From John OGroats to Lands End | Page 7

occupy our favourite position on the upper
deck, but had to descend a stage lower. We were saturated with water
from head to foot in spite of our overalls, and we were also very sick,
and, to add to our misery, we could hear, above the noise of the wind
and waves, the fearful groaning of some poor woman who, a sailor told
us, had been suddenly taken ill, and it was doubtful if she could recover.
He carried a fish in his hand which he had caught as it was washed on
deck, and he invited us to come and see the place where he had to sleep.
A dismal place it was too, flooded with water, and not a dry thing for
him to put on. We could not help feeling sorry that these sailors had
such hardships to undergo; but he seemed to take it as a matter of
course, and appeared to be more interested in the fish he carried than in
the storm that was then raging. We were obliged to keep on the move
to prevent our taking cold, and we realised that we were in a dark,
dismal, and dangerous position, and thought of the words of a
well-known song and how appropriate they were to that occasion:
"O Pilot! 'tis a fearful night, There's danger on the deep; I'll come and
pace the deck with thee, I do not dare to sleep." "Go down!" the Pilot
cried, "go down! This is no place for thee; Fear not! but trust in
Providence, Wherever thou may'st be."
The storm continued for hours, and, as it gradually abated, our feelings
became calmer, our fears subsided, and we again ventured on the upper
deck. The night had been very dark hitherto, but we could now see the
occasional glimmering of a light a long distance ahead, which proved
to be that of a lighthouse, and presently we could distinguish the bold
outlines of the Shetland Islands.
As we entered Bressay Sound, however, a beautiful transformation
scene suddenly appeared, for the clouds vanished as if by magic, and

the last quarter of the moon, surrounded by a host of stars, shone out
brilliantly in the clear sky. It was a glorious sight, for we had never
seen these heavenly bodies in such a clear atmosphere before, and it
was hard to realise that they were so far away from us. We could
appreciate the feelings of a little boy of our acquaintance, who, when
carried outside the house one fine night by his father to see the moon,
exclaimed in an ecstasy of delight: "Oh, reach it, daddy!--reach it!" and
it certainly looked as if we could have reached it then, so very near did
it appear to us.
It was two o'clock on Sunday morning, September 10th, when we
reached Lerwick, the most northerly town in Her Majesty's British
Dominions, and we appealed to a respectable-looking passenger who
was being rowed ashore with us in the boat as to where we could obtain
good lodgings. He kindly volunteered to accompany us to a house at
which he had himself stayed before taking up his permanent residence
as a tradesman in the town and which he could thoroughly recommend.
Lerwick seemed a weird-looking place in the moonlight, and we turned
many corners on our way to our lodgings, and were beginning to
wonder how we should find our way out again, when our companion
stopped suddenly before a private boarding-house, the door of which
was at once opened by the mistress. We thanked the gentleman for his
kind introduction, and as we entered the house the lady explained that it
was her custom to wait up for the arrival of the St. Magnus. We found
the fire burning and the kettle boiling, and the cup that cheers was soon
on the table with the usual accompaniments, which were quickly
disposed of. We were then ushered to our apartments--a bedroom and
sitting or dining-room combined, clean and comfortable, but everything
seemed to be moving like the ship we had just left. Once in bed,
however, we were soon claimed by the God of Slumber, sleep, and
dreams--our old friend Morpheus.
Sunday, September 10th.
In the morning we attended the English Episcopalian Church, and, after
service, which was rather of a high church character, we walked into
the country until we came in sight of the rough square tower of

Scalloway Castle, and on our return we inspected the ruins of a Pictish
castle, the first of the kind we had seen, although we were destined to
see many others in the course of our journey.
[Illustration: LERWICK. Commercial Street as it was in 1871.]
The Picts, we were informed, were a race of people who settled in the
north of