Y. Kilda from Without. 91 



In 1869, when the first Sea-bird Preservation Bill 

 was under discussion, the Duke of Northumberland 

 rose in his place in the House of Lords to move the 

 addition of a clause : " The operation of this Act 

 shall not extend to the Island of St. Kilda." 



The amendment was opposed by a second Duke, 

 who, in advance of his times, argued that where 

 there was no policeman to enforce an Act it was 

 unnecessary to enact that it was not to be enforced. 

 A third Duke replied (no legislator of humbler 

 degree took part in the debate), and, the House 

 very properly hesitating to give its sanction to the 

 shocking morals propounded by the noble objector, 

 the clause was accepted without a division, and has 

 since been embodied in subsequent Acts. Parliament 

 has been before now likened to the elephant's trunk 

 which can pick up a pin or uproot a forest tree. But 

 it would be difficult to find another instance in which 

 the wants of a population of less than eighty* all 

 told, have been provided for by special legislation. 



There is a tradition that the sixty or seventy miles 

 over which the Atlantic now rolls, between St. Kilda 

 and the nearest point of the Hebrides, was once 

 bridged by an isthmus, across which the hounds of a 

 great huntress, "The Greatly-Savage, Soft-skinned, 

 Red-haired Muiream," ran deer from Conagher to the 

 Butt of Lewis. 



The lady whose fame Captain Thomas, R.N., in 

 an interesting paper published in the Proceedings of 



* The population of St. Kilda, as shewn in the Census 

 returns, was 



In 1861 

 1871 

 1881 

 1891 



H 2 



