The Recreations of a Country ParsonBoyd, Andrew Kennedy Hutchison
General
The Recreations of a Country Parson
Boyd, Andrew Kennedy Hutchison
Clergy -- Anecdotes; Country life -- England; Rural clergy -- England
Let us try to remember the names of the places which reach along
the Frith upon either hand: we believe that a list of them will
show that not without reason it is said that Glasgow is unrivalled
in the number of her sea-side retreats. On the right hand, as we
go down the Frith, there are Helensburgh, Row, Roseneath, Shandon,
Gareloch-head, Cove, Kilcreggan, Lochgoil-head, Arrochar, Ardentinny,
Strone, Kilmun, Kirn, Dunoon, Inellan, Toward, Port Bonnatyne,
Rothesay, Askog, Colintrave, Tynabruach. Sometimes these places
form for miles one long range of villas. Indeed, from Strone to
Toward, ten or twelve miles, the coast is one continuous street.
On the left hand of the Frith are Gourock, Ashton, Inverkip, Wemyss
Bay, Skelmorlie, Largs, Fairlie: then comes a bleak range of sandy
coast, along which stand Ardrossan, Troon, and Ayr. In the island
of Cumbrae is Millport, conspicuously by the tall spire which marks
the site of an Episcopal chapel and college of great architectural
beauty, built within the last few years. And in Arran are the
villages of Lamlash and Brodick. The two Cumbrae islands constitute
a parish. A simple-minded clergyman, not long deceased, who held
the cure for many years, was wont, Sunday by Sunday, to pray (in the
church service) for 'the islands of the Great and Little Cumbrae,
and also for the adjacent islands of Great Britain and Ireland.'
But all this while the steam has been fiercely chafing through the
funnel as we have been stopping at Gourock quay. We are away at
last, and are now crossing the Frith towards the Argyleshire side.
A mile or two down, along the Ayrshire side, backed by the rich woods
of Ardgowan, tall and spectral-white, stands the Cloch lighthouse.
We never have looked at it without thinking how many a heart-broken
emigrant must be remembering that severely simple white tower as
almost the last thing he saw in Scotland when he was leaving it
for ever. The Frith opens before us as we advance: we are running
at the rate (quite usual among Clyde steamers) of sixteen or
seventeen miles an hour. There, before us, is Cumbrae: over Bute
and over Cumbrae look the majestic mountains of Arran; that great
granite peak is Goat-fell. And on a clear day, far out, guarding
the entrance to the Frith, rising sheer up from the deep sea, at
ten miles' distance from the nearest land, looms Ailsa, white with
sea-birds, towering to the height of twelve or thirteen hundred
feet. It is a rocky islet of about a mile in circumference, and
must have been thrown up by volcanic agency; for the water around
it is hundreds of feet in depth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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