Part 8

"I have never seen him before," said M'Ian; "but I suspect he is one of those poor fellows who, from extravagance, or devotion to opium or strong waters, have made a mull of life, and who are sent here to end it in a quiet way. We have lots of them everywhere."

"But," said I, "this seems the very worst place you could send such a man to--it's like sending a man into a wilderness with his remorse. It is only in the world, amid its noise, its ambitions, its responsibilities, that men pick themselves up. Sea-birds, and misty mountains, and rain, and silence are the worst companions for such a man."

"But then, you observe, sea-birds, and misty mountains, and rain, and silence hold their tongues, and take no notice of peccadilloes. Whatever may be their faults, they are not scandal-mongers. The doings in Skye do not cause blushes in London. The man dies here as silently as a crow; it is only a black-bordered letter, addressed in a strange hand, that tells the news; and the black-bordered epistle can be thrown into the fire--if the poor mother does not clutch at it and put it away--and no one be a bit the wiser. It is sometimes to the advantage of his friends that a man should go into the other world by the loneliest and most sequestered path."

So talking, we passed the farm-house, which, with the exception of a red-headed damsel, who thrust her head out of a barn to stare, seemed utterly deserted, and bent our steps towards the shore of the Loch. Rough grass bordered a crescent of yellow sand, and on the rough grass a boat lay on its side, its pitchy seams blistering in the early sunshine. Of this boat we immediately took possession, dragged it down to the sea margin, got in our guns and provisions, tumbled in stones for ballast, procured oars, and pushed of. We had to round the great hill which, from the other side of the valley, we had seen breaking down into the sea; and as we sailed and looked up, sheep were feeding on the green shelves, and every now and again a white smoke of sea-birds burst out dangerously from the black precipices. Slowly rounding the rocky buttress, which on stormy days the Atlantic fillips with its spray, another headland, darker still and drearier, drew slowly out to sea, and in a quarter of an hour we had passed from the main ocean into Loch Scavaig, and every pull of the oars revealed another ridge of the Cuchullins. Between these mountain ramparts we sailed, silent as a boatful of souls being conveyed to some Norse hades. [Sidenote: Lock Coruisk.] The Cuchullins were entirely visible now; and the sight midway up Loch Scavaig is more impressive even than when you stand on the ruined shore of Loch Coruisk itself--for the reason, perhaps, that, sailing midway, the mountain forms have a startling unexpectedness, while by the time you have pulled the whole way up, you have had time to master them to some extent, and familiarity has begun to dull the impression. In half an hour or so we disembarked on a rude platform of rock, and stepped out on the very spot on which, according to Sir Walter, the Bruce landed:

"Where a wild stream with headlong shock Comes brawling down a bed of rock To mingle with the main."

Picking your steps carefully over huge boulder and slippery stone, you come upon the most savage scene of desolation in Britain. Conceive a large lake filled with dark green water, girt with torn and shattered precipices; the bases of which are strewn with ruin since an earthquake passed that way, and whose summits jag the sky with grisly splinter and peak. There is no motion here save the white vapour steaming from the abyss. The utter silence weighs like a burden upon you: you feel an intruder in the place. The hills seem to possess some secret; to brood over some unutterable idea which you can never know. You cannot feel comfortable at Loch Coruisk, and the discomfort arises in a great degree from the feeling that you are outside of everything--that the thunder-splitten peaks have a life with which you cannot intermeddle. The dumb monsters sadden and perplex. Standing there, you are impressed with the idea that the mountains are silent because they are listening so intently. And the mountains are listening, else why do they echo our voices in such a wonderful way? Shout here like an Achilles in the trenches. Listen! The hill opposite takes up your words, and repeats them one after another, and curiously tries them over with the gravity of a raven. Immediately after, you hear a multitude of skyey voices.

"Methinks that there are spirits among the peaks."

How strangely the clear strong tones are repeated by these granite precipices! Who could conceive that Horror had so sweet a voice! Fainter and more musical they grow; fainter, sweeter, and more remote, until at last they come on your ear as if from the blank of the sky itself. M'Ian fired his gun, and it reverberated into a whole battle of Waterloo. We kept the hills busy with shouts and the firing of guns, and then M'Ian led us to a convenient place for lunching. As we trudge along something lifts itself off a rock--'tis an eagle. See how grandly the noble creature soars away. What sweep of wings! What a lord of the air! And if you cast up your eyes you will see his brother hanging like a speck beneath the sun. Under M'Ian's guidance, we reached the lunching-place, unpacked our basket, devoured our bread and cold mutton, drank our bottled beer, and then lighted our pipes and smoked--in the strangest presence. Thereafter we bundled up our things, shouldered our guns, and marched in the track of ancient Earthquake towards our boat. Embarked once again, and sailing between the rocky portals of Loch Scavaig, I said, "I would not spend a day in that solitude for the world. I should go mad before evening."

