Chapter 13

“Caithness cabes (i.e., ticks), lift up your heads,And let the Orkney sheep go by!”

How soon will telegrams and steamers—there is a daily mail between Thurso and Stromness—cause these local differences to share the fate of the national garb?

Behind Stroma, and towering over it in the purple grey cloud, is South Ronaldshaw, or Ronaldsha, in whose corrupted and degraded name we can hardly trace the pure and classical Norsk termination.[306]Properly Ronansey, from St Ronan, Ringan, orNinian, it still preserves an old-world flavour. Till the last thirty years wreckers were rife: it was held “best to let saut water gang its gate;” in other words, uncanny, as we find in “The Pirate,” to save a drowning sailor. Mariners lost all their rights when keel once touched sand; whatever was cast ashore became the lawful property of the people; Earl Patrick, who now is cursed at Scalloway because “he hung the Shetlanders,” was blessed for his wise laws against all that would help ships amongst the breakers; a wreck was a sight to “wile the parson out of his pulpit in the middle of his preaching,” and the blessing upon the shore was coupled with a wish that the Lord would send “mair wrecks ere winter.” Men still remember the old Orcadian minister’s prayer: “O Lord, I wish not ill to my neighbours, but if wrecks be going, remember Thy poor island of Sandey!”[307]The clergy feared to offend those sturdy pagans, their “little ones,” by denouncing from the pulpit what the devoutest held to be a “dispensation of Providence.” A pious fraud began by excommunicating all who broke the Sabbath in such Satan’s work, and the course of time did the rest.

But old ideas do not readily die. Lately a farmer in Orphir parish (Ör-fjara, or Ör-fyri, “a reef covered by high tide”), having lost many head of cattle by “witching,” applied to the “spae-wife,” who prescribed the sacrifice of a bull-calf, probably by cremation, to Baal. The practice is, of course, kept secret, yet the best possible authority at Kirkwall told me he had reason to suspect that such offerings to the sun-god are by no means singular. The late pugnacious Sir James Simpson (Archæological Essays) also heard of a cow being buried alive as a sacrifice to the spirit of murrain. The Yule bonfires and the games of ball at that season were also in honour of the greater light.

Beyond South Ronaldshaw we had a fair profile view of Hoy (=Há-ey, high isle), a three-hilled, long, narrow parallelogramwhich took us some five hours to pass. The fierce south-westers which scoop and scallop western Scotland, like western Iceland and the occidental coasts of north Europe generally, render cultivation impossible except on the leeward side, where the “links” are.[308]En passant, it may be observed that the island capitals between Caithness and Iceland, as Stornoway of the Hebrides, Kirkwall of the Orkneys, Lerwick of the Shetlands, and Thorshaven of the Færoes, are all built upon the eastern shore. We strained eyes in vain to sight the position of Walter Scott’s “Dwarfie Stones,” so calledper antiphrasin, says Brand;, and equally vain was the “search for the great carbuncle” of Ward Hill, now invisible as the gem of the Diamond Rock, and probably never seen save by the eyes of faith. I heard of the same mysterious light in the far Gaboon River. We were more fortunate with the Hill of Hoy, the tallest part of the dorsum (1500 feet), whose “Old Man,” which farther north would be called a “witch finger,” appeared first a dot, then a column, and lastly a dome upon the summit of a huge cathedral. It is of the “Old Red,” a pale, unfossiliferous sandstone, the normal material of the western mainland, though some describe it as a slaty formation supported by a base of granite, which also crops out near Stromness. According to Bleau, the midnight sun can be seen from it in midsummer; Dr Wallace qualifies the statement by opining that the true solar body cannot be visible, but only its image refracted through some watery cloud upon the horizon. The last glimpse of Hoy was Ronay Head, a glorious bluff at least 1000 feet high, and beyond it lay nought savepontus et aer.

I will here step out of the order of my journey, which would more wisely have been reversed. To begin with Iceland is to begin at the end, neglecting the various steps and stages of Orkneys, Shetlands, and Færoes, whilst to describe the climax and its anti-climax, would be utterly uninteresting and bathetic. My three days (Sept. 10, 11, and 12) at the Church-bay (Kirkjuvágr, vogr, vad, waw, wall) produced some results, and these shall be briefly recorded.

