of the Outer Hebrides. 29 



known to most people as if it were an island in the Pacific, 

 instead of a part of our own country. 



It is not the distance which makes St. Kilda so difficult of 

 access (it is not more, as I have already said, than sixty miles 

 from Harris) ; but the want of a good anchorage, and the never- 

 ceasing swell which beats on its precipitous shore, even in the 

 calmest weather, form such serious impediments to effecting a 

 landing, that, in many seasons, it would be impossible to get 

 there before the middle or end of June. 



An intending visitor to St. Kilda must take his choice of two 

 evils : — either to go in a small boat, which, on his arrival, can be 

 hauled up on the rocks, though most people would hardly ven- 

 ture three-score miles into the Atlantic in such a craft; or to go 

 in a larger vessel, which can lie in the bay at anchor so long as 

 the wind is light, but would be obliged to put to sea immediately 

 if the weather became bad, as the anchorage is very exposed and 

 dangerous. I had made arrangements for a smack to take me 

 there; but the spring and summer of 1868 were so unusually 

 stormy that I should have failed in the expedition if it had not 

 been for the kindness of Capt. Bell, of H.M.S. 'Harpy,' a 

 paddle-steamer, which was going to see how the St.-Kildians 

 were faring, since they had been cut off from communication 

 with the other islands for nearly nine months. 



About one o'clock, a.m., on the 22nd of May, the 'Harpy* 

 got under way from the Sound of Taransay, and, passing the 

 Islet of Gasgeir, which is frequented by numbers of the Great 

 Seal, arrived about nine pretty close under the cliffs of Boreray, 

 which is five miles north of St. Kilda itself. As we pitched over 

 the swells which rolled in from the west, long strings of Gannets 

 kept constantly passing us on their way to the Minch. They 

 have to travel in this way from fifty to a hundred miles every 

 day to their feeding-ground, as the herrings do not rise near 

 the surface of the water until they get inside the " Long Island.'' 

 Much of the seaweed they use in their nests is also brought in 

 the same manner, as the rocks of Boreray do not afford suf- 

 ficient for such multitudes of birds as breed there*. 



* The insufficiency of material induces the Gannets to phmder each 

 other, and Martin quaintly describes an instance he witnessed : — " One of 



