Boswell's Bus Pass Part 7

In the morning, once Boswell regained his composure after seeing the naked Johnson with a coloured handkerchief tied round his head, they compared thoughts. During the night they had both considered the possibility that their host, in league with the soldiers, was planning to rob them.

Instead they are offered breakfast. 'Fried, poached, scrambled or boiled Doctor?' Far from robbing them, MacQueen chums them for several miles and reminisces about being a member of the Highland army post Culloden. Ever the sentimentalist Boswell revealed that 'I several times burst into tears. There is a certain a.s.sociation of ideas in my mind upon that subject, by which I strongly affected. The very Highland names or the sound of a bagpipe, will stir my blood ...'

As they pa.s.sed through Glen s.h.i.+el Johnson is determined to be underwhelmed by the scenery. When Boswell called one of the mountains immense, he was grumpily corrected with the put-down: 'No, but 'tis a considerable protuberance.'

The protuberances looked especially fine from the bus windows. The trees nearest to the road pa.s.sed in a blur while those across the water maintained a statelier pace. We saw a man with a canoe on his head. The pylons were of an unusual shape hunched up, flexing their upper bodies. The low levels in the loch had the effect of creating real beaches along the edges. Soon whole drowned villages would re emerge, shaking off the water like wet dogs, and resume their ident.i.ty. Then the carca.s.ses of Wellington bombers would stretch, propellers unbuckle, and take once more to the skies after sixty years of biding their time. The wind had ploughed swimming lanes the length of the loch.

No sooner had the bus dropped us off at s.h.i.+el Bridge than a monstrous goat ran into the traffic, causing some heavy braking. It was a huge hairy goat complete with black dreadlocks and full Masonic regalia, an escaped regimental mascot. Or as Roy preferred, an emissary from the devil; a satanic visitor sent to warn us not to complete the journey. With trepidation we sought refuge in the nearby garage that had the air of the deserted village about it. Instead of a till there was an honesty box.

Within a hundred metres of the main road we pa.s.sed a meadow of cliched beauty. Four motionless horses were arranged symmetrically. One large brown mare stood in the dark green gra.s.s with a stillness and majesty that dispelled any lingering bad goat thoughts.

Near to this spot Boswell and Johnson found themselves surrounded by curious locals in a village that has now disappeared without trace. They sat on a green turf seat at the end of a house and accepted two dishes of milk that 'frothed like syllabub'. To counteract the Arcadian spirit of this encounter Boswell 'gave all that chose it snuff and tobacco'. As none of them could speak or read English they must have ignored the government warning that smoking kills. Boswell's tear-soaked sentimentality did not extend to his view of the curious onlookers and bearers of syllabub, 'Some were as black and wild in their appearance as any American savages whatever ... I said to Mr Johnson 'twas the same as being with a tribe of Indians. "Yes,'' said he, "but not so terrifying.''' Boswell the l.u.s.tful, also slyly observes that one of the women 'was as comely as the figure of Sappho'.

Johnson reveling in his new role of dispenser of largesse and s.h.i.+llings made the children line up and 'distributed his copper and made them and their parents all happy.' Word soon spread that Christmas has come early and the crowd swelled as cottages, byres and latrines empty. Boswell offered to pay for the syllabub. After frantic consultation the old woman who provided the dubious brew suggested half a crown when offered a s.h.i.+lling. Boswell gulped and handed over the money which in 1773 was the equivalent of the GNP of a small country. Thus the modern Scottish tourist industry was born.

The road soon climbed up towards the mountain pa.s.s known as the Mam Ratagan. Despite being lighter in the pocket Johnson struggled with the ascent. The horses nearly buckled with his weight while he huffed, puffed and cursed in several dead languages. Boswell conceded 'It is a terrible steep to climb'. At the summit they encountered a Dutch army officer who, to their delight, recognised them.

In a car park near the top we encountered two Indian tourists equipped with deep mist-penetrating binoculars. To our disappointment neither of them recognized us. We also made the mistake of making friendly eye contact with a man in the back of a parked camper van. He looked startled. Moments later a very disapproving female face emerged from below the level of the window. It was time to move on.

Roy noticed a tiny shrew on the road. It was not in robust good health and we speculated that it had perhaps been struck a glancing blow. The absurdity of a shrew being dazed by an encounter with a pa.s.sing Land Rover dawned on us both. What then, a b.u.t.terfly wing, a small zephyr, an angel?