The good ship “St Magnus” ran up “the String” to Kirkwall Roads, and landed me after a ten hours’ passage from Lerwick. My first care was to send my introductory letter, the gift of Mr Gatherer, to Mr George Petrie, well known in the anthropological world. He kindly led me to the little museum, which, like that of Lerwick, is far behind the order and neatness of Reykjavik. The collection contains good specimens of netting needles, cut out of rein and red deer bone: the former animal extended to the Orkneys, as broken bones have been found in the burghs, and suggest that they were continental. There were natural stone knives, looking as if shaped by art—the Brazil shows heaps of celts equally deceptive—pots of micaceous schist and steatite from Shetland; combs conjectured to have been used for ornamenting pottery; a two-handed scraper of whale’s bone; specimens of “bysmers” and “pundlers,” wooden bars used as steelyards, the former three, and the latter seven, feet long: they carried the Norwegian weights, “bysmars” and “lispunds,”[309]which took root in the Shetlands. I noticed the huge Varangian[310]fibulæ and torques; the querns still common amongst the islandry; red “keel” or pigment of silicious hæmatite, showing that even the artless dames did not ignore the art of rouge; rude beads of bone and clay; and a human skull with four rabbit teeth, possibly bevelled by the “bursten bigg,” coarse roasted bere or barley, even as the Guanches of Tenerife ground down their molars with parched grain. My guide showed me his ingenious plan for “squeezes,” and making casts of spearheads and similar articles by means of warmed gutta-percha applied to the stone, and lastly cooled in water.

Scapa (Skálpeið) Brock, the highly interesting ruin discovered by Mr Petrie in 1870, was of course visited. At the Earl’s Castle, whose approach is choked with trees like that of Baalbek, I remarked that the kitchen and the banqueting-room had false and shouldered arches, which might have been borrowed from the Haurán. We pitied poor St Magnus the Martyr for the insult lately offered to him in the shape of a wretched court-house—a similar affront has been inflicted upon York Minster. The old cathedral, grand in its rude and ponderous Norman-Gothic, is made remarkable by the red sandstone mixed with whitey-greycalcaires: it shares with St Mungo the honour of being the finest remains of Catholicism in the north, and it is unduly neglected by strangers. The view from that eye-sore, the stunted spire, is charming. North-west stretches the Bay of Firth, famed for oysters, backed by the dark heights of Rousay (Hrólfsey); while north-east lies Shapinshay (Hjápandisey),[311]smiling with corn and white houses, with the dark hillocks of low-lying Edey in the distance. Amongst the smaller islets may be mentioned castled Damsey (Daminsey); the Holm of Quanterness; Thieves’ Holm (Thjófaholmr), where robbers, who were supposed not to swim, found a safe prison, and often, too, a long home; and the whale-back of Gairsey (Gáreksey), with the stronghold of that Sveinn (Sweyn), who lost his pirate life when attacking Dublin—the Vikings seem ever to have preferred these fragments of earth where the sea, their favourite element, was never far distant. Nearer and rising from the reniform “Mainland,”aliasPomona, by the Sagas called Hrossey or Horse Island, is Wideford (Hvitfjörð) Hill, backed by the Oyce or Peerie Sea. The ground-wave is dark with bloomless gorse, and ruddy with fading heath, whilst higher still

“Earth clad in russet scorns the lively green.”

It is a progressive country: middle-aged men have shot grouse in the mosses near Kirkwall where now the fields bear corn. The peasant’s father despaired of growing grass: the son ploughs the bog, builds dry walls with the larger stones that cumber the surface, cuts deep drains, and top-dresses with sand and lime. Hands, however, are wanting; the fisheries bring more moneythan agriculture; and the good landlord will not part with his slow old tenantry, because he cannot replace it.

ST. MAGNUS CATHEDRAL & EARL'S PALACE, KIRKWALLVol. I. Page 283.

ST. MAGNUS CATHEDRAL & EARL'S PALACE, KIRKWALL

Vol. I. Page 283.

Two monuments in the cathedral are peculiarly interesting, and partly relieve the desert and dismal appearance of all Catholic places of worship converted to a “purer creed.” The first is that of the Irving family, true Orcadians, who never changed their name sinceA.D.1361, and one lies murdered inA.D.1614. Mr Petrie, the discoverer, communicated with the great Washington of that ilk, who replied courteously, forwarding at the same time a presentation copy of his works. Mr Pliny Miles (Norðurfari) and others of his class are fond of claiming all distinguished names for their own country; for instance, Snorri Thorfinnsson, “the first Yankee[312]on record,” is the forefather of Finn Magnússon and Thorvaldsen, whilst Captain Ericsson is the descendant of Eric the Red. It would be easier far to trace all American celebrities directly to Europe, and many of them would not be sorry to see the process thus inverted.

The second tomb, much more interesting to me than those of King Hakon and Maid Margaret, is the cenotaph of Dr Baikie, R.N., designed and inscribed, I believe, by Sir Henry Dryden: certainly both design and inscription deserve scanty credit. Not a word about the original profession of poor “Hammie,” as he was called by a host of friends. And why should it be a cenotaph? Why bequeath the explorer’s bones to the ignoble “European’s grave,” S’a Leone? Worse still, the journals, once so interesting, have been allowed to lie in obscurity for want of an editor, and a decade in these days takes away almost all the value of an African traveller’s diary. Dr Baikie is supposed also to have left a valuable collection of Nigerian vocabularies—these, at least, might be forwarded to the Anthropological Institute. I can only express a hope that the bereaved family will bestir itself before the cold shade of oblivion obscures the memory of a heroic name.

