greatly (though they were ignorant of the cause of his Antiquities threatening), as they knew he had more personal strength than them both, he being then about nine feet high, and stout in proportion. They accordingly carried home the roe, and told their mother that William had threatened them in such a manner. She communicated this circumstance to their father Robert Gun, adding, that she suspected William had heard of his father's death. Robert Gun, being afraid of young William's personal strength, wished to be in friendship with him, and proposed that he should marry his (Gun's) sister, who resided with them in the character of a housekeeper. William did not relish the match, and would not accept of her. Soon afterwards Robert Gun made a feast at his house, where he collected several of his friends, and contrived to make young William so much intoxicated that he was carried to bed, and Robert Gun put his sister to bed with him. When William awakened next morning, he was surprised to find Gun's sister in bed with him. She told him he might recollect that the ceremonies of marriage passed betwixt them the preceding evening, and that she was now his lawful spouse. He got up in a passion, and declared that he was imposed upon, and that he would hold no such bargain. Robert Gun flattered him, and said, as he was now married to his sister he would make the match as agreeable to him as possible, by putting him in possession of the estate of Langwell; and in order to accomplish his promise, he, with a few of his connections, concealed themselves near Hector More's castle on the rock until early in the morning. When the drawbridge was let down, they forced their way into the castle, and carried Hector More (who was then an old feeble man) out of his castle, and left him in a cot-house in the neighbourhood, where he remained for some little Antiquities time, and afterwards went to Sutherland, and passed the remainder of his days with one of his relations, Sutherland of Rearchar. Robert Gun then returned in triumph to Braemore, and conducted William Sutherland and his espoused wife to their castle, and gave them all possession of the estate of Langwell. William being very much dissatisfied with Robert Gun's conduct, and not liking the company of his sister as a spouse, went and complained of his grievances to the Earl of Caithness; who promised him redress as soon as he returned from the Orkneys, where he was going to quell a rebellion, along with the Baron of Roslin, and wished that he (William), being a very stout man, would accompany him. William consented to do so, and returned to Berrydale to bid his friends farewel before he would go on so dangerous an expedition. Just as he was parting with them at the burial ground on the braes on the east side of the water of Berrydale, he told his friends that he suspected he never would return from Orkney. He then laid himself down on the heath near the burial-ground, and desired his companions to fix two stones in the ground, the one at his head and the other at his feet, in order to show to posterity his uncommon stature ; which stones remain there still, and the exact distance between them is nine feet and five inches. Tradition also mentions his height to have been above nine feet. He went with Lord Caithness, &c. to the Orkneys, where he as well as the Earl and his sons were killed. This happened in the year 1530. The cause of the rebellion was this: In the year 1530, King James the Fifth granted the islands of Orkney to his natural brother, James Earl of Murray, and his heirs-male. The inhabitants took umbrage that an over-lord should be interposed between them and the sovereign, and rose in arms, under the command of Sir James Sinclair of Sandy. Lord Sin-Antiquities, clair, Baron of Roslin, and the Earl of Caithness, were sent with a party of men to quell the rebels, but the islanders defeated them; and, as already mentioned, the Earl, with his sons, and William More Sutherland, who accompanied them, were killed. The Caithness men who survived carried back the Earl of Caithness' head to be interred in his Lordship's burial-place in Caithness. Braal. In the parish of Falkirk, in the western part of the county, are several remains of the ancient fortresses or dwellings of the chiefs of this district. The tower or cas- Castle of tle of Braal stands on an eminence, at a small distance from the river of Thurso. It is completely square, of a very large area, wonderfully thick in the walls, which are partly built with clay and mortar mixed, and in some parts with mortar altogether. The stairs and conveyances to the several stories are through the heart of the walls. These stories were all of them floored and vaulted with stones prodigiously large, as are indeed most of the stones of the whole fabric. A great part of it still remains; is as upright and firm as ever, and seems, from its structure, to have been very high and stately; and, what is strange, the highest stones seem to be larger than those below. It surely cost immense labour to get some of them up to such a height, especially in those days, when it is to be supposed they had no proper machinery for the purpose. The plummet and rule were undoubtedly well applied in the progress of the work; but there is not the least impression of block or chissel, which shows the great antiquity of it. It was manifestly a place of strength as well as of habitation. A deep large well-contrived ditch secures it from the north. The next piece of antiquity worthy of notice is Dirlet Dirlet Cas Castle. It stands in a very beautiful romantic spot in the tle. Antiquities. Highlands called Dirlet, on a round high rock, very steep, almost perpendicular on all sides. The rock and castle hang over a very deep dark pool on the river Thurso, which runs close by its side. On each side of the river and the castle, and very near them, are two other rocks, much higher, looking down over the castle with a stately and tow ering majesty, and fencing it on these sides. By appearance, as well as by accounts, it was a place of strength in the days of rapine and plunder. For further security, it had the river on one hand, and a ditch on the other, through which the water was conveyed with a drawbridge. The last inhabitant was a descendant of the noble family of Sutherland. He was called in Erse the Pinder Derg, that is, the Red Knight. Lochmere The next in course is Lochmere Castle, about eight miles above Dirlet. It stood just on the bank of the loch, hanging over the first current of the river out of it. In that place the river is very narrow and very deep, and withal very rapid. It is said by report to have been built and inhabited by a personage called Morrar na Shean, that is, "the lord of the game or venison," because he delighted in these rural sports. It is said, also, that there was a chest, or some kind of machine, fixed in the mouth of the stream below the castle, for catching salmon in their ingress into the loch, or their egress out of it; and that immediately when a fish was entangled in the machine, the capture was announced to the whole family by the ringing of a bell, which the motions and struggles of the fish set a-going, by means of a fine cord that was fixed at one end to the bell in the middle of an upper room, and at the the other end to the machine in the stream below. The principal proprietors in this county are, the Earl of Caithness, Sir John Sinclair of Ulbster, Sir Benjamin Dunbar of Hempriggs, and Sinclair of Freswick; all of whom possess elegant mansion-houses, though their vici- Population. nity is necessarily bleak and naked during a great part of the year, in consequence of the impractibility of adorning them with plantations. Bower .... .... Olrick Reay Thurso Wattin Wick ... 644 694 652 92 3986 Total..22215 24802 10183/1242613263 2201) 714522609 Among the hills or high country on the borders of Language, Sutherland the Erse language is spoken; but in the rest of the county the language of the people has always been the same with that of the south of Scotland, unless in so far as distinguished, in a trifling degree, by a provincial The names of places seem to be derived from the Norwegian language. Ster, which in that language signifies "an estate," is the terminating syllable of a great number of places, such as, Ulbster, Stempster, accent. |