CHAPTER XIV

THE ISLET

With my stepping ashore I began the most unhappy part of my
adventures. It was half-past twelve in the morning, and though
the wind was broken by the land, it was a cold night. I dared
not sit down (for I thought I should have frozen), but took off
my shoes and walked to and fro upon the sand, bare-foot, and
beating my breast with infinite weariness. There was no sound of
man or cattle; not a cock crew, though it was about the hour of
their first waking; only the surf broke outside in the distance,
which put me in mind of my perils and those of my friend. To
walk by the sea at that hour of the morning, and in a place so
desert-like and lonesome, struck me with a kind of fear.

As soon as the day began to break I put on my shoes and climbed a
hill -- the ruggedest scramble I ever undertook-- falling, the
whole way, between big blocks of granite, or leaping from one to
another. When I got to the top the dawn was come. There was no
sign of the brig, which must have lifted from the reef and sunk.
The boat, too, was nowhere to be seen. There was never a sail
upon the ocean; and in what I could see of the land was neither
house nor man.

I was afraid to think what had befallen my shipmates, and afraid
to look longer at so empty a scene. What with my wet clothes and
weariness, and my belly that now began to ache with hunger, I had
enough to trouble me without that. So I set off eastward along
the south coast, hoping to find a house where I might warm
myself, and perhaps get news of those I had lost. And at the
worst, I considered the sun would soon rise and dry my clothes.

After a little, my way was stopped by a creek or inlet of the
sea, which seemed to run pretty deep into the land; and as I had
no means to get across, I must needs change my direction to go
about the end of it. It was still the roughest kind of walking;
indeed the whole, not only of Earraid, but of the neighbouring
part of Mull (which they call the Ross) is nothing but a jumble
of granite rocks with heather in among. At first the creek kept
narrowing as I had looked to see; but presently to my surprise it
began to widen out again. At this I scratched my head, but had
still no notion of the truth: until at last I came to a rising
ground, and it burst upon me all in a moment that I was cast upon
a little barren isle, and cut off on every side by the salt seas.

Instead of the sun rising to dry me, it came on to rain, with a
thick mist; so that my case was lamentable.

I stood in the rain, and shivered, and wondered what to do, till
it occurred to me that perhaps the creek was fordable. Back I
went to the narrowest point and waded in. But not three yards
from shore, I plumped in head over ears; and if ever I was heard
of more, it was rather by God's grace than my own prudence. I
was no wetter (for that could hardly be), but I was all the
colder for this mishap; and having lost another hope was the more
unhappy.

And now, all at once, the yard came in my head. What had carried
me through the roost would surely serve me to cross this little
quiet creek in safety. With that I set off, undaunted, across
the top of the isle, to fetch and carry it back. It was a weary
tramp in all ways, and if hope had not buoyed me up, I must have
cast myself down and given up. Whether with the sea salt, or
because I was growing fevered, I was distressed with thirst, and
had to stop, as I went, and drink the peaty water out of the
hags.

I came to the bay at last, more dead than alive; and at the first
glance, I thought the yard was something farther out than when I
left it. In I went, for the third time, into the sea. The sand
was smooth and firm, and shelved gradually down, so that I could
wade out till the water was almost to my neck and the little
waves splashed into my face. But at that depth my feet began to
leave me, and I durst venture in no farther. As for the yard, I
saw it bobbing very quietly some twenty feet beyond.

I had borne up well until this last disappointment; but at that I
came ashore, and flung myself down upon the sands and wept.

The time I spent upon the island is still so horrible a thought
to me, that I must pass it lightly over. In all the books I have
read of people cast away, they had either their pockets full of
tools, or a chest of things would be thrown upon the beach along
with them, as if on purpose. My case was very different. I had
nothing in my pockets but money and Alan's silver button; and
being inland bred, I was as much short of knowledge as of means.

I knew indeed that shell-fish were counted good to eat; and among
the rocks of the isle I found a great plenty of limpets, which at
first I could scarcely strike from their places, not knowing
quickness to be needful. There were, besides, some of the little
shells that we call buckies; I think periwinkle is the English
name. Of these two I made my whole diet, devouring them cold and
raw as I found them; and so hungry was I, that at first they
seemed to me delicious.

Perhaps they were out of season, or perhaps there was something
wrong in the sea about my island. But at least I had no sooner
eaten my first meal than I was seized with giddiness and
retching, and lay for a long time no better than dead. A second
trial of the same food (indeed I had no other) did better with
me, and revived my strength. But as long as I was on the island,
I never knew what to expect when I had eaten; sometimes all was
well, and sometimes I was thrown into a miserable sickness; nor
could I ever distinguish what particular fish it was that hurt
me.

All day it streamed rain; the island ran like a sop, there was no
dry spot to be found; and when I lay down that night, between two
boulders that made a kind of roof, my feet were in a bog.