After a long spell of cloudy, misty, and rainy weather, Thursday, the 12th September, broke fine, with a clear sun and a high rollicking wind which swept the rolling surface-water like abroom. In these islands, July, August, and September are frequently wet; in October the “peerie simmer”[313]of St Martin, the Indian summer of the United States, sets in and gladdens the eye of man before the glooms of winter round off the year. Mr Petrie proposed himself as guide to Wideford Hill, Ingishowe (Howe of Inga), Maes Howe, Stennis, Borgar (Brúargarðr), and Stromness—I need hardly tell the pleasure with which his kind offer was accepted. He has not only admirably described these and other antiquities (especially in his “Notice of the Brochs, or Large Round Towers of Orkney,” etc., read before the S.N.A., June 11, 1866): he has done far more important work by converting popularinsouciance, and even ridicule, into a something of his own enthusiasm. Nor should I forget to say that in this great task he has been ably and efficiently supported by the landlord-class, amongst whom Colonel Balfour of Balfour Castle and Ternaby (Tjarnabær), the owner of Maes Howe, has especially distinguished himself. We shall now hope to have heard the last of such barbarism as breaking up the venerable “Odin’s Stone” into building material. These acts are like the state of Uriconium, a national disgrace; we only wish that Jarl Hakon had Mr M——’s leg in the “Cashidawis,” or “Warm Hose”—a fitting reward for those who justify the sneer—

“Quod non fecerunt GothiHoc fecerunt Scoti.”

It is also to be desired that the liberal proprietor of Maes Howe would take active steps to defend the highly interesting central chamber from the inclemency of the weather; the barrow was opened in July 1861, and already the interior has suffered from exposure.

The most interesting event of the day was the inspection of Maes Howe, which some one has lately suggested to be “simply a Norse fort.” It would be mere impertinence to offer a generaldescription of this unique barrow after the studies of Mr Farrer (“Notice of Runic Inscriptions discovered during Recent Excavations in the Orkneys,” made by James Farrer, M.P.; printed for private circulation, 1862); lately popularised by Mr Fergusson in “Rude Stone Monuments.” The three mortarlessloculiof huge slabs and their closing stones reminded me so strongly of the miscalled “Tombs of the Kings,” north of Jerusalem, that I felt once more in the “Holy Land.” It is a glorious monument of the great tomb-building race, or races whose animistic creed, the essence of fetichism, expresses itself in tent-tombs (chambered cairns) and cave-tombs (rock-cut chambers) upon the Siberian steppes, the Algerian plains, the Wiltshire downs, and the Scoto-Scandinavian islands. At Maes Howe we find all its characteristics—the stone circle which drove away the profane; the long passage which keeps warm the cave or hut; the vestibule for the funeral feast, and the various rooms for the dead to live in. And at the first sight of the Branch Runes,[314]otherwise called Palm Runes, I remembered having seen a similar alphabet in northern Syria.

A ride to Hums, of old Emesa (February 27, 1871), and a visit to my old friend the Nestorian Matrán (Metropolitan) Butrus, introduced me to the alphabet known as El Mushajjar, or the branched, one of the many cyphers formerly and, for aught I know, still current amongst Semitic races. Returning to England, I sent a copy of it to the Anthropological Institute, intending to illustrate a paper which was reprinted in “Unexplored Syria” (vol. ii., Appendix, p. 241): unfortunately the copy was lost.

According to the Matrán’s MS. there are two forms of El Mushajjar, one applied to Arabic, and the other to Pehlevi. Both are read from right to left, and the following is the Arabic form:

No. I.

The adjoined is the Pehlevi.

No. III. is the Norsk-Runic alphabet, read from left to right, as classified by Mr George Petrie, to decipher the palm-runes in Maes Howe.

And the following are the inscriptions on the walls of Maes Howe:

The key to the cypher is here shown by the transverse stroke on the stem of the first letter to the left (A or æ).

forming an inceptive—“these runes.” In the word “Runar,” the left-hand branches are turned down by way of variety; of course the number is the same. Finally, it is interesting to compare this “Mushajjar” with a similar system, the Irish letters, which bear the names of trees. They are:

And even in the common runes, we may observe that there is only one (R) which is not composed of a rune-staff, supporting offsets disposed at various angles.

No. I., the Arabic form connected by horizontal base-lines, contains two sets of three, and four sets of four letters, read asusual in Semitic alphabets; beginning with Alpha and ending with Tau: it is in fact the Aleph-Tav of the Hebrews and of the older Arabs, as preserved in the numeral and chronological syllabarium “El Abjad.” I need hardly note that this was characteristic of the world-conquering Phœnician, that glorious gift to Greece, usually attributed to Cadmus (El Kadim, or the Ancient), and by us incongruously applied to our Aryan speech; a comparison of the sequencesa,b,c, andd(Abjad), andk,l,m, andn(Kalaman) with any other system at once proves direct derivation. In the Pehlevi Mushajjar the letters, it will be seen, are not joined at the base, and sundry branches are formed in a different way.

