A GENERAL VIEW OF SCOTLAND.
Highlands and Lowlands—Locked up for Fifteen Days—The Need of
a Good Sole—A Soft Side of a Rock—The Charm of Reading on the
Spot—A Fearful Experience—Bit and Bridle—Thunder-Riven—Volcanic
Eruption—Dangerous Pits—An Hundred-Eyed Devil—Gloomy Dens—Meeting
an Enemy—Eyes Like Balls of Fire—Voice Like Rolling Thunder—A
Speedy Departure—Leaping from Rock to Rock—Silver Thread among the
Mountains—Imperishable Tablets—The Cave of Rob Roy and the Land
of the McGregors—Lady of the Lake and Ellen’s Isle—Lodging with
Peasants and with Gentlemen—Rising in Mutiny—Strange Fuel—Character
of Scotch People—Scotch Baptists—Sunrise at Two O’Clock in the
Morning.
SCOTLAND, as the reader knows, is a small country. Its length from
north to south is two hundred miles, but east and west the country
is very narrow, no part of it being more than forty miles from the
sea-coast. This small area is divided into what are known as the
“Highlands” and “Lowlands,” the two sections being as unlike in the
nature of the soil, the character of the scenery, the habits and
industries of the people, as though they were a thousand miles apart.
To the historian and tourist the Highlands, occupying the northern,
or rather the northwestern, portion of Scotland, is by far the most
interesting section. The term, Highlands, however, does not, as many
people think, designate a broad, level, elevated table-land. On the
contrary, the Highlands of Scotland are a wild, savage world by
themselves, composed entirely of hills, morasses, mountains, glens,
moors, lakes and rivers.
For the last fifteen days, I have been in the heart of this enchanted
land, locked, as it were, in this rock-ribbed region. I have spent the
time in walking through the country; rowing on the lochs, or lakes;
climbing mountains; threading glens; exploring caves; talking to the
people of high and low degree, thus gaining information of every kind
and character, both as to the past and present condition of this wild
country and its poverty-stricken people. Hard work this. A man walking
through the mountains needs a good sole (soul)—spell it as you please.
To me, however, the work (I can not call it by any other name half so
appropriate) has been as pleasant as it has been difficult, and as
profitable as both combined. When I become very tired, and that is no
infrequent occurrence, I spread myself out on the soft side of some
projecting rock, high on the mountain side, and there, while resting, I
alternately feast my eager eyes on the outstretching landscape, or read
from books which I have along for that purpose. I read the “History of
Scotland,” “Heart of Midlothian,” “Rob Roy,” “The Lady of the Lake,”
“The Lay of the Last Minstrel,” and “Marmion.” In this way I have read
much of the history, poetry, and fiction of Scotland while on the spot,
or in the immediate neighborhood about which it was written. It lends a
new charm and gives an additional zest to what one reads, when he can
lift his eyes from the book and behold the places and objects mentioned
in its glowing pages.
I can never forget my experience of a week ago to-day. I was up at an
early hour. The sky was cloudless and the morn calm and quiet. Across
the lake stood Ben Lomond in its giant-like proportions. Its brow, grey
with eternal snow, looked so inviting that I determined to ascend and
sniff the mountain breeze. A friend, where I spent the night, and who
knew the difficulties in the way, tried to dissuade me from my purpose;
but when I take the bit between my teeth there is no bridle that can
stop me. Johnson, who by this time had thoroughly recovered from his
maiden effort at climbing mountains, and who is as fleet as a hart and
spirited as a gazelle, agreed to accompany me. So, ere the warbler
had finished his morning song, and while the dew was yet sparkling
bright on the heath, we set out for that towering peak, “where snow and
sunshine alone have dared to tread.”
For sixpence, a farmer’s lad rowed us across the loch, landing us at
the foot of the mountain whose rocky cliffs and thunder-riven sides we
were to climb. Seven hours’ toil brought us to the objective point,
and rewarded us with one of the finest, wildest, and most romantic
views to be had anywhere this side that deep and yawning gulf which
separates time from eternity. I found myself surrounded by a thousand
peaks, crags and cliffs, whose heads were white with the accumulated
snows of fifty winters, they being of different heights, and of every
conceivable shape, size and angle—all having been caused, apparently,
by the upheaval of some mighty volcanic eruption of the under world.
These iron-belted mountain sides are honey-combed with deep and dark
dens, dangerous pits and caves, which once furnished shelter and
security to those savage and lawless clans whose sole occupation was
arms, and who, under cover of night, often swooped down upon the barns,
flocks and herds of the Lowlanders like eagles upon their prey. When
once hidden away in those dark recesses, it would take an hundred-eyed
devil to discover their whereabouts; and, if discovered, it would
require an iron-handed Hercules to rout and discomfit them.
