The circumstances of difcrimination between thefe people and the rest of mankind, are so many, and their characters, by confequence, fo different, their manners and cuftoms fo fingular, and their mode of life fo inconfiftent with all that can be conceived, even in the lowest degree of civilization, that we are not to feek

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northern regions, they have a vein of poetry, that is to fay, a faculty in rhyming, and are lovers of music and dancing, but know no inftrument fave the jews' harp.

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The fame author, in his latter publication, The description of ⚫ the Western ifles,' gives a pleasant account of an inhabitant of St. Kilda, who, being prevailed on to accompany fome traders to Glafgow, was aftonifhed at the length of the voyage, and the prospect of that city. His relation is as follows:

Upon his arrival at Glasgow, he was like one that had dropped 'from the clouds into a new world, whofe language, habit, &c.

were, in all respects, new to him: he never imagined that fuch big houses of ftone were made with hands; and, for the pavements of the streets, he thought it must needs be altogether natural; for he could not believe that men would be at the pains to beat stones into the ground to walk upon. He flood dumb at ⚫ the door of his lodging with the greatest admiration; and, when <he faw a coach and two horses, he thought it to be a little house they were drawing at their tail with men in it; but he condemned the coachman for a fool to fit fo uneafy, for he thought it fafer to fit on the horse's back. The mechanism of the coach-wheel, ⚫ and its running about, was the greatest of all his wonders.

When he went through the streets, he defired to have one to lead him by the hand. Thomas Rofs a merchant, and others, that took the diverfion to carry him through the town, asked his 'opinion of the high church. He answered, that it was a large rock, yet, there were fome in St. Kilda much higher, but that thefe were the best caves he ever faw; for that was the idea which he conceived of the pillars and arches upon which the church ftands, When they carried him into the church, he was yet more surprised, and held up his hands with admiration, wondering how it was poffible for men to build fuch a prodigious ⚫ fabric,

for the motives which, at different times, have induced travellers to visit them.

The islands which Johnfon and his friend faw, though few in comparison with the whole number,

fabric, which he fuppofed to be the largest in the universe. He could not imagine what the pews were defigned for, and he fancied the people that wore masks, (not knowing whether they were men or women) had been guilty of fome ill thing, for ⚫ which they dared not fhew their faces. He was amazed at ⚫ women's wearing patches, and fancied them to have been blif⚫ters. Pendants feemed to him the most ridiculous of all things: •he condemned perriwigs mightily, and much more the powder • used in them; in fine, he condemned all things as fuperfluous he faw not in his own country. He looked with amazement on • every thing that was new to him. When he heard the church bells ring, he was under a mighty confternation, as if the fabric of the world had been in great diforder. He did not think there had been fo many people in the world as in the city of Glasgow; and it was a great mystery to him to think what they ⚫ could all defign by living so many in one place. He wondered how they could all be furnished with provifion; and when he faw big loaves, he could not tell whether they were bread, • stone, or wood. He was amazed to think how they could be provided with ale, for he never faw any there that drank water. He wondered how they made them fine cloaths; and to fee • ftockings made without being firft cut, and afterwards fewn, was no fmall wonder to him. He thought it foolish in women to • wear thin filks, as being a very improper habit for such as pre⚫ tended to any fort of employment. When he faw the womens'

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feet, he judged them to be of another shape than those of the men, because of the different shape of their fhoes. He did not approve of the heels of fhoes worn by men or women; and, when he observed horses with fhoes on their feet, and faftened with iron nails, he could not forbear laughing, and thought it the most ridiculous thing that ever fell under his obfervation. He longed to fee his native country again, and paffionately ⚫ wished it were bleffed with ale, brandy, tobacco and iron, as Glasgow was.'

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were fome of the most confiderable of the Hebrides; and his manner of defcribing them and the inhabitants, as alfo, his reception, is entertaining; but it is not enough particular to render it intelligible to a stranger. In the relation of hiftorical facts, and local circumstances, Johnson delighted not: whatever intelligence came in his way, furnifhed him with matter for reflection, and his book is rather a disquisition on Hebridian manners, than fuch a description of the iflands and the people as it was in his power to give.