Mr Farrer, who first “established the important fact of Runic inscriptions existing in Orkney, where none had hitherto been found,” gives both sets of palm-runes (Plates VIII. and IX.). He borrows the following information (p. 29, referring to Plate VIII.) from Professor Stephens, a good Norsk scholar: “The six crypt runes or secret staves represent the letters A, Æ, R, L, I, K, R, and signify Aalikr or Erling, a proper name, or perhaps the beginning of some sentence.” Professor Munch observes, “The other characters in the third line are known as ‘Limouna,[315]or Bough-Runes.’ They were used during the later times of the Runic period in the same manner as the Irish Ogham, but are not here intelligible. The writer probably intended to represent the chief vowels—A, E, I, O, U, Y. The Runic alphabet was divided into two classes: the strokes on the left of the vertical line indicating the class, and those on the right the rune itself.” And Professor Rafn declares, “The palm-runes underneath cannot be read in the usual manner; the first, third, and fourth of the runes beinga,o, andi; the writer probably intended to give all the vowels, but some of the letters have been obviously miscarried, and have perhaps been altered and defaced at a later period by other persons. In the first of these a cross line has been added to show that the letterais intended.” Of No. XVIII. (Plate X.), Mr Farrer notes, “The palm-runes are rarely capable of being deciphered.” Professor Munch similarly declares, “The boughrunes are not easy to decipher;” whilst Professor Stephens asserts, “The palm-runes on the first line indicate Thisar Runar—‘these runes.’”They are mentioned in the Elder Edda (Sigrdrífumál, stanza 11):

“Lim-runes thou must ken,An thou a leech wouldst be,And know to heal hurts.”

The cryptogram, “El Mushajjar,” was forwarded to Mr Petrie, who replied as follows: “I attempted by means of your tree-branched alphabet to read the palm-runes of Maes Howe, but failed. It then occurred to me that they might correspond with the Futhork, or Icelandic alphabet, and, obtaining the key of the cipher, I completely succeeded after a few hours’ trial. On referring to Mr Farrer’s copies of the translations given by the Scandinavian professors, I find that Professor Stephens appears to have put five runes in each of the first two classes, which makes the third palm-rune (inscription No. I.) to be L instead of Y; moreover, he does not give the key. My first attempt at classifying the runes by means of the cipher turned out correct, and I have therefore retained that classification in reading the second inscription. It is evident that the classification could be altered at will of the person using it, and this uncertainty of arrangement must constitute the difficulty of interpreting such runes.”

In Nos. XIX. and XX. (Plate X.) we read “Iorsafarar Brutu Orkhröugh”—the Jórsalafarar (Jerusalem-farers,i.e., pilgrim-visitors of Jerusalem) broke open Orkhow (shelter-mound), probably in search of treasure: the latter is an object especially Eastern. There are seven crosses, and one inscription (No. XIII.) must be read from right to left. We may therefore believe that certain oldCoquillards, and possibly Crusaders, returning from Palestine, whence they brought the “hubby,”[316]violated the tombs, and left a single name and an unfinished inscription to record their propensity[317]for grave-plundering.

We visited the museum at Stromness, the amorpholites or “Standing Stones,” and that “Mediterranean in miniature,” the Stennis Lake, whose flora is partly marine and partly lacustrine. Hereabouts, the plain shows distinct remnants of the two great epochs—Bruna-öld, the Age of Burning; and Hauga-öld, the Age of Burial. We have no reason to believe the tradition that Odin introduced cremation; doubtless, the “crematee” was chiefly of the wealthy classes, while the poor were inhumed—they were both synchronous in the days of the Twelve Tables: “Hominem mortuum in urbe ne sepelito, neve urito.” Hence a valuable rule for tracing the exact limits of old Roman cities, even of Rome herself: the cemetery was always outside the city settlement, and, if possible, to the south.

The day ended happily, as it began, in meeting Colonel Burroughs of Rousay, and Dr Rea of Arctic fame. My memories of Kirkwall are pleasant in the extreme. It wants only a good modern hotel to deserve the patronage of tourists, who, in these days, are told to “try Lapland,” when they have ample inducement to pass a summer in the “storm-swept Orcades,” and in other sections of the Scoto-Scandinavian archipelago.

On Friday, September 6, the “Jón Sigurðsson,” Captain Müller of whom more presently, made with some difficulty the Shetland Mainland. Many derivations are offered for the latter word, but, as the island is larger than all the rest put together, the obvious signification suffices.[318]A dark, thick fog had kept us drifting allnight close to the dangerous rocks called Hivda Grind, Havre de Grind, or Hardegrind, originally Nafargrind, from Grind (a hedge-gate or sea-way), and, perhaps, Höfða (a head or bluff). Our position, some seven miles E.S.E. of Foula (Fugley) Island, explained the noise of the surf and the shallowing of water to thirty-two fathoms—it is far easier in these latitudes to hear than to see the land! The raw mist obscured the bold, grand scenery of the western coast till noon, when a sickly sun sublimed the vapours, reminding me of the Malabar coast after the Nilgherry Hills. Very mild was the Roost[319]or Race of Sumburgh, a Euripus, where nine currents are said to meet. We could distinctly sight Fitful[320]Head, and

“We saw the tideBreak thundering on the rugged sideOf Sumburgh’s awful steep.”

