VOYAGE TO THE SHETLAND ISLES, ETC. — SCOTT'S DIARY KEPT ON BOARD
THE LIGHTHOUSE YACHT
The gallant composure with which Scott, when he had dismissed a work
from his desk, awaited the decision of the public—and the healthy
elasticity of spirit with which he could meanwhile turn his whole
zeal upon new or different objects—are among the features in his
character which will always, I believe, strike the student of
literary history as most remarkable. We have now seen him before the
fate of Waverley had been determined—before he had heard a word
about its reception in England, except from one partial
confidant—preparing to start on a voyage to the northern isles,
which was likely to occupy the best part of two months, and in the
course of which he could hardly expect to receive any intelligence
from his friends in Edinburgh. The Diary which he kept during this
expedition is—thanks to the leisure of a landsman on board—a very
full one; and, written without the least notion probably that it
would ever be perused except in his own family circle, it affords
such a complete and artless portraiture of the man, as he was in
himself, and as he mingled with his friends and companions, at one
of the most interesting periods of his life, that I am persuaded
every reader will be pleased to see it printed in its original
state. A few extracts from it were published by himself, in one of
the Edinburgh Annual Registers—he also drew from it some of the
notes to his Lord of the Isles, and the substance of several
others for his romance of the Pirate. But the recurrence
of these detached passages will not be complained of—expounded and
illustrated as the reader will find them by the personal details of
the context.
I have been often told by one of the companions of this voyage, that
heartily as Scott entered throughout into their social enjoyments,
they all perceived him, when inspecting for the first time scenes of
remarkable grandeur, to be in such an abstracted and excited mood,
that they felt it would be the kindest and discreetest plan to leave
him to himself. "I often," said Lord Kinnedder, "on coming up from
the cabin at night, found him pacing the deck rapidly, muttering to
himself—and went to the forecastle, lest my presence should disturb
him. I remember, that at Loch Corriskin, in particular, he seemed
quite overwhelmed with his feelings; and we all saw it, and retiring
unnoticed, left him to roam and gaze about by himself, until it was
time to muster the party and be gone." Scott used to mention the
surprise with which he himself witnessed Erskine's emotion on first
entering the Cave of Staffa. "Would you believe it?" he said—"my
poor Willie sat down and wept like a woman!" Yet his own
sensibilities, though betrayed in a more masculine and sterner
guise, were perhaps as keen as well as deeper than his amiable
friend's.
VACATION, 1814.
Voyage in the Lighthouse Yacht to Nova Zembla, and the
Lord knows where.
"July 29, 1814.—Sailed from Leith about one o'clock on board
the Lighthouse Yacht, conveying six guns, and ten men, commanded
by Mr. Wilson. The company: Commissioners of the Northern Lights,
Robert Hamilton, Sheriff of Lanarkshire; William Erskine, Sheriff
of Orkney and Zetland; Adam Duff, Sheriff of Forfarshire.
Non-commissioners, Ipse Ego; Mr. David Marjoribanks, son
to John Marjoribanks, Provost of Edinburgh, a young gentleman;
Rev. Mr. Turnbull, minister of Tingwall, in the presbytery of
Shetland. But the official chief of the expedition is Mr.
Stevenson, the Surveyor-Viceroy over the Commissioners—a most
gentlemanlike and modest man, and well known by his scientific
skill.[59]
"Reached the Isle of May in the evening; went ashore, and saw the
light—an old tower, and much in the form of a border-keep, with
a beacon-grate on the top. It is to be abolished for an oil
revolving-light, the grate-fire only being ignited upon the
leeward side when the wind is very high. Quære—Might not the
grate revolve? The isle had once a cell or two upon it. The
vestiges of the chapel are still visible. Mr. Stevenson proposed
demolishing the old tower, and I recommended ruining it à la
picturesque—i. e., demolishing it partially. The island might
be made a delightful residence for sea-bathers.
"On board again in the evening: watched the progress of the ship
round Fifeness, and the revolving motion of the now distant
Bell-Rock light until the wind grew rough, and the landsmen sick.
To bed at eleven, and slept sound.
"30th July.—Waked at six by the steward; summoned to visit the
Bell-Rock, where the beacon is well worthy attention. Its
dimensions are well known; but no description can give the idea
of this slight, solitary, round tower, trembling amid the
billows, and fifteen miles from Arbroath, the nearest shore. The
fitting up within is not only handsome, but elegant. All work of
wood (almost) is wainscot; all hammer-work brass; in short,
exquisitely fitted up. You enter by a ladder of rope, with wooden
steps, about thirty feet from the bottom, where the mason-work
ceases to be solid, and admits of round apartments. The lowest
is a storehouse for the people's provisions, water,
etc.; above that a storehouse for the lights, of oil, etc.; then
the kitchen of the people, three in number; then their sleeping
chamber; then the saloon or parlor, a neat little room; above
all, the lighthouse; all communicating by oaken ladders, with
brass rails, most handsomely and conveniently executed.
Breakfasted in the parlor.[60] On board again at nine, and run
down, through a rough sea, to Aberbrothock, vulgarly called
Arbroath. All sick, even Mr. Stevenson. God grant this occur
seldom! Landed and dined at Arbroath, where we were to take up
Adam Duff. We visited the appointments of the lighthouse
establishment—a handsome tower, with two wings. These contain
the lodgings of the keepers of the light—very handsome, indeed,
and very clean. They might be thought too handsome, were it not
of consequence to give those men, entrusted with a duty so
laborious and slavish, a consequence in the eyes of the public
and in their own. The central part of the building forms a single
tower, corresponding with the lighthouse. As the keepers'
families live here, they are apprised each morning by a signal
that all is well. If this signal be not made, a tender sails
for the rock directly. I visited the abbey church for the third
time, the first being—eheu![61]—the second with T. Thomson.
Dined at Arbroath, and came on board at night, where I made up
this foolish journal, and now beg for wine and water. So the
vessel is once more in motion.
"31st July.—Waked at seven; vessel off Fowlsheugh and
Dunnottar. Fair wind, and delightful day; glide enchantingly
along the coast of Kincardineshire, and open the bay of Nigg
about ten. At eleven, off Aberdeen; the gentlemen go ashore to
Girdle-Ness, a projecting point of rock to the east of the
harbor of Foot-Dee. There the magistrates of Aberdeen
wish to have a fort and beacon-light. The Oscar, whaler, was lost
here last year, with all her hands, excepting two; about forty
perished. Dreadful, to be wrecked so near a large and populous
town! The view of Old and New Aberdeen from the sea is quite
beautiful. About noon proceed along the coast of Aberdeenshire,
which, to the northwards, changes from a bold and rocky to a low
and sandy character. Along the bay of Belhelvie, a whole parish
was swallowed up by the shifting sands, and is still a desolate
waste. It belonged to the Earls of Errol, and was rented at £500
a year at the time. When these sands are passed the land is all
arable. Not a tree to be seen; nor a grazing cow, or sheep, or
even a labor-horse at grass, though this be Sunday. The next
remarkable object was a fragment of the old castle of Slains, on
a precipitous bank, overlooking the sea. The fortress was
destroyed when James VI. marched north [A. D. 1594], after the
battle of Glenlivet, to reduce Huntly and Errol to obedience. The
family then removed to their present mean habitation, for such it
seems, a collection of low houses forming a quadrangle, one side
of which is built on the very verge of the precipice that
overhangs the ocean. What seems odd, there are no stairs down to
the beach. Imprudence, or ill-fortune as fatal as the sands of
Belhelvie, has swallowed up the estate of Errol, excepting this
dreary mansion-house, and a farm or two adjoining. We took to the
boat, and running along the coast had some delightful sea-views
to the northward of the castle. The coast is here very rocky; but
the rocks, being rather soft, are wasted and corroded by the
constant action of the waves,—and the fragments which remain,
where the softer parts have been washed away, assume the
appearance of old Gothic ruins. There are open arches, towers,
steeples, and so forth. One part of this scaur is called
Dunbuy, being colored yellow by the dung of the sea-fowls, who
build there in the most surprising numbers. We caught three young
gulls. But the most curious object was the celebrated Buller of
Buchan, a huge rocky cauldron, into which the sea rushes through
a natural arch of rock. I walked round the top; in one place the
path is only about two feet wide, and a monstrous precipice on
either side. We then rowed into the cauldron or buller from
beneath, and saw nothing around us but a regular wall of black
rock, and nothing above but the blue sky. A fishing
hamlet had sent out its inhabitants, who, gazing from the brink,
looked like sylphs looking down upon gnomes. In the side of the
cauldron opens a deep black cavern. Johnson says it might be a
retreat from storms, which is nonsense. In a high gale the waves
rush in with incredible violence. An old fisher said he had seen
them flying over the natural wall of the buller, which cannot be
less than 200 feet high. Same old man says Slains is now
inhabited by a Mr. Bowles, who comes so far from the southward
that naebody kens whare he comes frae. 'Was he frae the
Indies?'—'Na; he did not think he came that road. He was far
frae the southland. Naebody ever heard the name of the place; but
he had brought more guid out o' Peterhead than a' the Lords he
had seen in Slains, and he had seen three.' About half-past five
we left this interesting spot, and after a hard pull reached the
yacht. Weather falls hazy, and rather calm; but at sea we observe
vessels enjoying more wind. Pass Peterhead, dimly distinguishing
two steeples and a good many masts. Mormounthill said to resemble
a coffin—a likeness of which we could not judge, Mormount being
for the present invisible. Pass Rattray-Head: near this cape are
dangerous shelves, called the Bridge of Rattray. Here the wreck
of the Doris merchant vessel came on shore, lost last year with a
number of passengers for Shetland. We lie off all night.
