PASSING by Lady’s Rock lighthouse as storm clouds started to lift, we looked out across the Firth of Lorn and recalled the rock’s grisly heritage of murder most foul.

When Lachlan Maclean decided to murder his wife, he came up with a cunning plan. He rowed her out to the rock, knowing that she would drown as the high tide submerged all in its wake.

Suitably sombre, he told Lady Catherine Campbell’s family that she had succumbed to illness. Trouble was, they wanted her body borne back to Inveraray Castle for burial, and that was going to be a tad tricky given she’d been lost at sea.

With his entourage, he duly arrived with a suitably weighted coffin and was bemused when Lady Catherine’s brother Archie shed not a single tear. Then he was stunned to find his late wife sitting at the funeral feast table, alive and well.

Which was more than might be said about Lachlan not long later. He was found dead in bed in Edinburgh, his throat slit by Sir John Campbell, another of Catherine’s brothers. That was back in 1527, by the way, before you start searching news headlines.

I’m just back from a Scottish sojourn and sorting through the photos I took, so thought I’d share a few of them with you this week. There’ll be more tomorrow.