plantations, and counts perhaps some twenty houses. A plain inn
stands by the wayside, where refreshments may be procured; there is a
merchant's shop filled with goods of the most miscellaneous
description; in this little place also resides a most important
personage--the agent of the Messrs Hutcheson, who is learned in the
comings and goings of the steamers. On our arrival we learned from
the agent that the steamer on the present occasion would be unusually
late, as she had not yet been sighted between Ardnamurchan and Eig.
In all probability she would not be off Ardvasar till ten P.M. It is
difficult to kill time anywhere; but at this little Skye clachan it
is more difficult than almost anywhere else. We fed the horse, and
returned it and the dog-cart to Mr M'Ian. We sat in the inn and
looked aimlessly out of the window; we walked along the ravine, and
saw the stream sleeping in brown pools, and then hurrying on in tiny
waterfalls; we watched the young barbarians at play in the wide green
in front of the houses; we lounged in the merchant's shop; we climbed
to the top of eminences and looked seaward, and imagined fondly that
we beheld a streak of steamer smoke on the horizon. The afternoon
wore away, and then we had tea at the inn. By this the steamer had
been visible for some little time, and had gone in to Eig. After tea
we carried our traps down to the stony pier and placed them in the
boat which would convey us to the steamer when she lay to in the bay.
Thereafter we spent an hour in watching men blasting a huge rock in a
quarry close at hand. We saw the train laid and lighted, the men
scuttling off, and then there was a dull report, and the huge rock
tumbled quietly over in ruins. When we got back to the pier,
passengers were gathering: drovers with their dogs--ancient women in
scarlet plaids and white caps, going on to Balmacara or Kyle--a
sailor, fresh from China, dressed in his best clothes, with a
slate-coloured parrot in a wicker cage, which he was conveying to
some young people at Broadford. On the stony pier we waited for a
considerable time, and then Mr Hutcheson's agent, accompanied by some
half dozen men, came down in a hurry; into the boat we were all
bundled, drovers, dogs, ancient women, sailor, parrot, and all, the
boat shoved off, the agent stood up in the bow, the men bent to their
oars, and by the time we were twenty boat-lengths from the pier the
_Clansman_ had slid into the bay opposite the castle and lay to,
letting off volumes of noisy steam.
[Sidenote: The Clansman.]
When the summer night was closing the _Clansman_ steamed out of
Armadale Bay. Two or three ladies were yet visible on the deck.
Wrapped in their plaids, and with their dogs around them, drovers
were smoking amidships; sportsmen in knickerbockers were smoking on
the hurricane deck; and from the steerage came at intervals a burst
of canine thunder from the leashes of pointers and setters
congregated there. As the night fell the air grew cold, the last
lady disappeared, the sportsmen withdrew from their airy perches,
amidships the pipe of the drover became a point of intense red. In
the lighted cabin gentlemen were drinking whisky punch, and
discussing, as their moods went, politics, the weather, the
fluctuations in the price of stock, and the condition of grouse.
Among these we sat; and my companion fell into conversation with a
young man of an excited manner and a restless eye. I could see at a
glance that he belonged to the same class as my tobacco-less friend
of Glen Sligachan. On Fellowes he bestowed his entire biography,
made known to him the name of his family--which was, by the way, a
noble one--volunteered the information that he had served in the
Mediterranean squadron, that he had been tried by a court martial for
a misdemeanour of which he was entirely guiltless, and had through
the testimony of nefarious witnesses been dismissed the service.
While all this talk was going on the steward and his assistants had
swept away the glasses from the saloon table, and from the oddest
corners and receptacles were now drawing out pillows, sheets, and
blankets. In a trice everything became something else; the sofas of
the saloon became beds, the tables of the saloon became beds, beds
were spread on the saloon floor, beds were extemporised near the
cabin windows. When the transformation had been completed, and
several of the passengers had coiled themselves comfortably in their
blankets, the remainder struggling with their boots, or in various
stages of dishabille, the ex-naval man suddenly called out "Steward!"
[Sidenote: The ex-naval man.]
That functionary looked in at the saloon door in an instant.
"Bring me a glass of brandy and water."
"It's quite impossible, Mr ----," said the steward; "the spirit-room
is shut for the night. Besides, you have had a dozen glasses of
brandy and water to-day already. You had better go to bed, sir."
"Didn't I tell you," said the ex-naval man, addressing Fellowes, who
had by this time got his coat and vest off; "didn't I tell you that
the whole world is in a conspiracy against me? It makes a dead set
at me. That fellow now is as great a foe of mine as was the
commodore at Malta."
Fellowes made no reply, and got into bed. I followed his example.
