Pen and pencil sketches of Faröe and Iceland

by Andrew James Symington

Having passed Sandoe, through the Skaapen Fiord, we see Hestoe, Kolter, Vaagoe, and other distant blue island heights in the direction of Myggenaes, the most western island of the group. We now sail between Stromoe on the west, and Naalsöe on the east. Stromoe is the central and largest island of the group, being twenty-seven miles long and seven broad. It contains Thorshavn, the capital of Faröe. Naalsöe, the needle island, is so called from a curious cave at the south end which penetrates the island from side to side like the eye of a needle—larger, by a long way, than Cleopatra’s. Daylight shews through it, and, in calm weather, boats can sail from the one side to the other. We observe a succession of sea-caves in the rocks as we sail along, the action of the waves having evidently scooped out the softer strata, and left the columnar trap-rock hanging like a pent-house over each entrance. These caves are tenanted by innumerable sea-birds. On the brink of the water stand restless glossy cormorants; along the horizontal rock-ledges above them, sit skua-gulls, kittiwakes, auks, guillemots, and puffins, in rows; and generally ranged in the order we have indicated, beginning with the cormorant on the lower stones or rocks next the sea, and ending with the puffin, which takes the highest station in this bird congress.

If disturbed, they raise a harsh, confused, deafening noise; screaming and fluttering about in myriads. Their numbers are so frequently thinned, and in such a variety of ways, that old birds may, on these occasions, be excused for exhibiting signs of alarm.

NAALSÖE.

The Faröese eat every kind of sea-fowl, with the exception of gulls, skuas, and cormorants; but are partial to auks, guillemots, and puffins. They use them either fresh, salted or dried. The rancid fishy taste of sea-birds resides, for the most part, in the skin only—that removed, the rest is generally palatable. In the month of May the inhabitants of many of the islands subsist chiefly on eggs. Feathers form an important article of export.

We watched several gulls confidingly following the steamer; one in particular, now flying over the deck as far as the funnel, now falling astern to pick up bits of biscuit that were thrown overboard to it. Long I stood admiring its beautiful soft downy plumage, its easy graceful motions, the great distance to which a few strokes of its powerful pinions urged it forward, or, spread bow-like and motionless, allowed it simply to float and at times remain poised in the air right over the deck, now peering down with its keen yet mild eyes, and leaving us to surmise what embryo ideas of wonder might now be passing through its little bird-brain.

The Danish officer raised, levelled his piece, and fired; the poor thing screamed like a child, threw up its wings, turned round, and fell upon the sea like a stone; its companions came flying confusedly in crowds to see what was wrong with it, and received another shower of lead for their pains.

Holding no peace-society, vegetarian, homeopathic &c. views, I do not object to the bona fide clearing of a country from dangerous animals; or to shooting, when rendered necessary for supplying our wants; but—from the higher, healthier platform of Christian manliness, reason and common sense—would most emphatically protest against thoughtless or wanton cruelty. Such barbarism could not be indulged in, much less be regarded as sport, but from sheer thoughtlessness in the best; while, under almost any circumstances, the destruction of animal life will, by the true gentleman, be regarded as a painful necessity.

Those who love sport for its own sake may be divided into three classes—the majority of sportsmen it is to be hoped belonging to the first of these divisions;—viz., the thoughtless, who have never considered the subject at all, or looked at any of its bearings; those whose blunted feelings are, in one direction, estranged from the beauty and joy of existence; and the third and last class, where civilization makes so near an approach to the depravity of savage natures, that a tiger-like eagerness to destroy life takes possession of a man and becomes a passion. He then only reckons the number of braces bagged, and considers not desolate nests, broken-winged pining birds, and the many dire tragedies wrought on the moor by his murderous gun.

A study of the habits of birds, taking cognizance of all the interesting ongoings of their daily lives, of their wonderful instincts and labours of love, would, we should think, make a man of rightly-constituted mind feel the necessity of destroying them to be painful; and he certainly would not choose to engage in it as sport. The fable of the boys and the frogs is in point, and the term “sport,” thus applied, is surely a cruel, and certainly a one-sided word. In low natures, sympathy becomes totally eclipsed and obscured by selfishness; and all selfishness is sin.