Its flank of clay-slate showed vast rivas (clefts) and stone-slips, while beyond it lay the skeleton of Jarlshof (Earl’s house), names now world-known. It is curious to trace how the practised eye and the wonderful memory which created our modern historical novel skimmed the very cream of Hjaltland peculiarities during a few days’ visit in August 1814, the year in which he published the Eyrbyggja Saga;[321]and it is fortunate for writing travellers that Sir Walter Scott did not visit the Færoes and Iceland. See what he did for the “Waverley Line” of Railway!Amongst the islanders he is a household word, but though the Troils of Papa Westræ do not object to Magnus Troil, they are still incensed by the portraiture of that “fiddling, rhyming fool,” poor Claud Halcro.

The approach to Bressey Sound, one of the finest ports in Great Britain, is unusually picturesque. On the right is the “Wart of Bressey”[322]—verrucose features are here common as in the Orkneys, but the word is the Icelandic “Varða,” and the German “Warte,” a watch-house. Its flanks are gashed for turf; and a goodly lighthouse is as much wanted on the dangerous western coast as on the Mediterranean shores of Africa. The island was lately sold, they say, for £20,000. On the left is the historic Knap or Knab (Hnapp meaning a button) of quartzose slate, backed by the quarries and the spreading town of Lerwick—mud bay. The (Arthur) Anderson Institute and the Widows’ Asylum reminded me of a Shetlander who began life as a clerk, became M.P. in 1847-52, and died the chairman of the great “P. & O.”—it is a pity that these fine establishments were not better endowed. The capital stands with its feet in the water; the houses, with their crow-stepped gables, being so built for convenience of smuggling, and its sons fondly compare it with cities on the Rhine. Half a dozen Dutch busses, riding in couples, now represent the hundreds of bygone days, when the British fisheries were called the “gold mine of Holland.” Certain features suggested modern Tiberias, but the disproportionate number of the churches soon weighed down that flight of fancy.

On the day after arrival, I set out with Captain Henry T. Ellis, R.N. (of “Hong-Kong to Manilla”), to do the tourde rigueur—Scalloway[323]Castle and Moseyaburgum, the Mousa (Mósey) Broch[324]or Pecht House. We took the excellent northern road, begun during the famine, and finished some four years ago (1870): formerly when a picnic was intended, gillies were sent on to smooth the way for riders. After a few yards, we left the fertile seaboard, whose skirts and smooths are, as in Iceland, the only sites for agriculture, and entered the normal type of country, which begins in Scotland and Ireland. There can be no better description of bog and moor, of hill-land or commonty, and of “moss, mount, and wilderness, quhairin are divers great waters,” than that which opens the first chapter of “Lord Kilgobbin,” the last work of that most amiable and sympathetic writer, whose unworthy successor I now am: “Some one has said that almost all that Ireland possesses of picturesque beauty is to be found on or in the immediate neighbourhood of the seaboard; and if we except some brief patches of river scenery on the ‘Nore’ and the ‘Blackwater,’ and a part of Lough Erne, the assertion is not devoid of truth. The dreary expanse called the Bog of Allen, which occupies a high table-land in the centre of the island, stretches away for miles, flat, sad-coloured, and monotonous, fissured in every direction by channels of dark-tinted water, in which the very fish take the same sad colour.” Similarly we read of Scotland: “The inland, the upland, the moor, the mountain, were really not occupied at all for agricultural purposes, or served only to keep the poor and their cattle from starving.”

The surface of this Irish Sliabh and Icelandic Heiði, a true “black country,” natural not artificial, rolls in low warty moors revetted with moss, spangled with Fífa, or cotton-grass (Epilobium, orEriophorum epistachion), and gashed with deep black earth-cracks, showing the substrata of peat; the tarns and flowing waters are inky as the many Brazilian “Unas” (Blackwaters), and though strongly peat-flavoured, they are not unwholesome. I could not find that they had been used for tanning, nor have the people yet found out the value of the “peat-coal,” macerated condensed[325]peat, so long appreciated by the Grand Trunk ofCanada and the railways of New England and Bavaria; even in the Brazil a patent for the manufactory was taken out some years ago, and Bahia now exports the article. Yet in Lyell’s “Principles of Geology” (11th edit., vol. ii., p. 504) we meet the strange assertion, “No peat found in Brazil.” The supply of the bog factories near Montreal costs nine shillings to ten shillings per ton, or about one-fourth the value of pit coal. The Torbite of Horwich (Lancashire) is even cheaper, and experts have said that it gets up steam to 10 lbs. pressure in one hour ten minutes, and to 25 lbs. in one hour thirty-two minutes—the figures of Lancashire coal being two hours twenty-five minutes and three hours—at any rate, we may believe that when water is excluded, its heating power is about half way between wood and coal. Thus it becomes an article of general value to brewers, distillers, and manufacturers; and the Swedish iron, equal to Low Moor, as well as the yield of the Bavarian, the Wurtemberg, and the Bohemian mines, are all treated with condensed peat. It is now time to utilise the vast bogs of the finest deep black fuel, in which Ireland and the Hebrides, the Shetlands and the Orkneys abound, especially when perpetual colliery strikes, causing coal famines and the immense rise in the value of the combustible, have made steamers lie idle in our ports. Truly Torf-Einarr Jarl, who first taught the art and mystery of “yarpha”-burning, deserves a memorial statue on the Torf-nes.

