This singular event made a profound sensation in the country.
It was a thing unheard of that a lake should in the space of a few
minutes empty itself, and disappear into the bowels of the earth.
There was nothing for it but to erase Loch Katrine from the map of
Scotland until (by public subscription) it could be refilled, care being
of course taken, in the first place, to stop the rent up tight.
This catastrophe would have been the death of Sir Walter Scott,
had he still been in the world.
The accident was explicable when it was ascertained that,
between the bed of the lake and the vast cavity beneath,
the geological strata had become reduced to a thin layer,
incapable of longer sustaining the weight of water.
Now, although to most people this event seemed plainly due
to natural causes, yet to James Starr and his friends,
Simon and Harry Ford, the question constantly recurred,
was it not rather to be attributed to malevolence?
Uneasy suspicions continually harassed their minds.
Was their evil
genius about to renew his persecution of those who ventured to work
this rich mine?
At the cottage, some days later, James Starr thus discussed
the matter with the old man and his son: "Well, Simon," said he,
"to my thinking we must class this circumstance with the others
for which we still seek elucidation, although it is no doubt
possible to explain it by natural causes.
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