From John OGroats to Lands End | Page 9

been known as the Orkneyman's Cave.
We went to the boat at the appointed time, but unfortunately the wind
was too strong for us to get round to the cave, so we were disappointed.
The boatman suggested as the next best thing that we should go to see
the Island of Noss. He accordingly took us across the bay, which was
about a mile wide, and landed us on the Island of Bressay. Here it was
necessary for us to get a permit to enable us to proceed farther, so,
securing his boat, the boatman accompanied us to the factor's house,
where he procured a pass, authorising us to land on the Island of Noss,
of which the following is a facsimile:
Allow Mr. Nailer and friends to land on Noss. To Walter. A.M. Walker.
Here he left us, as we had to walk across the Island of Bressay, and,
after a tramp of two or three miles, during which we did not see a
single human being, we came to another water where there was a boat.
Here we found Walter, and, after we had exhibited our pass, he rowed
us across the narrow arm of the sea and landed us on the Island of Noss.
He gave us careful instructions how to proceed so that we could see the
Holm of Noss, and warned us against approaching too near the edge of
the precipice which we should find there. After a walk of about a mile,
all up hill, we came to the precipitous cliffs which formed the opposite
boundary of the island, and from a promontory there we had a
magnificent view of the rocks, with the waves of the sea dashing
against them, hundreds of feet below. A small portion of the island was
here separated from the remainder by a narrow abyss about fifty feet
wide, down which it was terrible to look, and this separated portion was
known as the Holm of Noss. It rose precipitously on all sides from the
sea, and its level surface on the top formed a favourite nesting-place for
myriads of wild birds of different varieties, which not only covered the
top of the Holm, but also the narrow ledges along its jagged sides.
Previous to the seventeenth century, this was one of the places where
the foot of man had never trod, and a prize of a cow was offered to any

man who would climb the face of the cliff and establish a connection
with the mainland by means of a rope, as it was thought that the Holm
would provide pasturage for about twenty sheep. A daring fowler, from
Foula Island, successfully performed the feat, and ropes were firmly
secured to the rocks on each side, and along two parallel ropes a box or
basket was fixed, capable of holding a man and a sheep. This apparatus
was named the Cradle of Noss, and was so arranged that an Islander
with or without a sheep placed in the cradle could drag himself across
the chasm in either direction. Instead, however, of returning by the rope
or cradle, on which he would have been comparatively safe, the hardy
fowler decided to go back by the same way he had come, and, missing
his foothold, fell on the rocks in the sea below and was dashed to
pieces, so that the prize was never claimed by him.
[Illustration: THE HOLM OF NOSS. "It made us shudder ... as we
peered down on the abysmal depths below."]
We felt almost spellbound as we approached this awful chasm, and as if
we were being impelled by some invisible force towards the edge of the
precipice. It fairly made us shudder as on hands and knees we peered
down on the abysmal depths below. It was a horrible sensation, and one
that sometimes haunted us in our dreams for years afterwards, and we
felt greatly relieved when we found that we could safely crawl away
and regain an upright posture. We could see thousands upon thousands
of wild birds, amongst which the ordinary sea-gull was largely
represented; but there were many other varieties of different colours,
and the combination of their varied cries, mingled with the bleating of
the sheep, the whistling of the wind, the roaring of the waves as they
dashed against the rocks below, or entered the caverns with a sound
like distant thunder, tended to make us feel quite bewildered. We
retired to the highest elevation we could find, and there, 600 miles from
home, and perhaps as many feet above sea-level, was solitude in
earnest. We were the only human beings on the island, and the
enchanting effect of the wild scenery, the vast expanse of sea, the
distant moaning of the waters, the great rocks worn