Page:A Companion and Useful Guide to the Beauties of Scotland.djvu/262

244 not be much worse in that respect than I was; for my shoes and stockings were by that time complete brown boots, so covered were they with dirt and slime. By the help of the Highlandman, and my own servant, I however slipped, and hung by trees, and clung to pieces of rock, until I got down on the desired bank, which is on the whole not more than two yards wide, and projects, perhaps, twenty or more feet in direct front of the fall. This bank, whether by art, or worn away by frequent visitations, I cannot say, but there is on it a sunk path, in the middle of this slip of rock, (in shape like a marrow-spoon,) sufficiently wide to take in the legs of those who venture themselves in it: the bank rises on each side, and at the end of the path, forming a green earthen parapet, about knee high. I advanced to the furthest point, looking at the vast leap of the river, and tracing its course from the pool round the green bank on which I stood, two hundred feet below me, winding and dashing towards the promontory on which I had first gazed; and the top of the cataract was two hundred and seventy feet above me! The noise, as it was a flood, was beyond belief; it was impossible to hear any other sound; and the spray, in a great degree,