The descent proved problematic for the early travellers. The party had four horses between them and the guides decided the nags might live longer if they took it in turns to carry the corpulent and increasingly truculent burden between them. Johnson went into a sulk and declared that he was prepared to be carried by either the black or brown horse but did not fancy the grey ones in the least. Hay (an excellent name for a 'common ignorant horse hirer' as Boswell charitably dubbed him) hit on a cunning ruse to distract Johnson from his infantile petulance. Having observed how he had enjoyed watching goats frolicking earlier in the day he took out his I-Spy Goat Book. 'Just when Mr Johnson was uttering his displeasure, the fellow says, "see such pretty goats.'' Then whu! He whistled, and made them jump.'

Fortunately I had fewer problems with Roy. He only became challenging when he misread a sign indicating the proximity of an otter hide. After wondering why anyone would like to hire an otter he answered his own question with unwanted bawdy speculation. 'Two hours with an otter sir, you won't regret it; take a slippery one sir, well worth the extra expense.'

Having sulked his way down the hill Johnson became distraught when Boswell went on ahead to secure their accommodation in Glenelg. 'He called me back with a tremendous shout, and was really in a pa.s.sion with me for leaving him.' Beneath his apparent indifference to the scenery Johnson was disconcerted by the unfamiliar environment. For days they had travelled in the brooding shadow of the hills over genuinely challenging terrain. He was an old man, ent.i.tled to a moment of panic.

Increasingly bored with the incremental tedium of the walk Roy regaled me with a medley of marching songs that became more Tyrolean and Neo-fascist with every step. Soon tomorrow would truly belong to him. He then changed channels and launched into a horrible ballad in a cod Irish accent that apparently involved a traveller having consensual s.e.x with the daughter of Riley, the landlord. By all accounts the experience was mutually pleasurable but the traveler launched a preemptive strike against the landlord's wrath by waving a pistol in the air.

Roy then took his hobby of collie-teasing a stage further and deliberately provoked a bull that was brooding l.u.s.tfully beyond a mercifully secure fence. The animal roared and stamped in response to the verbal taunts. I think it was love at first slight.

On the outskirts of Glenelg we came to Bernera barracks, the last of the several forts built by c.u.mberland to warn the locals not to think of insurrection ever again. After the lavish and flattering hospitality they had met at both Fort George and Fort Augustus we can understand why Boswell 'would fain have put up there; at least I looked at them wishfully, as soldiers have always everything in the best order. But there was only a sergeant and a few men there.'

We went one better and finding a partial gap in the barbed wire defences broke in to the derelict, roofless barracks. After eyeballing giant nettles we stood in the central square. To our right the stables were still visible, small bushes grew from the arched windows and in a corner of an out-building we found the remains of an oven that would have glowed red with fire as fresh bread was shoveled from its maw.

We had booked into the Glenelg Inn, Boswell and Johnson's final destination before they left for the Isles. The site of the original inn is now a posh private house adjacent to the jetty from which they sailed to Armadale. In its day it was a fairground house of horrors, a monument to squalor and botulism. In Boswell's words, 'A la.s.s showed us upstairs into a room raw and dirty; bare walls, a variety of bad smells, a coa.r.s.e black fir greasy table, forms of the same kind, and from a wretched bed started a fellow from his sleep like Edgar in King Lear.' Johnson has his own simile to describe the apparition who rose to greet them. 'Out of one of the beds, on which we were to repose, started up, at our entrance, a man black as a Cyclops from the forge.'

Who was this fellow? Posterity demands an answer. Was it an evil sprite, an abandoned child fathered by a rampant soldier after the '45, a relative of the Masonic goat encountered earlier, an escaped slave?

Roy too had a fright when he found me wandering round the bedroom in the middle of the night without the slightest idea where I was. It was an unwanted intimation of the Alzheimer years ahead. I suspect Roy was quite relieved that Glenelg marked the end of this particular leg of the journey. A combination of helpline duties, Wilma, and Portobello Ceilidh Band commitments gave him the perfect excuse to return home.

Glenelg September 1st Oh Margaret, My body hurt with laughter. Joseph is great joker as you know well. You wait, I tell you very funny trick, but that later. All stories must move like the clock.

