The Right Honourable Sir George Murray, G.C.B., perhaps the most
distinguished member of the Ochtertyre family, after meritorious
service in Egypt and the Peninsular War, was chief of the general staff
under Wellington at Waterloo. He also served the State as a
politician, six times representing Perthshire in Parliament, and
attaining among many honours the office of Secretary of State for the
Colonies in the Duke of Wellington's Government of 1828. The present
Baronet is a worthy successor of an honoured line, and his generous
consideration for the public in throwing open his grounds and granting
the fullest facilities for their enjoyment deserves the highest praise.
It is claimed for Glenturret that the two last wolves seen in Scotland
were killed there. But a similar claim has been advanced for
Nairnshire, and, with far more likelihood, for the wilds of the Moor of
Rannoch. The glen, however, was long famous for its falcons. In few
places is the bird-life more various or abundant than in the woods of
bonnie Ochtertyre. And the rabbit, introduced there while the present
century was young, has evidently come to stay and to multiply.
At Upper Quoig two reputed witches once dwelt, but whether from greater
fear or greater enlightenment here than elsewhere, they were never
called to endure the ordeal either by fire or by water. They hunted in
couples apparently, for the story goes that two men at Clathick, rising
early on a May morning, saw them coming up the burn-side, putting a
tether across the stream, and saying, "Come all to me." This
incantation succeeded in providing the witches' dairy with a double
supply of milk, while their neighbours had none! Verily many poor old
crones have lost their lives on as trivial a charge. Passing westward
to the compact property of Clathick, now owned by Captain Campbell
Colquhoun, we learn that it was given off from Ochtertyre in dowry with
a Miss Mary Murray. It was a curious marriage contract provision that
her initials should be cut upon each lintel, and men were living thirty
years ago who had seen "M.M." carved on the stones of the old house.
The estate of Lawers conjures up from the deep oblivion of ages many
stirring times. It was originally "Fordie," but was named Lawers after
the Campbells from Loch Tayside came into possession. How different
our quiet Christian Lord's Days and "kirk-yard cracks" from these
Sunday and festival occasions of bloodshed,
"When strangers from Breadalbane
And clansmen from Loch Tay
Brought to the priest their offerings,
But fought each holy day!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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