NETHER LOCHABER.
WEASEL KILLING A HARE.—(Page 63.)
NETHER LOCHABER:
THE NATURAL HISTORY, LEGENDS, AND FOLK-LORE OF THE WEST HIGHLANDS.
BY
The Rev. ALEXANDER STEWART, F.S.A. Scot.;
MINISTER OF THE PARISH OF BALLACHULISH AND ARDGOUR.
EDINBURGH:
WILLIAM PATERSON.
MDCCCLXXXIII.
EDINBURGH: BURNESS AND COMPANY, PRINTERS TO HER MAJESTY.
TO
DONALD CAMPBELL, Esq., M.D.,
OF
CRAIGRANNOCH, BALLACHULISH,
IN PLEASANT RECOLLECTION OF HAPPY HOURS AT ONICH AND CRAIGRANNOCH,
AND
OF MANY A DELIGHTFUL MIDSUMMER RAMBLE,
THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED
WITH MUCH AFFECTIONATE REGARD BY HIS FRIEND
THE AUTHOR.
PREFATORY NOTE.
The contents of this volume made their first appearance in the shape of a series of papers from “Nether Lochaber” in the Inverness Courier, a well-known Northern Journal, long and ably conducted by the late Dr. Robert Carruthers. They are now presented to the public in book form, in the hope that they may meet with a friendly welcome from a still larger constituency than gave them kindly greeting in their original shape, as from fortnight to fortnight they appeared.
At one time it was the Author’s intention to rewrite and rearrange all, or almost all, these papers, adding, altering, or expunging as might be considered best. On second thoughts, however—second thoughts, besides, approved of by many literary and scientific friends, in whose judgment and good taste the Author has the utmost confidence—it was resolved to let them retain very much the form in which they first attracted attention, in the belief that any good that could result from a rewriting and reconstructing of them would be dearly purchased if it interfered, as it was almost certain to interfere, with their prima cura directness of phrase and freshness of local colouring.
In a volume dealing so largely with the Folk-Lore of the West Highlands and Hebrides, there are necessarily many Gaelic rhymes and phrases which at the first blink may tend to startle and repel the southern reader. These Gaelic quotations, however, the Author has taken care to translate into fairly equivalent English, so that even in this regard it is to be hoped the volume may prove equally acceptable to the Saxon, who is ignorant of the language of the mountains, as to the Celt, who knows and loves it as his mother tongue.
Nether Lochaber,
CONTENTS.
[CHAPTER I.] PAGE
Primroses and Daisies in early March—“The Posie”—Burns—“The Ancient Mariner”—William Tennant, Author of “Anster Fair”—Hebridean Epithalamium—A Bard’s Blessing—A Translation—Macleod of Berneray, 1
Autumnal Tints—Solomon and the Queen of Sheba—Sortes Sacræ—Sortes Virgilianæ—Charles the First and Lord Falkland—Virgilius the Magician—Thomas of Ercildoune, 8
An old Gaelic MS.—“The Bewitched Bachelor Unbewitched”—Fairy Lore—Lacteal Libations on Fairy Knowes, 18
Transit of Mercury—Improperly called an “Eclipse” of—November Meteors—Mr. Huggins—Spectrum Analyses of Cometary Light—Translation of a St. Kilda Song, 23
Bird Music—The Skylark’s Song—Imitation of, by a French Poet—Alasdair Macdonald—Scott, 29
Severe Drought—The Drive by Coach from Fort-William to Kingussie—Breakfast at Moy—Where did Scott find Dominie Sampson’s “Pro-di-gi-ous!”?—Professor Blackie’s Poem on Glencoe, 33
O the Barren, Barren Shore—Brilliant Auroral Display—Intense Cold—Birds—Glanders—Scribblings on the Back of One Pound Notes, 39
A Wet February—A Good Time coming—Sir Walter Scott—Mr Gladstone—Death of Sir David Brewster, 44
Long-Line Fishing—Scarcity of Fish—Their Fecundity—Large Specimen of the Raia Chagrinea—The Wolf Fish—The Devil Fish, 50
Birds—Contest between a Heron and an Eel, 54
Sea-Fishing—Loch and Stream Fishing—“Brindled Worms”—Rush-Lights—Buckie-Shell Lamps—The Weasel killing a Hare—Killing a Fallow Deer Fawn, 58
Extraordinary aspect of the Sun—Sunset from Rokeby—Mr. Glaisher—“Demoiselle” or Numidian Crane at Deerness—The Snowy Owl in Sutherlandshire—Does the Fieldfare breed in Scotland?—The Woodcock, 66