We get horse in Inverness. I love horse after time in Bohemian army, I tell you often about how Joseph was hero at Third Silesian war, and show you wound scar. There is horse for me, the doctor who hate horse and the master. We have horses too for bagages, and we buy two men who like slaves run by side of horse. They can talk the same tongue as natives, but one man is from Bohemia, his name Va.s.s. He from next village and know my sister. He say keep quiet, make them think I from Scotland or they send me back. Va.s.s is good man. We stop by falling down house made from mud and sticks. Old woman live there and smell of goats. We stop, Doctor and master want to see inside home. The woman she very frightened. The other slave man call Hay (like for horses) he tell doctor she want make loving with master. This is bad thing to say, master so stupid, he believe it and go to woman bedroom with flaming paper. He nearly fire whole house. The woman scream and shout. The man Hay tell doctor she send up prayers for him in her own tongue.(1) We see beautiful mountains and my heart climb in sky like bird. The doctor say mountains very small like hill in place called Lichfield. He say mountains big there too. We stay at fort again. Why so many forts? What they frightened of, where are the monster wild animals that roam in their minds? (This too is good writing Margaret!) Back on horse, the doctor grumble and say his a.r.s.e sore. Master say his own a.r.s.e not sore and he should be soldier. Doctor say master is a.r.s.e.

We come to place and are surround by country people who want to touch Joseph. They never see man so tall with big moustache. They give me strange magical drink called syllable. I am like G.o.d to them. The children they touch Joseph's coat and follow me. The master he is very cross. Whole world know he is most important. So he and doctor take s.h.i.+llings from Joseph and give them to old women who stop follow me and go with them. Then they give snuff, then they give whisky. Now master more happy. Sometime dear Margaret I want give him good Bohemian fist.(2) We stay at inn in nowhere country later. Doctor and master turn nose up at dirt on bed but Joseph make them happy by bring clean sheet. I am good servant. The doctor he say, and Joseph so proud he write down words 'You are a fine fellow. A civil man and a wise man.' This make me very please and happy. Wise man is good.(3) A strange thing happen at end of day. The master ride on away from doctor to tell inn we come. The doctor become very frighten and feel lost. He shout at master who is far gone now. The doctor look at hills with frighten eye then nearly fall from horse. I take his rope, tell him he is safe and lead doctor horse to inn.(4) While they have whisky I think joke is best thing to make happy again so I tell servant to cover face with fire soot and hide in bed. When doctor and master come in bedroom black face leap up and make big noise. (5)I am funny man, Margaret. I must end now. I wish you here to put your arms round this funny man who is also sad man because his Margaret is so far from me. I just want to put mouth on ... LETTER ILLEGIBLE AT THIS POINT ...

Your big friend and love one ... Joseph Ritter (1) 'Mr Johnson would not hurt her delicacy by insisting to see her bedchamber, like Archer in The Beaux' Stratagem. But I was of a more ardent curiosity, so I lighted a piece of paper and went round to see her bedchamber.' Boswell also seemed quite adamant that 'She sent us away with many prayers in Erse.'

(2) This is not the picture that Boswell creates, 'I then gave a penny apiece to each child. I told Mr Johnson of this, upon which he called to Joseph and our guides, for change for a s.h.i.+lling, and declared he would distribute among the children. Upon this being announced in Erse, there was a great stir.'

(3) Joseph's recall is excellent. This corresponds word for word with Boswell's account.

(4) This is an astonis.h.i.+ng insight. The fact that Johnson became unhappy at being momentarily forsaken is well known. However Joseph's account strongly suggests that Johnson experienced a panic attack. If this was the case, this is one of the first recorded instances.

(5) No one has ever suggested what in retrospect seems an obvious explanation for the strange case of the black figure; it was a practical joke.

STAGE SEVEN.

SKYE, RAASAY AND SKYE AGAIN.

A Perilous Chandelier An Unfortunate Misunderstanding Concerning an Otter A Noteworthy Rabbit Profound thoughts on Death Menacing Warriors Described The Pleasures of Silage A Wise and Accommodating Shepherd The Evil Consequent on Excessive Drinking A few well chosen words about Young People

Armadale Broadford Corriachatachan Sconser

Like a young child waiting for Christmas I counted the number of sleeps before I could travel again. My vicarious life was a.s.suming more importance than the real one of part time work, family and the weekly shopping. I sensed that Morag, my wife, was more than usually fearful for my sanity. I needed to get back. My chance came two weeks later when David once more n.o.bly agreed to resume his role as my carer and travelling support worker.

