第45章 OSTIG IN SKY(10)

The Islands afford few pleasures,except to the hardy sportsman,who can tread the moor and climb the mountain.The distance of one family from another,in a country where travelling has so much difficulty,makes frequent intercourse impracticable.Visits last several days,and are commonly paid by water;yet I never saw a boat furnished with benches,or made commodious by any addition to the first fabric.Conveniences are not missed where they never were enjoyed.

The solace which the bagpipe can give,they have long enjoyed;but among other changes,which the last Revolution introduced,the use of the bagpipe begins to be forgotten.Some of the chief families still entertain a piper,whose office was anciently hereditary.

Macrimmon was piper to Macleod,and Rankin to Maclean of Col.

The tunes of the bagpipe are traditional.There has been in Sky,beyond all time of memory,a college of pipers,under the direction of Macrimmon,which is not quite extinct.There was another in Mull,superintended by Rankin,which expired about sixteen years ago.To these colleges,while the pipe retained its honour,the students of musick repaired for education.I have had my dinner exhilarated by the bagpipe,at Armidale,at Dunvegan,and in Col.

The general conversation of the Islanders has nothing particular.

I did not meet with the inquisitiveness of which I have read,and suspect the judgment to have been rashly made.A stranger of curiosity comes into a place where a stranger is seldom seen:he importunes the people with questions,of which they cannot guess the motive,and gazes with surprise on things which they,having had them always before their eyes,do not suspect of any thing wonderful.He appears to them like some being of another world,and then thinks it peculiar that they take their turn to inquire whence he comes,and whither he is going.

The Islands were long unfurnished with instruction for youth,and none but the sons of gentlemen could have any literature.There are now parochial schools,to which the lord of every manor pays a certain stipend.Here the children are taught to read;but by the rule of their institution,they teach only English,so that the natives read a language which they may never use or understand.If a parish,which often happens,contains several Islands,the school being but in one,cannot assist the rest.This is the state of Col,which,however,is more enlightened than some other places;for the deficiency is supplied by a young gentleman,who,for his own improvement,travels every year on foot over the Highlands to the session at Aberdeen;and at his return,during the vacation,teaches to read and write in his native Island.

In Sky there are two grammar schools,where boarders are taken to be regularly educated.The price of board is from three pounds,to four pounds ten shillings a year,and that of instruction is half a crown a quarter.But the scholars are birds of passage,who live at school only in the summer;for in winter provisions cannot be made for any considerable number in one place.This periodical dispersion impresses strongly the scarcity of these countries.

Having heard of no boarding-school for ladies nearer than Inverness,I suppose their education is generally domestick.The elder daughters of the higher families are sent into the world,and may contribute by their acquisitions to the improvement of the rest.

Women must here study to be either pleasing or useful.Their deficiencies are seldom supplied by very liberal fortunes.Ahundred pounds is a portion beyond the hope of any but the Laird's daughter.They do not indeed often give money with their daughters;the question is,How many cows a young lady will bring her husband.A rich maiden has from ten to forty;but two cows are a decent fortune for one who pretends to no distinction.

The religion of the Islands is that of the Kirk of Scotland.The gentlemen with whom I conversed are all inclined to the English liturgy;but they are obliged to maintain the established Minister,and the country is too poor to afford payment to another,who must live wholly on the contribution of his audience.

They therefore all attend the worship of the Kirk,as often as a visit from their Minister,or the practicability of travelling gives them opportunity;nor have they any reason to complain of insufficient pastors;for I saw not one in the Islands,whom I had reason to think either deficient in learning,or irregular in life:

but found several with whom I could not converse without wishing,as my respect increased,that they had not been Presbyterians.

The ancient rigour of puritanism is now very much relaxed,though all are not yet equally enlightened.I sometimes met with prejudices sufficiently malignant,but they were prejudices of ignorance.The Ministers in the Islands had attained such knowledge as may justly be admired in men,who have no motive to study,but generous curiosity,or,what is still better,desire of usefulness;with such politeness as so narrow a circle of converse could not have supplied,but to minds naturally disposed to elegance.

Reason and truth will prevail at last.The most learned of the Scottish Doctors would now gladly admit a form of prayer,if the people would endure it.The zeal or rage of congregations has its different degrees.In some parishes the Lord's Prayer is suffered:

in others it is still rejected as a form;and he that should make it part of his supplication would be suspected of heretical pravity.