"Nonsense," said M'Ian. "Sportsmen erect tents at Coruisk, and stay there by the week--capital trout, too, are to be had in the Loch. The photographer, with his camera and chemicals, is almost always here, and the hills sit steadily for their portraits. It's as well you have seen Coruisk before its glory has departed. Your friend, the Landlord, talks of mooring a floating hotel at the head of Loch Scavaig full of sleeping apartments, the best of meats and drinks, and a brass band to perform the newest operatic tunes on the summer evenings. At the clangour of the brass band the last eagle will take his flight for Harris."

"The Tourist comes, and poetry flies before him as the red man flies before the white. His Tweeds will make the secret top of Sinai commonplace some day."

In due time we reached Camasunary, and drew the boat up on the rough grass beyond the yellow sand. The house looked deserted as we passed. Our friend of the morning we saw seated on a rock, smoking, and gazing up Glen Sligachan, still looking out for the appearance of his messenger from Broadford. At our shout he turned his head and waved his hand. We then climbed the hill and descended on Kilmaree. It was evening now, and as we pulled homewards across the rosy frith, I sat in the bow and watched the monstrous bulk of Blaavin, and the wild fringe of the Cuchullins bronzed by sunset. M'Ian steered, and the rowers, as they bent to their work, sang melancholy Gaelic songs. It was eleven at night by the time we got across, and the hills we had left were yet cutting, with dull purple, a pale yellow sky; for in summer in these northern latitudes there is no proper night, only a mysterious twilight of an hour and a sparkle of short-lived stars.

[Sidenote: Broadford Fair.]

Broadford Fair is a great event in the island. The little town lies on the margin of a curving bay, and under the shadow of a somewhat celebrated hill. On the crest of the hill is a cairn of stones, the burying-place of a Scandinavian woman, tradition informs me, whose wish it was to be laid high up there, that she might sleep right in the pathway of the Norway wind. In a green glen at its base stands the house of Corachatachin, breathing reminiscences of Johnson and Boswell. Broadford is a post town, containing a lime kiln, an inn, and perhaps three dozen houses in all. It is a place of great importance. If Portree is the London of Skye, Broadford is its Manchester. The markets, held four times a year, take place on a patch of moorland, about a mile from the village. Not only are cattle sold, and cash exchanged for the same, but there the Skye farmer meets his relations, from the brother of his blood to his cousin forty times removed. To these meetings he is drawn, not only by his love of coin, but by his love of kindred, and--the _Broadford Mail_ and the _Portree Advertiser_ lying yet in the womb of time--by his love of gossip also. The market is the Skye-man's exchange, his family gathering, and his newspaper. From the deep sea of his solitude he comes up to breathe there, and, refreshed, sinks again. This fair at Broadford I resolved to see. The day before the market the younger M'Ian had driven some forty stirks from the hill, and these, under the charge of John Kelly and his dog, started early in the afternoon that they might be present at the rendezvous about eight o'clock on the following morning, at which hour business generally began. I saw the picturesque troop go past--wildly-beautiful brutes of all colours,--black, red, cream-coloured, dun and tan; all of a height, too, and so finely bred that, but for difference of colour, you could hardly distinguish the one from the other. What a lowing they made! how they tossed their slavering muzzles! how the breaths of each individual brute rose in a separate wreath! how John Kelly shouted and objurgated, and how his dog scoured about! At last the bellowings of the animals--the horde chanting after that fashion their obscure "_Lochaber no more_"--grew fainter and fainter up the glen, and finally on everything the wonted silence settled down. [Sidenote: On the way to the fair.] Next morning before sunrise M'Ian and I followed in a dog-cart. We went along the glen down which Fellowes and I had come; and in the meadows over which, on that occasion, we observed a troop of horses galloping through the mist of evening, I noticed, in the beamless light that preceded sunrise, hay coops by the river side, and an empty cart standing with its scarlet poles in the air. In a field nearer, a couple of male blackcocks with a loud _whirr-rr_ were knocking their pugnacious heads together. Suddenly, above the hill in front the sun showed his radiant face, the chill atmosphere was pierced and brightened by his fires, the dewy birch-trees twinkled, and there were golden flickerings on the pools of the mountain stream along whose margin our road ascended. We passed the lake near which the peat-girls had laughed at us; I took note of the very spot on which we had given Bare-legs a shilling, and related the whole story of our evening walk to my companion as we tooled along.