Boswell noted how their hostess 'made a kind of jumping for joy' when she welcomed them to Armadale on Skye. Our arrival had no such impact on the CalMac workers who steadfastly refused to dance a jig in delight. The hostess's movements may have had their origins in a medical condition as Boswell and Johnson felt distinctly unwelcome in the house of Alexander Macdonald. Their moaning and bad mannered host saw them as a distraction from his own imminent journey to England.

Our initially cordial welcome at our B & B was soon eroded by being told in unambiguous terms that we must remove all footwear at the bedroom door so as not to deflower the beige carpet. And, furthermore, if we had to 'go during the night', could we use the shaving light rather than the bathroom light which allegedly created mayhem on a par with a battlefield nuclear explosion. Now confused by which cords could legitimately be pulled David tugged at the string hanging from the faux chandelier in the middle of the ceiling. The gale unleashed by the dervish fan blades had the same apocalyptic effect as a helicopter hovering above a cornfield. Desperate to stem the unleashed fury David thrust his hand upwards. The patina of blood on the flock wallpaper and a hand severed at the wrist seemed a small price to pay for peace.

Boswell commented 'We had an ill-dressed dinner, Sir Alexander not having a cook of any kind from Edinburgh. I alone drank port wine. No claret appeared. We had indeed mountain and Frontignac and Scotch porter. But except what I did myself, there was no hospitable convivial intercourse, no ringing of gla.s.ses.' Sadly we do not know how Sir Alexander reacted as he watched Boswell downing every alcohol tinctured liquid in the house including Jeyes Cleaning Fluid and the reserve supplies of Night Nurse before smas.h.i.+ng several gla.s.ses in a series of strange and solitary toasts.

Hospitable convivial intercourse in the Armadale Hotel must have been on the cards when the lone woman drinking in the bar asked if she could join us. Her Sisyphean task was to travel through remote corners of the kingdom checking insurance claims. She seemed bleakly lonely, a state to which she became instantly reconciled when David asked her if she fancied a wander along the beach looking for dead otters. She was a woman who must have survived many offers in tartan-trewed bars, but nothing like this. We patiently explained how Dr Johnson on finding his first dead otter on the very coast visible from the lounge bar flipped it over and commented how its 'underneaths' resembled those of a spaniel. Fearful lest the same happen to her and now desperate for one more night of loneliness our new friend excused herself, gulped her drink and went to bed.

The guests at Sir Alexander Macdonald's house on Skye included 'A little Aberdeens.h.i.+re man, one Jeans, a naturalist, with his son, a dwarf with crooked legs.' They were eventually joined by a posse of relatives but 'Sir Alexander let them stand round the room and stuck his fork into a liver pudding, instead of getting room made for them.' He then committed the cardinal sin of the worst oaf by dis.h.i.+ng out the punch with the soup ladle.

We would have welcomed the distraction of a few dwarves with crooked legs or the odd fragrant violation of ladle etiquette. Instead we were forced to eavesdrop on the loud triumphalist roaring of an American party who had invaded the bar with military bravado. One of the conquerors insisted in shocked tones 'Taking notes from crevices is bad luck.' While I was still trying to form a moral stance on this contentious issue their attention turned to a photograph alb.u.m. 'I like the way you're straddling Atlantis.' We hoped this was only a metaphor for ma.s.sive strategic delusions of colonial greed.

Despite the inauspicious start the mood of both travellers improved during the four days spent in Armadale. Johnson felt better after describing one of their fellow guests as a woman who 'would sink a ninety-gun s.h.i.+p. She is so dull so heavy.' He then declared that in seven years he would make Skye an independent island and that 'he'd roast oxen whole and hang out a flag as a signal to the Macdonalds to come and get beef and whisky.'

Boswell too felt his spirits rising. He announced 'I had felt a return of spleen during my stay in this mean mansion, and had it not been that I had Mr Johnson to contemplate, I should have been very sickly in mind.'

I had been struggling with my own mood and was irked by a sense of unreality hanging over the island. Paradoxically this may have had something to do with the sheer incongruity of seeing Skye in beautiful weather, as if the island had inappropriately insinuated itself into the photoshopped pages of an Aegean holiday brochure. The light made the ubiquitous rhododendrons an unnatural cloying pink and the shade endowed much of the ferny undergrowth with the synthetic quality of dark green plastic.

We walked along the coast as did Boswell and Johnson to Tormore House, previously the home of Alexander's factor who received the guests with all the hospitality at his disposal.

