Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland Part 1

Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland.

by Daniel Turner Holmes.

_PREFACE._

_White stands the long Kilpatrick row Of hills with deep and dazzling snow, And eastward, in a glimmering haze, Stretch to the Forth the Campsie Braes._

_But see! beyond the Clyde, a stain Of smoke that runs across the plain, And flecks for miles the vivid gleam: It is the tireless steed of steam._

_An old acquaintance! Ben and Strath Daily behold his thunderous path, That ceases not, until he feels The breeze of Mallaig cool his wheels._

_And Memory, fondly gazing back On many a journey by that track Of splendour, would, at home, retrace The charms and lore of every place;_

_Yea, pa.s.s, in thought, to storied Skye, Where all the glens in glamour lie; And, lightly scorning gust and spray, Leap o'er the Minch to Stornoway._

_And many a northern beach besides, Splashed by the foam of racing tides, Rises in thought: from here to there, Let Fancy's coinage pay the fare,--_

_Fancy, that wafts us o'er the main To utmost Thule and home again, Through mingled din of sea and sky, Even in the twinkling of an eye._

_D. T. H._

_Ingleholm, Bridge of Weir, 16th January, 1909._

LITERARY TOURING.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

Village libraries--Difficulties of travel--Literary Societies in the Highlands--Gaelic books--Happiness and geniality of natives--Oban to Gairloch--Winter sailing--A crofting village--Horrors of the Minch--Notes on Lewis--Highland doctors--Hotels and anglers--Recent books--Military--Moray Firth--Among the miners--Handloom weaving--Professor Blackie and the Highlands.

VILLAGE LIBRARIES.

At pretty frequent intervals, during the last four years, I have sallied forth from my home in Renfrewshire, north, south, east, and west, to some of the most remote and isolated nooks of insular and provincial Scotland, on a mission so uncommon as to justify the writing of a book of impressions and experiences. The Highlands and Islands of Scotland are, of course, visited every summer by a great host of excursionists, who go thither to fish, play golf, lounge, climb hills, and otherwise picturesquely disport themselves. A few earnest devotees of science spend their holidays botanising in the glens, scanning the geological strata, looking for fossils, measuring the outlines of brochs and prehistoric forts, or collecting relics of Culdee churches. My journeys were undertaken for none of the objects named: they were entirely connected with _libraries_ and _lecturing_, and, being undertaken mainly in the months of winter and spring, they have given me the opportunity of noting a great many interesting particulars that the summer traveller, bent on recreation or science, cannot be expected to notice.

_I do not think any finer gift could be given to a village community than a collection of useful and entertaining books._ The libraries with which my work was connected were sent, free of charge, to strath and glen, and nothing was asked in return, except that the volumes should be well housed and delivered to the people to read by some local librarian.

You will find these libraries in all the townships of the Hebrides, from Ness in Lewis, down the long chain of islands, to Islay and Jura. About thirty of them are established in the Shetlands, and as many in the Orkneys. Scores of little villages in Aberdeen, Ross, Sutherland, Argyle, Bute, and Perth, have been gratuitously supplied with them. The same is true of many a weather-beaten, quaint, red-tiled little fishing-village along the sh.o.r.es of the Moray Firth. In the barracks of Fort-George, Inverness, and Dingwall, the soldiers can solace their leisure hours by delightful, patriotic, and instructive reading, furnished to them without money and without price. Even in quiet, pastoral Roxburghshire, at a spot near the birthplace of Dandie Dinmont, you will find one of these serviceable collections of books.

It is a pleasure to me to be able to say that I have visited a great number of the districts mentioned, for the purpose of speaking to the people in a familiar and non-academic way on some of the books which have been presented to them. In this way I have spoken to about 40,000 people, the majority of whom had never previously been present at a discourse on a literary topic. Most of them had, of course, been in the habit of attending religious services and election meetings: but neither of these is the very best preparation for a literary evening. Some of my experiences have been intensely amusing, and I do not think any lecturer has ever, as regards rough roads, inclement weather, and amazing votes of thanks, had quite the same joys and sorrows as I have come through. I have often laughed (good-naturedly, I hope) at what came under my notice, but I am not so conceited as to suppose that the hilarity was always on one side.

DIFFICULTIES OF TRAVEL.

It can very easily be seen that he who proposed to visit all the above districts would have some hard and continuous work in prospect. Even on the mainland of Scotland there are many villages of difficult access.

