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Robert Dick proceeded with
his study of natural science. From conchology he went on to entomology and
botany. He gathered insects while he collected plants. They both lay in the
same beat. After his bread was baked in the morning and ready for sale, he
left the shop to the care of his housekeeper, and went out upon a search.
Or, he would take a journey to the moors and mountains, and return home at
night to prepare for the next day’s baking.
He began to make his entomological collection about the year 1836, when he
was about twenty-five years old. He worked so hard at the subject, and made
so many excursions through the country, that in about nine months he had
collected nearly all the insect tribes that Caithness contained. He spent
nearly every moment that he could spare until he thought he had exhausted
the field.
He worked out the subject from his own personal observation. He was one of
those men who would not take anything for granted. Books were an essential
end; but his knowledge was not founded on books, but on Nature. He must
inquire, search, and observe for himself. He was not satisfied with the
observations of others. He must get at the actual facts. He must himself
verify everything stated in books.
He was not satisfied with the common opinion as to the species or genus to
which any individual of the insect world belonged. He tested and tried
everything by the touchstone of science and careful observation. If he had
any doubts about an insect, from a gnat to a dragon-fly, he would search out
the grub, watch the process of its development from the larva and chrysalis
state, until the fly emerged before him in unquestionable identity. It will
thus be observed that he was from the first imbued with the true scientific
animus; and in the same spirit he continued to find out and discover the
true workings of Nature.
The Thurso people did not quite understand the proceedings of their young
baker. He made good bread, and his biscuits were the best in the town. But
he was sometimes seen coming back from the country bespattered with
mud,—perhaps after a forty or fifty miles’ journey on the moors in search of
specimens. What were they to make of this extraordinary conduct ? It could
have no connection with baking. What could he have been doing during these
long journeys ?
He was now doing fairly in business. He was not yet distracted by the
competition that afterwards ruined him. His wants were very small. He had
only himself and his housekeeper to provide for. He was accordingly able to
save money, and with his surplus capital he bought books.
“How painfully, how slowly,” he once said in a letter to Hugh Miller, “ man
accumulates knowledge! How easily, how quickly, it escapes and is gone!
Blessings on the noble art of printing, under the shadow of whose dominion,
thoughts, words, and deeds, are piled up like the proliferous corn of old in
the storehouses of Pharaoh! ”
Dick was now buying his flour from a merchant in Leith. He requests the
merchant to send him hooks as well as flour. The books were purchased,
packed in paper in the centre of the bags, and despatched to Thurso, by way
of Aberdeen, Wick, and the Pentland Firth. We find him thus receiving the
Gardener's Dictionary, the Naturalist's Magazine, and the Flori-graphia
Britannica. He also directs the flour merchant to buy him a microscope, and
to send it him as soon as possible. His correspondent says, “I have at
length bought for you the long-wished-for microscope. It is a very powerful
one. I hope you will find yourself amply rewarded for your time and
expense.” The microscope was despatched in July 1835, and it reached Dick in
safety. He found that, in the course of his investigations into the minutiae
of objects, he could not do without the microscope.
The flour merchant afterwards sent Dick numerous volumes of the Naturalist's
Library, and bought for him a copy of Hogarth’s Works,—the large edition,
with the original plates restored. We find, from the bill of lading
accompanying the flour and the volume, that its oinding cost Dick two
guineas. Other books, relating principally to botany, conchology, and
geology, shortly followed. Sometimes a phrenological cast from O’Neil was
imbedded in the flour. We find, from the communications that passed between
the correspondents, that Dick paid his accounts promptly,—usually within a
fortnight after the delivery of the flour.
When the books arrived at Thurso, and were unearthed from the flour, Dick
set to work and devoured them. For Dick was a great reader, almost a
ferocious reader. He read everything about air, earth, sea, and heaven, as
the multitude of books collected by him sufficiently indicate. He had plenty
of leisure. When his bread was baked, and ready for sale, he had nothing
else to do for the day but read and wander. When the weather was wet and
stormy, as it often was, he read, drew, and wrote letters to far-away
friends. For he had many correspondents, as the following pages will show.
