ST. KILDA. GENERAL DESCRIPTION. 23 



ST. KILDA.* 



THE remote and solitary position of St. Kilda has 

 continued, ever since the days of Martin, to confer on 

 it an interest to which it is scarcely entitled from any 

 peculiarity either in the manners or the condition of 

 its inhabitants. The spirit of romance seems still to 

 reside in the clouds and storms which separate this 

 narrow spot from the world, but, like other spirits, 

 vanishes before the rude touch of investigation. Yet 

 the difficulty of communication with even their fellow 

 countrymen, and the ignorance in which the inhabitants 

 are destined to live, of the manners, events, opinions 

 and improvements, of the world at large, are sufficient 

 to excite some unusual curiosity in the traveller whose 

 amusement it may be to study the varieties of human 

 life and manners .f 



The appointment of a resident clergyman in this island 



* See the Map of St. Kilda, and also the general Map. 



f Previously to my arrival, more than a year had elapsed since 

 any one had visited the island. The appearance of an armed vessel 

 brought the whole population down to the beach, nor could we help 

 admiring the courage of the chief personage, then, as it happened, 

 the wife of the Minister, who hailed us with the important question 

 " Friends or enemies ?" They had remained in ignorance of the escape 

 of Napoleon from Elba, and of the subsequent events which had 

 agitated Europe, then but just subsided. Here indeeji was the bliss 

 of ignorance, if ever it could concern an inhabitant of St. Kilda, what 

 dynasty ruled in France, and how the balance of power was to be 

 readjusted. They received with little emotion the news of his defeat 

 and surrender, together with that of his previous escape and re- 

 establishment. The peace with America was a matter of more interest, 

 since there was here an immediate prospect of participation in the 

 effects of war. Their remote and defenceless island was subject to 

 depredation from the ships of that enemy; who had in various places 

 given proofs of his knowledge of the country, by burning vessels in 

 the harbours and plundering the islands of cattle. It was an evil 

 also, not among the least, to a maritime Highlander, that the Ame- 



