It was now raining very heavily and the clouds hung low on the mountains. The scene, stupendous and deep, held us to silence, until the Mate said:

‘I feel we are sailing west.’

The remark seemed more apt then than I can hope to explain now. Actually we were going due east, but it felt as if we were sailing into the very heart of the west in its most arresting Ossianism. What fitful wind there was could no more than slowly curl upward and reform the mists on the mountains. Wild duck passed away from us, and on dim shores we saw swans of an incredible whiteness. The rain trickled down our faces, soft to the lips, and in the air around was, sudden as a memory, an immemorial fragrance. I dislike vagueness, but it is not always easy to be precise, to be able to separate with certainty the imaginary from the real. And even in the most elusive experience of this kind there may be something so overwhelmingly real that it transcends the personal and becomes old as history, the history of a whole folk, linking the historic process with a potency greater than may be found in its tongue or its music. Some folk music does search this out, but what it is in the music that makes the appeal I do not know.

We decided all at once that until the Mate returned a week hence, we should make this loch our home; and, rain or no rain, the prospect made us happy. For we were due a carefree rest, after what had been to us strenuous and anxious days.

‘That sounds pretty good to me,’ said the Crew.

‘I’ll come back,’ said the Mate.

‘More cheers,’ said the Crew.

So what ho! for an anchorage. It would have to be a good one, sheltered, peaceful, and away from all human interference. The Book nobly rose to the occasion. Indeed it had obviously been keeping up its severe sleeve ever since we left Portnalong the word splendid. So we headed for ‘a small bay which affords splendid shelter in 2 to 3 fathoms . . . ’.

‘I think’, said the Mate, ‘you should make a special donation to the publishers.’

‘We may yet’, said the Crew, ‘be invited to become members of the Clyde Cruising Club itself.’

‘You certainly’, said the Mate, ‘have won your—uh—trousers.’

Which was a complicated point, because having worn out her grey trousers fore and aft through walking on her knees, etc., in the cabin, she had complained of a slight cramp amidships brought on by refusing to walk on her knees in the only remaining (and nicely creased) blue ones.

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘But there is an opening for you too. We could write to the Club and suggest that, excellent as their Book is, it might be made still more useful if to each anchorage was added a short note explaining where and how to catch fish.’