60 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society. 



cliffs, to hide themselves, loaded with the very little moveable 

 property they possessed, while the man and his son were 

 employed in driving away the sheep. We might have 

 imagined ourselves landing in an island of the Pacific 

 Ocean. A few words of Gaelic soon recalled the latter, but 

 it was some time before the females came from their retreat 

 — very unlike, in look, to the inhabitants of a civilized 

 world." 



Speaking of the houses, Dr MacCuUoch says, " Such is the 

 violence of the wind in this region, that not even the solid 

 mass of an Highland hut can withstand it. The house 

 is therefore excavated in the earth, the wall required for 

 the support of the roof scarcely rising two feet above the 

 surface. The roof itself is but little raised above the level, 

 and is covered with a great weight of turf, above which 

 is the thatch — the whole being surrounded by turf stacks 

 to ward off the gales. The entrance to this subterranean 

 retreat is through a long, dark, narrow, and tortuous passage, 

 like the gallery of a mine, commencing by an aperture not 

 three feet high, and very difficult to find. With a little 

 trouble this might be effectually concealed; nor, were the 

 fire suppressed, could the existence of a house be suspected, 

 the whole having the appearance of a collection of turf 

 stacks and dunghills. Although our conference lasted some 

 time, none of the party discovered that it was held on the 

 top of the house. . . . The interior strongly resembles a 

 Kamtschatkan hut, receiving no other light than that from 

 the smoke-hole, being covered with ashes, festooned with 

 strings of dried fish, filled with smoke, and having scarcely 

 an article of furniture. Such is life in North Eona, and 

 though the women and children were half-naked, the mother 

 old, and the wife deaf, they appeared to be contented, well 

 fed, and little concerned about what the rest of the world 

 was doing." 



There were then about six or seven acres under cultiva- 

 tion, the surplus crop of which was paid by the cottar to the 

 tacksman in Lewis, and which amounted to 8 bolls of barley. 

 He (the cottar) was also bound to find 8 stones of feathers, 

 the produce of the sea-fowl, which, with the produce of the 