The second day I crossed the island to all sides. There was no
one part of it better than another; it was all desolate and
rocky; nothing living on it but game birds which I lacked the
means to kill, and the gulls which haunted the outlying rocks in
a prodigious number. But the creek, or strait, that cut off the
isle from the main-land of the Ross, opened out on the north into
a bay, and the bay again opened into the Sound of Iona; and it
was the neighbourhood of this place that I chose to be my home;
though if I had thought upon the very name of home in such a
spot, I must have burst out weeping.

I had good reasons for my choice. There was in this part of the
isle a little hut of a house like a pig's hut, where fishers used
to sleep when they came there upon their business; but the turf
roof of it had fallen entirely in; so that the hut was of no use
to me, and gave me less shelter than my rocks. What was more
important, the shell-fish on which I lived grew there in great
plenty; when the tide was out I could gather a peck at a time:
and this was doubtless a convenience. But the other reason went
deeper. I had become in no way used to the horrid solitude of
the isle, but still looked round me on all sides (like a man that
was hunted), between fear and hope that I might see some human
creature coming. Now, from a little up the hillside over the
bay, I could catch a sight of the great, ancient church and the
roofs of the people's houses in Iona. And on the other hand,
over the low country of the Ross, I saw smoke go up, morning and
evening, as if from a homestead in a hollow of the land.

I used to watch this smoke, when I was wet and cold, and had my
head half turned with loneliness; and think of the fireside and
the company, till my heart burned. It was the same with the
roofs of Iona. Altogether, this sight I had of men's homes and
comfortable lives, although it put a point on my own sufferings,
yet it kept hope alive, and helped me to eat my raw shell-fish
(which had soon grown to be a disgust), and saved me from the
sense of horror I had whenever I was quite alone with dead rocks,
and fowls, and the rain, and the cold sea.

I say it kept hope alive; and indeed it seemed impossible that I
should be left to die on the shores of my own country, and within
view of a church-tower and the smoke of men's houses. But the
second day passed; and though as long as the light lasted I kept
a bright look-out for boats on the Sound or men passing on the
Ross, no help came near me. It still rained, and I turned in to
sleep, as wet as ever, and with a cruel sore throat, but a little
comforted, perhaps, by having said good-night to my next
neighbours, the people of Iona.

Charles the Second declared a man could stay outdoors more days
in the year in the climate of England than in any other. This
was very like a king, with a palace at his back and changes of
dry clothes. But he must have had better luck on his flight from
Worcester than I had on that miserable isle. It was the height
of the summer; yet it rained for more than twenty-four hours, and
did not clear until the afternoon of the third day.

This was the day of incidents. In the morning I saw a red deer,
a buck with a fine spread of antlers, standing in the rain on the
top of the island; but he had scarce seen me rise from under my
rock, before he trotted off upon the other side. I supposed he
must have swum the strait; though what should bring any creature
to Earraid, was more than I could fancy.

A little after, as I was jumping about after my limpets, I was
startled by a guinea-piece, which fell upon a rock in front of me
and glanced off into the sea. When the sailors gave me my money
again, they kept back not only about a third of the whole sum,
but my father's leather purse; so that from that day out, I
carried my gold loose in a pocket with a button. I now saw there
must be a hole, and clapped my hand to the place in a great
hurry. But this was to lock the stable door after the steed was
stolen. I had left the shore at Queensferry with near on fifty
pounds; now I found no more than two guinea-pieces and a silver
shilling.

It is true I picked up a third guinea a little after, where it
lay shining on a piece of turf. That made a fortune of three
pounds and four shillings, English money, for a lad, the rightful
heir of an estate, and now starving on an isle at the extreme end
of the wild Highlands.

This state of my affairs dashed me still further; and, indeed my
plight on that third morning was truly pitiful. My clothes were
beginning to rot; my stockings in particular were quite worn
through, so that my shanks went naked; my hands had grown quite
soft with the continual soaking; my throat was very sore, my
strength had much abated, and my heart so turned against the
horrid stuff I was condemned to eat, that the very sight of it
came near to sicken me.

And yet the worst was not yet come.

There is a pretty high rock on the northwest of Earraid, which
(because it had a flat top and overlooked the Sound) I was much
in the habit of frequenting; not that ever I stayed in one place,
save when asleep, my misery giving me no rest. Indeed, I wore
myself down with continual and aimless goings and comings in the
rain.

As soon, however, as the sun came out, I lay down on the top of
that rock to dry myself. The comfort of the sunshine is a thing
I cannot tell. It set me thinking hopefully of my deliverance,
of which I had begun to despair; and I scanned the sea and the
Ross with a fresh interest. On the south of my rock, a part of
the island jutted out and hid the open ocean, so that a boat
could thus come quite near me upon that side, and I be none the
wiser.

Well, all of a sudden, a coble with a brown sail and a pair of
fishers aboard of it, came flying round that corner of the isle,
bound for Iona. I shouted out, and then fell on my knees on the
rock and reached up my hands and prayed to them. They were near
enough to hear -- I could even see the colour of their hair; and
there was no doubt but they observed me, for they cried out in
the Gaelic tongue, and laughed. But the boat never turned aside,
and flew on, right before my eyes, for Iona.

