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The substance of the
following Memoir was read at the Anniversary Meeting of the Society of
Antiquaries in November last. At the request of the Council, the paper
has been considerably enlarged by the introduction of farther selections
from Mr Rhind’s correspondence, principally from a series of letters
addressed by him to two of his friends, the Rev. John Earle, Rector of
Swanswick near Bath, and Dr J. Barnard Davis, one of the editors of
“Crania Britannica,” which these gentlemen readily placed at my
disposal.
Mr Bremner, the literary executor of Mr Rhind, having put into my
possession the manuscripts left by his relative, I have made various
selections from them, which are now printed in the Memoir.
The portrait of Mr Rhind has been successfully engraved by Mr Robert C.
Bell, from a photograph taken in 1860, belonging to Mr Alexander Kincaid
Mackenzie, the brother-in-law of Mr Rhind, which seems to me to preserve
a faithful and pleasing likeness of the original, as he appeared in his
later years.
J. S.
March, 1864.
The late Alexander Henry
Rhind was the only surviving son of Josiah Rhind of Sibster, banker in
Wick. He was born on the 26th July 1833, and during his earlier years
pursued his studies at the Pulteneytown Academy, under the tuition of Mr
Andrew Scott, now Professor of Oriental Languages in the University of
Aberdeen. He then proceeded to the University of Edinburgh, where he
became a student in the class of Natural History in the session of
1848-49, and in the class of Natural Philosophy in the session of
1849-50; but even when at College, his early taste for historical
pursuits displayed itself, and, as he wrote to me many years afterwards,
he then attended the lectures of Professor Cosmo Innes on Scottish
history and antiquities, delivered in the University in the winter of
1849-50; “and they appealed” (he writes) “so naturally to my then
growing old-world tastes, that I was an unfailingly regular attendant.”
Some of his common-place books of this period are preserved, which begin
with notes of College lectures, but soon merge into extracts from works
on the early history and topography of Scotland, especially of the shire
of Caithness, with details of Pictsh Houses and cairns in his own
district.
In March 1851 he was occupied in opening a set of remarkable, cairns at
Yarrows, and other localities, in the southern corner of the parish of
Wick ; and about the same time he translated from the German a work on
“The National Knowledge of Antiquities in Germany, and Notes of a Tour,”
by J. T. A. Worsaae.
In the summer of this year he visited the Great Exhibition in London,
and thereafter proceeded to a tour on the Continent, which occupied him
for several months. In the course of it he passed through the Low
Countries, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, Saxony, Prussia, and Denmark,
and visited all the remarkable museums of antiquities in these
countries.
My first intercourse with Mr Rhind occurred in the early- part of 1852.
He had been made aware of my inquiries for examples of sculptured
pillar-stones and crosses, and accordingly sent me rubbings of the
curious slab at Ulbster, of which a drawing will be found in my volume
“The Sculptured Stones of Scotland,” printed for the Spalding Club. The
patience and care of Mr Rhind in removing the coating of hard impacted
vegetable growth which covered and obscured the figures on this
monument, involving the work of several days, were singularly in harmony
with the accurate habits of research which his maturer years developed,
and which he carried into all his pursuits.
In December of this year, he was elected a Fellow of the Society of
Antiquaries of Scotland, and in the course of the session he presented
to the Museum two remarkable stone vessels found near Wick. In May 1853,
he prepared a paper, of which an abstract is printed in the Proceedings
(vol. i. p. 182), as “an attempt to define how far the Cymric encroached
upon the Gaelic branch of the early Celtic population of North Britain.”
This paper furnishes abundant evidence of wide reading and careful
independent thought.
About this time Mr Rhind devoted much attention to the systerna-tic
examination -of a Piet's house at Kettleburn in his native county,
carried out by workmen under his own eye and directions. A paper appears
in the “Archaeological Journal” for 1853, in which Mr Rhind gave an
account of this examination, and in 1854, the whole collection of
archaeological relics and osteological remains found in the Piet's house
were presented to our Society with a descriptive memoir, which is
printed in the "Proceedings,” vol. i. p. 264.
In August 1854, Mr Rhind addressed the following characteristic letter
to the Crystal Palace Company, suggesting to them the propriety of
erecting models of certain early British remains in their grounds at
Sydenham :—
J. Grove, Esq.,
Secretary to the Crystal Palace Co.
Sibster, near Wick, August 16, 1854.
“Sir,—I am not aware whether it has occurred to the Directors of the
Crystal Palace, that it might he very desirable to include among the
contemplated additions to its attractions, restorations, or, I should
rather say, copies of certain primeval British remains, which could not
fail to be universally instructing, and at the same time highly
promotive of the advancement of archaeological science. If this
suggestion has not already presented itself to those officially
connected with the undertaking in question, I would venture to urge,
that it is worthy of consideration ; and perhaps you will permit me to
state my reasons for believing it to be so.
“It is true that we may search in vain among the rude antiquities of our
own land for structures which have any artistic beauty to recommend
them, or which could produce the dazzling effect of the restored
antiquities of the East; but then the gentlemen interested in the
Sydenham Palace have wisely shown, as indeed they originally professed,
that it is their design, not merely to gratify or educate the eye, but
also to supply suggestive materials for intellectual information. It
will not, therefore, I imagine, be an objection to British aboriginal
remains, that in an ornamental point of view they would be deficient,
since, as practical and really attractive instructors, their value would
be undoubted. For does it seem altogether free from anomaly, that the
visitors to the “great popular educator," as it has justly been termed,
should have every facility for ascertaining how ah Assyrian monarch was
housed three thousand years ago, or for studying the sepulchral customs
which prevailed on the hanks of the Nile more than a millennium before
our era, while no means whatever are afforded to enable them to form any
idea of the manners and state of civilisation at those periods of their
predecessors on British soil—their ancestors it may be. That such means,
were they once in existence, would be eagerly and extensively taken
advantage of, can scarcely be questioned ; for even among the most
unthinking sightseers— much more among those of ordinary
intelligence—when the curiosity is once excited with respect to past
ages, it involuntarily and naturally directs itself with special
reference to one’s native land. Thus many had they only the opportunity,
would doubtless acquire sensible and rational views on the subject of1
our national archaeology, in place of previous ignorance or erroneous
prejudices; and I feel persuaded, that another and very important result
would be a more general diffusion of a knowledge of the scientific value
of archaeological relics, and of the consequent necessity that exists
for their more careful preservation. A more efficient vehicle for the
promulgation of this truth can scarcely be conceived than the Crystal
Palace, which cannot fail to be visited by people of all classes from
all parts of the country; and I do believe that the information on this
matter which they might there receive, would do much to prevent the
wanton destruction of aboriginal antiquities, which those who have
practical opportunities for research are so incessantly called upon to
deplore.
“I hesitate to offer any observations respecting the details of the
proposal I have indicated; but it will be seen that I have been alluding
more particularly to the erection of facsimiles of specimens of the more
remarkable types of those primeval British remains which are of an
architectural or structural character. Some models of weapons,
implements, utensils, and ornaments, might certainly be well introduced
for illustrative purposes ; but as these smaller relics are already
collected, and can be seen elsewhere, it would scarcely be an object to
bring together very many copies of them at Sydenham. There, as I
conceive, attention should be directed to that which cannot be attempted
in ordinary museums—to the reproduction of those remains which are even
more vivid exponents of primeval manners than weapons or tools, and
which are more generally appreciable by unscientific beholders. For how
much more readily is the curiosity satisfied by a sight of the dwelling,
than by the mere inspection of the rude implements of its occupants; how
much more vague are the ideas called up by the arrow-head, the spear,
and the sword, than by the actual presence of the stronghold which these
were used to defend ; how much more meagre are the teachings of the urn
and the favourite arms or decorations of the deceased, than of the
sepulchre in which these were deposited. And we have dwellings still in
excellent preservation, the most curious of which are perhaps the ‘
Piet’s Houses,’ hill forts still nearly perfect in all their details,
cromlechs and chambered cairns, which have well resisted the influence
of ages, leaving nothing for the imagination to supply. To reproduce
examples of these and of such like (which, were it foimd necessary'
could be effected without much detriment even in the open air) could not
involve any extravagant expenditure, as the materials and workmanship
would be of the coarsest kind; and T feel assured, even after making
large deductions for my own antiquarian predilections, that the outlay
would be fully justified by the interest taken in its results. I am the
more confirmed in this belief, from having had occasion to observe more
particularly at Copenhagen, and at the Dublin Exhibition, the deep
attention which casual visitors, with no strongly developed
archaeological tastes, are disposed to bestow on good collections even
of the minor relics, which, as I have already implied, are not
calculated to be so popularly significant or attractive as restorations
of the character I have indicated. Nor would it be the general public
alone that would benefit by such reproductions, although this, of
course, under the circumstances, would be the primary object, but
scientific antiquaries, both native and foreign, and especially the
latter, would find them of very considerable service; as they would thus
have an opportunity of examining in detail primeval structures which
otherwise they would never see except on paper, since it might not be
convenient for many of them to make pilgrimages to remote districts in
Scotland or Ireland, where the finest examples of the remains in
question are preserved. This last consideration is, however, as I have
said, of secondary importance, as the Directors, I doubt not, desire to
make it their first care to provide that which shall be popularly
available; but even with this end only in view, and leaving out of sight
the contingent advantages I have pointed out, still I would hope that it
may be deemed advisable to reproduce at least some specimens of our
national remains—of only a single dwelling and a single tomb—as a means
of enabling every one to know something of primeval Britain.
“Conceiving that the Directors of the Crystal Palace Company will not
regard as an intrusion any such suggestion as the above, when offered
from proper motives and with becoming respect, I take the liberty to
address them through you, and to request that you will be so obliging as
to bring under their notice the subject of this letter.—I have the
honour to be, Sir, yours faithfully.”
Mr Rhind gave evidence of his diligent inquiries- into the early History
of Scotland in an article which appeared in the “ Eetrospec-tive Eeview”
for February 1853, under the title of “Early Scottish History and its
Exponents.” He chose as his text-book the well-known “Critical Essay” of
Thomas Innes, and the following passage contains his opinion of that
work :—
“It is not, of course, our intention to hold up the "Critical Essay" as
an unapproachable model of perfection, though candour must admit that
few disquisitions of its kind' can advantageously be compared with it.
