A Summer in Skye, Volume 2 (of 2)

Name: A Summer in Skye, Volume 2 (of 2)
Author: Alexander Smith

Alexander Smith's *A Summer in Skye, Volume 2* continues his prose travelogue of the Isle of Skye, blending landscape description, folklore, and character sketches gathered during a leisurely tour of the island's north and west. The narrator moves from the household of Mr M'Ian—an old-fashioned tacksman who governs his cotters through inherited paternal custom rather than cash rent—to that of "the Landlord," an India-seasoned proprietor whose household mixes Highland relics with Eastern curiosities and who runs a more modern, businesslike estate, complete with a "penal settlement" system for tenants in arrears and a village school. Along the way the narrator visits Portree, Dunvegan Castle (with its dungeons, Fairy Room, and the legendary Fairy Flag), the ruined stronghold of Duntulm and Flora Macdonald's neglected grave at Kilmuir, the fantastical rock formations of Quirang and Macleod's Tables, and the desolate grandeur of Glen Sligachan and Lord Macdonald's deer forest. Interwoven throughout are local legends recounted by drivers and guides—the sinking of Macdonald's barge that gave Dunvegan to the Macleods, the ghost of Donald Gorm, the Battle of the Spoiled Dikes, and the massacre in the Eig cave—alongside vivid genre scenes: a lamb-branding at the fank, a boat crossing bargained with reluctant ferrymen, and an evening of storytelling in the "Fairy Room." The volume broadens geographically and socially with an excursion to Ireland, where the narrator stays with John Penruddock, a hearty sheep-farmer, and witnesses a raucous cattle fair at Keady that erupts into a pitched brawl between Irish dealers and Welsh forgemen. A leisurely "smoking parliament" on the Landlord's lawn provides occasion for essayistic digressions comparing Highland and Irish temperament and humor, the psychology of emigration, and the promised benefits of the coming Skye railway. The book closes with the departure of a party of emigrants bound for Canada under the Landlord's paternal arrangements, and the narrator's own homeward voyage south, reflecting on the health, memories, and human encounters gained from the summer. Throughout, Smith's method is essayistic and impressionistic rather than narrative: extended set-piece descriptions of scenery (the Cuchullins, sea lochs, ruined castles) alternate with anecdote, transcribed dialect speech, and reflective passages on antiquity, clan relations, landlord-tenant paternalism, and the vanishing of old Celtic ways before modernization—epitomized by the railway that will, for better or worse, "send an electric shock through the entire Island."

By Alexander Smith · First published 1865 · Genre: Travel Writing, Essays, Memoir · 75,152 words

First lines

Walking into the interior of Skye is like walking into antiquity; the present is behind you, your face is turned toward Ossian. In the quiet silent wilderness you think of London, Liverpool, Edinburgh, or whatever great city it may be given you to live and work in, as of something of which you were cognisant in a former existence. Not only do you breathe the air of antiquity; but everything about you is a veritable antique. The hut by the road-side, thatched with turfs, smoke issuing from the roof, is a specimen of one of the oldest styles of architecture in the world. The crooked spade with which the crofter turns over the sour ground carries you away into fable. You remove a pile of stones on the moor, and you come to a flagged chamber in which there is a handful of human bones -- whose, no one can tell. Duntulm and Dunsciach moulder on their crags, but the song the passing milkmaid sings is older than they. You come upon old swords that were once bright and athirst for blood; old brooches that once clasped plaids; old churchyards with carvings of unknown knights on the tombs; and old men who seem to have inherited the years of the eagle or the crow. These human antiques are, in their way, more interesting than any other: they are the most precious objects of _virtu_ of which the island can boast. And at times, if you can keep ear and eye open, you stumble on forms of life, relations of master and servant, which are as old as the castle on the crag or the cairn of the chief on the moor. Cash payment is not the "sole nexus between man and man. " In these remote regions your servants' affection for you is hereditary as their family name or their family ornaments; your foster-brother would die willingly for you; and if your nurse had the writing of your epitaph, you would be the bravest, strongest, handsomest man that ever walked in shoe leather or out of it.

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A Summer in Skye, Volume 2 (of 2) is listed on Textopian as a novella by Alexander Smith, dated 1865 CE.

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Work type: Novella
Author: Alexander Smith
Date: 1865 CE
Language: English
Genres: Travel Writing, Essays, Memoir, Descriptive Prose, Scottish Literature
Length: 75,152 words
Structure: 1 section, 408 paragraphs
Reading fit: Standard (8th-9th Grade)

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Genres

Travel Writing — The work is structured as a chronological account of the author's journey through the Scottish Highlands and islands, documenting routes, locations, and experiences encountered during his summer sojourn.
Essays — Numerous philosophical meditations and reflective passages throughout explore themes of nature, human character, progress, death, and the relationship between civilization and landscape.
Memoir — A first-person personal narrative documenting the author's summer experiences, observations, and encounters with memorable individuals, structured as autobiographical recollection.
Descriptive Prose — Extensive, elaborate descriptions of Scottish landscapes, architecture, weather, and natural phenomena demonstrate sophisticated descriptive technique as a central literary feature.