When the weather was fine, he
set out on his walks, along the shore, or up the country, sometimes as far
as Morven. “Many is the walk,” says one of his old acquaintances, “ which I
have enjoyed in his company on the sea-beach near Thurso Castle. I was once
with him, when I found a new shell, and it was truly delightful to hear him
explain its history and habits, as if it had been his next-door neighbour,
and he had known the tiny thing all his life long. How kindly and meekly he
spoke, and how ready he was for a joke; and what a keen perception he had of
the ridiculous in everything that crossed his observation. The same night we
also found a curious sort of nut, which he told me had been carried by the
ocean currents and prevailing winds all the way from the West Indies, and
was cast up on the beach just below Thurso Castle.”
“On another occasion,” says the same writer, “I walked with him on a
botanical excursion, as far as I could, up the Thurso river; and I am not
far from the truth when I say that he talked all the way. "I begin slowly"
he said, referring to Iris walking, ‘but we’ll improve before long/ and so
it proved; for before he had reached Oldfield he had got into a
four-miles-an-hour pace, and by the time we reached Isauld it was a regular
trot and race down the banks and across the river to one of his favourite
haunts. I cannot now remember what were the special prizes of the excursion,
though I well remember that we came home richly loaded with things, to me
rich and rare, which, with his usual kindness, he named and labelled for me
next day. After a lapse of more than sixteen years, I lighted accidentally
one day on a pile of plants, collected principally in Caithness, and forming
my first herbarium. It had passed through the hands of Mr. Dick, and bears
his sign-manual on every sheet. Any one would say it is the handwriting of
an educated man—a bold, full, fluent hand—without any trace of the
crampedness and angularity of those who earn their bread by manual toil.
Besides, the technical names of the plants are always spelt correctly.”
But it was very seldom that he made his botanical excursions with others. He
almost invariably went alone. When he had arranged his work, and had a
journey in view, he had everything in order by the hour that he intended to
set out; and then nothing would detain him. When about to start on a long
journey, he wore thick-soled boots, with hob-nails in them. He soaked his
stockings with water; and when he came to a burn he soaked them again. He
took with him some ship biscuit, which was easily carried. This constituted
his principal refreshment during his long journeys. The burn or the mountain
tarn supplied beverage enough for one of the most temperate and enduring of
men. “I never drink much when travelling,” he used to say. “It takes the
wind out of me, and seriously interferes with my comfoit and endurance.”
How he delighted in spring! He welcomed its approach with joy. The winters
were usually cold and stormy. The cold winds blew violently over Caithness,
and prevented any green thing appearing on the surface. But Dick was up
before the sun was up. He was out before the flowers were out. He watched
them thrusting their way upwards into the air, watched them while they
blossomed into flowers, and watched them while they shrank into decay.
Spring is late in the north. Even at the beginning of May the earth is still
brown. Only in some sheltered spots by the river-side are any green things
to be seen. There are very few hedges near Thurso. “On the 4th of May,” says
Dick, “the buds are only swelling. There is no 'May blossom’ in Caithness.
Even at the end of May the few hedges are not in full leaf.” The first
flowers that appear are the yellow Coltsfoot, the yellow Primrose, the
yellow Buttercup, the Marsh Marigold, the little yellow Celandine, and a few
blue flowers of the Dog Violet. These are all the beauties of the northern
flora in May. The cold winds are still sweeping over the county.
Dick went out one morning at the end of May, towards the Beay hills, to see
how the flowers were growing. The morning was cold and cheerless. The flag
fences along the road were hung with rain pearls. When he reached the Beay
links, he found the ground covered with cowslips. From thence he went up the
hills to the waterfall to gather ferns. They were only beginning to expand.
The summer moss, Polytrichum was there in thousands. By and by everything
would be in bloom.