The section set apart for the elucidation of Scottish history, properly
so called, is especially deserving of praise, from the comprehensiveness
of its mode of treatment; and the chapters allotted to the Picts are
also valuable, though ethnologically we decline to recognise them as the
standard of our faith. After making such an avowal, it may perhaps be
expected by some that we should enter on the great battle-field of the
Pictish controversy; but on this occasion, having neither space nor
inclination to do so, we have carefully and designedly eschewed this
exciting subject, with the view of confining our observations to the
Scots alone. For the present, then, let a single parenthetical remark
suffice—namely, that it is our matured conviction, after having perused,
we may almost say, eveiy scrap extant bearing upon the discussion, that,
notwithstanding the endless volumes which have been written, the more
minute and interesting facts of the case have yet to be evoked. Hay,
more; we do not hesitate to say, that the most recent investigator of
this complicated and somewhat mysterious topic, Dr Latham, is—always
excepting John Pinkerton— farthest from the truth, since he expresses
his belief, on most frivolous and untenable grounds, that 'the Picts may
have been Scandinavians.’”
In the "London Quarterly Review,” No. IV. for September 1854, another
article by Mr Rhind occurs as a Review of Worsaae's “Account of the
Danes and Norwegians in England, Scotland, and Ireland.” This paper
furnishes us with Mr Rhind’s opinion of the nature and amount of the
Horse influence in Britain, and especially in Scotland, and was noted as
remarkable at the time of its appearance, by competent judges, who only
came to know of its authorship in after days.
The first decided symptom of pulmonary disease in Mr Rhind was
manifested in the autumn of 1853, and his health now required him to
select warmer quarters for the winter than his own northern home could
furnish. Up to this time he had been able for considerable bodily
exertion. He enjoyed shooting and boating, and took part in the
exploration of ancient remains. The immediate change in his physical
power is expressed in a letter to his friend Dr Davis, written from
Clifton in April 1854.—“The ascent of a gentle acclivity has now more
terrors for me than climbing to a point in the Mont Blanc range 10,000
feet above the sea-level had two or three years ago.”
As his purpose was to proceed to the Scotch Bar, he meant to have
attended the law classes at Edinburgh during the winter of 1853-4, but
he had now to retreat to Clifton. Here he received accounts of the death
of his elder and only surviving brother, and soon after he was led to
abandon his design of studying for the bar. In a letter to me written
from Clifton, on 7th November .1854, he refers to his interest in the
prosperity of the Society. “I assure you I will do what I can to write
something for the Antiquaries, for I am quite of your mind that it is a
necessary duty to do so on the part of every one who professes to take
an interest in national antiquities and in the Society, which, whatever
its shortcomings, must be regarded as the representative of them, and
must be upheld as such.”
The winter of 1854-5 was partly spent at Yentnor, whence he frequently
wrote to me, and from which he sent a paper printed in our
“Proceedings,” (vol. ii. p. 72) on the "Bronze Swords occasionally
attributed to the Romans.” In the course of the same season he prepared
a paper on “British Primeval Antiquities; their Present Treatment and
their Real Claims.”
This paper after being read to the Society, was printed by Mr Rhind as a
pamphlet for the public, its main object being to create a healthy
reverence throughout the country for the remains of early times, and to
secure their more careful treatment afterwards. With the same object he
afterwards wrote a paper “On the Present Condition of the Monuments of
Egypt and Nubia,” which is printed in the “Archaeological Journal” for
1856.
In announcing to me the completion of this paper on British Antiquities,
he thus wrote of its purport (Ventnor, 9th February 1855)—
“It relates to the neglect and danger to which national primeval relics
are exposed. For some time I have been inquiring into this subject, and
have devoted to it a good deal of trouble, and shall have to expend
still more, particularly in examining additional blue books and other
parliamentary papers, which a friend in the House of Commons has
promised to send me. At first I intended embodying my materials in the
form of a review article, but I then thought that the subject was likely
to receive much more attention if brought before a society, one of whose
cardinal duties is to see after the interests of archaeological remains.
That being done, and the society (if it thought proper) being induced to
take some active step, I would he disposed to go to the expense of
printing the paper afterwards as a pamphlet for more general
circulation, in the expectation that it might be productive of some
good. I say this because, feeling convinced that the success of
archaeology depends upon the better conservation of antiquarian remains,
I have already exerted myself in some degree to that end, and intend
continuing to do so, in so far as it may be in my power. I am quite sure
that you will feel with me in this matter.”
In the year 1854, Mr Rhind wrote an article for the “Ulster Journal of
Archaeology,” (vol. ii. p. 100) in which he recorded the “Results of
Excavations in Sepulchral Cairns in the North of Scotland, Identical in
Internal Design with the Great Chambered Tumuli on the Banks of the
Boyne in Ireland.” These excavations had been executed at various times
under Mr Rhind’s personal superintendence. From such investigations he
always anticipated useful results, and at a later period he expressed
his opinion on the general subject in the following terms :—
“But however valuable such repositories as those alluded to may be, and
however important we may regard the aggregation of antiquarian relics,
it should always be kept prominently in mind, that the field from which
primeval archaeology has most to hope for is the careful, survey and
excavation of early remains. To me it seems that, the special
encouragement, furtherance, and undertaking of such explorations, should
be the prime function of bodies incorporated with a view to
archaeological study j and particularly of that body in England whose
position, means, and representative character at once warrant and demand
exertion—the Society of Antiquaries of London. Researches of this kind
are pecriliarly the work for associated energy and conjoined resources,
which can best accomplish them extensively and systematically. They are
also the essential pabulum, the necessary element of that scientific
progress in ethnological inquiry, which alone imparts dignity, utility,
and solid value to antiquarian pursuits; and therefore, if societies
existing for the interests of these should fail to direct a due
proportion of their efforts to clear the way for an onward march, they
may survive as centres of barren co-operation, but their tendency will
be to sink into mere embodiments of elaborate triviality, retarding, as
cumberers of the ground, the true advancement of the science which they
would profess to have in charge.”
The following passages regarding the excavations in question, and some
of the conclusions deducible from them, occur in a letter to Dr Davis,
written from Clifton on the 2d June 1854 :—
“If health, however, permit me to carry on many of the excavations in
the North which I project, I am not without hopes of securing some
tolerable specimens [of Crania.] But this, as I have said, entirely
depends, I regret, on the state of my health, for it is impossible, I
have found, to carry on such researches satisfactorily without personal
superintendence; and such superintendence, when the object is in a
remote district, involves considerable exertion and exposure.
“I certainly am disposed at present to regard the Cairns as somewhat
older than the “Picts’ Houses,” hut not much so; for, apart from other
considerations, there is a degree of similarity in the method in which
they have both been built, that I conceive marks them as being nearly
synchronous (if I may so use the word). This similarity is more
appreciable to one engaged in the excavation of them, than it could be
made by description; but it certainly exists, only the workmanship in
the Cairns is somewhat ruder, and therefore, perhaps, of slightly more
ancient date. Any such opinion, however, is liable to a little
modification as facts accumulate; but, reasoning from present grounds, I
think it is not far wrong.
“When you ask the question, ‘Must we not refer both (cairns and ‘Picts’
houses’) to the Picts’ I am certainly quite disposed to answer in the
affirmative, with only one apparent petitio pjrincipii (which might,
however, be made good), namely, that those remains belong, not to an
Allo-phylian race, but to the earliest Celtic population of North
Britain. I confess that this question is not at present perhaps capable
of complete solution; but assuming the fact to be as I have stated it,
then I believe the memorials in question to be Pictish, because, after
as minute an examination of the disputed subject as I am capable of
instituting, I feel persuaded that the northern Picts (at least) were
the descendants of the early Gael. But although this is my opinion, and
I presume is yours, from your question, still it is not universal, as
there are many who believe that the Picts were not Gael at all, but an
invading Gothic people, who took possession of the territory they held
about the Christian era, according to some, and a century or two later,
according to others. Although all parties would probably agree that the
remains in question are early Celtic (overlooking for the present the
Allophylian theory), there would not necessarily be the same unanimity
as to their being strictly Pictish; but of all this, I dare say, you are
well aware, and I only allude to the subject because you asked my
opinion.”
In March 1855, Mr Rhind submitted a statement to Lord Duncan, at that
time the Scotch Lord of the Treasury, with the view of obtaining
official directions that ah primeval vestiges should be carefully laid
down on the Ordnance map of Scotland, which would then “exhibit an
additional phase of usefulness by furnishing, as it were, an
easily-consulted index, of immense service in archaeological inquiries,
which would show at a glance where certain relics are located, or what
remains exist in specific districts,—a species of information which at
present is perfectly unattainable, except by minute and generally
impracticable personal research.”
It was to follow up this attempt, and very much in consequence of
suggestions made to me by Mr Rhind, that the Society of Antiquaries
resolved to bring the subject under the notice of the Michaelmas County
meetings of this year all over Scotland, with the view of obtaining a
general and influential expression of opinion in favour of the proposed
addition to the objects of the Ordnance Survey. He took a warm and
direct interest in forwarding this movement of the Society; and when he
was in London in October 1855, on the point of starting for Egypt, he.
wrote to me :—
“I got the copies of the circular which you sent to me, as also three
others from Mr Robertson; and I communicated with friends who would see
that a responsive resolution was proposed, and the matter ventilated in
Ross, Caithness, Sutherland, Orkney, Berwick, Inverness, Perth,
Kincardine, and one or two other shires. On my requesting the Kilkenny
Society to adopt the same course with regard to the landowners of the
south-east of Ireland, they readily agreed to do so; and in England,
too, I hope something by-and-by will be done, so that the movement may
be general, and therefore more effective.” _
The winter of 1855-6 was spent in Egypt, in the course of which Mr Ehind
began those researches in the Tombs at Thebes, which were to bear such
remarkable fruits. I need hardly say that the numerous objects of
interest, discovered by him at the cost of great labour and expense
(including a set of bilingual papyri and a painted bier, both supposed
to be unique), were all sent to our National Museum. In a letter,
written to me from Thebes on 24th January 1856, the following passage
occurs :—
“It is my earnest desire to add to our museum such a series of Egyptian
antiquities as will form a fair comparative representation of the
archaeology of the extraordinary people who lay so near the primary
fountains of civilisation. With this view, I shall gladly purchase where
I can, objects suitable for my purpose, which any of the peasantry
around may possess, with the view of supplementing where the results of
my own excavations may be wanting.”
