Part 1 (1/2)
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 Renfrews.h.i.+re, 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 towns.h.i.+ps 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 fis.h.i.+ng-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 Roxburghs.h.i.+re, 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-s.h.i.+re 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 towns.h.i.+ps 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, accomplis.h.i.+ng the journey in forty-five minutes. The fare between the two piers is one s.h.i.+lling, 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.