The Poetical Works of Walter C. Smith :: :: University of Virginia Library

Poor fishers on the wild west shore
Where slow mists trail along the hills,
And from the mist comes evermore
The sound of rushing brooks and rills,
Are plodding, grave, with lingering feet,
About the high hot noon of day,
Along the circle of the street
That straggles round the circling bay.

'Neath crags and hills the long loch winds
Through rocky isles where sea-birds flock;
Along the slopes the grey birch finds
Frail footing on the slaty rock;
On every ledge there grows a pine
With roots that cling as the branchestoss,
And the oaks along the low sea-line
Are greenly feathered with fern and moss.
Behind the cliffs are mountains steep
By foaming torrents scored and scarred,
And up their gullies the adders creep,
But the peaks are ragged and jagged and barred:
Cloud-capped often their stormy tops,
While ridge and corrie and crag are bare,
Or a girdle of mist will ring the slopes,
While the heights rise clear in the upper air.
A desolate land of fern and moss,
Of brackened braes and craggy hills,
And shores where fickle waters toss,
And birch-and-hazel-fringèd rills,
And foaming cataracts like snow
That in the gorges leap and run,
And rocks, ice-polished long ago,
That gleam like waters in the sun,
And gorgeous sunsets that enfold
The mountains with a purple robe,
And dash the crimson and the gold
In billowy spray about the globe:
A land of wayside cairns—the place
Of resting for the biers of death—
And tokens of a fading race,
And relics of forgotten faith—
Legend and rhyme and mystic rite,
The worship of a God unknown,
Stealthily done at dead of night
By sacred well or standing stone.
Oh marvel not they love the land
Who watch its changeful hills and skies,
For in its desolation grand
A charm of 'wildering beauty lies.

A meagre life they have, and still—
Not stiller almost is the grave—
Those villagers beneath the hill
That looks down on the long sea-wave;
Rude are the huts of stone and turf
That straggle round the circling street,
The thatched roofs soaked with rain or surf,
And blackened with the smoking peat.
No ploughshare tears the scanty soil,
Enough for them are spade and hoe;
'Tis on the waters that they toil,
And in the seas their harvests grow.

371

The moors are for the hare and grouse,
The corries for the antlered stag,
But shaggy big-horned cattle browse
On the fringe of bracken and rush and flag.
And now and then comes like a dream
A white-sailed yacht into the bay,
And now and then a snort of steam
Sounds from the headland far away;
But never shows the world's proud strife,
Its strain of power, and rush of thought:
Time counts for nothing in their life,
But comes and goes, and changes nought.
Yet men have grown there, true and brave,
Bronzed with weather, and horny of hand,
Who wrestled with the problems grave
That at the porch of Wisdom stand;
And you shall find in low, thatched cot,
Round-angled, and with smoke begrimed,
Love that can sweeten every lot,
And Faith that hath all fates sublimed.
But why are the long-oared boats afloat?
Why tolls the bell from the steepled kirk?
It is not the hour to launch the boat,
And it is not the Sabbath of rest from work;
And why are the children sad and grave,
With no ripple of mirth by the rippling wave?
And whither away do the strong men walk,
While the women gather in groups and talk?

Scene—Village Street of Kinloch-Thorar. Group of Women at the Post Office Door.
First Fisherwoman.

—Ochone! but this iss a sad day on Loch Thorar, Mrs. Slit.

Mrs. Slit.

—You may say that, 'Lizbeth, and in Glen Shelloch too, and Glen Turret, which iss more.

First Fisherwoman.

—He wass a good man, and a faithful minister. He wass not a dumb dog that will be gnawing the bones, and will not bark when he should.

Mrs. Slit.

—Och yes! he wass all that, though he might not preach like Black Rory of Skye, or big John of Strathnaver. But he would not be passing my shop door without getting pickles of snuff for the old men, and sweeties too for the bairns. Yes, yes! it will not be the same shop now that he does not come here any more.

Second Fisherwoman.

—But what iss this, Mrs. Slit; Miss Ina will not be for burying him in the kirkyard, but in Isle-Monach, where my Donald would be seeing ghosts at Yule and Pasch.

Mrs. Slit.

—It iss your Donald that would be having the whisky, then. For they are quiet men, the monks, when they are living, and they will not be frisky now that they are in their graves.

Second Fisherwoman.

—But they are in Purgatory, whatever; and our minister had no faith in Purgatory, or organs or saints or good works. Why would she be for burying him among them? Iss it Papist she will be turning?

First Fisherwoman.

—Or Pagan, Mrs. Slit? For our May wass saying she would read more about heathen gods and goddesses than about Abraham or Moses; and May wass maid in the manse till Candlemas last.

Mrs. Slit.

—May will not know what young ladies have to know. And which iss more, she might do better than to be talking about her betters. As for Purgatory, it iss not any more, since the laird's great grandfather forbade it, or it will only be for the poor cottars at Glen Chroan. And whether or no, our minister's daughter will have nothing to do with it, you may be sure.

372

But it iss true Miss Ina never wass just like other maids. But her heart iss good, whatever, yes! and which iss more, it iss soft and warm as a lintie's nest, and sweeter as the bog-myrtle.

Third Fisherwoman.