However much engrossed Mr Rhind might be in his own special pursuits, he
was at all times ready to take an interest in and to forward the
researches of friends who applied to him for assistance.
Writing to Dr Davis, from Thebes, on 8th Feb. 1856, regarding his
efforts to procure modern skulls for him in Egypt, he says:— “For this
you may be very sure that I shall keep an outlook, as I hold it to be
selfish, if one can help those at home, especially friends, to lose an
opportunity of doing so, when they themselves may not easily have any
other means of coming at what they want.”
In the month of November 1856, Mr Rhind published a little volume
entitled “Egypt; its Climate, Character, and Resources as a Winter
Resort.” Its object is thus stated in the preface:—
“I have been led to prepare this book, conceiving that the modest
position which it assumes to occupy required to be filled up, and that
it was almost a duty to attempt to do so. Although I am not without hope
that its contents may have some interest for those desirous only to
increase their acquaintance with the realities of eastern travel, the
whole design has acquired its colour from having been undertaken chiefly
with a view to those who have to think of countries with reference to
the sanative influence of their climates.”
The volume contained not only the results of the author’s experience,
but also thermometrical notes contributed by Lord Haddo (late Earl of
Aberdeen), Sir Gardener Wilkinson, and others.
Mr Rhind spent part of the summer of 1856 at Sibster, and in the course
of it resumed the excavation of some of the remains in his neighbourhood.
The result was communicated to the Society in a paper entitled "Notes of
Excavations of Tumuli in Caithness made in the summer of 1856 ” printed
in the “Proceedings,” vol. ii. p. 372. In it he makes the following
statements :—
“It is scarcely necessary to notice, in so cursory a manner, that these
four tumuli, in the simplicity of the interments, without the not
unusual accompaniments of primeval burials, find many coincidences,
particularly in the north, and add to a large aggregate of facts of a
like nature. A careful survey of these has for some time seemed to me an
inquiry of decided importance, which would probably involve a necessity
for material modification of the current classifications, and limit the
applicability of the psychological deductions which have commonly
attributed to primeval ages certain feelings on the subject of futurity,
without sufficient reference to the special divergences indicated by
observed data, which, to say the least, mil hardly verify the exactness
of such a universal scheme of primeval religion. I cannot obtrude this
subject here, especially as I hope shortly to develop, in a more
appropriate and extended form, some of the views to which a
consideration of this matter is calculated to lead.” .
In July of this year a Congress of the Archaeological Institute was held
in Edinburgh. Mr Rhind took a warm interest in all the preliminary
arrangements for it; and Mr Way assures me that his exertions largely
contributed to its success.
At this meeting, Mr Rhind read a paper “On Megalithic Remains in Malta,”
which affords a specimen of his careful system of induction, and his
cautious refusal to adopt conclusions from merely traditional premises.
He also read a communication “On the History of Systematic
Classification of Primeval Relics,” in which he pointed out that the
idea of arranging by fixed progressive periods had not originated with
northern archaeologists, but had been discussed in Scotland long before
it took shape in Scandinavia. Both papers are printed in the
“Archaeological Journal ” for 1856.
The winter of 1856-7 was again spent in Egypt, when Mr Rhind resumed the
excavations among the tombs at Thebes which he had commenced in the
previous season. In a letter to Dr Davis, from Goorneh, Thebes, dated
9th January 1857, Mr Rhind thus describes his arrangements :—
“Having stated to our consul-general, Mr Bruce, when at Cairo, the
objects I bad in view, he very kindly applied for and obtained for me a
firman from the viceroy. Armed with this precious document, under the
seal of Said Pacha, enjoining all the governors throughout Egypt to aid
me in whatever I may require, and permitting me to excavate wherever I
like in the whole country, I possess here, where I have taken up my
position, a sort of irresponsible power. I certainly shall not abuse it;
and I do need it, for I have a shocking set of scoundrels to deal with.
I have already forty men at work at one point and twenty at another. At
the former I was cheered yesterday by the discovery of eight mummy
cases, and to-day of six more. They were not within a tomb, but give
evidence, I hope, of the proximity of one, and I shall diligently
persevere in search of it, as, from the position, it would probably be
interesting. On Monday I intend to have fifty more men in the valley of
the splendid tombs of the kings. I have several times gone diligently
over the ground, and I have marked off several spots that seem
promising. ... I have also originated an excavation on the Island of
Elephantine, 150 miles up the river, which Lord Henry Scott and Mr
Stobart have undertaken to superintend for me, sending for me should it
promise favourably.”
The exertions thus undergone by Mr Rhind seem to have been greater than
his strength could bear; for in writing to Dr Davis from Palermo on 8th
May 1857, he states:—
“In the early months of spring I was myself by no means so well as I
could have wished, partly I believe in consequence of over exertion,
which it was difficult for the time to avoid. This compelled me to
relinquish some of my designs, and one in particular, which I greatly
regret, a series of excavations, in what we call the Western Valley,
which, from its remote situation, would have involved an amount of
fatigue to reach it daily on horseback for the purpose of supervision,
that after a very unmistakeable warning I did not dare to think of
undertaking. I kept to work vigorously however at various points nearer
home, and at one of these in particular I met with very considerable
success. My reward there was a large and remarkable tomb with its
deposit in untouched security.”
In this letter, Mr Rhind adds :—
“After leaving Thebes I had intended pitching my tent for another month,
as last year, in the shadow of the Pyramids of Geezeh, but I found that
the season was rather far advanced. Accordingly I sailed from Alexandria
on the 4th of April for Malta, and thence here, where I have now been
established for more than a fortnight enjoying myself thoroughly. A more
delicious place I have never seen. The eye may be almost constantly
intoxicated with the exquisite landscape ; and all around the city the
air is redolent of the perfumes of endless varieties of flowers, orange
blossoms, and the other products of a most luxuriant vegetation. Alan is
the sole saddening element in the prospect, both from what he too often
appears to be in point of comfort, and from what we know he is in point
of liberty. It had been my design to go on to Naples and Rome, but every
thing here is so attractive that I shall not tear myself away uutil it
is necessary to turn homewards.”
The summer of 1857 was partly spent at Sibster, from which place he
wrote to me on 14th September, a letter, containing the following
interesting remarks on the Round Towers or Burghs which are peculiar to
the Northern Parts of Scotland.
“I shall answer your last question [about burghs] first, as to whether I
have bestowed much attention on the subject. Whenever and wherever I
could, I have not failed to note everything that came in my way
respecting the burghs, and I have also made them a subject of special
inquiry. I know a large number of facts connected with them, but I do
not feel in a condition to hazard as yet definite results. I have never
been able to hear of any of these peculiar memorials except in the
northern division of Scotland, the Orkney, Shetland, and Western Isles;
and I have made it a matter of very wide search in the antiquarian
topographical literature of England and Ireland to find some trace of
them and of the allied ‘ Piets’ houses,’ of which I have been disposed
to regard them as the outgrowth or development. I have never been able
to find any definite allusion to their existence in Ireland, although I
have particularly looked for such, because I saw reason to expect that
they might he in that country for the following reason. We have in
Scotland a remarkable class of chambered cairns. In the north I have
been a great deal among these and Picts’ houses, and I have been led to
perceive in the structural portions of both a certain conformity which I
could not exactly make clear to you in a short note, but which would
warrant a belief that both were the products of the same architectural
development. The burgh, if I am right in what I have said, would follow
the same analogy. Now I have inquired in vain as yet for either a Piet’s
house or a burgh, in Ireland; but chambered cairns like ours are there,
such as those at Hew Grange, and one in Kilkenny, although I cannot make
out that they are very numerous. Still their presence has to me always
induced the expectation of at least the correlative Piet’s house being
at some time discovered. If the towers Dr Simpson has seen are identical
with Dundornadilla, I hope he has taken a note of their structure and
locality. If they are merely circular buildings, without possessing the
double concentric walls, they will still be interesting, but I do not
think they would be burghs. In answer to your question, I would say that
this is the distinguishing mark of the burgh. Simple circular buildings
may be found in any country, and are perhaps not uncommon products of
early mediaeval architecture ; but even were such structures found in
Scotland, which I do not know, or at the moment remember, I should
require to be well assured of their archaic uncemented construction, and
to judge somewhat from their position before classifying them as
burghs.”
On 8th October 1857, he wrote Dr Davis from Edinburgh—
"I am delighted to see that your cranial treasures have attained such
valuable extent; and when you allude to what I have been able to do to
swell them, you estimate much more highly than I do the little aid it
has been in my power to give. Most gladly would I ere now have put you
in possession of some specimens to supply your deficiency of modern
Celtic types, but I have hitherto been completely baffled.....I have no
reasonable doubt, however, that were I ever to be restored to a degree
of health, which I cannot conceal from myself it would be too sanguine
to expect, such as would enable me to undertake researches in the
northern counties of the extent which I earnestly desire, then, being
personally present in Highland localities, I might confidently hope to
procure at the same time what you so much desire. Sometimes
recollections of this kind tempt me to be querulous and repining, but I
should not forget that with much to bemoan I have much to be thankful
for.”
A few days after this letter was written, Mr Rhind was prostrated by an
unexpected attack of illness, which confined him for a long time, and
reduced him to such a state of weakness, that although Dr Davis, who had
come to Scotland on a tour, was in the same hotel with him in Edinburgh,
he was unable to see him. Writing to Dr Davis from Malaga, on 11th
December 1857, he thus describes his illness:—
"The attack of hemoptysis which prostrated me in Edinburgh was most
unexpected, and very considerable. I was just about going out to church
on the morning of the Indian fast-day, when, without any apparent
proximate cause that I could remember, except it were bending a little
before, I felt blood flow into my chest, and I lost perhaps a
tea-cupful.
