We left Kintallen in time to catch the first of the tide up the Corran Narrows. It was a day of tall cloud and sun and fragrance after the rain. The transformation that makes life on the West so dramatic; from glooms and drowning deeps to the sky-shepherd driving his white flocks down the blue fields of paradise (as the ancients saw it).
Even the Mate vowed he would catch fish, and told us that the red-headed boy had caught nothing in his short net last night, and that all his father had got in his long net after rowing many miles to set it were five dogfish. But the Crew, for once, did not respond and we wondered what was wrong.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. But we could see she did, and at last she owned up frankly. ‘I am sorry we are going back.’
Shades of the fear and excitement that had stuck her lips! We laughed; but all the same there was something in her remark that affected us, and we too were suddenly sorry to think that this was the last salt-water trip of the cruise.
The Morven hills were alive with light and shadow but no longer fabulously high; Glencoe opened out its dark passage to the sun; Ballachulish slate quarries; the bright homesteads of Ardgour; the brilliant white of the Corran lighthouse; and here we were rounding last night’s red buoy with its ‘staff and globe and white light every six sees.’ It marked the end of Culchenna Spit, and over against it on the Corran side was a red and white ringed beacon, with ball on top, marking the end of Salachan Spit. We sailed between, picking up two black buoys on our port side and so straight for the Narrows where the flood tide makes six knots. We saw a passenger steamer coming from Fort William and judged that we should meet right in the Narrows. Which we did. But the Thistle has her moments, and merely heaved her stern once or twice at the retreating Lochfyne. The engine paid little attention to us to-day. Couldn’t be bothered, and once eased off her throttle as if she, too, were a bit sick at going home.
There is an anchorage round the lighthouse in Camus Asaig, and, passing in front of the hotel, we went and had a look at it; but somehow we felt that to anchor here would be unreal, a malingering, a mere stop-gap, so we put about and headed for Fort William, not even altering course to look at Inverscadle Bay, two miles farther on, though it was inviting, with a glen behind.
Soon we saw Fort William in the distance and presently came on a road with hurrying cars, and enclosures by houses with tents and caravans. The sight quite depressed the Crew, and even the Mate, lying on his back on top of the house in the sun, wondered lazily what all the haste was about (though he has a lot of motoring to do himself). This hurry, and grouping of folk in enclosures, and congested social activity generally, did seem a bit of a mistake that afternoon.
‘The cars sound from here like buzzing bees,’ said the Mate.
‘That never find any honey,’ said the Crew.
A large pier ahead confused us, until we discovered two piers on our starboard side—the anchorage being anywhere inshore for half-a-mile south of them. This is an exposed place, for the prevailing summer winds are sou’westerly and quite a sea can beat up here in an hour. We dropped anchor in about four fathoms just south of the first pier and went ashore for stores.
In the sunshine, Fort William was alive with cars and visitors. As the core of extensive aluminium works, it is a busy place. In the summer time it is a natural tourist centre: for motorists doing the Big Glen, for steamer tourist traffic, and for climbers and hikers. Wild Glen Nevis behind it has a youth hostel half-way up. For those who are anxious to keep the Highlands insulated from taint of industry lest, inter alia, it affect the tourist industry, Fort William provides an answer, for the increase in tourism since the establishment of the aluminium works has been enormous. It is not implied that the tunnelling and pipe lines and factory buildings attract visitors (though they may, for we are drawn to behold the more striking works of our fellows), yet it does seem clear that the presence of these things has not kept visitors away. If our trip brought home to us one thing more than another it is that from the independence of crofting and sea-fishing or other natural industry to the dependence on tourism and sport is a regrettable descent in the history of any people, if it is not indeed the end of their history.
The Mate bought two haddock in Fort William and paid one shilling and eightpence for them, so the Crew brightened up a bit. (Some weeks later I went to sea with a seine-net boat, and the fishermen realised just about this sum net—for each box containing six stones of haddock.) Meantime the wind had risen and we were nearly beaten in rowing the two hundred yards to our boat. So up came the anchor and we rolled across to Camus na Gall on the other side, looked at it, went round the point into Loch Eil, looked at that, successfully circumnavigated the deceitful Corpach Islands, and came back to rest in Camus na Gall, which was sheltered, if with slow currents going everyway.
And we were glad we came back, for Ben Nevis that evening was a fine sight, with yellow sunlight on its massive shoulders and pure white cloud in its ravines. When the darkness descended, the town strung itself along the shore in points of light that went deep into the water, wavering like electric eels, while four bright eyes, penstock-high, looked out from the mountain’s dark face. Below, the factory was very bright, and further north the new town of Inverlochy was a faint wash of light.
Inverlochy! That marvellous march of Montrose and his men over the passes, and the surprise and bloody defeat of the Campbells!
And across the water from us, the last stones of the Fort to which Glencoe of the Macdonalds had come to hand in his people’s submission—too late for their enemies and those who remembered battlefields like Inverlochy.