Extraordinary Heat and Drought—Plentifulness of Fungi—Cows fond of Mushrooms—Shoals of Whales—A rippling breeze, and a Sail on Loch Leven, 70
Herrings—Chimæra Monstrosa—Cure for Ringworm—Cold Tea Leaves for inflamed and blood-shot Eyes—An old Incantation for the cure of Sore Eyes—A curious Dirk Sheath—A Tannery of Human Skins, 73
The Ring-Dove—A Pet Ring-Dove—Its Death—Shenstone—The Belone Vulgaris or Gar-Fish—A Rat and a Kilmarnock Night-cap—Extraordinary Roebuck’s Head at Ardgour, 79
The “Annus Mirabilis” of Dryden—1870 a more wonderful Year in its way than 1666—Winter—Number of Killed and Wounded in the Franco-Prussian War—Battles of Langside, Tippermuir, Cappel—Carrier Pigeons—The Velocity with which Birds fly, 86
Signs of a severe Winter—The Little Auk or Auklet—The Gadwall—Falcons being trained by the Prussians to intercept the Paris Carrier Pigeons—Ballooning—The King of Prussia’s Piety—John Forster—Solar Eclipse of 22d December 1870—The Government and the Eclipse—Large Solar Spots—Visible to the naked eye—Rev. Dr. Cumming—November Meteors, 94
November Rains: 1500 tons per Imperial Acre!—Rainfall in Skye—An old Gaelic Apologue—The Drover and his Minister—Grand Stag’s Head—Scott as a Poet—Mr. Gladstone and Scott—An old Lullaby from the Gaelic, 99
Winter—Auroral Displays in the West Highlands always indicative of a coming Storm—Corvus Corax—Wonderful Ravens—Edgar Allan Poe, 106
Along the Shore after Birds—An Otter in pursuit of a Fish—Tame Otter at Bridge of Tilt: Employed in Fishing—His hatred of all sorts of Birds—“The Otter and Fox,” a translation from the Gaelic, 114
Storms—An “inch” of Rain—Atherina Presbyter—Lophius Piscatorius—Mr. Mortimer Collins’ misquotation from the Times, 121
Aurora Borealis—Unfavourable weather for Birds about St. Valentine’s Day—The Water-Vole in the Rhi—In the Eden in Fifeshire—In the Black Water, Kinloch Leven—Does it feed on Salmon Fry and Ova?—The Kingfisher—Character of the Water-Vole—Note about the Hedgehog, 127
March—The Story of a Spanish Dollar—The Spanish Armada—The “Florida”—Faire-Chlaidh, or Watching of the Graveyard—Molehill Earth for Flowers, 133
The Beauty of the West Highland Seaboard—Dr. Aiton of Dolphinton—Dr. Norman Macleod—Specimen of Turtle-Dove (Columba Turtur) shot in Ardgour—The belief on the Continent of its value as a Household Pet—Bechstein—Male Birds dropping Eggs in confinement, 140
Thunderstorm—Potato Field in Bloom—The Hazel Tree—Hazel Nuts—Potato Shaws for Cattle—Ferns for Bedding Cattle—Marmion—Scott, 144
Harvest—Scythe and Sickle v. Reaping Machines—Potatoes—Garibaldi and Potatoes at Caprera—Fishing—Platessa Gemmatus, or Diamond Plaice—Mushrooms—The Poetry of Fairy Rings—Harvest-Home, 150
The disappearance of the glories of Autumn, and the advent of Winter—Innovations and Innovators—New Version of the Scriptures—The Milkmaid and her Fairy Lover, translated from the Gaelic, 159
Wild Birds’ Nests in early April—Rook stealing Eggs frightened and almost captured—The Domestic Cock—What he was, and what he is—Sadly demoralised by intermixture with “Cochin-Chinas” and “Bramahpootras,” 165
The Vernal Equinox—Beauty of Loch Leven—Astronomical Notes—How an old Woman supposed to possess the Evil Eye escaped a cruel death, 172
Midges and other Bloodsuckers—The Tsetse of South Africa—The Abyssinian Zimb—Livingstone—Adders and Grass Snakes—Lucan’s Pharsalia—Celsus—Legend of St. John ante Portam Latinam, 178
The Leafing of the Oak and Ash—Splendid Stags’ Heads—Edmund Waller—Old Silver-Plate buried for preservation in the ’45—Mimicry in Birds—An accomplished Goldfinch, 185
Potato Culture—Sensibility of the Potato Shaw to Weather changes—The Carline Thistle—Burns—The true Carduus Scotticus—The old Dog-Rhyme, 192
A non-“Laughing” Summer—Rheumatic Pains—Old Gaelic Incantation for Cattle Ailments, 199
Early sowing recommended—Vitality of Superstitions—Capnomancy—Hazel Nuts: Frequent References to in Gaelic Poetry—How best to get at the full flavour of a ripe Hazel Nut, 204