We had been told that the house is lived in by a spry old woman in her eighties who would have welcomed us with the same fervor as the earlier owner. Unfortunately she was not at home although I thought I caught sight of a head nodding in the gloom of the sitting room.

Walking back up the hill we caught up with two elderly American flower spotters. They gleefully reeled off their finds so far, harebells, lilies, Michaelmas daisies, fuchsia, campion, 'Yes, it was campion'. One of them then spoke the immortal line during the delivery of which time itself slowed down, 'For years I have tried to grow fuchsias in my back pa.s.sage.' A flower therapy for our times. A meadow of flowers flowering in Magritte's dream. Lie face down in your garden, whip off your drawers and let your neighbours feast their eyes on the fuchsias just a small treat, mind before teatime.

Before we took our leave of our landlord and lady we glanced at the visitors' book left reproachfully open. A very scary drawing of a rabbit leapt off the first page, the significance of which would soon become abundantly clear. The comments from visitors as far flung as Scarborough and Wick were astonis.h.i.+ng. The fact that we had spent the night in Valhalla had pa.s.sed us by. Had we slept on a bed of petals with a small army of compliant vestal virgins in attendance we would not have experienced the o.r.g.a.s.mic state of rapture experienced by previous inhabitants of the room. Hyperboles dripped off the pages. Declarations of unctuous grat.i.tude were interspersed with descriptions of breakfasts fit to be delivered on silver platters to condemned men on the morning of their executions. We felt that we had missed out somehow. 'We will recommend you to all our gay biking friends, hope the oil comes off the sheets' will have given them pause for thought.

Boswell writes on September 5th 'Sir Alexander and Rorie and I walked to the parish church of Sleat. It is a poor one; not a loft in it.' We set out to do the same.

Distracted, David wandered into the driveway of a large house. I followed and saw him in a standoff with possibly the largest rabbit that has ever lived (including the pair of famine-alleviating monsters presented by an American entrepreneur to the president of North Korea who promptly arranged for them to be cooked and served at the presidential table).

In addition to being the size of a small dog David's nemesis was strangely striped. Irrespective of its size or decoration it was totally nonplussed by our presence and lollopped off into the shaking undergrowth. Our deviation from the main road had been observed by two of Skye's finest champions of the Neighbourhood Watch scheme. 'Can we help you?' they asked with the barely hidden conviction that they had intercepted two house plundering rogues from the mainland. Moments later they looked in horror at each other. 'Not the rabbit!' one of them said before they both plunged into the vegetation never to be seen again. Puzzled, we decided to walk along the coast instead.

After the disconcerting rabbit experience we approached a beached trawler with caution as it was being guarded by a very still Alsatian dog. Our trepidation was justified when we realized that the creature was made of tin and that half of its nightmare metallic skull was missing.

The church at Kilmore has a pervasive and wistful serenity. Boswell and Johnson went to inspect the monument erected to the memory of the Alexander Macdonald's son who had died aged 25 in Rome six years before their visit. Johnson comments on the florid nature of the description without acknowledging the unquenchable pain endured by parents with a dead child.

Inside the new church a memorial tablet on the wall features a mayfly on a bas relief. On a summer's day it seemed a powerful symbol of mortality and the transient nature of all things, more effective than more conventional momenti mori. The fragile beauty of the carved gossamer wings would have rattled Johnson who told Boswell 'He never had a moment in which death was not terrible to him.' In a letter to John Taylor he admitted that 'the approach of death is very dreadful. I am afraid to think on that which I know I cannot avoid.'

If possible Boswell was even more obsessed with death. Three years prior to the journey he lay in bed alongside his infant daughter and 'engaged her attention with telling her how pretty angels would come and carry her from the kirk hole (the grave) to Heaven, where she would be with G.o.d and see fine things.' Needless to say the child was petrified.

We sat on the kerb outside of the church waiting for the Broadford bus. The adjacent shelter was a small monument to expressionism. A pink cycle was parked inside next to a beehive which contained copies of the West Highland Free Press. On the other side of the gla.s.s a stone shrine had been built around a spring, next to a small statuette with no arms.

While trying to superimpose meaning on the eclectic randomness of the shelter two geriatric Dutchmen swaddled in leather astride of Harley Davidsons appeared in the middle of the road. They circled several times while maintaining unflinching eye contact. They were in fact so old they could easily have seen us as young things fit for ritual slaughter. They may have been aging scouts for a younger tribe approaching rapidly over the horizon. Eventually the Easy Rider moment pa.s.sed and the ancient warriors shot off.

