Brown heath and blue bells : being sketches of Scotland, with other papers
Winter, William, 1836-1917
Mil lIHilll mini Ik ■■111 w hHHbi ■ JhH ■I ^% I ^ <?V% vv * <7, A^ -'^\- a\- V *> 'r>. % l,J< , & BROWN HEATH AND BLUE BELLS j&m J ^OWN HEATH AND BLUE BELLS Being Sketches of Scotland WITH OTHER PAPERS V BY WILLIAM WI %n& MACMILLAN AND COMPANY AND LONDON I895 All rights reserved Copyright, 1895, By MACMILLAN AND CO. THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS WASHINGTON it. 1 .1 r. " Nr.rfoanti Press: J. S. Cus%nJ & Co. — Berwick & Smith. No? vood, Mass., U.S.A. TO SElt^afatfj Campbell Wnter HONOURED AND LOVED COMPANION OF MY LONG JOURNEY THROUGH MANY LANDS OF SUNSHINE AND OF SHADOW OF JOY AND OF GRIEF I DEDICATE THIS BOOK PKEFACE. Tee favour which has been accorded to previous sketches by the present toriter has encouraged him to believe that he may venture to offer to a friendly public these additional pages, in a kindred vein. He has endeavoured to express the charm of lovely and inspiring scenes in Scotland and elsewhere, to stimulate the desire for travel in storied regions, and to impart such hints of beauty as a traveller might helpfully remember. He is desirous that this volume may be considered in rela- tion to its predecessors, — Shakespeare* s 7 8 PREFACE. England, Gray Days and Gold in England and Scotland, and Old Shrines and Ivy, — all of which aim to reflect the poetry of memorable places and of natural loveli- ness, and all of which are offered as simple and possibly useful memorials of careless wandering and reverent thought. In Gray Days and in Old Shrines there are twelve chapters on Scotland. A few personal tributes are added to the sketches in the present volume, with a view to diversify its contents, and also vnth the feeling that ad- miration for fine spirits may fitly consort with remembrance of beautiful scenes. The end is a note of poetry, to suit a farewell: " The setting sun, and music at the close." W. W. November 11, 1895. CONTENTS. SKETCHES OF SCOTLAND. PAGE I. OVER THE BORDER ... 13 II. THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES 21 HI. THE PASS OF GLENCOE ... 32 IV. THE HOLY ISLE .... 41 V. FAREWELL TO IONA ... 55 VI. DUNFERMLINE ABBEY . . .58 Vn. HAUNTS OF MARY STUART . . 66 VIII. THE CANTERBURY OF SCOTLAND . 80 IX. SCOTTISH BORDER SCENERY . 90 X. SCOTTISH MEMORIES ... 94 OTHER PAPERS. XI. TEWKESBURY AND SALISBURY . Ill XII. STRATFORD GLEANINGS . . 127 9 IO CONTENTS. PAGE XIII. RELIC AND REVERIE . 141 XIV. A VALLEY OF PEACE. . 152 XV. MOUNTAIN DAYS. . 160 XVI. SEASHORE PICTURES . 164 XVII. TRIBUTES . . .. . 177 1. George Arnold. 2. Fitz-James O'Brien. 3. Charles Dawson Shanly. 4. Rufus Choate. 5. Oliver Wendell Holmes. 6. Jefferson. XVIII. ON THE VERGE. . 233 Brown Heath and Blue Bells Land of brown heath and shaggy wood, Land of the mountain and the flood. On the wild hill Let the wild heath-bell flourish still" Sir Walter Scott. BBOWN HEATH AND BLUE BELLS. OVER THE BORDER. GLASGOW, September8, 1894. —Masses of dusky cloud were hanging low over Liverpool as I sped away from it, in the early morning, on a journey to Scotland. The air was cold, the day cheerless, and the time seemed long before I came to the open country and was gladdened with the sight of green fields, the dark foliage of many trees, and the golden sheaves of the late harvest, — lovely in the glint of sun- shine, beneath dim, slate-coloured skies. Soon I saw the towers and steeples of Orm- skirk and, in its adjacent pastures, many bright patches of heather, purple against the green. The country there is low and flat, and is much intersected with canals. Next came Rufford, green but sombre, — 13 14 OVER THE BOEDER. its dreariness accented by the trembling of wind-swept rushes that grow in its cold streams. At Croston there was a pleasing picture of placid life, in the grouping of cattle in the fields, and presently, gazing over Houghton, I was aware of distant mountains, rising nobly through the mist. Spires, chimneys, and copious smoke an- nounced busy Blackburn, and soon there- after the train flashed into deep and va- riegated valleys of Lancashire. Around Gisborne the country smiles with bloom, the hillside pastures are populous with sleek cattle and fleecy sheep, and in the deep dales the emerald of the meadow is strik- ingly diversified with the darker green of those graceful hedge-rows which add so much to the charm of that delicious land. After Hellifield there were green fields and picturesque hedges upon every side, — a few walls of stone coming into the picture, — and then the open country grew lonely and bleak once more, as I gazed on vacant moorlands, and saw, with musing eyes, a single figure of a traveller, lessening in the dim distance, upon a long and solitary road. Around Settle and Appleby the valleys are of great breadth and splendid beauty, and as you look westward from OVER THE BORDER. 