"1st August.—Off Fraserburgh—a neat little town. Mr.
Stevenson and the Commissioners go on shore to look at a light
maintained there upon an old castle, on a cape called Kinnaird's
Head. The morning being rainy, and no object of curiosity ashore,
I remain on board, to make up my journal, and write home.
"The old castle, now bearing the light, is a picturesque object
from the sea. It was the baronial mansion of the Frasers, now
Lords Saltoun—an old square tower with a minor fortification
towards the landing-place on the sea-side. About eleven, the
Commissioners came off, and we leave this town, the extreme point
of the Moray Firth, to stretch for Shetland—salute the castle
with three guns, and stretch out with a merry gale. See Mormount,
a long flattish-topped hill near to the West Trouphead, and
another bold cliff promontory projecting into the firth.
Our gale soon failed, and we are now all but becalmed; songs,
ballads, recitations, backgammon, and piquet, for the rest of the
day. Noble sunset and moon rising; we are now out of sight of
land.
"2d August.—At sea in the mouth of the Moray Firth. This day
almost a blank—light baffling airs, which do us very little
good; most of the landsmen sick, more or less; piquet,
backgammon, and chess, the only resources.—P.M. A breeze, and
we begin to think we have passed the Fair Isle, lying between
Shetland and Orkney, at which it was our intention to have
touched. In short, like one of Sinbad's adventures, we have run
on till neither captain nor pilot know exactly where we are. The
breeze increases—weather may be called rough; worse and worse
after we are in our berths, nothing but booming, trampling, and
whizzing of waves about our ears, and ever and anon, as we fall
asleep, our ribs come in contact with those of the vessel; hail
Duff and the Udaller[62] in the after-cabin, but they are too
sick to answer. Towards morning, calm (comparative), and a nap.
"3d August.—At sea as before; no appearance of land; proposed
that the Sheriff of Zetland do issue a meditatione fugæ warrant
against his territories, which seem to fly from us. Pass two
whalers; speak the nearest, who had come out of Lerwick, which is
about twenty miles distant; stand on with a fine breeze. About
nine at night, with moonlight and strong twilight, we weather the
point of Bard-head, and enter a channel about three quarters of a
mile broad which forms the southern entrance to the harbor of
Lerwick, where we cast anchor about half-past ten, and put Mr.
Turnbull on shore.
"4th August.—Harbor of Lerwick. Admire the excellence of this
harbor of the metropolis of Shetland. It is a most beautiful
place, screened on all sides from the wind by hills of a gentle
elevation. The town, a fishing village built irregularly upon a
hill ascending from the shore, has a picturesque appearance. On
the left is Fort Charlotte, garrisoned of late by two companies
of veterans. The Greenlandmen, of which nine fine vessels are
lying in the harbor, add much to the liveliness of the scene. Mr.
Duncan, Sheriff-substitute, came off to pay his respects to his
principal; he is married to a daughter of my early
acquaintance, Walter Scott of Scotshall. We go ashore. Lerwick, a
poor-looking place, the streets flagged instead of being
causewayed, for there are no wheel-carriages. The streets full of
drunken riotous sailors from the whale-vessels. It seems these
ships take about 1000 sailors from Zetland every year, and return
them as they come back from the fishery. Each sailor may gain
from £20 to £30, which is paid by the merchants of Lerwick, who
have agencies from the owners of the whalers in England. The
whole return may be between £25,000 and £30,000. These
Zetlanders, as they get a part of this pay on landing, make a
point of treating their English messmates, who get drunk of
course, and are very riotous. The Zetlanders themselves do not
get drunk, but go straight home to their houses, and reserve
their hilarity for the winter season, when they spend their wages
in dancing and drinking. Erskine finds employment as Sheriff, for
the neighborhood of the fort enables him to make main forte,
and secure a number of the rioters. We visit F. Charlotte, which
is a neat little fort mounting ten heavy guns to the sea, but
only one to the land. Major F., the Governor, showed us the fort;
it commands both entrances of the harbor: the north entrance is
not very good, but the south capital. The water in the harbor is
very deep, as frigates of the smaller class lie almost close to
the shore. Take a walk with Captain M'Diarmid, a gentlemanlike
and intelligent officer of the garrison; we visit a small
fresh-water loch called Cleik-him-in; it borders on the sea,
from which it is only divided by a sort of beach, apparently
artificial: though the sea lashes the outside of this beach, the
water of the lake is not brackish. In this lake are the remains
of a Picts' castle, but ruinous. The people think the castle has
not been built on a natural island, but on an artificial one
formed by a heap of stones. These Duns or Picts' castles are so
small, it is impossible to conceive what effectual purpose they
could serve excepting a temporary refuge for the chief.—Leave
Cleik-him-in, and proceed along the coast. The ground is
dreadfully encumbered with stones; the patches which have been
sown with oats and barley bear very good crops, but they are mere
patches, the cattle and ponies feeding amongst them, and
secured by tethers. The houses most wretched, worse than the
worst herd's house I ever saw. It would be easy to form a good
farm by enclosing the ground with Galloway dykes, which
would answer the purpose of clearing it at the same time of
stones; and as there is plenty of limeshell, marle, and
alga-marina, manure could not be wanting. But there are several
obstacles to improvement, chiefly the undivided state of the
properties, which lie run-rig; then the claims of Lord Dundas,
the lord of the country, and above all, perhaps, the state of the
common people, who, dividing their attention between the fishery
and the cultivation, are not much interested in the latter, and
are often absent at the proper times of labor. Their ground is
chiefly dug with the spade, and their ploughs are beyond
description awkward. An odd custom prevails: any person, without
exception (if I understand rightly), who wishes to raise a few
kail, fixes upon any spot he pleases, encloses it with a dry
stone wall, uses it as a kailyard till he works out the soil,
then deserts it and makes another. Some dozen of these little
enclosures, about twenty or thirty feet square, are in sight at
once. They are called planty-cruives; and the Zetlanders are so
far from reckoning this an invasion, or a favor on the part of
the proprietor, that their most exaggerated description of an
avaricious person is one who would refuse liberty for a
planty-cruive; or to infer the greatest contempt of another,
they will say, they would not hold a planty-cruive of him. It
is needless to notice how much this license must interfere with
cultivation.
"Leaving the cultivated land, we turn more inland, and pass two
or three small lakes. The muirs are mossy and sterile in the
highest degree; the hills are clad with stunted heather,
intermixed with huge great stones; much of an astringent root
with a yellow flower, called Tormentil, used by the islanders
in dressing leather in lieu of the oak bark. We climbed a hill,
about three miles from Lerwick, to a cairn which presents a fine
view of the indented coast of the island, and the distant isles
of Mousa and others. Unfortunately the day is rather hazy—return
by a circuitous route, through the same sterile country. These
muirs are used as a commonty by the proprietors of the parishes
in which they lie, and each, without any regard to the extent of
his peculiar property, puts as much stock upon them as he
chooses. The sheep are miserable looking, hairy-legged
creatures, of all colors, even to sky-blue. I often
wondered where Jacob got speckled lambs; I think now they must
have been of the Shetland stock. In our return, pass the upper
end of the little lake of Cleik-him-in, which is divided by a
rude causeway from another small loch, communicating with it,
however, by a sluice, for the purpose of driving a mill. But such
a mill! The wheel is horizontal, with the cogs turned diagonally
to the water; the beam stands upright, and is inserted in a
stone-quern of the old-fashioned construction. This simple
machine is enclosed in a hovel about the size of a pig-sty—and
there is the mill![63] There are about 500 such mills in
Shetland, each incapable of grinding more than a sack at a time.
"I cannot get a distinct account of the nature of the land
rights. The Udal proprietors have ceased to exist, yet proper
feudal tenures seem ill understood. Districts of ground are in
many instances understood to belong to Townships or Communities,
possessing what may be arable by patches, and what is muir as a
commonty, pro indiviso. But then individuals of such a Township
often take it upon them to grant feus of particular parts of the
property thus possessed pro indiviso. The town of Lerwick is
built upon a part of the commonty of Sound, the proprietors of
the houses having feu-rights from different heritors of that
Township, but why from one rather than another, or how even the
whole Township combining (which has not yet been attempted) could
grant such a right upon principle, seems altogether uncertain. In
the mean time the chief stress is laid upon occupance. I should
have supposed, upon principle that Lord Dundas, as superior,
possessed the dominium eminens, and ought to be resorted to as
the source of land rights. But it is not so. It has been found
that the heritors of each Township hold directly of the Crown,
only paying the Scat, or Norwegian land-tax, and other duties
to his lordship, used and wont. Besides, he has what are called
property lands in every Township, or in most, which he lets to
his tenants. Lord Dundas is now trying to introduce the system of
leases and a better kind of agriculture.[64] Return home and
dine at Sinclair's, a decent inn—Captain M'Diarmid and
other gentlemen dine with us.—Sleep at the inn on a straw couch.