......I have now been settled down for a fortnight, and the change has
already done me a world of good. I have gained strength; appetite become
vigorous ; chest sensations apparently subsiding into their former
character.......After two winters spent in Egypt, I do not as yet find
this an unsatisfactory change for the climate of the Nile. It is several
degrees cooler certainly, probably 9 or 10 in the middle of the day, but
is still sufficiently warm for any one who would be content with the
sunniest days of our own August.”
At the Anniversary Meeting of the Society, on St Andrew’s Day 1857, Mr
Rhind was elected an Honorary Member.
While at Malaga, in the spring of 1858, Mr Rhind heard of his father’s
death, an event which was thus communicated to Dr Davis in a letter from
Algiers, written on the 26th March of this year:—
“Early in February I had a great grief, in the intelligence (until quite
previously), entirely unexpected, of the death of a most affectionate
father, whose whole being was devoted to me. The affliction was the more
severe, that the stroke, by snapping the last tie of near relationship,
leaves me as it were alone. Feeling that' a change from a place saddened
by so gloomy an association would be desirable, we left Malaga about the
middle of this month, and crossed over to Algeria.” .
To those acquainted with Mr Rhind’s warm, loving mature, the depth of
such a wound may be estimated. Some of the thoughts which sustained him
under his feelings of desolation, we may gather from the following.
verses, which I find copied into one of his commonplace hooks :— .
“WHO IS ALONE?
How heavily the path of
life '
Is trod by him who walks alone;
Who hears not on his dreary way
Affection’s sweet and cheering tone ;
Alone although his heart should bound
With love to all things great and fair,
They love not him,—there is not one
His sorrow or his joy to share.
' * * * * *
Who is alone, if God be nigh?
Who shall repine at loss of friends,
While he has One of boundless power,
Whose constant kindness never ends?—
Whose presence felt enhances joy,
Whose love can stop each flowing tear,
And cause, upon the darkest cloud,
The pledge of mercy to appear.”
In the letter to Dr Davis
last quoted, Mr Rhind thus refers to the question of Treasure Trove, in
the adjustment of which he felt great interest:—
“Before the last occurrence diverted my thoughts, and when, in point of
strength, I had so far recovered as to be able to undertake a little
work, I prepared what I had for some time promised, an Exposition of the
Law of Treasure Trove for the Scottish Antiquaries.”
This paper was read to the Society, and is noticed in the Proceedings
(vol. iii. p. 76). It was printed as a pamphlet, with a preface, dated
Malaga, 15th January 1858, under the title of “The Law of Treasure
Trove—How can it be best adapted to accomplish useful results?”
In a letter to me from Algiers, dated 30th March 1858, he thus writes of
his new quarters:—
“I need not say I have very great satisfaction in noting any particulars
that may be of use to our friend Innes, as regards spring quarters. For
myself, I have been very greatly pleased with this place, in point of
climate, since I have been here. The air is singularly soft and balmy,
without, however, being humid or relaxing; and as March and April have
the reputation of being normally of this character here, I do not know
any place where these months could be spent more agreeably. As to
earlier spring and winter, there is a certain proportion of rain and
changeable weather, as everywhere on the Mediterranean seaboard, but
less, so far as I can judge, than at any point on the northern shores,
excepting only Malaga. By the end of April or early in May, the heat,
although, it is said, not oppressive, becomes so considerable as to
indicate removal to those who, contemplating spending the summer in our
home climate, do not wish to accustom themselves to a high temperature.
By the way, one thing is probably worth mentioning, that local medical
opinion seems to be, that the air here being somewhat stimulant, does
not always suit those who are nervously excitable, and has a tendency to
arouse irritation in that direction.
“In point of other attractions, the country around Algiers is of its
kind the most beautiful I ever saw—ravines and slopes, infinitely
diversified by the most luxuriant vegetation. These, too, are in all
directions penetrated by excellent roads, and so the drives and points
of view are very various.
“The town itself is bustling and lively—too much so to my taste. The
hotels are good, and their scale of charges about the same as usually
prevails in France. For a strong man there are plenty of expeditions on
all sides by steamer or diligence, and much, if not always of special,
of adequate interest to see, in Roman sites, the outline of the country,
the Kabyles, and so on. If Innes thinks of coming here this season, and
conceives there is anything I can do for him beforehand, I shall have
the greatest pleasure in being of any use to him.”
In the beginning of May, Mr Rhind left Algiers for the south of France,
where he lingered for some weeks, Avignon being his, head quarters. Part
of the summer and autumn was spent at Sibster. On 23d August 1858, he
writes to Dr Davis from this place “a hurried line respecting the
Sutherland (Dunrobin) skull as you wish it,” in which he recapitulates
his reasons, formerly stated to myself, for believing the deposit to be
Scandinavian:—
“1. The sculptured stones (of which one was used as a cap-stone) being
native and peculiar, were not likely to be regarded by roving strangers,
who were inimical also to the indigenous population; and they (the
Horsemen) might naturally make use of a convenient slab.
“2. The situation not far from the shore gives probability to a
Scandinavian origin.
“3. The grave, in its structure of slah-stones and general character,
corresponds with an interment which I knew in Caithness, of undoubted
Norse origin, as the usual two shell-shaped brooches were present.
“4. The grave seemed to indicate a date almost, if not quite,
contemporaneous -with the native use of the sculptured stones ; and so a
native population would hardly use one for an uncontemplated purpose.
“I think the objection to your line of argument would be—(1) The
difficulty of drawing too strict a line between the symbols on the
pre-Christian and the Christian stones; (2) and chiefly, The Norsemen
are much more likely to. have buried in this fashion as pagans, and not
as Christians. Their paganism in the North of Scotland is of much later
date by several centuries than the introduction of Christianity among
the native tribes. Add to which this deposit is prima facie (though not
necessarily) pagan, as it had at least one accompaniment, a corroded
(apparently) ferrule of iron for the haft, perhaps of spear or pike.”
In September, Mr Rhind came southwards. I was not in Edinburgh when he
passed through, but he wrote to me afterwards of his endeavours to
assist Mr Hamilton, to whom was entrusted the construction of the cases
for the National Museum, by giving him all the facts suggested by his
experience, and by introducing him to the officers of the British
Museum, who were most conversant with the subject. In October) Mr Rhind
took up his quarters at Hyeres in the South of France, from which he
wrote to me, on 28th October—
“I am here establishing myself rather nearer home than usual—at all
events, for the winter—with the intention of moving down the Spanish
coast, or into Italy, in January, when the harsh spring winds may be
anticipated. At a first start, I am quite charmed with this place. The
views are exquisite; the vegetation almost richer than Italian; the
hotel where I am staying exceedingly comfortable; and the climate, it is
to be hoped, enjoyable.”
In this letter he recurs to the subject of Treasure Trove, to the
settlement of which he wished to give a fresh impulse, and adds,— “The
time was thought opportune to bring together the two pamphlets on
British Antiquities and Treasure Trove, and I have set them out in a
volume with a new preface, the sentiments of which in a letter to Dr
Davis, written from Hyeres on 26th December 1858, he says :—
“I am much pleased to have your opinion of the photograph of the Maltese
skull. Your attribution of it to an African type coincides with that of
certain Italian physicists, Orioli of Bologna, being, I think, one. Its
history is this,—It was found with crumbling bones in a species of
crypt, in the Megalithic remains at Hagar Kim, in Malta,—a paper on
which I read at the Congress of the Archaeological Institute at
Edinburgh in 1856. The specialties of these curious vestiges, and
generally the primeval archaeology of the Mediterranean coasts and
islands, offers a somewhat important field of research, which I always
try to keep in view. I am just now finishing a long paper of about sixty
MS. pages on one branch of the subject, ‘Megalithic Vestiges in North
Africa and their place in Primeval Archaeology.’”
The paper just referred to is printed in “Archaeologia", vol. xxxviii.
p. 252. -
In the beginning of February 1859, Mr Bhind left Hyeres for Nice, whence
he proceeded by Genoa and Leghorn to Borne, which he reached just before
the commencement of the Carnival. Writing to me from Borne on 2d March,
he says :—
“I need, not tell you of the Archaeological profusion here. It is
overpowering in quantity and dazzling in kind. During the past week I
have examined most of the ruins of ancient Borne. The art galleries and
the churches I have not yet entered upon. With regard to these, however,
I intend, on this occasion, only to familiarize myself with the most
prominent exemplars; and my time I propose chiefly to devote to the
study of the Etruscan antiquities, with respect to which, I want to lay
a good basement in my memory for comparative purposes.”
Leaving Borne on the last day of March, Mr Rhind spent a few days in
Naples, and then feeling the need of repose after the excitement of
sight-seeing, took up his abode for some weeks in the beautiful Island
of Capri. “The change,” he writes to Dr Davis, “was most pleasant and
useful, allowing an opportunity for digesting, so to say, the crowded
impressions of two tolerably laborious months.”
The revolutionary events then occurring in that country compelled Mr
Rhind to alter his plans and led him to hasten his return to England
without visiting the Balearic Islands, which he was “anxious to see for
the sake of their curious remains—the Talyots.” On his return he resumed
his residence at Clifton.
At this time a Committee of our Society was engaged in determining the
principles on which the arrangement of the National Museum was to
proceed. Mr Rhind, as I have said, had at various times visited, and
carefully examined, the chief Museums of Antiquities in Europe. He had
done this with a definite object and purpose, and as I was naturally
desirous of obtaining the result of his experience at the time when we
were about to fix the future arrangement of our own collection, he was
so good as embody his views in the following “Memorandum on the
Arrangement of the National Museum of Scottish Antiquities” :—
“With regard to the classification of an Archaeological Museum such as
ours, there are, I think, at least two points which may form an
axiomatic basis to start from.
“The first is, that a collection calculated to teach inductively or
deductively, should be arranged with respect to its instructive
capabilities, and not merely in the manner most convenient for generic
adjustment or reference, as for example books in a library.