15 those scenes of peace and plenty you can see the mountains of Cumberland, and your thoughts will drift away to the poetic past, — to Southey, the blameless and gentle, among his books, on Greta's bank, and to Wordsworth, austere and simple, wander- ing among his native hills, and speaking forth their heart, in words of golden ca- dence and imperishable truth. At Salkeld you would note a tiny river flowing, amid flowers, through a plain of sunshine, and, far away, the receding, misty, much broken outline of the country of the Lakes. There was but a faint prospect of storied Carlisle, — memorable for its sad associations of the crushed rebellion of '45, — and after Car- lisle I caught a glimpse of the ocean ; and then, with a quick sense of freedom and of home, I dashed across the Border and was in Scotland. It has been my fortune, at various times, to see this land in capricious moods of weather, but never before in such a blaze of warmth and light. There was not a cloud in the sky as I rolled through Dum- fries, and underneath a golden sun the pas- tures all around it glowed and sparkled with brilliant emerald sheen, while in the clear, cool, autumn breeze the flowering vines and 1 6 OVER THE BORDER. the roses, on many a gray stone cottage, seemed to dance with joy. The country all along is level, but its diversity makes it piquant, and as I heard or saw the familiar names, and caught a fleeting glimpse of Cluden, I thought of Robert Burns, — whose especial region it is, — and could not fail to recognise its loveliness and feel its charm. There, within the radius of a few miles, is comprised the entire story of that great poet's life. His first seven years are associated with the cottage at Alloway, where he was born, January 25, 1759, and where he lived, a happy boy, until 1766. Then, becoming a labourer for his father, he moved to the farm of Mount Oliphant, where he remained till he was eighteen. In 1777 he accompanied his parents to another farm in Ayrshire, called Lochlea. His next residence, and one at which he wrote many characteristic and beautiful poems, notably The Cotter1 s Saturday Night, was at Mossgiel, near Mauchline, — his home from 1784 till 1788. In 1786 he first repaired to Edinburgh, and dur- ing about two years he was a brilliant figure in that brilliant • capital ; but Edin- burgh was an episode. In July, 1788, he established his residence at Ellisland, OVER THE BORDER. 1 7 where he wrote, among other immortal verses, John Anderson, and that exquisite lyric, To Mary in Heaven, and where he became an exciseman. In 1791 he settled in the neighbouring town of Dumfries, and there he died, July 21, 1796, and there he was buried. His lifetime comprised only thirty-seven years and a half. He never left Scotland, and even of his native land he saw but little. It is astonishing to con- sider how narrow were the physical limits of Burns's environment and observation, when contrasted with the wide range of his experience. Thus recalling familiar facts, and with many wandering thoughts upon them, I traversed the country of Burns and sped through the haunted lands of the Border, — leaving, far eastward, St. Mary's Loch and the haunts of the Ettrick Shep- herd, and far southward Ecclefechan, with its memories of Carlyle ; passing Kilmar- nock, where the poems of Burns were first published ; seeing the distant mountains of Arran, beyond the water of Ayr ; thinking of Scott, Campbell, Wilson, Motherwell, Thomson, Gait, Montgomery, and the many minstrels who have shed imperishable glory on the land ; and coming at last, in the cold lustre of closing day, to Glasgow and rest. 1 8 OVER THE BORDER. The traveller commonly sees Glasgow in rain, and then it is dismal ; but on a bright day there is not a cheerier city in the king- dom. Along the Broomielaw — while the Clyde flashes in sunshine, and the graceful stone bridges are thronged with vehicles and people — the ships and steamers are gay with flags, and there is every sign of prosperous activity. In Buchanan street and other great thoroughfares the teeming shop-windows denote a profuse opulence, and in the bright faces and lithe move- ments of the many pedestrians it is easy to read the story of energetic labour, buoyant spirits, and a happy and hopeful mind. The Lowland Scots seem not to be as vari- able as the Highlanders, — who alternate forever between impetuous joy and calm despondency, the smile and the secret tear, — but to possess more of the steadiness and uniformity that mark the English. Glas- gow is self-centred, the home of contented industry, and the peer, for enterprise, of any city in the world. Edinburgh pos- sesses the eminent advantage of position, and is glorious with historic association and literary renown; but Glasgow is the commercial centre of Scotland ; and to look upon her long lines of busy, brilliant OVER THE BORDER. 