The nearest railway station to Durness on Loch Eriboll is Lairg, sixty miles away. Gairloch in Ross-shire is thirty miles distant from the railway station of Achnasheen. In the great county of Aberdeen there are a good many villages that can only be reached by long and tiresome driving in a mail coach. At different parts of the Moray Firth little townships lie huddled at the foot of precipitous cliffs, and, at first sight, seem inaccessible except by sea. To one accustomed to the sumptuous equipment of the Clyde steamers, even the journey to the shrine of Hugh Miller at Cromarty is pleasant only in good weather: a wee, puffing, hard-wrought steam-launch takes a slant course of five miles from Invergordon to Cromarty pier, accomplishing the journey in forty-five minutes. The fare between the two piers is one shilling, and there is no extra charge for the use of the cabin, which is reached by a perpendicular and very slippery ladder, and would be better suited for philosophical reflection in a gale if the crew did not use it as a store-room for engine-grease and old oilskins. In the Outer Islands, Watt's machine is, of course, unknown, and many of the roads which imaginative cartographers have inserted in their maps, will perhaps be finished when the last trump is about to sound.

Railway travelling, too, is attended with some inconveniences in winter.

The Glasgow-Inverness train, for example, may, on the coldest night of the year, break down at Dalnaspidal; and in such a case the pa.s.sengers will have to sit, entertained by howling blasts, till a fresh engine comes up from Blair Atholl. Such an experience was once mine, and I always think of it when I read the ninth ode of Horace's first book.

Outside were the great snow-sheeted mountains, and the moon was gazing in blear-eyed compa.s.sion through a screen of haze. From end to end of the train resounded the rhythmic beat of cold-footed pa.s.sengers striving to bring some warmth of blood to the toes.

In Grantown-on-Spey, I got an uncommon surprise one February. There had been some snow in the Lowlands, but at Grantown the fall had been excessive, and the roads were enc.u.mbered. On arriving at the station, the travellers saw a sleigh waiting to convey them to the hotel. The conveyance suited the weather admirably, and the horses seemed to be enjoying the fun. No wheeled vehicles were to be seen: even the milkmen sleighed their commodity from door to door. "_If we had a brace of grand-dukes and a bomb or two, we could fancy ourselves in Russia_,"

said the facetious hotel-porter. He a.s.serted that it was well for the country when abundant snow came down early in the year. It seems that Grantown is apt to suffer from drought in a hot summer following on a rainless spring. A copious fall of snow early in the year is retained in the mountains, and ensures plenty of moisture during the months of heat.

Moisture is needed in summer, for the population is trebled then, and most tourists require a little water, sometimes, to qualify their potations.

It is evident from what I have said, that the pedantic and vexatious system adopted by Euclid in his Elements of Geometry could not be employed in arranging the chapters of this book. The stern consecutiveness of that immortal but unpopular author would be out of place in describing journeys which might have been taken in the reverse order without much difference in the results.

LITERARY SOCIETIES IN THE HIGHLANDS.

Winter with its long nights gives leisure to the remote glensmen and crofters. The distractions of the town are not there to take their minds away from study and meditation. Books may not be abundant, but what literature is available is eagerly fastened on and thoroughly digested.

In the Lowlands we skip over our books and know nothing thoroughly. The Highlander, with his limited means and choice, is forced to peruse and re-peruse, even though he has nothing more lively than Boston's _Fourfold State_, or Hervey's _Meditations among the Tombs_. But he knows well what he has so often read, and is quite competent to discuss and criticise his little row of volumes. A few of the Highland townships have literary societies in which every variety of subject is debated: the meetings are usually opened with prayer, but not always closed in that way. There is a tiny clachan, some twenty miles distant from Ullapool, on the side of a hill, in view of the grotesque peaks of Suilven, which has a most flourishing literary society--with president, vice-president, rules, minutes, and committees. Not once, but twice a week does this society meet, and when the full moon is propitious for a clear journey home through the mora.s.ses, the debates are often unduly prolonged and the chairman's summing-up luxuriantly prolix. How many politicians of note in London have been raked fore and aft in that little schoolroom! What measures and enactments, plausible to the unthinking metropolitans, have been cut and slashed there, while the conscious moon, gleaming in at the window, strove vainly to disperse the loquacious throng! Listen to the chairman's modest remarks: "_I do not wish_," he says, "_to embarra.s.s the Government, but_...." Unthinking Asquith, here is a man who does not wish to embarra.s.s you; he could do it, but he is merciful! You may breathe freely, you and your Cabinet, for spite of your slips and blunders, the Ross-shire crofters will not turn round and rend you. They do not wish to embarra.s.s the Government; but have a care: their eyes are on you, and forbearance has its limits.

