Malcolm | Page 6

desolation
of its lean ribbed and naked interior, producing all the phantasmic
effect of a great swampy desert; old pools of water overgrown with a
green scum, lay in the hollows between its rotting timbers, and the
upper planks were baking and cracking in the sun. Near where they lay
a steep path ascended the cliff, whence through grass and ploughed
land, it led across the promontory to the fishing village of Scaurnose,
which lay on the other side of it. There the mad laird, or Mad Humpy,
as he was called by the baser sort, often received shelter, chiefly from
the family of a certain Joseph Mair, one of the most respectable
inhabitants of the place.
But the way he now pursued lay close under the cliffs of the headland,
and was rocky and difficult. He passed the boats, going between them
and the cliffs, at a footpace, with his eyes on the ground, and not even a
glance at the two men who were at work on the unfinished boat. One of
them was his friend, Joseph Mair. They ceased their work for a moment
to look after him.
"That's the puir laird again," said Joseph, the instant he was beyond
hearing. "Something's wrang wi' him. I wonder what's come ower
him!"
"I haena seen him for a while noo," returned the other. "They tell me 'at
his mither made him ower to the deil afore he cam to the light; and sae,
aye as his birthday comes roun', Sawtan gets the pooer ower him. Eh,
but he's a fearsome sicht whan he's ta'en that gait!" continued the
speaker. "I met him ance i' the gloamin', jist ower by the toon, wi' his
een glowerin' like uily lamps, an' the slaver rinnin' doon his lang baird.
I jist laup as gien I had seen the muckle Sawtan himsel'."

"Ye nott na (needed not) hae dune that," was the reply. "He's jist as
hairmless, e'en at the warst, as ony lamb. He's but a puir cratur wha's
tribble's ower strang for him--that's a'. Sawtan has as little to du wi' him
as wi' ony man I ken."

CHAPTER IV
: PHEMY MAIR
With eyes that stared as if they and not her ears were the organs of
hearing, this talk was heard by a child of about ten years of age, who
sat in the bottom of the ruined boat, like a pearl in a decaying oyster
shell, one hand arrested in the act of dabbling in a green pool, the other
on its way to her lips with a mouthful of the seaweed called dulse. She
was the daughter of Joseph Mair just mentioned--a fisherman who had
been to sea in a man of war (in consequence of which his to-name or
nickname was Blue Peter), where having been found capable, he was
employed as carpenter's mate, and came to be very handy with his tools:
having saved a little money by serving in another man's boat, he was
now building one for himself.
He was a dark complexioned, foreign looking man, with gold rings in
his ears, which he said enabled him to look through the wind "ohn his
een watered." Unlike most of his fellows, he was a sober and indeed
thoughtful man, ready to listen to the voice of reason from any quarter;
they were, in general, men of hardihood and courage, encountering as a
mere matter of course such perilous weather as the fishers on a great
part of our coasts would have declined to meet, and during the fishing
season were diligent in their calling, and made a good deal of money;
but when the weather was such that they could not go to sea, when their
nets were in order, and nothing special requiring to be done, they would
have bouts of hard drinking, and spend a great portion of what ought to
have been their provision for the winter.
Their women were in general coarse in manners and rude in speech;
often of great strength and courage, and of strongly marked character.
They were almost invariably the daughters of fishermen, for a wife
taken from among the rural population would have been all but useless
in regard of the peculiar duties required of her. If these were less
dangerous than those of their husbands, they were quite as laborious,

and less interesting. The most severe consisted in carrying the fish into
the country for sale, in a huge creel or basket, which when full was
sometimes more than a man could lift to place on the woman's back.
With this burden, kept in its place by a band across her chest, she
would walk as many as twenty miles, arriving at some inland town
early in the forenoon, in time to dispose