| Glasgow Digital Library | Ebooks | Title page | Contents | Indexes |
|---|
Side by side with much that was picturesque and delightful in its primitive simplicity, we came across things of appalling modernity: such as a woman wearing a Piccadilly fringe, a piece of barbed-wire stretched round the minister's garden, and a youth sporting a dicky. It is wonderful to think that within the confines of the British Isles on the eve of the twentieth century, it is still possible to find a man sitting on Friday night in a rude semi-underground house lighted only by the primitive stone lamp of his forefathers of prehistoric times; and still more so, perhaps, to reflect that the same man may on the following Sunday so far link the distant past with the present as to be sitting in church with a dicky and tie on, and a copy of the Bible printed in Gaelic on a book-rest before him. Yet such is the case.
Iron lamp
When the St Kildans go to Borrera to pluck the sheep or catch birds, they stay in a semi-underground hut -which I shall describe hereafter - containing a lamp of the Stone Age still in use. We were able to trace the history of illumination at St Kilda with a fair degree of completeness. First of all we saw the stone lamp on Borrera, then an iron one from which the illustration on p.22 was made, and lastly a cheap paraffin abomination which, when alight, considerably increased the horrors of darkness. Its small, foul smelling flame was burning dimly within a smoke-blackened globe unrestricted by anything in the nature of a chimney.
We noticed that the natives were fearfully inquisitive, but scrupulously honest. Martin, who visited the "lone isle" just two hundred years ago, says that the inhabitants "use swimming and diving, and are very expert in both." Today, according to Mackenzie, not a single man or woman enters the water unless it be by accident. He relates that when he first began to visit the place as factor, he went down to the Bay one morning to have a swim. So unusual was the sight that the entire population rushed down to the beach to watch him.
This led to an extremely awkward situation, for the women squatted themselves down beside his clothes. He swam round and round for a while in the hope that their curiosity would ere long be satisfied, and that they would then return to their household duties. Not a bit of it. The sight of a man performing the part of a fish was far too entertaining a business to be regarded with indifference, and they sat on enchanted until he swam close in and told them to go away.
Mr Fiddes, the minister, told me that the temperature of the sea round St Kilda is lower in summer than in winter, on account of the icebergs that become detached in Polar regions and drift southwards into the Gulf Stream. He also informed me that he was at that moment disproving the assertions of horticulturists that strawberries could not be grown in so high a latitude as that in which he lived by producing the fruit in his own garden.
I leave horticulturists to crack this nut for themselves, and hasten to present a much more startling one for ornithologists from the same gentleman. He told me in all good faith and sincerity that Great Northern Divers make no nest at all, but hatch their single egg under their wings, in which position he had himself seen a bird carrying one.
Upon re-telling this astounding story to Mackenzie his gillie overheard it, and afterwards told me that the minister was quite right, as three independent witnesses, including his own brother, had, whilst sitting on the cliffs of Skye one Sunday afternoon, witnessed a Great Northern Diver lay her egg in the sea below them, and dive after and catch it before it reached the bottom. On rising to the surface again the bird tucked her egg away under her wing and swam off.
St Kildans bartering with the factor
When I showed my scepticism in regard to the accuracy of the reports of this wonderful performance he said, "Ah weel, sir, if ye dinna believe it, I will no believe your story that Cuckoos put their eggs into other birds' nests within their nebs." This had reference to a conversation lie had heard between his master and myself, during which Mackenzie told me that he once shot a Cuckoo with its egg in its bill.
The factor and the people were soon hard at work buying and selling oil, feathers, and cloth, on the one hand, and pails, spades, and similarly useful articles, on the other, down at the storehouse by the sea.
We stood by for a few minutes to watch the market, shown in the picture above. The chattering and excitement were incredible.
In the afternoon of the same day all the women and children assembled in our cottage to munch sweets and go through the packages of many-coloured kerchiefs, shawls, and petticoats the factor had brought with him for their inspection and purchase. And for six mortal hours did Mackenzie, poor man! withstand with the utmost equanimity a continuous fusilade of questions and badinage. But this was not all. At eleven o'clock at night a soft tap-tapping was heard upon the door, and in they all trooped to re-open their bargaining. I wonder what the average Bond Street shopkeeper would say to being invaded at this hour by a crowd of lady customers who had been unable to make up their minds in the afternoon.
A St Kilda woman always regards everybody with suspicion, and does not hurry over a purchase, thinking that she is being cheated.
| Glasgow Digital Library | Ebooks | Title page | Contents | Indexes |
|---|