19 streets, her sumptuous public buildings and monuments, and her noble University, throned above the lovely pageant of Kelvin Grove, and to hear the clatter of hammers in the splendid shipyards on the Clyde, is to know the restless, puissant, victorious spirit of the present day, and to feel that Scot- land is the land of deeds as well as dreams. Devotion to practical affairs, on the other hand, has not made Glasgow mindless of national literature and art, — for George Square, with its grand column to Scott, and its statues of Burns, Campbell, Sir John Moore [commemorated in Charles Wolfe's immortal lines, "Not a drum was heard"], Lord Clyde, Livingston, Watt, and Sir Robert Peel, not to speak of the massive, symmetrical buildings around it, is, architecturally, finer than the vaunted Trafalgar Square, of London, and nobler in its meaning. The poet Campbell was born in Glasgow, but I sought in vain for the house of his birth. In those streets he may have walked, as was his custom of composition, when making the sonorous and splendid Pleasures of Hope ; and, thinking of the wonderful eloquence and beauty of .that poem, it has been a pleasure, passing all words, to follow in the footsteps of that 20 OVER THE BORDER. fine genius, and to honour his pure and noble memory. There may be other pursuits which tend more to broaden the mind and strengthen the character, but, if so, I have not found them ; and I know not of any pursuit so gratifying to the imagination and so stimulative to spiritual growth as that of musing among haunts that have been adorned by genius, endeared by associations of heroic or pathetic experience, and digni- fied by the splendid force of illustrious ex- ample. The present should not be blindly undervalued, in comparison with the past ; but no man is to be envied who could stand unmoved beside the grave of Motherwell, in Glasgow's solemn Necropolis, or at the stone that covers the dust of Edward Irving, — a stone whereon the face of the apostle looks with eyes of life from a wonderful painted window, — in the gloomy crypt of her grim cathedral. By sights like those the best virtues of human character are sustained and augmented, and by sights like those the place of them is made precious forever, in a loving and reverent remembrance. THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. II. THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. OBAN, Argyllshire, September 12, 1894. — In the cold, gray light of dawn, look- ing from a high casement in the St. Enoch Hotel, I saw the towers and chimneys of Glasgow, its ranges of buildings, — lighted here and there, but mostly dark, — and its long lines of empty street, bleak and cheer- less, thinly veiled in mist. To view a great centre of population and industry when thus quiescent is to be reminded of that pathetic weakness which, even at his best, always underlies the condition and achievement of man. The lesson of humility may be learned in many ways, and it is a lesson that, sooner or later, all persons must learn. The city was still asleep when I made my way toward the Clyde, and even upon the Broomielaw, usually so populous, I saw but few passengers. I was soon embarked and gliding down the river — at first slowly, amid ships, barges, and steamers, that 22 THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. seemed to rise like phantoms out of the mist ; then more rapidly, as the sharp, brisk wind came on to blow, and the river grew clearer beneath the gradual approach of the sun. Soon I was speeding past those great shipyards, the glory of this region, the echo of whose busy hammers is heard all round the world. Then presently I saw, upon the green banks of the Clyde, farmhouses couched among trees, cattle in pasture, a circle of smiling hills, and far away, beneath a gray sky necked with blue, the mountain peaks that seem to whisper of Loch Lomond and the haunted North. Flights of rooks enlivened the air, and in the wake of the vessel an eager flock of gulls persistently followed, with catlike mewing and shrill cries. Overhead the dome of heaven was filled with misty, dreamlike sunshine. Around flitted many steamers and many a tiny craft with brown sails and sturdy hull — the fishing boats of Greenock. Past Dunoon and Innellan, onward I journeyed, past the pretty lighthouse on Toward Point, past opulent Rothesay, — its gray houses and teeming causeways gloomy in the sub- dued light, — and so into the lovely Kyles of Bute, and over happy waterways to Loch Fyne, rocky Tarbert, the port of Ardrishaig, THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. 