30 i 



THE l^ARMEK'S MAGAZINE, 



the ruiQS a mighty flood had left, of what may have been 

 pinnacles and gorgeous monuments of art ; and the 

 mind is intensely affected by the idea of what must be 

 the power of those winds and waves that toss about 

 such gigantic fragments* easily as a child flings its peb- 

 bles here and there on' the strand." 



Lerwick, the capital of and the only large town in the 

 islands, is very pleasantly and almost romantically 

 situated near the centre of Mainland. It assumes the 

 outline of a crescent, formed by the circular bay, on the 

 sloping sides of which the houses are erected. The main 

 street, if street it can be called, so narrow is it and tor- 

 tuous, generally follows the outline of the bay; and 

 from this, narrow alleys lead oft' at all angles, by which 

 the higher parts of the town are reached. From the ir- 

 regular manner in which the houses are set down, chiefly 

 with their gables seaward, a certain picturesqueness of 

 effect is obtained when viewed from the sea. It only 

 lacks colour to impart to it the liveliness of a conti- 

 nental town ; but as the houses nearly all are covered 

 with gray slate, a coldness and chillness result, by no 

 means pleasing to the artistic eye. Partially enshrouded 

 in the mists and sprayey clouds which often sweep the 

 sky of these northern regions, it is a dull and cheerless 

 place to look upon. A novelty is noticeable in the 

 numerous small stone quays by which access is obtained 

 from the bay to the houses which skirt the shore. As 

 there is comparatively little rise and fall of the tide, 

 communication is kept up, Venice-like, from one part 

 of the town to another by boats, of which nearly every 

 family possesses one, or at least a share in one. These 

 being perpetually paddled about — even women and chil- 

 dren handling the oar with dexterity — impart a pleasing 

 liveliness to the scene. 



The town is protected by the guns of Fort Charlotte, 

 which command the town and harbour. It is fortunate 

 that no active protection is likely to be called for ; for a 

 broadside from the guns would, we fear, do more harm 

 to the battery-walls which support them than to an in- 

 vading foe. Their first discharge would probably be 

 their last and final one. 



On the side of the Mainland, opposite to Lerwick, 

 and about five miles distant from it, lies the village of 

 Scalloway, beautifully situated in the bight of a bay, 

 from which a view of the island-studded sea is obtained, 

 Scalloway boasts of one of the few ancient buildings 

 remaining in Shetland. The castle was built by the " in- 

 famous Earl Pate," or Patrick Stewart, who built it to 

 aid him in his depredations on the poor inhabitants — 

 depredations backed by such atrocities and cruelty, that 

 James VL of Scotland sent a force to capture him ; 

 which being effected, he was taken to Edinburgh, and 

 there executed. 



Opposite Lerwick lies the island of Brenay, or 

 Brana, and divided from it by a bay or sound, which 

 forms the well- sheltered harbour or roadstead of Ler- 

 wick. Brenay is six miles long by some two or three in 

 breadth, and possesses some examples of the finest and 

 most scientific farming met with in Shetland, and to 

 which we shall hereafter allude. 



Divided from Brenay by a narrow sound, some quarter 

 of a mile in breadth only, but with a strong tide and an 

 easterly wind often impassable, lies the small island of 

 Noss, thedistinguishingfeatureof which is the precipitous 



* We may here note, with refereoce to the power of the 

 waves ia these Northern eeas, that Mr. Stevenson, the well- 

 kuown lighthou33 engineer, instituted a series of experiments 

 at the wild and solitary " Skerries," half-way between Ler- 

 wick and Unst ; the result of which showed the waves to 

 exercise a pressure upon the rocks of three tons per square foot. 

 No wonder that old Ocean flings huge rocks about as did the 

 fabled giants of ancient days 



headland v/hich terminates its eastern border, the height 

 of which is stated to be 600 feet. The " Holme of Noss" 

 is another, and not the least striking, of its natural 

 curiosities. It is a small rocky islet, covered on its 

 summit with a few yards of pasture ; to obtain the benefit 

 of which, a daring mode of access has been devised. An 

 expert climber — one of those adventurous cragsmen who 

 scale the giddiest heights of the worn sea- cliffs in search 

 of the eggs of the sea-fowl, ■which whiten by their 

 amazing numbers their shattered faces — took boat one 

 day, and, climbing up the perpendicular (nay, in some 

 places overhanging) cliffs, reached the top ; at the edge 

 of which, nearest the mainland, he fixed strong stakes, 

 fastening to these a cable, which was passed across the 

 chasm to the mainland, where it was firmly secured. 

 This cable of communication afforded a means of carry- 

 ing a cradle or box, which served to convey across a few 

 sheep to partake of the pasture thus so daringly won 

 from Old Ocean. At the time of our visit to the 

 " Holme" this cradle was taken away ; but as our boat 

 sailed through the narrow channel between the holme 

 and the mainland, we looked up to the dizzy height above 

 us, and formed some notion of the steady eye of him 

 who ventured to scale the frowning sea-wall. 



The south side of the island of Bressay abounds in 

 fine examples of frowning cliffs and craggy rocks. We 

 extract from an account of our visit, contributed to the 

 pages of the " Journal of Agriculture" for October, 

 1858, the following notice of the notabilities in this way : 

 " We took boat one day to explore it, and, being 

 favoured with a day more than usually adapted for the 

 excursion, we coasted along the base of its sullen and 

 frowning ramparts, and drank in to our hearts' content 

 the spirit of Shetland sea-scenery. On the south-west 

 point is a towering headland, some 400 or 600 feet high, 

 the name of which is the Bend of Bressay. Viewed 

 from the sea, it is grand and imposing, the face of the 

 hoary cliff being broken up into towering peak and 

 shattered crag and crevice, trodden only by the foot of 

 the sea- fowl or flapped by the eagle's wing. The inter- 

 est of the point is wonderfully enhanced by two magni- 

 ficent arches, perfectly gothic in outline. These are 

 formed by two projecting pillars, or rather buttresses, 

 which by some strong convulsion of nature have been 

 rent from the main mass, and project into the sea so 

 much as to form arches of magnificent width and height, 

 through which the giants of old might have wended 

 without bending their waving plumes. . . . Not 

 far from this point is the entrance to a cave only acces- 

 sible in the finest of weather. , . . The entrance is 

 formed by a magnificent arch, high overhead, and the 

 sides of which are beautiful with the gorgeous and 

 varied colouring of the rocks. The interior of the cavern 

 is tortuous and narrow, and can only be seen to advan- 

 tage by the light of torches. Then the glistening stalac- 

 tites greet the eye, and gigantic figures and unearthly 

 shapes start from the rocky walls, carved by Nature's 

 hands and chiselled into curious shapes and fantastic 

 contortions in ages long gone by. . . . We rowed 

 along the coast some distance further, till we came to a 

 bay or cove enclosed by black cliffs ; these started sheer 

 out of the water to a height of, it is said, 700 or 800 

 feet, twice the height of St. Paul's. The face of this 

 horridly frowning sea-wall was honeycombed by the 

 action of the weather into thousands of tiny nooks and 

 crevices, which afforded shelter for myriads of sea-fowl. 

 As the report of our fowling-piece echoed from the 

 cliffs, they rose in such numbers as fairly to obscure the 

 light, forming a living curtain overhead, and filling the 

 air with alarmed and discordant screechings. It was 

 curious, at the feet of these battling cliffs — which 

 afforded no spot on which a sea-leaguered wretch could 

 plant a foot to climb to safety — to find, as we turned 



