 seven
hundred black cattle, which they had saved in the general wreck of their
affairs: but their beloved chief, who was a promising youth, did not live to
enjoy the fruits of their fidelity and attachment.
    The most effectual method I know to weaken, and at length destroy this
influence, is to employ the commonalty in such a manner as to give them a taste
of property and independence - In vain the government grants them advantageous
leases on the forfeited estates, if they have no property to prosecute the means
of improvement - The sea is an inexhaustible fund of riches; but the fishery
cannot be carried on without vessels, casks, salt, lines, nets, and other
tackle. I conversed with a sensible man of this country, who, from a real spirit
of patriotism, had set up a fishery on the coast, and a manufacture of coarse
linen, for the employment of the poor Highlanders. Cod is here in such plenty,
that he told me he had seen seven hundred taken on one line, at one hawl - It
must be observed, however, that the line was of immense length, and had two
thousand hooks, baited with muscles; but the fish was so superior to the cod
caught on the banks of Newfoundland, that his correspondent at Lisbon sold them
immediately at his own price, although Lent was just over when they arrived, and
the people might be supposed quite cloyed with this kind of diet - His linen
manufacture was likewise in a prosperous way, when the late war intervening, all
his best hands were pressed into the service.
    It cannot be expected, that the gentlemen of this country should execute
commercial schemes to render their vassals independent; nor, indeed, are such
schemes suited to their way of life and inclination; but a company of merchants
might, with proper management, turn to good account a fishery established in
this part of Scotland - Our people have a strange itch to colonize America, when
the uncultivated parts of our own island might be settled to greater advantage.
    After having rambled through the mountains and glens of Argyle, we visited
the adjacent islands of Ila, Jura, Mull, and Icolmkill. In the first we saw the
remains of a castle, built in a lake, where Macdonald, lord or king of the
isles, formerly resided. Jura is famous for having given birth to one Mackcrain,
who lived one hundred and eighty years in one house, and died in the reign of
Charles the Second. Mull affords several bays, where there is safe anchorage; in
one of which, the Florida, a ship of the