"5th August 1814.—Hazy disagreeable morning;—Erskine trying
the rioters—notwithstanding which, a great deal of rioting still
in the town. The Greenlanders, however, only quarrelled among
themselves, and the Zetland sailors seemed to exert themselves in
keeping peace. They are, like all the other Zetlanders I have
seen, a strong, clear-complexioned, handsome race, and the women
are very pretty. The females are rather slavishly employed,
however, and I saw more than one carrying home the heavy
sea-chests of their husbands, brothers, or lovers, discharged
from on board the Greenlanders. The Zetlanders are, however, so
far provident, that when they enter the navy they make liberal
allowance of their pay for their wives and families. Not less
than £15,000 a year has been lately paid by the Admiralty on this
account; yet this influx of money, with that from the Greenland
fishery, seems rather to give the means of procuring useless
indulgences than of augmenting the stock of productive labor. Mr.
Collector Ross tells me that from the King's books it appears
that the quantity of spirits, tea, coffee, tobacco, snuff, and
sugar, imported annually into Lerwick for the consumption of
Zetland, averages at sale price, £20,000 yearly, at the least.
Now the inhabitants of Zetland, men, women, and children, do not
exceed 22,000 in all, and the proportion of foreign luxuries
seems monstrous, unless we allow for the habits contracted by the
seamen in their foreign trips. Tea, in particular, is used by all
ranks, and porridge quite exploded.
"We parade Lerwick. The most remarkable thing is, that the main
street being flagged, and all the others very narrow lanes
descending the hill by steps, anything like a cart, of the most
ordinary and rude construction, seems not only out of question
when the town was built, but in its present state quite excluded.
A road of five miles in length, on the line between Lerwick and
Scalloway, has been already made—upon a very awkward and
expensive plan, and ill-lined as may be supposed. But it is
proposed to extend this road by degrees: carts will then be
introduced, and by crossing the breed of their ponies
judiciously, they will have Galloways to draw them. The streets
of Lerwick (as one blunder perpetrates another) will
then be a bar to improvement, for till the present houses are
greatly altered, no cart can approach the quay. In the garden of
Captain Nicolson, R. N., which is rather in a flourishing state,
he has tried various trees, almost all of which have died except
the willow. But the plants seem to me to be injured in their
passage; seeds would perhaps do better. We are visited by several
of the notables of the island, particularly Mr. Mowat, a
considerable proprietor, who claims acquaintance with me as the
friend of my father, and remembers me as a boy. The day clearing
up, Duff and I walk with this good old gentleman to
Cleik-him-in, and with some trouble drag a boat off the beach
into the fresh-water loch, and go to visit the Picts' castle. It
is of considerable size, and consists of three circular walls of
huge natural stones admirably combined without cement. The outer
circuit seems to have been simply a bounding wall or bulwark; the
second or interior defence contains lodgments such as I shall
describe. This inner circuit is surrounded by a wall of about
sixteen or eighteen feet thick, composed, as I said, of huge
massive stones placed in layers with great art, but without
mortar or cement. The wall is not perpendicular, but the circle
lessens gradually towards the top, as an old-fashioned
pigeon-house. Up the interior of this wall there proceeds a
circular winding gallery ascending in the form of an inclined
plane, so as to gain the top by circling round like a corkscrew
within the walls. This is enlightened by little apertures (about
two feet by three) into the inside, and also, it is said, by
small slits—of which I saw none. It is said there are marks of
galleries within the circuit, running parallel to the horizon;
these I saw no remains of; and the interior gallery, with its
apertures, is so extremely low and narrow, being only about three
feet square, that it is difficult to conceive how it could serve
the purpose of communication. At any rate, the size fully
justifies the tradition prevalent here as well as in the south of
Scotland, that the Picts were a diminutive race. More of this
when we see the more perfect specimen of a Pict castle in Mousa,
which we resolve to examine, if it be possible. Certainly I am
deeply curious to see what must be one of the most ancient houses
in the world, built by a people who, while they seem to have
bestowed much pains on their habitations, knew neither the art
of cement, of arches, or of stairs. The situation is
wild, dreary, and impressive. On the land side are huge sheets
and fragments of rocks, interspersed with a stinted vegetation of
grass and heath, which bears no proportion to the rocks and
stones. From the top of his tower the Pictish Monarch might look
out upon a stormy sea, washing a succession of rocky capes,
reaches, and headlands, and immediately around him was the deep
fresh-water loch on which his fortress was constructed. It
communicates with the land by a sort of causeway, formed, like
the artificial islet itself, by heaping together stones till the
pile reached the surface of the water. This is usually passable,
but at present overflooded.—Return and dine with Mr. Duncan,
Sheriff-substitute—are introduced to Dr. Edmonstone, author of a
History of Shetland, who proposes to accompany us to-morrow to
see the Cradle of Noss. I should have mentioned that Mr.
Stevenson sailed this morning with the yacht to survey some isles
to the northward; he returns on Saturday, it is hoped.
"6th August.—Hire a six-oared boat, whaler-built, with a taper
point at each end, so that the rudder can be hooked on either at
pleasure. These vessels look very frail, but are admirably
adapted to the stormy seas, where they live when a ship's boat
stiffly and compactly built must necessarily perish. They owe
this to their elasticity and lightness. Some of the rowers wear a
sort of coats of dressed sheep leather, sewed together with
thongs. We sailed out at the southern inlet of the harbor,
rounding successively the capes of the Hammer, Kirkubus, the
Ving, and others, consisting of bold cliffs, hollowed into
caverns, or divided into pillars and arches of fantastic
appearance, by the constant action of the waves. As we passed the
most northerly of these capes, called, I think, the Ord, and
turned into the open sea, the scenes became yet more tremendously
sublime. Rocks upwards of three or four hundred feet in height
presented themselves in gigantic succession, sinking
perpendicularly into the main, which is very deep even within a
few fathoms of their base. One of these capes is called the
Bard-head; a huge projecting arch is named the Giant's Leg.
'Here the lone sea-bird wakes its wildest cry.'[65]
Not lone, however, in one sense, for their numbers and
the variety of their tribes are immense, though I think they do
not quite equal those of Dunbuy, on the coast of Buchan. Standing
across a little bay, we reached the Isle of Noss, having hitherto
coasted the shore of Bressay. Here we see a detached and
precipitous rock, or island, being a portion rent by a narrow
sound from the rest of the cliff, and called the Holm. This
detached rock is wholly inaccessible, unless by a pass of peril,
entitled the Cradle of Noss, which is a sort of wooden chair,
travelling from precipice to precipice on rings, which run upon
two cables stretched across over the gulf. We viewed this
extraordinary contrivance from beneath, at the distance of
perhaps one hundred fathoms at least. The boatmen made light of
the risk of crossing it, but it must be tremendous to a brain
disposed to be giddy. Seen from beneath, a man in the basket
would resemble a large crow or raven floating between rock and
rock. The purpose of this strange contrivance is to give the
tenant the benefit of putting a few sheep upon the Holm, the top
of which is level, and affords good pasture. The animals are
transported in the cradle by one at a time, a shepherd holding
them upon his knees. The channel between the Holm and the isle is
passable by boats in calm weather, but not at the time when we
saw it. Rowing on through a heavy tide, and nearer the breakers
than any but Zetlanders would have ventured, we rounded another
immensely high cape, called by the islanders the Noup of Noss,
but by sailors Hang-cliff, from its having a projecting
appearance. This was the highest rock we had yet seen, though not
quite perpendicular. Its height has never been measured: I should
judge it exceeds 600 feet; it has been conjectured to measure 800
and upwards. Our steersman had often descended this precipitous
rock, having only the occasional assistance of a rope, one end of
which he secured from time to time round some projecting cliff.
The collecting sea-fowl for their feathers was the object, and he
might gain five or six dozen, worth eight or ten shillings, by
such an adventure. These huge precipices abound with caverns,
many of which run much farther into the rock than any one has
ventured to explore. We entered (with much hazard to our boat)
one called the Orkney-man's Harbor, because an Orkney vessel run
in there some years since to escape a French privateer.
The entrance was lofty enough to admit us without striking the
mast, but a sudden turn in the direction of the cave would have
consigned us to utter darkness if we had gone in farther. The
dropping of the sea-fowl and cormorants into the water from the
sides of the cavern, when disturbed by our approach, had
something in it wild and terrible.
"After passing the Noup, the precipices become lower, and sink
into a rocky shore with deep indentations, called by the natives,
Gios. Here we would fain have landed to visit the Cradle from
the top of the cliff, but the surf rendered it impossible. We
therefore rowed on like Thalaba, in 'Allah's name,' around the
Isle of Noss, and landed upon the opposite side of the small
sound which divides it from Bressay. Noss exactly resembles in
shape Salisbury crags, supposing the sea to flow down the valley
called the Hunter's bog, and round the foot of the precipice. The
eastern part of the isle is fine smooth pasture, the best I have
seen in these isles, sloping upwards to the verge of the
tremendous rocks which form its western front.
