Part 9

The fair was running its full career of bargain-making, and consequent dram-drinking, rude flirtation, and meeting of friend with friend; when up the middle of the road, hustling the passengers, terrifying the cattle, came three misguided young gentlemen--medical students, I opined, engaged in botanical researches in these regions. But too plainly they had been dwellers in tents. One of them, gifted with a comic genius--his companions were desperately solemn--at one point of the road threw back the collar of his coat, after the fashion of Sambo when he brings down the applauses of the threepenny gallery, and executed a shuffle in front of a bewildered cow. Crummie backed and shied, bent on retreat. He, agile as a cork, bobbed up and down in her front, turn whither she would, with shouts and hideous grimaces, his companions standing by the while like mutes at a funeral. The feat accomplished, the trio staggered on, amid the scornful laughter and derision of the Gael. In a little while I encountered M'Ian, who had finished his business and was anxious to be gone. "We must harness the horse ourselves," he said, "for that rascal, John Kelly, has gone off somewhere. He has been in and out of tents ever since the cattle were sold, and I trust he won't come to grief. He has a standing quarrel with the Kyle men, and may get a broken head." [Sidenote: Lachlan Roy.] Elbowing our way through the crowd, we reached the dog-cart, got the horse harnessed, and were just about to start, when Lachlan Roy, his bonnet off, his countenance inflamed, came flying up. "Maister Alic, Maister Alic, is my face red yet?" cried he, as he laid his hand on the vehicle. "Red enough, Lachlan; you had better come with us, you may lose your money if you don't." "Aw, Maister Alic dear, don't say my face is red--it's no red, Maister Alic--it's no vera red," pled the poor fellow. "Will you come with us, or will you not?" said M'Ian, as he gathered up the reins in his hand and seized the whip. At this moment three or four drovers issued from a tent in the neighbourhood, and Lachlan heard his name shouted. "I maun go back for my bonnet. It wouldna do to ride with gentlemen without a bonnet;" and he withdrew his hand. The drovers shouted again, and that second shout drew Lachlan towards it as the flame draws the moth. "His face will be red enough before evening," said M'Ian, as we drove away.

After we had driven about a quarter of an hour, and got entirely free of the fair, M'Ian, shading his eyes from the sun with a curved palm, suddenly exclaimed, "There's a red dog sitting by the road-side a little forward. It looks like John Kelly's." When we got up, the dog wagged its tail and whined, but retained its recumbent position. "Come out," said M'Ian. "The dog is acting the part of a sentinel, and I daresay we shall find its master about." We got out accordingly, and soon found John stretched on the heather, snoring stertorously, his neck-tie unloosened, his bonnet gone, the sun shining full on the rocky countenance of him. " [Sidenote: John Kelly.] He's as drunk as the Baltic," said M'Ian; "but we must get him out of this. Get up, John." But John made no response. We pinched, pulled, and thumped, but John was immovable. I proposed that some water should be poured on his face, and did procure some from a wet ditch near, with which his countenance was splashed copiously--not to its special adornment. The muddy water only produced a grunt of dissatisfaction. "We must take him on his fighting side," said M'Ian, and then he knelt down and shouted in John's ear, "Here's a man from Kyle says he's a better man than you." John grunted inarticulate defiance. "He says he'll fight you any day you like." "Tell him to strike me, then," said John, struggling with his stupor. "He says he'll kick you." Under the insult John visibly writhed. "Kick him," whispered M'Ian, "as hard as you can. It's our only chance." I kicked, and John was erect as a dart, striking blindly out, and when he became aware against whom he was making such hostile demonstrations his hands dropped, and he stood as if he had seen a ghost. "Catch him," said M'Ian, "his rage has sobered him, he'll be drunk next moment; get him into the dog-cart at once." So the lucid moment was taken advantage of, he was hoisted into the back seat of the vehicle, his bonnet was procured--he had fallen asleep upon it--and placed on the wild head of him; we took our places, and away we started, with the red dog trotting behind. John rolled off once or twice, but there was no great harm done, and we easily got him in again. As we drove down the glen toward the house we set him down, and advised him to dip his wildly-tangled head in the stream before he went home.

During the last few weeks I have had opportunity of witnessing something of life as it passes in the Skye wildernesses, and have been struck with its self-containedness, not less than with its remoteness. A Skye family has everything within itself. The bare mountains yield mutton, which possesses a flavour and delicacy unknown in the south. The copses swarm with rabbits; and if a net is set over-night at the Black Island, there is abundance of fish to breakfast. The farmer grows his own corn, barley, and potatoes, digs his own peats, makes his own candles; he tans leather, spins cloth shaggy as a terrier's pile, and a hunchbacked artist in the place transforms the raw materials into boots or shepherd garments. Twice every year a huge hamper arrives from Glasgow, stuffed with all the little luxuries of housekeeping--tea, sugar, coffee, and the like. At more frequent intervals comes a ten-gallon cask from Greenock, whose contents can cunningly draw the icy fangs of a north-easter, or take the chill out of the clammy mists.

