English gothic style now rears its walls where once the Military Fort stood. Two grim bastions, the green moat with its stone bridge, the officers guard-room, the engine-house and military well are nearly all that have been preserved as relics of the past. It was shelled from the "Battery Rock" and taken after two days by the Jacobite warriors on their southward march, and afterwards re-occupied by the victorious army of Culloden. Here a host of the Highland Lairds were detained after the fatal battle of '46; here the bleeding head of Robert Mackenzie was brought and delivered to the Duke of Cumberland as that of Prince Charlie; here Lord Lovat was confined in a dungeon before being taken to London for execution, whilst from its walls issued the companies of savage soldiery who laid waste and almost depopulated the neighbouring country.

In 1773 the Fort was visited by Dr. Johnson and Boswell, then on their way to Skye. Four years later, we find Dr. Johnson entering in his Diary that he had passed the previous night in such sweet, uninterupted sleep as he had not known since he slept at Fort-Augustus. The Fort was occupied till the Crimean War, and then sold, in 1867, to the late Lord Lovat for £5000, and in 1876 the present Peer made it over together with sixteen acres of the surrounding land to the Benedictine Order and the revenues of the adjoining farm of Borlam were added as an endowment for 19 years. Some idea of the scale on which the establishment has been constructed may be formed from the statement that its cost is estimated at £80,000, and its future church will not be less than £50,000. The Institution comprises a quadrangle of four distinct buildings - the College, Monastery, Hospice, and Scriptorium—connected by exquisite cloisters in the purest early English Gothic, and designed by P. P. Pugin, of 111 Victoria Street, Westminster. These cost some £8000. The Scriptorium is unique and cost £1000. It is the monastic studio for painting, illuminating and carrying on works of art. The Monks have also established a printing press. The College is connected with the Glasgow and London Universities and its ordinary staff of Professors is supplemented by lay

University Professors, who live in a house apart from the College and, receiving their salaries from the Marquis of Bute, are known as the "Bute Professors." Tourists who wish to see this interesting establishment will be courteously received, and can obtain tickets of admission at the College gates for the sum of One Shilling. This fee goes to defray the cost of the clock and chimes (£800) from which the public derive so much convenience. As it takes the steamer about forty-five minutes to pass through the locks of Fort-Augustus, passengers will have ample time to visit the College and Cloisters and to ascend the great Tower.

The Fort has a farther interest from being the place where Mrs. Grant of Laggan resided for some time with her husband, who was Chaplain of the Forces, and where she wrote her beautiful "Letters from the Mountains," composed the finest of her poems, mastered the Celtic language, and became an authority on Celtic matters. Her books on America are quoted by the Duke of Argyle as his highest authority, in his "First Impressions of the New World." About two miles from the Fort on our right, is Glendoe, one of the most sweetly rural, and, at the same time, wildly romantic spots to be met with anywhere. This glen is the birth-place of General Fraser, who passed his early years here, and was killed at Saratoga, in Burgoyne's expedition.

Loch Ness is twenty-four miles long. having an average breadth of a mile-and-a-half, though in some parts having only about half that width. The depth of this loch is very great-in some places 900 feet, which is the cause that it has never been known to freeze, a fact which of old gave rise to many superstitions on the subject. The sides of the hills on each side of the loch are luxuriantly clothed with oak, ash, birch, and fir, intermingled with a thick undergrowth of hazel, holly, and other varieties of copsewood. Who can forget the sight of all the sylvan beauty in this lovely place, where, in autumn, the glory of the purple heather, or, in early summer, the furze and broom, with their green and gold, and the fragments of red granite crags, gave a variety of colouring seldom seen; whilst the peculiar and beautiful sheen of the water of the loch imparts a rich tone to the whole, and

fills up a picture of sweet enchantment, especially when the scene is lit up by the glory of the summer sky at sunset.

morriston

The first stage from Fort-Augustus, on the north shore, is Invermorriston, where an impetuous mountain Inver stream flows into the lake. The river scenery, including the fall, is well worthy of a visit. Formerly the fall barred the ascent of salmon, but operations have been undertaken to enable the fish to run. The upper reaches of the river were a few years ago stocked with salmon fry, by the late Mr. Dunbar, of Brawl Castle. The old family mansion of the Grants of Glenmorriston looks out upon the lake. There is a beautiful drive through Glenmorriston on to Loch Duich and Lochalsh, in the Sound of Skye.

"Falls of

A little further on, and on the opposite side of the loch, are the far-famed "Falls of Foyers." There Foyers." is a pier here where passengers land, and where the steamer usually waits to give passengers time to visit the Falls. From the pier to the Falls there is a walk of about three-quarters of a mile by a winding path up a hillside which leads to where the greater Fall can be seen to the best advantage. The scenery all around is strikingly grand and picturesque. The smoke arising

from the Falls looks in the distance as if from a furnace,
hence the name given it in Gaelic, of "Eas-na-Smùid,"
which means the "Smoking Cataract." The river Foyers
rises among the mountains of the "Monaliath," and runs
thirteen miles along a high-based glen, overhung with
wild mountains, and within a mile-and-a-half of its mouth
makes two falls of respectively forty and ninety feet.
Standing, awe-struck, gazing at the wondrous sight, the
poet Burns wrote:—

"Among the heathy hills and ragged woods,
The roaring Foyers pours his mossy floods,

Till, full, he dashes on the rocky mounds,

Where, through a shapeless breach, his stream resounds.

As high in air the bursting torrents flow,

As deep recoiling surges foam below,

Prone down the rock the whitening sheet descends,

And viewless Echo's ear, astonish'd, rends.

Dim seen through rising mists and ceaseless showers,
The hoary cavern, wide surrounding, lowers ;
Still through the gap the struggling river toils,
And still, below, the horrid caldron boils."