Gairloch In North-West Ross-Shire Part 29

There are two considerable sea islands pertaining to the parish of Gairloch, viz., Longa, in the sea loch of Gairloch, which is now uninhabited but affords pasturage for sheep, and Isle Ewe, in Loch Ewe, which is inhabited and contains a sheep and dairy farm. There are other small islands on the sea coast; the only considerable one is Foura, on the west side of the mouth of Loch Ewe. It is the largest of the smaller islands in the sea. Other islands are mentioned in their places.

There are eighty-one considerable fresh-water lochs in the parish of Gairloch, besides a vast number of smaller sheets of water which, though locally bearing the name of loch, or lochan, are but tarns.

The lochs measuring a mile and upwards in length are:--

LENGTH IN MILES.

Loch Maree, 12 Fionn Loch, 5 Loch Fada, 3 Loch a Chroisg (Loch Rosque; one end only), 3 Loch a Bheallaich, 2 Loch na h' Oidhche, 1 Loch a Bhaid Luachraich, 1 Loch Fada, 1 Loch Gharbhaig, 1 Loch Kernsary, 1 Loch Tollie, 1

The princ.i.p.al river is the Ewe, by which Loch Maree empties itself into the sea. It is barely two miles in length. There is but one bridge across it, viz., at Poolewe, where the river joins the sea. The stream which runs past Kenlochewe into Loch Maree is called the Kenlochewe river, and is the main feeder of Loch Maree, and so of course also of the River Ewe. Above Kenlochewe it has three divisions, viz., the Garbh river, coming from Loch Clair, the small stream coming down Glen Dochartie, and the small river Bruachaig. The streams called the Grudidh Water and the Talladale Water, or Lungard burn, are also feeders of Loch Maree, and are sometimes termed rivers, but they are scarcely worthy of the name.

There are two small rivers that flow into Gairloch (the sea loch), viz., the Kerry and the Badachro river. The Little Gruinard river, flowing out of Fionn Loch, forms part of the boundary of the parish towards the east or north-east. The Kenlochewe and Garbh rivers, and the Ewe, the Kerry, the Badachro, and the Little Gruinard river, are all more or less salmon streams.

The most extensive wood in the parish is that of Glas Leitire, near the head of Loch Maree. Another considerable wood is at Talladale, and there are woods on most of the islands of Loch Maree. These are all natural woods, except those on one or two of the islands, one of which is called "the planted island." At Shieldaig, Kerrisdale, and Flowerdale there are woods more or less natural, but many of the fine trees about Flowerdale House have been planted. There are small natural woods about Tollie and Inveran, at the foot of Loch Maree, and at Kernsary, as well as at Loch a Druing. There is also a natural wood between Kernsary and Tournaig, called Coille Aigeascaig. The woods about Inverewe House are entirely planted. There are some natural woods on the north-east sh.o.r.e of Loch Maree, especially between Letterewe and Ardlair, at which latter place there are also plantations. The princ.i.p.al larch plantations are the one between Slatadale and Talladale, and that in Kerrisdale, both containing good poles. The old fir trees about Loch Clair and the bridge of Grudidh, as well as some particularly fine specimens of pine in the woods at Glas Leitire, are remarkable for their picturesque character, and testify to the superiority of nature's planting as compared with man's handiwork.

There are two caves in Gairloch parish, one at Cove and the other at Sand of Udrigil, used as places of meeting for public worship. There is a cave or cavern at North Erradale, described in Part IV., chap. x.

There is also a fine cave at Opinan, described in the same chapter. Many other caves occur on the sea-sh.o.r.e and in other places. Of smaller caves, the Cave of the King's Son at Ardlair, and the Cave of Gold between Ardlair and Letterewe, are separately described in these pages.

There are several waterfalls in the parish, but they are not of the grandest type, and are only really good after a heavy downpour. There is a fine one on the crag called Bonaid Donn, overlooking the farm of Tagan, at the head of Loch Maree. This crag is a shoulder of Beinn a'

Mhuinidh, and the fall is called Steall a' Mhuinidh, a name almost synonymous with that of the celebrated continental p.i.s.s-vache. In dry weather it is little more than a black stain on the face of the cliff, but in heavy rain it becomes an interesting feature in the landscape. If a strong wind be blowing, clouds of spray are driven from this fall, producing a curious effect.

