They Do Not, However, Seem To Make Much Impression On The Public
Mind.
The necessaries of life are obtained at a cheaper rate than
formerly, and that satisfies the people.
Peel has been making a speech in
Parliament on the free-trade question, which I often hear referred to as a
very able argument for the free-trade policy. Neither on this question nor
on that of the Jewish disabilities, do the opposition seem to have the
country with them.
Letter LI.
A Visit to the Shetland Isles.
Aberdeen, _July_ 19, 1849.
Two days ago I was in the Orkneys; the day before I was in the Shetland
Isles, the "farthest Thule" of the Romans, where I climbed the Noup of the
Noss, as the famous headland of the island of Noss is called, from which
you look out upon the sea that lies between Shetland and Norway.
From Wick, a considerable fishing town in Caithness, on the northern coast
of Scotland, a steamer, named the Queen, departs once a week, in the
summer months, for Kirkwall, in the Orkneys, and Lerwick, in Shetland. We
went on board of her about ten o'clock on the 14th of July. The herring
fishery had just begun, and the artificial port of Wick, constructed with
massive walls of stone, was crowded with fishing vessels which had
returned that morning from the labors of the night; for in the herring
fishery it is only in the night that the nets are spread and drawn. Many
of the vessels had landed their cargo; in others the fishermen were busily
disengaging the herrings from the black nets and throwing them in heaps;
and now and then a boat later than the rest, was entering from the sea.
The green heights all around the bay were covered with groups of women,
sitting or walking, dressed for the most part in caps and white short
gowns, waiting for the arrival of the boats manned by their husbands and
brothers, or belonging to the families of those who had come to seek
occupation as fishermen. I had seen two or three of the principal streets
of Wick that morning, swarming with strapping fellows, in blue highland
bonnets, with blue jackets and pantaloons, and coarse blue flannel shirts.
A shopkeeper, standing at his door, instructed me who they were.
"They are men of the Celtic race," he said - the term Celtic has grown to
be quite fashionable, I find, when applied to the Highlanders. "They came
from the Hebrides and other parts of western Scotland, to get employment
in the herring fishery. These people have travelled perhaps three hundred
miles, most of them on foot, to be employed six or seven weeks, for which
they will receive about six pounds wages. Those whom you see are not the
best of their class; the more enterprising and industrious have boats of
their own, and carry on the fishery on their own account."
We found the Queen a strong steamboat, with a good cabin and convenient
state-rooms, but dirty, and smelling of fish from stem to stern. It has
seemed to me that the further north I went, the more dirt I found. Our
captain was an old Aberdeen seaman, with a stoop in his shoulders, and
looked as if he was continually watching for land, an occupation for
which the foggy climate of these latitudes gives him full scope. We left
Wick between eleven and twelve o'clock in the forenoon, and glided over a
calm sea, with a cloudless sky above us, and a thin haze on the surface of
the waters. The haze thickened to a fog, which grew more and more dense,
and finally closed overhead. After about three hours sail, the captain
began to grow uneasy, and was seen walking about on the bridge between the
wheel-houses, anxiously peering into the mist, on the look-out for the
coast of the Orkneys. At length he gave up the search, and stopped the
engine. The passengers amused themselves with fishing. Several coal-fish,
a large fish of slender shape, were caught, and one fine cod was hauled up
by a gentleman who united in his person, as he gave me to understand, the
two capacities of portrait-painter and preacher of the gospel, and who
held that the universal church of Christendom had gone sadly astray from
the true primitive doctrine, in regard to the time when the millennium is
to take place.
The fog cleared away in the evening; our steamer was again in motion: we
landed at Kirkwall in the middle of the night, and when I went on deck the
next morning, we were smoothly passing the shores of Fair Isle - high and
steep rocks, impending over the waters with a covering of green turf.
Before they were out of sight we saw the Shetland coast, the dark rock of
Sumburgh Head, and behind it, half shrouded in mist, the promontory of
Fitfiel Head, - Fitful Head, as it is called by Scott, in his novel of the
Pirate. Beyond, to the east, black rocky promontories came in sight, one
after the other, beetling over the sea. At ten o'clock, we were passing
through a channel between the islands leading to Lerwick, the capital of
Shetland, on the principal island bearing the name of Mainland. Fields,
yellow with flowers, among which stood here and there a cottage, sloped
softly down to the water, and beyond them rose the bare declivities and
summits of the hills, dark with heath, with here and there still darker
spots, of an almost inky hue, where peat had been cut for fuel. Not a
tree, not a shrub was to be seen, and the greater part of the soil
appeared never to have been reduced to cultivation.
About one o'clock we cast anchor before Lerwick, a fishing village, built
on the shore of Bressay Sound, which here forms one of the finest harbors
in the world. It has two passages to the sea, so that when the wind blows
a storm on one side of the islands, the Shetlander in his boat passes out
in the other direction, and finds himself in comparatively smooth water.
It was Sunday, and the man who landed us at the quay and took our baggage
to our lodging, said as he left us -
"It's the Sabbath, and I'll no tak' my pay now, but I'll call the morrow.
My name is Jim Sinclair, pilot, and if ye'll be wanting to go anywhere,
I'll be glad to tak' ye in my boat." In a few minutes we were snugly
established at our lodgings.
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