"As we are to dine at Gardie-House (the seat of young Mr. Mowat),
on the Isle of Bressay, Duff and I—who went together on this
occasion—resolve to walk across the island, about three miles,
being by this time thoroughly wet. Bressay is a black and heathy
isle, full of little lochs and bogs. Through storm and shade, and
dense and dry, we find our way to Gardie, and have then to
encounter the sublunary difficulties of wanting the keys of our
portmanteaus, etc., the servants having absconded to see the
Cradle. These being overcome, we are most hospitably treated at
Gardie. Young Mr. Mowat, son of my old friend, is an improver,
and a moderate one. He has got a ploughman from Scotland, who
acts as grieve, but as yet with the prejudices and
inconveniences which usually attach themselves to the most
salutary experiments. The ploughman complains that the Zetlanders
work as if a spade or hoe burned their fingers, and that though
they only get a shilling a day, yet the labor of three of them
does not exceed what one good hand in Berwickshire would do for
2s. 6d. The islanders retort that a man can do no more than
he can; that they are not used to be taxed to their work so
severely; that they will work as their fathers did, and not
otherwise; and at first the landlord found difficulty in
getting hands to work under his Caledonian task-master. Besides,
they find fault with his ho, and gee, and wo, when
ploughing. 'He speaks to the horse,' they say, 'and they
gang—and there's something no canny about the man.' In short,
between the prejudices of laziness and superstition, the
ploughman leads a sorry life of it;—yet these prejudices are
daily abating, under the steady and indulgent management of the
proprietor. Indeed, nowhere is improvement in agriculture more
necessary. An old-fashioned Zetland plough is a real curiosity.
It had but one handle, or stilt, and a coulter, but no sock; it
ripped the furrow, therefore, but did not throw it aside. When
this precious machine was in motion, it was dragged by four
little bullocks yoked abreast, and as many ponies harnessed, or
rather strung, to the plough by ropes and thongs of rawhide. One
man went before, walking backward, with his face to the bullocks,
and pulling them forward by main strength. Another held down the
plough by its single handle, and made a sort of slit in the
earth, which two women, who closed the procession, converted into
a furrow, by throwing the earth aside with shovels. An antiquary
might be of opinion that this was the very model of the original
plough invented by Triptolemus; and it is but justice to Zetland
to say, that these relics of ancient agricultural art will soon
have all the interest attached to rarity. We could only hear of
one of these ploughs within three miles of Lerwick.
"This and many other barbarous habits to which the Zetlanders
were formerly wedded seem only to have subsisted because their
amphibious character of fishers and farmers induced them to
neglect agricultural arts. A Zetland farmer looks to the sea to
pay his rent; if the land finds him a little meal and kail, and
(if he be a very clever fellow) a few potatoes, it is very well.
The more intelligent part of the landholders are sensible of all
this, but argue like men of good sense and humanity on the
subject. To have good farming, you must have a considerable farm,
upon which capital may be laid out to advantage. But to introduce
this change suddenly would turn adrift perhaps twenty families,
who now occupy small farms pro indiviso, cultivating by
patches, or rundale and runrig, what part of the property is
arable, and stocking the pasture as a common upon which each
family turns out such stock as they can rear, without
observing any proportion as to the number which it can support.
In this way many townships, as they are called, subsist indeed,
but in a precarious and indigent manner. Fishing villages seem
the natural resource for this excess of population; but, besides
the expense of erecting them, the habits of the people are to be
considered, who, with 'one foot on land and one on sea,' would be
with equal reluctance confined to either element. The remedy
seems to be, that the larger proprietors should gradually set the
example of better cultivation, and introduce better implements.
They will, by degrees, be imitated by the inferior proprietors,
and by their tenants; and, as turnips and hay crops become more
general, a better and heavier class of stock will naturally be
introduced.
"The sheep in particular might be improved into a valuable stock,
and would no doubt thrive, since the winters are very temperate.
But I should be sorry that extensive pasture farms were
introduced, as it would tend to diminish a population invaluable
for the supply of our navy. The improvement of the arable land,
on the contrary, would soon set them beyond the terrors of famine
with which the islanders are at present occasionally visited;
and, combined with fisheries, carried on not by farmers, but by
real fishers, would amply supply the inhabitants, without
diminishing the export of dried fish. This separation of trades
will in time take place, and then the prosperous days of Zetland
will begin. The proprietors are already upon the alert, studying
the means of gradual improvement, and no humane person would wish
them to drive it on too rapidly, to the distress and perhaps
destruction of the numerous tenants who have been bred under a
different system.
"I have gleaned something of the peculiar superstitions of the
Zetlanders, which are numerous and potent. Witches, fairies,
etc., are as numerous as ever they were in Teviotdale. The latter
are called Trows, probably from the Norwegian Dwärg (or
dwarf) the D being readily converted into T. The dwarfs are the
prime agents in the machinery of Norwegian superstition. The
trows do not differ from the fairies of the Lowlands, or
Sighean of the Highlanders. They steal children, dwell within
the interior of green hills, and often carry mortals into their
recesses. Some, yet alive, pretend to have been carried off in
this way, and obtain credit for the marvels they tell of
the subterranean habitations of the trows. Sometimes, when a
person becomes melancholy and low-spirited, the trows are
supposed to have stolen the real being, and left a moving phantom
to represent him. Sometimes they are said to steal only the
heart—like Lancashire witches. There are cures in each case. The
party's friends resort to a cunning man or woman, who hangs about
the neck a triangular stone in the shape of a heart, or conjures
back the lost individual, by retiring to the hills and employing
the necessary spells. A common receipt, when a child appears
consumptive and puny, is that the conjurer places a bowl of water
on the patient's head, and pours melted lead into it through the
wards of a key. The metal assumes of course a variety of shapes,
from which he selects a portion, after due consideration, which
is sewn into the shirt of the patient. Sometimes no part of the
lead suits the seer's fancy. Then the operation is recommenced,
until he obtains a fragment of such a configuration as suits his
mystical purpose. Mr. Duncan told us he had been treated in this
way when a boy.
"A worse and most horrid opinion prevails, or did prevail, among
the fishers—namely, that he who saves a drowning man will
receive at his hands some deep wrong or injury. Several instances
were quoted to-day in company, in which the utmost violence had
been found necessary to compel the fishers to violate this
inhuman prejudice. It is conjectured to have arisen as an apology
for rendering no assistance to the mariners as they escaped from
a shipwrecked vessel, for these isles are infamous for plundering
wrecks. A story is told of the crew of a stranded vessel who were
warping themselves ashore by means of a hawser which they had
fixed to the land. The islanders (of Unst, as I believe) watched
their motions in silence, till an old man reminded them that if
they suffered these sailors to come ashore, they would consume
all their winter stock of provisions. A Zetlander cut the hawser,
and the poor wretches, twenty in number, were all swept away.
This is a tale of former times—the cruelty would not now be
active; but I fear that even yet the drowning mariner would in
some places receive no assistance in his exertions, and certainly
he would in most be plundered to the skin upon his landing. The
gentlemen do their utmost to prevent this infamous practice. It
may seem strange that the natives should be so little
affected by a distress to which they are themselves so constantly
exposed. But habitual exposure to danger hardens the heart
against its consequences, whether to ourselves or others. There
is yet living a man—if he can be called so—to whom the
following story belongs: He was engaged in catching sea-fowl upon
one of the cliffs, with his father and brother. All three were
suspended by a cord, according to custom, and overhanging the
ocean, at the height of some hundred feet. This man being
uppermost on the cord, observed that it was giving way, as unable
to support their united weight. He called out to his brother who
was next to him—'Cut away a nail below, Willie,' meaning he
should cut the rope beneath, and let his father drop. Willie
refused, and bid him cut himself, if he pleased. He did so, and
his brother and father were precipitated into the sea. He never
thought of concealing or denying the adventure in all its parts.
We left Gardie-House late; being on the side of the Isle of
Bressay, opposite to Lerwick, we were soon rowed across the bay.
A laugh with Hamilton,[66] whose gout keeps him stationary at
Lerwick, but whose good-humor defies gout and every other
provocation, concludes the evening.
"7th August, 1814.—Being Sunday, Duff, Erskine, and I rode to
Tingwall upon Zetland ponies, to breakfast with our friend Parson
Turnbull, who had come over in our yacht. An ill-conducted and
worse-made road served us four miles on our journey. This Via
Flaminia of Thule terminates, like its prototype, in a bog. It
is, however, the only road in these isles, except about half a
mile made by Mr. Turnbull. The land in the interior much
resembles the Peel-heights, near Ashestiel; but, as you
approach the other side of the island, becomes better. Tingwall
is rather a fertile valley, up which winds a loch of about two
miles in length. The kirk and manse stand at the head of the
loch, and command a view down the valley to another lake beyond
the first, and thence over another reach of land, to the ocean,
indented by capes and studded with isles; among which, that of
St. Ninian's, abruptly divided from the mainland by a deep chasm,
is the most conspicuous. Mr. Turnbull is a Jedburgh man by birth,
but a Zetlander by settlement and inclination. I have reason to
be proud of my countryman; he is doing his best, with great
patience and judgment, to set a good example both in temporals
and spirituals, and is generally beloved and respected among all
classes. His glebe is in far the best order of any ground I have
seen in Zetland. It is enclosed chiefly with dry-stone, instead
of the useless turf-dykes; and he has sown grass, and has a
hay-stack, and a second crop of clover, and may claim
well-dressed fields of potatoes, barley, and oats. The people
around him are obviously affected by his example. He gave us an
excellent discourse and remarkably good prayers, which are seldom
the excellence of the Presbyterian worship.[67] The congregation
were numerous, decent, clean, and well-dressed. The men have all
the air of seamen, and are a good-looking hardy race. Some of the
old fellows had got faces much resembling Tritons; if they had
had conchs to blow, it would have completed them. After church,
ride down the loch to Scalloway—the country wild but pleasant,
with sloping hills of good pasturage, and patches of cultivation
on the lower ground. Pass a huge standing stone or pillar. Here,
it is said, the son of an old Earl of the Orkneys met his fate.
