Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland Part 12

There are now in the Highlands a number of excellent higher cla.s.s public schools, in which the elements of secondary education are taught. The pupils in these schools are drawn from wide areas, and, by means of bursaries, can board away from their own homes. The Golspie Technical School is an altogether unique higher-grade inst.i.tution. At a library lecture delivered in Golspie, the boys belonging to the school (forty-eight in number, divided into four clans, each with a chief) were present, accompanied by the Princ.i.p.al and his staff. My attention was at once drawn to them by their fine physique, their gentlemanly bearing, and their earnest attention. Next day, I had the pleasure of visiting the school and seeing the working of the scheme initiated by the d.u.c.h.ess of Sutherland.

The inst.i.tution is really a boarding-school for poor lads of talent belonging to the northern counties. They are under the eye of some teacher at every hour of the day, and are kept incessantly busy, not at books alone. They are taught to do their own washing, dusting, scrubbing, cooking, and darning. The training is excellent: one is impressed by its practical character and educational thoroughness. Latin and Greek are not attempted at all, the literary instruction being entirely based on English and the modern tongues. The science part of the curriculum is remarkably complete, and art is by no means neglected.

Before a pupil has the good fortune to be admitted, the Princ.i.p.al visits the parents. It is almost incredible (so he told me) the squalor of some of the cots he had seen. Too often, in the Highlands, the one bedroom of the family (frequently identical with the kitchen) has free communication with a malodorous byre or stye. What a contrast with the dormitory of the Technical School, where there is no lullaby of lowing kine, but a tranquil, high-roofed hall that would do for the siesta of the Duke of Sutherland himself!

ON THE SIDLAWS.

High up on a spur of the Sidlaw Hills in the county of Forfar, there is a wee school that supplies education for a wide and spa.r.s.ely-peopled countryside. The teacher is Mr. Brown, who was once a dominie in the island of Whalsay. He is a jovial and courteous man, and leads you on very astutely to ask him how long he taught there. Such a question gives him the opportunity of replying with a laugh: "_I was there exactly the length of time Napoleon was in St. Helena, five years and seven months_." When in Whalsay, Mr. Brown took the service on Sunday, if the minister happened to be ill. In this capacity he achieved great popularity by the meritorious device of shortening the sermon to fifteen minutes. He was so much in love with the first sermon he wrote, that he never wrote another, contenting himself with giving it again and again, and merely varying the text. If he could only hit upon a suitable t.i.tle, and a suitable publisher for this sermon, Mr. Brown would get it printed, and scattered broadcast over the Shetland Islands. I believe it would furnish unique food for thought even to sinners on the mainland.

Mr. Brown received me with extreme kindness, and invited me inside to see his school. I heard his senior cla.s.s read, and thought the p.r.o.nunciation extremely good. About 12.55 the attention of the pupils became visibly impaired; glances were furtively cast towards the door; there was a feeling of expectancy all along the benches. Suddenly the door sprang open, as if by some violent external impact, and a middle-aged dame entered, carrying in each hand a large pail of steaming potato-soup. Accompanying her was a young woman with dozens of small pewter basins, and large spoons. I never saw such expeditious ladling, such quick distribution, such speed of consumption, and such manifest enjoyment all round. The steam of the soup obscured the wall-maps, and the parsing exercise on the blackboard. The children could get as many helpings as nature would permit, _for one farthing_. When the mist cleared away, teacher and taught once more proceeded to tackle simple proportion and a.n.a.lysis of sentences. I personally examined the soup, and found it to be "nae skinking ware that jaups in luggies."

SOME SURPRISES.

Some surprises are in store for one who calls in casually at some of the remoter schools. I have more than once found the teacher _giving instruction in his shirt sleeves_. In one school, I saw the master with _a large melodeon_ (the Board being too stingy to supply a piano), giving an inharmonious accompaniment to the musical drill. I got a dreadful surprise on meeting the schoolmaster of a district in Jura: the unfortunate gentleman was _stone-deaf_, his auditory nerves being completely destroyed. Yet he managed, unaided, a school of forty-seven pupils, and got excellent reports. The case is unparalleled in my experience, and I should not have believed it possible had I not personally seen the man at his work. He heard with his eyes, and could most nimbly interpret what his pupils said by watching their lips. The scholars liked him, and did not attempt to take advantage of his defect.

In another insular school, I was introduced to a lady-teacher who had _lost both her arms in youth_, and who, in consequence, has been forced to bring up her pupils entirely on the principles of moral suasion. By holding the pen with her teeth, she can write a fine running _hand_ (if I may say so without violence to language). She is an extremely clever lady: it was a treat to see how well she could control the children with a word or a glance.