"What want they that a king should have?"

And once a week the _Inverness Courier_, like a window suddenly opened on the roaring sea, brings a murmur of the outer world, its politics, its business, its crimes, its literature, its whole multitudinous and unsleeping life, making the stillness yet more still. [Sidenote: The islesman's year.] To the Islesman the dial face of the year is not artificially divided, as in cities, by parliamentary session and recess, college terms, vacations short and long, by the rising and sitting of courts of justice; nor yet, as in more fortunate soils, by imperceptible gradations of coloured light--the green flowery year deepening into the sunset of the October hollyhock; the slow reddening of burdened orchards; the slow yellowing of wheaten plains. Not by any of these, but by the higher and more affecting element of animal life, with its passions and instincts, its gladness and suffering; existence like our own, although in a lower key, and untouched by solemn issues; the same music and wail, although struck on rude and uncertain chords. To the Islesman the year rises into interest when the hills, yet wet with melted snows, are pathetic with newly-yeaned lambs, and it completes itself through the successive steps of weaning, fleecing, sorting, fattening, sale, final departure, and cash in pocket. The shepherd life is more interesting than the agricultural, inasmuch as it deals with a higher order of being; for I suppose--apart from considerations of profit--a couchant ewe, with her young one at her side, or a ram, "with wreathed horns superb," cropping the herbage, is a more pleasing object to the æsthetic sense than a field of mangel-wurzel, flourishing ever so gloriously. The shepherd inhabits a mountain country, lives more completely in the open air, and is acquainted with all the phenomena of storm and calm, the thunder-smoke coiling in the wind, the hawk hanging stationary in the breathless blue. He knows the faces of the hills, recognises the voices of the torrents as if they were children of his own, can unknit their intricate melody as he lies with his dog beside him on the warm slope at noon, separating tone from tone, and giving this to rude crag, that to pebbly bottom. From long intercourse, every member of his flock wears to his eye its special individuality, and he recognises the countenance of a "wether" as he would the countenance of a human acquaintance. Sheep-farming is a picturesque occupation: and I think a multitude of sheep descending a hill-side, now outspreading in bleating leisure, now huddling together in the haste of fear--the dogs, urged more by sagacity than by the shepherd's voice, flying along the edges, turning, guiding, changing the shape of the mass--one of the prettiest sights in the world.

[Sidenote: The fold.]

The milking of the cows is worth going a considerable distance to see. The cows browse about on the hills all day, and at sunset they are driven into a sort of green oasis, amid the surrounding birch-wood. The rampart of rock above is dressed in evening colours, the grass is golden green; everything--animals, herds, and milkmaids are throwing long shadows. All about, the cows stand lowing in picturesque groups. The milkmaid approaches one, caresses it for a moment, draws in her stool, and in an instant the rich milk is hissing in the pail. All at once there arises a tremendous noise, and pushing through the clumps of birch-wood down towards a shallow rivulet which skirts the oasis, breaks a troop of wild-looking calves, attended by a troop of wilder-looking urchins armed with sticks and the branches of trees. The cows low more than ever, and turn their wistful eyes; the bellowing calves are halted on the further side of the rivulet, and the urchins stand in the water to keep them back. An ardent calf, however, breaks through the cordon of urchins, tumbles one into the streamlet, climbs the bank amid much Gaelic exclamation, and ambles awkwardly toward his dam. Reaching her, he makes a wild push at the swollen udder, drinks, his tail shaking with delight; while she, turning her head round, licks his shaggy hide with fond maternal tongue. In about five minutes he is forced to desist, and with a branch-bearing urchin on each side of him, is marched across the rivulet again. One by one the calves are allowed to cross, each makes the same wild push at the udder, each drinks, the tail ecstatically quivering; and on each the dam fixes her great patient eyes, and turning licks the hide whether it be red, black, brindled, dun, or cream-coloured. When the calves have been across the rivulet and back again, and the cows are being driven away to their accustomed pasturage, a milk-maid approaches with her pail, and holding it up, gives you to drink, as long ago Rebecca gave to drink the servant of Abraham. By this time the grass is no longer golden green; the red light has gone off the rocky ramparts, and the summer twilight is growing in the hollows, and in amongst the clumps of birchwood. Afar you hear the noise of retiring calves and urchins. The milk-maids start off in long procession with their pails and stools. A rabbit starts out from a bush at your feet, and scurries away down the dim field. And when, following, you descend the hill-side toward the bridge you see the solemn purple of the Cuchullins cutting the yellow pallor of evening sky--perhaps with a feeling of deeper satisfaction you notice that a light is burning in the porch of Mr M'Ian's house. [Sidenote: Lamb-weaning.] "The fold," as the milking of the cows is called, is pretty enough; but the most affecting incident of shepherd life is the weaning of the lambs--affecting, because it reveals passions in the fleecy flocks, the manifestation of which we are accustomed to consider ornamental in ourselves. From all the hills men and dogs drive the flocks down into a fold, or _fank_, as it is called here, consisting of several chambers or compartments. Into these compartments the sheep are huddled, and then the separation takes place. The ewes are returned to the mountains, the lambs are driven away to some spot where the pasture is rich, and where they are watched day and night. Midnight comes with dews and stars; the lambs are peacefully couched. Suddenly they are restless, ill at ease, goaded by some sore unknown want, and seem disposed to scatter wildly in every direction; but the shepherds are wary, the dogs swift and sure, and after a little while the perturbation is allayed, and they are quiet again. Walk up now to the fank. The full moon is riding between the hills, filling the glens with lustres and floating mysterious glooms. Listen! you hear it on every side of you, till it dies away in the silence of distance--the fleecy Rachel weeping for her children! The turf walls of the fank are in shadow, but something seems to be moving there. As you approach, it disappears with a quick short bleat, and a hurry of tiny hooves. Wonderful mystery of instinct! Affection all the more affecting that it is so wrapt in darkness, hardly knowing its own meaning. For nights and nights the creatures will be found haunting; about those turfen walls seeking the young that have been taken away.

