Inquiring After The Reliques Of Former Manners, I Found That In
Ulva, And, I Think, No Where Else, Is Continued The Payment Of The
Mercheta Mulierum; A Fine In Old Times Due To The Laird At The
Marriage Of A Virgin.
The original of this claim, as of our tenure
of Borough English, is variously delivered.
It is pleasant to find
ancient customs in old families. This payment, like others, was,
for want of money, made anciently in the produce of the land.
Macquarry was used to demand a sheep, for which he now takes a
crown, by that inattention to the uncertain proportion between the
value and the denomination of money, which has brought much
disorder into Europe. A sheep has always the same power of
supplying human wants, but a crown will bring at one time more, at
another less.
Ulva was not neglected by the piety of ardent times: it has still
to show what was once a church.
INCH KENNETH
In the morning we went again into the boat, and were landed on Inch
Kenneth, an Island about a mile long, and perhaps half a mile
broad, remarkable for pleasantness and fertility. It is verdant
and grassy, and fit both for pasture and tillage; but it has no
trees. Its only inhabitants were Sir Allan Maclean and two young
ladies, his daughters, with their servants.
Romance does not often exhibit a scene that strikes the imagination
more than this little desert in these depths of Western obscurity,
occupied not by a gross herdsman, or amphibious fisherman, but by a
gentleman and two ladies, of high birth, polished manners and
elegant conversation, who, in a habitation raised not very far
above the ground, but furnished with unexpected neatness and
convenience, practised all the kindness of hospitality, and
refinement of courtesy.
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