Think not because they live remote from train and telegraph, that you are immune from their censure. Far from it! Round the hill-side at a stated hour every day, in shine or shower, gust or calm, comes the mail-coach of King Edward VII., bringing its pile of letters and newspapers. I see the little throng of village politicians, eager-eyed, peruse the latest parliamentary news. There they get all the needed pabulum for the next political debate. If the answers to Mr. Galloway Weir have been shifty and evasive, it will go hard with the Government to-night in the little schoolroom, and the plaster will fall in showers of dust from the ceiling as the iniquities of our rulers are ruthlessly shown up. I should not like to feel the rough side of that chairman's tongue.

A library of representative English works, presented to a remote provincial society like the one I speak of, is a centre of unspeakable entertainment and instruction. The _entertainment_, during the long nights of winter, when the natives gather round the ingle and someone reads aloud, is a very palpable addition to the joys of life. The _instruction_ is perhaps slower in coming, but is none the less sure.

Only by comparison of books can their relative value as literature be determined. Bigotry and narrow-mindedness in literature and religion are almost always the result of ignorance. In the Highlands it is oftenest the local teacher who is the librarian, and the books are accommodated in the school. The teacher is thus able to make his instruction in literature vivid and interesting to his senior pupils; he can authorise a pupil to take a particular volume home and require an essay to be written on it within a given time; and he can, in school, read aloud typical pa.s.sages of good prose to supplement the limited extracts of the cla.s.s text-books. The books have been selected (i.) to form useful reading for adults; (ii.) to supply suitable pabulum for literary societies; (iii.) to aid the schemes of the Education Department in connection with what is called the "Supplementary Course of Instruction in English Literature." The selection of the books for the use of senior scholars has been, as a rule, easy enough. Dictionaries of the French and German languages, good atlases, and works of reference have, in most cases been included.[1]

[1] Let the southern reader remember that a boy born in a city like Glasgow has, as respects opportunities of getting on, infinitely better chances than a lad of equal ability born in a Highland village. The crofter's son has no reading-room with costly works of reference, scientific manuals, English translations of Latin authors, etc., to go to when he is in need of help. He begins the battle of life at a very serious disadvantage, and often gives up the fight altogether. Anything that tends to equalise the chances of town and country, from the point of view of mental equipment, would do more general good to Scotland, by bettering the available brain power, than any half-dozen Acts of Parliament taken at random.

GAELIC BOOKS.

In selecting the books specially intended for the perusal of the older people, an attempt is made to meet the needs of the various localities.

In the bi-lingual districts there is always a shelf of Gaelic books, such as the original texts of Norman Macleod's exquisite sermons, M'Rury's religious compilations, Macleod's clever poetry _The Lyre of the Grove_, Campbell's _Popular Tales of the West Highlands_, and Magnus Maclean's manuals of Celtic Literature. There being a distinct dearth of comely Celtic reading that the ordinary native can understand, arrangements have been made for the translation into Gaelic in several volumes by competent scholars, of extracts from Mr. Lang's _True Story Book_, and from other sources.

The regrettable thing about Gaelic is its hopelessly bewildering spelling. The sounds are pleasing and melodious in a high degree, but they hide themselves behind most peculiar disguis.e.m.e.nts of print. Most people will admit, I think, that a language which spells Avon, _Amhuinn_, and Rory, _Ruaridh_, would benefit greatly by a visit from Pitman. The utility of sane phonetics was brought home to me very forcibly by a story I heard from a gentleman in the west of Skye. This gentleman is an excellent English scholar, can speak Gaelic but is unable to read it. He got a letter once from St. Kilda composed by an islander who spelt Gaelic by ear and not according to the awe-inspiring orthography of the dictionary. The gentleman, who could not have made out the letter had it been spelt correctly, was able to read it as it stood, without the slightest hesitation. If a more rational spelling were generally adopted, an immense number of Lowlanders who are interested in philology, would study the grand old tongue, were it only to understand the numberless place names of Celtic origin that occur in British geography.

