Page:Tales of my landlord (Volume 4).djvu/305

 ted presbyterians had in the preceding reigns sought refuge among dells and thickets, caves and cataracts,—in spots the most extraordinary and secluded—although he had heard of the champions of the Covenant, who had long abidden beside Dobs linn on the wild heights of Pelmoodie, and others who had been concealed in the yet more terrific cavern called Creehope-linn, in the parish of Closeburn, yet his imagination had never exactly figured out the horrors of such a residence, and he was surprised how the strange and romantic scene which he now saw had remained concealed from him while a curious investigator of such natural phenomena. But he readily conceived, that, lying in a remote and wild district, and being destined as a place of concealment to the persecuted preachers and professors of non-conformity, the secret of its existence was carefully preserved by the few shepherds to whom it might be known.