The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1888-10-27
THE SCOTTISH CROETERS.


Elizabeth X. PennelI Describes Their Ex-
ceedingly Miserable Condition.
The gray wretchedness of the after
uoon was fit prelude to Barra. When
we came to Castle Bay, rain was falling
upon it's waters, on the battlemented
castle, perched upon rocky, sea-weed-
covered islet, and on the town set
against a background of high bare
hills. But the steamer stopped and
we went ashore to look about us. A
few ugly new houses, shops with plate
glass windows, often cited as proofs of
the islands prosperity, and then the
real Barra: mass of brick cottages
compared to which those of Null
were mansions, those of kilchrennan
understanding up and down the rocky
hillside. Only by a polite figure of
speech can the stone pile in which the
Hebridean crofter makes his home be
called a cottage. 1t is, as it was de-
scribed many years ago, but ga heavy
matched roof thrown over few rudely
put together stones" The long low
walls are built of loose rock blackened
bv constant rain. The matched roof,
almost as black, is held in place with
out by a network of ropes, with
in by rafters of drift-wood. The
crofter has no wood save that
which the sea yields, and yet
insome districts he must pay for pick
in up the beams and spars washed up
d his wild shores, just as he must for
s<grass and heather he cuts from the
Etlder moorland when he makes his
roof. Not until you come close to the
rough stone heap can you see that it is
house, with an opening for doorway,
one tiny hole for window. From a dis
lance there is but its smoke to distin-
guish it from the rocks strewn around
it.
At Castle Bay, where many OF these
'scenes of misery" as Pennant called
them one hundred years ago, were
grouped together, there was not even
the pretence Of a street, but just the
rock, rough, ragged and broken, as
God made it. The people who live here
are almost all fishermen, and, as if in
token of their calling, they have fash
toned the thatch of their roofs into the
shape of boats. One cottage, indeed, is
topped with a genuine boat. There
were few chimneys, but smoke came
pouring from the doors, from holes in
the thatch and walls. Many of the
roofs had a luxuriant growth of grass,
with here and there clump of daisies.
Or of the yellow flowers which give
color to Highland road-sides. But this
was all the green we saw on their hill
side OF rock and mud.
Through open door ways we had
glimpses of dark, gloomy interiors,
dense with smoke. We did not cross a
threshold, however; to seek admittance
seemed not unlike making show of
the peoples misery. The women and
girls who passed in and out, and stood
to stare at us, looked strong and
healthy. Theirs is a life which must
6lJllCI MIL VI uCtl hCiis NldIlN NCIS
handsome, with strangely foreign,
lgypsy-like faces; and so were the bon
.neted men at work on the pier. 1t may
be there is truth in the story which
gives a touch of Spanish blood to the
people of the Outer Hebrides. If the
ships of the Armada went down with
all their treasure it is said their crews
survived and lived and took unto them
selves wives in the Islands, from which
chance of deliverance was small. We
heard only Gaelic spoken while we
were at Castle Bay. The people of
Great Britain need not go abroad in
search of foreign parts; but an English
man, who only wants to see the misery
and wrongs of nations foreign in name
as well as in reality, would find little
pleasure in Barra. Elizabeth Robins
Pencil, IN Harpcr'S Magazine.