Even on the 24th of June—midsummer day— the ferns were not fully out. “The
first fern I saw,” says Dick, “was Lastrea dilatata, but it was so ugly that
it was not worth looking at a second time. The next I saw was Asplenium
trichomanes, or Common Maiden Hair; but the specimens were too small for my
purpose. The next was the Black-stalked Spleenwort. I passed through a
forest of brackens, and saw the Northern Hard Eem, and the Black Bog-rush—a
plant rare in Scotland, even on the west coast. I passed on and went
up-hill, where I saw the Beech Fern and many other plants, of which European
Sanicle was the most abundant. It was once thought to cure every disease,
and was called ‘Self-heal.’ I saw the Common Polypody, and the Oak Polypody.
Up the hill the Foxglove was the most conspicuous. I also found Woodruff,
Spottedleaved Hawkweed, and Persian Willow; white roses and red roses; and
other plants too numerous to mention, I wound along by a sheep-road to the
hill-top, and lay down, looking across the dead level of the county. I
counted thirteen lochs! ”
At the beginning of July, he adds,—“We are just getting into first-rate
order here as to wild plants. We shall by and by have a grand display of
yellow flowers —all yellow; tens of thousands, and ten times ten,— all
destined to pass away after fulfilling the great end for which they came
into flower—leaving seed for times to come times without end.”
On the 24th of July he says, “Now it gets warmer. The com becomes half full
of marigold. The heather begins to bloom. I made for the seaside,” he adds,
“and found a butterfly sleeping on the heather! Poor thing!” As the summer
heat increases, the Caithness grasses, plants, and flowers, make their
appearance in succession. “People in the south,” says Dick, “think that as
Caithness is so far north, its flora must differ greatly from that in their
own neighbourhood. No doubt the general aspect of a district in the south
differs very strikingly in its prominent features. And yet, after all, we
have very few plants that may not also be found in the south.
“The Caithness flora is not alpine—not even sub-alpine. I know of only three
Baltic plants in Caithness ; and of these only one is a rarity. Indeed it is
peculiar to Caithness; for Caithness is the only British district in which
it grows. We have the Baltic rush by the river-side. But then Juncus
balticus grows at Barry Sands, near Dundee. Last summer, I was much pleased
to meet the Baltic rush growing in a small marsh about six miles inland. I
was highly delighted. I had never seen it so far from the sea.”
Robert Dick proceeded with the study of botany in the most resolute way. He
would take nothing for granted. Where others had observed, he also would
observe, and verify for himself. Hence, with the utmost toil and labour, he
wandered over Caithness, to see the plants growing in their native habitats.
He must find them where they grew, and study them, from time to time, on the
spot. He determined to master the entire subject. He mapped out the country
into districts, and resolved carefully to examine each of them in turn. It
was a long and arduous work, but he successfully carried out his purpose. At
length the plants of Caithness, from one end of the county to the other
—from the Morven hills in the south to Dunnet Head in the north—from Noss
Head in the east to Halladale Head in the west—became as familiar to him as
the faces of familiar friends.
The banks of the river Thurso were among his favourite haunts. He searched
the valley in its remotest nooks,— from its source in Bencheilt to its
entrance into the sea at Thurso. The flats along its serpentine course
abound in plants and grasses, which he scanned with the true naturalist’s
eye. During the long summer nights, when “day never darkens into mirk,” he
would make journeys of forty or fifty miles, for the purpose of gathering
some favourite plant in its far-off native habitat. He would return home in
glory, bringing with him a stem of grass, a flower, or a bulb.
During midsummer time in the north, it is light nearly all the night
through. The sun slightly descends below the horizon, but the light still
remains. Farther north, the sun is seen at midnight. When it rises in
Caithness, the morning is a prolonged dawn. An eloquent writer says, “ The
earth is most beautiful at dawn; but so very few people see it, and the few
that do are almost all of them labourers, whose eyes have no sight for that
wonderful peace, and coolness, and unspeakable sense of rest and hope which
lie like a blessing on the land. I think if people oftener saw the break of
day they would vow oftener to keep that dawning day holy and would not so
often let its fair hours drift away with nothing done that were not best
left undone.”