23 and the Crinan Canal. All along that course the scenery is sharply characteristic of Scotland ; — a rocky coast, girdled with steel-coloured seas ; hills clad with heather ; peaceful bays ; stone houses, scattered among the rocks ; fishing-boats, with red or brown canvas, at anchor, or under sail, or slowly drifting with the tide ; fields, su- perbly cultivated, alternating with lonely pasture and moorland, sprinkled over with wandering sheep ; ruined towers, on dark, sea-girt crags ; and, over all, the ever-chang- ing gladness and gloom of skies that are al- ways beautiful, never at rest, and never twice the same. Beside the Crinan the Highland piper was playing, as he always does, and I heard once more the wild slogan of the MacGregor and the tearful cadences of Bonnie Doon. Once through the Crinan, the brief and cheery run to my desired haven was northward, along the coast of Lorn, with Islay, Jura, and Scarba on the west and south, past the ominous precincts of Corrivreckin, past St. Columba's Garve- loch Isles, past the slate quarries of Balna- huay, and so to the Sound of Kerrera and the gay and generous port of Oban. The Sound of Kerrera, running about northeast and southwest, and being about a 24 THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. mile wide, separates the island of Ken-era from the mainland. At the head of it lies Oban, in a sheltered bay, backed by a great semicircle of wooded crags and heather- covered hills. The water front of the town, in shape a crescent, is protected by a splen- did sea-wall, made of granite, and fretted like the battlements of a castle. Two little piers jut into the harbour, around which are often clustered many black steamboats, picturesque with rakish hulls, tapering spars, and red funnels, and upon which, at almost all times, there is the stir of travel. Along the crescent street and up the con- tiguous hillside are ranged the many stone buildings that constitute the town. Hotels are numerous ; lodging-houses abound ; the permanent inhabitants number about four thousand ; there are gay shops, — in one of which I saw a sporran and a mas- sive twisted stick once owned by Eob Roy MacGregor, together with a bronze clock, once the property of Sir Walter Scott, — and in all ways the place is pleasant. A traveller wishing for seclusion, rest, comfort, and variety could nowhere find them in more abundance than at Oban. The Mac- Brayne steamers, a fleet of thirty-six superb vessels, strong, swift, safe, and luxurious, THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. 25 ply continually in these waters, and excur- sions are feasible from this point to every part of Scotland. Meantime, the immedi- ate vicinity of the town has charms that familiarity will only endear. Each day I have walked many miles, and every day I have found a new prospect of beauty. A few steps from this place will, at any time, bring the pilgrim into Highland glens where absolute solitude seems throned in perpetual sway ; where nothing stirs but, now and then, a wandering sheep, or the fragrant purple heather just ruffled by the gentle wind ; and where the only sound is the lone call of the solitary curlew or the musical murmur of a hidden brook. Or, should he be minded for the water and for the heights and moors of Kerrera, a sail of half an hour will bring him to that lonely and lovely island, upon which, although it is not unin- habited, he may stroll for hours, without sight of a human face or sign of a human abode. Gazing from a headland on the west coast of Kerrera, I saw the dark mountains of Mull and Morven, clear-cut against the heavens, — vast masses of rock and verdure, softly relieved by spots of light, and calm as if no gale had ever swept their summits, nor darkness, tempest, and 26 THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. danger been ever known. The sky was covered with thin, gray clouds, in which were rifts of blue, and from behind its fleecy mantle the sun flashed here and there a gentle radiance. The sea, in all direc- tions, was smooth and still, and the thin, rocky points that jut into it, and the tiny islands scattered