Only M'Iver kept his wits about him. "Scatter," said he in English "scatter without adieus, and all to the fore by morning search back to the Brig of Urchy, comrades there till the middle of the day, then the devil take the hindmost."

Three sprigs of gall mean three Campbells, do they not? and that's the baron-bailie and Sonachan, and this one with the leaves off the half-side is the fellow with the want And oak is Stewart a very cunning clan to be fighting or foraying or travelling with, for this signal is Stewart's work or I'm a fool: the others had not the gumption for it.

Gilbert, thinking it desirable to give his guests a more extensive acquaintance with the surrounding country than his boats could afford, proposed to take a carriage, which would be ferried from Port Sonachan to the other side of the lake, after which we might drive as much as possible along the shores till we reached Ardhonnel Castle.

Sonachan and the baron-bailie quarrelled away about some point of pedigree as they sat, a towsy, unkempt pair, in a dusty corner of the byre, with beards of a most scraggy nature grown upon their chins. Their uncouthness gave a scruple of foppishness to M'I ver, and sent him seeking a razor in the widow's house.

"All the same," said he, "I would advise you to put some of the Almighty's provand in your pouch, for fear the grace that is ours now may be torn suddenly enough from us." Sonachan pointed at Stewart, who had already filled every part of his garments with broken meat, and his wallet as well. "There's a cautious man," said he, "whatever your notion of sudden ceasing may be.

Of the five Campbells three were gentlemen Forbes the baron-bailie of Ardkinglas, Neil Campbell in Sonachan, Lochowside, and the third no other than Master Gordon the minister, who was the most woebegone and crestfallen of them all.