A HUNDRED YEARS IN THE HIGHLANDS 99 



again at my command. That abominable yacht made 

 it impossible for me to say, * But I'll not go. I'd 

 rather catch salmon than voters.' So with a heavy 

 heart I left my country — for my country's good we 

 shall hope, but, at all events, for an aquatic battle such 

 as I have never seen and never shall see again. As the 

 old ballad did not appeal to me which says — 



" ' Up in the mornin's no for me, 

 Up in the momin' airly; 

 I'd rather gae supperless to my bed, 

 Than rise in the mornin' airly,' 



it was soon after dawn on a calm grey morning that I 

 found myself parading Stornoway Pier, whence the 

 long harbour was visible down to the open sea about three 

 miles away. I observed people looking seaward with 

 their spy-glasses, and wondered what they were taken 

 up with. In a few minutes all but myself and some of the 

 wise men with glasses were scampering away up the 

 town like mad bulls, roaring their loudest for all hands 

 to get out the boats, and ere one could cry * Peas ' every 

 male in the town seemed gone crazy, shouting out, 

 Mucan mara, Mucan mara /' (' Whales, whales !') 

 Many, half-dressed and hatless, were carrying oars and 

 guns, boat-hooks, old broadswords, and other kinds of 

 lethal weapons, one of them even bearing a kitchen spit 

 with its wooden wheel at the end like a gallant lancer's 

 jpear. They all tumbled into the many boats at the 

 Dier and on the shore, first throwing into them heaps of 

 jmallish stones, evidently to be used as round shot for 

 he enemy. I just sucked a finger of astonishment, 

 57ondering if I was living in an asylum, until a telescope- 