Strength of Insects—Necrophorus Vespillo, or Burying-Beetle—Fœtid smell of—How Willie Grimmond earned an Honest Penny in Glencoe, 210
Seaweed as a Fertiliser—Homer, Horace, Virgil—November Meteors—Gaelic Folk-Lore—A Curfew Prayer—A Bed Blessing—A Cattle Blessing—Rhyme to be said in driving Cattle to Pasture—“Luath,” Cuchullin’s Dog—Notes from the Outer Hebrides, 217
The Delights of Beltane Tide—Bishop Gawin Douglas—His Translation of the Æneid—The Fat of Deer—“Light and Shade” from the Gaelic—Mackworth Praed—Discovery of an old Flint Manufactory in the Moss of Ballachulish, 225
Warm showery Summer disagreeable for the Tourist, but pastorally and agriculturally favourable—Xiphias Gladius, or Sword-Fish, cast ashore during a Mid-summer Gale—Garibaldi dining on Potatoes and Sword-Fish steaks at Caprera—The General’s Drink—Medicinal virtues of an Onion—Nettle Broth—Translation of a New Zealand Maori Song, 233
Mountains—The Lochaber Axe, Ancient and Modern, 238
Sea-Fowl—Weather Prognostics—Goosander (Mergus Merganser, Linn.)—Gales of Wind—January Primroses—Lachlan Gorach, the Mull “Natural”—A Dancing Rhyme, 244
Plague of Thistles in Australia and New Zealand—How to deal with them—Cnicus Acaulis, Great Milk Thistle, or Stemless Thistle—Fierce Fight between two Seals, “Nelson” and “Villeneuve,” 250
Wounds from Stags’ Antlers exceedingly dangerous—The old Fingalian Ballads—Number of Dogs kept for the Chase—Dr. Smith’s “Ancient Lays” of modern manufacture—The Spotted Crake (Crex Prozana) at Inverness—Its Habits, 258
Whelks and Periwinkles—An Ossianic Reading—The Sea-shore after a Storm—The Rejectamenta of the deep—An amusing Story of a Shore-Searcher—Severity of Winter—Wild-Birds’ Levee—Woodcock—Snipe—Blue Jay, 264
A “Blessed Thaw” after a Severe Frost—Longevity in Lochaber—A ready “Saline draught”—A probatum est Recipe for Catarrh and Colds—Egg-shell Superstition—Curious old Gaelic Poem, 272
“Albert,” a famous Labrador Dog—As a Water Dog—His intelligence—Takes to Sheep-Stealing—Death! 278
An old Fingalian Hero—His keenness of Sight and sharpness of Ear—Foresters and Keepers—Foxhunters—Donald MacDonald—His Dogs—Sandy MacArthur the Mole-catcher, 286
Autumnal Night—Meteors—The Spanish Mackerel—Professor Blackie’s Translations from the Gaelic—The “Translations” of the Gaelic Society of Inverness, 293
Crops—Potato Slug—Fern Slug—Brackens: How thoroughly to extirpate them—The Merlin, Falcon, and Tringa, 299
The Hedgehog an Egg and Bird Eater?—Bird-catching—“Old Cowie”—Mackenzie—Lanius Excubitor—The Butcher-Bird or Shrike—Tea-Drinking and Sobriety, 305
Superstition amongst the People—Difficulty of dealing with it—Examples of Superstitions still prevalent in the Highlands—Cock-crowing at untimely hours—Itching of the Nose—Ringing in the Ears—The “Dead-Bell”—Sir Walter Scott—Hogg—Mickle, 313
Welcome Rain in May—Plague of Mice in Upper Teviotdale—Arvicola Agrestis—Field-Mice in Ardgour—How exterminated—A Singing Mouse—Farmers’ Mistakes—Mackenzie the Bird-catcher, 319
Tourist Grumblers; how to deal with them—Sea Fishing—Superstition about a Gull—Josephus—Story of Mosollam and the Augur, 327
Heat in Mid-August—Early Planting and Sowing—Over-ripening of Crops—Medusæ—Stinging Jelly-Fish—The amount of solid matter in Jelly-Fish, 334
Approach of Winter—Contentedness of the People—Poets and Wild-Bird Song—Differences in the Colouring and Markings of Birds’ Eggs—Late Nest-building—Anecdote of Provost Robertson of Dingwall, Mr. Gladstone’s Grandfather, 341
Spring—Hood’s Parody of Thomson’s Invocation—The excellence of Nettle-Top Soup—Cock-crowing—Birds’-nesting—Professor Geikie—Curious Story of an old Pipe-Tune, 348
Rain in Lochaber—An Apple Tree in bloom by Candle-light—Mackenzie the Bird-catcher—A Badenoch “Wise Woman” spitting in a Child’s Face to preserve it from the Fairies, 355
