46 THE CRUISE OF THE BETSEY ; OR, 



son, a week or so previous to the Disruption. Ere it received 

 an answer, the Disruption took place ; and, laying the whole 

 circumstances before my brethren in Edinburgh, who, like 

 myself, interpreted the silence of the Doctor into a refusal, 

 I suggested to them the scheme of the Betsey, as the only 

 scheme through which I could keep up unbroken my connec- 

 tion with my people. So the trial is now over ; and here we 

 are, and yonder is the Betsey." 



We descended the Scuir together for the place of meeting, 

 and entered, by the way, the cottage of a worthy islander, 

 much attached to his minister. " We are both very hungry," 

 said my friend : " we have been out among the rocks since 

 breakfast time, and are wonderfully disposed to eat. Do not 

 put yourself about, but give us anything you have at hand." 

 There was a bowl of rich milk brought us, and a splendid 

 platter of mashed potatoes, and we dined like princes. I ob- 

 served for the first time in the interior of this cottage, what 

 I had frequent occasion to remark afterwards, that much of 

 the wood used in buildings in the smaller and outer islands 

 of the Hebrides must have drifted across the Atlantic, borne 

 eastwards and northwards by the great gulf-stream. Many 

 of the beams and boards, sorely drilled by the Teredo navalis, 

 are of American timber, that from time to time has been cast 

 upon the shore, a portion of it apparently from timber-laden 

 vessels unfortunate in their voyage, but a portion of it also, 

 with root and branch still attached, bearing mark of having 

 been swept to the sea by Transatlantic rivers. Nuts and 

 seeds of tropical plants are occasionally picked up on the 

 beach. My friend gave me a bean or nut of the Dolichos 

 urens, or cow-itch shrub of the West Indies, which an islander 

 had found on the shore some time in the previous year, and 

 given to one of the manse children as a toy ; and I attach 

 some little interest to it, as a curiosity of the same class with 

 the large canes and the fragment of carved wood found float- 