As an inftance of Johnson's inattention to hiftorical facts, let me mention his account of Icolmkill*, called alfo Iona, which, though introduced by a fentiment that is admired for its piety and pathos of expreffion, is so abrupt, as to displease. He calls it that illuftrious ifland which was once the luminary of the Caledonian regions, whence favage clans and roving barbarians derived the benefits of knowledge, and the bleffings of religion; but who can read thus much, concerning a spot fo dignified, without wishing, that the author had mentioned a few of thofe hiftorical particulars, on which his reflections are founded? He might have told us from Bede, that the island takes its name from Columb, an abbot, who, about

Martin fays, that the word Kill in the Irish or Erfe language fignifies a church; if then we reject the prepofition I, and call it Columkill, we feem to have an intelligible name for it, i. e. Columb's church ifland. He farther relates, that the churches and the monaftery were, by the kings of Scotland, endowed with revenues to the amount of 4000 marks a year. But, whoever wishes for fatisfaction in this, and many other particulars refpecting this ifland, will receive it in the perufal of Mr, Pennant's Voyage to the Hebrides.

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the year 565, came from Ireland, and preached the Gofpel to the northern Picts, and was called the apostle of the Picts, and that Melifchen their king, being converted to the faith of Christ, gave the abbot the isle of Iona, by Bede called Hy or Hu, who built two churches thereon, in one whereof he is interred, and also a monastery.

Bede flourished about 734, and may be faid to fpeak from recent authority. Bishop Gibfon has recognised his account, and adds, that in a little village here, or hereabout, named Sodor, or, as others call it, Soa, a bishop's fee was erected, from which all the adjacent ifles, including Iona, took the name of Sodorenfes the jurifdiction thereof, he elsewhere fays, was given to the bishop of the isle of Man, and hence arifes the compound appellative, bishop of Sodor and Man. In the first of these particulars, he, however, ftands corrected in a relation cited by Mr. Pennant, and founded on good authority, purporting, that during the time that the Norwegians were in poffeffion of the ifles, they divided them into two parts; the northern, which comprehended all that lay to the north of a certain promontory, and were, therefore, called the Norderys; and the fouthern, which were those that lay to the fouth thereof, and were, for a fimilar reafon, called the Suderys. Voyage to the Hebrides, 257.

I have fome reafon to think that, in writing the account of his journey to the Western islands, Johnfon had in his eye one of the most delightful books of the like kind in our language, Maundrell's journey from Aleppo to Jerufalem.' The motives that induced him to undertake a labour fo formidable to at

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man of his age, as his tour must be thought, I will not enquire into: doubtlefs, curiofity was one of them; but, it was curiofity directed to no peculiar object. He was neither an antiquary nor a naturalift; he had little acquaintance with the treasures which lie below the furface of the earth; and for the ftudy of botany he never difcovered the leaft relish. If any particular fubject may be faid to have engaged his attention, it must have been the manners of a people of whom he knew little but by report, the knowledge whereof might furnish him with new topics for reflection and difquifition, an exercise of his mental powers which, of all others, he most delighted in. That in this employment he has conducted himself with that impartiality which becomes a lover of truth, the natives of the kingdom he visited deny; and, that he carried out of this country the temper of a man who hoped for an hofpitable reception among ftrangers, few are fo hardy as to affert. Accordingly, we find in his narrative an intermixture, not only of praise and blame, but of gratitude and invective.

The volume which this tour gave birth to may properly be called a differtation, for it has fcarcely any facts, and confifts chiefly in propofitions which he hunts down, and enlivens with amufing difquifition. As he fays himself, on another occafion, the negative catalogue of particulars is very copious: what he did not fee, what he could not learn, what he would not believe, what he did not enquire about, and what he is not fure of, altogether form a confiderable enumeration. Yet the merit of this tract is great; for, though I will admit that no one going his route could derive from him direction or intelligence; though no remembrance