Our eighteen-mile walk had given us a good idea of “Caledonia stern and wild,” and at the same time had developed in us an enormous appetite when by two o’clock we entered the hotel facing Bonar Bridge for our dinner.  The bridge was a fine substantial iron structure of about 150 feet span, having a stone arching at either end, and was of great importance, as it connected main roads and did away with the ferry which once existed there.  As we crossed the bridge we noticed two vessels from Sunderland discharging coals, and some fallen fir-trees lying on the side of the water apparently waiting shipment for colliery purposes, apt illustrations of the interchange of productions.  There were many fine plantations of fir-trees near Bonar Bridge, and as we passed the railway station we saw a rather substantial building across the water which we were informed was the “Puirshoose,” or “Poor House.”

Observing a village school to the left of our road, we looked through the open door; but the room was empty, so we called at the residence of the schoolmaster adjoining to get some reliable information about our further way, We found him playing on a piano and very civil and obliging, and he advised us to stay for the night at what was known as the Half-way House, which we should find on the hill road to Dingwall, and so named because it was halfway between Bonar and Alness, and nine miles from Bonar.  Our road for the first two miles was close along Dornoch Firth, and the fine plantations of trees afforded us some protection against the wind and rain; then we left the highway and turned to the right, along the hill road.  After a steep ascent for more than a mile, we passed under a lofty elevation, and found ourselves once more amongst the heather-bells so dear to the heart of every true Scot.

At this point we could not help lingering awhile to view the magnificent scene below.  What a gorgeous panorama!  The wide expanse of water, the bridge we had lately crossed and the adjoining small village, the fine plantations of trees, the duke’s monument rising above the woods at Golspie, were all visible, but obscured in places by the drifting showers.  If the “Clerk of the Weather” had granted us sunshine instead of rain, we should have had a glorious prospect not soon to be forgotten.  But we had still three miles to walk, or, as the people in the north style it, to travel, before we could reach the Half-Way House, when we met a solitary pedestrian, who as soon as he saw us coming sat down on a stone and awaited us until we got within speaking distance, when he began to talk to us.  He was the Inspector of Roads, and had been walking first in one direction and then in the other during the whole of the day.  He said he liked to speak to everybody he saw, as the roads were so very lonely in his district.  He informed us that the Half-Way House was a comfortable place, and we could not do better than stay there for the night.