The warriors on the bus were predominately young Samurai. I must have missed the gentle lilting request from the driver, 'Shentlemen could you please be obliging and place your yumis, yaris and naginatas in the receptacle provided at the back of the bus'. In fact their weapon of choice was the Nikon L35AF2/One Touch. A lens rose and fell as its owner gauged whether his collection of foreign cloud formations would be further enhanced by a coiled nimbus with fluffy edges.

The only non j.a.panese voices were owned by an elderly couple from the North of England who became increasingly animated with each pa.s.sing farmyard dung heap, 'the smell of wet silage is the best thing in the world but you don't want it too wet.' Absolutely not. Did the bus company advertise its magical silage mystery tours throughout the world?

A craving for drink dictated a brief sojourn in a Broadford hotel. All of the bar staff spoke with English accents. There was evidence everywhere of a reverse demographic in operation in the Western Isles. Outgoers were being replaced by incomers. The whole population was swapping. The gra.s.s in Skye is greener than the sward in Tunbridge Wells. Hanging by a strap in the London Underground is better than being held to ransom by the infrequent bus service on the Islands. At least there is an element of choice. Throughout the Highlands Johnson found evidence of a more sinister demographic s.h.i.+ft.

The bar itself had undergone some sort of clearance. Although the size of a football pitch and more than capable of accommodating all of the tour buses on which its survival depended, we were the only customers. We offered to run about a lot and create an illusion of business but the offer was treated with the disdain it deserved.

A highlight of Boswell and Johnson's tour was the hospitable reception they met at Coriatachan, a farmhouse some six miles from Broadford owned by Mackinnon, a tenant of the grumpy Sir Alexander. Here they found good company, a copious supply of books and huge quant.i.ties of drink which Boswell was quite unable to resist.

The road to Coriatachan coincides for part of the way with the route of the long defunct Broadford quarry railway and initially follows the perimeter fence of the most dangerous electricity substation on the planet; more dangerous than eating cabbages grown on Gruinard Island, more dangerous than any nuclear waste processing plant, more dangerous than a cynanide-tasting party. The evidence for this is the absurd proliferation of yellow signs showing a small man being felled by a bolt of electricity and the legend DANGER OF DEATH KEEP OUT. The signs hang nine inches apart for the entire length of the fence.

Having resisted the urge to climb the fence and find out what death felt like we walked through the occasional shower in the direction of the original farmhouse which lies between two streams. Tiny birds of prey hovered in the distance like marks on the retina.

When Birkbeck Hill recreated the journey in the late1880's he describes 'Far up the valley to the West a flock of sheep was coming white from the shearing, bleating as they spread out along the hillside. Another flock the dogs were gathering into what had been the yard of the old house.' One hundred and twenty odd years later this is exactly what we saw. An obliging shepherd listened to our story and pointed us in the direction of a blue-coated figure rounding up the last of the strays.

Donald John McKinnon must have been in his nineties. Twinkling and urbane and speaking with a Lewis accent he revealed an astonis.h.i.+ng knowledge of the original travellers and was gently adamant that the Yale edition of the Journey is the most authoritative. He had been presented with a copy by the great, great, grandchild of the original McKinnon's older daughter but had lent it to someone who had failed to return it. If you are that person please make an old man happy and put it in the post. Ditto the American visitor from Arkansaw who promised to send a very early photograph of Coriatachan. Dig out the photo, send it now!

He ended the conversation by saying, 'Well lads, I had best get back to work, I don't want to be getting the sack' and said we were welcome to clamber over the ruins. A tree grows out of the original wall, its branches filling the s.p.a.ce that would have been occupied by the upper story. Was it the same s.p.a.ce in which Johnson wrote his Latin ode to Mrs Thrale? Was it the same s.p.a.ce where Boswell woke with a hangover when they visited Skye for the second time?

'I awaked at noon with a severe head-ach. I was much vexed that I should have been guilty of such a riot, and afraid of a reproof from Dr. Johnson. I thought it very inconsistent with that conduct I ought to maintain, while the companion of the Rambler. About one he came into my room and accosted me, 'What drunk yet?' His tone of voice was not that of severe upbraiding: so I was relieved a little. "Sir,'' said I, 'they kept me up.' He answered, 'No, you kept them up, you drunken dog.'