There is a double cascade on the Garavaig burn, a little more than a mile west from Talladale. It received the name of the Victoria Falls on the visit of Her Majesty the Queen to Talladale in 1877.

Another good fall is situated a short distance behind Letterewe House, and forms a beautiful object as seen from the deck of the steamer.

The finest falls in the parish are the falls of the Kerry, situated on the River Kerry, shortly after it leaves Loch Bad na Sgalaig. If there be any quant.i.ty of water in the little Kerry river, a series of magnificent cascades tumble down the narrow channel in a deep rocky gorge. When Sir Kenneth Mackenzie's young plantations on the hill sides here have grown, they will greatly add to the beauty of the place.

There are two small waterfalls about a mile up the private road leading east from Flowerdale House.

These are all the waterfalls in Gairloch parish worthy of separate mention, but it must be added that in heavy rain there are many fine cascades on steep hill sides, seen from the mail-car or the deck of the steamer.

The natural features thus enumerated go to make up the princ.i.p.al scenic beauties of this lovely country, unsurpa.s.sed, as I think, for its combinations of n.o.ble mountains, gleaming lochs, wide moorlands, rugged crags, rocky torrents, and smiling woods, all diversified from hour to hour according to the spectator's point of view, and the constant trans.m.u.tations of sunshine and shade, of calm and storm. With these must be included distant peeps of the blue mountains of adjoining districts, and enchanting views from all parts of the coast over the sea, with its ever-changing hues and effects.

Chapter II.

CLIMATE AND WEATHER.

In the present day the subjects of climate and weather receive extraordinary attention from numbers who are in search of health.

One of our most eminent physicians has told me, that the North-West Highlands, especially those parts where mountain and sea air are combined, possess more restorative qualities for the jaded const.i.tution than any other part of the United Kingdom, and that they surpa.s.s in this respect many favourite resorts on the continent of Europe. My own personal inquiry and experience tend to confirm this opinion. Not only is the atmosphere charged with ozone, but all nature is pure and refreshing. To the traveller who comes from busy towns where everything is defiled by smoke and filth, this region possesses a powerful charm in its absolute purity. Here thirst may be quenched at almost every burn or loch, and flowers and ferns may be plucked without the fingers of the gatherer being soiled.

But changeable weather is a frequent drawback to those who cannot wait for improvement. The rain-fall is believed to be over seventy inches in the year. The mountains are often covered with clouds. But there is some compensation; when the clouds break up and the rain is over, wonderful wreaths of mist roll about the hills and glens in mysterious beauty.

Sir George Steuart Mackenzie of Coul, in his "General Survey" (1810), has a chapter on the climate. His remarks are quite applicable to the climate of Gairloch in the present day. He says:--"Our winters are much milder than those of the continent, but our summers are colder." "In this country it cannot be said that we enjoy the season of spring until the portion of the year so denominated has pa.s.sed. The heat of the months of July and August is often equal to, and sometimes more considerable than, the greatest heat experienced in England, but with more variation between day and night." "When our springs are late, we are pretty sure of our gardens containing abundance of fruit, and that the summer heat will be more uniform than usual." "During three-fourths of the year the wind blows from between the points south-west and north-west. The heaviest rains proceed from the southward of west. Snow storms most frequently come from the north-west, but the most severe ones are from the north-east. During summer the south and south-west winds are sometimes accompanied by thunder. On the whole the climate of Ross and Cromarty shires must be considered as moist, but particularly so in the western districts. The average annual temperature may be stated for the whole county at 46. Snow falls in greatest quant.i.ty in the month of February; but severe storms are sometimes experienced at an earlier period of the winter. It has been remarked that the climate has been becoming worse for many years. I can answer for the truth of this since the year 1796; and I judge from the ripening of certain garden fruits. About that time I had ripe peaches sent to my shooting quarters from the open wall in the month of August. I have not had them well ripened since till the middle of September, sometimes later, and often not at all."