In such “sea-girdled peat-mosses” as these, agriculture is a farce, and only sheep can pay. The foundation of the rocks, snowy quartz veining grey and chloritic slate, is that of Minas Geraes, and yet crushing for gold has not, we were assured, been attempted. Dr Cowie informed me that copper and iron are now successfully worked near Sandwich; and I hope soon to hear of prospecting for the nobler metal. At present ourAfrican California, the Gold Coast itself, is not more thoroughly neglected.[326]

Shetland life is concentrated near the sounds and voes (the Vogr of Iceland), where the dykes of Galway and Roscommon, dry or mortared walls, enclose yellow fields of oats, barley, and potatoes black with frost. Churches, and manses bigger than the churches; kilns burning kelp and lime; substantial houses, thatched with barley-straw, upon “pones,” or slabs of dried turf, the whole kept in place by “simmins” (straw ropes), stones, and logs, dotted the lowlands. Here and there stood a few willows and maple-planes, erroneously called sycamores,[327]under the shelter of walls; and uncommonly pleasant after Iceland was the twitter of the birdies. Many broken and unroofed cottages, some of them leper-houses in bygone days, reminded us that the disease lingered longer in Scotland than in England; in the Scoto-Scandinavian islands than in Scotland; and in Iceland than in the “Eyjar.” The frequent ruined home-steads of small tenantry, compelled, when their land was “laid down to grazing,” to seek their fortunes elsewhere, are the salient features. The “murid” (murret) coloured Shetland sheep have now made way for Scotch intruders; the cattle are from Ayrshire; and English horses, not “cussers from Lanarkshire,” have taken the place of shelties. Ducks and geese are everywhere; skarfs and gulls are more numerous than the speckled cocks and hens; and salt-fish, which here is not sun-dried, lies piled, as in Iceland, upon the sands.

Much has been said in books[328]about the physical beauty of the Shetlanders, but neither of us could see it. There is a greatervariety of race than in the islands farther north, but less, as might be expected, than in the Orkneys and Caithness. The blue eyes are milder than in Iceland, the long bright locks are the same, but the complexion is by no means so “pearl and pink”—perhaps its muddiness may result from peat-water. The blondes, as a rule, wear that faded and colourless aspect, which especially distinguishes the Slav race. The look is shy and reserved, and the voice is almost a whisper, as if the speaker were continually nervous: strangers notice this peculiarity even in society.En revanche, the women appear to be peculiarly industrious. They crowd Commercial Street during the Monday markets, and even when carrying their heavy “cassies,” “cassie-cazzies,” or crates of peat, which serve for “Ronin the Bee,” they spin yarn and knit “tree-ply stockings,” apparently not intended for their own naked feet. The Wadmel, or Wadmaal, the North of England Woadmel, here better known as “Shetland claith,” cannot, however, compare with that of Iceland; the texture is loose, and the stuff in the shops is evidently meant to sell, not to last.

After seeing the humble wonders of Scalloway Castle, we struck southwards and across the Mainland, where we could hire a boat for the Whalesback of Mousa. The leek-shaped Broch has a pair of romantic legends attached to it, but they are too modern for interest. This most perfect specimen of the seventy round towers[329]has been often described, but no one seems to have noticed the similarity of the double walls of the vaulted and many-storied bee-hive chambers, and of the other peculiarities, with those of the pre-historic Sardinian Nurhágghi. The “stepped domes” of dry stone, and the “concealments,” also reminded me much of similar features in outlying Syria. Some ill-conditioned party of “cheap-trippers,” or “devil’s-dust tourists,” has lately fired the secular moss which clothed the south-western wall. On the way back to Lerwick there is another ruin in Clickamin (also written Chickhamin) Lake: interesting as the means of comparison, it has an addition evidently more modern of extensive outworks, which Mousa Castle wholly wants.

Unfortunately for myself, I had not time to call upon the late Mr Thomas Edmonston of Buness, whose philological labours are so valuable to northern students;[330]and to tell unpleasant truth, I was somewhat surprised by the success of the nineteenth century in abolishing all the old hospitality. We inspected the contents of the dark little room, the anthropological collection of the Shetlands, which deserves a catalogue, and other comforts of civilised life. Many Hjaltlanders have never heard of it. The most interesting articles are the steatite pots from Unst, and the ceramic remains, guiltless of wheel, collected in the Brochs. There are also some rough “thunderbolts”—here the stone celt is considered, as by the ancient Greeks, to be an ἀστροπελέυς. Hence Claudian (fifth century) sings:

“Pyrenæisque sub antrisIgnea flumineæ legere ceraunia nymphæ.”

