Note 29 — Chapter VII · LEGENDS AND LITERARY NOTABILIA.
Reading edition
Collins's long Ode on Popular Superstitions in the Highlands of Scotland, addressed to Home, author of Douglas, contains some excellent rhetorical passages. Speaking of the second-sighted seer, Collins represents him as one who
"In the depth of Uist's dark forest dwells."
We may say of Uist what Lord Rosebery said of Caithness, that it is entirely delivered from the contaminating influence of foliage. The air one breathes there does not suffer deterioration by coming through any such dark forest as Collins mentions: it blows from the Atlantic in an absolutely pure and strong condition.