A mile or two after we had passed the little fishing village with which I had formerly made acquaintance, we entered on a very dismal district of country. It was precisely to the eye what the croak of the raven is to the ear. It was an utter desolation in which nature seemed deteriorated, and at her worst. Winter could not possibly sadden the region; no spring could quicken it into flowers. The hills wore but for ornament the white streak of the torrent; the rocky soil clothed itself in heather to which the purple never came. Even man, the miracle-worker, who transforms everything he touches, who has rescued a fertile Holland from the waves, who has reared a marble Venice out of salt lagoon and marsh, was defeated there. Labour was resultless--it went no further than itself--it was like a song without an echo. A turf-hut with smoke issuing from the roof, and a patch of green round about, which reminded you of the smile of an ailing child, and which would probably ripen, so far as it was capable of ripening, by November, was all that man could wrest from nature. [Sidenote: Broadford Fair.] Gradually, however, as we proceeded, the aspect of the country changed, it began to exhibit traces of cultivation; and before long, the red hill with the Norwegian woman's cairn atop, rose before us, suggesting Broadford, and the close of the journey. In a little while the road was filled with cattle, driven forward with oath and shout. Every now and then a dog-cart came skirring along, and infinite was the confusion, and dire the clangour of tongues, when it plunged into a herd of sheep or skittish "three-year-olds." At the entrance to the fair, the horses were taken out of the vehicles, and left, with a leathern thong fastened round their fore-legs, to limp about in search of breakfast. On either side of the road stood hordes of cattle, the wildest-looking creatures, with fells of hair hanging over their eyes, and tossing horns of preposterous dimensions. On knolls, a little apart, women with white caps and wrapped in scarlet tartan plaids, sat beside a staked cow or pony, or perhaps a dozen sheep, patiently waiting the advances of customers. Troops of horses neighed from stakes. Sheep were there, too, in restless throngs and masses, continually changing their shapes, scattering hither and thither like quicksilver, insane dogs and men flying along their edges. What a hubbub of sound! what lowing and neighing! what bleating and barking! Down in the hollow ground tents had been knocked up since dawn; there potatoes were being cooked for drovers who had been travelling all night; there also liquor could be had. To these places, I observed, contracting parties invariably repaired to solemnise a bargain. At last we reached the centre of the fair, and there stood John Kelly and his animals, a number of drovers moving around them and examining their points. By these men my friend was immediately surrounded, and much chaffering and bargain-making ensued; visits to one of the aforesaid tents being made at intervals. It was a strange sight that rude primeval traffic. John Kelly kept a sharp eye on his beasts. Lachlan Roy passed by, and low was his salute, and broad the smile on his good-natured countenance. I wandered about aimlessly for a time, and began to weary of the noise and tumult. M'Ian had told me that he would not be able to return before noonday at earliest, and that all the while he would be engaged in bargain-making on his own account, or on the account of others, and that during those hours I must amuse myself as best I could. As the novelty of the scene wore off, I began to fear that amusement would not be possible. Suddenly lifting my eyes out of the noise and confusion, there were the solitary mountain tops, and the clear mirror of Broadford Bay, the opposite coast sleeping green in it with all its woods; and lo! the steamer from the south sliding in with her red funnel, and breaking the reflection with a track of foam, and disturbing the far-off morning silence with the thunders of her paddles. That sight solved my difficulty for me in a moment. I thought of Dr Johnson and Boswell. "I shall go," I said, "and look at the ruins of the House of Corachatachin, that lies in the green glen beneath the red hill, on the top of which the Norse woman is buried;" and so saying I went.