We ran into Thorshafn (Færoes) on September 4, when a shower of rain had laid the fog. The “Isles of Sheep,” others say of “Feathers,” are evidently built like Iceland, with submarine trap; and the deep narrow “grips” between them, passages free from any danger except the “vortices,”[331]which can be seen, suggest that they have parted into long narrow fragments under the influence of subaërial cooling and contraction. The deep black strata appear peculiarly regular, as those of the western Fjörðs of Thule, streaked with lines of red ochre, spotted with white guano, and not showing, in this part at least, any signs of Palagonite or sea-sand. The leaf-shaped valleys,the water-falls, and the natural arches, are familiar to us after “Snowland;” the shallow turf lies upon the steepest inclines, and not unfrequently it is torn off by the frantic wind with as much ease as a rug is rolled up.

KIRKJUBÆ RUINS IN FÆROE ISLANDS

The course lay abreast of Mygganaes (Midge Naze),[332]with its head to the south, and projecting a long low tail cut by a “coupé,” like that of Sark. We then opened Waagoe (voe islet), so called because imbedded in the greater Stromoe. At the southern end, where once whales abounded, as may be seen in prints of 1844, many “Battles of the Summer Islands” were fiercely waged. We pass Gaasholm, Tind-holm, or Peak Island, a slice of rock with jagged uplifted edge, here a common feature, the Koltar (Coulter), which passably represents its name, and Hestoe the horse-eyot. The latter is a common Scandinavian name for a feature with a long straight dorsum, ready as it were for the saddle—witness the Horse of “Copinshay” (Kolbeins-ey): the hunchbacks are mostly called “hogs,” and the smaller outliers “calves.” The normal shape is a quoin, bluff to north or east, and sloping with a regular green incline to the water. There is no snow; the hay crop has been got in, and the settlements are villages, not Bærs or detached farms. We ran within easy sight of Kirkjubæ, which stands well out from its adjacent hovels; it is the last Roman Catholic building in the islands, and the “Reformation” left its sturdy walls unroofed. Visitors speak of an iron plate imbedded in its masonry, and supposed to denote treasure, which is not likely. The old Church still keeps up a mission-house and chapel at Thorshafn, but we found the building void of priests.

Whilst the “haaf,” or outer sea, was calm as a lake, a cold and furious southerly wind, the gift of the funnel between Sandoe and Stromoe, blew in our faces, and when we had turned the southern point of the latter, it again met us from the north-east.The capital Thorshafn is a small heap of houses, or rather boxes strewed “promiscuous” on the ground, and a large white church, whose belfry is adorned with a gilt ball and a profusion of crosses. It has, however, a literary dean, and, better still, a library. The site of the settlement is a spit of rock dividing the harbour into a northern and a southern “hop”—the latter being generally preferred. A green flag floating over a shed near the fort denotes the quarantine station; planked boat-houses figure conspicuously, and the roofs are more grassy even than in Iceland. Willows, elder-trees, and currant-bushes, looking gigantic after the stunted vegetation farther north, flourish in sheltered spots, especially near the well-bridged brook in the southern part of the city. Along the dorsum of the spit runs an upper road with a small central square, looking as if a single house had been pulled down to make room. Huge boulders have not disappeared from the thoroughfares, and the latter are the most crooked and irregular of any that claim to be in Europe; narrow, steep, and steppy—- narrower than Malta, steeper than ramps at “Gib,” and steppy like Dalmatian towns, for instance Curzola and Lésina: in places they are supplied with hand-rails.

The people are remarkably English in appearance, and perhaps an easy reason may be found for the resemblance. They appear rather shy than the reverse, and they notably lack Hazlitt’s “Scotch stare.” The women show the bloom of infinite delicacy that characterises the complexion of Iceland. The men, who unwisely shave their faces, still affect the picturesque island-dress, a peculiar-shaped cap of dark colour with thin blue or red stripes, long brown jacket, knee breeches of Wadmal, long stockings, and untanned spartelles, or “chumpers,” the wooden-soled clogs of “Lankyshire.”

We called on Hr Sysselmand Müller, and we left the Færoes with a conviction that its capital is one of the “slowest” places now in existence: the only possible excitement would be to buy a 560-fathom “fowl-rope,”[333]and to dangle like the samphire-gatherer of dreadful trade over the bird-precipices. “In a rope’s end between earth and heaven, with the blue sky above you, and below you the still bluer sea tumbling, between which two you swing to and fro like a pendulum,” one might secure a novel sensation to take the place of many anillusion perdue. A St Bartholomew’s Day of a hundred and fifty whales, a massacre headed by the parson and the schoolmaster, must also have its charms, but these events are unhappily waxing rare.

NOTE ON STONE IMPLEMENTS AND OTHER PRE-HISTORIC REMAINS FOUND IN THE SHETLAND ISLANDS.By the late Robert Cowie, M.A., M.D.