[Sidenote: Mr M'Ian.]

But my chief delight here is my friend, Mr M'Ian. I know that I described him when I first saw him in his own house; but knowing him better now, as a matter of course I can describe him better. He would strike one with a sense of strangeness in a city, and among men of the present generation; but here he creates no surprise--he is a natural product of the region, like the red heather, or the bed of the dried torrent. He is master of legendary lore. He knows the history of every considerable family in the island; he circulates like sap through every genealogical tree; he is an enthusiast in Gaelic poetry, and is fond of reciting compositions of native bards, his eyes lighted up, and his tongue moving glibly over the rugged clots of consonants. He has a servant cunning upon the pipes; and, dwelling there this summer, I heard Ronald wandering near the house, solacing himself with their music: now a plaintive love-song, now a coronach for chieftain borne to his grave, now a battle march, the notes of which, melancholy and monotonous at first, would soar into a higher strain, and then hurry and madden as if beating time to the footsteps of the charging clan. I am the fool of association; and the tree under which a king has rested, the stone on which a banner was planted on the morning of some victorious or disastrous day, the house in which some great man first saw the light, are to me the sacredest things. This slight, gray, keen-eyed man--the scabbard sorely frayed now, the blade sharp and bright as ever--gives me a thrill like an old coin with its half-obliterated effigy, a Druid stone on a moor, a stain of blood on the floor of a palace. He stands before me a living figure, and history groups itself behind by way of background. He sits at the same board with me, and yet he lifted Moore at Corunna, and saw the gallant dying eyes flash up with their last pleasure when the Highlanders charged past. He lay down to sleep in the light of Wellington's watch-fires in the gorges of the Pyrenees; around him roared the death-thunders of Waterloo. There is a certain awfulness about very old men; they are amongst us, but not of us. They crop out of the living soil and herbage of to-day, like rocky strata bearing marks of the glacier or the wave. Their roots strike deeper than ours, and they draw sustenance from an earlier layer of soil. They are lonely amongst the young; they cannot form new friendships, and are willing to be gone. They feel the "sublime attractions of the grave;" for the soil of churchyards once flashed kind eyes on them, heard with them the chimes at midnight, sang and clashed the brimming goblet with them; and the present Tom and Harry are as nothing to the Tom and Harry that swaggered about and toasted the reigning belles seventy years ago. We are accustomed to lament the shortness of life; but it is wonderful how long it is notwithstanding. Often a single life, like a summer twilight, connects two historic days. Count back four lives, and King Charles is kneeling on the scaffold at Whitehall. To hear M'Ian speak, one could not help thinking in this way. In a short run across the mainland with him this summer, we reached Culloden Moor. The old gentleman with a mournful air--for he is a great Jacobite, and wears the Prince's hair in a ring--pointed out the burial-grounds of the clans. Struck with his manner, I inquired how he came to know their red resting-places. As if hurt, he drew himself up, laid his hand on my shoulder, saying, "Those who put them in told me." Heavens, how a century and odd years collapsed, and the bloody field--the battle-smoke not yet cleared away, and where Cumberland's artillery told the clansmen sleeping in thickest swathes--unrolled itself from the horizon down to my very feet! For a whole evening he will sit and speak of his London life; and I cannot help contrasting the young officer, who trod Bond Street with powder in his hair at the end of last century, with the old man living in the shadow of Blaavin now.

[Sidenote: Skye stories.]

Dwellers in cities have occasionally seen a house that has the reputation of being haunted, and heard a ghost story told. City people laugh when these stories are told, even although the blood should run chill the while. But in Skye one is steeped in a ghostly atmosphere; men walk about here gifted with the second sight. There has been something weird and uncanny about the island for some centuries. Douglas, on the morning of Otterbourne, according to the ballad, was shaken with superstitious fears:--

"But I hae dream'd a dreary dream-- Beyond the Isle of Skye, I saw a dead man win a fight, And I think that man was I."