During our sail, Dr. Johnson asked about the use of the dirk, with which he imagined the Highlanders cut their meat.  He was told, they had a knife and fork besides, to eat with.  He asked, how did the women do? and was answered, some of them had a knife and fork too; but in general the men, when they had cut their meat, handed their knives and forks to the women, and they themselves eat with their fingers.  The old tutor of Macdonald always eat fish with his fingers, alledging that a knife and fork gave it a bad taste.  I took the liberty to observe to Dr. Johnson, that he did so.  ’Yes, said he; but it is because I am short-sighted, and afraid of bones, for which reason I am not fond of eating many kinds of fish, because I must use my fingers.’

Dr. M’Pherson’s Dissertations on Scottish Antiquities, which he had looked at when at Corrichatachin[577], being mentioned, he remarked, that ’you might read half an hour, and ask yourself what you had been reading:  there were so many words to so little matter, that there was no getting through the book.’

As soon as we reached the shore, we took leave of Kingsburgh, and mounted our horses.  We passed through a wild moor, in many places so soft that we were obliged to walk, which was very fatiguing to Dr. Johnson.  Once he had advanced on horseback to a very bad step.  There was a steep declivity on his left, to which he was so near, that there was not room for him to dismount in the usual way.  He tried to alight on the other side, as if he had been a young buck indeed, but in the attempt he fell at his length upon the ground; from which, however, he got up immediately without being hurt.  During this dreary ride, we were sometimes relieved by a view of branches of the sea, that universal medium of connection amongst mankind.  A guide, who had been sent with us from Kingsburgh, explored the way (much in the same manner as, I suppose, is pursued in the wilds of America,) by observing certain marks known only to the inhabitants.  We arrived at Dunvegan late in the afternoon.  The great size of the castle, which is partly old and partly new, and is built upon a rock close to the sea, while the land around it presents nothing but wild, moorish, hilly, and craggy appearances, gave a rude magnificence to the scene.  Having dismounted, we ascended a flight of steps, which was made by the late Macleod, for the accommodation of persons coming to him by land, there formerly being, for security, no other access to the castle but from the sea; so that visitors who came by the land were under the necessity of getting into a boat, and sailed round to the only place where it could be approached.  We were introduced into a stately dining-room, and received by Lady Macleod, mother of the laird, who, with his friend Talisker, having been detained on the road, did not arrive till some time after us.