“July 29th, 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.
“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 gratefire 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 seabathers.
“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
| DIARY—JULY, 1814. | 137 |
“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, &c.; above that a storehouse for the lights, of oil, &c.; then the kitchen of the people, three in number; then their sleeping-chamber; then the saloon or parlour, a neat little room; above all, the lighthouse; all communicating by oaken ladders, with brass rails, most handsomely and conveniently executed. Breakfasted in the parlour.* 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, intrusted
* On being requested while at breakfast to inscribe his name in the album of the tower, Scott penned immediately the lines “Pharos Loquitur,” which may be seen in the last edition of his Poetical Works, Vol. X. p. 355. |
| 138 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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 harbour of Fort-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 L.500 a-year at the time. When these sands are past, the land is all arable. Not a tree to be seen; nor a grazing cow, or sheep, or even
* This is, without doubt, an allusion to some happy day’s excursion when his first love was of the party. |
| DIARY—JULY, 1814. | 139 |
| 140 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“1st August.—Off Frasersburgh—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-
| DIARY—AUGUST, 1814. | 141 |
“2d August.—At sea in the mouth of the Moray Frith. This day almost a blank—light baffling airs, which do us very little good, most of the landsmen sick, more or less; picquet, 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 Sindbad’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* 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
* Erskine—sheriff of Shetland and Orkney. |
| 142 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“4th August.—Harbour of
Lerwick. Admire the excellence of this harbour 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 harbour, 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 Scots-hall. 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 L.20 to L.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
L.25,000 and L.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
| DIARY—LERWICK. | 143 |
| 144 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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
| DIARY—SHETLAND. | 145 |
“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
* Here occurs a rude scratch of drawing. |
| 146 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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 L.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
labour. 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
consump-
| DIARY—SHETLAND. | 147 |
“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, any thing 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,
| 148 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
| DIARY—SHETLAND. | 149 |
“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 harbour, 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
| 150 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
‘Here the lone sea-bird wakes his wildest cry.’ |
| DIARY—CRADLE OF NOSS. | 151 |
“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
| 152 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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, &c., 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 got a shilling
a-day, yet the labour 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
taskmaster. 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
| DIARY—SHETLAND. | 153 |
“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
| 154 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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
| DIARY—SHETLAND SUPERSTITIONS. | 155 |
“I have gleaned something of the peculiar
superstitions of the Zetlanders, which are numerous and potent. Witches,
fairies, &c., 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
| 156 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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
| DIARY—TINGWALL. | 157 |
“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
* Robert Hamilton, Sheriff of Lanarkshire, and afterwards one of the Clerks of Session, was a particular favourite with Scott—first, among many other good reasons, because he had been a soldier in his youth, had fought gallantly and been wounded severely in the American war, and was a very Uncle Toby in military enthusiasm; 2dly, because he was a brother antiquary of the genuine Monkbarns breed; 3dly (last not least), because he was, in spite of the example of the head of his name and race, a steady Tory. Mr Hamilton sent for Scott when upon his deathbed in 1831, and desired him to choose, and carry off as a parting memorial, any article he liked in his collection of arms. Sir Walter (by that time sorely shattered in his own health) selected the sword with which his good friend had been begirt at Bunker’s Hill. |
| 158 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
| DIARY—SCALLOWAY CASTLE. | 159 |
“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 slily
couched under it an allusion to the evil practices by which the Earl had
established his power. He perhaps trusted that the
| 160 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“Scalloway has a beautiful and very safe harbour, 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 Ting-wald 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 Scotstar-
* In his reviewal of Pitcairn’s Trials (1831), Scott says “In erecting this Earl’s Castle of Scalloway, and other expensive edifices, the King’s tenants were forced to work in quarries, transport stone, dig, delve, climb, and build, and submit to all possible sorts of servile and painful labour, without either meat, drink, hire, or recompense of any kind. ‘My father,’ said Earl Patrick, ‘built his house at Sumburgh on the sand, and it has given way already; this of mine on the rock shall abide and endure.’ He did not or would not understand that the oppression, rapacity, and cruelty by means of which the house arose, were what the clergyman really pointed to in his recommendation of a motto. Accordingly, the huge tower remains wild and desolate—its chambers filled with sand, and its rifted walls and dismantled battlements giving unrestrained access to the roaring sea blast.”—For more of Earl Patrick, see Scott’s Miscellaneous Prose Works, vol. xxi. pp. 230, 233; vol. xxiii. pp. 327, 329. |
| DIARY—SCALLOWAY—7TH AUGUST, 1814. | 161 |
“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
| 162 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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
| DIARY—LERWICK—8TH AUGUST, 1814. | 163 |
“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
* Mr W. S. Rose informs me that, when he was at school at Winchester, the morris-dancers there used to exhibit a sword-dance resembling that described at Camacho’s wedding in Don Quixote; and Mr Morritt adds, that similar dances are even yet performed in the villages about Rokeby every Christmas. |
| 164 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
| DIARY—LERWICK. | 165 |
“Just as we were going to dinner, the yacht
appeared, and Mr Stevenson landed. He
gives a most favourable 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 every thing 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 whisky 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
| 166 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“9th August, 1814.—Waked at
seven, and find the vessel has left Lerwick harbour, 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
sea-shore. 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
| DIARY—PICTS’ CASTLE ON MOUSA. | 167 |
“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, re-
| 168 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“We get on board, and in time, for the wind
freshens, and becomes contrary. We beat down to Sumburghhead, 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
| DIARY—SUMBURGH-HEAD. | 169 |
| 170 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“10th August, 1814.—The omen
was but too true—a terrible combustion on board, among plates, dishes, glasses,
writing-desks, &c. &c.; 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 headach 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
| DIARY—THE FAIR ISLE. | 171 |
“We are now clear of Zetland, and about ten o’clock reach the Fair Isle;* 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,
* This is a solitary island, lying about half-way between Orkney and Zetland. |
| 172 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
* An American Commodore. |
| DIARY—THE FAIR ISLE. | 173 |
| 174 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“The manners of these islanders seem primitive and simple, and they are sober, good-humoured, 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* 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—
| DIARY—THE FAIR ISLE. | 175 |
“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. Mariages 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.
| 176 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
| DIARY—THE FAIR ISLE. | 177 |
‘Dost thou think on thy deserts, son of Hodeirah? Dost thou long for the gale of Arabia?’ |
“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 splendour, had been secured by our munificence, which consisted in a moderate benefaction of whisky 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 honour, we hung out our colours, stood into the bay, and saluted with three guns,
‘Echoing from a thousand caves,’ |
| 178 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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
| DIARY—SANDA. | 179 |
“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 savour
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
| 180 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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 carcasses 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
| DIARY—THE ORKNEYS. | 181 |
“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 harbour, 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 sandbanks, 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 bolt-sprit 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 humour 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
road-stead or harbour, 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,
| 182 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“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
every thing 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
| DIARY—THE ORKNEYS. | 183 |