He had rebelled against his father, and fortified himself in
Zetland. The Earl sent a party to dislodge him, who, not caring
to proceed to violence against his person, failed in the attempt.
The Earl then sent a stronger force, with orders to take him dead
or alive. The young Absalom's castle was stormed—he himself fled
across the loch, and was overtaken and slain at this pillar. The
Earl afterwards executed the perpetrators of this
slaughter, though they had only fulfilled his own mandate.
"We reach Scalloway, and visit the ruins of an old castle,
composed of a double tower or keep, with turrets at the corners.
It is the principal, if not the only ruin of Gothic times in
Zetland, and is of very recent date, being built in 1600. It was
built by Patrick Stewart, Earl of Orkney, afterwards deservedly
executed at Edinburgh for many acts of tyranny and oppression. It
was this rapacious lord who imposed many of those heavy duties
still levied from the Zetlanders by Lord Dundas. The exactions by
which he accomplished this erection were represented as grievous.
He was so dreaded that upon his trial one Zetland witness refused
to say a word till he was assured that there was no chance of the
Earl returning to Scalloway. Over the entrance of the castle are
his arms, much defaced, with the unicorns of Scotland for
supporters, the assumption of which was one of the articles of
indictment. There is a Scriptural inscription also above the
door, in Latin, now much defaced:—
'PATRICIUS ORCHADIÆ ET ZETLANDIÆ COMES. A. D. 1600.
CUJUS FUNDAMEN SAXUM EST, DOMUS ILLA MANEBIT
STABILIS: E CONTRA, SI SIT ARENA, PERIT.'
"This is said to have been furnished to Earl Patrick by a
Presbyterian divine, who slyly couched under it an allusion to
the evil practices by which the Earl had established his power.
He perhaps trusted that the language might disguise the import
from the Earl.[68] If so, the Scottish nobility are improved
in literature, for the Duke of Gordon pointed out an
error in the Latinity.
"Scalloway has a beautiful and very safe harbor, but as it is
somewhat difficult of access, from a complication of small
islands, it is inferior to Lerwick. Hence, though still nominally
the capital of Zetland, for all edictal citations are made at
Scalloway, it has sunk into a small fishing hamlet. The
Norwegians made their original settlement in this parish of
Tingwall. At the head of this loch, and just below the manse, is
a small round islet accessible by stepping-stones, where they
held their courts; hence the islet is called Law-ting—Ting, or
Thing, answering to our word business, exactly like the Latin
negotium. It seems odd that in Dumfries-shire, and even in the
Isle of Man, where the race and laws were surely Celtic, we have
this Gothic word Ting and Tingwald applied in the same way. We
dined with Mr. Scott of Scalloway, who, like several families of
this name in Shetland, is derived from the house of Scotstarvet.
They are very clannish, marry much among themselves, and are
proud of their descent. Two young ladies, daughters of Mr.
Scott's, dined with us—they were both Mrs. Scotts, having
married brothers—the husband of one was lost in the unfortunate
Doris. They were pleasant, intelligent women, and exceedingly
obliging. Old Mr. Scott seems a good country gentleman. He is
negotiating an exchange with Lord Dundas, which will give him the
Castle of Scalloway and two or three neighboring islands: the
rest of the archipelago (seven, I think, in number) are already
his own. He will thus have command of the whole fishing and
harbor, for which he parts with an estate of more immediate
value, lying on the other side of the mainland. I found my name
made me very popular in this family, and there were many
inquiries after the state of the Buccleuch family, in which they
seemed to take much interest. I found them possessed of the
remarkable circumstances attending the late projected sale of
Ancrum, and the death of Sir John Scott, and thought it strange
that, settled for three generations in a country so distant, they
should still take an interest in those matters. I was loaded with
shells and little curiosities for my young people.
"There was a report (January was two years) of a kraken or some
monstrous fish being seen off Scalloway. The object was
visible for a fortnight, but nobody dared approach it, although I
should have thought the Zetlanders would not have feared the
devil if he came by water. They pretended that the suction, when
they came within a certain distance, was so great as to endanger
their boats. The object was described as resembling a vessel with
her keel turned upmost in the sea, or a small ridge of rock or
island. Mr. Scott thinks it might have been a vessel overset, or
a large whale: if the latter, it seems odd they should not have
known it, as whales are the intimate acquaintances of all Zetland
sailors. Whatever it was it disappeared after a heavy gale of
wind, which seems to favor the idea that it was the wreck of a
vessel. Mr. Scott seems to think Pontopiddan's narrations and
descriptions are much more accurate than we inland men suppose;
and I find most Zetlanders of the same opinion. Mr. Turnbull, who
is not credulous upon these subjects, tells me that this year a
parishioner of his, a well-informed and veracious person, saw an
animal, which, if his description was correct, must have been of
the species of sea-snake, driven ashore on one of the Orkneys two
or three years ago. It was very long, and seemed about the
thickness of a Norway log, and swam on the top of the waves,
occasionally lifting and bending its head. Mr. T. says he has no
doubt of the veracity of the narrator, but still thinks it
possible it may have been a mere log, or beam of wood, and that
the spectator may have been deceived by the motion of the waves,
joined to the force of imagination. This for the Duke of
Buccleuch.
"At Scalloway my curiosity was gratified by an account of the
sword-dance, now almost lost, but still practised in the Island
of Papa, belonging to Mr. Scott. There are eight performers,
seven of whom represent the Seven Champions of Christendom, who
enter one by one with their swords drawn, and are presented to
the eighth personage, who is not named. Some rude couplets are
spoken (in English, not Norse), containing a sort of
panegyric upon each champion as he is presented. They then dance
a sort of cotillion, as the ladies described it, going through a
number of evolutions with their swords. One of my three Mrs.
Scotts readily promised to procure me the lines, the rhymes, and
the form of the dance. I regret much that young Mr. Scott was
absent during this visit; he is described as a reader
and an enthusiast in poetry. Probably I might have interested him
in preserving the dance, by causing young persons to learn it. A
few years since, a party of Papa-men came to dance the
sword-dance at Lerwick as a public exhibition with great
applause. The warlike dances of the northern people, of which I
conceive this to be the only remnant in the British
dominions,[69] are repeatedly alluded to by their poets and
historians. The introduction of the Seven Champions savors of a
later period, and was probably ingrafted upon the dance when
mysteries and moralities (the first scenic representations)
came into fashion. In a stall pamphlet, called the history of
Buckshaven, it is said those fishers sprung from Danes, and
brought with them their war-dance or sword-dance, and a rude
wooden cut of it is given. We resist the hospitality of our
entertainers, and return to Lerwick despite a most downright fall
of rain. My pony stumbles coming down hill; saddle sways round,
having but one girth and that too long, and lays me on my back.
N. B. The bogs in Zetland as soft as those in Liddesdale. Get
to Lerwick about ten at night. No yacht has appeared.
"8th August.—No yacht, and a rainy morning; bring up my
journal. Day clears up, and we go to pay our farewell visits of
thanks to the hospitable Lerwegians, and at the Fort. Visit kind
old Mr. Mowat, and walk with him and Collector Ross to the point
of Quaggers, or Twaggers, which forms one arm of the southern
entrance to the sound of Bressay. From the eminence a delightful
sea view, with several of those narrow capes and deep reaches or
inlets of the sea, which indent the shores of that land. On the
right hand a narrow bay, bounded by the isthmus of Sound, with a
house upon it resembling an old castle. In the indenture of the
bay, and divided from the sea by a slight causeway, the lake of
Cleik-him-in, with its Pictish castle. Beyond this the bay
opens another yet; and, behind all, a succession of capes,
headlands, and islands, as far as the cape called Sumburgh-head,
which is the furthest point of Zetland in that
direction. Inland, craggy, and sable muirs, with cairns, among
which we distinguish the Wart or Ward of Wick, to which we walked
on the 4th. On the left the island of Bressay, with its peaked
hill called the Wart of Bressay. Over Bressay see the top of
Hang-cliff. Admire the Bay of Lerwick, with its shipping,
widening out to the northwards, and then again contracted into a
narrow sound, through which the infamous Bothwell was pursued by
Kirkaldy of Grange, until he escaped through the dexterity of his
pilot, who sailed close along a sunken rock, upon which Kirkaldy,
keeping the weather-gage, struck, and sustained damage. The rock
is visible at low water, and is still called the Unicorn, from
the name of Kirkaldy's vessel. Admire Mr. Mowat's little farm, of
about thirty acres, bought about twenty years since for £75, and
redeemed from the miserable state of the surrounding country, so
that it now bears excellent corn; here also was a hay crop. With
Mr. Turnbull's it makes two. Visit Mr. Ross, collector of the
customs, who presents me with the most superb collection of the
stone axes (or adzes, or whatever they are), called celts. The
Zetlanders call them thunder-bolts, and keep them in their
houses as a receipt against thunder; but the Collector has
succeeded in obtaining several. We are now to dress for dinner
with the Notables of Lerwick, who give us an entertainment in
their Town-hall. Oho!
"Just as we were going to dinner, the yacht appeared, and Mr.
