h' A.28 WITH NATURE AND A GAME

For nine inontbs in the year the inhabitants of St. Kilcla are doomed to an utter ig-norance of the doings of the outer Avorkl unless some stray fishing-smack should, under favourable conditions of wind and tide, venture to drop in and see them. They the initiative of Mr. Johnhave, however—through Sands, I believe—improved upon jjoor Lady Grange's method of trying to communicate with friends during-her eight weary years of exile in these desolate regions. It is recorded that this unfortunate woman

ST. KILDA MAILBOAT.

wrapped up letter after letter with yarn in pieces of cork, and consigned them to the sea in the hope that some day one would be Avafted to where some pitying hand would find a means of delivering her from a bondage brought about through some disagreement with her husband, Lord Grange, whose friends kidnapped the unhappy lady in 1732, and, after forcibly detaining her on some small IIel)ridean island a while, conveyed her to St. Kilda, where she is said to have spent a great part of her time in weeping. to send news of When the natives now desire any happenings on the island to their friends, they cut a (;avity in a solid piece of wood roughly hewn like a boat, and, putting a small canister or

bottle containing a letter and request that whoso-ever picks it up will post it to its destination (a penny being enclosed in the boat for that purpose), they nail a lid or hatch over the cavity, with the letters of the words "Please open" crudely cut on the top of it. To the boat is attached a bladder made from a sheep's skin, and the whole is cast into the sea during the prevalence of a westerly wind. I was assured that an average of four out of six of these interesting little mailboats are picked up either on the shores of Long Island or Norway, and their contents forwarded to the people whose hands they are intended to reach. 8ucli as find their way to the Norwegian coast are sent to the Foreiorn Office in London, from which venerable institution they emerge again in due course, accompanied by an official document often exceeding them many times in length. I was so much interested in these miniature mailboats that I got a man who was accustomed to make them to construct one for me absolutelv complete in every particular. I had it put in the sea so as to observe its behaviour, and in order that my brother might have an opportunity of photographing the man in the act of despatching it. As I had expressed a desire to hear from the St. Kildans during the winter by means of one of their miniature mailboats, they dispatched one containing' three letters for me at eleven o'clock on the morning of March 24th, during the prevalence of a north-westerly wind. On the 31st of the same month it was picked up by a shepherd in a little bay at Vallay, North Uist, and its contents forwarded to me by post. The letters had been placed in a small tin canister, and despite the fact that thev had become soaked with sea water, they

St Kilda 20th March 189[facsimile clips remainder of date]

Dear Friend.

I received your letter of the 10th February and I was much pleased to learn that you understood my letter. I am in good health at present, though some of the friends is very sick with a bad cold they got. I was very sorry to learn that you were not in good health through the winter. We havent seen a Trawler or Liner

[Facsimile of portion of a Letter received

I may tell you that I was hunting today at the back of Conicher and killed fifteen Fulmars but four of them was lost. I was thinking of the day I was with you and Cherry photographing when a big stone fall from your feet and nearly killed Cherry. I hope to see you yet, this is to be sent in a toy boat by the first north-west wind. of which Finly Mc. Quien, is Captain. with best wishes remember me to your brother. I remain

yours Faithfuly Niel Fergu[facsimile clips remainder of signature]

by the Author per St. Kilda Mailboat.]

still retained a delightful aronia of peat smoke when they reached my hands, reminding' me forcibly of my staA' on the island. Martin, in his entertaining account of a visit paid to St. Kilda in 1697, as already mentioned, after jjraising the good looks of the people, says,

^' The present generation comes short of the last in strength and longevity. They showed us huge big stones, carried by the fathers of some of the inhabitants now living, any of which is a burthen too heavy for any two of the present inhabitants to raise from the ground, and this change is all within the compass of forty years. ]3ut notwithstanding this, anyone inhabiting St. Kilda is always reputed stronger than two of the inhabitants belonging to the Isle of Harris or the adjacent isles."

Curiously enough, the same pessimistic belief in the physical degeneracy of the human race is rife to-day in many Yorkshire dales, and old men will as evidence of the fact point out huge stones in the remains of ancient dry walls that mark long-forgotten divisions of the land, and say that no man now living could lift them, forgetful of the fact that in all probability they never were lifted, but simplv rolled into their present situations over smaller stones })laced conveniently for the purpose. The same historian whom I have just quoted also recorded the fact that ukmi of llirta, had '' generally but very thin beards." They have evidently taken the reproach to heart, for nearly all of them have now thick bushy ones. lh(^. jjlace The highest population record of known is two hundred souls all told, aiul the lowest rea(;hed, a few years back, sixty. At the time of our visit in the summer of ISDO IIuto

were seventy -three people on the island, including the minister and his serving-maid.