This he said with good-humoured English pleasantry. Soon afterwards Coirechatachan, Coll and other friends a.s.sembled round my bed. Corry had a brandy-bottle and gla.s.s with him, and insisted I should take a dram. 'Ay,' said Dr. Johnson, 'fill him drunk again. Do it in the morning, that we may laugh at him all day. It is a poor thing for a fellow to get drunk at night, and skulk to bed, and let his friends have no sport.'

Finding him thus jocular, I became quite easy; and when I offered to get up, he very good-naturedly said, "You need be in no such hurry now'''.

I took my host's advice, and drank some brandy, which I found an effectual cure for my head-ach. When I rose, I went into Dr. Johnson's room and taking up Mrs McKinnon's prayer-book, I opened it at the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity, in the epistle for which I read, "And be not drunk with wine, wherein there is excess.'' Some would have taken this as a divine interposition.'

Boswell's debauchery extended into a second night that finished at five in the morning but not before he had drunk innumerable kettles of brandy and bottles of punch. He also discovered that he was fluent in Erse and sang enthusiastically in his new tongue. When he eventually got to bed he was consumed with anxiety, foreboding 'and all the gloomy chances that imagination can figure disturbed me. I felt the utmost impatience to get home, and was tormented for some time.' Relief from this self inflicted torment was administered by Coll who burst into his bedroom with an overlooked bottle of punch.

Sadly the youth hostel at Broadford offered no such pleasures. SYHA could not provide in every room 'a smart lad lying on a table in the corner of the room, ready to spring up and bring the kettle whenever it was wanted'. Still, David did his best by springing up at intervals with his hip-flask. Despite his efforts there was not the merest echo of the Coriatachin conviviality. Small knots of hostellers kept themselves to themselves keen to preserve the illusion that they alone were staying for the night and that no one else existed. I began to feel paranoid and half expected some hairy hippy to grab me by the throat and ask, 'and which part of YOUTH hostel don't you understand, you old b.a.s.t.a.r.d?'

Sharing a room with arguably the most bad tempered Frenchman outside of the Franco-Prussian war at least provided us with the incentive to make an early start.

Our departure from the hostel in the morning was marked by a slightly menacing fly past of gulls. I asked David if he ever sorted out the gull problem at his Edinburgh tenement. He smirked.

We were joined at the bus stop by a couple in their twenties joined at the tongue, erotic Siamese twins. I think I had seen them the night before in the communal lounge. Were they young lovers parting for ever after a chance encounter? Hard up honeymooners? I don't know if it was their comfort together or their youth that I envied most.

A gaggle of ragam.u.f.fin small boys fought their way up the road, using their homework-laden satchels like weapons in a mediaeval joust. One of the schoolbags was tossed into the tree while its owner watched helplessly. There was no real malice involved and no one minded when the bag tumbled back down again. I looked into the higher branches in case the tree was heavily laden with leather satchels, sports bags, brief cases, duffle bags; the acc.u.mulated snared fruit of many years of teasing and minor bullying.

When the Sconser bus arrived to take us to the Raasay ferry the doors exuded the clas.h.i.+ng odours of Lynx deodorant and sample perfumes peeled from glossy magazine covers.

Although the smells and the noise were the same there was a collective palpable innocence that set this bus apart from hundreds on the mainland with similar cargos negotiating the high rise schemes and queues of hacked-off commuters.

The mountains and clouds must make a difference to the young psyche. From the windows the mountains were gradually losing consciousness as the mist lowered, offering absolution, discretion and the calming balm of invisibility; white incense seeped from under the doors of unseen mansions. The mist also appeared in various spouts. Geysers and gouts of steam rose from phantom locomotives in innumerable gullies. Perhaps this was prefigured in the Warrington dream.

Tuesday 7th September Coriatachan Skye My Dearest Margaret, Please pity and bless your skin wet admiring man. The rain drip from my ears and breeches. I never know rain like this, my soul is like sponge which the G.o.ds hold fast (see Margaret, my writing get better and better, soon you sell my letters to publisher in High Street and make money for new life). I think master and doctor want home now. They argue and the doctor he sulk like spoiled boy. Sometime I think they like married couple who see too much of the other, not like Joseph and his Margaret. The master make doctor angry when he make fun of small man who come to supper. Master bend over and talk in tiny voice to make doctor laughing. But he not laugh, he threaten to hit master with k.n.o.b stick if he do cruel thing again.(1) The doctor is good man who also write to his Thrale, who also married woman like Margaret. I see picture of Thrale woman in Doctor's bag, why such pretty woman go with big bear man make me wonder.