upon its surface, seemed carved out of ebony. In front were visible the lighthouse on the southern arm of Lis- more, the lady rock, — a dark speck in the glassy water, whence the Campbells res- cued Fair Ellen of Lorn, — the ruins of Duart Castle, in Mull, and of Ardtornish, in Morven, the ancient fortress of the Lord of the Isles. In every quarter, far and near, the rocky shores, indented by many bays, displayed the greatest variety of shape and prospect. There is almost always a stir in the heavens in this wild region, and even while I gazed an arrow of gold darted slantwise across the grim Morven hills, while above it huge masses of great, steel- coloured clouds were curled upward toward the zenith, and a single brilliant shaft of light fell straight upon the intervening plain of the sea. Upon some neighbouring rocks rested for a moment a few uneasy gulls. In the pastures, below my crag, heedless THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. 2J slieep were feeding and cattle were couched at rest. A single sail-boat drifted on the deep. A solemn hush seemed brooding over the world. Only at times the melan- choly jackdaws croaked, from a higher cliff ; the air was turned to music by the momentary rippling warble of small birds ; and, in the deep silence, was faintly audible the sleepy buzzing of idle flies. Amid that scene of peace I looked toward the more dis- tant Hebrides, and almost I could see, upon the gloomy, desolate waters, the frowning, martial galleys of old Norwegian kings. Southwesterly from Oban the road to Kil- bride, Ardoran, and Loch Feochan runs close to the margin of Kerrera Sound, and for a lovely twilight ramble I do not think a sweeter place was ever discovered. Al- most as soon as you leave the town you come upon great boulders clad with heather, and your walk is then between sea and mountain, along the base of a gigantic cliff, — at first slightly masked by a luxuriant growth of larch and fir, then naked and bold in its colossal strength and rugged desolation. In cosey nooks beneath the shadow of those tremendous crags are a few dwellings, lovely amid flowering lawns, and richly decorated with the beautiful green 25 THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. and crimson of the delicate woodbine, — their windows opening on the ever-change- ful waters of the Sound. Those waters, when last I saw them, were faintly wrinkled by the gentle wind of evening, while every puff of the breeze brought delicious odour from the moorlands and the woods. A lit- tle island rose dark in the stream, and mid- way between Lorn and Kerrera a bright, revolving light flashed from a tiny buoy, fast anchored to the rocks. At that point there is a ferry to Kerrera, — practicable when signalled from the mainland ; and, looking across to that island, with its rich, green pasture lands, its broad stretches of breezy heath, its scattered farmhouses and its dark ravines, the stroller is strongly tempted to kindle the signal brand or wind the horn. The margin of the shore is there a confused mass of scrawled rocks, while great beetling cliffs overhang the road. To- ward the end of the crag I saw the mouth of a cavern which — since it has been there, unchanged, for countless centuries — must often have been the abode of savage beasts, or of men scarcely less savage, in the earlier ages of unrecorded time. Not distant, in the vacant pasture, was a strange, uncouth, lichen-covered stone, in shape a THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. 29 clumsy sphinx, silently watching over the bleak and darkening waste. Along the white road, which curves with the curving of the shore, there is an ample growth of rushes and of thistles, — whereof the down was floating here and there, — and, looking up the gorges of the hills, I saw much bracken and great shining patches of golden gorse. Throughout that region there is a wealth of flowers, while among the mountain rocks are great trees of thick ivy, so that the face of every crag is veined with green, and the sternest aspect of nature often wears a smile. In a little bay, where a boat had been beached, I rested long, to dream upon that scene of savage grandeur and yet of sweet repose. Far out upon the glassy water a single sloop was nestled, like a bird asleep. The regular, rhythmic beat of the oars of a distant skiff floated over the silent sea. The faint breeze was scented with the fragrance of hay-fields, near at hand. A few drowsy bird-notes were sprinkled on the air; and slowly, over the sacred stillness, the soft gray light which follows the sunset waned and faded, until all was dark. This