How great the change since then! Though hardly yet a suggestion of what will be when the Highlands develop their natural industries through water power and recognise they have fish and trout and salmon, mutton and game and meat, heather honey and milk and berries, roots and vegetables and whisky, that cannot be excelled, if they can be equalled, for quality and flavour anywhere in the world. The end is not yet. To realise that this is no vague prophecy—consider the envious eyes of industrial combines. These combines will beat the landlords and the scenic sentimentalists. And if it does not go well with the workers after that, the workers will fight. There will never again be a repetition of the defeatism of the Clearances. The folk will come into their own. God hurry the merry day!
We spent a forenoon round about Corpach, talking to the lock-keepers, buying an official chart of the Caledonian Canal (one shilling), and arranging to begin the through passage to Inverness at three o‘clock (£3). We discussed the prospect, for we had never passed through locks and wondered about head and stern ropes. We had a good head rope, and tied the two long sheets of the foresail for a stern rope. At one o’clock a canal official called and asked us if we could arrange to enter at two-thirty, as two fishing boats were going through at that time. We of course said we could; but we were a bit disappointed, for I had a good idea of what packing three boats into one lock would mean in the way of care. A drifter can hit an iron stanchion a fair side-wallop without damage; but if she closed in on us in a back wash, it would be like crushing an egg. Not but that we might look after ourselves, if we could rely on the engine. Moreover, it takes over two hours to clear the locks here, for after the two entering locks you come to what the guidebooks poetically call ‘Neptune’s Staircase’—a series of eight locks.
When we got under way it was with more misgiving than we had faced rocks and seas. If we had thought all excitement over, the first two days in the Caledonian Canal made us think again.
We got round sharp on two-thirty to find the drifter Invernairne (Hopeman) and the seine-netter The Gleaners (Lossiemouth) already in the open lock. The Mate had to stand forward, ready with rope and fender, so I had to watch where we were going, disappear to the engine, reappear, and bespeak the Crew at the helm. I was more anxious to make a decent entrance before these fishermen than I would have been before any yachtsmen, but if I kept going too long and then could not get out of gear—well, that must not happen. I judged my distance—but not the flow of water from the lock against me; I went forward again and again came short, for there was nothing less than a spate flowing; my bobbing up and down may have amused the onlookers, but I kept that engine going and finally drew alongside the Invernairne with the flywheel still revolving. For which I was more relieved than any steam engineer might guess I
How friendly were the crews! In no time we were fast to the Invernairne and when I explained my difficulties the engineer and his mate came aboard to have a look at the engine, while the skipper, a dark obliging man, full of humour and fun, explained what he thought was wrong. The cones of the clutch were sticking because they were dirty and were not getting enough oil. This, too, was the engineer’s opinion, and he advised a cupful of oil in the gearcase before each long run. Otherwise the engine looked a good one, he said. I had long been certain that all that was necessary was a proper overhaul. However, she would get the cupful of oil—even if she had got it before!
Meantime the sluice gates were opening and in the boil of the waters the large vessels swung in a way that kept us busy. But soon we were moving forward into the next lock, towed by the Invernairne, having to drop astern to avoid the gates, before again hauling up to her starboard quarter. Then we discovered our dangerous moment, for when the Invernairne gave a few kicks astern, we were caught in the backwash and our own stern swung out to the lock wall. I dived with the fender, but the Mate checked the movement with our stern rope; instantly we surged ahead, and before I could get back to our bow we had scored a heavy hit on the stern of The Gleaners. This was bad. But now we were getting the hang of the business, and when we began the ascent of the eight locks at Banavie, I was ready for the Invernairne’s kick astern, while the skipper of The Gleaners had fendered his own stern to help us. The surge came, we strained ahead, I dropped the fender over our stem; but three inches from taking the impact, we stopped, and glancing up at the steering house I saw the skipper’s face hanging out the window, smiling at me.
I laughed back at the sheer neatness of the operation. After that we never bumped, for the skipper, spinning his wheel like a top, gave us the maximum of room while he took the gates as a Parisian cabman takes a kerb. What perfect control he had over his vessel, and how sympathetic the response of the engineer! We got great pleasure from watching this, and in the hours it took to ascend old Neptune’s Staircase, we had many a friendly talk.
What astonished us most in this talk was the good humour and human friendliness that prevailed amongst men who had been fishing for three months in the western seas and had barely cleared their working expenses. At thirty pounds a week, these expenses had beaten them in the end, and they were now returning for a month to get ready for Yarmouth and the hope of better luck.
During the three months, they had missed only one night at sea. That very morning at three o’clock they had hauled their drift of over seventy nets eighteen miles south-east of Castlebay, and here they were, regretting that the two hours’ hold-up at Corpach on account of low tide, would prevent their getting through the Caledonian Canal the same night!
‘You didn’t get any herring this morning, then?’
‘If we had, we wouldn’t be here now! No, we only got a few mackerel. Would you like some?’
And before we could properly protest, the skipper had his knife out and his young son had three fat mackerel on the gunwale. Then—a small thing this, but somehow typical—the skipper’s pocket knife was so sharp that it cut right through the hard head of the mackerel and along the bone as if it were slicing butter. Inside a couple of minutes he presented us with the three fish split and cleaned. At once he wanted them back, for the galley was in good trim and would fry them for us in no time. But we refused to give them back.