Stevenson landed. He gives a most favorable account of the isles
to the northward, particularly Unst. I believe Lerwick is the
worst part of Shetland. Are hospitably received and entertained
by the Lerwick gentlemen. They are a quick, intelligent
race—chiefly of Scottish birth, as appears from their names,
Mowat, Gifford, Scott, and so forth. These are the chief
proprietors. The Norwegian or Danish surnames, though of course
the more ancient, belong, with some exceptions, to the lower
ranks. The Veteran Corps expects to be disbanded, and the
officers and Lerwegians seem to part with regret. Some of the
officers talk of settling here. The price of everything is
moderate, and the style of living unexpensive. Against these
conveniences are to be placed a total separation from public
life, news, and literature; and a variable and inhospitable
climate. Lerwick will suffer most severely if the Fort
is not occupied by some force or other; for, between whiskey and
frolic, the Greenland sailors will certainly burn the little
town. We have seen a good deal, and heard much more, of the
pranks of these unruly guests. A gentleman of Lerwick, who had
company to dine with him, observed beneath his window a party of
sailors eating a leg of roast mutton, which he witnessed with
philanthropic satisfaction, till he received the melancholy
information, that that individual leg of mutton, being the very
sheet-anchor of his own entertainment, had been violently carried
off from his kitchen, spit and all, by these honest gentlemen,
who were now devouring it. Two others, having carried off a
sheep, were apprehended, and brought before a Justice of the
Peace, who questioned them respecting the fact. The first denied
he had taken the sheep, but said he had seen it taken away by a
fellow with a red nose and a black wig (this was the Justice's
description). 'Don't you think he was like his honor, Tom?' he
added, appealing to his comrade. 'By G—, Jack,' answered Tom, 'I
believe it was the very man!' Erskine has been busy with these
facetious gentlemen, and has sent several to prison, but nothing
could have been done without the soldiery. We leave Lerwick at
eight o'clock, and sleep on board the yacht.
"9th August, 1814.—Waked at seven, and find the vessel has
left Lerwick harbor, and is on the point of entering the sound
which divides the small island of Mousa (or Queen's Island) from
Coningsburgh, a very wild part of the main island so called. Went
ashore, and see the very ancient castle of Mousa, which stands
close on the seashore. It is a Pictish fortress, the most entire
probably in the world. In form it resembles a dice-box, for the
truncated cone is continued only to a certain height, after which
it begins to rise perpendicularly, or rather with a tendency to
expand outwards. The building is round, and has been surrounded
with an outer-wall, of which hardly the slightest vestiges now
remain. It is composed of a layer of stones, without cement; they
are not of large size, but rather small and thin. To give a
vulgar comparison, it resembles an old ruinous pigeon-house. Mr.
Stevenson took the dimensions of this curious fort, which are as
follows: Outside diameter at the base is fifty-two feet; at the
top thirty-eight feet. The diameter of the interior at the base
is nineteen feet six inches; at the top twenty-one feet;
the curve in the inside being the reverse of the outside, or
nearly so. The thickness of the walls at the base seventeen feet;
at the top eight feet six inches. The height outside forty-two
feet; the inside thirty-four feet. The door or entrance faces the
sea, and the interior is partly filled with rubbish. When you
enter you see, in the inner wall, a succession of small openings
like windows, directly one above another, with broad flat stones,
serving for lintels; these are about nine inches thick. The whole
resembles a ladder. There were four of these perpendicular rows
of windows or apertures, the situation of which corresponds with
the cardinal points of the compass. You enter the galleries
contained in the thickness of the wall by two of these apertures,
which have been broken down. These interior spaces are of two
descriptions: one consists of a winding ascent, not quite an
inclined plane, yet not by any means a regular stair; but the
edges of the stones, being suffered to project irregularly, serve
for rude steps—or a kind of assistance. Through this narrow
staircase, which winds round the building, you creep up to the
top of the castle, which is partly ruinous. But besides the
staircase, there branch off at irregular intervals horizontal
galleries, which go round the whole building, and receive air
from the holes I formerly mentioned. These apertures vary in
size, diminishing as they run, from about thirty inches in width
by eighteen in height, till they are only about a foot square.
The lower galleries are full man height, but narrow. They
diminish both in height and width as they ascend, and as the
thickness of the wall in which they are enclosed diminishes. The
uppermost gallery is so narrow and low, that it was with great
difficulty I crept through it. The walls are built very
irregularly, the sweep of the cone being different on the
different sides.
"It is said by Torfæus that this fort was repaired and
strengthened by Erlind, who, having forcibly carried off the
mother of Harold, Earl of the Orkneys, resolved to defend himself
to extremity in this place against the insulted Earl. How a
castle could be defended which had no opening to the outside for
shooting arrows, and which was of a capacity to be pulled to
pieces by the assailants, who could advance without annoyance to
the bottom of the wall (unless it were battlemented upon
the top), does not easily appear. But to Erlind's operations the
castle of Mousa possibly owes the upper and perpendicular, or
rather overhanging, part of its elevation, and also its rude
staircase. In these two particulars it seems to differ from all
other Picts' castles, which are ascended by an inclined plane,
and generally, I believe, terminate in a truncated cone, without
that strange counterpart of the perpendicular or projecting part
of the upper wall. Opposite to the castle of Mousa are the ruins
of another Pictish fort: indeed, they all communicate with each
other through the isles. The island of Mousa is the property of a
Mr. Piper, who has improved it considerably, and values his
castle. I advised him to clear out the interior, as he tells us
there are three or four galleries beneath those now accessible,
and the difference of height between the exterior and interior
warrants his assertion.
"We get on board, and in time, for the wind freshens, and becomes
contrary. We beat down to Sumburgh-head, through rough weather.
This is the extreme south-eastern point of Zetland; and as the
Atlantic and German oceans unite at this point, a frightful tide
runs here, called Sumburgh-rost. The breeze, contending with the
tide, flings the breakers in great style upon the high broken
cliffs of Sumburgh-head. They are all one white foam, ascending
to a great height. We wished to double this point, and lie by in
a bay between that and the northern or north-western cape, called
Fitful-head, and which seems higher than Sumburgh itself—and
tacked repeatedly with this view; but a confounded islet, called
The Horse, always baffled us, and, after three heats, fairly
distanced us. So we run into a roadstead, called Quendal Bay, on
the south-eastern side, and there anchor for the night. We go
ashore with various purposes,—Stevenson to see the site of a
proposed lighthouse on this tremendous cape—Marjoribanks to
shoot rabbits—and Duff and I to look about us.
"I ascended the head by myself, which is lofty, and commands a
wild sea-view. Zetland stretches away, with all its projecting
capes and inlets, to the north-eastward. Many of those inlets
approach each other very nearly; indeed, the two opposite bays
at Sumburgh-head seem on the point of joining, and
rendering that cape an island. The two creeks from those east and
western seas are only divided by a low isthmus of blowing sand,
and similar to that which wastes part of the east coast of
Scotland. It has here blown like the deserts of Arabia, and
destroyed some houses, formerly the occasional residences of the
Earls of Orkney. The steep and rocky side of the cape, which
faces the west, does not seem much more durable. These lofty
cliffs are all of sand-flag, a very loose and perishable kind of
rock, which slides down in immense masses, like avalanches, after
every storm. The rest lies so loose, that, on the very brow of
the loftiest crag, I had no difficulty in sending down a fragment
as large as myself: he thundered down in tremendous style, but
splitting upon a projecting cliff, descended into the ocean like
a shower of shrapnel shot. The sea beneath rages incessantly
among a thousand of the fragments which have fallen from the
peaks, and which assume an hundred strange shapes. It would have
been a fine situation to compose an ode to the Genius of
Sumburgh-head, or an Elegy upon a Cormorant—or to have written
and spoken madness of any kind in prose or poetry. But I gave
vent to my excited feelings in a more simple way; and sitting
gently down on the steep green slope which led to the beach, I
e'en slid down a few hundred feet, and found the exercise quite
an adequate vent to my enthusiasm. I recommend this exercise
(time and place suiting) to all my brother scribblers, and I have
no doubt it will save much effusion of Christian ink. Those
slopes are covered with beautiful short herbage. At the foot of
the ascent, and towards the isthmus, is the old house of
Sumburgh, in appearance a most dreary mansion. I found, on my
arrival at the beach, that the hospitality of the inhabitants had
entrapped my companions. I walked back to meet them, but escaped
the gin and water. On board about nine o'clock at night. A little
schooner lies between us and the shore, which we had seen all day
buffeting the tide and breeze like ourselves. The wind increases,
and the ship is made SNUG—a sure sign the passengers will not be
so.
"10th August, 1814.—The omen was but too true—a terrible
combustion on board, among plates, dishes, glasses,
writing-desks, etc., etc.; not a wink of sleep. We weigh and
stand out into that delightful current called Sumburgh-rost,
or rust. This tide certainly owes us a grudge, for it
drove us to the eastward about thirty miles on the night of the
first, and occasioned our missing the Fair Isle, and now it has
caught us on our return. All the landsmen sicker than sick, and
our Viceroy, Stevenson, qualmish. This is the only time that I
have felt more than temporary inconvenience, but this morning I
have headache and nausea; these are trifles, and in a well-found
vessel, with a good pilot, we have none of that mixture of danger
which gives dignity to the traveller. But he must have a stouter
heart than mine, who can contemplate without horror the situation
of a vessel of an inferior description caught among these
headlands and reefs of rocks, in the long and dark winter nights
of these regions. Accordingly, wrecks are frequent. It is
proposed to have a light on Sumburgh-head, which is the first
land made by vessels coming from the eastward; Fitful-head is
higher, but is to the west, from which quarter few vessels come.
