I believe some rare ferns are to be found in Iona; it includes in its vegetable kingdom one hawthorn, and a species of dwarf-oak is said to occur there sparingly; but I cannot remember seeing even the most inferior specimen of a tree upon the island. Bareness, desolation, is its one characteristic,—a feature from which the meanness and poverty of the row of village huts by no means detracts. As, once more re-embarked on our steamer, we take a final view of Iona, the external impression is meagre and poor indeed. So much the warmer and more animated, then, is the glow of enthusiasm and gratitude with which we dwell on the piety and self-sacrifice of those saints of old with whose memory the Blessed Isle is still fragrant. Nor are the piety and zeal of God's saints perpetuated chiefly by ecclesiastical monuments, or embalmed in human hearts alone; for,
"when, subjected to a common doom
Of mutability, those far-famed piles
Shall disappear from both the sister Isles,
Iona's saints, forgetting not past days,
Garlands shall wear of amaranthine bloom,
While heaven's vast sea of voices chants their praise."
Is it the weariness of body entailed on us by our pilgrimages among the wonders of Staffa and the ruins of Iona,—is it the mind overtasked by the effort to grasp and comprehend so much of interest and novelty,—or is it the soul tuned to deeper thoughts and holier sympathies than are wont to engage it, which steeps us for the remainder of our voyage in the luxury of repose? A mingling of all, I suspect. And happily the sentiment seems universal. Christie, who, warned by her painful experience of the steamer's oscillations, as she swung like a pendulum on the sea-swell off Staffa, has been only too glad to accompany us on shore at Iona, is not only relieved of her sea-sickness, but insured for the rest of the trip. Somehow she, the Bailie, and I find ourselves among that large proportion of our company who have gradually migrated to the forward part of the boat, where, forgetful of the conventionalities which have hitherto restrained us, we are grouped on the fore-deck in whatever listless or indolent attitude the prevailing mood may suggest. The August afternoon is drawing to a close, and the sun is declining. Our share in the day's labor—though it be but laborious pleasure—is done; the remainder of the task devolves on the Pioneer, and, while she ploughs the waves, we have but to rest, meditate, and congratulate ourselves and one another. There is a hum of merry voices from the knot of gay young Scots, whose spirits are toned down, not damped, by the experiences of the day. Our English girls, with their young brother, are prettily grouped on the deck-floor, the latter stretched at the feet of the youngest girl, and exchanging with her those sweet confidences which always exist between a chivalrous boy and the sister nearest his own age. Their confiding parents have remained aft, as have a majority of the elders of the company; but, though youth, freedom, and high natural spirits preponderate at our end of the boat, peace seems to be brooding over us with dove-like wings.
We are still skirting the bold, precipitous shores of Mull, the central loadstone which has kept us all day to our course, and now and then our attention is especially engrossed by the view of her rugged cliffs, terrible in winter's storms, and her natural arches of basalt, through which the sea washes at high-water, and which betray in every feature a family likeness to great Staffa. But for the most part our hearts and thoughts now are with the past, and gratitude and thanksgiving are welling up within us for a day on which sunshine, fair breezes, and a prosperous voyage have combined with Nature's most glorious revelations and humanity's holiest relics in opening up to us pleasures and privileges beyond compare. Or, if a thought of the future mingles with our meditations, it is the rapturous thought that these gifts of Providence once ours are ours for a life-time.
At length, a softening of the majestic landscape, a contraction from the sea's wide expanse into comparatively still waters, and, bidding farewell to Mull, we have entered the Sound of Kerrera, and the great island is hid from us by its less imposing sister, Kerrera Island, the same that land-locks the Bay of Oban. We have but to make our way through the picturesque channel, whose scenery is already familiar to our eyes, and now Dunolly, the moss-crowned warder of the bay, greets us once more, her friendly face, as we sweep into our little harbor, seeming to hail us with a "Welcome Home!"
Home to the Caledonian, where a "towsy tea," as my Scotch friends would term it, awaits the tired and hungry travellers: a motley, substantial meal: fowls of the daintiest,—fresh herring, never eaten in such perfection as on the Hebridean coast,—honey-comb of the tint of burnt umber,—fragrant, ambrosial honey, the very juice of the heather, the crystallized sun and dew in which these unshadowed hills bask and bathe without let or hindrance.
Then a stroll round the bay and along the white sea-wall, now glistening in the moonlight, and then to bed, to dream perhaps of Ossian's heroes, of storm-swept castles, of old monkish rites, and of the ocean cathedral's eternal chant,—dreams which, however varied and strange, can lull the spirit into no softer illusions, can rouse it to no wilder ecstasies than the reality of our experience in our twelve hours' sail round Mull.