Although time has not advanced, nor any change of season occurred to
tinge the landscape with colder hues, we are obliged to ask our reader's
company to a scene as unlike the sunny land we have been sojourning in
as possible. It is a little bay on the extreme north coast of Ireland,
closely landlocked by rugged cliffs, whose basalt formation indicates a
sort of half-brotherhood with the famed Causeway. Seen from the tall
precipices above, on a summer's day, when a vertical sunlight would have
fallen on the strip of yellow crescent-like beach along which white-
crested waves slowly came and went, the spot was singularly beautiful,
and the one long, low, white cottage which faced the sea would have
seemed a most enviable abode, so peaceful, so calm it looked. Closely
girt in on three sides by rocky cliffs, whose wild, fantastic outlines
presented every imaginable form, now rising in graceful pinnacles and
minarets, now standing out in all the stern majesty of some massive
fortress or donjon keep, some blue and purple heaths might be seen
clothing the little shelves of rock, and, wherever a deeper cleft
occurred, some tall, broad-leaved ferns; but, except these, no other
vegetation was to be met with. Indeed, the country for miles around
displayed little else than the arid yellowish grass that springs from
light sandy soil, the scant pasturage of mountain sheep. Directly in
front of the bay, and with a distinctness occasionally startling, might
be seen rising up from the sea a mass of stately cliffs, which seemed
like a reflection of the Causeway. This was Staffa, something more than
thirty-odd miles off, but which, in the thin atmosphere of a calm day,
might easily be traced out from the little cove of Port-na-Whapple.
Port-na-Whapple had once been a noted spot amongst fishermen; the
largest “takes” of salmon--and of the finest fish on the coast--had been
made there. For three or four weeks in the early autumn the little bay
was the scene of a most vigorous activity, the beach covered with rude
huts of branches and boat canvas, the strand crowded with people, all
busily engaged salting, drying, or packing the fish; boats launching, or
standing in, deep-laden with their speckled freight; great fires blazing
in every sheltered nook, where the cares of household were carried on in
common, for the fishermen who frequented the place lived like one large
family. They came from the same village in the neighborhood, and, from
time out of mind, had resorted to this bay as to a spot especially and
distinctively their own. They had so identified themselves with the
place that they were only known as Port-na-Whapple men; a vigorous,
stalwart, sturdy race of fellows were they, too, that none molested or
interfered with willingly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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