Caught in a Squall on Loch Leven—Potatoes and Herrings: How to cook them—A day in Glen Nevis—A visit to Uaimh Shomhairle, or Samuel’s Cave—The Cave-Men, 361
Showers in Harvest Time—Magnificent Sunset—Night sometimes seeming not to descend but to ascend—Death of M. Leverrier—The Discovery of Neptune—Pigeon cooing at Midnight—The Owl at Noon—Cage-Birds singing at Night, 370
October Storms—Cablegram Predictions—Indications of coming Storms—Geordie Braid, the St. Andrews and Newport Coach-driver—The Naturalist in Winter—Drowned Hedgehogs: Spines become soft and gelatinous—Lophius Piscatorius—Disproportion between head and body in the Devil-Fish a puzzle—An Itinerant Fiddler, 379
A Trip to Glasgow—Kelvin Grove Museum—Highland Association—A run to Rothesay—Rothesay Aquarium, 387
Overland from Ballachulish to Oban on a “Pet Day” in February—Story of Clach Ruric—Castle Stalker: an old Stronghold of the Stewarts of Appin—James IV.—Charles II.—Magpies—Dun-Mac-Uisneachan, 394
Nest-building—Cunningham’s objection to Burns’ Song, “O were my Love yon Lilac fair”—Birds and the Lilac Tree—Rivalries of Birds—Birds and the Poets—The Nightingale, 402
March Dust—Moons of Mars—Planetoids—Occultation of Alpha Leonis—Zodiacal Light—Snow Bunting—Old Gaelic Ballad of “Deirdri:” Its Topography, 410
NETHER LOCHABER.
CHAPTER I.
Primroses and Daisies in early March—“The Posie”—Burns—“The Ancient Mariner”—William Tennant, Author of Anster Fair—Hebridean Epithalamium—A Bard’s Blessing—A Translation—Macleod of Berneray.
The weather [March 1868] with us here still continues wonderfully genial and mild: taken all in all, the season may be noted as in this respect perhaps without precedent in our meteorological annals. The sun, with nearly eight degrees of southern declination, is not yet half-way through Pisces; we are still three weeks from the vernal equinox, and yet on our table before us, as we write these lines, there is as pretty a posy of wild-flowers as you could wish to see, consisting of daisies, primroses, and other modest beauties, the “firstlings of the year,” culled from bank and brae at a date when in ordinary seasons the country, snow-covered or ice-bound, is but a bleak and barren waste. Older and wiser people than ourselves confidently predict “a winter in mid-spring” as yet in store for us; but meliora speramus, we had rather believe that to one of the mildest winters on record will succeed a genial spring, a splendid summer, and an abundant harvest. In any case, as somebody said of Scaliger and Clavius, Mallem cum Scaligero errare quam cum Clavio rectè sapere: I had rather, that is, be a partaker in the errors of Scaliger, than a sharer in all the wisdom of Clavius. Even so, we had rather err with the optimists than be ranked with the pessimists, even when their predictions turn out the truest. In our forenoon ramble on Friday last did we not find a merle’s nest in the close and well-guarded embrace of an old thorn root, with its pretty treasure of four brown-spotted, greyish-green eggs? and with our wild-flower bouquet before us, are we not better employed in crooning one of Burns’ sweetest lyrics than in predicting evil, even if we were certain that our prediction should become true?—said lyric being that entitled The Posie, which, dear reader, if you do not know it already, you should incontinently get by heart. Here is a verse or two:—
“Oh, luve will venture in where it daurna weel be seen;
Oh, luve will venture in, where wisdom ance has been;
But I will down yon river rove, amang the wood sae green—
And a’ to pu’ a posie to my ain dear May.
“The primrose I will pu’, the firstling o’ the year,
And I will pu’ the pink, the emblem o’ my dear;
For she’s the pink o’ womankind, and blooms without a peer—
And a’ to be a posie to my ain dear May.
“The lily it is pure, and the lily it is fair,
And in her lovely bosom I’ll place the lily there;
The daisy’s for simplicity and unaffected air—
And a’ to be a posie to my ain dear May.