I have much to tell Margaret, and the world too when it ready for my letters on famous journey. The doctor is clever man, he know history and has read every book in Christian kingdom but he has bit of mad man too as he like bag piper who play at breakfast and play at dinner. Even when he stop I hear noise in head. My head ache with pipe noise.

I know all things about pipes and their making. I know how in past people burn to death while they play pipes. Perhaps death is good for them.(2) The master he get worse with his drinking. He have whisky every morning when he wake, he tell me it is custom. At night he wait until doctor go to bed and he drink until he cry then fall down. Sometime he pretend he talk like natives and make up words to songs, and then Joseph must carry him to sleep. He become more sad in morning again, and drink whisky again. One night I stop at door and see him do strange thing. It is odd to write in letter but I am servant faithful to truth. I see master play with razor and talk to himself in high voice. I go in room, what you doing? I shout. He drop razor and look at me strange. Just a dream Joseph, he say, just a dream. Then I see odd thing, as he pull down sleeve I see he already make blood marks on arm. This journey not good for him.(3) But I not want to make Margaret have alarm. I tell you thing to make you laugh. We stay in small cottage, lots of people all crowd in. The bedrooms full of people. We have many priests come to see doctor. One priest he stay night and while the maid take his clothes he make water like he on his own. He stand proud and p.i.s.s with girl in room. I shake head, I see many things in long life but not priest p.i.s.s like this.(4) When doctor not talk of shoes he talk of second sight. At first Joseph think second sight is when blind man is made better by G.o.d but he mean when we see what happen in future. The master too he talk same rubbish and because he know that the master like second sighting stories he always ask about it. He hear one day of man on this island who tell the future and the master look silent. At night master wake me in parlour(5) and we leave house holding boots. We travel under big moon and find this future seeing man who live in small hut with smoke and goats. The master he pretend to be brave and give sovereign. The mad man talk in native tongue and shout devil words. He touch the master on head and make to touch him on privates but the master gets angry and leave the man with cross words. He say very little on journey back and tell me not to say word to doctor.(6) Back in parlour I too am scared and want to hold Margaret my bosoms friend, Your Sad Jo (1) The victim of Boswell's cruel mockery was the son of John Janes or Jeans, a dealer in mineral specimens and fossils. Anderson in his biography of the Jeans family records that the son, 'a coa.r.s.e and contemptible character' succeeded him in the business but was drowned on a dark night in 1809 by falling into the basin near London's New Pier. There is something of the hypocrite in Johnson's reaction as he astonished Boswell a matter of days later by impersonating their hostess on Skye. Ever the sycophant Boswell congratulated Johnson on his powers of imitation: 'To see a beauty represented by Mr Johnson was excessively high. I told him it was a masterpiece and that he must have studied it much. "Ay,'' said he.'

(2) Joseph is recalling a conversation that took place at Armadale. In Johnson's words, 'As the bagpiper was playing, an elderly Gentleman informed us, that in some remote time, the Macdonalds of Glengary having been injured, or offended by the inhabitants of Culloden, and resolving to have justice or vengeance, came to Culloden on a Sunday, where finding their enemies at wors.h.i.+p, they shut them up in the church, which they set on fire; and this, said he, is the tune that the piper played while they were burning.'

(3) If true, this is an astonis.h.i.+ng insight into Boswell's mental state and related behaviour. The journal offers substantial evidence that Boswell was sinking into one of his habitual states of melancholy. What Joseph apparently witnessed was his master self harming. Although the term belongs to the modern world of psychology there is no reason to doubt that the phenomenon has always offered a temporary respite from otherwise unmanageable emotions. This insight is certainly compatible with modern theories that Boswell suffered from bipolar disorder.

(4) Boswell also saw fit to comment on this unusual departure from polite behaviour. 'I observed tonight a remarkable instance of the simplicity of manners or want of delicacy among the people in Skye. After I was in bed, the minister came up to go to his. The maid stood by and took his clothes and laid them on a chair piece by piece, not excepting his breeches, before throwing off which he made water, while she was just at his back.'

(5) The detail is correct. We know that Joseph was obliged to sleep in the parlour at Coriatachan.

(6) There is absolutely no reference to this encounter in any of Boswell's subsequent writing. There is however no doubting the travellers' near fixation with the second sight.

Sconser Raasay