Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

"We came late to Aberdeen, where I found my dear mistress's letter, and learned that all our little people were happily recovered of the measles. Every part of your letter was pleasing.

"There are two cities of the name of Aberdeen. The old town, built about a mile inland, once the see of a bishop, which contains the King's college and the remains of the cathedral, and the new town, which stands for the sake of trade upon a frith or arm of the sea, so that ships rest against the key.

"The two cities have their separate magistrates, and the two colleges are in effect two universities, which confer degrees on each other.

"New Aberdeen is a large town, built almost wholly of that granite which is used for the new pavement in London, which, hard as it is, they square with very little difficulty. Here I first saw the women in plaids. The plaid makes at once a hood and cloak, without cutting or sewing, merely by the manner of drawing the opposite sides over the shoulders. The maids at the inns run over the house barefoot, and children, not dressed in rags, go without shoes or stockings. Shoes are indeed not yet in universal use; they came late into this country. One of the professors told us, as we were mentioning a fort built by Cromwell, that the country owed much of its present industry to Cromwell's soldiers. They taught us, said he, to raise cabbage and make shoes. How they lived without shoes may yet be seen; but in the passage through villages, it seems to him that surveys their gardens that when they had not cabbage they had nothing.

"Education is here of the same price as at St. Andrew's, only the session is but from the 1st of November to the 1st of April. The academical buildings seem rather to advance than decline. They showed their libraries, which were not very splendid; but some manuscripts were so exquisitely penned, that I wished my dear mistress to have seen them. I had an unexpected pleasure, by finding an old acquaintance now professor of physick in the King's college. We were on both sides glad of the interview, having not seen nor perhaps thought on one another for many years; but we had no emulation, nor had either of us risen to the other's envy, and our old kindness was easily renewed. I hope we shall never try the effect of so long an absence."

"Inverness, 28th Aug., 1773.

August 23d. I had the honour of attending the Lord Provost of Aberdeen, and was presented with the freedom of the city, not in a gold box, but in good Latin. Let me pay Scotland one just praise! There was no officer gaping for a fee. This could have been said of no city on the English side of the Tweed. I wore my patent of freedom pro more in my hat, from the new town to the old, about a mile. I then dined with my friend the professor of physick at his

she often wandered in the night among the graves and ruins, only she had sometimes notice by dreams of the death of her relations. We then viewed the remains of a castle on the margin of the sea, in which the archbishops resided, and in which Cardinal Beatoun was killed.

"The professors who happened to be resident in the vacation made a public dinner, and treated us very kindly and respectfully. They showed us their colleges, in one of which there is a library that for luminousness and elegance may vie at least with the new edifice at Streatham. But learning seems not to prosper among them; one of their colleges has been lately alienated, and one of their churches lately deserted. An experiment was made of planting a shrubbery in the church, but it did not thrive.

"Why the place should thus fall to decay I know not; for education, such as is here to be had, is sufficiently cheap. Their term, or as they call it their session, lasts seven months in the year, which the students of the highest rank and greatest expense may pass here for twenty pounds; in which are included board, lodging, books, and the continual instruction of three professors.

"20th. We left St. Andrew's, well satisfied with our reception, and crossing the Frith of Tay came to Dundee, a dirty, despicable town. We passed afterwards through Aberbrothwick, famous once for an abbey, of which there are only a few fragments left; but those fragments testify that the fabrick was once of great extent, and of stupendous magnificence. Two of the towers are yet standing, though shattered; into one of them Boswell climbed, but found the stairs broken: the way into the other we did not see, and had not time to search; I believe it might be ascended, but the top I think is open.

"We lay at Montrose, a neat place, with a spacious area for the market, and an elegant town-house.

the

"21st. We travelled towards Aberdeen, another university, and in way dined at Lord Monboddo's, the Scotch judge, who has lately written a strange book about the origin of language, in which he traces monkeys up to men, and says that in some countries the human species have tails like other beasts. He inquired for these long-tailed men of Banks, and was not well pleased that they had not been found in all his peregrination. He talked nothing of this to me, and I hope we parted friends; for we agreed pretty well, only we disputed in adjusting the claims of merit between a shopkeeper of London and a savage of the American wildernesses. Our opinions were, I think, maintained on both sides without full conviction. Monboddo declared boldly for the savage, and I, perhaps for that reason, sided with the citizen.

"We came late to Aberdeen, where I found my dear mistress's letter, and learned that all our little people were happily recovered of the measles. Every part of your letter was pleasing.

There are two cities of the name of Aberdeen. The old town, built about a mile inland, once the see of a bishop, which contains the King's college and the remains of the cathedral, and the new town, which stands for the sake of trade upon a frith or arm of the sea, so that ships rest against the key.

"The two cities have their separate magistrates, and the two colleges are in effect two universities, which confer degrees on each other.

"New Aberdeen is a large town, built almost wholly of that granite which is used for the new pavement in London, which, hard as it is, they square with very little difficulty. Here I first saw the women in plaids. The plaid makes at once a hood and cloak, without cutting or sewing, merely by the manner of drawing the opposite sides over the shoulders. The maids at the inns run over the house barefoot, and children, not dressed in rags, go without shoes or stockings. Shoes are indeed not yet in universal use; they came late into this country. One of the professors told us, as we were mentioning a fort built by Cromwell, that the country owed much of its present industry to Cromwell's soldiers. They taught us, said he, to raise cabbage and make shoes. How they lived without shoes may yet be seen; but in the passage through villages, it seems to him that surveys their gardens that when they had not cabbage they had nothing.