Dr Mackenzie tells us something in his delightful gossipy way of the old-fashioned summers. He says:--"What long hot summer days we used to have then compared with the present short lukewarm ones, that no sooner begin than they end disgracefully in comparison. Astronomers tell us their registers shew that the present seasons are just the same as in say 1812. What stuff and nonsense! In those happier times everybody had summer as well as winter clothing. Who dreams of such extravagance now in the north? Not a soul, at least of the male animals. Well do I remember one fine day before we migrated to the west, having gone down to the river to bathe with my brothers, and dawdling away our time, naked, making mill dams or dirt pies, on the sandy sh.o.r.e, when putting on my shirt finding as it were pins inside. On examination there were several water blisters on my back, needing a pin to empty them, and many days pa.s.sed before they were healed up! And I imagine we were all alike.

Who ever hears now of such blistering sun, unless on an extra thin-skinned, toddy-filled, irritable nose? Then in our eastern garden the extensive walls were every year coated with apricot, peach, and nectarine trees, just crusted with loads of as fine and well ripened fruit as five most healthy stomach-always-empty urchins, who had the free run of the garden, could eat up as fast as they ripened, aye, afford often to pelt each other with a half-eaten peach or apricot, because a wasp had dug into it on its wall side. And where in that garden, or in my own still warmer one (Eileanach, Inverness), is a living, growing peach or nectarine wall tree now to be found? Every one dead for want of sun to ripen its wood ere winter killed it. In our garden (Conan House) was a standard filbert tree, perhaps twenty-four feet high, with a stem as thick as my body, every year bearing bushels of as fine full filberts as Mr Solomon ever exhibited in Covent Garden, till old John, ruined in mind by having a vinery put up for him about sixty feet north of the poor filbert, actually cut it down on the sly, when we were in the west, in the idea that it might possibly shade the vinery! I never saw my father (Sir Hector Mackenzie of Gairloch) in a hurry, or pa.s.sion, or heard him swear, but sure I am when he came on the site of the filbert, where it was not, a friend would have avoided listening to his even _sotto-voce_ thoughts on _that_ day. But old John perhaps only looked forward to the shocking seasons to come, when money could not discover a ripe common hazel nut, as has been the case for years now in our nut wood jungles, that used every year to flood the country with myriads of sacks of nuts, every one full to the bung, in cartloads at the Beauly markets, and in every town and village,--the nut crackers being a regular nuisance, paving every street and road and room with sh.e.l.ls for months. The whole people in the country seemed to live with pockets full of nuts, their price being fabulously low. Nonsense talking of our temperature now being what it was seventy years ago!

Moreover we used (I believe as a matter of duty) always to be settled in the west (Gairloch), for the summer, before the 'King's birthday,' June 4th. Is there an idea of loyalty in Britain now resembling the general adoration of King George the Third in those early times? I don't believe we really know now what was meant by the loyalty of those old days. Did the general feudal feeling of those times promote royal loyalty?

Probably it did. Was it the cause of our never failing to have a huge china bowl after dinner with a pail of 'cream that wad mak a caunle o'

my finger,' to wash down the first strawberries of the season on the 4th of June? Don't I remember their delicious smell in Flowerdale House, and their taste too? 'North Carolinas' the gardener called them. And now, in the same garden (but I deny the same climate utterly), no strawberry thinks it is called upon to ripen in less than a month later. 'The same temperature as seventy years ago!' What fools we must be supposed to be by the rascal astronomers! And we also always had a few Mayduke cherries to swear by on the 4th of June. Afterwards, was there ever such a ma.s.s of cherries offered, before or since, to five fruity boys, and as devoted a tutor, as in the Tigh Dige garden (Flowerdale), sheltered from every cold wind, and held up to the sun, by all that could be desired in woods and mountains. No, I'm sure; no one can tell me where it defied five such fruiterers and their equally busy tutor to make such an impression on the tall crowd of cherry trees in that garden. Our dear tutor told me, years after, of one thing that was a weight on his mind, viz., that having dropped one forenoon nine hundred cherry-stones from his mouth into his worm-fishing bag, he was called away, and prevented finishing his thousand in one day!"