The ex-naval man sat gloomily alone for a while, and then with the
assistance of the steward he undressed and clambered into a cool
berth beside one of the cabin windows. Thereafter the lights were
turned low.
I could not sleep, however; the stifling air of the place, in which
there lived a faint odour of hot brandy and water, and the constant
throb throb of the engines, kept me awake. I turned from one side to
the other, till at last my attention was attracted by the movements
of my strange friend opposite. He raised his head stealthily and
took covert survey of the saloon; then he leant on his elbow; then he
sat upright in his berth. That feat accomplished, he began to pour
forth to some imaginary auditor the story of his wrongs.
He had not gone on long when a white night-capped head bounced up in
a far corner of the dim saloon. "Will you be good enough," said the
pale apparition in a severe voice, "to go to sleep? It's monstrous,
sir, that you should disturb gentlemen at this hour of the night by
your nonsensical speeches."
At the sight and the voice the ex-naval man sank into his berth as
suddenly as an alarmed beaver sinks into his dam, and there was
silence for a time.
Shortly, from the berth, I saw the ex-naval man's head rising as
stealthily as the head of a blackcock above a bunch of rushes. Again
he sat up in bed, and again to the same invisible auditor he confided
his peculiar griefs.
"Confound you, sir." "What do you mean, sir?" and at the half-dozen
white apparitions confronting him the ex-naval man again dived.
In about ten minutes the head opposite began again to stir. Never
from ambush did Indian warrior rise more noiselessly than did the
ex-naval man from his blankets. He paused for a little on his elbow,
looked about him cautiously, got into a sitting position, and began a
third harangue.
"What the devil!" "This is intolerable!" "Steward, steward!" "Send
the madman on deck;" and the saloon rose _en masse_ against the
disturber of its rest. The steward came running in at the outcry,
but the ex-naval man had ducked under like a shot, and was snoring
away in simulated slumber as if he had been the Seven Sleepers rolled
into one.
That night he disturbed our rest no more, and shortly after I fell
asleep.
A fierce trampling on deck, and the noise of the crane hoisting the
cargo from the deep recesses of the hold awoke me. I dressed and
went above. The punctual sun was up and at his work. We were off a
strip of sandy beach, with a row of white houses stretching along it,
and with low rocky hills behind the houses. Some half-dozen
deeply-laden shore boats were leaving the side of the steamer. Then
a cow was brought forward, a door was opened in the bulwarks, and the
animal quietly shoved out. Crummie disappeared with a considerable
plunge, and came to the surface somewhat scant of breath, and with
her mind in a state of utter bewilderment. A boat was in readiness;
by a deft hand a coil of rope was fastened around the horns, the
rowers bent to their task, and Crummie was towed ashore in triumph,
and on reaching it seemed nothing the worse of her unexpected plunge
forth.
The noisy steam was then shut off; from the moving paddles great
belts of pale-green foam rushed out and died away far astern; the
strip of beach, the white houses with the low rocky hills behind,
began to disappear, and the steamer stood directly for Portree, which
place was reached in time for breakfast. We then drove to the
Landlord's, and on alighting I found my friend John Penruddock
marching up and down on the gravel in front of the house.
_JOHN PENRUDDOCK._
Penruddock was rather a hero of mine. He was as tall, muscular, and
broad-shouldered as the men whom Mr Kingsley delights to paint, and
his heart was as tender as his head was shrewd. A loquacious knave
could not take him in, and from his door a beggar would not be sent
empty away. The pressure of his mighty hand when he met you gave you
some idea of what the clenched fist would be with its iron ridge of
knuckles. He was the healthiest-minded man I have ever met in my
walk through life. He was strong yet gentle, pious yet without the
slightest tincture of cant or dogmatism; and his mind was no more
infested with megrims, or vanity, or hypochondriasis, or
sentimentality, than the wind-swept sky of June with vapours. He was
loyal and affectionate to the backbone: he stuck to his friends to
the last. Pen was like the run of ordinary mortals while your day of
prosperity remained, but when your night of difficulty fell he came
out like a lighthouse, and sent you rays of encouragement and help.
[Sidenote: John Penruddock.]
Pen had farms in Ireland as well as in Skye, and it was when on a
visit to him in Ulster some years since that I became acquainted with
his homely but enduring merits. For years I had not seen such a man.