“The second is, that such a collection being the embodiment, or rather
the data,' of scientific inquiries not fully developed, speculative, and
progressive, should not, as far as possible, be classified according to
any conclusion that may be doubtful, and thus cramped into a mere
illustration of a foregone formula, instead of being allowed, by a
quasi-natural juxta-position of the objects, to evolve whatever shades
of meaning they may bear.
“If these be the essentials of classification which we should endeavour
to approach, we must fail to approve of either of the two systems with
which, (as adopted on a large scale) we are familiar. The one is that
embraced by the Koyal Irish Academy, which may be called what I have
termed a mere generic adjustment, whereby, in consequence of
arrangement, simply according to material (wood, bone, stone, &c.) which
may belong to any age, race or country, the function of teaching is
almost altogether abrogated, and what little precise knowledge has been
hardly won of primeval ages, is nearly enwrapped in its original chaos.
The other is the method of the three processional periods which is
commonly described as Danish, which is in use at Copenhagen, at
Schwerin, under Herr Lisch, who, I believe, first employed it, and not
to mention other collections, is practically the plan followed in the
British room of the British Museum. To it arises the objection under the
second head, that its teaching is not unequivocal, and is admitted by
native investigators themselves not to be of universal application, even
in the three Scandinavian countries where it is most strongly
maintained, while, with regard to Britain, the sum of our experience up
to this point will not at all warrant such unqualified precision.
“Further, in both the systems there is the radical defect, that either,
if rigidly earned out, involves the dismemberment of sepulchral deposits
or other finds, which, it being one of the peculiarities in Britain,
consist often of objects of diverse material, and which, precisely for
this reason, constitute in their integrity our most valuable data.
“On these grounds, I conceive that a blending of the two systems, or
rather following an arrangement springing naturally from the relics
themselves, and, above all, from the circumstances in which they have
been found, would be at once more scientifically just and practically
useful. In such arrangement, I would admit but one inevitable
generalization, even that to be confronted by a scheme of constant
correctives of simple application. This generalization would merely be a
recognition of the relative inferiority and superiority of artistic
appliances and products, a gradation inferentially related to the lapse
of time—as the broad teaching of history and experience is progress in
those matters—but a gradation not necessarily chronometrical, and the
precise significance of which it would be the object of this corrective
system gradually to unfold, rather than preliminarily to assume.
“A short outline of the practical details I should propose to follow
will be more explanatory than an exposition of abstract principles.
“Supposing the classification were to be commenced as you enter the
Museum, I should begin by arranging in the first wall case to the right,
all the stone weapons and implements now in our possession, not forming
part of heterogeneous finds. In the 6ame case I would place those urns,
patera and ornaments, &c., of a similarly isolated character, the like
of which, experience or analogy may teach us, has been found in
conjunction with stone relics in this country. In a portion of this case
duly defined, and headed “Illustrative/’ as opposed to “Native,” I
should exhibit corresponding objects from other countries, including
Irish relics ; but not English relics, which, for obvious ethnographical
reasons, it would not at this stage be necessary to dissociate from
Scottish. In continuation of this case, I would have a space for early
mixed and indeterminate objects, and then proceed on the same plan with
the metallic and correlative relics, taking care, as before, to be
guided, if possible, by facts, or at all events, by analogy and
judgment, in determining what vestiges are to be associated.
“Then, as to the practical commentary on this stringing together or
quasiclassification of what may be called the waifs or separate objects,
I would have in the wall cases immediately opposite, or in some
instances in cases on the floor, any group in its integrity which
constituted any one sepulchral deposit, or the contents of any one
primeval dwelling; a description of archaeological material of great
value, and not unlikely to accumulate from the increasing care of
excavators. Already we have several. Accompanying these, I would have,
whenever drawings exist, illustrations of the remains, and even
positions in which they were discovered—representations which might be
merely the engravings in use—to illustrate descriptive papers, original
sketches, or photographic copies of these on a small scale, now so
easily and cheaply produced. Models also of the vestiges which have
yielded the relics, and, indeed, of all others of a corresponding
character, are also a species of treasure which should find their place
here, and the accumulation of which ought to receive every attention :
nor would I limit this mode of illustration to the groups. In every
instance, where similar material exists for the elucidation of what I
have termed the isolated objects, in the opposite wall-cases, I would
likewise back them with such exponents of their history. For both the
groups and the separate objects, I would also have another common
rule—that each should bear a plainly legible statement of at least the
place and description of monument in which it was found, along with a
precise reference to volume and page of the “original source,” whenever
the circumstances under which it was discovered have been recorded,
whether in MS. in the archives of the Society, or in print in the
Society’s Proceedings, or elsewhere.
“It is thus by blending and reflecting, one against the other, the
intimations of single objects—relics in their primitive groups, and
monuments, all in their mutual co-relation,—that we shall best extract
their fullest signification, and at the same time guard against going
beyond it.
“As I have here chiefly to deal with pre-historic vestiges, I need
hardly go farther, and it is unnecessary to add, that at the conclusion
of a sequence such as the foregoing notes indicate, we should come to
works bearing evidence of direct Roman influence. Of a later period
still, we have as yet in Scotland recovered very few relics
corresponding in date to the Anglo-Saxon antiquities so numerous in
England, and this, in fact, is one of the dimmest vistas in Scottish
archaeology. At the outskirts, and at the close of this epoch, we come
to Scoto-Irish products—the contents of a few Scandinavian graves on our
coasts, distinguished generally by their shell-shaped brooches, and
hordes like the valuable addition from Orkney which the Museum has
lately received. Then antiquarian inquiry, already begun to find outlet
in other paths, is bereft almost entirely of much of its older field,
and its materials and products, at once more full and more precise, fall
readily, with only occasional difficulties, into chronological line.
“I have thus hurriedly endeavoured to sketch the general features of the
conception I have formed of a scientific archaeological collection.
After acquaintance with nearly all the museums in Europe, the impression
which remains with me is, that the foregoing outline represents the idea
of what one would wish a National assemblage of relics to be, as a
medium whereby to arrive readily, practically, and in an unbiassed
shape, at an estimate of the archaeological characteristics of any given
country. It need scarcely be added that such an arrangement implies
neither particular difficulty nor undue extravagance of space. It would
require care and judgment, but no more trouble than such an object
legitimately demands; and in its minuter developments such as the
supplying of titles, illustrations, and references, the work could be
gradually completed not necessarily before but after the Museum is
opened.”
A. Henry Rhind.
Clifton, 11th June 1859.
In the month of July 1859, Mr Rhind came to Edinburgh, where he resided
during that month and part of August. In the end of July he attended the
meeting of the Archaeological Institute at Carlisle where I met him. He
only remained for a couple of days, and feeling unable for the fatigue
of country excursions, he confined himself to an examination of the
local museum of the Institute, and to attendance in the Sections at the
reading of the more remarkable papers.
At a later period of the season he arranged for a lease of the beautiful
mansion of Down House near Bristol, of which, on 10th October, he thus
wrote to me at Malvern, where I was at the time—
“I have been getting settled in my new abode, into which I moved a week
ago. Although I am pretty well accustomed to moving my tent, yet it is a
sad tax on time and other occupations shaking into place, when the
result promises to be something like permanency. When it is over,
however, and my senates are fixed, I fancy I may count upon having no
other flitting in the full sense of the term until the last.”
He was at the same time meditating his usual winter flight, but amid all
his distractions, he kept in view the arrangement of the Museum at
Edinburgh. In the same letter he writes me—
“I have heard from Mr M‘Culloch [the keeper of the Museum] several
times, and I write as fully as I can in answer to his questions. You
know, however, the difficulty of realising the positions of absent
things, and of tracing in and by letters, transpositions which a glance
might set at rest. So far as I make out he has been getting on nicely \
but when you get home, do look h\ and keep him, as far as possible, to
principles, which, with the best will in the world, one is apt to
overlook in a natural, and, indeed, so far commendable anxiety to
arrange for the eye and for facility of cataloguing.”
It was Mr Rhind's wish to have been present at the meeting of the
British Association which took place at Aberdeen in September of this
year: he took especial interest in the proceedings of the Ethnological
Section, and the relative Archaeological Museum formed under the
auspices of Mr Charles E. Dalrymple and other members of a local
committee. But as he afterwards wrote to Dr Davis from Boulogne on 7th
November, he was unable to enjoy the pleasure: “To me it was a decided
privation to have been obliged to forego the meeting at Aberdeen, as
besides the other inducements, I had counted upon meeting so many
friends together who are not easily brought within reach otherwise.” In
this letter he informed Dr Davis that he had been detained at Boulogne
from the effects of a bad cold caught during the passage across, which
proved unexpectedly boisterous, by exposure from which he could find no
shelter, in consequence of the crowd on board and the miserably
uncomfortable construction of the steamer. He however felt so much
better as to propose to begin his journey to Hyeres on the following
day. On that day, however, he had a recurrence of his old complaint,
which completely prostrated him, and detained him at Boulogne for a
month before he gathered even a feeble amount of strength. “You will
readily believe,” he afterwards wrote to Dr Davis from Hyeres on 3d
March 1860, “that under these circumstances a journey across France in
mid winter was rather an undertaking, but there was nothing else to be
done, and by care and arrangement I accomplished it without detriment.”
In the same letter he writes—
“I have no doubt you have read Darwin’s remarkable book on the “ Origin
of Species.” I had it sent here with a parcel of others, and have just
finished it. Viewed antagonistically or not, it is a great performance,
from the evident and continuous thought with which it has been
elaborated, and the free range which it evinces over a vast area of
facts. Without as yet having been able to give it full consideration, I
am disposed to think that he has done more than has ever been done
formerly to show cause for believing that species are not necessarily
fixed elemental points. But how far, and to what extent, the power and
principle of mutability has been operative, is the question. Whether an
inflexible logic, from specials to the widest generals, is to bear down
all before it; and whether an analogy, not necessarily of universal
application, must be held to swamp all difficulties, is the issue. I
should like to see this phase discussed by the professed physiologists
and zoologists ; and I dare say this will come presently, but hitherto
they seem to have been rather holding aloof.'.
