[Gazetteer of Scotland Contents]
GALLOWAY (Mull of,) a remarkable and well-known promontory, forming the southern point of the Rinns of Galloway, in the parish of Kirkmaiden, Wigtonshire. It is an exceedingly bold rocky headland, 1½ mile long, and ¼ of a mile broad, stretching from west to east nearly at right angles with the eastern coast of the mainland, and connected with the country behind it by a long isthmus, the sides of which are indented with small bays called respectively East and West Tarbet. The south and south-west fronts of the promontory break down almost precipitously into the sea, and are perforated with caverns in which the billows, during a southerly wind and a flowing tide, roll and tumultuate with a reverberating sound resembling thunder. On the promontory, in North lat. 54° 38′, and. West long. 4° 52′ from Greenwich, a lighthouse, erected in 1830, displays an intermittent light, which alternately blazes on the view during 2½ minutes, and suffers eclipse during ½ a minute, and is seen at the distance of 21 nautical miles. It is 21 miles north-north-west from Point-of-Ayre lighthouse in the isle of Man; and the same distance, south-east by east, from Copeland lighthouse on the Irish coast. From the balcony of the lighthouse are seen the Alpine summits of the southern Highlands of Scotland, the towering Paps of Jura, a far expanse of the Irish sea, 90 miles of the coast of Ireland, the whole of the isle of Man, and the shrowded and far-away mountain-peaks of Cumberland, – forming altogether one of the most magnificent scenes which Scotland, rich and prodigal in the brilliance and variety of her landscapes, spreads out for tutoring the taste, and sublimating the feelings, and inciting or aiding the heavenward aspirings of her children.