Some teachers in the Lowlands complain of children playing truant. That vice is not common in the Highlands, but it exists to a slight extent.

In my presence the teacher of a school in Skye made the absentees of the previous day, write out their reasons for non-attendance. I give some of the typical answers:

(i.) Dear Sir,--I had to work all day at the peats.

(ii.) I was kept at home for harrowing with the horses.

(iii.) I was herding the lambs and keeping them from the sheep.

(iv.) _I was on the sh.o.r.e all day, but I will not do it again._

ARRAN SCHOOLS.

The Arran schools that I had the pleasure of visiting struck me as being very well managed. It is wonderful how much excellent work some of these country children get through. The schools are almost all supplied with Paisley libraries, and thus the pupils, under the guidance of their masters, can overtake an extensive course of reading in British authors.

At Loch Ranza the higher pupils study Shakespeare, Sh.e.l.ley, and Wordsworth.[23]

There is no desire whatever on the part of the young people to be taught the language of their forefathers. As a consequence, Gaelic is rapidly dying out in the island. Twenty years ago it was the language of the playground at Whiting Bay: now the pupils speak English only. At my request the teacher there addressed a few Gaelic phrases to the a.s.sembled children, but only two knew what he was saying. In the neighbourhood of Lagg, there is a more general knowledge of the venerable tongue.

In spite of the decay of Gaelic, Arran has produced some Celtic scholars of great brilliancy, the most eminent being the late Dr. Cameron of Brod.i.c.k. Mr. Kennedy of Caticol has made a great reputation for himself in philology: he is in touch with Celtic scholarship on the Continent and is also an adept in Irish Gaelic. In his manse, I saw a famous Celtic ma.n.u.script, the _Fernaig MS._, a brown-leaved pa.s.sbook, full of old poems written carefully in a very small neat hand. It is said to be worth 2,000, but not having that amount of loose cash about me, I could not gratify myself by offering to purchase it.

[23] A striking object-lesson on the instability of mortal life is permanently given to the Loch Ranza pupils by the proximity of the churchyard, which is just over the wall from the school. The thoughtful visitor should not fail to read the tombstones. If a lover of books, he will be interested in learning that the founder of the famous publishing firm of Messrs. Macmillan belonged to the North c.o.c.k farm near Loch Ranza. The pensive moralist will perhaps be most affected by an old stone, A.D.

1813, declaring that Elspa Macmillan left this _inhospitable world_, aged 86. _That_ was no rash inference.

SCIENCE AND LITERATURE.

Those rural teachers cannot be too strongly commended who combine literary studies with work in the open air. I know some masters who encourage their pupils to collect, say, all the flowers mentioned in Wordsworth and Burns. That is idealising the study of botany in a most delicious way. Wordsworth's descriptions of flowers are nothing less than divine: to take a single example out of hundreds, his lines on the daffodils beginning--

"I wandered lonely as a cloud."

Even the gayest of our lyrists, Herrick, has something to say about that flower that is as powerful as a sermon. Birds, trees, and flowers should, as far as possible, be known by all the young people, and some poetic word a.s.sociated with each. It is astonishing how accurately our best poets describe the objects of nature, and how their imaginative touches show insight and give a pleasure above mere science. Spenser's catalogue of the trees is worth knowing by heart. All the vicissitudes of the changing months have their apt poetical descriptions if we only look for them. Cowper, Thomson, and Wordsworth might be especially recommended to pupils for their brilliant word-painting of landscape. I cannot think of a finer adjunct to the teaching of open-air science than the auxiliary descriptions of such great masters of verse.

As Mendelssohn composed _songs_ without words, so may the schoolmaster give _lessons_ of the most powerful import without a word being spoken.

A beautiful interior in a schoolroom is a silent lesson in order and good taste. Beauty and order have a most valuable influence on the emotions and the character. It is a pleasure to see the attention that is now given to the cultivation of taste. Clean, bright cla.s.s-rooms; pictures of artistic merit on the walls; busts; collections of fossils, sea-sh.e.l.ls, and the like--these are to be found even in remote country schools. Such spontaneous education of the eye is something that cannot be overestimated for importance and fruitfulness.

Lord Avebury puts the case for artistic environment very well indeed.

"Our great danger in education," he says, "is the worship of book-learning--the confusion of instruction and education. We strain the memory instead of cultivating the mind. The children are wearied by the mechanical act of writing and the interminable intricacies of spelling; they are oppressed by columns of dates, by lists of kings and places, which convey no definite idea to their minds, and have no near relation to their daily wants and occupations. We ought to follow exactly the opposite course, and endeavour to cultivate their taste rather than fill their minds with dry facts."

