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The old manse at Kilchrist, having become ruinous, was abandoned; and, as none was built to replace it, Mr. Mackinnon rented the farm and house of Kilbride. There had once been a chapel there, dedicated to St. Bridget, and her name still clings to the spot. Behind rises the group of the Red Hills; further over, the black serrated crests of Blaven, the most striking of all the Skye mountains, tower up into the north-western sky, while to the south the eye looks away down the inlet of Loch Slapin to the open sea, out of which rise the ridges of Rum and the Scuir of Eigg. The farm lay around the house and stretched into the low uplands on the southern side of the valley. The farming operations at Kilbride will be noticed in a later chapter.

A HIGHLAND MINISTER’S WIFE

In the wide Highland parishes, where roads are few and communications must largely be kept up on foot, the minister’s wife is sometimes hardly less important a personage than her husband, and it is to her that the social wants of the people are generally made known. Mrs. Mackinnon belonged to another family of the same clan as the minister, and was in every way worthy of him. Tall and massive in build, with strength of character traced on every feature of her face, and a dignity of manner like that of a Highland chieftainess, she was born to rule in any sphere to which she might be called. Her habitual look was perhaps somewhat stern, with a touch of sadness, as if she had deeply realised the trials and transitoriness of life, and had braced herself to do her duty through it all to the end. But no Highland heart beat more warmly than hers. She was the mother of the whole parish, and seemed to have her eye on every cottage and cabin throughout its wide extent. To her every poor crofter looked for sympathy and help, and never looked in vain. Her clear blue eyes would at one moment fill with tears over the recital of some tale of suffering in the district, at another they would sparkle with glee as she listened to some of the droll narratives of her family or her visitors. She belonged to the family of Corriehatachan, and among her prized relics was the coverlet under which Samuel Johnson slept when he stayed in her grandfather’s house. That house at the foot of the huge Beinn na Cailleach has long ago disappeared; some fields of brighter green and some low walls mark where it and its garden stood.