Of the pre-historic weapons of warfare, or implements of domestic economy, which have been found in the Shetland Islands, by far the most numerous and important are the stone implements. These naturally divide themselves into two classes, viz., thepolishedand therude. First let us speak of the polished stone implement, celt, steinbarte, battle-axe head, or “thunderbolt.” This implement has, for centuries, been an object of search, not only for the antiquary and the collector of curiosities, but for the native peasantry—the latter class regarding it with superstitious awe, as a sort of household god, who brings luck to the family that is fortunate enough to possess it. They term it the “thunderbolt,” from a belief—everywhere found and dating from all times—that the weapon has come down from the sky during a thunderstorm. These “celts,” or steinbartes, as they are generally termed in scientific language, again divide themselves into two varieties, viz. (1.) the single-edged steinbarte and (2.) the double-edged steinbarte.

1. The single-edged steinbarte, which is by far the most common, is thus very accurately described by Dr Hibbert, in his excellent work on Shetland: “This variety of blade has one cutting edge, generally of a semilunar outline, and tapering from opposite points to a blunted extremity or heel. In some specimens both sides are convex; in others one side only, theother being flattened. All the edges except the broad sharpened margin are bluntly rounded off. The single-edged stone-axes of Shetland vary much in their dimensions, being from four to eight or ten inches in length; their breadth proportionately differing. When the Shetland steinbarte was used in war, its blunt tapering extremity may be supposed to have been introduced within the perforation made into some wooden or bone haft, and afterwards secured by overlapping cords, formed of thongs of leather, or the entrails of some animal; twine of hemp not being then in use.”

From considerable personal observation, I can testify to the accuracy of the above description, except that there appears to be in these instruments greater variety in size than that indicated by the learned Doctor; the largest single-headed steinbarte in the Lerwick Museum being 14½ inches long by 4½ inches at the broadest point, and the smallest 4½ inches long by 2½ inches at the broadest point.

Continuing the paragraph just quoted, Dr Hibbert says: “Another kind of steinbarte has been said to occur in Shetland, the sharp edge of which describes the segment of a circle, whilst the chord of the outline is thickened like the back of a knife. Probably its blunt edge was fixed within the groove of a wooden or bone handle, so as to form a single-edged cutting instrument.” This peculiar variety must have been very rare indeed, for no one appears to have seen it since the days of the Rev. Mr Low of Orkney, who wrote exactly a century ago.

2. The double-edged steinbarte is described as follows by Dr Hibbert: “The blade of this instrument is a stone completely flattened on each of its sides, and not more than the tenth of an inch thick; it is of an oblong shape, having one blunted margin perfectly straight, and, with the stone in such a position that the dull edge is the uppermost, we have the form of a blade presented, in which the two narrow edges are irregularly rounded off at their angles, so that one edge is much broader than the other. Every part of the margin but that which constitutes the summit of the outline is sharpened; by which means there is a great addition made to the extent of the cutting edge. The blade is 5½ inches long, and from 3 to 4 broad.” This description does not correspond with the specimens I have been able to examine. If they are to be considered fair specimens, I would describe the so-called double-edged steinbarte thus: An oblong flat piece of porphyry, serpentine, or some similar stone, 5 or 6 inches long by 4 or 5 broad, and about a third or a fourth of an inch thick, with a thin sharp edge all round.

These instruments, many of which are very beautiful both as regards form and polish, are generally formed of a peculiarly compact green porphyry or of serpentine. They have been found in most of the districts of Shetland, particularly in the parishes of Unst, Delting, Wells, and Sandsting. The situations and numbers in which they have been found, also present great variety. Some have been taken out of ancient stone coffins, others found inside of or near to old “burghs,” while many have been dug up in the common—some near the surface and others several feet beneath it.[334]Most of them have been found singly, but in many instances large collections of such weapons have been discovered. Thus, in one instance, twenty-four of them were found in one spot, in another eight, and in a third seven, the last-mentioned series being arranged in the form of a circle.

Polished stones having the shape of spear-heads have also been found in Shetland, but very rarely. They are said to be about four inches long, having a groove apparently for receiving a wooden shaft.

Flint arrow-heads, although frequently dug up in Orkney, have not yet, as far as I can learn, been found in Shetland.

2.The Rude Stone Implements.

While the polished archaic stone implements have been known during a long period of modern history, the rude or unpolished have only very recently been discovered, or at all events recognised; and for this discovery we are chiefly indebted to the late Dr James Hunt, London; Dr Arthur Mitchell, Edinburgh; and Mr George Petrie, Kirkwall, who conducted archæological explorations in Shetland in the summer of 1865. Vast quantities of such articles must from time to time have been turned up by the peasantry; but it is only about this period they appear to have been recognised—a circumstance somewhat curious considering the many searches during a long series of years, made for relics of pre-historic times, by various accomplished antiquaries. These rough instruments present great variety both as to shape and size. Let us endeavour to indicate the chief types.

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