“The hawthorn I will pu’, wi’ its locks o’ siller grey,
Where, like an aged man, it stands at break o’ day;
But the songster’s nest within the bush I winna tak away—
And a’ to be a posie to my ain dear May.”
Mark that line in italics, and ponder its exquisite tenderness. How it must have irradiated, like a sudden flood of sunshine over a mountain landscape, the poet’s heart as he penned it! Here you have the germ of the doctrine afterwards more broadly taught by Coleridge in the well-known lines of the Ancient Mariner:—
“Farewell, farewell, but this I tell
To thee, thou Wedding Guest,
He prayeth well, who loveth well
Both man, and bird, and beast.
He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things, both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.”
We love The Posie of Burns for its own sake, but we love it all the more, perhaps, because our attention was first directed to its sweet simplicity and tender beauty by one of our earliest and kindest friends, himself a poet of no mean order, the late Professor William Tennant, author of Anster Fair, in all its fantastical gaiety and homely mirth the most original poem, perhaps, to be found in the literature of our country.
A gentleman who resides at present in Cheltenham, a cadet of one of the oldest and most respectable families on the West Coast, and himself the head of a house not unknown in Highland story, has been so good as to send us a short Gaelic poem in manuscript, with a request that we should give an English version of it. With this request we very readily comply, such a task being to us a labour of love; the poem itself, besides, being very beautiful, and the history of its composition extremely interesting, as throwing some light on the manners and customs of the olden times. The following prefatory note from the MS. itself sufficiently explains the origin of this quaint and curious Hebridean Epithalamium:—“It was the custom in the West Highlands of Scotland in the olden time to meet the bride coming forth from her chamber with her maidens on the morning after her marriage, and to salute her with a poetical blessing called Beannachadh Bàird. On the occasion of the marriage of the Rev. Donald Macleod of Durinish, in the Isle of Skye, this practice having then got very much into desuetude, and none being found prepared to salute his bride agreeably to it, he himself came forward and received her with the following beautiful address.” We present our readers with the original lines verbatim et literatim, precisely as they stand in the MS., only omitting two lines that are partly illegible from their falling into the sharp foldings of the sheet. The sense and tenor of these lines, however, we have ventured to guess at and to incorporate with our English version:—
Beannachadh Bàird.
Mìle fàilte dhuit le ’d bhrèid,
Fad’ a rè gu’n robh thu slàn,
Moran laithean dhuit as sìth,
Le d’ mhaitheas as le d’ nì ’bhith fàs.
A chulaidh cheiteas a chaidh suas.
’S tric a thairin buaidh air mnaoi—
Bithse gu suilceach, ceiteach,
O thionnseain thu fhein ’san treubh.
An tùs do choiruith ’s tu òg,
An tùs gach lò iarr Righ nan Dùl;
Cha’n’ eagal nach dean e gu ceart
Gach dearbh-bheachd a bhios ’nad rùn,
Bithsa fialuidh—ach bith glic.
Bith misneachail—ach bith stolt.
Na bith brith’nach, ’s na bith balbh,
Na bith mear na marbh ’s tu òg;
Bith gleidhteach air do dhea ainm,
Ach na bith duinte ’s na bith fuar;
Na labhair fòs air neach gu olc,
’S ged labhras ort, na taisbean fuath.
Na bith gearannach fo chrois,
Falbh socair le cupan làn;
Chaoidh dh’ an olc na tabhair spèis—
As le ’d bhrèid ort, mìle fàilt!
Whether with the sense of the above we have succeeded in catching anything of its quaint beauty and tenderness in the following lines, is for the reader to judge:—
A Bard’s Blessing.
Comely and kerchief’d, blooming, fresh and fair,
All hail and welcome! joy and peace be thine;
Of happiness and health a bounteous share
Be shower’d upon thee from the hand divine.
Wearing the matron’s coif, thou seem’st to be
Even lovelier now than erst, when fancy-free,
Thou in thy beauty’s strength did’st steal my heart from me.
Though young in years thou ‘rt now a wedded wife;
O seek His guidance who can guide aright.
With aid from Him, the rugged path of life
May still be trod with pleasure and delight;
For He who made us bids us not forego
A single, sinless pleasure in this world of woe.
Be open-hearted, but be eident too,
Be strong and full of courage, but be staid;
Aught like unseemly folly still eschew—
Be faultless wife as thou wast faultless maid!
Guard against hasty speech and temper violent,
And knowing when to speak, know also to be silent.
Guard thy good name and mine from smallest stain;
In manner still be kindly, frank, and free;
If thou ‘rt reviled, revile not thou again;
In hour of trial calm and patient be;
And when thy cup is full, walk humbly still,
A careless, proud, rash step the blissful cup may spill!
