MEMOIR OP PENNANT. 
41 
into the ground, or to a small dagger which the 
natives usually carry about them, and which they 
will stick into the ground, and twisting round it a 
fishing cord, descend by that to climbing places, 
and after finishing their business, scramble up by it 
without fear. Few w’ho make a practice of this, 
come to a natural death. They have a common 
saying, ‘ Such a one’s gutcher went over the meah ; 
and my father went over the sneah too.’ It is a 
pity that the old Norwegian law was not here in 
force. It considered this kind of death as a species 
of suicide. The next of kin, in case the body could 
be seen, was directed to go the same way ; if he 
refused, the corpse was not to be admitted into 
holy ground. 
“ But the most singular species of fowling is in 
the holm of Ness, a vast rock severed from the isle 
of Ness by some unknown convulsion, and only 
about sixteen fathoms distant. It is of the same 
stupendous height (1480 feet) as the opposite pre- 
cipice, with a raging sea between, so that the 
intervening chasm is of matchless horror. Some 
adventurous climber, having reached the rock in a 
boat and gained the height, fastens several stakes 
on the small portion of earth which is to be foimd 
on the top ; correspondent stakes are placed on the 
edge of the correspondent cliffs. A rope is fixed 
to the stakes on both sides, along which a machine, 
called a cradle, is contrived to slide, and by the 
help of a small parallel cord, fastened in like 