Formerly the infants of St. Kilda used to be nearly all carried off by a mysterious malady known as " eight-day sickness." The disease generally manifested itself by the little stranger refusing to partake of nourishment on the fifth day after its advent into the world, and proved fatal on the eighth. So great were the odds in favour of every child born dying before the completion of its eighth day, that mothers never thought of providing clothing for their babies until they had passed the period of danger. The reason for delaying the preparation of infant garments will be understood when it is mentioned that two mothers in St. Kilda had had twenty-eight children between them, and only succeeded in rearing four. But thanks to Mr. Fiddes, who now brings the St. Kildans into the world, marries them, and l^uries them, all this has been changed. Bv proper treatment and the use of antiseptics, he has stopped the ravages of the disease; and all honour to him for his conquest. " Stranger's cold " is another remarkable affection which invariably attacks the islanders on the arrival of a boat. It is a kind of influenza of which the natives stand in great dread, and the factor told me that he was afraid even to blow his nose in the presence of any of them, lest they should, in the event of its breaking out amongst them, accuse him of having brought it. The malady is of great antiquity^, for Martin gave offence on the occasion of his visit by telling the people that he thought their " notion of infection but a mere fancy." During our stay on the island there were one or two cases of illness. One old man's condition

became so serious that his wife was heard chanting over him, evidently in the belief that the time had come to sing his })raises in the usual form of a death dirge. She was a little too previous, however, for by a judicious administration of brandy and bovril in small alternate doses, we set the old fellow on his legs again in a few days. The other case was that of a poor old maid wdio lived all alone in an ancient straws-thatched hut close to our cottage. I went with my friend Mackenzie one morning to take her a cup of something comforting, and found her lying in a huge sort of box, surrounded by two or three cats, wliicJi, even in St. Kilda, are associated with old maids. In front of the entrance to the box-like bedstead on which this old woman was lying were four thick iiags driven into the ground so as to form a rough kind of square, in the centre of which smouldered a small turf tire. Directly over this, and suspended from the roof-tree, was a long, smoke-blackened chain used for hanging kettles and cooldng-pots on.

Whilst we were on the island a doctor came to vaccinate the children, but so small was the faith of the natives in Jenner's great discovery, that he was obliged t(j take his departure without having operated upon a single child. Perhaps they did not understand that he had come in order to pro-vent a repetition of the terrible disaster their for-bears suffered in 1724, when an awful visitation of small-pox swept aw^ay the entire adult male popida-tion of the place wdtli the exception of four, who were catching Gannets on Borrera or Soa at tlu^ time of the outbreak. As there was nobody left to man a boat and fetch them off, they remained from August of one year to Whitsuntide of the next, and thus escaped the ravages of ihv tei-rible scourge.

8t. Kilda is the only place in the whole of Scotland where drunkenness is unknown, although it is said that all the inhabitants keep a supply of whisky by them for use in cases of illness. Such admirable self-restraint is worthy of all praise. They could have had no great acquaintance with intoxicating liquors even in Martin's time, when they were much gayer and livelier than they are now. : " One of the St. Kilda men, after heHe says had taken a prett}' large dose of Aqua Vitce, and was become very heavy with it, as he was falling into a sleep and fancying it to be his last, expressed to his com})anions the great satisfaction he had in meeting with such an easy passage out of this world. For, said he, it is attended by no kind of pain." Henry Brougham says that when he visited St. Kilda in 1799 the people had ''an excessive eagerness for spirits and tobacco." This certainly is not the case now. Only four men besides the minister smoke, and, although I took a supply of tobacco with me on purpose for them, they showed no great eagerness to possess it. Their taste for sweets, especially " bull's-eyes " and pep^^ermint lozenges, was much stronger than for either drink or tobacco. Strangely enough, several comparatively recent writers have stated that they ' ' saw no partiality for sugar and sweets "; but this we certainly observed, the men often holding out their big brown palms along with the children when ''sweeties" were being distributed. As a further illustration of the existence of this taste for saccharine dainties, I may also mention that the young women and children fetched us a supply of delicious new milk every evening in return for a handful of sweets all round. So fully does the factor recognise the d2

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