"--BIRRELL'S DIARY, (IN DALZELL'S FRAGMENTS OF
SCOTTISH HISTORY),pp.60,61.
?
NOTES TO THE HIGHLAND WIDOW.
Note 7.--LOCH AWE.
"Loch Awe, upon the banks of which the scene of action took
place, is thirty-four miles in length. The north side is bounded
by wide muirs and inconsiderable hills, which occupy an extent of
country from twelve to twenty miles in breadth, and the whole of
this space is enclosed as by circumvallation. Upon the north it
is barred by Loch Eitive, on the south by Loch Awe, and on the
east by the dreadful pass of Brandir, through which an arm of the
latter lake opens, at about four miles from its eastern
extremity, and discharges the river Awe into the former. The
pass is about three miles in length; its east side is bounded by
the almost inaccessible steeps which form the base of the vast
and rugged mountain of Cruachan. The crags rise in some places
almost perpendicularly from the water, and for their chief extent
show no space nor level at their feet, but a rough and narrow
edge of stony beach. Upon the whole of these cliffs grows a
thick and interwoven wood of all kinds of trees, both timber,
dwarf, and coppice; no track existed through the wilderness, but
a winding path, which sometimes crept along the precipitous
height, and sometimes descended in a straight pass along the
margin of the water.
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