Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-10-12
AFOOT IN SCOTLAND.
Excellency of Speech of the Highlander.
Metropolis of All the Picts.
Where Clans Have Gathered for Centuries
Back and Ancient Kings Sat in State.
Famous Battle Fields.


Copyright 1885, s.sst
Special Correspondence to the Gazette. 50
INVERNESS. SCOTLAND, SsRssSa 1890.
Whether you come from the Western isles
through the Caledonian canal, with its noble
reaches of lakes bordered by cloud kissed mount
aims, where monarch Ben Nevisseowls through
the swirling mists; or BY thsFeastern coast,
where the German ocean thunders against gran
tie hesdlands and mighty precipices. and no
sound save the roaring of the tempest or ;he
shrieking of seafowl is ever heard; or vine, he
you tramp across fair Perthshire or Inveruoss4
shire over the fine highway where modern civil
iZation has untitled the old Roman roadssgand
in your 50-mile pilgrimage from Edinbutfh you
have learned to love High and scenes IN way
that gives you faint notion of the psssionataf
devotion of the old clansmen for the glenS and
straths in which they were given birth; however
you may have come, by the time you have begun
to realize familiarity and acquaintance with
the royal burgh OF Inverness, its bewitchlng en-
virons. and especially with the most character
istic of its people and the grave. silent folk who
swarm here from the Businesses Of the North,
curious sense of interest, almost reachi lg the
peasurabe thrill of discovery, possesses you.
Inverness is the metropolis of the Highlands.
You realize you are in Scotland; yet when you
recall your surroundings, when you compare
habit, custom, manner, dialect, motive, and
even your own feelings and attitude resulting
from a strangers contact with strangers, YOU
feel that you have come to new and distinct
land. While every human north OF the English
border is Scotch as the term goes, to the
last drop of blood in his veins. and all possess
qualities typical Of endless devotion to like
have come here and found such radical differ
ence between these folk and any you have hith-
erto known in Scotland, you begin to wonder:
Where can
THE GENUINE scoTcHMAN
be found in Scotland? Is he in GLASGOW with
his hard, commercial ways; his driving, rest
1e1~ Ill, =uaF nv he
mad money makers Of New York or
Chicago? Is he in Edinburgh. with his
PHILOSOPHERS, theologies, aristocracies, genealo
ogies, and often his threadbare povertles?
Is he among the Border wales with his barbarous
dialects and lethargic, sodden coltent? Is he
in tine Western Isles. starving half the time in
desolate clachans, the victim of poor crops,
eviction, commissions, and the slave of east
shore fisher smackmen? Or is he of Iverness,
North, the true Scotch of Scotchmen, though he..
has no dialect, speaks Gaelic more eIquisySssy'
than q Dublin professor, and reels onsssSook
English" in greater purity than pr9f1ssor at
Oxford or a Boston booksellers clerkA
This excellence of speech in the fAf N}qrth be-
comes the more surprising when yoasrememoer
that all printed examples of hroaH Scotch in
diaIectic anecdotes have been atutihnted by their
manufacturers to Scottish Hightanders. The
fact IS that the nearer you come to the English
border, on the one side, or the Scottish border
on the other, the more do both Scottish and .
English folk hurl angular chunks Of Doric prosf
yincialisms at You until you sioken VIII
u
These Borderers have the greatcst
pride in their ''rich broad Scotch tpsig
eh N F6m gaqs br5 BOth s5s
England to Berwck-on-Tweed and kack
through Keiso, Jedburgh, Keswick, Anna1eand
Dumfres, in Scotland, in ordinary course of
travel you will find more people whom you can
not readily understand than in all the rest of
Scotland; and you will in the same way discover
more folk, from the most learned established
or Free, church minister down 20 the most
ignorant giIlie or humble crofter. who speak the
English language dramatically, with precision
and directness, and with pleasing meditation
and infection, north of the Grampan hills,
than in Glasgow and Edinburgh combined:
A Highland sheepherder, over on the sides of
dozen books in his life, said to me in connection
with his lonely life and vocation: 81 am not
alone when have these sheep with me, can
see so far from my sheeling.' This was not
only suggestively poetic. but it was expressed
in excellent English; and L give
EXACT WORDS.
