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Part I
A Sketch of the
Moral and Physical Character, and of the Institutions and Customs of the
Inhabitants of the Highlands of Scotland
Sketches of the Highlanders
Section VI.
Bards—Pipers—Music.
While the common people
amused themselves, as I will have occasion to notice afterwards, with
recitals of poetry and imaginary or traditionary tales, every chief had
his bard, whose office it was to celebrate the warlike deeds of the family
and of individuals of the clan; to entertain the festive board with the
songs of Ossian, of Ullin, and of Oran; and to raise the feelings and
energies of the hearers by songs and narratives, in which the exploits of
their ancestors and kinsmen were recorded. The bards were an important
order of men in Highland society. In the absence of books they constituted
the library, and concentrated the learning of the tribe. By retentive
memories, indispensable requisites in their vocation, they became the
living chronicles of past events, and the depositaries of popular poetry.
They followed the clans to the field, where they eulogized the fame
resulting from a glorious death, and held forth the honour of expiring in
the arms of victory in defence of their beloved country, as well as the
disgrace attending dastardly conduct, or cowardly retreat. Before the
battle they passed from tribe to tribe, and from one party to another,
giving to all exhortations and encouragement; and when the commencement of
the fight rendered it impossible for their voice to be heard, they were
succeeded by the pipers, who, with their inspiring and warlike strains,
kept alive the enthusiasm which the bard had inspired. When the contest
was decided, the duties of these two public functionaries again became
important. The bard was employed to honour the memory of the brave who had
fallen, to celebrate the actions of those who survived, and to excite them
to future deeds of valour. The piper, in his turn, was called upon to
sound mournful lamentations for the slain, and to remind the survivors how
honourably their friends had died. By connecting the past with the
present, by showing that the warlike hero, the honoured chief, or the
respected parent, who, though no longer present to his friends, could not
die in their memory; and that, though dead, he still survived in fame, and
might sympathize with those whom he had left behind, a magnanimous
contempt of death was naturally produced, and sedulously cherished. It has
thus become a singular and characteristic feature of Highland sentiment,
to contemplate with easy familiarity the prospect of death, which is
considered as merely a passage from this to another state of existence,
enlivened with the assured hope of meeting their friends and kindred who
had gone before them, and of being followed by those whom they should
leave behind. The effect of this sentiment is perceived in the anxious
care with which they provide the necessary articles for a proper and
becoming funeral. Of this they speak with an ease and freedom, equally
remote from affectation or presumption, and proportioned solely to the
inevitable certainty of the event itself. Even the poorest and most
destitute endeavour to lay up something for this last solemnity. To be
consigned to the grave among strangers, without the attendance and
sympathy of friends, and at a distance from their family, was considered a
heavy calamity;
[This feeling still exists
with considerable force, and may afford an idea of the despair which must
actuate people when they can bring themselves to emigrate from a beloved
country, hallowed by the remains of their forefathers, and where they so
anxiously desired that their own bones might be laid. Lately, a woman aged
ninety-one, but in perfect health, and in possession of all her faculties,
went to Perth from her house in Strathbrane, a few miles above Dunkeld. A.
few days after her arrival in Perth, where she had gone to visit a
daughter, she had a slight attack of fever. One evening a considerable
quantity of snow had fallen, and she expressed great anxiety, particularly
when told that a heavier fall was expected. Next morning her bed was found
empty, and no trace of her could be discovered, till the second day, when
she sent word that she had slipt out of the house at midnight, set off on
foot through the snow, and never stopped till she reached home, a distance
of twenty miles. When questioned some time afterwards why she went away so
abruptly, she answered, "If my sickness had increased, and if I had died,
they could not have sent my remains home through the deep snows. If I had
told my daughter, perhaps she would have locked the door upon me, to
prevent my going out in the storm, and God forbid that my bones should lie
at such a distance from home, and be buried among Gaull-na machair, ' the
strangers of the plain.' "
Now, since this woman, who
was born on the immediate borders of the plains had such a dread of
leaving her bones among strangers, as she considered a people whom she was
accustomed to meet frequently, and among whom her daughter and family
resided; how much stronger must this feeling be in the central and
northern Highlands, where the majority of the people never saw the plains
or their inhabitants!]
and even to this day,
people make the greatest exertions to carry home the bodies of such
relations as happen to die far from the ground hallowed by the ashes of
their forefathers. "A man well known to the writer of these pages," says
Mrs Grant, "was remarkable for his filial affection, even among the sons
and daughters of the mountains, so distinguished for that branch of piety.