place, indeed, is one of strange and incommunicable beauty, and words can but 30 THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. faintly suggest its charm. Looking north- ward from my windows in the home-like Royal Hotel of Oban, I see the pretty bay of this picturesque city, placid now, and smooth as a mirror, and on it a few little steam- yachts and fishing-boats at anchor. Many gulls are resting on its glossy, steel-like sur- face, or circling, with shrill clamour, in the empurpled, golden air. Immediately before me lies the ample garden of a neighbouring dwelling, — its walks fringed with marigolds and late roses, its green lawns shaded by tremulous willow trees, the rowan, and the ash, a still fountain in its centre, and in the ample, dry basin a child at play. Beyond the garden rises the embattled sea-wall of the town. Away to the right stretches a long line of dwellings, gray against the autumn-tinted gseen of Dunolly Mount. Through the middle distance extends the bleak, green, treeless, broken and vacant point of Kerrera, upon which, near its north- ern extremity, rises a simple monument, to commemorate that admirable public bene- factor, David Hutcheson, whose manage- ment of steam navigation opened to general access the western highlands of Scotland. On the left are the buildings and gardens of the Caledonian Railway, and a little west- THE GATE OF THE HEBRIDES. 3 1 ward of them rises the wooded height of Pulpit Hill, — commemorating the revered character and life of David Macrae, — from which you may have one of the loveliest views of landscape and water that are any- where to be found. Far off, in the north and west, ridge beyond ridge, extend the dark and frowning mountains of Morven and of Mull. From the streets adjacent comes a noise of traffic, the click of hoofs, the rattle of wheels, and the occasional din of bells. Squads of tourists hasten to and fro along the causeway. Flocks of black- faced sheep and herds of shaggy, wide- horned cattle appear suddenly, from time to time, coming around the curves of the har- bour road, and, spurred by shepherds and by vigilant collie dogs, tramp away and vanish. The sun, as it sinks behind the western mountain, casts slanting rays of golden light across the peaceful bay, from beneath thick clouds of lilac and of steel. The sky immediately above is of the clearest, deepest blue, and high in heaven the little starlings are flying in flocks, while a single sea-swallow, poised for an instant, makes a picture of wild freedom and happy sover- eign power, serene in the sapphire arch. 32 THE PASS OF GLENCOE. III. THE PASS OP GLENCOE. GLENCOE HOTEL, Pass of Glencoe, September 14, 1894. — As I sailed out of Oban Bay the sea was perfectly smooth, the air was cool and sweet, and, looking eastward, I could see rifts of blue, shining through a gray and rainy sky. The course was northward, past the ivy-clad ruins of Dunolly Castle, and past the mouth of Loch Etive, with Lismore, the Great Gar- den, on the west, and the mountains of Benderloch and Ardchattan on the east, while in front gradually opened a gay and blooming prospect of the Airds of Appin. It is a lovely country, and whether seen in sunshine or in shadow it fires the imagi- nation and satisfies the heart. On Lis- more the fields were green and fair, and upon the rocks that fringe the shore glowed many patches of brilliant moss, which pres- ently were reflected in the still and shining water ; and I saw little clefts along the coast, THE PASS OF GLENCOE. 23 wherein boats had been beached, and, in- land, occasional tall trees, and many stone cottages nestled in sheltered nooks. The whole scene was encompassed with hills, and constantly, as we sped onward, — leav- ing a wake of broadening rollers, over which the greedy seagulls circled and screamed, — that wrinkled landscape would change in form and colour, till the senses were bewil- dered with its variety and its pomp. Far to the eastward were visible the gigantic double peaks of Ben Cruachan, and not alone those proud, imperial heights, but the spires and ridges of all the mountain chains around Glen Creran, Glen Etive, Glen Kinglas, and Glen Strae ; while in the west, defined with wonderful sharpness of outline, rose the frowning bastions of Mor- ven, and, more southerly, the black, pre- cipitous mountains of Mull. As the boat drew near to Appin, — whence sprung the royal Stuarts, — the sea, before it, was a mirror of burnished steel, while behind, underneath a misty sun, it was one broad plain of rippling silver. There is a fine bay at Appin, a sturdy sea-wall and a pretty beach, and I could see the