The same morning we land at Columba, or the Holy Isle. The story of St. Columba’s visit to Iona is laid somewhere in the year A.D. 563. He, it seems, according to some authorities, was an Irishman, and from Iona he and his companions made the tour of Pagan Scotland; and hence now Scotland is true blue Presbyterian and always Protestant. Here, as at Staffa, we miss the tourists, who scamper and chatter for an hour at each place, and then are off; and I was glad. As Byron writes:—
“I love not man the less, but nature more, From these our interviews, in which I steal From all I may be or have been before, To mingle with the universe, and feel What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.”
The history of Iona is a history of untold beauty and human interest. Druids, Pagans, Christian saints, have all inhabited the Holy Isle. Proud kings, like Haco of Norway, were here consecrated, and here—
“Beneath the showery west, The mighty kings of three fair realms were laid.”
All that I could do was to visit the ruins of the monastery and the cathedral, and one of the stone crosses, of which there were at one time 360, and to regret that these beautiful monoliths were cast into the sea by the orders of the Synod as “monuments of idolatrie.” St. Columba, like all the saints, was a little ungallant as regards the fair sex. Perhaps it is as well that his rule is over. He would not allow even cattle on the sacred isle. “Where there is a cow,” argued the saint, “there must be a woman; and where there is a woman there must be mischief.” Clearly, the ladies have very much improved since the lamented decease of the saint. From Iona we made our way to the very prosperous home of commerce and whisky known as Campbeltown. Actually, the duty on the latter article paid by the Campbeltown manufacturers amounts to as much as £60,000 a year. At one time it was the very centre of Scottish life. For three centuries it was the capital of Scotland. It is still a very busy place, and it amused me much of a night to watch the big, bare-footed, bare-headed women crowding round the fine cross in the High Street, which ornaments what I suppose may be called the Parochial Pump. Close to the town is the church and cave of St. Kieran, the Apostle of Cantyre, the tutor of St. Columba. At present the chief boast of Campbeltown is that there were born the late Norman Macleod and Burns’ Highland Mary. When Macleod was a boy the days of smuggling were not yet over in that part of the world. Here is one of his stories:—“Once an old woman was being tried before the Sheriff, and it fell to his painful duty to sentence her. ‘I dare say,’ he said uneasily to the culprit, ‘it is not often you have fallen into this fault.’ ‘No, indeed, shura,’ was the reply; ‘I hae na made a drap since yon wee keg I sent yoursel’.’” Let me remark, _en passant_, that my friend, the Doctor, was born here, and that is proof positive that at Campbeltown the breed of great men is not yet exhausted. I mention this to our lady, and she is of the same opinion.