Chapter I: Front Matter

Note: Images of the original pages are available through
Internet Archive. See
https://archive.org/details/scottishreminisc00geikuoft

Transcriber’s note:

Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).

A caret character is used to denote superscription. A
single character following the caret is superscripted
(example: Matthe^w). Multiple superscripted characters are
enclosed by curly brackets (example: 12^{th}).

Other notes will be found at the end of this document.

SCOTTISH REMINISCENCES

* * * * * *

PUBLISHED BY

JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS, GLASGOW

Publishers to the University.

MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD., LONDON.

_New York_, _The Macmillan Co._
_London_, _Simpkin, Hamilton and Co._
_Cambridge_, _Bowes and Bowes._
_Edinburgh_, _Douglas and Foulis._

MCMVIII.

* * * * * *

SCOTTISH · REMINIS- CENCES ❧ ❧ BY SIR ARCHIBALD·GEIKIE·K.C.B.

Glasgow · James · MacLehose and · Sons · Publishers · to The · University · 1908

First Edition, April, 1904. Reprinted April 1904, 1905, 1908.

Glasgow: Printed at the University Press by Robert MacLehose and Co. Ltd.

FROM THE PREFACE.

One who has sojourned in every part of a country and for sixty years has mingled with all classes of its inhabitants; who has watched the decay and disappearance of old, and the uprise of new usages; who has been ever on the outlook for illustrations of native humour, and who has been in the habit all along of freely recounting his experiences to his friends, may perhaps be forgiven if he ventures to put forth some record of what he has seen and heard, as a slight contribution to the history of social changes.

Literature is rich in Scottish reminiscences of this kind, so rich indeed that a writer who adds another volume to the long list runs great risk of repeating what has already been told. I have done my best to avoid this danger by turning over the pages of as many books of this class as I have been able to lay hands upon. In the course of this reading I have discovered that not a few of the ‘stories’ which I picked up long ago have found their way into print. These I have generally excluded from the present volume, save in cases where my version seemed to me better than that which had been published. But with all my care I cannot hope to have wholly escaped from pitfalls of this nature.

No one can have read much in this subject without discovering the perennial vitality of some anecdotes. With slight and generally local modification, they are told by generation after generation, and always as if they related to events that had recently occurred and to persons that were still familiarly known. Yet the essential basis of their humour may occasionally be traced back a long way. As an example of this longevity I may cite the incident of snoring in church, related at p. 86 of the following chapters, where an anecdote which has been told to me as an event that had recently happened among people now living was in full vigour a hundred years ago, and long before that time had formed the foundation of a clever epigram in the reign of Charles II. Another illustration of this persistence and transformation may be found in the anecdote of the wolf’s den (p. 292). The same recurring circumstances may sometimes conceivably evoke, at long intervals, a similar sally of humour; but probably in most cases the original story survives, undergoing a process of gradual evolution and local adaptation as it passes down from one generation to another.

CONTENTS.

Pages

CHAPTER I.

Social changes in Scotland consequent on the Union of the
Crowns. Impetus given to these changes after Culloden in
the eighteenth century, and after the introduction of
steam as a motive power in the nineteenth. Posting from
Scotland to London. Stage coach travelling to England.
Canal travelling between Edinburgh and Glasgow. Loch
Katrine in 1843. Influence of Walter Scott. Steamboats
to London. Railroads in Scotland. Effects of steamboat
development in the West Highlands, 1–37

CHAPTER II.

Traces of Paganism in Scotland. Relics of the Celtic
Church; ‘Deserts.’ Survival of Roman Catholicism in
West Highlands and Islands. Influence of the Protestant
clergy. Highland ministers. Lowland ministers. Diets of
catechising. Street preachers, 38–76

CHAPTER III.

The sermon in Scottish Kirks. Intruding animals in country
churches. The ‘collection.’ Church psalmody. Precentors
and organs. Small congregations in the Highlands. Parish
visitation. Survival of the influence of clerical
teaching. Religious mania, 77–106

CHAPTER IV.

Superstition in Scotland. Holy wells. Belief in the Devil.
Growth of the rigid observance of the Sabbath. Efforts
of kirk-sessions and presbyteries to enforce Jewish
strictness in regard to the Sabbath. Illustrations of the
effects of these efforts, 107–141

CHAPTER V.

