324 Mr. George Tate on the Fame Islands. 



the tempestuous waves which break over the island. Fossheiand, 

 some time prior to 1G90, was superseded by Brownsman ; its 

 position is indicated in the early poetical Life of St. Cuthbert, 

 where it is said, " Stapheleland cum Tosseland conjuncta pro- 

 batur '/* for the two islands are separated by a narrow channel, 

 which is dry at low tides. The Celtic fuss means a ditch or 

 trench, but its application as descriptive of the island is not ob- 

 vious. In the more modern name, as well as in Svvedman, we 

 may have the Celtic maen for 'rock.' Other names, such as 

 Harecarres and Oxcarres, have probably been given from some 

 fancied resemblance which the form of the rocks had to these 

 animals. 



On a line summer day, an excursion to these islands is a 

 source of pleasure, from the novelty of the objects which arrest 

 attention, and from the interesting associations which cluster 

 around them. A boat for this purpose, with skilful and intelli- 

 gent seamen, can be obtained either at Monkshouse or North 

 Sunderland. 



The Fame, or House Island, is the largest and most import- 

 ant of the group. It is of an irregular quadrangular form, and 

 at low water has an area of about sixteen acres, eleven of which 

 are almost entirely bare rock. The soil is light and peaty, rest- 

 ing on a subsoil of clay from 2 feet to 3 feet thick, beneath 

 which is the basaltic rock. Formerly, especially in the days of 

 the monks, barley was grown successfully upon it; in 1855 it 

 supported twelve sheep, but at present no animals are kept, nor 

 is any portion (excepting small garden plots) in tillage. We 

 observed on this island forty-eight indigenous plants, the rarest 

 being the Danish scurvy-grass {Cochlearia Danica). The south 

 and west sides of the island present precipitous cliffs of rudely 

 columnar basalt, rising black and frowning to the height of 

 about 80 feet. It slopes towards the water on the east side, 

 vvhere it is protected by other islands, and where there is a 

 fitting landing-place for boats. To the north, as an ancient 

 author graphically describes it, " it is open to the whole force 

 of the waves, in the midst of which it lies like the broken and 

 defenceless hull of a shipwrecked vessel.^' 



All the islands are more or less deeply fissured, — a common 

 phsenomenon in basaltic rocks. One of these fissures, on the 

 north-west part of the Fame, is called the Churrij and extends 

 from the sea into the island for some distance, being partly 

 bridged over with rock, and having an opening upward at the 

 farther end. When a storm comes from the north, the waters 

 at half-tide rush with violence up this chasm, and arc forced up- 

 wards through the perforation, and form a magnificent column, 

 rising in the air to the height of 90 feet, which can be distinctly 