I could not believe such wickedness, and ran along the shore from
rock to rock, crying on them piteously. even after they were out
of reach of my voice, I still cried and waved to them; and when
they were quite gone, I thought my heart would have burst. All
the time of my troubles I wept only twice. Once, when I could
not reach the yard, and now, the second time, when these fishers
turned a deaf ear to my cries. But this time I wept and roared
like a wicked child, tearing up the turf with my nails, and
grinding my face in the earth. If a wish would kill men, those
two fishers would never have seen morning, and I should likely
have died upon my island.

When I was a little over my anger, I must eat again, but with
such loathing of the mess as I could now scarce control. Sure
enough, I should have done as well to fast, for my fishes
poisoned me again. I had all my first pains; my throat was so
sore I could scarce swallow; I had a fit of strong shuddering,
which clucked my teeth together; and there came on me that
dreadful sense of illness, which we have no name for either in
Scotch or English. I thought I should have died, and made my
peace with God, forgiving all men, even my uncle and the fishers;
and as soon as I had thus made up my mind to the worst, clearness
came upon me; I observed the night was falling dry; my clothes
were dried a good deal; truly, I was in a better case than ever
before, since I had landed on the isle; and so I got to sleep at
last, with a thought of gratitude.

The next day (which was the fourth of this horrible life of mine)
I found my bodily strength run very low. But the sun shone, the
air was sweet, and what I managed to eat of the shell-fish agreed
well with me and revived my courage.

I was scarce back on my rock (where I went always the first thing
after I had eaten) before I observed a boat coming down the
Sound, and with her head, as I thought, in my direction.

I began at once to hope and fear exceedingly; for I thought these
men might have thought better of their cruelty and be coming back
to my assistance. But another disappointment, such as
yesterday's, was more than I could bear. I turned my back,
accordingly, upon the sea, and did not look again till I had
counted many hundreds. The boat was still heading for the
island. The next time I counted the full thousand, as slowly as
I could, my heart beating so as to hurt me. And then it was out
of all question. She was coming straight to Earraid!

I could no longer hold myself back, but ran to the seaside and
out, from one rock to another, as far as I could go. It is a
marvel I was not drowned; for when I was brought to a stand at
last, my legs shook under me, and my mouth was so dry, I must wet
it with the sea-water before I was able to shout.

All this time the boat was coming on; and now I was able to
perceive it was the same boat and the same two men as yesterday.
This I knew by their hair, which the one had of a bright yellow
and the other black. But now there was a third man along with
them, who looked to be of a better class.

As soon as they were come within easy speech, they let down their
sail and lay quiet. In spite of my supplications, they drew no
nearer in, and what frightened me most of all, the new man
tee-hee'd with laughter as he talked and looked at me.

Then he stood up in the boat and addressed me a long while,
speaking fast and with many wavings of his hand. I told him I had
no Gaelic; and at this he became very angry, and I began to
suspect he thought he was talking English. Listening very close,
I caught the word "whateffer" several times; but all the rest was
Gaelic and might have been Greek and Hebrew for me.

"Whatever," said I, to show him I had caught a word.

"Yes, yes -- yes, yes," says he, and then he looked at the other
men, as much as to say, "I told you I spoke English," and began
again as hard as ever in the Gaelic.

This time I picked out another word, "tide." Then I had a flash
of hope. I remembered he was always waving his hand towards the
mainland of the Ross.

"Do you mean when the tide is out --?" I cried, and could not
finish.

"Yes, yes," said he. "Tide."

At that I turned tail upon their boat (where my adviser had once
more begun to tee-hee with laughter), leaped back the way I had
come, from one stone to another, and set off running across the
isle as I had never run before. In about half an hour I came out
upon the shores of the creek; and, sure enough, it was shrunk
into a little trickle of water, through which I dashed, not above
my knees, and landed with a shout on the main island.

A sea-bred boy would not have stayed a day on Earraid; which is
only what they call a tidal islet, and except in the bottom of
the neaps, can be entered and left twice in every twenty-four
hours, either dry-shod, or at the most by wading. Even I, who
had the tide going out and in before me in the bay, and even
watched for the ebbs, the better to get my shellfish -- even I (I
say) if I had sat down to think, instead of raging at my fate,
must have soon guessed the secret, and got free. It was no
wonder the fishers had not understood me. The wonder was rather
that they had ever guessed my pitiful illusion, and taken the
trouble to come back. I had starved with cold and hunger on that
island for close upon one hundred hours. But for the fishers, I
might have left my bones there, in pure folly. And even as it
was, I had paid for it pretty dear, not only in past sufferings,
but in my present case; being clothed like a beggar-man, scarce
able to walk, and in great pain of my sore throat.

I have seen wicked men and fools, a great many of both; and I
believe they both get paid in the end; but the fools first.

****

Top of Page

< BACK    NEXT >

| Home | Reading Room | KIDNAPPED