Volume 3 - Electric Scotland

IJRNBFX'ULA. 81
hundred of my own to examine: conclu^Iing with the
islands of Ely and Thanet surrounded by lofty cliffs and
a roaring ocean ; not forgetting that, instead of joining
the party in the Elysian Fields, Plato chose to reside apart,
as you will find in a book of high authority,, in an island
of his own.
But my present business is with Clanranald's islands.
This is a still more extraordinary country than South
Uist. Being self-erected pilot, and knowing as much
about Benbecula as Nova Zembla, we stood on with a
fair breeze out of Loch Eynort; soon making Loch Skiport,
and then looking out for the channel by which the two
islands were separated. But as no channel appeared,
and as nothing did appear but more islands and more
rocks and more sounds, and every one like every other,
I concluded either that Loch Skiport had grown larger
since my former visit, or that the vessel was standing still.
Instead of this, we had run past the whole fry and both
the channels, and were proceeding as fast as possible
along North Uist. If the natives find their own way
home, it must be by the same instinct as the herrings.
At length I betook myself to the boat and rowed
boldly into Loch Uskeba, hoping- to land somewhere.
You must not suppose that Loch Uskeba is filled with
whisky, as a certain geographer thought the Lake of
Geneva was full of gin : it is, simply. Water Bay. The
attempt to find our way through it, proved as entertaining
as impracticable; every fresh shore and headland being
exactly like all the rest, and the whole a labyrinth of
islands, peninsulas, promontories, bays, and channels.
When we thought we had arrived at the mainland, it
proved to be an island, every true channel proved a false
one, and after being caught in half a dozen of these
traps, we had the satisfaction of discovering that we were
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