R o u n d tower s .
were they acquainted with it, no fort of punilhment fhould ever
induce them to be guilty of breach of truft to their leader *.
The other example is taken from more recent and mercenary
days. In the year 1746, when the young pretender preferred
the prefervation of an unhappy life by an inglorious flight, to the
honor of falling heroically with his faithful followers in the field
of Culloden, he for five months led the life of a fugitive, amidft a
numerous and various fet of mountaineers. He truflred his perfon
often to the loWeft and moft dilfolute of the people ; to men
pinched with poverty, or accuftomed to rapine: yet neither the
fear of punilhment for aflifting the wretched wanderer, nor the
dazzling allurement of the reward of thirty thoufand pounds,
could ever prevail on any one to violate the laws of hofpitality, or
be guilty of a breach of truft. They extricated him out of every
difficulty; they completed his deliverance, preferving his life for
mortifications more afflidting than the dreadful hardffiips he fuf-
tained during his long flight.
Soon after entering the pariffi of Mauline, leave, on the right,
Edradour. At this place, on the top of a fteep den, are the remains
of a circular building, called the black caftle, about fixty
feet diameter within fide, and the walls about eight feet thick.
There is another about a mile weft from the village of Mouline,
near Balyou'an, and a third on an eminence fouth of the former.
One of thefe anfwers to another fimilar at Killichange, in the pa-
riffi of Logierait. Some conjedture thefe round buildings to have
* LeJltj de origine, moribus, et rebus geftis Scotoma, 405.
been
been intended for making fignals with fires in cafe of invafions:
others think them to have been- Tigh Fajly, or a ftorehoufe for
the concealment of valuable effedts in cafe of fudden inroads.
The firft is a very probable opinion, as I can trace, approaching
towards the weft fea, a chain of thefe edifices, one within fight
o f the next, for a very confiderable way. It is not unlikely, if
Search was made, but that they may even extend to the eaft fea, fo
"as to form a feries of beacons crofs this part of the kingdom.
My worthy fellow-voyager, Mr. Stuart, has, from remarks
on feveral in the neighborhood of Killin, enabled me to trace
them for feveral miles. To begin with the moft eaftern, next to
tftofe I have mentioned, there is one on the hill of Drummin, op-
polite to Taymouth, on the fide of the vale : another lies within
view, above the church of Fortingal: on the hill Eruim-an-timboir,
is a third, oppofite to Alt-mhuic, eaft of Miggerny; one under the
houfe of Cajhly, called Caftal-mhic-neil; and another, about half a
mile weft, of the name of Cajtal-a-chon-bhaican, a crooked ftone,
called Con-bhacan, being eredted about two hundred feet eaft from
it, and fo named, from a tradition that the Nimrods of old times
tied their dogs to it with a' leathern thong, when they returned from
the chade. The figure of this building differs from the others,
being oval *: the greateft length within the wall is feventy-one
feet; the breadth forty •, the thicknefs at the fides twelve feet, at
the ends only eight. The door at the eaft end low and narrow,
covered with a flag.
* The Fagh sna aitt eighe, or the work o f one night, engraved book III.
tab. VIII, o f Mr. Wright's Lmthiana, is fimilar to this.
H z But