Dick had many a long and lonely walk at sunset, at dawn, and even at
midnight. And yet he was not lonely. His love of nature made a paradise of
that bare north country.- His solitude was not loneliness. Solitude, to him,
was sweet society. He felt the companionship of nature about him—on the
moors, in the mountains, and along the sea-shore. On calm evenings, when the
sea was at rest, he walked along the sands. The sea, though quiet, seemed to
breathe. It was like a living thing— like a creature at rest.
Dick was an insatiable wanderer. When he had done his daily work, and the
weather was fine, he set out on his botanical excursions. The county was all
before him. He would go to the Eeay hills in search of ferns; or up the
Thurso river in search of plants and grasses; or to the extreme point of
Dunnet Head. His eyes were always open to receive new impressions. He
wondered at the infinite varieties of nature, even in that cold bare
country. The lines written by Longfellow upon another great lover of nature,
are quite as applicable to Dick:
“And he wandered away and away
With Nature, the dear old nurse,
Who sang to him night and day
The rhymes of the universe.
“And whenever the way seemed long,
Or his heart began to fail,
She would sing a more wonderful song,
Or tell a more marvellous tale.”
He was more joyful on the
moors than amid the noise of streets. There he was alone with himself. Hot a
sound was to he heard as he trudged along, save the heating of his own
heart—not a voice save that of heaven. The clouds threw their purple •
shadows over the moor. The grouse flew up with a whirr, whirr! The blue
mountain hare flew past him, though there was no danger to be apprehended
from him.
The deluge sometimes caught him. One afternoon, in August, he walked
thirty-two miles amidst soaking rain. He had gone up to the top of a
mountain, and found only a plant of white heather. He walked and ran all the
way hack, through moors, mosses, and heather, jumping the flagstone fences;
and at last reached home after nine and a half hours’ walking and running.
Yet he was up next morning at six, and went through his day’s work as usual.
The following is a pleasanter day’s adventure. It was written to his sister
at the end of August:—“ Since I wrote you last, I have managed to walk
thirty-six miles. Long, long ago, I chanced to find a Fern eighteen miles up
the country. It was not new, consequently not a discovery; hut it was as
good as such to me. It had never crossed me in all my wanderings, or rather
I had never found it until then. Ho one told me where it grew, for the best
of reasons—that no one knew.
Since I first found it, I have every year gone a-walking to it, just to
visit it, again and again. This year, I have been there and back. The fern
is very small: I enclose a specimen. It is the Eue-leaved, or Wall
Spleenwort. The rocky spot in which it grows contains many other ferns, some
of them not at all common.
“Besides the wild rocky scenery of the place, there is the only approach to
a Highland glen which we have in Caithness. You set out from Thurso, and for
the first three or four miles there is nothing hut corn and here on each
side of the road; and in dry leas, showers of yellow Crowfoots and Ragworts;
with here and there the blue heads of Scabious, or yellow Dandelions, 01
yellow Hawkbits. All is yellow, yellow, dashed here and there with masses of
purple heath, redder by far than you can possibly imagine.
“On you go, diverting the time as you best can,—for all is wonderful. Then,
at the distance of ten miles from Thurso, you are on a hill-top, and you
stand and look around you. It is sweet to stand on a hill-top, and gaze far
up the country. Southwards you see farther than you will ever wander. Of
course you cannot tell in words all that you see. You gaze eastward,
northward, and westward; and then, after satiating yourself with the
prospect, you move down the farther side of the hill, and get onward. Twelve
miles, thirteen miles, and many wonders are to be seen. And in due time you
get among the heather—heather everywhere—and water black to drink. After
going a mile through a moor, you find yourself all at once on the brink of a
precipice. You look down, and the waters are tumbling and surging below; you
are satisfied, and could sing with joy too. After a time, I went my way
homewards.”
