The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

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CHAPTER XIV.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
(The CorxTiES of Perth, Forfab, Kincardine, Aberdeen, Banff, Elgin, Nairn, Inverness, Ross
AND Cromarty, Sutherland, Caithness, Orkney, Shetland, and Argyll.)
General Features.
riTS is a portion of tlie British Islands which, compared with England
and Southern Scotland, is but thinly populated. In its great geo-
graphical features, its relief, contours, and coast-line, it resembles
Scandinavia rather than any other part of Great Britain. If
the sea once more flooded the broad plain stretching from the
Forth to the Clyde, its character of insularity would hardly become more apparent
than it is now. Upper Caledonia is, in foct, a large island, with smaller islands
for its satellites.
Far more elevated in the mean than England, nearlj' the whole of it is
occupied by mountains ; and these mountains form ranges, which extend almost
without an exception from the south-west to the north-east. In the south this
Highland region is bounded by the Strathmore, or " Great Valley," through which
the plain of the Forth is extended north-eastward towards Montrose and Stone-
haven. The vallej'S of the Dee, Doveran, Spey, Findhorn, and Nairn run parallel
with that plain towards the German Ocean, and the remarkable fissure of
Glenmore, which connects Loch Eil with the Inverness Firth, extends in the
same direction. There are few fissures in Europe which in rigidity of contour can
compare with this "Great Glen" of Scotland, which, 100 miles in length, joins
the Atlantic to the German Ocean. If the Dee were to rise but 100 feet, the
northern extremity of Scotland would be separated from the remainder of the
Highlands, and the chain of lakes and rivers now occupying the glen converted
into a narrow strait of the sea of uniform width. The ocean would then follow
the path apparently traced for it in the Caledonian Canal. The execution of that
work was greatly facilitated by the existence of the river Ness, which falls into
Inverness Firth, and Loch Ness, which occupies the centre of the isthmus. AU the
had to do was to excavate a canal 22 miles in length, and to furnish it
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