There was a reality and honest stuff in him, which in living with him
and watching his daily goings on revealed itself hour by hour, quite
new to me. The people I had been accustomed to meet, talk with, live
with, were different. The tendency of each of these was towards art
in one form or other. And there was a certain sadness somehow in the
contemplation of them. They fought and strove bravely; but like the
Old Guard at Waterloo, it was brave fighting on a lost field. After
years of toil there were irremediable defects in that man's picture;
fatal flaws in that man's book. In all their efforts were failure
and repulse, apparent to some extent to themselves, plain enough to
the passionless looker-on. That resolute, hopeless climbing of
heaven was, according to the mood, a thing to provoke a jest or a
sigh. With Penruddock all was different. What he strove after he
accomplished. He had a cheerful mastery over circumstances. All
things went well with him. His horses ploughed for him, his servants
reaped for him, his mills ground for him, successfully. The very
winds and dews of heaven were to him helps and aids. Year after year
his crops grew, yellowed, were cut down and gathered into barns, and
men fed thereupon; and year after year there lay an increasing
balance at his banker's. This continual, ever-victorious activity
seemed strange to me--a new thing under the sun. We usually think
that poets, painters, and the like, are finer, more heroical, than
cultivators of the ground. But does the production of a questionable
book really surpass in merit the production of a field of
unquestionable turnips? Perhaps in the severe eyes of the gods the
production of a wooden porringer, water-tight, and fit for househould
uses, is of more account than the rearing of a tower of Babel, meant
to reach to heaven. Alas! that so many must work on these Babel
towers; cannot help toiling on them to the very death, though every
stone is heaved into its place with weariness and mortal pain; though
when the life of the builder is wasted out on it, it is fit
habitation for no creature, can shelter no one from rain or snow--but
towering in the eyes of men a _Folly_ (as the Scotch phrase it) after
all.
I like to recall my six weeks' sojourn in sunny Ulster with my
friend. I like to recall the rows of whity-green willows that
bordered the slow streams; the yellow flax fields with their azure
flowers, reminding one of the maidens in German ballads; the flax
tanks and windmills; the dark-haired girls embroidering muslins
before the doors, and stealing the while the hearts of sheepish
sweethearts leaning against the cottage walls, by soft blarney and
quick glances; the fields in which a cow, a donkey, half a dozen
long-legged porkers--looking for all the world like pigs on
stilts--cocks and hens, ducks and geese promiscuously fed; and, above
all, I like to recall that somnolent Sunday afternoon in the little
uncomfortably-seated Presbyterian church, when--two-thirds of the
congregation asleep, the precentor soundest of all, and the good
clergyman illustrating the doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints
by a toddler at its mother's knee attempting to walk, falling and
bumping its forehead, getting picked up, and in a little while,
although the bump had grown to the size of an egg, spurring and
struggling to get to the floor once again--my eye wandered to the
open church door, and in the sunshine saw a feeding bee fold its
wings on a flower and swing there in the wind, and I forgot for a
while drawling shepherd and slumbering flock. These are trifles, but
they are pleasant trifles. Staying with Pen, however, an event of
importance did occur.
It was arranged that we should go to the fair at Keady; but Pen was
obliged on the day immediately preceding to leave his farm at
Arranmore on matter of important business. It was a wretched day of
rain, and I began to tremble for the morrow. After dinner the storm
abated, and the dull dripping afternoon set in. While a distempered
sunset flushed the west the heavy carts from the fields came rolling
into the courtyard, the horses fetlock-deep in clay and steaming like
ovens. Then, at the sound of the bell, the labourers came, wet,
weary, sickles hanging over their arms, yet with spirits merry
enough. These the capacious kitchen received, where they found
supper spread. It grew dark earlier than usual, and more silent.
The mill-wheel rushed louder in the swollen stream, and lights began
to glimmer here and there in the dusty windows. Penruddock had not
yet come; he was not due for a couple of hours. Time began to hang
heavily; so slipping to bed I solved every difficulty by falling
soundly asleep.
The lowing of cattle, the bleating of sheep, the barking of dogs, and
the loud voices of men in the courtyard beneath, awoke me shortly
after dawn. In the silence that followed I again fell asleep, and
was roused at last by the clangour of the breakfast bell. When I got
up the sun was streaming gloriously through the latticed window;
heaven was all the gayer and brighter for yesterday's gloom and sulky
tears, and the rooks were cawing and flapping cheerfully in the trees
above. When I entered the breakfast-room Pen was already there, and
the tea-urn was bubbling on the table.
[Sidenote: On the way to the fiar.]
At the close of the meal Tim brought the dog-cart to the door. Pen
glanced at his watch. "We have hit the time exactly, and will arrive
as soon as Mick and the cattle." There was an encouraging chir-r-r,
a flick of the whip, and in a trice we were across the bridge and
pegging along the highway at a great pace.
