Somewhat higher lies Lorne towards the North, a country producing the best barley; divided by Loch Linnhe, a vast lake, upon which stands Beregonium, a castle, wherein the courts of justice were anciently kept: and not far from it Dunstaffnage, that is Stephen's Mount, anciently a seat of the kings; above which is Lochaber, a lake insinuating itself so far into the land out of the western sea, that it would meet the lake of Ness, which empties itself into the eastern ocean, did not the hills, which lie between, separate them by a very narrow neck. The chiefest place in this tract is Tarbert in Loch Kilkerran, where K. James 4, by authority of parliament, constituted a justice and sheriff, 1503, to administer justice to the inhabitants of the Southern isles. These countries, and these beyond them, were in the year of our Lord 605 held by those Picts, which Bede calls the northern Picts, where he tells us, that in the said year, Columbanus a priest and Abbot, famous for the profession of monkery, came out of Ireland into Britain, to instruct those in the Christian religion that by the high and fearful ridges of mountains, were sequestered from the Southern countries of the Picts; and that they in requital, granted him the island Hii, lying over against them, now called I-Columb-Kill;<492> of which in its proper place. Its stewards, in the last age, were the Lords of Lorne; but now by a female heir it is come to the Earls of Argyll, who always use this among their other titles of honour.

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