176 Anniversary Address. 



drawing laigh. To keep the sea in ane open little boat, it 

 was dangerous, and to go to Dumbarr we durst not, so of 

 necessity we took us towards St. Tab's Head, but we having 

 but twa oars, and the boat slow and heavie, it was about 

 eleven hours of the night ere we could win there : howbeit 

 na man was idle, yea, I rowed myself till the hyde came oft' my 

 fingers, mair acquainted with the pen nor working on an 

 oar. Coming under the craig, we rowed in within a pretty 

 little how betwixt the main and the Head, where easily 

 going a-land we refreshed us with cold water and wine, and 

 returning to our boat sleeped the dead of the night ; but 

 needed nane to waken us, for soon be the daylight appeared, 

 three was sic a noise of fowls on the craig and about us, 

 because of their young anes, that we were almost pressed 

 to launch out."* 



On the steep bank leading up from this secluded little 

 bay, Arenaria verna was observed to be still in flower ; 

 also, the showy Astragalus hypoglottis; and some examples 

 of Asplenium -ruta-muraria were perceived in the rock 

 fissures. It was found rather unsafe to rest on the thymy 

 knolls at the top, as they swarmed with the yellow ant, 

 Formica flava. The tips of the wild thyme tufts were to be 

 distinguished by the profusion of the hoary pseudo-galls, 

 produced by the larvae of a mite, for which they furnish the 

 breeding receptacle. The rock butterfly, Uipparchia Semele, 

 started from its basking places on every little crag or sunny 

 bank littered with stones, hovering and dropping down as 

 uncertain as a withered leaf. 



The birds, unfortunately, at the time of our visit, had 

 almost all left their breeding places and gone to sea. A few 

 of the guillemots, swimming in line, were still to be observed; 

 and all was silent, except the clamour of the gulls, which 

 haunt the Head all the year round. 



The sites, so far as they were known, of the several small 

 monastic establishments that once existed on the Head, or 



* Melville's "Autobiography," pp. 169, 170. 



