A SCOTTISH SHRINE

Hokitika Guardian, 7 November 1928, Page 7

A SCOTTISH SHRINE

PRINCE CHARLIE AMD FLORA Mac DONALD.

ROMANTIC ISLE OF SKYE.

(By J. M. N. Jetfnes)

PORTREE, (Isle of Skye)

Before cumin'’; here 1. observed that those whom I eiieoiintered spoke to me about Skye niter a fashion which was different from their appreciations of other places. It was as if Skye belonged to another order of things in their minds, as if it were something more than a beautiful part of Scotland. As they spoke of it I saw the heads of one or two who had visited it themselves, take a pensive tilt. You know how people will unconsciously tilt their heads, to shift from the outer to the inner glance, from the sights actually before them to the levels of memory. That retrospective lift of the chin, which means so much, seemed to come naturally upon tin* mention of Skye, and even those who had never been to it at all agreed that 1 must visit the island. It gives the impression, therelore, that Sk.ve was in some way a Scottish shrine. And that was indeed the truth. What is enshrined here? Highland feeling; ill n. degree the tongue and manners of past generations; wild peaks and lonely moors beyond all in wildness and in loneliness. More than this, in these hills and shores burns the fire of history. There i.s no mere natural beauty umpiickenod by life: the Lonnie Prince and Flora Macdonald have given to them that under soul which man can sometimes breathe into the rock and soil. A TALK OK ('IIIVALBY. Nothing has occurred on this island to overe loud that laic of chivalry and devotion, or oven to make it more distant. In so many other places so much of tradition is overlaid: houses have gathered, booths and refreshment rooms, petrol pumps, and a thousand tilings lie heavily upon the once Using scene, till it dies a second death. But here, on the lonely shores ol Troternish, where he landed with flora 1 f’-.'f years ago. it is still Prince Charlie’s day. There may he a few more houses strung out upon the upland. and the road which winds round tin* coastline is no doubt a creation of later times. Fortunately it is pretty had: it is rather a test of endurance to use it.