To me, I confess, of all Hebridean associations, Dr Johnson's visit is the pleasantest. How the doctor ever got there is a matter for perpetual wonder. He liked books, good cheer, club-life, the roar of Fleet Street, good talk, witty companions. One cannot imagine what attractions the rainy and surge-beaten islands possessed for the author of the "Vanity of Human Wishes." Wordsworth had not yet made fashionable a love for mountain and lake, and the shapes of changing cloud. Scott had not yet thrown the glamour of romance over the northern land, from the Sark to the Fitful Head. Sidenote: Dr Johnson in Skye.] For fine scenery Johnson did not care one rush. When Boswell in the fulness of his delight pointed out "an immense mountain," the doctor sincerely sneered, "an immense protuberance." He only cared for mountains in books, and even in books he did not care for them much. The rain-cloud, which would put Mr Ruskin into ecstasies, could only suggest to the moralist the urgent necessity of an umbrella or a coach. Johnson loved his ease; and a visit to the Western island, was in his day a serious matter--about as serious as a visit to Kamtschatka would be in ours. In his wanderings he was exposed to rain and wind, indifferent cookery, tempestuous seas, and the conversation of persons who were neither witty nor learned--who were neither polished like Beauclerk, nor amusing like Goldsmith--and who laughed at epigram as Leviathan laughs at the shaking of the spear. I protest, when I think of the burly doctor travelling in these regions, voluntarily resigning for a while all London delights, I admire him as a very hero. Boswell commemorates certain outbreaks of petulance and spleen; but, on the whole, the great man seems to have been pleased with his adventure. Johnson found in his wanderings beautiful and high-bred women, well-mannered and cultivated men--and it is more than probable that, if he were returning to the islands to-day, he would not find those admirable human qualities in greater abundance. What puzzles me most is the courage with which the philosopher encountered the sea. I have, in a considerable steamer more than once, shivered at the heavy surge breaking on Ardnamurchan; and yet the doctor passed the place in an open boat on his way to Mull, "lying down below in philosophical tranquillity, with a greyhound at his back to keep him warm," while poor Bozzy remained in the rain above, clinging for dear life to a rope which, a sailor gave him to hold, quieting his insurgent stomach as best he could with pious considerations, and sadly disturbed when a bigger wave than usual came shouldering onward, making the boat reel, with the objections which had been taken to a particular providence--objections which Dr Hawkesworth had lately revived in his preface to "Voyages to the South Seas." Boswell's journal of the tour is delicious reading; full of amusing egotism; unconsciously comic when he speaks for himself, and at the same time valuable, memorable, wonderfully vivid and dramatic in presentment when the "Majestic Teacher of Moral and Religious Wisdom" appears. What a singular capacity the man had to exhibit his hero as he lived, and at the same time to write himself complacently down an ass! It needed a certain versatility to accomplish the feat, one would think. In both ways the most eminent success attends him. And yet the absurdity of Boswell has all the effect of the nicest art. Johnson floats, a vast galleon, in the sea of Boswell's vanity; and in contrast with the levity of the element in which it lives, its bulk and height appear all the more impressive. In Skye one is every now and again coming on the tract of the distinguished travellers. They had been at Broadford--and that morning I resolved I should go to Broadford also.

[Sidenote: Corachatachin.]

Picking my steps carefully through the fair--avoiding a flock of sheep on the one side, and a column of big-horned black cattle on the other, with some difficulty getting out of the way of an infuriated bull that came charging up the road, scattering everything right and left, a dozen blown drovers panting at its heels--I soon got quit of the turmoil, and in half an hour passed the lime-kiln, the dozen houses, the ten shops, the inn, and the church, which constitute Broadford, and was pacing along the green glen which ran in the direction of the red hills. At last I came to a confused pile of stones, near which grew a solitary tree whose back the burden of the blast had bent, and which, although not a breath of wind was stirring, could no more regain an upright position than can a round-shouldered labourer on a holiday. That confused pile of stones was all that remained of the old house of Corachatachin. I wandered around it more reverently than if it had been the cairn of a chief. It is haunted by no ghost. So far as my knowledge extends, no combat ever took place on the spot. But there Boswell, after Dr Johnson had retired to rest, in company with some young Highland bloods--ah, me! their very grandchildren must be dead or gray by this!--brewed and quaffed five gigantic bowls of punch, with what wild talk we can fancy; and the friend of the "Majestic Teacher of Moral and Religious Wisdom" went to bed at five in the morning, and awoke with the headache of the reprobate. At noon the doctor burst in with the exclamation, "What, drunk yet?" "His tone of voice was not that of severe upbraiding," writes the penitent Bozzy, "so I was relieved a little." Did they fancy, these young men, as they sat that night and drank, that a hundred years after people would write of their doings?--that the odour of their punch-bowls would outlive themselves? No man knows what part of his life will be remembered, what forgotten. A single tear, hurriedly brushed away mayhap, is the best thing we know of Xerxes. Picking one's steps around the ruin, one thought curiously of the flushed faces which death has cooled for so long.

[Sidenote: The Fair at Broadford.]

When I got back to the fair about noon, it was evident that a considerable stroke of business had been done. Hordes of bellowing cattle were being driven towards Broadford, and drovers were rushing about in a wonderful manner, armed with tar-pot and stick, and smearing their peculiar mark on the shaggy hides of their purchases. Rough-looking customers enough these fellows, yet they want not means. Some of them came here this morning with £500 in their pocket-books, and have spent every paper of it, and this day three months they will return with as large a sum. As I advanced, the booths ranged along the side of the road--empty when I passed them several hours before--were plentifully furnished with confections, ribbons, and cheap jewellery, and around these fair-headed and scarlet-plaided girls swarmed thickly as bees round summer flowers.