—Och yes! it will be warm and sweet, but not good, Mrs. Slit. None of our hearts iss good, as he would often say, who will never say it any more. But many a time, when the lads wass out fishing, it iss Miss Ina that would hail them from her bit boatie, and she would have the kind word for each of them; yes! and she would call at our doors too on her way home, and tell us about Dugald or Donald or Alisthair and the herrings. Och yes! she hass the kind heart, whatever, and it will be a sorry one this day.

First Fisherwoman.

—Yes! she hass the kind heart, Miss Ina; and if she would have the making of the law, it would be the better for us, though it iss true she iss for making the men carry the peats, and wade out to the boats too, which it would be a shame for women to see.

Second Fisherwoman.

—But whose boat will she be having, now? For it iss a rhyme I heard long ago—

Coffined corpse in fisher's boat;
Make ready a shroud when it's next afloat.

Mrs. Slit.

—The de'il an ye were in your shroud, woman, to speak of such a thing! Do you know that it iss Sir Diarmid himself that will bring his gig, and his gillies, and his piper too, all in the brave tartan, with plaid and sporran, as if the minister would be a chief, for he was not more than third cousin to the laird's grandfather. And it iss the chief that you would be singing your carline rhymes about, and making a shroud for him too!

Second Fisherwoman.

—But he iss not a fisher.

Mrs. Slit.

—He will fish more than your Donald, whatever: for when Donald iss in the humour, the loch iss never in trim; and when the loch iss in the humour, he hass no inclination. But it iss not for you, woman, to be speaking of the laird and a shroud in one breath, and him a brave young gentleman, and which iss more, just growing the beautiful beard too. Yes!

First Fisherwoman.

—But why will she be for burying him among the monks, when there iss a Christian kirkyard at her door, Mrs. Slit?

Mrs. Slit.

—Who hass a better right to lie there? For he comes of the old stock that built the Abbey Kirk; and all their graves are there, and there iss nobody else but chiefs and monks and ministers and superior persons, which iss proper. There has not been a burial there since old Sir Kenneth's, the day of the great storm, when half our boats wass wrecked, and the poor lads were bobbing about the loch, like pellocks in a gale of wind.

Third Fisherwoman.

—O chone! yes; and it is myself will mind it, if I am spared to my dying day. My Alisthair, that wass to be married just the week after, drifted ashore among the tangles before his Mysie's door, and she will never be herself again since that fery hour. And it wass Miss Ina that would have the bodies carried to the kirk, and the funeral there; for they will preach to us, said she, better than the minister, or an angel from heaven.

First Fisherwoman.

—Sure, and she wass right there, for there would not be a profane swearer or a Sabbath-breaker in the parish for six months after, though the whisky wass wanted for the sore heart sometimes, maybe.

373

Mrs. Slit.

—Yes! it wass a great sermon, the lads lying in a row, and just the day before they had talked to us, and which iss more, they had laughed with us; and now they looked at us, and would not know us any more. Och yes! it wass a great sermon, and it wass God himself that preached it. But there, now; they are leaving the manse. It iss our own lads that will be carrying the coffin, with its white wreaths and ferns. Och! and Sir Diarmid and Miss Ina make the handsome pair, like the brown pine and the bonnie birch tree. She iss liker him than that Doris, with her mouth that is always smiling, and her eyes that never do.

First Fisherwoman.

—But they will be saying he must marry Doris, whatever.

Mrs. Slit.

—Maybe yes, maybe no. It iss not every fish you hook that comes to the creel; and the stag iss not on the spit because Donald has loaded his gun. And that will be her uncle, the Doctor, that wass the ne'er-do-well, and nearly broke his brother's heart, and which is more, emptied his purse too. But he iss come home now, they say, as rich as the English lord at Loch Eylert. Sure they will rest the coffin somewhere for his cairn, and for the drop whisky there. And now Eachan Macrimmon is playing a coronach as it were for a chief: “Peace to his soul, and a stone to his cairn.”

Chorus.
Slowly the muffled oars dip in the tide,
Slowly the silent boats shadow-like glide
Past the grey, steepled kirk, past the low manse,
Now in the ripples that glimmer and glance
Where the sun flashes, and now in the shade
The birch-feathered rocks and the great hills have made;
Slowly and silently onward they pass
Over the calm spaces shining like glass,
While the wild wailing strains of the coronach swell,
And fall with the breeze and the slow-tolling bell.
Long, low and dark is the first of the train,
With six bending oars keeping time to the strain;
In it a coffin, and by it a maiden
Who to the moaning sea moans sorrow-laden,
As they drop down to the dim abbey pile
Lying half-hid in a cleft of the isle,
Ruined and roofless, 'mid tangle of trees
That dip their low boughs in the wave, but the breeze
Rustles their higher leaves over a tower
Green with massed ivy, and crown'd with wall-flower.
There, with his forefathers, peaceful to sleep
By the white surf of the unresting deep,
Where once the Culdee monk toiled, prayed, and died,
Where once the galleys oared out in their pride,
Where still the clansmen their high chiefs bewail,
Silent they laid the good priest of the Gael.

No cross was reared above his head,
No requiem was sung or said,
No hope was spoken of the just
In glory rising from the dust:
In silent awe they did their part,
Yet the good hope was in every heart.