sleek, contented cattle, feeding in their pastures, the slop- ing hillsides above them, thickly wooded 34 THE PASS OF GLENCOE. with the hardy Scotch fir, and the great highlands beyond, red and gleaming with heather, in its perfection of bloom. The land was of various colours, — tawny, yel- low, red, and dark green, — and the water was so placid that the unbroken reflection of the adjacent mountains could be dis- tinctly seen in its depths, while each lonely bird that drifted on the surface left a rip- ple in its wake. Sometimes near the land, sometimes distant from it, the rapid steamer made her steadfast way, while ever, as she advanced among the engirdling hills, new vistas of beauty kept opening and chang- ing, till perception was confused with the novel vicissitude of mysterious prospect. The sun, about meridian, hung in the heavens, like a silver shield. Mists began to thicken and to droop, but through them I saw the riven sides of crags, black and barren from long scarcity of rain, and towering behind them the dark mass of Ben Vair, where it frowns upon the mouth of Loch Leven. The landing was at Bal- lachulish pier, and from that point onward I drove toward the famous Pass of Glencoe. No doubt it is a beaten track ; but every track is beaten, in these days of systematic touring and all-conquering steam, and, as THE PASS OF GLENCOE. 35 to the results of observation, everything is dependent on the eyes that see. For a time the course was by the margin of the loch and eastward along the base of the great mountains that border it, following a road through the village of Ballachulish, where there are slate quarries of great ex- tent, and where I saw a fine slate-stone monument, to commemorate the Queen's Jubilee year, — inscribed with the date, Sep- tember, 21, 1887. In that region the fields are divided with walls of slate, and at one point the carriage rolls beneath a tall and splendid arch of slate-stones, fashioned in a buttress to the impending hill, and cre- ating a singular effect of rugged grace. A small church appears, proclaiming itself by no less than six crosses, and on the broad reaches of bleak hillside the traveller's gaze wanders curiously over groups of moun- tain sheep, — the tiny, graceful beasts of the Highlands. It is one effect of solemn emotion that it causes you to observe trifles with acute perception, and I think no per- son of a sensitive temperament could ap- proach that little village of Glencoe without such feelings of awe as would impress the scene upon his memory forever. The place of the massacre lies near the entrance to 36 THE PASS OF GLENCOE. the glen, and it is marked by a simple granite shaft. Scarce anything remains of the shielings of the Mclan tribe of the clan Macdonald, — the wretched victims of that hideous crime, — but you are told of the spot where the house of the chieftain stood, and you see the ruins of a few huts that once were the homes of his unfortu- nate people. Time, that heals all wounds and tries to hide all scars, has gently cov- ered every vestige of the inhuman butchery with verdure and bloom, and that scene of horror is now a peaceful hamlet, in which you may hear the sound of the church-bell and the laughter of children at their play. All the same, there is a shadow on the place that nothing can remove, — a sense of unspeakable terror and dread. More than two centuries have passed since that fearful winter night (February 13, 1692), when the soldiers of king William so basely murdered the trusting Highlanders whose bread they had eaten and in whose homes they had slept ; but, whether from its phys- ical peculiarities or from the mysterious power of association, the Pass of Glencoe is forever invested with pathos and gloom. All around are huge mountains, black and barren, or clad with green turf and bracken, THE PASS OF GLENCOE. yj and mostly veined with deep, stony fissures, which are the beds of rapid rivulets. Low in the gorge you see the rocky bed of the river Cona, here and there diversified with tiny waterfalls, and you hear the noise of water bickering over the stones, the lonely caw of rooks, and the bleating of distant sheep. Beside that river the long road, like a ribbon of silver, ascending and de- scending, winds away, with the windings of the glen. Far in the Pass I found a refuge, and it was my privilege to spend a night amid those scenes of desolation, — among the dreariest beneath the eye of heaven. In that way only can the full meaning of such a place be absorbed into the mind, — the lonely magnificence of stu- pendous natural objects, and that copious, cruel, terrible vitality of