Country Life

At daggers drawn

IN 1910, there appeared in Inverness a catalogue for the auction of stock from John Munro’s Old Curiosity Shop in Castle Street. Lot 377a was ‘an old dirk with ivory handle inlaid with gold’. A colourful tale is attached to this weapon. It had, so the story went, belonged to Alexander Fraser, son of Thomas, Lord Lovat, a local clan chieftain. In about 1700, Fraser had attended a wedding at Teawig, a farm that still sits on a sharp bend in the road near the village of Beauly in Inverness-shire. The property was an island of Clan Chisholm ownership amid vast Fraser landholdings.

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from Country Life

Country Life3 min read
There Is No Sting In This Tale
THERE are beautiful insects and insects handsome to the human eye, but among the least pretty of those six-limbed legions is one directly descended from ancestors that flourished in the Permian period, some 250 million years ago. It is a living fossi
Country Life4 min read
I Don’t Think You’re Ready For This Jelly
SAVOURY jelly. For some, a wobbling vision of edible hell, the very essence of fleshy malaise. For others, a tremulous delight, as delicate as it is pellucid, invalid food made majestic. But whatever your view, these jellies remain a resolutely adult
Country Life3 min read
Kindred Spirits
IN 1979/1980, I had a cupboard/office in Covent Garden. When in funds, I would walk around to Joe Allen’s, where it was almost impossible to get a table, and hope that its maître d’, the famous restaurateur Jeremy King, would seat me. His next move w

Related Books & Audiobooks