A fisherman taking salmon near the mouth OF
the Ness told me pleasantly: I'VE have not
been very fortunate this year with salmon; but 1
scarce, oatmeal is plentiful. - An old black
smith, at a little forge near Carnoch, said:
Were I not too old to take the journey, I
should like to still enjoy the advantages your
at Drumnadrochit informed me: The steam
ers on the canal are very punctual in their ar
rivals An Inverness policeman, of whom l
had made inquiry regarding arrival and de-
parture of Beauty coaches. responded: Il am
sorry cannot tell you. If you will wait q mo-
ment l will ascertain for you at the Highland
railway station office ragged lad, hawking
fish with donkey and cart OF whom l asked
the value Of his diminutive outfit, promptly re-
piled: II think, sir, as good ones could be
got for f5; though l would not like to take that
for them" My iandlady, very ordinary sort
prefer sir. an infusion Of tea, or q brewing of
coffee" The humblest shopkeepet will say:
81 cannot supply the article to-day air; or Il
am sorry have not the article you wish. -
I these down
The Iowliest in strath vennel speaks with sur
prisIng correctness and sgreeability. Straight |
dinna ken;' PLEASE come i'm or CT am glad |
to see you'' supplants Coon ava, - and honest |
''Yes. sir, - will not give away to the Lowland |
accepted, peasant English pronunciation of 20 |
aye have noticed the same phenomenon of |
uupolluted English in another region where |
both English and Gaelic are spoken, at old Gal
way, in the west OF Ireland. Galway is the |
laughing stock of the brogue- slatheriug ollie |
tanti of Dublin, and the Highlsnders are ever |
the butt OF hypercritical Edinburgh. Yet both |
The men OF Connaught and the descendants of |
The openly feared, secretly despised Highland |
clans UNNECESSARILY the superiors of either
Dublin or Edinburgh folk in the construction Of |
colloQuial expression and the delivery of sueech
itself. Some attribute this perfection of speech,
IN both districts, to the remote, and to some ex-
.ent continuous, translation of language from |
he old Erse into English. preventing
-upted spoken language from imitation, and |
tending to secure and preserve untainted the
pure English OF literature.
If this royal old capital of the Highlands were
not pleasing to you from the purity Of tongue,
he attitude of citizen to stranger, and, its peo-
pie, certain fine grain of dignity that is never
reserve that is never selfshuess,
and yet 8 congenial consideration that never be-
rays, il it possesses, the contemplate afability
Of alert venality; you could not help falling
completely in love with the romance of its his
ory. the beauty of the city itself, and the anti
Iuarian interest and scenic grandeur of its en-
Iironment. Your fancy can travel a long way
back here at ancient Inverness, for il was the
original metropolis Of all the Picts. COLUMBIA,
5cotland's great apostle. came here in the sixth
century and converted Brudeus, king of the
picts. William the Lion granted it four char
ers, and these brave old documents sre still
Iced until the invasion OF Scotland by Ed
ward L. Inverness was undoubtedly the seat
)r frequent resort, OF all Scottish kings, whose |
presence was required 10 protecting the ancient
,apital from the incurslons OF the Danes and |
northern Vikings, for quelling the insurrec-
ions of rebellions northern chiefs. Macbeth,
If Shakspearean fame, the maormer or great
nan of Ross, became also that OF Moray, in
luding Inverness, by marriage, and was once
master OF the original castle Of Inverness on
the Crown, ~ at the mouth of the Ness, which
place is regarded by some authorities as the
Gene OF King Duncan's murder. Then a later
astle, where the shire buildings now stand on
he crown of picturesque hill in the heart OF
he city. was afterwards in the hands Of Mac
huff. It also became the prison of Sir John Lo-
rat. In 1908 il was Seized for Edward /. Its
,enuiless fugitive in the Western Isles
prompted that valiant adventurer to the course
" enterprise which finally gave him the throne
md Scotland a noble line of patriot |
rings. James l, when in the North,
n 1927, to castigate its turbulent