Dick often relieved his solitary moments by writing to his sister, then
living at Haddington. She had complained to him of her lowness of spirits,
when he thus wrote:—“Cheer up, cheer up, my bonnie sister, and I will tell
you a story. One fine summer evening, not long ago, your brother set out for
the far-away hills. He had been there before. The sun’s heat was strong when
he set out (it was then August), but on he went, past bothies, and houses,
and milestones, until he was ‘o’er the muir amang the heather.’ Then past
burns and lochs, up a hill and over a hill, through a bog and through a
mire, until the sun set, and still he was toiling on, with a long, long moor
before him.
“Have you ever been all alone on a dreary moor, when the shadows of the
coming darkness are settling down, and the cold clammy fog goes creeping up
the hill before you? It is hard work and very uncanny walking to pick your
steps, as there is no proper light to guide you. Tor you must remember that
moors are not bowling-greens or finely-smoothed lawns. They may be flowery
paths, it is true, but very rough ones, full of man-traps, jags, and holes,
into which, if you once get, you may with difficulty wade your way out
again.
“But on I went,—hop, step, and, jump,—now up, now down, huffing and puffing,
with my heart rapping against my breast like the clapper of a mill. Then
everything around looked so queer and so quiet, with the mist growing so
thick that it was difficult to distinguish one hill from another. Had I not
been intimately acquainted with every knowe and hillock of the country
through which I was travelling, I never could have got through it. But,
cheer up ! never lose heart! There’s the little loch at last, and there’s
the hill! Ay, hut your work’s not done yet. You must climb the hill, for
what you seek is only upon its very top.
“It’s rough work running through a moor, hut it takes your wind clean out of
you to climb the hill that lies beyond it. Were you ever up a hill-top at
night, your lee lane, with the mist swooping about you and drooking your
whiskers and eyebrows? I daresay no. But up this hill I had to clamber on my
hands and knees to find the plants that I had come in search of. Yes! I
found them, though I was not quite sure until the sun had risen to enlighten
me. Then I found that I had made out my point.
“The light enabled me to make my way downhill. Feeling thirsty, as well I
might, I clambered over rocks, and braes, and heather, to a very pretty loch
at the hill-foot. Picking my steps to a place full of large stones, I came
to a pair of them where I stooped down into the clear water and drank my
fill. It is a grand thing to dip your nose down into the water like a bird,
with the shingle and gravel lying below you, and then take your early
morning drink.
“But I have no time to say out my say. Only this, sister, only this : never
lose heart in the thickest mists you should ever get into; but take heart,
for assuredly the sun will rise again, and roll them up and away, to be seen
no more.”
In a future letter to his sister, written on the 12th of November, he thus
describes his journey to Morven top :—
“On Tuesday last I set out at two o’clock in the morning to go to the top of
Morven. Morven is a hill to the south of this, and by measurement on the map
28 miles as the crow flies. But taking into account the windings and
turnings of the road—up hill, down hill, and along valleys—it is a good deal
more : say 32 miles from Thurso to Morven top.
“For the first 18 miles I had a road: the rest of the way was round lochs,
across burns, through mires and marshes, horrid bogs, and hummocky heaths. I
tucked up my trousers, and felt quite at ease, though I was ankle deep, and
often deeper, for fifteen minutes on end, and sometimes more. When I had a
marsh to wade I had it level, but when I had heather I had an awful amount
of jumping. ... At last, however, I found myself on the top of the famous
Morven.
“The Caithness people have few hills. They think a mighty deal of Morven and
Maiden Pap and Skerry Ben. But these hills are not much to boast of. They
are none of them as big as books make them, and I laughed when I thought of
what people had said to me about this wonderful Morven. One said that it was
so very high that it would take half a day to climb from the foot of the
hill to the top. Another account, given in a book, stated that Morven could
only be ascended from the west side, being totally inaccessible on all other
sides. Downright nonsense! Morven is accessible on every side.
