Scenes and legends of the north of Scotland

by Hugh Miller

THE WHALE-FISHERS.

In a fishing season late in this period, two men of the place, who, like most of the other inhabitants, were both tradesfolks and fishermen, were engaged one morning in discussing the merits of an anker of Hollands which had been landed from a Dutch lugger a few evenings before. They nodded to each other across the table with increasing heartiness and good-will, until at length their heads almost met; and as quaich after quaich was alternately emptied and replenished, they began to find that the contents of the anker were best nearest the bottom. They were interrupted, however, before they had fully ascertained the fact, by the woman of the house tapping at the window, and calling them out to see something extraordinary; and, on going to the door, they saw a plump of whales blowing, and tumbling, and pursuing one another, in a long line up the bay. A sudden thought struck one of the men: “It would be gran’ fun, Charlie man,” said he, addressing his companion, “to hook ane o’ yon chiels on Nannie Fizzle’s crook.” “Ay, if we had but bait,” rejoined the other; “but here’s a gay fresh codling on Nannie’s hake, an’ the yawl lies on the tap o’ the fu’ sea.” The crook—a chain about six feet in length, with a hook at one end, and a large ring at the other, and which, when in its proper place, hung in Nannie’s chimney to suspend her pots over the fire—was accordingly baited with the cod, and fastened to a rope; and the two men, tumbling into their yawl rowed out to the cossmee. Like the giant of the epigram they sat bobbing for whale, but the plump had gone high up the Firth; and, too impatient to wait its return, they hollowed to a friend to row out his skiff for them; and leaving their own at anchor, with the crook hanging over the stern, they returned to Nannie Fizzle’s, where they soon forgot both the yawl and the whales.

They were not long, however, in being reminded of both. A person came bellowing to the window, “Charlie, Willie, the yawl! the yawl!” and, on staggering out, they saw the unfortunate yawl darting down the Firth with twice the velocity of a king’s cutter in a fresh breeze. Ever and anon she would dance, and wheel, and plunge, and then shoot off in a straight line. Wonderful to relate! one of the whales had swallowed the crook; the little skiff was launched and manned; but the Hollands had done its work; one of the poor fellows tumbled over the thaft, the other snapped his oar;—all was confusion. Luckily, however, the rope fastened to the crook broke at the ring; and the yawl, after gradually losing way, began to drift towards the shore. The adventure was bruited all over the town; and every one laughed at the whale-fishers except Nannie Fizzle, who was inconsolable for the loss of her crook.

It was rumoured a few weeks after that the carcass of a whale had been cast ashore somewhere in the Firth of Beauly, near Redcastle, and the two fishermen set off together to the place, in the hope of identifying the carcass with the fish in which they had enfeoffed themselves at the expense of Nannie Fizzle. The day of the journey chanced to be also that of a Redcastle market; and, as they approached the place, they were encountered by parties of Highlanders hurrying to the fair. Most of them had heard of the huge fish, but none of them of the crook. When the Cromarty men came up to the carcass, they found it surrounded by half the people of the fair, who were gazing, and wondering, and pacing it from head to tail, and poking at it with sticks and broadswords. “It is our property every inch,” said one of the men, coming forward to the fish; “we hooked it three weeks ago on the cossmee, but it broke off; and we have now come here to take possession. It carried away our tackle, a chain and a hook. Lend me your dirk, honest man,” he continued, addressing a Highlander; “we shall cut out hook and chain, and make good our claim.” “O ay! nae doubt,” said the Highlander, as he obligingly handed him the weapon; “but och! it’s no me that would like to eat her, for she maun be a filthy meat.” The crowd pressed round to witness the dissection, which ended in the Cromarty man pulling out the crook from among the entrails, and holding it up in triumph. “Did I no tell you?” he exclaimed; “the fish is ours beyond dispute.” “Then,” said a smart-looking little pedlar, who had just joined the throng, “ye have made the best o’ this day’s market. I’se warrant your fishing worth a’ the plaiding sold to-day.” The Highlanders stared. “For what is it worth?” asked a tacksman of the place. “Oh, look there! look there!” replied the pedlar, tapping the blubber with his elwand, “ulzie clear as usquebaugh. I’se be bound it’s as richly worth four hunder punds Scots as ony booth at the fair.” This piece of mischievous information entirely altered the circumstances of the case as it regarded the two fishermen; for the tacksman laid claim to the fish on his own behalf and the laird’s, and, as he could back his arguments by a full score of broadswords, the men were at length fain to content themselves with being permitted to carry away with them Nannie Fizzle’s crook. I am afraid it is such of our naturalists as are best acquainted with the habits of the cetacea that will be most disposed to question the truth of the tradition just related. But, however doubtful its foundation, a tradition it is.

THE FLIGHT OF THE DROVE.

