IN THIS SERIES
CAMBRIDGE
CANTERBURY
CHANNEL ISLANDS
CLYDE, FIRTH OF
ENGLISH LAKES
ISLE OF MAN
ISLE OF WIGHT
LONDON, ROMANCE OF
OXFORD
STRATFORD-ON-AVON
Leamington and Warwick
THAMES
TROSSACHS
NORTH WALES
WESSEX
WINDSOR AND ETON
PUBLISHED BY
ADAM & CHARLES BLACK
SOHO SQ., LONDON
[Illustration: The Waterfall in Dhoon Glen]
_Beautiful Britain_
_The Isle of Man_
_By
Joseph E Morris_
[Illustration: Landscape]
_London Adam & Charles
Black_
_Soho Square W
1911_
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE ISLAND AS A WHOLE 5
II. CONCERNING PEEL 10
III. TYNWALD HILL AND THE NORTHERN PARTS OF THE ISLAND 18
IV. FROM RAMSEY TO LAXEY 40
V. CASTLETOWN AND THE SOUTH SIDE OF THE ISLAND 48
INDEX 64
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
1. THE WATERFALL IN DHOON GLEN _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
2. DOUGLAS BAY (A MIDSUMMER NIGHT) 9
3. MAUGHOLD CHURCH 16
4. A BREEZY MORNING AT POINT OF AYRE 25
5. RAMSEY BAY LOOKING NORTHWARDS 27
6. SULBY GLEN AND SNAEFELL 30
7. GLEN MAYE 32
8. THE CALF OF MAN FROM SPANISH HEAD 43
9. PORT ST. MARY 46
10. CASTLETOWN AND CASTLE RUSHEN 49
11. PEEL HARBOUR AND CASTLE 56
12. BRADDA HEAD, PORT ERIN _On the cover_
THE ISLE OF MAN
CHAPTER I
THE ISLAND AS A WHOLE
Either Ruskin or Wordsworth--I forget for the moment which--says
somewhere that the English Lake Country begins where its mountains
first become visible over the sands of Morecambe Bay. This, indeed, is
a proper rebuke to the foolish modern tendency--so entirely subversive
of all real aesthetic appreciation--which wishes always to hurry us (too
frequently by railway) into the very heart of a beautiful district,
instead of encouraging us to approach it by insensible gradations, thus
allowing its beauties to work up gradually to their natural and proper
climax. Luckily this mistake is impossible in the case of the Isle
of Man, which is necessarily approached by water. It is astonishing,
indeed, from what great distances its mountains are visible over the
Irish Sea. On any fine evening they are plainly conspicuous from
anywhere along the level strip of land that constitutes the south-west
coast of Cumberland; it is not necessary, in fact, to climb to the
summit of Black Comb in order to see
Main ocean, breaking audibly, and stretched
Far into silent regions blue and pale--
And visibly engirding Mona's Isle.
The prospect thus afforded is one of singular distant attractiveness,
though the Isle of Man presents no such splendid group of huddled
peaks as the Cumberland fells present, in their turn, as seen from the
Isle of Man. Only North Barrule, indeed, towards the north end of the
island, rises to a distinct and graceful cone.
The Isle of Man has suffered, if we may say so without paradox, from
the excess of its own popularity. For many years past it has been
the favourite touring ground of holiday-makers from the crowded
manufacturing district of South Lancashire; and this, perhaps, has
rather tended to discourage those quiet lovers of Nature who, though
not exactly addicted to taking their pleasures sadly, at any rate
prefer to enjoy occasional solitude, and do not always appreciate the
joys of a noisy crowd. Douglas, indeed, in the season is crowded with
merry trippers, who pour into it from steamer after steamer, and tax
its accommodation to the breaking point. And what is true of Douglas is
perhaps also true, in a modified degree, of Ramsey, and even of Port
Erin and Peel. These, of course, are centres from which brakes and
char-à-bancs and waggonettes perambulate every corner of the island;
even the culminating summit of Snaefell itself is now climbed by a
double line of electric railway, and crowned by a huge hotel. "Pretty
as the island is," says Mr. Haskett Smith, "its hills are nothing
more than hills, except where they are also railways or tea-gardens."
Tea-gardens, no doubt, are abundantly in evidence; and there is
scarcely a glen in the whole island that is not rigorously kept under
lock and key, and only to be opened at a price. The tripper element,
again, in the Isle of Man is probably responsible for the absence of
the old-fashioned mountain inns--like Wastdale Head, in Cumberland,
or Penygwryd, near Snowdon--that form so pleasant a feature among the
mountains of England and Wales. There even was once a dancing saloon
in the lonely recesses of Injebreck; and no one who loves mountains
tolerates dancing in their secret recesses, unless indeed it be the
fairies dancing their "ringlets to the whistling wind."
Most people indeed who love Nature will avoid Mona in the "season";
but luckily the "season" is short. From October to Easter the lodging
houses are empty, and the island lives its own peculiar life. It is
remarkable, indeed, how little permanent harm has been done to its
pleasant landscapes by this yearly incursion of the southern Goths and
Vandals. Fashion has not dotted its hills with villas, as Windermere
has been dotted, and to some extent Ambleside and Coniston. The two
streams of life that meet here in summer flow together for a time side
by side, but do not seem to commingle. Go there in spring when the
fields are full of lambs, and the hedgerows are yellow with primroses.
Climb the rolling moorlands that are still red with winter bents, and
wander along the hills that drop into the sea so steeply between Peel
and Bradda Head. Linger in the old churchyards at Kirk Maughold and
Kirkmichael among the immemorial cross-slabs of a long since vanished
race; sit among the ruins of St. Patrick's Island--broken cathedral and
broken castle, old, mysterious round tower, and ruined pre-Conquest
church--till the place is peopled again with dead voices and dead
faces, and till the whole island
Glows as if the Middle Age
Were gorgeous upon earth again.
[Illustration: DOUGLAS BAY (A MIDSUMMER NIGHT).
A panoramic view of the town from Douglas Head.]
You will receive no rude shock in the course of your wandering, nor
necessarily encounter a single "tripper." In this way most certainly,
but in this way alone, you will "pluck out the heart of [the] mystery"
of pleasant, green "Ellan Vannin."