“My object in ascending the hill was to gather plants, and of course I went
up the steepest face to get among the crags and stones near the top. Morven
is poor in plants. I found nothing new. True, the season was too far gone,
but there in sheltered spots many of them still lived. On the top Alchemilla
aljpina was in flower. I observed from the decayed leaves on all sides that
the various species were not many. Braalnabin, a much lower hill, and much
nearer to Thurso, is better for ferns. Two weeks since I went there and got
nine different ferns all in bloom, though none of them were new to me.
“Strange it was to look around me. The day was cold and stormy. The sun was
shining above me, but a snowstorm was battling far below. Skerry Ben was
grey-white with snow. The sound of the wind among the crags was like the
roaring of the sea along the shore.
“I reached Morven top at eleven o’clock A.M. and left it at two p.m. It was
now mid-day. The river of Berridale runs at the foot of Morven. The best way
of getting over it is to wade through it; but what of that? The Highlandman
walks best when his feet are wet, and so does the Lowlandman, if he could
only be persuaded to try. In going to Morven I had waded no fewer than six
burns, and at least a score of marshes. My feet had not been dry since seven
in the morning.
It was all the same to me
which way I took. ‘Onward !’ was the word. And yet the light of day was gone
and the moon was up, long long before I gained a civilised road.
“The night became windy and stormy. Tremendous sheets of hailstones and rain
impeded my progress, so much so that I thought, as Burns says, that ‘ the
deil had business on his hand,’ and that he was determined to finish my
course with Morven. But no! In spite of hail, rain, wind, and fire (in fact
I had them all), I got home at three o’clock on Wednesday morning, having
walked, with little halt, for about twenty-four hours. I went to bed, slept
till seven o’clock, then rose, and went to my work as usual. Sixty miles is
a good walk to look at a hill. Oh, those plants, those weary plants!”
On one of his midnight excursions Dick was taken for a poacher. It may be
mentioned that the river Thurso is one of the best salmon rivers in
Scotland, Indeed, in early spring, there is no river that comes up to it.
Sir John Sinclair boasted that on one occasion 2500 salmon had been caught
at one haul—a draught that has never been exceeded. The price paid by the
salmon-fishers is so high—at present £20 per rod monthly— that the river is
carefully watched to prevent poaching.
One night a gentleman in charge of the river went out to see that the
keepers were doing their duty, and also to detect the poachers if he could.
He went to a particular spot where there were evident traces of poaching.
The river was then in good poaching order.
Just at the break of day, an hour or more before sunrise, the watcher saw
the figure of a man on the horizon, some hundred yards distant. He shrank
down, and crept forward, watching the man's movements in the grey dawn of
morn. He was seen close by the river’s side, prowling up and down the banks.
Surely this must be a poacher. The man moved on. When he appeared on some
high bank, the watcher hid himself so that he might not be seen between him
and the horizon. He crawled forward on all fours, stalking the poacher as he
would a deer.
At last, after nearly two hours’ stalking and dodging, the man suddenly
disappeared in some low crevices in the rocks, just below Dirlot Bridge. The
sun was just rising; the watcher saw him crouching down, as if hiding
something amongst the ferns. Of course it must be a salmon! With beating
heart, he suddenly rushed up to the man, and shouted, “Now I have caught you
poaching!”
The man’s back was towards him. He was intently gazing on some object before
him. He turned round in a composed manner, and said, “No, sir, I am not
poaching; I am only gathering some specimens of plants!” He then opened his
handkerchief, which contained some herbs, plants, and flowers. The watcher
was disappointed and disgusted. He had been crawling for two hours on his
hands and knees, coming up with his man, and finding in his possession, not
a salmon, but a lot of things which, in his estimation, were worse than
useless!
Dick was then sixteen miles from Thurso. He had left home at midnight in
search of his favourite botanical specimens. Some of them were so minute and
delicate that they could only he seen at sun-dawn. It was only at the break
of day that they unfolded their delicate tints, spread their leaves, and put
forth their lovely blossoms to the rising sun—perhaps revealed to the
per-fervid botanist by the glistening of a dew-drop.
Thus Dick was rewarded, but not the salmon-watcher who had stalked him. |