nature which is so completely indifferent to the life of man. Thus I reflected, sitting alone, among the rocks in that wilderness, and listening, in the gloaming, to the voice of the hidden mountain streams. Above me towered the gigantic black crags of Bidean-nam-Bian, its huge bastions banked like some great organ, whereon, smitten by all .the tem- pests round about the world, might sound, through everlasting time, the solemn music 38 THE PASS OF GLENCOE. of eternity. Not distant I saw the black waters of Loch Triochatan, and far above, in the mountain side, the dark and seem- ingly inaccessible arch of Ossian's cave, — for that poet was born beside the Cona, and the spell of his weird genius rests on all those rocks and waters. As the night deepened, a faint moonlight, as from another world, — for the moon was hid- den behind the mountain peaks, — drifted into the Pass, suffusing its grim battle- ments and dusky depths with an unearthly glow ; and almost I could see dim shapes of phantoms, the murdered children of the glen, gliding toward me, across the riven rocks. Later, and just before the dawn, I looked, forth again, and saw where great clouds of mist were drifting across the mountain sides, while yet the peaks rose bare and grim above, and looking upward I beheld, through a rift in the driving clouds, the golden orb of the morning star. I had seen Glencoe under a blaze of sun- shine. I was now to see it under the tran- sient shadow of a storm. Nothing can exceed in grandeur the effect of the Scot- tish mountains when they are draped in mist. All the imagery of Ossian is justi- fied, and more than justified, by the por- THE PASS OF GLENCOE. 39 tentous shapes and the immeasurable magnitude that the vapours impart to the hills. Sometimes those mists are piled upon each other till they reach far into the heavens. Sometimes they drift in vast masses, low down upon the crags. Sometimes they impend and float in strange processions, — thin, long streamers, moving slowly across the mountain side. But, what- ever shape they take, and however they come, they are beautiful ; and very grate- ful I was to the little birds whose twitter- ing in the eaves of the cottage awakened me before the dawn, that I might enjoy that spectacle of majesty and wild romance. I took a boat and rowed for a while upon the lake, — musing in that delightful soli- tude, beyond the reach of man to despoil or to mar, however darkened with the shadow of his crime and sin. I saw the remains of the old bridle path, along which some of the Macdonalds escaped from the murderous hands of Campbell of Glen Lyon, and I was told that many ruined houses, once tiny cots of stone and thatch, the homes of the clan Macdonald of other days, may still be seen, scattered in places among the hills. Scotland's glens were far more populous two hundred years ago than 40 THE PASS OF GLENCOE. they are now, for then the land was owned by the clans, and each clan obeyed its chieftain and possessed the product of its toil ; but after the rising for Prince Charles, in '45, and the disaster of Culloden, those lands were rended and parcelled among the conquerors, and gradually the old inhabi- tants have been banished to the south or into foreign countries. The clannish feel- ing, the native language, and the primitive customs of the Highlander have not, indeed, been extinguished ; but they survive only in remote and isolated places — such as Morven, Iona, Mull, and Colonsay, and such as the weird Pass of Glencoe. Far distant be the day when a language so sweetly musical and so poetically expres- sive shall cease to sound, when customs so picturesque shall be discarded, and when a home life so generous and romantic shall exist no more. THE HOLY ISLE. 41 IV. THE HOLY ISLE. IONA, September 24, 1894. — The sky was cloudy and the wind was cold when I sailed out of Oban, bound for Staffa and Iona, but the sea was smooth, and soon the sun struggled through the clouds and streaked the liquid plain with lace-like rays of silver. On Mull the mountain shapes were dark and stately, and the green hills of Morven — less impressive, however, than when they are half hid- den by streamers of drifting mist — stood forth, bold and splendid, in the gray light of an autumn morning. The tide was gently plashing on the lady rock as the boat swept by it, and frowning in the dis- tance, rose the grim ruin of Duart Castle, — objects eloquent of the cruel Maclean and of his baffled crime, long since commemo- rated alike in poem and in play. In the north I saw again Ardtornish, and I thought of Scott and of the Lord of the Isles. Over 42 THE HOLY ISLE. 