INTRODUCTORY

ADDRESS

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quifitely fine, than their fagacity and activity are admirable. The having access to rich stores of all manner of productions dredged up with ease from the bottom of these feas, preferved in their native element, and frequently feen in all their healthful, animated ftate; while the spirit of enterprize actuates their frame, informs their beauty, and calls forth all their ingenuity and arts; became an inviting incitement to › attempt the delineation of fome of their more elegant forms, and to defcribe fuch peculiarities as occur in their manner of life. These seemed alfo most interesting and engaging fubjects of attention, and claimed a feparate department in this: Work..

Myriads of existence, in a most animated and bufy fcene, for ever lie concealed from our view in the unfathomable retreats of the Ocean; but enough is feen to give us high conceptions of its concealed wonders, and inspire the profoun- · dest astonishment, at the infinite variety of forms that are: there made recipient of life, and capable of exhibiting fuch eminent specimens of admirable workmanship, as disclose high evidences of DEITY! of SUPREME INTELLIGENCE, ordaining the forms and infpiring the energies of CREATION! and offering innumerable teftimonies to our view, that INFINITE WISDOM is the LORD of NATURE!

This is the incense that Divine Philosophy kindles on the Altar of Science, and finds that facred flame beam with the : light of life..

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In the prefent fo distinguished æra of improvement in the Arts, when all Europe is awake to the refined enjoyments derived from works of Tafte; the researches of Science are every day pursued with encreafing relish, and the fruits of thefe engaging ftudies come forth to view in a luftre unknown to former ages.

While the high pleasure of investigating the economy of NATURE, in her more wonderful and hidden paths, joined to that of contemplating those august and beautiful scenes which adorn the more open theatre of Creation, are constituted some of the superior amusements of polished life; the unravelling of the annals of the more obfcure periods of early ages, and tracing out thofe circumftances that relate to the first improvements of Society, in Science, in Religion, and in Manners, feem equally interefting to numbers: while all confpire to furnish out the profound and elevating entertainments of Genius and Philosophic enquiry:-The Arts that favour these flourish, under the protection of the most EMINENT CHARACTERS of the BRITISH NATION:-to THEM this WORK is addressed, as at their instance it has been carried on, By their most obedient

humble Servants,

CHARLES CORDINER,

JULY 1, 1788.

AND

PETER MAZELL.

The GREEN-LOCH, in GLEN-MORE.

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LEN-MORE is a rugged valley, of vaft extent, embofomed deep amid the Carn-gorum, and other mountains. It contains a very valuable foreft belonging to the Duke of Gordon. It is computed that there are thirty thoufand trees in it, fit for mafts and yards of fhips, and are excellent timber when cut into planks and deals. The wild and magnificent prospects, afforded by the mountainous regions which surround the Glen, are full of that horrid grandeur which astonishes and over-awes; yet there is a native power in thefe great fcenes to elevate and please. The mind of the admirer partakes of their fublimity: beholding these enormous and lofty piles of precipices, cloathed with wood, gradually rifing to the sky-their fummits partaking of the azure of the firmament, and towering above the clouds-the astonished fpectator feels a kind of connexion with these fuperior regions he explores, and experiences a correfponding elevation of thought. The regions round Glen-more are full of these great scenes of nature, which in contemplation yield the moft fublime pleasure.

The Green-loch is at one end of Glen-more; (in the middle of the valley there is a still larger piece of water). This Loch has derived its appellation from the tinge given to it by the leaves, which are continually falling into it from the trees on the overhanging precipices. The broad variegated mountain which cuts the most diftinguished figure on the border of the Loch, and in the view here given of it, is called Crag-na-gaul. The rock in many places is mouldering down, and fweeps away the rifing trees; but clumps of vaft firs, interfperfed with hazel, holly, and, near the borders of the Loch, quaking-afh, ftill maintain their ground amid the falling rocks. Nature is ever bufy, replacing what is loft by the occafional devastation.

Enormous fallen trees, and others decaying through age, or fhattered by the ftorms of many a winter, hanging over the Loch in all their native wildnefs, and in the cafual arrangements of Nature in her rudeft ftate, make the environs of this Loch prefent' the most picturefque and romantic fcenes, worthy the pencil of a Rembrandt, a Salvator Rofa, or a Claud Lorrain.

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