A Child of the Glens | Page 3

Head, as it rears its peculiar and
acute-angled summit against the sky. One look, and you are convinced
that no road could wind its way round the base of that frowning
monster. But let us strive to penetrate this cut-off region either on foot
across the moors, or by the rough mountain road that suffices for the
wants of the few and scattered residents. Standing (sometimes not
without difficulty) on the pitched-up edge of the mighty headland, and
gazing on the remote sea beneath, you feel oppressed by the sense of
Nature's vastness and your own insignificance. Nor does the dreary
extent of rock and pool-dotted moor that stretches inland to the very
horizon afford any relief to such feelings. So you turn away in search of
rest and shelter. Then but a comparatively few downward steps and you
find that the tempestuous wind has ceased to wrangle with you; already
you are beneath the shadow of the great rock. Descending further, the
bleak aspect of Nature is transformed. The heather gives place to dwarf
shrubs; the bare, weather-beaten rocks are clothed with blackberry
bushes, or hidden amid luxurious bracken. Dark hollies clinging to
detached rocks present varied and life-like forms. The air has suddenly
become still. The butterflies hover over the foxgloves. The wild
strawberry is at your feet. The sloeberries ripen around you. The sea
before you might be the Mediterranean, so gently does it ripple up to
the very edge of the hundred tiny plants that force their way amid the
sand. Great rock bastions shut you in on either side, and behind, the
green slope you had descended rises upward till it meets the blue sky

beyond. You might be in the south of England rather than in the "black
north" of Ireland; and you are struck with the probably accidental
suggestiveness of the name--Tor Bay. It was here that McAravey's lot
was cast, and here that Elsie and Jim used in their leisure hours to
gather the strawberries and stain themselves with sloes.
CHAPTER II.
Not that Elsie and Jim had many leisure hours. Like all else in the little
household, they had their work to do. McAravey's "farm" was but a
little patch of ten acres, part of it not even yet quite won back from rock
and bracken. On this he toiled as only a man can toil who works for
himself, and is assured of his interest in the soil on which he drops his
sweat. That he had no grown-up son (as might have been) to aid his
declining strength was a hidden sorrow to the old man. He worked on,
however, and bravely did his uncomplaining wife assist him. Neither of
them had ever known an hour of either ill health or idleness, and they
were guiltless of any conscious or intentional cruelty when they early
and sternly disciplined their young charges to the same laborious life.
The duties of the children were manifold. Jim herded McAravey's two
or three cows, or acted as scarecrow in the little patch of corn, each
precious grain of which was grudged to the passing birds. Elsie scoured
the house, and carried out milk to one or two somewhat distant
neighbours. But the most arduous labour of the children was one that
they shared together. When the weather suited--after a stormy night, or
when there was a spring tide--they would stand for hours on the beach,
often wet to the waists, dragging the tempest-tossed sea-weed to the
shore with large wooden rakes. This occupation was not merely
arduous but dangerous. More than once had little Jim, who was of
lighter build than the girl, been fairly dragged off his feet by the force
of the receding wave, as it wrestled with him for the possession of the
mass of floating weed which he had hooked in his rake. The weed thus
drawn to shore was subsequently sorted, the greater part being used for
manure, while the rest was burned in one of those rough kilns that
abound along the coast, and reduced to kelp, which is used in the
manufacture of soap and glass, and from which iodine is extracted.
Thus, almost from infancy, the children had been inured to labour, and

alas! for them the sunny hours of idle rambling amid the tangled foliage
of the glen were few and far between. Neither child had received any
education. The only school was nearly four miles off, up on the open
moorland. It was only in summer that the children could possibly attend,
and even then their visits were infrequent and irregular. On all religious
subjects their young minds were dark as night. Even a few days at
school had taught them that such things as reading and writing existed,
and Jim especially had developed in