With this bard’s blessing on thy wedded morn,
All at thy bridal chamber-door we greet thee;
May every joy of truth and goodness born
Through all thy life-long journey crowd to meet thee;
And may the God of Peace now richly shed
A blessing on thy kerchief-cinctured head!
The word breid in the original, which we have rendered kerchief and coif, was in the olden times the peculiar head-dress of married females, while virgins wore their braided locks uncovered, a simple ribbon to bind the hair, and occasionally a sprig of heather or modest flower by way of ornament, being the only head-dress that could with propriety be worn by a maiden in the good old anti-chignon days of our grandmothers. The Highland maiden’s narrow ribbon for binding the hair was in the south of Scotland called a snood, probably from the old English snod—“neat, handsome”—a word still in use in the English border counties. In the south, even more pointedly than in the north, the emblematical character of the maiden ribbon or snood was recognised. It was only when a maiden became an honest, lawful wife that the coif—also called curch and toy—could be worn with propriety. If a damsel was so unfortunate as to lose pretentions to the name of maiden, without acquiring a right to that of matron, she was neither permitted to wear that emblem of virgin purity, the snood, nor advanced to the graver dignity of the coif or curch. In old Scottish songs there occur many sly allusions to such misfortunes, as in the original words of the popular tune of “Ower the muir amang the heather”—
“Down amang the broom, the broom,
Down among the broom, my dearie,
The lassie lost her silken snood,
That gart her greet till she was wearie.”
And in a verse of a curious old ballad that we took down some years ago from the recitation of a grey-headed Paisley weaver—
“And did ye say ye lo’ed me weel?
Then, kind sir, ye maun marrie me;
For that I maunna wear my snood
Aft brings the saut tear to my ee.”
The reverend author of the above lines was probably born about the year 1700, or perhaps ten or twenty years earlier, for we find that he died a man well advanced in years in 1760. In the Scots Magazine of that year there is the following notice of Mr Macleod’s death:—“Jan. 12th.—At Durinish, in the Isle of Skye, the Rev. Donald Macleod, minister of that parish, a gentleman, says our correspondent, who adorned his profession, not so much by a literary merit, of which he possessed a considerable share, as by a consistent practice of the most useful and excellent virtues. To do good was the ruling passion of his heart; in composing differences, in diffusing the spirit of peace and friendship, in relieving the distressed, in promoting the happiness of the widow and orphan, his zeal was almost unexampled, his activity unmeasured, his success remarkable. It is almost unnecessary to add that he lived with a most amiable character, and died universally regretted.”
A somewhat curious circumstance is the following:—One of the Rev. Mr. Macleod’s daughters was married to Macleod of Berneray, she being that gentleman’s third wife. Berneray was at the date of this third marriage seventy-five years of age, notwithstanding which he became by this lady the father of nine children. He lived a hale and hearty old man till he was upwards of ninety. He was reckoned in his day a splendid specimen of the stalwart, sterling, straight-forward, and chivalrous Highland gentleman, “all of the olden time.”
CHAPTER II.
Autumnal Tints—Solomon and the Queen of Sheba—Sortes Sacræ—Sortes Virgilianæ—Charles the First and Lord Falkland—Virgilius the Magician—Thomas of Ercildoune.
With occasional gales of wind and blustering showers [October 1868], that, from their chilliness and snellness, you suspect to be sleet, although you don’t like as yet exactly to say so—meteorological phenomena, however, in no way strange or unusual on the back of the autumnal equinox—the weather with us here continues delightfully bright and breezy, and the country looks beautiful. Field and upland are still as freshly green as at midsummer, while the deep, rich russet hues and golden tints of the declining year, gleaming in the fitful sunlight, and intermingling their glories with the still beautifully fresh and unspotted foliage of our hardier trees and shrubs; with the ripe, ruddy bloom of the heather empurpling the moorland and the hill, and a perfect sea of “brackens brown” mantling the mountain side, and fringing, in loving companionship with the birch, the alder, and the hazel, the torrent’s brink, as it leaps in foam from rock to rock and dashes downwards with its wild music to the sea,—all this, with a thousand indescribable accessories, scarcely perceptible indeed in the general effect, but all bearing their fitting part in the delightful whole, presents at this season, and never more markedly than this year, a scene that you never tire of gazing at, and declaring again and again, and with all your heart, to be “beautiful exceedingly.” As you gaze on such a scene as this, you feel that no painter could paint it; that there is a something in it all too subtile and spiritual to be transferred to canvas by any art whatever. An imitation, indeed, of all that is palpable and tangible about it you may get, and it may be very beautiful perhaps, and a triumph of art in a way; but, even as you gaze in admiration, ready to grant the artist all the praise that is his due, are you not apt, remembering the scene as nature has it, to
“Start, for soul is wanting there?”