There is one precious faculty that runs the risk of being stifled by too much memory work. I mean the faculty of imagination. Youth is the time when fancy is busy; it is the period when the brain can furnish unlimited scaffolding for castles in the air. Wordsworth was so impressed, indeed, by the opulence of the youthful fancy, that he could only account for it by supposing recent contact with heaven.

STUDY OF SCOTT.

I sometimes think that in the training of the youthful intellect and imagination we have not made sufficient use of the novels and romances of Scott. Of late years a great improvement is noticeable in this respect, and Scott is coming to be regarded as (for school purposes) our greatest historian. In some schools, as Lord Avebury has hinted, it was formerly thought that pupils knew history adequately when they could rattle off a list of dates and tell something of the deeds and misdeeds of a set of unhappy persons who masqueraded as statesmen and courtiers.

Such unedifying farce has nothing to do with history, which is a serious, instructive, and all-embracing study. The social life of the great ma.s.s of a nation is far more important and interesting than the eccentric deeds of a few high-placed rogues or saints. The old school-history was, unfortunately, too often a glum compendium of insignificant detail, told without breadth of view or fire of restorative imagination.

In the history of Scotland, most of what is worth knowing may be most enjoyably learned from the pages of Sir Walter. Hardly any epoch of Caledonian annals, hardly any county in the land has escaped the treatment of his masterly hand. From the Borders to the rain-lashed Shetlands (the _Pirate_ deals with gusty Thule), from Perth to Morven, the great wizard has made his country known to all lands. In his stories the past faithfully reproduces itself, and we are impressed, instructed, and amused.

THE OLD CLa.s.sICAL DOMINIE.

It is a pleasure to think that a few of the old school of Scotch dominies, who date from before the 1872 Act, are still to the fore, and still engaged in teaching. They have all fixity of tenure, and so enjoy the privilege of criticising, as adversely as they like, the degeneracy of modern educational developments. These "_old parochials_," as they are called, are men of good scholarship, well versed in Horace and Virgil, and generally fond of snuff and Latin quotations.

The Act of 1872 did a great deal for elementary education, but very little indeed to encourage that type of higher instruction, which was the glory of the old parish school. Ian Maclaren and other writers have given pleasant sketches of country schoolmasters who were strong in the ancient tongues, and who sent their pupils straight to the benches of the University. I believe such men as "Domsey" were quite common in this country. Porteous, whom I knew, was one of these. Porteous was a philologist second to none in these realms, and was on intimate terms of acquaintanceship with the famous Veitch, who gave such a _redding up_ to the Greek verbs. It was very amusing to hear the complete way in which Porteous could silence some imperial young examining professor on the weighty subject of cla.s.sical derivation. The latter would appeal to some such authority as Curtius, whereupon Porteous would unlock the desk in which lay the tawse, and taking therefrom a copy of the invoked Curtius, open it at the root in question, and display the page all marked with pencil corrections and emendations. In support of his views, would come such a torrent of erudition from half a score of Cla.s.sical, Sanscrit, Gothic, and Anglo-Saxon rills, that the young professor would feel "like one of sense forlorn," and be fain to put palm to forehead in dazed amazement. A pupil learning the rudiments under such a teacher, was dazzled rather than instructed by the ruthless surgery of words that constantly went on. No word was too small for Porteous to operate upon: he settled _hoti's_ business, and could so inflate Greek vocables by supplying digammas and dropped consonants, that Plato would have disowned them. Give him chalk, a blackboard, and a cla.s.s of six, and he would in ten minutes fill the board with hieroglyphics, curves, arrow-headed diagonals, etc., all meant to ill.u.s.trate the relationships, divergencies, and contrarieties of the Aryan roots. His life was spent in the company of these radicals, and he could call them forth out of their trickiest hiding-places. In the midst of his chalky toil, he would turn round with radiant glee as if to say, "This is a merry and exciting trade: it is my fun and is as good as poaching or golf." But woe betide the youth who showed levity. Soon would there be weeping and wailing and tingling of palms. His reputation for strap-wielding made roots respected.

Another teacher of the school of Porteous was Thomas Taylor, whose death I saw announced a few weeks ago. Where has all _his_ Greek lore gone to, so a.s.siduously cultivated, so continuously added to? If Taylor's soul is ever re-incarnated in a mortal body, it is absurd to suppose that he must begin to learn the Greek alphabet just like a novice. His clay is indeed mixed with the clay of common men, but I love to think of him dwelling on the other side of the River in the meads of asphodel, discussing with kindred shades, the topics he delighted to handle when he was here. With tearful eye I pen these doleful decasyllabics to his memory:--

What chums Tom Taylor and Charles Lamb had been O'er bottled porter and the _Fairy Queen_!