After proceeding about a mile, we turned into a narrow path which
gradually led us up into a wild irregular country. Corn-fields,
flax-tanks, and sunny pasture lands, dotted with sheep, were left
behind as up-hill we tugged, and reached at last a level stretch of
purple moor and black peat bog. Sometimes for a mile the ground was
black with pyramids of peat; at other times the road wriggled before
us through a dark olive morass, enlivened here and there with patches
of treacherous green; the sound of our wheels startling into flight
the shy and solitary birds native to the region. Ever and anon, too,
when we gained sufficient elevation, we could see the great waves of
the landscape rolling in clear morning light away to the horizon;
each wave crested with farms and belts of woodland, and here and
there wreaths of smoke rising up from hollows where towns and
villages lay hid. After a while the road grew smoother, and afar the
little town of Keady sparkled in the sun, backed by a range of
smelting furnaces, the flames tamed by the sunlight, making a
restless shimmer in the air, and blotting out everything beyond.
Beneath, the high road was covered with sheep and cows, and vehicles
of every description, pushing forward to one point; the hill paths
also which led down to it were moving threads of life. On the brow
of the hill, just before we began to descend, John pulled up for a
moment. It was a pretty sight. [Sidenote: The fair at Keady.] A few
minutes' drive brought us into Keady, and such a busy scene I had
never before witnessed. The narrow streets and open spaces were
crowded with stalls, cattle, and people, and the press and confusion
was so great that our passage to the inn where our machine was to be
put up was matter of considerable difficulty. Men, stripped to
trousers and shirt, with red hair streaming in the wind, rushed
backwards and forwards with horses, giving vent at the same time to
the wildest vociferations, while clumps of sporting gentlemen, with
straws in their mouths, were inspecting, with critical eyes, the
points of the animals. Travelling auctioneers set up their little
carts in the streets, and with astonishing effrontery and power of
lung harangued the crowd on the worth and cheapness of the articles
which they held in their hands. Beggars were very plentiful--disease
and deformity their stock-in-trade. Fragments of humanity crawled
about upon crutches. Women stretched out shrunken arms. Blind men
rolled sightless eyeballs, blessing the passenger when a copper
tinkled in their iron jugs--cursing yet more fervently when
disappointed in their expectation. In one place a melancholy acrobat
in dirty tights and faded tinsel was performing evolutions with a
crazy chair on a bit of ragged carpet; he threw somersaults over it;
he embraced it firmly, and began spinning along the ground like a
wheel, in which performance man and chair seemed to lose their
individuality and become one as it were; and at the close of every
feat he stood erect with that indescribable curve of the right hand
which should always be followed by thunders of applause, the clown
meanwhile rolling in ecstasies of admiration in the sawdust. Alas!
no applause followed the exertions of the artist. The tights were
getting more threadbare and dingy. His hollow face was covered with
perspiration, and there was but the sparsest sprinkling of halfpence.
I threw him a shilling, but it rolled among the spectators' feet, and
was lost in the dust. He groped about in search of it for some
little time, and then came back to his carpet and his crazy chair.
Poor fellow! he looked as if he were used to that kind of thing.
There were many pretty faces among the girls, and scores of them were
walking about in holiday dresses--rosy-faced lasses, with black hair,
and blue eyes shadowed by long dark eyelashes. How they laughed, and
how sweetly the brogue melted from their lips in reply to the ardent
blarney of their sweethearts. At last we reached an open square, or
cross, as it would be called in Scotland, more crowded, if possible,
than the narrow streets. Hordes of cattle bellowed here. Here were
sheep from the large farms standing in clusters of fifties and
hundreds; there a clump of five or six, with the widow in her clean
cap sitting beside them. Many an hour ago she and they started from
the turf hut and the pasture beyond the hills. Heaven send her a
ready sale and good prices! In the centre of this open space great
benches were erected, heaped with eggs, butter, cheeses, the
proprietors standing behind anxiously awaiting the advances of
customers. One section was crowded with sweetmeat stalls, much
frequented by girls and their sweethearts. Many a rustic compliment
there had for reply a quick glance or a scarlet cheek. Another was
devoted to poultry; geese stood about in flocks; bunches of hens were
scattered on the ground, their legs tied together; and turkeys,
enclosed in wicker baskets, surveyed the scene with quick eyes, their
wattles all the while burning with indignation. On reaching the inn
which displayed for ensign a swan with two heads afloat on an azure
stream, we ordered dinner at three o'clock, and thereafter started on
foot to where Penruddock's stock was stationed. It was no easy
matter to force a path; cows and sheep were always getting in the
way. Now and then an escaped hen would come clucking and flapping
among our feet, and once a huge bull, with horns levelled to the
charge, came dashing down the street, scattering everything before
him. Finally, we reached the spot where Mick and his dogs were
keeping watch over the cows and sheep.