Many of these peaks and cliffs are separated only by narrow and
gloomy glens hundreds of feet deep. The glen may be ten, fifteen, or
twenty-five feet wide at the bottom, but the rough and irregular sides
tower up so high, and come so near closing at the top, that the rocky
chasm is dark and gloomy. I have, I think, very little superstition
about me; yet I confess that while walking through these silent halls,
where the sun has never shone, I felt half inclined to look around
me for hissing serpents, for hobgoblins and rats. While in one of
these unseemingly—I had almost said unearthly—places, a dreamy,
far-away spell came over me. I fell into an absent-minded mood.
Just as I reached a dark, horrible-looking place, I paused. I stood
still, my eyes resting upon the stone floor; I was thinking about—I
do not know what. All at once I heard a furious noise; and, turning
suddenly around, I beheld a huge wildcat rushing down the glen, with
eyes glaring like balls of fire. By this time he was within five feet
of me, and gave the most unearthly yell that I have ever heard. It
seemed as if it would rend the very rocks. Every hair on my head was
a goose-quill, and they were all on ends. For a moment I was still as
death, and pulseless as a statue, while the noise that startled me was
rolling, ringing, and reverberating down the glen like the mutterings
of distant thunder. As John Bunyan would say, “I departed, and was
seen, there no more.”
Having gotten out of the glen, I went back upon Ben Lomond and enjoyed
the picture. I said it was a grand sight, and so it was. Turn my eyes
as I would, I could see mountain streams fed by melting snow, the water
being churned into madness as it leaped from rock to rock, until it was
lost in the abyss below. Looking beneath me, I could see several of the
Scottish lakes, which were as beautiful as the mountains were grand. I
saw Loch Lomond, on whose calm bosom many islands float, winding around
like a silver thread among the mountains for twenty miles.
All this made a picture that I can never forget. It is indelibly
stamped on the imperishable tablets of memory; and there it will
remain, an object of interest and admiration, until the flood-gates of
life are shut in eternal rest.
We visited Rob Roy’s cave, the land of the Macgregors, the house in
which Helen Macgregor was born, Loch Katrine where Scott wrote “The
Lady of the Lake,” and many other places known to history and to song.
Johnson and I found no difficulty in walking twelve to twenty miles a
day. We sometimes obtained lodgings with peasants, and at others with
“gentlemen,” or landlords. The peasants call themselves “servants,”
and always speak of the landlord as “master.” This nomenclature is
suggestive of the real relationship existing between the two classes.
It is none other than that of master and slave. These peasants are
still plodding along in the same old grooves whose rough edges wore
their fathers out. Many of them, like the dumb ass in the tread-mill,
expect only their bread, and verily they are not disappointed. I almost
wonder that the very stones in the streets do not rise in mutiny, and
clamor for justice until their cry is heard by the dull ears of power.
While walking from Loch Lomond to Loch Katrine, I saw several peasants
spading up the ground. They had dug several holes, each large enough to
swallow a good-sized house. The dirt was taken out in square blocks,
much the size of three bricks put side by side, or about the shape of
a Mexican adobe. In appearance, these blocks resembled soft, sticky,
black prairie mud. Seeing them spread out to dry, I thought they were
to be used as building material. Upon making inquiry, I found that it
(the dirt) was preparing for fuel. The peasants call it moss. They dry
it and stack it, as we stack fodder or oats. They say it burns well.
The Scotch people, as a whole, have impressed me very favorably. They
have a straightforward way of doing business. Almost every face wears
on it the stamp of genuine honesty. The better classes of people are
social, kind and accommodating in their nature, though somewhat stiff
and dignified in their bearing.
Religiously, most Scotchmen are Presbyterians in belief and devout
in spirit. They are no people for innovations or change, even though
the new be superior to the old. I would as soon undertake to turn the
Amazon from its wonted channel as to swerve these Scotch people from
their fixed modes of thought and habits of life. As the boy said of his
father’s horse that would go no farther, they are “established.”
Just twenty years ago, the main body of our Baptist people of this
country formed what is known as the “Baptist Union of Scotland.” They
now have eighty-five churches and ten thousand members. Though few in
number, they expect, like Gideon’s band of old, to come off conquerors
at last. All the Baptist ministers whom I have chanced to meet have
received me into their confidence, into their homes and families. They
have extended to me every act of kindness and of courtesy that I could
ask or wish.
In a month from now, the people of Scotland will have very little
night. In the latter part of June they have twilight until eleven
o’clock, and the sun rises about two o’clock in the morning. It is now
almost ten o’clock at night, and I can see to write without artificial
light, and the moon is not shining.