"Education is here of the same price as at St. Andrew's, only the session is but from the 1st of November to the 1st of April. The academical buildings seem rather to advance than decline. They showed their libraries, which were not very splendid; but some manuscripts were so exquisitely penned, that I wished my dear mistress to have seen them. I had an unexpected pleasure, by finding an old acquaintance now professor of physick in the King's college. We were on both sides glad of the interview, having not seen nor perhaps thought on one another for many years; but we had no emulation, nor had either of us risen to the other's envy, and our old kindness was easily renewed. I hope we shall never try the effect of so long an absence."

(6 Inverness, 28th Aug., 1773.

August 23d. I had the honour of attending the Lord Provost of Aberdeen, and was presented with the freedom of the city, not in a gold box, but in good Latin. Let me pay Scotland one just praise! There was no officer gaping for a fee. This could have been said of no city on the English side of the Tweed. I wore my patent of freedom pro more in my hat, from the new town to the old, about a mile. I then dined with my friend the professor of physick at his

house, and saw the King's college. Boswell was very angry that the Aberdeen professors would not talk. When I was at the English church in Aberdeen I happened to be espied by Lady Di. Middleton, whom I had sometime seen in London. She told what she had seen to Mr. Boyd, Lord Errol's brother, who wrote us an invitation to Lord Errol's house, called Slane's Castle. We went thither on the next day (24th of August), and found a house, not old, except but one tower, built upon the margin of the sea upon a rock, scarce accessible from the sea. At one corner a tower makes a perpendicular continuation of the lateral surface of the rock, so that it is impracticable to walk round: the house inclosed a square court, and on all sides within the court is a piazza or gallery two stories high. We came in as we were invited to dinner, and after dinner offered to go; but Lady Errol sent us word by Mr. Boyd, that if we went before Lord Errol came home we must never be forgiven, and ordered out the coach to show us two curiosities. We were first conducted by Mr. Boyd to Dunbuys, or the yellow rock. Dunbuys is a rock consisting of two protuberances, each perhaps one hundred yards round, joined together by a narrow neck, and separated from the land by a very narrow channel or gully. These rocks are the haunts of sea fowl, whose clang, though this is not their season, we heard at a distance. The eggs and the young are gathered here in great numbers at the time of breeding. There is a bird here called a coote, which though not much bigger than a duck, lays a larger egg than a goose. We went then to see the Buller or Boulloir of Buchan; Buchan is the name of the district, and the Buller is a small creek or gulf, into which the sea flows through an arch of the rock. We walked round it, and saw it black at a great depth. It has its name from the violent ebullition of the water, when high winds or high tides drive it up the arch into the basin. Walking a little further I spied some boats, and told my companions that we would go into the Buller and examine it. There was no danger; all was calm; we went through the arch, and found ourselves in a narrow gulf surrounded by craggy rocks, of height not stupendous, but to a Mediterranean visiter uncommon. On each side was a cave, of which the fisherman knew not the extent, in which smugglers hide their goods, and sometimes parties of pleasure take a dinner."

"Skie, 6th Sept., 1773.

"I am now looking on the sea from a house of Sir Alexander Macdonald, in the Isle of Skie. Little did I once think of seeing this region of obscurity, and little did you once expect a salutation from this verge of European life. I have now the pleasure of going where nobody goes, and seeing what nobody sees. visit several of the smaller islands, and then pass west of Scotland.

Our design is to over to the south

"I returned from the sight of Buller's Buchan to Lord Errol's, and having seen his library, had for a time only to look upon the sea, which rolled between us and Norway. Next morning, August 25, we continued our journey through a country not uncultivated, but so denuded of its woods that in all this journey I had not travelled a hundred yards between hedges, or seen five trees fit for the carpenter. A few small plantations may be found, but I believe scarcely any thirty years old; at least, as I do not forget to tell, they are all posteriour to the union. This day we dined with a country gentleman, who has in his grounds the remains of a Druid's temple, which when it is complete is nothing more than a circle or double circle of stones, placed at equal distances, with a flat stone, perhaps an altar, at a certain point, and a stone taller than the rest at the opposite point. The tall stone is erected I think at the south. Of these circles there are many in all the unfrequented parts of the island. The inhabitants of these parts respect them as memorials of the sepulture of some illustrious person. Here I saw a few trees. We lay at Bamff.

[ocr errors]

August 26th. We dined at Elgin, where we saw the ruins of a noble cathedral; the chapter-house is yet standing. A great part of Elgin is built with small piazzas to the lower story. We went on to Foris, over the heath where Macbeth met the witches, but had no adventure; only in the way we saw for the first time some houses with fruit trees about them. The improvements of the Scotch are for immediate profit; they do not yet think it quite worth their while to plant what will not produce something to be eaten or sold in a very little time. We rested at Foris.

"A very great proportion of the people are barefoot, and if one may judge by the rest of the dress, to send out boys without shoes into the streets or ways; there are however more beggars than I have ever seen in England; they beg, if not silently, yet very modestly.

"Next day we came to Nairn, a miserable town, but a royal burgh, of which the chief annual magistrate is styled lord provost. In the neighbourhood we saw the castle of the old Thane of Cawdor. There is one ancient tower with its battlements and winding stairs yet remaining; the rest of the house is, though not modern, of later

erection.

66

"On the 28th we went to Fort George, which is accounted the most regular fortification in the island. The major of artillery walked with us round the walls, and showed us the principles upon which every part was constructed, and the way in which it could be defended. We dined with the governor, Sir Eyre Coote, and his officers. It was a very pleasant and instructive day, but nothing puts my honoured mistress out of my mind.

66

At night we came to Inverness, the last considerable town in the north, where we stayed all the next day, for it was Sunday, and saw the

« AnteriorContinuar »