"We are now clear of Zetland, and about ten o'clock reach the
Fair Isle;[70] one of their boats comes off, a strange-looking
thing without an entire plank in it, excepting one on each side,
upon the strength of which the whole depends, the rest being
patched and joined. This trumpery skiff the men manage with the
most astonishing dexterity, and row with remarkable speed; they
have two banks, that is, two rowers on each bench, and use very
short paddles. The wildness of their appearance, with long
elf-locks, striped worsted caps, and shoes of raw-hide—the
fragility of their boat—and their extreme curiosity about us and
our cutter, give them a title to be distinguished as natives.
One of our people told their steersman, by way of jeer, that he
must have great confidence in Providence to go to sea in such a
vehicle; the man very sensibly replied that without the same
confidence he would not go to sea in the best tool in England.
We take to our boat, and row for about three miles round the
coast, in order to land at the inhabited part of the island. This
coast abounds with grand views of rocks and bays. One immense
portion of rock is (like the Holm of Noss) separated by a chasm
from the mainland. As it is covered with herbage on the top,
though a literal precipice all round, the natives
contrive to ascend the rock by a place which would make a goat
dizzy, and then drag the sheep up by ropes, though they sometimes
carry a sheep up on their shoulders. The captain of a sloop of
war, being ashore while they were at this work, turned giddy and
sick while looking at them. This immense precipice is several
hundred feet high, and is perforated below by some extraordinary
apertures, through which a boat might pass; the light shines
distinctly through these hideous chasms.
"After passing a square bay called the North-haven, tenanted by
sea-fowl and seals (the first we have yet seen), we come in view
of the small harbor. Land, and breakfast, for which, till now,
none of us felt inclination. In front of the little harbor is the
house of the tacksman, Mr. Strong, and in view are three small
assemblages of miserable huts, where the inhabitants of the isle
live. There are about thirty families and 250 inhabitants upon
the Fair Isle. It merits its name, as the plain upon which the
hamlets are situated bears excellent barley, oats, and potatoes,
and the rest of the isle is beautiful pasture, excepting to the
eastward, where there is a moss, equally essential to the comfort
of the inhabitants, since it supplies them with peats for fuel.
The Fair Isle is about three miles long and a mile and a half
broad. Mr. Strong received us very courteously. He lives here,
like Robinson Crusoe, in absolute solitude as to society, unless
by a chance visit from the officers of a man-of-war. There is a
signal-post maintained on the island by Government, under this
gentleman's inspection; when any ship appears that cannot answer
his signals, he sends off to Lerwick and Kirkwall to give the
alarm. Rogers[71] was off here last year, and nearly cut off one
of Mr. Strong's express-boats, but the active islanders
outstripped his people by speed of rowing. The inhabitants pay
Mr. Strong for the possessions which they occupy under him as
sub-tenants, and cultivate the isle in their own way, i. e., by
digging instead of ploughing (though the ground is quite open and
free from rocks, and they have several scores of ponies), and by
raising alternate crops of barley, oats, and potatoes; the first
and last are admirably good. They rather over-manure their crops;
the possessions lie runrig, that is, by alternate ridges, and
the outfield or pasture ground is possessed as common to
all their cows and ponies. The islanders fish for Mr. Strong at
certain fixed rates, and the fish is his property, which he sends
to Kirkwall, Lerwick, or elsewhere, in a little schooner, the
same which we left in Quendal Bay, and about the arrival of which
we found them anxious. An equal space of rich land on the Fair
Isle, situated in an inland county of Scotland, would rent for
£3000 a year at the very least. To be sure it would not be
burdened with the population of 250 souls, whose bodies (fertile
as it is) it cannot maintain in bread, they being supplied
chiefly from the mainland. Fish they have plenty, and are even
nice in their choice. Skate they will not touch; dog-fish they
say is only food for Orkney-men, and when they catch them, they
make a point of tormenting the poor fish for eating off their
baits from the hook, stealing the haddocks from their lines, and
other enormities. These people, being about halfway between
Shetland and Orkney, have unfrequent connection with either
archipelago, and live and marry entirely among themselves. One
lad told me, only five persons had left the island since his
remembrance, and of those, three were pressed for the navy. They
seldom go to Greenland; but this year five or six of their young
men were on board the whalers. They seemed extremely solicitous
about their return, and repeatedly questioned us about the names
of the whalers which were at Lerwick, a point on which we could
give little information.
"The manners of these islanders seem primitive and simple, and
they are sober, good-humored and friendly,—but jimp honest.
Their comforts are, of course, much dependent on their master's
pleasure; for so they call Mr. Strong. But they gave him the
highest character for kindness and liberality, and prayed to God
he might long be their ruler. After mounting the signal-post
hill, or Malcolm's Head, which is faced by a most tremendous
cliff, we separated on our different routes. The Sheriff went to
rectify the only enormity on the island, which existed in the
person of a drunken schoolmaster; Marchie[72] went to shoot
sea-fowl, or rather to frighten them, as his calumniators allege.
Stevenson and Duff went to inspect the remains or vestiges of a
Danish lighthouse upon a distant hill, called, as usual, the
Ward, or Ward-hill, and returned with specimens of
copper ore. Hamilton went down to cater fish for our dinner, and
see it properly cooked—and I to see two remarkable indentures in
the coast called Rivas, perhaps from their being rifted or
riven. They are exactly like the Buller of Buchan, the sea
rolling into a large open basin within the land through a natural
archway. These places are close to each other; one is oblong, and
it is easy to descend into it by a rude path; the other gulf is
inaccessible from the land, unless to a crags-man, as these
venturous climbers call themselves. I sat for about an hour upon
the verge, like the cormorants around me, hanging my legs over
the precipice; but I could not get free of two or three
well-meaning islanders, who held me fast by the skirts all the
time—for it must be conceived that our numbers and appointments
had drawn out the whole population to admire and attend us. After
we separated, each, like the nucleus of a comet, had his own
distinct train of attendants.—Visit the capital town, a wretched
assemblage of the basest huts, dirty without, and still dirtier
within; pigs, fowls, cows, men, women, and children, all living
promiscuously under the same roof, and in the same room—the
brood-sow making (among the more opulent) a distinguished
inhabitant of the mansion. The compost, a liquid mass of utter
abomination, is kept in a square pond of seven feet deep; when I
censured it, they allowed it might be dangerous to the bairns;
but appeared unconscious of any other objection. I cannot wonder
they want meal, for assuredly they waste it. A great bowie or
wooden vessel of porridge is made in the morning; a child comes
and sups a few spoonfuls; then Mrs. Sow takes her share; then the
rest of the children or the parents, and all at pleasure; then
come the poultry when the mess is more cool; the rest is flung
upon the dunghill—and the goodwife wonders and complains when
she wants meal in winter. They are a long-lived race,
notwithstanding utter and inconceivable dirt and sluttery. A man
of sixty told me his father died only last year, aged
ninety-eight; nor was this considered as very unusual.
"The clergyman of Dunrossness, in Zetland, visits these poor
people once a year, for a week or two during summer. In winter
this is impossible, and even the summer visit is occasionally
interrupted for two years. Marriages and baptisms are
performed, as one of the Isles-men told me, by the slump, and
one of the children was old enough to tell the clergyman who
sprinkled him with water, 'Deil be in your fingers.' Last time,
four couple were married; sixteen children baptized. The
schoolmaster reads a portion of Scripture in the church each
Sunday, when the clergyman is absent; but the present man is
unfit for this part of his duty. The women knit worsted
stockings, night-caps, and similar trifles, which they exchange
with any merchant vessels that approach their lonely isle. In
these respects they greatly regret the American war; and mention
with unction the happy days when they could get from an American
trader a bottle of peach-brandy or rum in exchange for a pair of
worsted stockings or a dozen of eggs. The humanity of their
master interferes much with the favorite but dangerous
occupation of the islanders, which is fowling, that is, taking
the young sea-fowl from their nests among these tremendous crags.
About a fortnight before we arrived, a fine boy of fourteen had
dropped from the cliff, while in prosecution of this amusement,
into a roaring surf, by which he was instantly swallowed up. The
unfortunate mother was laboring at the peat-moss at a little
distance. These accidents do not, however, strike terror into the
survivors. They regard the death of an individual engaged in
these desperate exploits as we do the fate of a brave relation
who falls in battle, when the honor of his death furnishes a balm
to our sorrow. It therefore requires all the tacksman's authority
to prevent a practice so pregnant with danger. Like all other
precarious and dangerous employments, the occupation of the
crags-men renders them unwilling to labor at employments of a
more steady description. The Fair Isle inhabitants are a
good-looking race, more like Zetlanders than Orkney-men. Evenson,
and other names of a Norwegian or Danish derivation, attest their
Scandinavian descent. Return and dine at Mr. Strong's, having
sent our cookery ashore, not to overburthen his hospitality. In
this place, and perhaps in the very cottage now inhabited by Mr.
Strong, the Duke of Medina Sidonia, Commander-in-Chief of the
Invincible Armada, wintered, after losing his vessel to the
eastward of the island. It was not till he had spent some weeks
in this miserable abode, that he got off to Norway.
