[491]

     ’Caught in the wild Aegean seas,
      The sailor bends to heaven for ease.’

FRANCIS.  Horace, 2, Odes, xvi. 1.

[492] See ante, iv.  Dec. 9, 1784, note.

[493] Such spells are still believed in.  A lady of property in Mull, a friend of mine, had a few years since much difficulty in rescuing from the superstitious fury of the people, an old woman, who used a charm to injure her neighbour’s cattle.  It is now in my possession, and consists of feathers, parings of nails, hair, and such like trash, wrapt in a lump of clay.  WALTER SCOTT.

[494] Sir Walter Scott, writing in Skye in 1814, says:—­’Macleod and Mr. Suter have both heard a tacksman of Macleod’s recite the celebrated Address to the Sun; and another person repeat the description of Cuchullin’s car.  But all agree as to the gross infidelity of Macpherson as a translator and editor.’  Lockhart’s Scott, iv. 308.

[495] See post, Nov. 10.

[496] ’The women reaped the corn, and the men bound up the sheaves.  The strokes of the sickle were timed by the modulation of the harvest-song, in which all their voices were united.’  Johnson’s Works, ix. 58.

[497] ’The money which he raises annually by rent from all his dominions, which contain at least 50,000 acres, is not believed to exceed L250; but as he keeps a large farm in his own hands, he sells every year great numbers of cattle ...  The wine circulates vigorously, and the tea, chocolate, and coffee, however they are got, are always at hand.’ Piozzi Letters, i. 142.  ’Of wine and punch they are very liberal, for they get them cheap; but as there is no custom-house on the island, they can hardly be considered as smugglers.’ Ib. p. 160.  ’Their trade is unconstrained; they pay no customs, for there is no officer to demand them; whatever, therefore, is made dear only by impost is obtained here at an easy rate.’  Johnson’s Works, ix. 52.

[498] ’No man is so abstemious as to refuse the morning dram, which they call a skalk.’  Johnson’s Works, ix. p. 51.

[499] Alexander Macleod, of Muiravenside, advocate, became extremely obnoxious to government by his zealous personal efforts to engage his chief Macleod, and Macdonald of Sky, in the Chevalier’s attempts of 1745.  Had he succeeded, it would have added one third at least to the Jacobite army.  Boswell has oddly described M’Cruslick, the being whose name was conferred upon this gentleman, as something between Proteus and Don Quixote.  It is the name of a species of satyr, or esprit follet, a sort of mountain Puck or hobgoblin, seen among the wilds and mountains, as the old Highlanders believed, sometimes mirthful, sometimes mischievous.  Alexander Macleod’s precarious mode of life and variable spirits occasioned the soubriquet.  WALTER SCOTT.

[500] Johnson also complained of the cheese.  ’In the islands they do what I found it not very easy to endure.  They pollute the tea-table by plates piled with large slices of Cheshire cheese, which mingles its less grateful odours with the fragrance of the tea.’ Works, ix. 52.