"Got here all safe, Mick, I see."
"All safe, sir, not a quarter o' an hour ago."
"Well, I have opened my shop. We'll see how we get on."
[Sidenote: Bargain-making.]
By this time the dealers had gathered about, and were closely
examining the sheep, and holding whispered consultations. At length
an excited-looking man came running forward; plunging his hand into
his breeches pocket, he produced therefrom half-a-crown, which he
slapped into Penruddock's hand, at the same time crying out
"Ten-and-six a head." "Fifteen," said John, returning the coin.
"Twelve shillings," said the man, bringing down the coin with
tremendous energy; "an' may I niver stir if I'll give another
farthin' for the best sheep in Keady." "Fifteen," said John,
flinging the half-crown on the ground; "and I don't care whether you
stir again or not." By this time a crowd had gathered about, and the
chorus began. "There isn't a dacenter man than Mr Penruddock in the
market. I've known him iver since he came to the counthry." "Shure
an' he is," began another; "he's a jintleman ivery inch. He always
gives to the poor man a bit o' baccy, or a glass. Ach, Mr Loney,
he's not the one to ax you too high a price. Shure, Mr Penruddock,
you'll come down a six-pence jist to make a bargain." "Is't Mr Loney
that's goin' to buy?" cried a lame man from the opposite side, and in
the opposite interest. "There isn't sich a dealer in county Monaghan
as Mr Loney. Of coorse you'll come down something, Mr Penruddock."
"He's a rich one, too, is Mr Loney," said the lame man, sidling up to
John, and winking in a knowing manner, "an' a power o' notes he has
in his pocket-book." Mr Loney, who had been whispering with his
group a little apart, and who had again made an inspection of the
stock, returned the second time to the charge. "Twelve-an'-six,"
cried he, and again the half-crown was slapped into Penruddock's
palm. "Twelve-an'-six, an' not another farthin' to save my soul."
"Fifteen," said John, returning the half-crown with equal emphasis;
"you know my price, and if you won't take it you can let it stand."
The dealer disappeared in huge wrath, and the chorus broke out in
praises of both. By this time Mr Loney was again among the sheep; it
was plain his heart was set upon the purchase. Every now and then he
caught one, got it between his legs, examined the markings on its
face, and tested the depth and quality of its wool. He appeared for
the third time, while the lame man and the leader of the opposing
chorus seemed coming to blows, so zealous were they in the praises of
their respective heroes. "Fourteen," said Mr Loney, again producing
the half-crown, spitting into his hand at the same time, as much as
to say, he would do the business now. "Fourteen," he cried, crushing
the half-crown into Penruddock's hand, and holding it there.
"Fourteen, an' divil a rap more I'll give." "Fourteen," said John,
as if considering, then throwing back the coin, "Fourteen-and-six,
and let it be a bargain."
"Didn't I say," quoth John's chorus leader, looking round him with an
air of triumph, "didn't I say that Mr Penruddock's a jintleman? Ye
see how he drops the sixpence. I niver saw him do a mane thing yet.
Ach, he's the jintleman ivery inch, an' that's saying a dale,
considerin' his size."
"Fourteen-and-six be it then," said the dealer, bringing down the
coin for the last time. "An' if I take the lot you'll give me two
pounds in t' myself?"
"Well, Loney; I don't care although I do," said Penruddock, pocketing
the coin at last. A roll of notes was produced, the sum counted out,
and the bargain concluded. The next moment Loney was among the
sheep, scoring some mark or other on their backs with a piece of red
chalk. Penruddock scattered what spare coppers he possessed among
the bystanders, and away they went to sing the praises of the next
bargain-maker.
Pen turned to me laughing. "This is a nice occupation for a
gentleman of respectable birth and liberal education, is it not?"
"Odd. It is amusing to watch the process by which your sheep are
converted into bank-notes. Does your friend, Mr Loney, buy the
animals for himself?"
"Oh, dear, no. We must have middlemen of one kind or another in this
country. Loney is commissioned to purchase, and is allowed so much
on the transaction."
By this time a young handsome fellow pushed his horse through the
crowd and approached us. "Good morning," cried he to Penruddock.
"Any business doing?"
"I have just sold my sheep."
"Good price?"
"Fair. Fourteen and six."
"Ah, not so bad. These cattle, I suppose, are yours? We must try if
we can't come to a bargain about them." Dismounting, he gave his
horse in keeping to a lad, and he and John went off to inspect the
stock.