WHALING AND BEAR-HUNTING 117 



name. Few there are who know this. Men learn about the 

 Kings of England and of Israel, with their dates, at public 

 schools, but never a word are they taught of the far longer, 

 far more dramatic and interesting succession of Scottish kings, 

 previous to their succession to the English crown. Not one 

 in a hundred knows that the old name for Ireland was 

 "Scotia," that it was not till the seventh century that the 

 Scots of Ireland gave their name to Alba, to the United 

 Scots and Picts of Britain north of Tweed, our Scotland of 

 to-day. But we are verging toward dangerous ground let 

 us get to sea again and continue to chronicle on the rolling 

 deep, and let Erin go bragh. 



Erin goes fast away on our right a violet line between 

 white-capped greenish waves and a grey, windy sky. We 

 came down Belfast Lough against dead head-wind and 

 proudly passed much larger sailing craft than ourselves 

 waiting in shelter for fair wind, and having hunted for a boat 

 in which to deposit our pilot ! We got out to sea, set sail, and 

 have again become a sailing-ship with a strong breeze on our 

 quarter. We knocked off eleven knots an hour, leaving 

 tramps and such-like behind us. But what an awful appear- 

 ance we have ! Four days alongside the quays in Belfast, 

 with coal-dust flying everywhere, have made us like a collier, 

 rather hard lines, considering we make no mess coaling our- 

 selves as others do. What a change there will be in the 

 amenity of seaports and all towns when oil takes the place 

 of coals. Imagine a clean town Edinburgh, for example, 

 and the beauty of such a dream ! 



It was the air pump and the connections between our oil 

 tanks that brought us into the thick of great events into 

 " Ulster Day " and the signing of the National Covenant, 

 and a small matter (hunting for some flexible iron tubing) 

 brought us into the great and beautiful City Hall. I am 

 sure few people have heard what an exquisitely designed 

 building this is indeed, what a very handsome town Belfast 

 is, taking it all round. And the people ! how I wish my 

 northern countrymen knew what they were like in the mass. 

 How very like themselves, both men and women, but perhaps 



