Scotland/Scots > Black's picturesque tourist of Scotland

QUIRAING.
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this part of the coast are extremely fine, but it is almost as
easy to scale them as to know their names, especially when
pronounced by the liquid and accommodating tongues of natives.
Two miles to the west of Loch Staffin is the celebrated
Quiraing.
The mountain in which this wonderful series of rocks is
placed is about 1000 feet in height, sloping by a steep declivity
towards the west, but presenting north-eastwards a face of
rugged precipices, varied by huge uprising columns of basalt,
and massy fragments of fluted rock. In other parts large
spaces forming concave sections present themselves to view,
ribbed by fissures and projecting seams, between which, in
moist weather (which is seldom wanting) streamlets descend in
lengthened silvery streaks. Quiraing itself consists of a ver¬
dant platform, covered with an even turf 100 paces long by
66 broad. It is studded all round with massive columns of
rock, rising up in lofty peaks, by the intervention of deep
chasms, which are, for the most part, inaccessible. On
approaching the great inlet to the platform, the passage is
mpch obstructed by heaps of stones and rubbish, washed down
o^fallen during the waste of ages.
An isolated pyramidal clifl', called the Needle, stands guard
to-'the right of the entrance. The traveller gains the top of
the rugged pass, and is struck with wonder at the scene which
presents itself. Instead of a dark and narrow cave, he beholds
the spacious opening spread before him, with the verdant plat-
foftn in its centre, to which by a short descending path he
may thread his way. He now beholds the rocks frowning aloft,
add the rugged cliffs ranging themselves in circles around him.
Rocky pyramids, like a bulwark, encompass the fairy plain on
which he stands. All is felt to be. a dreary solitude ; yet there
islia pleasing beauty in the silent repose. A panoramic view
of: the distant sea and district below is visible only in detached
fragments, through the rugged clefts and chasms, between the
surrounding pyramids*
* Tourists who may prefer visiting Quiraing by the carriage roaT instead of by
the sea-coast path or by boat, can do so by taking a vehicle to Uig, a small hamlet
on the west coast of the peninsula of Trotternish, and sit miles from Quiraing. A
guide and refreshment, and a pony and cart may be got at the small inn at L'ig, and