His mother being a widow, and having a numerous family, who had married
very early, he continued to live single, that he might the more sedulously
attend to her comfort, and watch over her declining years with the tenderest care. On her birth-day, he always collected his brothers and
sisters, and all their families, to a sort of kindly feast, and in
conclusion, gave a toast, not easily translated from the emphatic
language, without circumlocution,—An easy and decorous departure to my
mother, comes nearest to it. ["Crioch Onerach" may you have an honourable
exit or death, is a common expression to a friend, in return for a kindly
word or action.] This toast, which would shake the nerves of fashionable
delicacy, was received with great applause, the old woman remarking, that
God had been always good to her, and she hoped she would die as decently
as she had lived; for it is thought of the utmost consequence to die
decently." The ritual of decorous departure, and of behaviour to be
observed by the friends bf the dying on that solemn occasion, being fully
established, nothing is more common than to take a solemn leave of old
people, as if they were going
on a journey, and pretty much in the same terms. People frequently send
conditional messages to the departed. If you are permitted, tell my dear
brother, that I have merely endured the world since he left it, and that I
have been very kind to every creature he used to cherish, for his sake. I
have, indeed, heard a person of a very enlightened mind, seriously give a
message to an aged person, to deliver to a child he had lost not long
before, which she as seriously promised to deliver, with the wonted salvo,
if she was permitted." [Mrs Grant's Superstitions of the Highlanders.]
Speaking in this manner of death as a common casualty, a Highlander will
very gravely ask you where you mean to be buried, or whether you would
prefer such a place of interment, as being near to that of your ancestors.
With this freedom from the
fear of death, they were, and still are, enthusiastically fond of music
and dancing, and eagerly availed themselves of every opportunity of
indulging this propensity. [At harvest-home, halloween, christenings, and
every holiday, the people assembled in the evenings to dance. At all
weddings, pipes and fiddles were indispensable. These weddings were
sometimes a source of emolument to the young people, who supplied the
dinner and liquors, while the guests paid for the entertainment, more
agreeably to their circumstances and inclinations than in proportion to
the value of the entertainment itself. Next morning the relations and most
intimate friends of the parties re-assembled with offerings of a cow,
calf, an article of furniture, or whatever was thought necessary for
assisting the establishment of a young housekeeper. See Appendix, M.]
Possessing naturally a good ear for music, they displayed great agility in
dancing. Their music was in unison with their character. They delighted in
the warlike high-toned notes of the bagpipes, and were particularly
charmed with solemn and melancholy airs, or Laments (as they call them)
for their deceased friends,—a feeling, of which their naturally sedate and
contemplative turn of mind rendered them peculiarly susceptible; while
their sprightly reels and strathspeys were calculated to excite the most
exhilarating gaiety, and to relieve the heart from the cares and
inquietudes of life. [See Appendix, N.]
Such were and still are
some of the most striking and peculiar traits in the character of this
people. "Accustomed to traverse tracts of country, which had never been
subjected to the hands of art, contemplating every day the most
diversified scenery, surrounded every where by wild and magnificent
objects, by mountains, lakes, and forests, the mind of the Highlander is
expanded, and partakes in some measure of the wild sublimity of the
objects with which he is conversant. Pursuing the chase in regions not
peopled, according to their extent, he often finds himself alone, in a
gloomy desart, or by the margin of the dark frowning deep; his
imagination is tinged with pleasing melancholy; he finds society in the
passing breeze, and he beholds the airy forms of his fathers descending on
the skirts of the clouds. When the tempest howls over the heath, [Previous
to a tempest, some mountains in the Highlands emit a loud hollow noise
like the roaring of distant thunder; and the louder the noise, the more
furious will be the tempest, which it generally precedes about twelve or
twenty-four hours. From this warning, when "the spirit of the mountain
shrieks," (Ossian.) the superstitious minds of the Highlanders presage
many omens. Beindouran in Glenorchy, near the confines of Perth and
Argyle, emits this noise in a most striking manner. It is remarkable that
it is emitted only previous to storms of wind and rain. Before a fall of
snow, however furious the tempest, the mountain, which is of a conical
form, and 3500 feet in height, is silent. In the same manner several of
the great waterfalls in the Highland rivers and streams give signals of
approaching tempests and heavy falls of rain. Twenty-four or thirty hours
previous to a storm, the great falls on the river Tummel, north of
Shichallain, emit a loud noise, which is heard at the distance of several
miles. The longer the course of the preceding dry weather, the louder and
the more similar to a continued roll of distant thunder is the noise;
consequently, it is louder in summer than in winter. When the rain
commences the noise ceases. It forms an unerring barometer to the
neighbouring farmers. Why mountains and waterfalls in serene mild weather
emit such remarkable sounds, and are silent in tempests and rains, might
form an interesting subject of physical inquiry.] and the elements are
mixed in dire uproar, he recognises the airy spirit of the storm, and he
retires to his cave. Such is, at this day, the tone of mind which
characterizes the Highlander, who has not lost the distinctive marks of
his race by commerce with strangers, and such, too, has been the picture
which has been drawn by Ossian." [Dr Graham of Aberfoyle, on the
Authenticity of Ossian.] Such scenes as these impressed the warm
imaginations of the Highlanders with sentiments of awe and sublimity; and,
without any moroseness or sullenness of disposition, produced that
serious turn of thinking so remarkably associated with gaiety and
cheerfulness. |