But we must not be misunderstood. Painters and painting we love, and have always loved, and should be sorry, indeed, to be considered as in any way dead or indifferent to the power and beauty of the art. Painting, after all, however, and especially landscape painting, is but an imitative art, and the longer we live, and the more we are brought face to face with nature, the more shall we feel that there is a charm, an attractiveness, and a loveliness about her all her own—a something that you feel but cannot describe, that the artist as he gazes feels too, and strives to grasp and instil into his picture, but cannot charm into interminglement with his colours, “charm he never so wisely.” Viewed æsthetically, nature in sooth consists not of matter only, but of matter and spirit, and therein is the secret of her surpassing power over us. You may subtly imitate and reproduce exact representations of her more prominent features and general outlines, and the painter, according as he is more or less gifted with the poetic mens divina, may infuse a moral meaning into his work, and a subtile beauty entirely independent of the mere manipulation of his subject—be it landscape, seascape, or cloudscape—and his work may impart instruction as well as pleasure and delight; but, granting all this, there shall still be something awanting even in the finest pictures, that something which we have ventured to call spirit—the spirit that pervades and permeates nature in all her works, that is her life, that may be “spiritually discerned” in her, but cannot be transferred to canvas.
In the collection of Jewish traditions known as the Talmud there is a very pretty story of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, that will serve to illustrate our meaning better than the longest dissertation could be. It is to the following effect:—Attracted by his wealth, and wisdom, and power—the fame whereof had gone forth into all lands—the Queen of Sheba, the Beautiful, paid a visit to Solomon, the Wise, at his own court, that she might there admire the splendour of his throne and be instructed of his wisdom. Charmed with the courtesy and gallantry of the accomplished King, delighted with the magnificence and splendour of his court, and amazed at his surpassing wisdom, which, indeed, exceeded all that she had heard reported of it, the Queen still thought that Solomon could be outwitted, and she resolved to have the glory of puzzling and outwitting one so wise. To this end she one day presented herself before the King, bearing in one of her hands a wreath of natural flowers, the most beautiful she could gather, and in the other a similar wreath of artificial flowers, the most beautiful and like unto natural flowers that the cunning of herself and her handmaidens could fashion. Of the two wreaths the hues were of the brightest, and the flowers of the one wreath were as if they had been pulled off the same stalks that bore the flowers of the other. “Tell me now, O King,” said the Queen as she stood at some distance from the throne whereon the monarch sate, “Tell me now, O King, which of these wreaths I hold in my hands is fashioned of artificial flowers, for one of them is so fashioned; and which of them of natural flowers, that grew from out the earth, and imbibed their beauty and their brightness from the sun, for of such of a truth is one of them formed?” And, lo, the King was perplexed and sorely troubled, for he wist not what answer to make, seeing that the two wreaths were as like one to another as twin sisters at their mother’s breast, or twin lilies on the same stalk. And the courtiers of the King, and his princes, and his servants, were sorely grieved that the sagacity of the King should be at fault, and his superhuman wisdom at last fail. But, lo, the spirit of wisdom came upon the King in his perplexity. Observing some bees clustering outside, he ordered the window to be opened, and soon the bees came swarming into the court, and after hovering for a moment about the one wreath, they straightway left it and settled upon the other, which observing, “That,” said the King, “that, and not the other, is the wreath of the flowers that grew from out the earth and in the sun, and were not fashioned with hands.” And the Queen was mightily surprised at the exceeding wisdom of the King, and did obeisance unto Solomon, laying the wreaths of flowers upon the steps of the ivory throne that was overlaid with gold, and of which there was not the like made in any kingdom. And the courtiers, and the princes, and the servants of the King clapped their hands and cried, “O King! live for ever.” If we are wise and judge aright, we shall always, like the bees of Solomon, be attracted by nature rather than by art, however beautiful. Our doctrine was never, perhaps, so briefly and pithily enforced as by the Macedonian conqueror on a certain occasion. A courtier one day asked him to listen to him how well he could, whistling, imitate the notes of the nightingale. Alexander declined the proffered musical entertainment with the contemptuous remark, “I have heard the nightingale herself.” No wonder that the would-be melodist slunk away abashed; and such be the fate of all mere echoers and imitators when at any time they claim more than is their due, or would have us appraise their pinchbeck at the value of sterling gold. There is an amount of truth, and a hidden meaning and beauty, in Byron’s lines, that he was himself perhaps unconscious of in the ribald mood of the moment, when, alluding to the statuary’s art, he exclaimed—
“I’ve seen much finer women, ripe and real,
Than all the nonsense of their stone ideal.”