Later on when we were presented with three fresh herring out of a dozen or so which they were obviously keeping in a small box for their own use, we protested strongly.
‘Nonsense!’ he said. ‘If it wasn’t you it would be somebody else.’
We were strangers to them and still do not know their names, as they do not know ours (if they have remembered us at all).
And while this was going on, the rain was coming down in buckets. I hadn’t put on my oilskin trousers and my knee-boots were full. The Mate was wet to the skin. Ben Nevis—the most spectacular view is from Banavie—rolled massive rain clouds over its summit and down into its glens. I heard a click! behind me. The rain streaming off her sou’wester, the Crew had tried for a photograph!
They could not give any reason for the failure of the herring fishing on the West, though the mate, a quiet reasonable man, blamed the presence of large numbers of squids. In a long talk with him, wherein old sailing days were contrasted with the present steam age, I found him inclined to think that the courses of nature were nowadays being interfered with. The herring shoals were getting broken up before in the ordinary way they would have come inshore. Ring-netting also tended to destroy immature herring. There must be a limit even to nature’s bounty. You cannot go on bagging the golden egg without giving the goose a chance. The same thing could be seen happening to-day in many of the small ports of the Moray Firth. In the old days, with line fishing, you always got white fish and the best white fish. Along comes the seine-net. For a time there is great profit. Then the drags get less profitable and less profitable, until at last the men are working harder than they did with the lines and not getting so sure a result.
‘And not getting the fish to eat themselves, for the best must always go to the market. And the country folk around —they can no longer buy them,’ said a member of the crew.
Meantime the sea bottom is being cleaned. Great hauls of immature fish are taken aboard and shovelled back—to help to feed the gulls. ‘I have done it myself,’ said the mate. A slower process with the herring, no doubt. There are immense shoals in the sea and they move about mysteriously. But the drifters are getting into debt.
‘And the Scottish boats, owned on the old family basis, won’t stand up in the long run against the English boats, based on shore syndicates or capitalism?’
‘Well—I don’t know. English capitalism is feeling the draught. Make no mistake about that. And the trawlers, from poaching inshore here, right to the Arctic—they’re no longer paying, not as a body. The best of the trawler companies was down thousands last year.’
With line fishing and drift nets, a reasonable balance in nature was kept. Beyond that, some sort of order seemed necessary. A man can take great crops off virgin soil, but not indefinitely. We manure our land and breed our stock. The fishing industry was still pretty much in the early hunter stage. We have been treating the sea as a jungle.
A vast and fascinating subject, with skill and luck and courage and constant danger behind it.
When we were up the eight locks, the skipper of the Invernairne hung on to our bow rope. ‘Save you bothering with your engine,’ he cried cheerfully.
Just before then, the Mate heard him entertaining some of the crew of The Gleaners. In the midst of the process, his face had disappeared and reappeared with a mask on, a grotesque ‘false face’, that had increased the merriment. The Gleaners had been seine-netting from Ayr and, unlike their neighbour, had done fairly well. But they were all the brethren of adven ture, good luck or bad.
For the seven or eight miles up to Gairlochy we got an exciting tow, countering the swing of the bends with strong pressure on our tiller, the tow rope taut as a fiddle string. The dinghy was heavy with rain water and in the narrow passage through a swing bridge yawed a couple of inches short of smashing herself against the stone work.
The banks were wooded and very green in the rain. Distant prospects were half-veiled—in the way a figure in a photograph, thrown very slightly out of focus, may have depth added to its beauty. We wondered if any canal in the world was so beautiful as this one in the same moment as we wondered what might happen to us should the Invernairne slacken speed too suddenly on entering the lock for which she was now blowing. The Mate suggested we might get them to cast us off, but I was banking on the skipper—and not without reason, for he reduced speed so smoothly that our rope never even sagged as we pulled to his quarter inside the lock. Then off again, and soon we were in Loch Lochy, with the mate of the drifter standing by to let go. When I gave him the signal, he cast us off, and we waved our farewells.
‘Not only the salt of the sea, but the salt of the earth,’ said our Mate.
Let me confess (with some difficulty) that we were impulsively moved by all this kindness and friendliness. Whitman seems the poet to quote, though an Indian visionary has achieved the word disinterestedness. And not consciously on the part of these fishermen as a decent or moral thing to do, but naturally as one might tell a joke or pass the time of day. Should they ever read these words, they will smile.
Yet the point has to be made. If any men had reason to curse their luck, to rail against fate, surely these men had, who for months had worked day and night in those wild seas for less than their keep—nay, for years, and would work for years more, while markets were rigged against them and men in safe shore jobs made money out of them. To think of the sure salary I myself had got for mere Revenue accountancy was enough to make me blush.
The more I see of life the more I am convinced there is a primordial goodness in man, a natural generosity. Out of consciousness of this grows the idealism that inspires all political extremism, for it realises, with a sort of wild and maddened anguish, how acquisitiveness and greed and colossal egoism born of power have contorted or crushed the goodness and the generosity.
And of all elements for quickening the free primordial spirit of man, what can surpass the sea, with its thrill of life over the near presence of death?