In youth, one day, seeking forbidden fruit Tom tumbled from the branches with his loot, And broken bones compelled the lad to go On straddling crutches, warily and slow, Counting the pebbles on his path below.

The noisy pleasures of the open air, The football kicked exuberant here and there.

Cricket, beloved of sinewy juvenals, And golf with all its hazards, clubs and b.a.l.l.s, Were not in Taylor's province: so he turned To calmer pastimes where the ingle burned, And when the whole world turned to _goals_ and _tees_ He took to _Iliads_ and to _Odysseys_.

He'd croon like one possessed the magic strain Of heroes tossed along the unvintaged main, And, crutch aloft in air, would fondly beat Time to the rushing of the poet's feet.

Poetry was all his solace: those bright dames That old Dan Chaucer in his rapture names, And those in Villon's pages that appear As dazzling-white as snows of yester-year, Trooped past his eye in long procession fair.

O, Sovereign Virgin, what a crowd was there!

Helen, alas! with Paris by her side, On the high deck crossing the sunny tide, Circe, bright-moving in her G.o.dlike bloom Before the throbbing music of the loom.

The love-lorn heroines of Shakespeare's plays, The red-cheeked country girls of Burns's lays, Would to his raptured eye the tear-drop bring, And set his crazy quill a-sonnetting.

VOGUE OF LATIN IN FORMER TIMES.

The old-world schoolmaster believed Latin was a universal specific. He loved the language and knew all the flock of frisky little exceptions of gender and conjugation, even as a shepherd knows his sheep. He gave his pupils gentle doses of the _Delectus_, and watched with eager, almost menacing, eye, for the working of the charm. It is quite possible that no pupil ever went over that _Delectus_, with its world-weary fragments of trite morality, without a feeling of pleasure at the _Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_. Yet it was educative, and moreover a boy was equipped for life with quotations suiting every juncture. Fate was powerless against one who had mastered the _Delectus_. The faculty of Latin quotation was to some extent also a badge of respectability.

Fancy, too, the glory of being the exclusive possessor in a mixed company of the knowledge that Castor and Pollux came out of the one egg!

It was a sore drawback to a boy once upon a time if he were shaky on the compounds of _fero_.

"_The pest of the present day is the prevalence of examinations_:"

these, it is alleged, have destroyed the grand old freedom of learning which gave full scope for the individuality alike of teacher and pupil.

Oh! those were days of the G.o.ds, when five hours were spent daily burrowing in Virgil and Horace! Arcadia was realised--a sunny clime of Nymphs, Fauns, and Graces. The supreme luxury of abundant time--the leisurely chewing of sweet-phrased morsels--is gone: it is gone, that chast.i.ty of phrase and perfection of idiom, which felt a bad quant.i.ty like a wound. The examination craze has destroyed the cla.s.sical dominie, and the intrusion of science, falsely so-called, has well-nigh asphyxiated the Napaeae of the dells. It was formerly possible for the teacher to develop to the full his literary taste and declaim the sonorous t.i.t-bits of Virgil till the tears started from his eyes. Now the instructors of youth seem to regard the works of the tuneful Mantuan as composed for the purpose of ill.u.s.trating the use of the Latin subjunctive. Youths cannot get at the Aeneid, the spirit and majesty of it, I mean, owing to the pestilential numbers of grammatical reminiscences recalled by almost every line. When once you begin to set examination papers on a subject, the romance seems to evaporate. There is something withering about test-questions. This modern disease of grammatical annotation, engendered largely by prosaic examiners, who have published grammars, is spreading to the English Cla.s.sics, and we may soon expect Burns to furnish a text for exceptional scansion, bob-wheel metrics and general philological catechising. Items which glide effortless into the brain in desultory reading are not so easily remembered if the examination is in store. Certain gentlemen have recently been reading Milton with a pair of compa.s.ses in order to discover the exact point of the caesural pause in every line: they give figures, strike percentages, and set questions which even the leading character in "Paradise Lost" couldn't answer. Literary microscopy is likely to ruin Shakespeare's reputation in school and would have done so long ago but for Lamb's _Tales_--a darling compilation and by far the best introduction to the poet. "_Shakespeare is a horrid man_" is the deliberate verdict of the schoolgirl who has been teased to death by the notes within the tawny covers of the Clarendon Press Edition. And fancy what Chaucer's Prologue must seem like, taught by a man bent only on philological hunts, variant readings, and a complete explanation of all the final e's.