From March to September the nights are much shorter than in more southern lat.i.tudes. In June and July night may be said to be of only two hours' duration, and in clear weather those two hours are but a subdued twilight. A description of a summer evening on Loch Maree is given by Dr MacCulloch (see Appendix D). Of course in winter the days are shorter and the nights longer than in England. In autumn and spring grand displays of the Aurora Borealis, or northern lights, often relieve the darkness, frequently prognosticating tempestuous weather. Rainbows of intensest brilliance are frequently seen in Gairloch, and the weird lunar rainbow is occasionally to be observed. Strange to say fogs are almost unknown in this humid region; even with a h.o.a.r-frost there is no fog. With a south-east wind and a cloudless sky, the mountain ranges are often rendered marvellously imposing by a silvery haze, which apparently enhances their magnitude and adds mystery to their forms.

The winters are not usually severe. Whether from the action of the Gulf Stream, or owing to the presence of such large ma.s.ses of water, the frosts have not, as a rule, the same intensity as in many parts further south; so that a variety of shrubs and other plants can be grown in the open air which elsewhere need protection, and many flowers and fruits are earlier than in less favoured places. Some winters have been so mild that even geraniums and calceolarias have survived unprotected in the open ground.

There is a Gaelic proverb which may be translated thus, "If spring mist should enter the meal-chest, snow will follow." The meaning is, that when mist is seen in spring, snow always falls soon after. From long observation I can vouch for the truth of this curious saying. Snow often falls during the spring months; but the heavy falls of snow are now-a-days usually in December, January, and February. They are, however, of comparatively rare occurrence.

When snow comes it gives wonderful glory to the mountains, and even frost has its peculiar charms. In the exceptionally severe winter of 1880-1, which had only once been surpa.s.sed in the experience of the oldest inhabitants, the ice displayed some of the peculiar forms described by those who have visited the Arctic circle. On the margin of Loch Maree (whose waters never wholly freeze), and especially where streams debouch into it, great hummocks of ice were formed. At the same time the brackish waters of Loch Ewe became covered with ice floes, of such extent as actually to prevent the pa.s.sage of boats which had started to cross from the west side of the loch to convey persons who wished to attend sacramental services then being held at Aultbea. It was the only time I ever saw the sea frozen, and this circ.u.mstance, coupled with the phenomena witnessed on the ice-bound sh.o.r.es of Loch Maree and the unnatural silence of nature,--whose murmuring streams were frozen dumb, and whose benumbed birds could give forth no note or song,--really seemed to transfer one to another world.

Perhaps the best spot in the parish to observe the sunsets is the Gairloch Hotel. Looking over the bay of Gairloch, no near mountains obstruct the view, and the aspect in summer and autumn is exactly right.

Beyond the bay of Gairloch itself lies the Minch, and again beyond and above the Minch are the distant and seemingly transparent hills of Skye.

The scene is as it were framed by the lines of hills on either side of Gairloch, and in the immediate foreground are strips of yellow sand and ridges of dark rock. None can tell, none can paint, the glories of the setting sun; words as well as pigments are powerless to adequately record the wondrous changes of the splendid colours that gleam in the sky and clouds, the subtle tints suffused over the sea and distant hills, and the marvellous glow pervading the whole of the beauteous scene!

In this mountain land too there are countless varieties of what may be called cloudscapes; the numerous summits attract and then break up the cloud ma.s.ses into rough and fleecy shapes, some thick enough to obstruct the light, others edged by silvery gleams, and others again brilliant with the sun shining through them,--the whole exhibiting wonderful examples of aerial chaos. These broken clouds are most usually seen in mountain lands; they are quite different from the wreaths of mist previously spoken of.

Some reference ought to be made here to the colouring of the landscape.

