Home  »  Articles  »  What the Stranger Saw

What the Stranger Saw

Rev Murdoch Campbell

It might be of interest to mention how Highland religious custom impressed the stranger from the south who, over a hundred years ago, came across solemn scenes such as have been described by William Laidlaw and William Howitt. The two Williams apparently never met, but they each gave an independent account of what they saw. They were both gentlemen of learning and culture. Their reverent sympathy for that form of pure religion which brought such blessings to our forebears is far removed from some of our modern writers on Highland religious life. This is how William Laidlaw, Sir Walter Scott's friend, writes of a communion service at the famous 'Burn' near Ferintosh, in Ross-shire:

"The people here gather in thousands to the Sacraments, as they did in Ettrick in Boston's time. We set out on Sabbath to the communion at Ferintosh, near Dingwall, to which the people resort from fifty miles distant. Dr MacDonald, the minister, who attracts this concourse of persons, was the son of a weaver in Caithness (but from the Celtic population of the mountains there). He preached the sermon in the church in English, with a command of language, and a justness of tone, active, and reasoning - keeping close to the pure metaphysics of Calvin - that I have seldom, if ever heard surpassed. He had great energy on all points, but it never touched an extravagance.

The Gaelic congregation sat in a dell or cleuch of a long, hollow, oval shape bordered with hazel, birch and wild roses. It seemed to be formed for the purpose. We walked round the outside of the assembled thousands, and looked down on the glen from the upper end, and the scene was really indescribable.

Two-thirds of those present were women, dressed mostly in large, high, wide, muslin caps, the back part standing up like the head of a paper kite, and ornamented with ribbons. They had wrapped round them bright coloured plaid shawls, the predominant hue being scarlet.

It was a warm breezy day, one of the most glorious in June. The place will be about half a mile from the firth, on the south side, and at an elevation of five hundred feet. Dingwall was just obvious at the foot of Ben Wyvis, still spotted with wreaths of snow. Over the town, with its modern castle, its church, and Lombardy poplars, we saw up the richly cultivated valley of Strathpeffer.

The tufted rocks and woods of Brahan were a few miles to the south, and fields of wheat and potatoes separated with hedgerows of trees, intervened. Farther off, the high peaked mountains that divide the county of Inverness from Ross-shire towered in the distance.

I never saw such a scene. We sat down on the brae among the people, the long white communion tables being conspicuous at the bottom. The congregation began singing the psalm to one of the old plaintive wild tunes that I am told are only sung in the Gaelic service. The people all sing, but in such an extended multitude they could not all sing together. They chanted as it were in masses or large groups. I can compare the singing to nothing earthly, except it be imagining what would be the effect of a gigantic and tremendous Aeolian harp, with hundreds of strings! There was no resisting the impression.

After coming a little to myself I went and paced the length and breadth of the amphitheatre, taking averages and carefully noting, as well as I could, how the people were sitting together, and I could not in this way make less than nine thousand five hundred, besides those in the church, amounting, perhaps, to one thousand five hundred.

Most of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood, with their families, were there. I enjoyed the scene as something perfect in its way, and of rare beauty and excellence."

And this is William Howitt’s testimony written in 1838:

"We thought ourselves fortunate in August, 1838, when we happened to fall in with the celebration of this annual ordinance in the Highlands. We were at Beauly, about a dozen miles west of Inverness, on Sunday morning, and were enquiring of the landlady of our excellent inn how far it was to the celebrated Falls of Kilmorack.

'Oh,' said she, 'it is a bare two miles, and you will be just in time to see the Sacrament administered there in the open air to the Gaelic congregation.'

Most of the people were on foot, none was barefooted. On week days, we saw scarcely a woman with shoes or stockings, but today, none was without. And, with the exception that hardly one had a bonnet on, the young women were not much to be distinguished from those of our smartest towns. They all had their hair neatly braided and adorned with a comb of tortoiseshell. Many of them had silk gowns and handsome worked muslin collars, others were dressed in white. . .

Just where the river issues from the cliffs overlooking the salmon leap, there juts out a lofty piece of tableland. That is the burial ground of Kilmorack, and there, as we approached, we beheld upwards of a thousand people collected and conspicuous in the bright and varied hues of Highland costume.

We stood, and, for a moment, almost imagined we were come upon a band of the ancient Covenanters. A more striking picture we never saw.

We entered the burial ground through a dense crowd and seated ourselves on the low wall built on the edge of the precipice over the river. Beneath a spreading tree near the garden wall stood a moveable booth of wood. From this booth the minister was now addressing the assembly while two other ministers occupied a seat behind him.

On his left stood his little kirk, and, on the green knolls above, his manse, and a few Highland huts. . .

A more serious and decorous congregation never was seen.

When those who had gone forward communicated, the minister again addressed them, and they retired from the table, and a fresh company took their place. Another minister then came forward and there followed a new succession of psalms, prayers and addresses.

We left about three o'clock, but were told that not until six o'clock would the service close.

Shortly after we left, the distant voice of the minister and the wild cadence of the Gaelic psalms, like the breezy music of an Aeolian harp, reminded us that it was a sacred anniversary of a grave and religious people."

Surely such scenes as those just related must have an unusual background. What was it that moved such multitudes to walk in all weathers over moor, mountain and stream - many of them walking a distance of thirty miles each way - to be present at the celebration of a religious ordinance? There is but one answer. God’s Spirit had been moving among them. They had therefore come to see the infinite value of their personal salvation, and of the unsearchable spiritual riches which the gospel of Christ freely offered to sinful men. They knew, as God had revealed, that the only alternative to the enjoyment of that blessing was everlasting sorrow. Therefore they gathered on 'the mountain' where the Gospel of salvation was proclaimed by men who gave manifold proofs that they were 'chosen vessels' sent with 'good news from a far country.'

The delight with which the people drank from the well of life may be illustrated by the involuntary exclamations of a man from Skye who, as the Word was being preached, felt the joy of the Lord filling his heart. "Oh," he cried, "that my wife and neighbours were here: Oh that everyone in the island were here - yea, and the whole world too!"

The words remind us of those of Christiana as she stood in sight of the Cross and saw Incarnate Love dying in her stead.

The Rev. Duncan MacGregor, who laboured for some years in Stornoway and who afterwards ministered at Ferintosh and Dundee, once described a communion season on the outskirts of Stornoway in Lewis:

"The congregation may be seen carrying forms, stools and chairs to the hallowed spot. There they sit, wet or dry, during the five days of the solemnity, with a love and reverence for God's ordinances rarely equalled. . . On a sacramental Monday we met a frail old man carrying a stool in his hand. 'What have you got there, Alister?' 'Oh,' he said with tears, 'my heart is sore taking the stool away!'

There had Alister during these days been refreshed with draughts from the well of Bethlehem. He felt it good to be there. It was the gate of Heaven. He therefore wept taking the stool away."

Let me give one other instance of the drawing and converting power of the Gospel. In an Argyllshire village a number of men used to drink ardent spirits. But the Lord was working in the land, and many were turning from the error of their way. One night a member of the party failed to appear. He had been convicted of his sin and was now rejoicing in God's salvation. The band became smaller and smaller until at last only one man turned up at the old haunt. 'What has happened to them? What did they find better than what they had? I must go and see for myself.' Thus mused the last of the group. He went, and before long he also rejoiced in God's gift of eternal life.

Such stories could be multiplied to show that behind the great gatherings which William Laidlaw and William Howitt had witnessed was the saving and drawing power of God through the preaching of Christ and Him crucified.

top-of-page