In a letter to me from Hyeres, dated 27th February of this year, are the
following passages on “The Picts’ and “The Sculptured Stones of
Scotland/’ which are well worth preserving:—
“As to the special point you mention, defining Galloway in the tenth
century Terra Pictorum, I do not, like you, remember any authority
applicable, otherwise than inferentially. But with regard to the actual
ethnologic position of the Celtic population which we seem to find there
later, that could only be dealt with as part of the general question
affecting the Picts. And first of all, what force is to be given to the
name Pictish. If we are to use it merely in a political sense (so to
say) as describing the nation we find in East and North East Scotland,
then it would have no more ethnographic significance than for example
the terms Mercian or East Anglian in South Britain, and would fail to be
a palpable distinction. But if we are to make it a test of race, and of
generic import, we have the old problem in all its complexity. I myself
greatly doubt the accuracy of a rigid application. I am satisfied as to
the generic Kelticism of the Picts, but not that they were exclusively
or specially Gaelic, or specially Cymric. While, then, Bede lays down
their boundaries to the South expressly enough, in his day, as a nation,
we must not necessarily ipso facto conclude that the race element of
Pietism was at all times, or at any time, restricted to the north of his
line, and to the exclusion of Ireland—where, the more I used to think of
it, the more I was convinced that there was not an uniformity in its
Keltism. I should greatly like to see developed the line of inquiry
which you point to, and which the new glimpses of Pictish institutions
have opened up—namely, a minute comparison with the state of matters in
Ireland and South . Britain.
“As to the Stones, a section of what you mention is very much what I
have been endeavouring to keep in view. With reference to a general
idea, in demanding which you rather drive me into a corner, I would be
disposed to formulate it somewhat thus :—
“1. The crude figures in their simplicity (those we term symbols) have
not hitherto been met with—at all events similarly grouped elsewhere.
“2. The ornamentation,—interlaced knot work, and such like—was common in
Eoman work, particularly of late time.
“3. Certain of the figures, such as some of the men and horses, have a
strong resemblance to debased Roman work. To give one or two
analogies:—on the fronts of Christian sarcophagi from the catacombs at
Rome, and in incidental bas reliefs often merely built into modern walls
in Italy, I have noted groups of considerable correspondence with the
best of ours; such as men with kilt-like tunics, horses of the same
full, rounded contour, ridden by men without stirrups and with pointed
toes, a chariot with occupants like one at Meigle.
“As to the first (the symbols) I should not feel quite warranted to
speculate whence they originated, although, judging by analogy and by
the epoch to which they seem referrible, I should suspect that they
sprung from some untraceable foreign germs, rather than consider that
they were of pure native creation. But that they were a specially native
development seems clear from their number and local restriction. The
second and third, again, I should be inclined to look upon as almost
entirely adopted and imitative products. If this view be correct, it
should exercise an influence on what may be termed the archaeological
reading of the third (the figures, &c.), by making it doubtful whether
they are intended to represent the contemporary dress or customs of the
country.
“On the general ethnical questions hinging on the positive or negative
affirmation of an early native art-growth, I could not here enter.
“I am now in correspondence with Italy on the subject of some of those
reliefs and sarcophagi to which I alluded; but it is difficult to
accomplish exactly what one wants. In a fortnight or so a friend of mine
is going there, and I think I may be able to get some help through him.
If you chance to have any spare copies of individual stones on thin
paper, and would send me three, being of examples typically
representative of respectively the symbols, the ornamenting knot-work,
and the pictorial figures, they might be very useful in enabling me to
send clear instructions by my friend.”
In his next letter to me, dated 4th April, he writes :—
“Your letter, and the packet with the lithographs of the stones which
you so practically replied to me by sending, arrived safely a fortnight
ago, and I lost no time in employing the latter in the manner I had in
view. I have not yet heard from Borne as to the results of the
instructions I gave for a draughtsman’s work, nor, indeed, do I expect
to do so for some little time.
“The report of your last meeting shows a most thriving state of things.
Accurate drawings and descriptions, like that by Captain Thomas of the
houses in Harris, are of the highest interest, and I echo your wish that
they (particularly the plans and drawings) were more numerous. I am very
glad to be able to send you with this, I suppose in time for your next
meeting, a paper, the materials for which have at various times cost me
much trouble in the gathering. It forms part of the diggings in the
general archaeology of the Old World, which I try to keep following out,
without being very hopeful, I am sad to confess it, that I shall ever be
able to complete my scheme.”
The paper thus referred to was “On the Use of Bronze and Iron in Ancient
Egypt, with reference to General Archaeology.” An abstract of it is
printed in our Proceedings, vol. iii. p. 464.
About the middle of April Mr Rhind began his homeward journey, making
Tismes his headquarters for two or three weeks, "as there is a good deal
of antiquarian interest there, and close by at Arles,” reaching England
early in June. On the 15th of this month he wrote Dr Davis on the
subject of a series of ethnological queries, which that gentleman
proposed to put into the hands of competent observers in different
localities :—
“In the matter of the 'queries' of course, I shall be most glad to be of
any use to you; but when you and Stuart talk of my opinion on the
subject as being of any value, I am only certain that you both very
decidedly overestimate it. I think the form of the questions is well
calculated to get at the facts you want; but I frankly confess to you
that I should put little or no reliance for purposes of sound deduction,
upon the answers in the mass which you are likely to receive. Nobody
will know better than yourself how rare is the capacity for scientific
observation, even in matters where direct tangible testimony is alone
involved, without the necessity of the exercise of judgment. But in the
case of your queries, where the observer has to state general results
(as in 2, 3, and 6), from a comparative discrimination of many (say
twenty) diverse units, I think the task is one which, if well executed,
would itself require a judicious and rational ethno-loger. Again,
supposing that individual observers were tolerably capable, there would
almost necessarily be sufficient difference in' their respective mental
processes of weighing evidence, to make the aggregate product an
accretion of ^uniform items. In fact, it seems to me that a series of
observations, such as those in question, to be of full practical value,
would require to be made by one practised eye, guided by one standard of
elimination—in short, it is an affair in which, from the delicacy of the
process,-as applied to minute ethnology, everything depends on the
observer and his judicial ability. I would strongly, therefore, incline
to the view that, if you contemplate founding on a series of inquiries
of the nature indicated in the ‘queries,’ it would he a very great
matter if you could, in your own person, make the few local inspections
that would be needed. Previously selecting your points, and provided
with introductions, a tour of four or six weeks would, I believe,
accomplish the work satisfactorily, and in such a manner that, if you
came to build, you could rely upon the bricks.”
In the month of August 1860 I had the pleasure of visiting Mr Rhind at
his residence near Bristol. He was then busy with his book on Thebes,
and in such health as enabled him to enjoy the society of his friends,
and to take daily drives in his carnage. The season, however, was on the
whole wet and gloomy, and he, in company with his friend Mr Palmer, who
had been his companion at Hyeres, sailed for Madeira in the month of
October.
While at Madeira he executed his settlements on the 1st January 1861.
Writing to Mr Earle from Madeira, on 10th April 1861, he says—
"I have got on exceedingly well through the whole season—at least
keeping my ground, and working with some degree of steadiness. My
Egyptian volume is now almost quite done ; and when I reach England, I
hope, after a good revisal, to be ready to go to press. The only thing I
feel sure about it is, that it will not to anybody, or intrinsically,
represent the amount of labour it has cost me. We are looking forward to
flight, and have arranged the mode. At one time our plan was to make for
the Canary Islands, and thence by the coast of Africa to the south of
Spain; but a hitch as to the steamboats has obliged us to give up this
on the present occasion, although I do so reluctantly, as I am anxious
to learn something of the Guanche antiquities at Tenerifle. We have now
fixed to sail direct to England about the 18th of May; and before the
end of that month I hope to be at home, where I shall speedily expect to
welcome you, to get the light of your countenance, and, the benefit of
your experience, as to the killed shrubs, before going to see the
results of your labours in your own vineyard.”
In the end of May he reached his residence at Down House, where he spent
the summer. In the beginning of September Mr Palmer came to visit him
with the view of concerting plans for again spending the ensuing winter
together in a warmer climate. On the second day after his arrival Mr
Palmer was unexpectedly seized by haemorrhage of the lungs. Writing to
Mr Earle on the 11th Sept., Mr Rhind says—
“Alas! alas! there is anything in view but a visit to you this week.
Poor Palmer came to me this day week looking wretchedly ill; and the
night after but one he appeared at my bedside (at half-past two in the
morning) coughing violently from haemorrhage, and begging for help.
Happily I had the needful appliances at hand.' I got him to bed, and sat
with him until we got a surgeon, before whose arrival the bleeding
ceased.”
Mr Palmer’s death was thus announced to Mr Earle on the 20th
September:—“My last letter would prepare you for our poor friend’s
illness taking the worst turn. And so it has been. He went calmly to his
rest yesterday morning.”
Mr Rhind again returned to Madeira for the winter of 1862. He thus
writes to Mr Earle on 3d January 1862—
“I have settled down into the Jond of fossil life which I followed (and
which the nature of the place compels one to follow) last year. I am
occupying the same rooms, meeting very many of the same people,
revolving in my morning rides in the same narrow circles, which the
bounding hills prescribe, and altogether feeling as if I had never left
the island. There is a lamentable want of variety and life in this
exile—that is undeniable. Indoors, of course, one has one’s occupations;
but the want of interesting objects, and, to some extent, of
'interesting people outside, makes what ought to be the pleasantest part
of the day, often the least so. In the house in which I am staying, and
which has some seventeen guests, we are, as to personnel, in some
respects worse, in some respects better off, than last year. Of course
the larger number of the people are simply of negative characteristics;
and if we have none who are actually treasures, neither have we any—and
it is something to say of a miscellaneous household—that are positively
obnoxious. One-half are Germans; and as I have a general liking for
their race, I am glad of the interim,, and live.
