"I could have sworn now," said I to my cicerone, "that yon tree and waterfall was the very place where you intended to make a stop to-day." "The Lord forbid!" said Donald hastily.
"And for what, Donald?
Why should you be willing to pass so pleasant a spot ?" "It's ower near Dalmally, my leddy, to corn the beasts; it would bring their dinner ower near their breakfast, poor things.

An' besides, the place is not canny." "Oh! then the mystery is out.

There is a bogle or a brownie, a witch or a gyre-carlin, a bodach or a fairy, in the case ?" "The ne'er a bit, my leddy--ye are clean aff the road, as I may say.

But if your leddyship will just hae patience, and wait till we are by the place and out of the glen, I'll tell ye all about it.

There is no much luck in speaking of such things in the place they chanced in." I was obliged to suspend my curiosity, observing, that if I persisted in twisting the discourse one way while Donald was twining it another, I should make his objection, like a hempen cord, just so much the tougher.
At length the promised turn of the road brought us within fifty paces of the tree which I desired to admire, and I now saw to my surprise, that there was a human habitation among the cliffs which surrounded it.