Independently of the moral consideration, that, from the
pitch of power in which he stood a few days before, the
proudest peer of the proudest nation in Europe found himself
dependent on the jealous and scanty charity of these secluded
islanders, it is scarce possible not to reflect with compassion
on the change of situation from the palaces of Estremadura to the
hamlet of the Fair Isle—
'Dost thou wish for thy deserts, O Son of Hodeirah?
Dost thou long for the gales of Arabia?'[73]
"Mr. Strong gave me a curious old chair belonging to Quendale, a
former proprietor of the Fair Isle, and which a more zealous
antiquary would have dubbed 'the Duke's chair.' I will have it
refitted for Abbotsford, however. About eight o'clock we take
boat, amid the cheers of the inhabitants, whose minds, subdued by
our splendor, had been secured by our munificence, which
consisted in a moderate benefaction of whiskey and tobacco, and a
few shillings laid out on their staple commodities. They agreed
no such day had been seen in the isle. The signal-post displayed
its flags, and to recompense these distinguished marks of honor,
we hung out our colors, stood into the bay, and saluted with
three guns,
'Echoing from a thousand caves."
and then bear away for Orkney, leaving, if our vanity does not
deceive us, a very favorable impression on the mind of the
inhabitants of the Fair Isle. The tradition of the Fair Isle is
unfavorable to those shipwrecked strangers, who are said to have
committed several acts of violence to extort the supplies of
provision, given them sparingly and with reluctance by the
islanders, who were probably themselves very far from being well
supplied.
"I omitted to say we were attended in the morning by two very
sportive whales, but of a kind, as some of our crew who had been
on board Greenland-men assured us, which it was very dangerous to
attack. There were two Gravesend smacks fishing off the isle.
Lord, what a long draught London makes!
"11th August, 1814.—After a sound sleep to make amends for
last night, we find, at awaking, the vessel off the Start of
Sanda, the first land in the Orkneys which we could make. There
a lighthouse has been erected lately upon the best construction.
Landed and surveyed it. All in excellent order, and the
establishment of the keepers in the same style of comfort and
respectability as elsewhere, far better than the house of the
master of the Fair Isle, and rivalling my own baronial mansion of
Abbotsford. Go to the top of the tower and survey the island,
which, as the name implies, is level, flat, and sandy, quite the
reverse of those in Zetland: it is intersected by creeks and
small lakes, and, though it abounds with shell marle, seems
barren. There is one dreadful inconvenience of an island life, of
which we had here an instance. The keeper's wife had an infant in
her arms—her first-born, too, of which the poor woman had been
delivered without assistance. Erskine told us of a horrid
instance of malice which had been practised in this island of
Sanda. A decent tenant, during the course of three or four
successive years, lost to the number of twenty-five cattle,
stabbed as they lay in their fold by some abominable wretch. What
made the matter stranger was, that the poor man could not
recollect any reason why he should have had the ill-will of a
single being, only that in taking up names for the militia, a
duty imposed upon him by the Justices, he thought he might
possibly have given some unknown offence. The villain was never
discovered.
"The wrecks on this coast were numerous before the erection of
the lighthouse. It was not uncommon to see five or six vessels on
shore at once. The goods and chattels of the inhabitants are all
said to savor of Flotsome and Jetsome, as the floating wreck
and that which is driven ashore are severally called. Mr.
Stevenson happened to observe that the boat of a Sanda farmer had
bad sails—'If it had been His (i. e., God's) will that you
hadna built sae many lighthouses hereabout'—answered the
Orcadian, with great composure—'I would have had new sails last
winter.' Thus do they talk and think upon these subjects; and so
talking and thinking, I fear the poor mariner has little chance
of any very anxious attempt to assist him. There is one wreck, a
Danish vessel, now aground under our lee. These Danes are the
stupidest seamen, by all accounts, that sail the sea. When this
light upon the Start of Sanda was established, the Commissioners,
with laudable anxiety to extend its utility, had its description
and bearings translated into Danish and sent to Copenhagen. But
they never attend to such trifles. The Norwegians are
much better liked, as a clever, hardy, sensible people. I forgot
to notice there was a Norwegian prize lying in the Sound of
Lerwick, sent in by one of our cruisers. This was a
queer-looking, half-decked vessel, all tattered and torn, and
shaken to pieces, looking like Coleridge's Spectre Ship. It was
pitiable to see such a prize. Our servants went aboard, and got
one of their loaves, and gave a dreadful account of its
composition. I got and cut a crust of it; it was rye-bread, with
a slight mixture of pine-fir bark or sawings of deal. It was not
good, but (as Charles XII. said) might be eaten. But after all,
if the people can be satisfied with such bread as this, it seems
hard to interdict it to them. What would a Londoner say if,
instead of his roll and muffins, this black bread, relishing of
tar and turpentine, were presented for his breakfast? I would to
God there could be a Jehovah-jireh, 'a ram caught in the
thicket,' to prevent the sacrifice of that people.
"The few friends who may see this Journal are much indebted for
these pathetic remarks to the situation under which they are
recorded; for since we left the lighthouse we have been
struggling with adverse wind (pretty high too), and a very strong
tide, called the Rost of the Start, which, like Sumburgh Rost,
bodes no good to our roast and boiled. The worst is that this
struggle carries us past a most curious spectacle, being no less
than the carcases of two hundred and sixty-five whales, which
have been driven ashore in Taftsness Bay, now lying close under
us. With all the inclination in the world, it is impossible to
stand in close enough to verify this massacre of Leviathans with
our own eyes, as we do not care to run the risk of being drawn
ashore ourselves among the party. In fact, this species of
spectacle has been of late years very common among the isles. Mr.
Stevenson saw upwards of a hundred and fifty whales lying upon
the shore in a bay at Unst, in his northward trip. They are not
large, but are decided whales, measuring perhaps from fifteen to
twenty-five feet. They are easily mastered, for the first that is
wounded among the sounds and straits so common in the isles
usually runs ashore. The rest follow the blood, and, urged on by
the boats behind, run ashore also. A cut with one of the long
whaling knives under the back-fin is usually fatal to these huge
animals. The two hundred and sixty-five whales, now
lying within two or three miles of us, were driven ashore by
seven boats only.
"Five o'clock.—We are out of the Rost (I detest that word),
and driving fast through a long sound among low green islands,
which hardly lift themselves above the sea—not a cliff or hill
to be seen—what a contrast to the land we have left! We are
standing for some creek or harbor, called Lingholm Bay, to lie to
or anchor for the night; for to pursue our course by night, and
that a thick one, among these isles, and islets, and sand-banks,
is out of the question—clear moonlight might do. Our sea is now
moderate. But, oh gods and men! what misfortunes have travellers
to record! Just as the quiet of the elements had reconciled us to
the thought of dinner, we learn that an unlucky sea has found its
way into the galley during the last infernal combustion, when the
lee-side and boltsprit were constantly under water; so our soup
is poisoned with salt water—our cod and haddocks, which cost
ninepence this blessed morning, and would have been worth a
couple of guineas in London, are soused in their primitive
element—the curry is undone—and all gone to the devil. We all
apply ourselves to comfort our Lord High Admiral Hamilton, whose
despair for himself and the public might edify a patriot. His
good-humor—which has hitherto defied every incident, aggravated
even by the gout—supported by a few bad puns, and a great many
fair promises on the part of the steward and cook, fortunately
restores his equilibrium.
"Eight o'clock.—Our supplemental dinner proved excellent, and
we have glided into an admirable roadstead or harbor, called
Lingholm Bay, formed by the small island of Lingholm embracing a
small basin dividing that islet from the larger isle of Stronsay.
Both, as well as Sanda, Eda, and others which we have passed, are
low, green, and sandy. I have seen nothing to-day worth marking,
except the sporting of a very large whale at some distance, and
H.'s face at the news of the disaster in the cook-room. We are to
weigh at two in the morning, and hope to reach Kirkwall, the
capital of Orkney, by breakfast to-morrow. I trust there are no
rusts or rosts in the road. I shall detest that word even
when used to signify verd antique or patina in the one sense, or
roast venison in the other. Orkney shall begin a new
volume of these exquisite memoranda.
"Omission.—At Lerwick the Dutch fishers had again appeared on
their old haunts. A very interesting meeting took place between
them and the Lerwegians, most of them being old acquaintances.
They seemed very poor, and talked of having been pillaged of
everything by the French, and expected to have found Lerwick
ruined by the war. They have all the careful, quiet, and
economical habits of their country, and go on board their busses
with the utmost haste so soon as they see the Greenland sailors,
who usually insult and pick quarrels with them. The great
amusement of the Dutch sailors is to hire the little ponies, and
ride up and down upon them. On one occasion, a good many years
ago, an English sailor interrupted this cavalcade, frightened the
horses, and one or two Dutchmen got tumbles. Incensed at this
beyond their usual moderation, they pursued the cause of their
overthrow, and wounded him with one of their knives. The wounded
man went on board his vessel, the crew of which, about fifty
strong, came ashore with their long flinching knives with which
they cut up the whales, and falling upon the Dutchmen, though
twice their numbers, drove them all into the sea, where such as
could not swim were in some risk of being drowned. The instance
of aggression, or rather violent retaliation, on their part, is
almost solitary. In general they are extremely quiet, and employ
themselves in bartering their little merchandise of gin and
gingerbread for Zetland hose and night-caps."