“Two of our set are very good specimens in various ways; but being
Northerns (Sleswig men), and rather out of the way of the literary
activity of Germany, they are not such ‘full men’—to use Bacon’s
phrase—as their countrymen of corresponding position and education
sometimes are.” “I am looking forward with some degree of pleasure to my
spring move. My plan is to sail for Teneriffe at the first of April, to
spend three weeks or a month there, looking up the Guanche antiquities;
and then to make for Seville, by way of Cadiz, at the beginning of May.
I should hope to spend a month pleasantly in and about Seville, and then
to return to England, either by Lisbon or Gibraltar.”
About six weeks later in the season (15th February) Mr Rhind wrote to me
from Madeira. The following passage in his letter shows how he kindled
up at any plan for elucidating native antiquities:—
“I saw in an Aberdeen paper, which was sent to me by the last mail, a
report of your Spalding Club meeting. The account of what had been
accomplished, and what was contemplated, seemed very satisfactory. The
plan which you seem yet to keep partly in abeyance, I think is well
worthy of every consideration—I mean following up the Sculptured Stones
by a somewhat similar exemplification of the historical architecture of
the north-east of Scotland. There never is likely to be such an
opportunity as that offered by the united effort of a Club like the
Spalding, for constructing a corpus of the historico-ethnographical
materials of the northern counties—a work which, as wed as appealing to
our national feelings, must have a somewhat unexpected scientific value,
from the evidence to be afforded as to the character of development in a
comparatively isolated region. The mediaeval chartulary, and
similar.social illustrations, are one part of such a coiyus; the
sculptured stones notably another; the household, castellated, and
ecclesiastical architecture would be another; and I have for some time
thought of suggesting to you one more, and yet an earlier link, to be
taken up when the sculptured stones were finished, and illustrated by
the same process of collocation and embodiment of thoroughly trustworthy
facts and illustrations. "What I mean is, a series of representations of
a large number of the prominent and typical early vestiges of the
northern counties—the hill forts, the circles and other ortholithic
erections, the eirde houses and Picts’ Houses, the cairns and barrows,
and the relics of stone, metal, and clay found in connection -with them.
The interest of such an exemplification of the primeval state of our
northern home, we can readily picture ; and to produce such a monument,
fairly adjusted and apportioned, is a work such as a hody like the
Spalding Club is well calculated to accomplish, and it is worthy of an
effort to achieve. To prevent its too exclusively absorbing the funds of
the Club, I should think: there would be little difficulty in organising
an adequate auxiliary fund, to be subscribed to by volunteers, of whom I
would gladly be one. I do hope you will think of this as favourably as I
do, and keep the matter in view.”
He adds—
“I am just correcting the last sheets of my Theban book. What reception
the volume may meet with I can hardly guess; but at any rate I have not
spared labour upon it. To find that it should meet with some degree of
success would naturally, of course, be pleasant, after first toiling to
gather the materials for it in Egypt, and then grinding them into shape
with an amount of labour which it is perhaps as well the result should
not show. In Edinburgh I hope it will find some readers, who may already
have been interested in the relics in the Museum, which part of it
describes.”
This volume, on which Mr Rhind expended so much thought and labour, was
soon afterwards published with the title, “Thebes, its Tombs and their
Tenants Ancient and Present, including a Record of Excavations in the
Necropolis.” It contains eleven chapters, the first of which is devoted
to the general history of Thebes; the second describes the Necropolis as
one of the most remarkable in the world; the third gives the result of
former sepulchral researches; the fourth describes the unrifled tomb of
a Theban dignitary and its contents, portions of which were of an
unusual character, and others unique; the fifth gives an account of a
burial-place of the poor; the sixth records excavations among tombs of
the kings, and of various grades; the seventh is devoted to the theories
explanatory of Egyptian sepulture; the eighth to the sepulchral evidence
of early metallurgic practice; the ninth points out how the demand for
Egyptian relics has been supplied, and its influence on the condition of
the monuments; the tenth furnishes an account of the present tenants of
the tombs; and the eleventh continues the account of these tenants and
of their rulers. The volume is illustrated by plates of the more
remarkable objects.
In the preface Mr Rhind explains the delay which had occurred in the
appearance of the volume; one reason for which was, his hope of being
able to collect a farther series of sepulchral details in other parts of
the country.
“But the chief cause of the delay has been that, believing any work
intended for publication to be entitled to at least such advantages as
time and care may give, the demand for both in this case has been
increased by the breaches in continuous progress involved in the
circumstances of a lengthened annual absence abroad. Even now I have had
to correct the proofs of two-thirds of these sheets about fifteen
hundred miles from England.”
Mr Rhind is here silent on the subject of interruptions arising from
serious illnesses, which at times reduced him to an extreme state of
weakness, and permanently disabled him from anything beyond a restricted
amount of daily exertion.
On the 5th May Mr Rhind wrote to me from Gibraltar—
“I spent rather more than three weeks in various parts of the island of
Teneriffe, but chiefly in the beautiful valley of Orotava, to which
Humboldt gave the palm for beauty, even in comparison with all the
scenery of the Cordilleras, which he had traversed. I much enjoyed my
sojourn there, and in Teneriffe generally. The weather was magnificent,
and the climate generally seems to promise so well for a winter, that I
am at present minded to return there next year. The facilities of
communication with Europe form one considerable inducement, there being
six or seven steamers every month. The drawback is the very indifferent
accommodation. Another motive to go back is, to investigate a little
more fully the relics of the Guanches, the ancient population which the
Spaniards found in possession, at the conquest, 400 years ago. Their
condition offers some interesting analogies with that of the primeval
races of Europe, &c.; and what I have already been able to learn on the
subject, makes me desirous to have some opportunity of knowing more. To
leave Teneriffe, I took advantage of a mercantile steamer that was to
make a long detour, which promised some novelty. We touched first at
another of the Canaries, La Palma, and then at another, Lanzarote—the
first mountainous and of considerable beauty; the last also mountainous,
but arid from want of water. Our next point was Mogador, on the coast of
Morocco, where we lay two days. This town has all the curious oriental
characteristics; but being comparatively new, and having been built as a
commercial depot, it wants much of the picturesqueness of the ancient
Muslim cities. From Mogador we coasted northwards, looking in at three
other Barbary towns—Mazagan, Darel Baees, and Tangier—and arriving here
on Friday night, after a pleasant voyage of nine days. In four and
twenty hours I hope to be again under way, as my object is to reach
Seville on the 8th, and to stay there until the end of the month. About
the beginning of the second week in June, I hope to be at home.”
Among Mr Rhind’s papers I found a very careful account of Teneriffe,
with minute details of its products and resources. It is a mere
fragment, however, and does not touch on the antiquities of the island,
his observations on these being probably reserved till after the second
visit which he projected.
Mr Rhind resumed his residence at Down House, where he spent the summer
of 1862. In the autumn he was again prostrated by an attack of illness,
of which he wrote to me from Clifton on the 20th September. He had
arranged to part with his lease of Down House at this time, with the
intention of selecting for next season a more sheltered residence in the
same neighbourhood. In the letter just referred to he writes—
“I have decided to turn my face to Egypt again for the coming winter. I
sail for Malta from Southampton on the 4th of next month. Early in
November I hope to be once more on the Nile. In spring, according to my
present plans, I make for Corfu; and, if strength permits, I intend to
get about among the Greek islands for six or eight weeks, with an eye to
early vestiges.”
Before lie left England, Mr Rhind executed a codicil to his settlement,
by which he transferred from the University of Edinburgh to the Society
of Antiquaries of Scotland his endowment of a Professorship of
Archaeology. His reasons are fully stated in that document, which is
printed in the Appendix to this Memoir.
Mr Rhind reached Egypt in safety, and speedily began a series of
systematic observations on the Nile and its deposits. His purpose is
thus expressed in a paper found among his notes, which may have been
intended as a preface to the volume, which he meant to prepare under the
title of “The Nile Valley in Relation to Chronology.”
“This work will, with other materials, contain the result of
observations made during a voyage devoted to tracing the operations of
the Nile, for 1000 miles of its course from the second Cataract to the
sea. Among the facts embodied are the depth of water; rate of current;
amount of sediment; constituents of alluvium and of sand; these, and
other conditions being classified with reference to the respective
points in the river’s course. Side by side with such data, showing the
Nile’s mode of action, will be given the various evidences according to
their locality of what it has accomplished. Among such evidences are
measurements indicating the position of the ancient monuments in
relation to the river and the alluvium, and traces of fluviatile action
on or near the mountains of the valley. It will be shown from terrace
marks in the hills, and the presence of alluvial deposits and river
shells at levels high above the present water range, that in its earlier
career the Nile was a destructive stream, wearing out its bed where its
subsequent work has been to build it up.
“In reviewing the changes which have occurred during the historical
period, it will be shown with reference to Lower Nubia and Upper Egypt,
that the facts require a different explanation from either of the two
most current hypotheses, viz. :—the assumed scooping out of the bed of
the river between Semneh and Assouan, or the bursting of a barrier at
the rocks of Silsilis. As to Lower Egypt, including the Delta, the
subject of the rate of alluvial deposit will be investigated and the
value examined of the proofs it may afford as to the antiquity of man’s
presence.”
The following letter to Mr Earle, written from La Majolica, on the Lake
of Como, on the 8th of June 1863, is valuable, from its preserving a
detailed account of Mr Khind’s proceedings during the previous winter:—
“I do not doubt that, from some of my Clifton friends, you will have
long ago learned that there has been only too good reason why I have not
replied to your letter, which came to me in Egypt just at the very time
of my overthrow. I longed to write to you, but I was unwilling to use
another’s hand, and I feel that you will forgive me for delaying until I
could myself, as it were, speak to you face to face, if it be but a word
or two.