It is astonishing how difficult of thorough eradication are certain superstitions, if once established amongst a people. Once let the popular mind become inoculated with error in this shape, and although times may change and the manners of the people may alter, though a new tongue even shall have succeeded the language in which the error was imbibed, and knowledge have spread and civilisation have steadily progressed, yet there the superstition still lurks, frightened it may be at the outward light, and, owl-like, ashamed to appear in the brightness of the blessed sunshine of unclouded truth, but ever ready, nevertheless, under favourable circumstances, to manifest itself, and assert its sway over its votaries, like certain fabled mediæval philters and potions that when administered are said to have lurked for years and years in the human system, till, under certain conditions, their subtle properties were called into active operation, and the desired effect was produced. A short time ago we spent an evening in the company of a gentleman from the south of Scotland, a distinguished antiquary and archæologist, and of wonderful skill in everything connected with the folk-lore of Scotland, whether of the past or present. In the course of conversation, “over the walnuts and the wine,” our friend surprised us not a little by informing us that even at this day, in certain parts of the south-western districts of Scotland, the Sortes Sacræ are frequently resorted to by the people when they are in doubt or perplexity about anything of sufficient importance in their opinion to warrant their having recourse to this ancient mode of divination. The Sortes Sacræ are founded upon the more ancient Sortes Virgilianæ—Virgilian Lots, a method of divination which had at least the merit of being extremely simple, and not necessarily occupying much of the votary’s time. What may be called the literary oracle, as distinguished from vocal oracles, was consulted in this wise: The operator having before him a copy of Virgil—the sortes were generally confined to the Æneid—opened the volume ad aperturam libri, anywhere, at random, when the first passage that accidentally struck the eye was carefully read and pondered with as little reference as possible to its immediate context, and a meaning extracted from it which was supposed to indicate the issue of the event in hand, and which was to be considered inevitable and irrevocable as the fates had so decreed. A man with the knowledge thus obtained could not by any precaution or change of conduct avert the impending doom, good or evil; he could only put his house in order, and so arrange matters the best way he could; that if evil came it might be borne with dignity and patience; if good, that it might be enjoyed with moderation and devout gratitude to the gods. It is said that at the outbreak of the troubles that culminated in the Commonwealth, Charles I. and Lord Falkland found themselves on a certain day in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, when the latter jocularly proposed that they should inform themselves of their future fortunes by means of the Sortes Virgiliæ; and certainly, read by the light of after events, it must be confessed that the passages stumbled upon seem singularly ominous of the fate that overtook both. The passage read by the Martyr King was from the fourth book of the Æneid, and is as follows:—
“At bello audacis populi vexatus et armis,
Finibus extorris, complexu avulsus Iuli,
Auxilium imploret, videatque, indigna suorum
Funera: nec, cum se sub leges pacis iniquæ
Tradiderit, regno aut optata luce fruatur,
Sed cadat ante diem, mediaque inhumatus arena.”
Which Dryden, if with rather too much amplification, still very beautifully translates thus:—
“Yet let a race untamed and haughty foes
His peaceful entrance with dire arms oppose,
Oppress’d with numbers in th’ unequal field,
His men discouraged and himself expell’d:
Let him for succour sue from place to place,
Torn from his subjects and his son’s embrace.
First let him see his friends in battle slain,
And their untimely fate lament in vain;
And when at length the cruel wars shall cease,
On hard conditions may he buy his peace.
Nor let him then enjoy supreme command,
But fall untimely by some hostile hand,
And lie unburied on the barren sand.”
Lord Falkland’s eye fell on the following lines in the eleventh book:—
“Non hæc, O Palla, dederas promissa parenti.
Cautius ut sævo velles te credere Marti!
Haud ignarus eram, quantum nova gloria in armis,
Et predulce decus primo certamine posset.
Primitiæ juvenis miseræ! bellique propinqui
Dura rudimenta! et nulli exaudita Deorum
Vota, precesque meæ!”
—which the same translator has rendered as follows:—
“O Pallas, thou hast failed thy plighted word,
To fight with caution, not to tempt the sword;
I warn’d thee, but in vain, for well I knew
What perils youthful ardour would pursue;
That boiling blood would carry thee too far,
Young as thou wert to dangers, raw to war;
O curs’d essay of arms, disastrous doom,