Towards the end of winter, when frosts and snows are done with, much of the heather a.s.sumes an indefinable grey tint, and the bent-gra.s.s becomes a sandy brown. The leafless trees make one thankful for the firs and hollies with their grateful greens. The larches are the first deciduous trees to give signs of the coming spring. About the "Day of Our Lady"

they appear tinged with pale green, and in April the birches usually follow. By the latter part of May all nature has revived, and most of the trees are in full leaf. The gra.s.ses and ferns become brilliant in June, and the heather is then making a rapid new growth of lovely velvety shades of colour. From this time until August the hillsides and moorlands present exquisite phases of green and russet colouring, on which the eye rests with unwearying pleasure. The artist, who generally visits the Highlands in the autumn, seldom attempts to depict these summer effects. He more usually represents the splendid tints of August and September, when the heather is of every shade of lilac and purple; when the brackens, broken by winds, are gorgeous with reds, yellows, and rich browns; and when the bent-gra.s.s is magnificent with its radiant orange hues. The declining year brings fresh glories; all these colours are now modified and chastened; the rowan trees grow scarlet, the weeping birches become like fountains of gold, and the oaks a brilliant brown. Even in winter there are beautiful effects of paler colours; indeed it is true that there is no season when the landscape does not delight the eye.

I have long known and loved this country. I have seen it and been charmed by it in every kind of weather and at every season of the year, and I have found an ever new delight in its grand yet lovely scenery.

You, my reader, may not have the same opportunity of prolonged observation, and you may not become possessed of my intense affection for this region, yet if you linger here awhile, and go about with eyes and heart open to impressions of beauty and joy, you will soon freely admit that these descriptions are not mere rhapsody.

Chapter III.

ANECDOTES AND NOTES.

The loneliness and wildness of most parts of Gairloch are of course highly favourable to the presence and observation of some of the rarer British birds and animals.

The list of Gairloch birds given further on reveals a curious fact, viz., that several kinds, such as the house-sparrow, bullfinch, blackbird, and red-shank, formerly unknown or rare in Gairloch, are now plentiful; whilst other birds, including the house-martin, skylark, and whimbrel, formerly abundant, are now scarce. No local causes for these changes can be suggested. There is no wholesale destruction of the smaller birds here as in France. What then can be the reason?

Dr Mackenzie has some interesting remarks on this point. Speaking of his young days (1815-1820) he writes as follows:--

"Now, gentle reader, please explain why, till we were men, no blackbird was ever heard of in Gairloch,--only heaps of ring-ouzels; not a sparrow nor a magpie (except one unfortunate who was shot, and report says cooked as game, at Kerrysdale, and p.r.o.nounced excellent), no rooks nor wood-pigeons, tho' plenty blue-rocks, and for many years now these then strangers have found their way to the west. Indeed blackbirds are now in crowds there, and have so entirely superseded the ring-ouzel that one of these is quite a rarity. And please explain also why not only

'When I was young and was werry little, The only steam came from the kettle,'

but why then no bird ever touched _any_ fruit but cherries, while now no fruit, ripe or unripe, except black currants, is safe unless netted; the very pears, not full grown, being all pecked full of holes (or their mere skeletons hanging on the tree) by the blackbird pests, who, one might suppose, would die on the spot but for fruit that long ago not one of them would touch. Till three years ago I never dreamed of netting my morello cherry-trees. No blackbird till then would look at a morello, had I offered him 5. Now, unless netted, I need to use them before they are really ripe, or the black villains will eat them all up.

"When I was young house-swallows were legion. Now they are easily counted in the north. In our western church (Gairloch) then broken window-panes were too plenty, and the swallows' operations (building, feeding, and other arrangements), to the discomfort of those in the pews below the nests, I suppose I should admit interested us a good deal more than the preacher. Night-jars also then were very plenty, and one could hardly take an evening walk without seeing them flit in the dusk and light on the footpath before us, with their singular cat-purring song. I have often come on their extra-simple exposed nest in the heather."

The golden or black eagle may frequently be seen in Gairloch, soaring aloft in the sky. There is a general inclination now to preserve this n.o.ble denizen of the air. The eagle does comparatively little injury to game, but is accused of killing lambs and even sheep. The golden or black eagle is a size smaller than the erne or white-tailed eagle, which latter is also sometimes seen in Gairloch.