“I spent the winter on the Nile pleasantly, and as to health
improvingly. But I could not resist getting involved in interesting
work, which I could not always keep within proper bounds. The main part
of my time was given to investigating the operations of the river and
the growth of the alluvium, with reference to the monuments. I began and
carried out the work systematically for 1000 miles of the river’s
course, and had brought my notes and collections into such form, that I
had communicated with the Longmans to announce a volume on ‘ The Nile
Valley in relation to Chronology.’ When I reached Cairo, I fear I was
more diligent mentally and bodily than a due calculation of
contingencies warranted ; and one or two detrimental causes having
fallen upon me untowardly together, I was prostrated by a sharp attack
of haemorrhage from the lung. I had a weary confinement at Cairo—another
at Alexandria. I have been reduced and enfeebled miserably. But yet the
necessities of escaping from the heat of the south obliged me to start
first for Corfu, which did not at all suit me, and then to journey on
until I could halt at this beautiful lake. A week’s quiet here has done
me some good ; but my exhausted condition of frame, I cannot but see,
leaves it doubtful whether the turn of the balance shall be upwards or
down. Guided as it will be by the same hand, it will be for me to accept
trustfully whatever result the Father bestows.
“In a few days more I hope to make a start to cross the Alps, probably
by the Spliigen, and to journey, if I am able, to England by slow
stages, arriving about the end of the month.
“By the way, I had another piece of work in the winter, which, if it
please God that we meet, I should like to have your help with, as it is
in your special line of country. I made a vocabulary, and endeavoured to
disentangle the grammar of two Nubian dialects, which till now have
wanted such exposition. In process of the work I came upon several, and
even important facts.
“But, alas! who shall say whether these, and the results of my Nile
labours, shall not now return again to chaos. At present I cannot even
think consecutively of, much less work at either.”
"A letter to me from the same place, written on the 5th June, gives much
the same account of himself as that just quoted, but with rather less
detail. One passage in it may be quoted, to show how warmly he clung to
the recollection of old friends.
“In turning over the stranger’s book, I saw that Innes spent some time
in this house last summer. It reminds me to beg you to remember me to
him, and to Robertson. My Cain’s doom, I fear, is nearly fatal to my
retaining a place in the recollection of friends.”
He adds—
“I had not closed this an hour, when a messenger from Como brought me a
packet of letters, including yours of the 1st. I feel much your kind
remembrance and sympathy. I have not said much about myself in this
letter; but you will infer that my condition hangs, as it were, in a
balance, and the turn may be to either side. It is for me to bow to the
will of the Father, whether His hand shall lead into the sunshine, or
into the valley of the shadow.”
Mr Rhind’s friends could not but be alarmed at such accounts of his
health, but he had so often been raised up from a state of great
prostration in previous times that hope was not extinguished.
The next accounts, however, brought the intelligence that the <end had
come, and that the feeble flicker of life had now been extinguished. It
was an end serene and beautiful,—in complete unison with the life which
preceded it. He literally “fell asleep". The circumstances are detailed
in the following letter from Mr Rhind’s servant, James Fisher, written
to Mr Earle, from Zurich on the 3d of July :—
“You will, I know, be very sorry to hear that poor Mr Rhind is no more ;
he died sleeping during the night. Yesterday he took a drive, but the
heat was so great that he suffered much from it, and complained of being
very tired and fatigued when we got back ; and so he determined to go
early to bed, and, as he had had a very bad night the previous one, he
thought he should be able to sleep better, feeling so tired. At
half-past ten I found he was sleeping comfortably. I had to give him
some milk, if he awoke during the night, but, as he did not move, I
still considered him to be sleeping. I looked at him several times this
morning without going near him, thinking I would not wake him; but at
last I stepped quietly up to. the bedside, and, to my great horror,
found he had ceased to breathe. He must have died without the least
struggle—he had not moved his head from the pillow.
“I believe he has written to you since he was first attacked with
hsemoptysis at Cairo on the 30th of March. Since then he has never got
much stronger ; and although from a three weeks’ stay on the Lake of
Como he got a very little better, he got worse again by the four days’
journey from there to here.”
Mr Rhind’s body was brought from Zurich, and interred in the family
burying-ground in the parish churchyard of Wick, on the 13th of July.
Shortly before the execution of his settlements, in January 1861, Mr
Rhind left a letter to his executors, dated 30th November 1860, in which
he gave instructions for the completion of his work on the Tombs at
Thebes, in the event of his own death before he should have been able to
bring it out. He also directed them, in that event, to provide funds for
the completion of a volume, containing Fac-similes of two remarkable
Bilingual Papyri found by him at Thebes, then in progress, under the
charge of Dr Birch, keeper of Oriental Antiquities in the British
Museum. This volume was all but finished at the time of his death, and
has since been issued with the following title, “Facsimiles of Two
Papyri found in a Tomb at Thebes, with a Translation by Samuel Birch,
LL.D., &c.; and ail Account of their Discovery, by A. Henry Bhind, Esq.,
F.S.A., &c. Lond. 1863.” '
The notes of Mr Rhind’s observations and soundings of the Nile, during
the early part of 1863, were found among his papers after his death ;
but it did not appear that he had completed any part of the volume, of
which these were to form the groundwork. While, therefore, these notes
could not be printed as a whole, I have thought it right to give in the
Appendix extracts containing his observations on the deposits and
current of the Nile at Thebes and Memphis, not merely as presenting a
remarkable picture of his energetic character and active mind, but as
evidences of that thoroughness and patience in the pursuit of truth
which characterised all his labours, and which now animated him to
encounter this long-sustained inquiry at a time of great bodily
weakness.
One passage in his observations at Memphis appears very remarkable, not
only as a token of his continued appreciation of the value of
excavations on historical sites, but also as a testimony to the extent
of still unexplored ground in Egypt.
“Deep excavations at Memphis might therefore be very important, as well
in a historical as a physical point of view. But, in truth, throughout
all Egypt it may be said, that all that has as yet been done in the way
of excavation is little more than mere scratching, and the vastness of
the mine makes us wonder whether it will ever be thoroughly explored.”
It will have been seen that thoroughness was the predominating feature
of his character, and that it entered into all his pursuits. The study
of antiquities with Mr Rhind was a very different thing from the mere
gratification of a taste; whether in the Valley of the Nile, or among
the moors of his native Caithness, his search was always for authentic
facts and objects, which he reckoned of value only in their relation to
the history of man’s progress ; and while he had every facility and
temptation to form a private Museum for himself, he, from the first,
subordinated all his inquiries to public ends, and placed every object
which he could discover or acquire in a public collection, where
classification and accessibility might render them of real and permanent
value. Ever since Mr Rhind became a Member of the Society of Antiquaries
of Scotland, he has devoted his energies and resources to further its
objects and secure its permanency. There has been no important step in
its progress during the last ten years, in which I cannot trace his
influence more or less directly. He was often prostrated by attacks of
severe illness, but the earliest of his returning powers were devoted to
the furtherance of some work in which the progress of Archaeology and
the position of the Society were involved ; and while Mr Rhind
contributed much to its prosperity in his lifetime, the well-considered
bequests with which he has enriched it, show the hearty regard for its
welfare which he maintained to the last. From these it will be seen,
that he has left to the Society his valuable library, which, after the
elimination (suggested by himself,) of a class of works of a
miscellaneous character, not bearing on the objects of the Society, will
still amount to above 1600 volumes, some of them of great rarity and
value. He has left to it a sum of L.400, “to be expended on practical
archaeological excavations in the north-eastern portion of Scotland,
where the remains are mostly unknown to the general student, are often
in good preservation, and, from ethnographical reasons, are likely to
afford important information.” He gives to the Society the copywright of
his work, “ Thebes, its Tombs and their Tenants,” and after providing
for the foundation and endowment of an institution at Wick for the
industrial training of young women from certain parishes in the county
of Caithness; the foundation of two Scholarships in the University of
Edinburgh, and many other bequests of a private character, he has left
the residue of his estate of Sibster for the endowment of a Professor or
Lecturer on Archaeology in connection with this Society, and has
committed its management to the Council, with many practical directions
and suggestions, which show how well the subject had been previously
considered by him. The last bequest may ultimately yield a sum of about
L.700Q, but is not available during the lifetime of Mr Bremner, to whom
the liferent right of Sibster is left.
It has been a great solace to me to gather up these memorials of our
departed friend; but I would not have felt it right to intrude them at
such lengthy on the Society if it had not given me the opportunity of
preserving many of Mr Bhind’s observations and opinions on
archaeological points, which are of a more general and enduring interest
than the mere utterances of private friendship. From the feelings which
have been expressed to me, I believe that the members would have felt
regret if some such record of the life of one, who has proved so great a
benefactor to the Society, had not been preserved, and I cannot doubt,
that those who succeed us will be glad to know something of one whose
benefactions will bear fruit so long as the Society lasts.
In looking back to the short and bright career of Mr Rhind, it is
instructive to observe how much earnest and laborious work he was able
to achieve. At the time of his death he had not attained his thirtieth
year, and during the portion of his life in which he carried on his
historical pursuits, his health was at all times precarious, and often
prostrated by severe attacks of illness. 'Instead, however, of resigning
himself to the solaces often necessary, and always captivating to
invalids, but which tend rather to enervate than to brace to any great
exertion, Mr Rhind pursued his studies with an equable and unbroken
ardour—resuming the thread where it had been broken by an attack of
illness, and gathering from every country, whither the varying
necessities of health carried him, fresh materials for observation and
study.
Wherever he went Mr Rhind acquired new friends. To all, his sweetness
and unselfishness, his warm and sympathetic nature, could not hut be
attractive, while to those who could appreciate them, the treasures of
his active and-well stored mind formed an additional tie and charm.
A remarkable feature of Mr Rhind’s character was his unvarying
cheerfulness. He had many alarming illnesses, but he never fretted or
became impatient, although for the time he had to abandon some
engrossing pursuit. He carried on his labours under a constant sense of
his precarious tenure of life, but was never disheartened by it—eager
and hopeful while engaged in his favourite pursuits, but implicitly
trustful and resigned when warned that he must abandon them. To his
unruffled calmness in every contingency we doubtless owe the
prolongation of his days, and the many works crowded into a little
space, for he seemed to realize the poet’s words.
Not enjoyment and not
sorrow
Is our destined end or way,
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us further than to-day.
While, therefore, we
cannot but mourn the early removal of such a friend and associate as Mr
Rhind, we mingle with our sorrow admiration of his noble and unselfish
character, and cherish as a precious bequest the example of his bright
and earnest career.
JOHN STUART. |
