In my early rambles over Skye, I found that ‘a little Gaelic is a dangerous thing.’ I had sufficient acquaintance with the language to be able to ask my way, but had made no attempt to ‘drink deep’ at the Celtic spring. On one occasion when passing a night in a crofter’s cottage, I could make out that the conversation which the inmates were carrying on, related to myself and my doings. In a thoughtless moment I made a remark in Gaelic. It had no reference to the subject of their talk, but it had the effect of putting an end to that talk, and of turning a battery of Gaelic questions on me. In vain I protested that I had no Gaelic. This they good humouredly refused to believe, repeating again and again, ‘Cha Gaelig gu leor, you have Gaelic enough, but you don’t like to speak it.’
CHAPTER X.
The Orkney Islands. The Shetland Islands. Faroe Islands contrasted with Western Isles. ‘Burning the water.’ A fisher of men. Salmon according to London taste. Trout and fishing-poles. A wolf’s den.
THE ORKNEY ISLANDS
The Orkney and Shetland Islands present in many respects a strong contrast to the Hebrides. Differing fundamentally in their geological structure, and consequently also in their scenery, they are inhabited by a totally distinct race of people, and the topographical names, instead of being Gaelic, are Norse or English. The natives, descendants of the old Norwegian stock that once ruled the north and west of Scotland, still retain many marks of their Scandinavian origin. Blue eyes and fair hair are common among them. They are strongly built and active, with an energy and enterprise which strike with surprise one who has long been familiar with the west Highland indolence and procrastination. My first descent upon the Orkneys was a brief but interesting expedition, when after a ramble along the north coast of Caithness, I had reached, with my colleague, Mr. B. N. Peach, the little inn of Huna, near John o’ Groat’s House. For geological purposes we were desirous of visiting the nearest of the Orkney group, Stroma, ‘the island of the stream,’—a name which graphically marks its position in the midst of the broad tidal current of the Pentland Firth that sweeps past it like a vast river, and with a flow fully three times faster than that of an ordinary navigable river. We engaged the old ferryman, who used to run the mail-boat from Caithness to Orkney, and were warned by him that, as the weather looked threatening and the tide in the evening would be against us, he could not give us more than an hour on the island, and he would not allow the men to have any whisky on the voyage, since they might need all their wits about them before we got back. The sail across was easily made. Obeying our captain’s injunctions to keep within the prescribed hour, we did most of our work running, and succeeded in ascertaining what we wanted to know. On re-embarking, we soon perceived that his prognostication as to the weather was likely to be fulfilled. The sky had become entirely overcast, and, though no rain fell, ominous moanings of wind warned us not to linger. The tide had turned and was beginning to flow westwards against the breeze. As it increased in its rate of flow the surface of the firth began to curl and boil, streaks of foam were whirled round in yeasty eddies, while here and there the water, as if in agony, would rear itself in swirling columns that burst into spray, which was swept along by the wind in clouds of spindrift. Not far off we could see the ‘Merry men of Mey,’ a tumultuous group of breakers above a dangerous reef, surging up into sheets of foam-crested water that writhed and tossed themselves far up into the misty air. Our pilot sat at the helm watching every advancing billow and cleverly bringing the boat round in time to meet it. It was a difficult piece of navigation, skilfully performed. We could then understand why the men were to be prohibited from tasting whisky till they got back to Huna. But arrived in safety, we cheerfully ordered the stipulated bottle for them.
ORKNEY BOATMEN
Subsequently on crossing over into the Orkney group, I had soon occasion to note the difference between the boatmen there and those with whom I was familiar in the west of Scotland. More adventurous and skilful than their Celtic fellow-countrymen, they generally possess larger and stronger boats, which they keep in better trim. Some of their smaller boats are built with sharp sterns, and exactly resemble the common type one sees in Norway. In the eighteenth century, as Boswell mentions, the people in the Inner Hebrides sometimes obtained their boats from Norway. The Orcadians, among other traces of their Scandinavian descent, seem to take to the water as naturally as the seals which they shoot. On several occasions my Orkney boatmen piloted me along the base of cliffs and among rocks against which the heavy Atlantic swell was breaking, where no Skye boatmen I ever met with would have ventured. No one can fully realize the grandeur of the great cliff of Hoy unless he can look up at it from below, as well as from the crest above. Its warm tints of bright yellow and red make it seem aglow with light even in dull weather, and from a distance it looks as if it caught sunbeams which are falling on no other part of the scene. Viewed from its upper edge, this cliff presents a wonderful picture of decay. The horizontal beds of sandstone have been split by the weather into long deep vertical chasms, and etched out into fantastic cusps and cupolas, alcoves and recesses. From the edge of the precipice, which rises a thousand feet above the sea, one looks down on the long Atlantic rollers, seemingly diminished to mere ripples, and their heavy breakers to streaks of foam, while the surge, though it thunders against the rocks, ‘cannot be heard so high.’ The Old Man of Hoy, which has been left standing as an isolated column in front of this great cliff, is the grandest natural obelisk in the British Islands, for it rises to a height of 450 feet above the waves that beat against its base.
Swept by the salt-laden blasts from the ocean, Orkney and Shetland cannot boast of trees. Hedges of elder grow well enough when under the protection of stone walls, but are shorn off obliquely when they rise above them, as if a scythe or bill-hook had cut them across. A group of low trees, sheltered by the houses at Stromness, appears to be the resort of all the birds within a compass of many miles. There is a story of an American traveller who landed at Kirkwall in the dark, and, after a stroll before breakfast next morning, returned to the hotel amazed at the ‘completeness of the clearing’ which he supposed the inhabitants had made of their forests. To the geologist, the antiquary, and the lover of cliff scenery, the Orkney islands offer much of great interest. Though it was in the first of these capacities that I was drawn to the islands, the standing stones, brochs, and mounds, as well as the magnificent coast-precipices, were soon found to have irresistible attractions.
THE SHETLAND ISLES