At the mouth of Loch Scavaig lies a small flat island of red sandstone named Soay, which when I first came to the district was chiefly noted for possessing the fattest boy in the West Highlands. The soil of this island is thin and poor, the climate rather moist, and the situation, facing the Atlantic, cuts the island off from constant communication with Skye. The crofters had their little bits of land, and some of them possessed also frail boats, with which they ferried themselves over the sound to the Skye shore, and added to their slender fare by a little fishing. But one family owned the fat boy, and the brilliant idea occurred to his parents to take him to Glasgow, and earn an honest penny by exhibiting him to the public. They left the island for this purpose, with bright visions of success. But they had no Barnum to take charge of them, nor do they seem to have fallen into the hands of any other showman experienced in
All our antic sights and pageantry,
Which English idiots run in crowds to see.
Had large posters been widely placarded announcing that the veritable fat boy of Pickwickian fame could be seen in all his rotundity for the modest charge of sixpence, enough money might have been made, not only to keep the family for the rest of their lives, but perhaps to buy up the whole island, and establish a dynasty of Kings of Soay. But the young prodigy and his disappointed parents had sorrowfully to return wiser and poorer to their northern home.
The first visit to Glasgow is a memorable event in the lives of those West Highlanders who have never seen more people together than at a fair or a sacrament, or more houses than make one of their little clachans. Donald’s astonishment at the crowded streets, the interminable array of high houses, and the bustle and swirl of city-life, has been chronicled in many ludicrous anecdotes. One of these may be quoted as illustrative of one aspect of commercial dealing. Many years ago a newly-arrived Highlander was being shown the sights of Glasgow by a fellow-countryman who had now got used to them. As they crossed a street, they saw in the distance a dense crowd of people, and the newcomer naturally asked what it meant. He was told that there was a man being hanged. He then enquired what they were hanging him for, and was told it was for sheep-stealing. He looked aghast at this news, and at last exclaimed: ‘Ochan, ochan; hanging a man for stealing sheeps! Could he no’ ha bocht them and no’ peyed for them?’
A HIGHLAND FAIR
The best opportunity of seeing the whole crofter population of a district is furnished by the summer fairs or markets. In Strath, this important gathering is held on an open moor not far from Broadford. Everybody who has anything to sell or to buy makes a point of attending it, from far and near, accompanied by a still larger number of idlers, intent only on fun and whisky. Old and young, men, women, and children, horses and cattle, sheep and dogs, find their way to the ‘stance.’ Whether or not much business profitable to the crofters was done, the fair to the outside spectator used always to be eminently amusing and picturesque.
The quantity of whisky consumed on these occasions must have been enormous. There was likewise a kind of epidemic of bargaining. I remember the case of a woman who brought a small terrier dog for sale, which she had named Idir—a Gaelic word, equivalent to our expression ‘At all.’ Having sold her dog, she passed on complaining, ‘Cha ’n ’eil margadh IDIR, IDIR’ (This is no market, at all, at all), sounding out the last word so loudly as to reach the ears of the dog, which, when it came to her, she caught up in her arms and sold again in a more distant part of the fair. Another occasion which brought the scattered crofter communities of Strath together was the half-yearly celebration of the communion in Broadford Church. Not only the people of the parish, but numbers of others from adjacent parishes, tramped many a long mile to attend the services.
One cannot live much in the Highlands without meeting with instances of that inveterate laziness already alluded to, more especially on the part of the men. They have a certain code of work for women, and another for themselves, and that of the women is generally the heavier of the two. This national characteristic has been often noticed. Writing as far back as 1787, Mrs. Grant, of Laggan, gave what is not improbably its true explanation. After alluding to the Highlanders as formerly fighters, hunters, loungers in the sun, fond of music and poetry, she continues thus: ‘Haughtily indolent, they thought no rural employment compatible with their dignity, unless, indeed, the plough.’ Hence they left all the domestic and family concerns to their women, who worked the farms, attended to the cattle and other cognate labours. ‘The men are now civilised in comparison to what they were, yet the custom of leaving the weight of everything on the more helpless sex still continues. The men think they preserve dignity by this mode of management; the women find a degree of power or consequence in having such an extensive department, which they would not willingly exchange for inglorious ease.’[21]
“WOMEN’S WORK” IN HIGHLANDS