Litigiousness of the Scots. Sir Daniel Macnee and
jury-trial. Scottish judges, Patrick Robertson, Cullen,
Neaves, Rutherford Clark. 142–155

CHAPTER VI.

Medical Men. Sandy Wood. Knox. Nairn and Sir William Gull.
A broken leg in Canna. Changes in the professoriate
and students in the Scottish Universities. A St.
Andrews Professor. A Glasgow Professor. Some Edinburgh
Professors--Pillans, Blackie, Christison, Maclagan,
Playfair, Chalmers, Tait. Scottish Schoolmasters. 156–184

CHAPTER VII.

Old and new type of landed proprietors in Scotland.
Highland Chiefs--Second Marquess of Breadalbane; late
Duke of Argyll. Ayrshire Lairds--T. F. Kennedy of Dunure;
‘Sliddery Braes’; Smith of Auchengree. Fingask and
Charles Martin. New lairds of wealth, 185–204

CHAPTER VIII.

Lowland farmers; Darlings of Priestlaw. Sheep-farmers. Hall
Pringle of Hatton. Farm-servants. Ayrshire milk-maids.
The consequences of salting. Poachers. ‘Cauld sowens
out o’ a pewter plate.’ Farm life in the Highlands. A
Skye eviction. Clearances in Raasay. Summer Shielings
of former times. Fat Boy of Soay. A West Highlander’s
first visit to Glasgow. Crofters in Skye. Highland ideas
of women’s work. Highland repugnance to handicrafts, 205–238

CHAPTER IX.

Highland ferries and coaches. The charms of Iona. How to
see Staffa. The Outer Hebrides. Stones of Callernish.
St. Kilda. Sound of Harris. The Cave-massacre in Eigg.
Skeleton from a clan fight still unburied in Jura.
The hermit of Jura. Peculiar charms of the Western
Isles. Influence of the clergy on the cheerfulness of
the Highlanders. Disappearance of Highland customs.
Dispersing of clans from their original districts.
Dying out of Gaelic; advantages of knowing some Gaelic;
difficulties of the language, 239–273

CHAPTER X.

The Orkney Islands. The Shetland Islands. Faroe Islands
contrasted with Western Isles. ‘Burning the water.’ A
fisher of men. Salmon according to London taste. Trout
and fishing-poles. A wolf’s den, 274–293

CHAPTER XI.

Scottish shepherds and their dogs. A snow-storm among
the Southern Uplands. Scottish inns of an old type.
Reminiscences of some Highland inns. Revival of roadside
inns by cyclists. Scottish drink. Drinking customs now
obsolete, 294–320

CHAPTER XII.

Scottish humour in relation to death and the grave.
Resurrectionists. Tombstone inscriptions. ‘Naturals’ in
Scotland. Confused thoughts of second childhood. Belief
in witchcraft. Miners and their superstitions. Colliers
and Salters in Scotland were slaves until the end of the
eighteenth century. Metal-mining in Scotland, 321–346

CHAPTER XIII.

Town-life in old times. Dirtiness of the streets. Clubs.
Hutton and Black in Edinburgh. A feast of snails. Royal
Society Club. Bailies ‘gang lowse.’ Rothesay fifty years
ago. James Smith of Jordanhill. Fisher-folk of the Forth.
Decay of the Scots language. Receipt for pronouncing
English, 347–369

CHAPTER XIV.

The Scottish School of Geology. Neptunist and Vulcanist
Controversy. J. D. Forbes. Charles Maclaren. Hugh Miller.
Robert Chambers. W. Haidinger. H. von Dechen. Ami Boué.
The life of a field-geologist. Experiences of a geologist
in the West Highlands. A crofter home in Skye. The Spar
Cave and Coruisk. Night in Loch Scavaig, 370–409

CHAPTER XV.

Influence of Topography on the people of Scotland.
Distribution and ancient antagonism of Celt and Saxon.
Caithness and its grin. Legends and place-names. Popular
explanation of boulders. Cliff-portraits. Fairy-stones
and supposed human footprints. Imitative forms of flint.
Scottish climate and its influence on the people.
Indifference of the Highlander to rain. ‘Dry rain.’ Wind
in Scotland. Salutations on the weather. Shakespeare on
the climate of Morayland. Influence of environment on the
Highlander, 410–439

Index, 440–447