The mishap of the whale-fishers was followed by a much greater mishap—the total failure of the herring fishery. The herring is one of the most eccentric little fishes that frequents our seas. For many years together it visits regularly in its season some particular firth or bay;—fishing villages spring up on the shores, harbours are built for the reception of vessels; and the fisherman and merchant calculate on their usual quantum of fish, with as much confidence as the farmer on his average quantum of grain. At length, however, there comes a season, as mild and pleasant as any that have preceded it, in which the herring does not visit the firth. On each evening, the fisherman casts out his nets on the accustomed bank, on each morning he draws them in again, but with all the meshes as brown and open as when he flung them out; in the following season he is equally unsuccessful; and, ere the shoal returns to its accustomed haunts, the harbour has become a ruin, and the village a heap of green mounds. It happened thus, late in the reign of Queen Anne, with the herring trade of the Moray Firth. After a busy and successful fishing, the shoal as usual left the Firth in a single night; preparations were made for the ensuing season; the season came, but not the herrings; and for more than half a century from this time Cromarty derived scarcely any benefit from its herring fishery.

My town’s-folk in this age—an age in which every extraordinary effect was coupled with a supernatural cause—were too ingenious to account for the failure of the trade by a simple reference to the natural history of the herring; and two stories relating to it still survive, which show them to have been strangely acute in rendering a reason, and not a little credulous in forming a belief. Great quantities of fish had been caught and brought ashore on a Saturday, and the packers continued to work during the night; yet on the Sunday morning much still remained to be done. The weather was sultry, and the fish were becoming soft; and the merchants, unwilling to lose them, urged on the work throughout the Sabbath. Towards evening the minister of the parish visited the packers; and, as they had been prevented from attending church, he made them a short serious address. They soon, however, became impatient; the diligent began to work, the mischievous to pelt him with filth; and the good man abruptly concluded his exhortation by praying that the besom of judgment would come and sweep every herring out of the Firth. On the following Monday the boats went to sea as usual, but returned empty; on the Tuesday they were not more successful, and it was concluded that the shoal had gone off for the season; but it proved not for the season merely; for another and another season came, and still no herrings were caught. In short, the prayer, as the story goes, was so fully answered, that none of the unlucky packers who had insulted the minister witnessed the return of the shoal.

The other story accounts for its flight in a different and somewhat conflicting manner. Tradition, who, as I have already shown, is even a more credulous naturalist than historian, affirms that herrings have a strong antipathy to human blood, especially when spilt in a quarrel. On the last day of the fishing, the nets belonging to two boats became entangled; the crew that first hauled applied the knife to their neighbours’ baulks and meshes, and, with little trouble or damage to themselves, succeeded in unravelling their own. A quarrel was the consequence; and one of the ancient modes of naval warfare, the only one eligible in their circumstances, was resorted to—they fought leaning over the gunwales of their respective boats. Blood was spilt, unfortunately spilt in the sea; the affronted herrings took their departure, and for more than half a century were not the cause, in even the remotest degree, of any quarrel which took place on the Moray Firth or its shores. One of the combatants, who distinguished himself either by doing or suffering in this unlucky fray, was known ever after by the name of Andrew Bleed; and there are men still living who remember to have seen him.

URQUHART OF GREENHILL.

The failure of the herring trade was followed by that of Urquhart of Greenhill. He is said to have been a shrewd industrious man, of great force of character, and admirably fitted by nature and habit, had he lived in better times, to have restored the dilapidated fortunes of his house. During the reign of William he was adding ship to ship, and field to field, until about the year 1700, when he was possessed of nearly one-half the lands of the parish, and of five large vessels. But it was his lot to speculate in an unfortunate age; and having, with almost all the other merchants of Scotland, suffered severely from the Union, the failure of the herring fishery completed his ruin. He sank by inches; striving to the last, with a proud heart and a bitter spirit, against the evils which assailed him. All his ships were at length either knocked down by the hammer of the auctioneer, or broken up by the maul of the carpenter, except one; and that one, the Swallow of Cromartie, when returning homewards from some port of the Continent, was driven ashore in a violent night-storm on the rocky coast of Cadboll, and beaten to pieces before morning. It was with difficulty the crew was saved. One of them, a raw young fellow, a much better herdsman than sailor, escaped to his friends, full of the wild scenes he had just witnessed, and set himself to relate to them the particulars of his voyage;—it was his first and his last. Smooth water and easy sailing may be delineated in common language; he warmed, however, as the narrative proceeded. He described the gathering of the tempest, the darkening of the night, the dashing of the waves, the howling of the winds, and the rolling of the vessel; but being unfortunately no master of climax, language failed him in the concluding scene, where there were rocks, and breakers, and midnight darkness, and a huge ship wallowing in foam, like a wounded boar in the toils of the hunters. “Oh!” exclaimed the sailor herdsman, “I can think o’ nae likening to that puir ship, and the awfu’ crags and awfu’ jaws, except the nowt i’ the byre, when they break their fastenings i’ the mirk night, and rout and gore, and rout and gore, till the roof-tree shakes wi’ the brattle.” The people of the present age may not think much of the comparison; but it was deemed a piece of very tolerable humour in Cromarty in the good year 1715. Greenhill’s remark, when informed of the disaster, had more of philosophy in it. “Aweel,” said he, taking a deliberate pinch of snuff, and then handing the box to his informant, “I have lang warstled wi’ the warld, and fain would I have got on the tap o’t; but I may be just as weel as I am. Diel haet can harm me now, if the laird o’ Cadboll, honest man, doesna put me to the law for dinting the Swallow against his march-stanes.”