What I have said about Gaelic spelling explains the inability of a large percentage of the population to read a book printed in the native idiom.

What is the use then, it may be asked, of translating the _True Story Book_? The answer is obvious to one who knows the Highlands. In the Outer Isles there are many old people who know no English and whose only literary solace comes from listening to others reading. At the evening _ceilidh_ a competent reader of Gaelic can usually be found. Then, again, we are likely to see, in the near future, a notable revival of interest in the old language, consequent on the efforts of the _Mod_, and on the recognition of Gaelic by the Department as a fit subject of study in the Highland schools. Such a revival, to be lasting in its effects, must be enforced and sustained by a constant supply of pure and interesting Gaelic books, both native and translated. Religious books there are in abundance, thanks to the zeal of the Protestant clergy.

Needless to say, the compilations of the Dean of Lismore are as unintelligible to the modern Gael as Cynewulf is to a London cab-driver.

I should like to see a round dozen of good English novels put into Gaelic by translators who knew the idiom thoroughly.

The fervour displayed at Highland gatherings, admirable as it is from a sentimental point of view, is apt to grow cold at the prospect of laborious work to be done. It is not creditable that the great majority of Gaelic speakers are unable to read a page of Gaelic print. Nor is it creditable that those who can both read and speak, do so little for the interpretation of the literature. Blackie's books and translations are still among the best, and Blackie was a Lowlander, was born, indeed, in the Saltmarket of Glasgow. My frequent visits to the north and west have convinced me that another difficulty in the way of a possible resurgence of Gaelic is the lack of a recognised standard of colloquial speech. The language is split up into many dialects, each possessing its own special idioms and vocabulary. A Glasgow firm of printers not long ago conceived the idea of printing post-cards with Gaelic greetings: they found that every city Highlander they consulted had either in grammar or turn of phrase some special way of framing the sentences. "Grand Gaelic to-day!"

is an exclamation sometimes heard at the door of a Highland church in town, and indicates that the minister who has officiated comes from the same strath as the person speaking.

A moderate amount of encouragement to Gaelic is all that can reasonably be expected from the Government, seeing that the prime duty of the schoolmaster everywhere is to impart a sound knowledge of English.[2]

[2] In an editorial of June 6, 1908, the _Glasgow Herald_ excellently says:--"The first requisite for a Highlander is such a knowledge of English as will open up to him the lucrative employment from which ignorance of English must shut him out, and it is no kindness to him to interfere with his acquisition of this indispensable accomplishment.... So good a Gael as Professor Magnus Maclean has observed that 'even more remarkable than the dearth of philosophical and dramatic poems, and, we might add, of narrative and pastoral poetry proper, is the scarcity of Gaelic prose.' By all means, however, let a literary knowledge of the Gaelic language be encouraged among Gaelic-speaking children. It is a very different matter to enforce such steps as would lead to the teaching of Gaelic to children that live indeed in Gaelic-speaking districts but yet speak only English."

HAPPINESS AND GENIALITY OF NATIVES.

What has struck me most in my travels by land and sea, is the extraordinary amount of happiness, geniality, and good humour that still exists in the world. There is a substantial amount of felicity in the majority of men. Every one knows the sentence of Emerson: "Give me health and a day, and I will make the pomp of empires ridiculous." I like to give concrete examples of philosophic maxims, and I should particularise Emerson's dictum thus: "Bard Macdonald of Trotternish, Skye, whose only cow came near being impounded by the Congested Districts Board in order to pay for the price of seed-potatoes furnished to him by the said Board, having good health, makes the pomp of empires ridiculous three hundred and sixty-five days every year." Bard Macdonald is a very poor man, yet he has contrived to hitch his waggon on to a fixed star. He lives in one of those low thatch-roofed bothies that, with the accompanying croft, are rented at from 2 to 4 a year. He has a wife and a large family. Yet, tormented as he is by present poverty and past arrears, he eyes the future with serenity. I heard him sing a Gaelic poem of his own composition, containing twenty-five verses of intricate versification, and at the conclusion he was far less exhausted than any of the company. Then, again, Torquil M'Gillivray, schoolmaster of a rainy township on the sea-edge of one of the Skye _nishes_, has tranquillity of mind as great as any of the Seven Sages ever enjoyed. He is perfectly contented with his lot of rural dominie, and when I, in my presumption, ventured to speak critically of certain social conditions in his beloved island, he rebuked me by crooning tenderly the following lines: