6 FIELD AND FERN. 



makes a brave figure as he goes in full uniform, with 

 his cocked hat and clanking sword, to church. It is 

 grand to watch his six blue-jackets pulling through 

 the bay; and he had just derived no small lustre 

 from having brought an American skipper most 

 promptly to his bearings, when Jonathan declined 

 either to hoist his bunting or to show his papers. 



Most tourists take a pony and a guide/ and sally 

 forth after " thick little trout with red spots." Loch 

 fishing, however, is not in our way ; our toes would 

 brush the heather ; and Mr. Hay's Ordnance map, 

 with green, red, and yellow lines, is an all-sufficient 

 aid. The road out of Lerwick winds for a short space 

 among boulders and peat-hags, then down a rocky 

 path to the right, of which a woman with a huge 

 caissie full of hosiery on her back seemed to make 

 nothing, and over the strath at Dales Voe. The 

 road became puzzling, so we asked a girl ; but she 

 took fright at the map, and hurried swiftly down the 

 hill to a cottage, whose women inmates came out 

 and surveyed us with as much zeal as if we were 

 a travelling gorilla. So we fall back on our map, 

 and leave the green line, which means ' ' road prior 

 to 1847," cut the yellow entirely, as it is merely 

 ' ' surveyed/' take to the red " formed by the Relief 

 Board" for a short space, and finally hit off" the 

 green triumphantly by Laxforth Voe and Wabister. 

 Sheaves appear in a valley, with small farm-houses 

 here and there, and black and white cows, looking 

 no bigger than trick ponies, on the hills. The sides of 



