BY
1 ALPH • HALL GAIN

.21

u

ISLE OF MAN

UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME

Abbotsford
Canterbury Country Sketches
EdinburghEton
The Garden that I
Love
Gardens of England
Inns of Court
Haunts of Ancient
Peace
The H eart of Scotland
(10JX72 inches)
Isle of Wight

MiddlesexNew Forest
Scottish Life and
Character
The Homes of Tenny
son
The Tower of London
Westminster Abbey
WindsorWorcestershireYorkshire Coast
Yorkshire Dales
Yorkshire Vales

A. AND C. BLACK, SOHO SQUARE, LONDON

PEEL HARBOUR AND CASTLE

ISLE OF MAN

BY
W. RALPH HALL CAINE
AUTHOR OF 'the CRUISE OF THE PORT KINGSTON'

WITH 20 ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
BY
A. HEATON COOPER

^VP9

LONDON
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK
1909

A17BTBAI.ABIA

AGENTS
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
64 & 66 FIFTH AVENUE. NEW YORK
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
BOS FLINDERS Lane, MELBOURNE
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA,
37 RICH.MUND STREET WEST. TORONTO
MACMILLAN Sc COMPANY, LTD.
MACMILLAN Building, BOMBAY
509 Bow BAZAAR STREET, CALCUTTA

Preface
The literature of the Isle of Man grows apace.
Never has the island figured so largely on the
printed page, in verse and in prose, as within the
last twenty years. The remembrance might weU
dissuade me. Life, scene, and story on the Isle of
Man are, however, like so many facets of a diamond,
only one of which fills the eye of the observer.
My point of view may not be the best, it may
not be always true ; but I think I may fairly claim
it to be individual, sincere, and wholly unfettered.
Whatever has been hitherto said, I believe that the
reader will not have travelled with me far without
making the discovery that I have here wide ground
of historic fact, deduction, and observation, wholly
untouched by kinsman or friend, and yet entirely
necessary to an understanding of our island, our
people, and our institutions.
I recount with great brevity, admittedly, but I
think with sufficient completeness for my purpose,
history, legend, tradition, and the growth of our

vi PREFACE
language and hterature. I have endeavoured to
afford some glimpse of our hopes, some shadow
of our fears. I try to realize aspects of the free
and enlightened form of government, of which
we are, or were, the favoured inheritors. I have
endeavoured to show the crude notions which our
alien governors, lay and clerical, have from time to
time attempted, and too often succeeded, in engraft
ing upon a social organization as much superior to
their own as it was above their intelhgence or
powers of appreciation.
The reader need not have a drop of Manx blood
in his veins, and yet find that Man presents an
absorbing story, wholly out of proportion to its
importance in its relation to the larger world or its
mere geographical area — full of significance, too, in
the light of problems agitating the public mind of
England at the present hour, or entering the realm
of what is called practical pohtics.
We have, for instance, no land agitation. That
question was satisfactorily disposed of as long ago
as 1704. Neither have we any suffragist agitation,
while the marriage problem, as so ably and fear
lessly expounded by Lord Gorell, can hardly be
said to exist.
In the Isle of Man women 'enjoy' the vote.

PREFACE vii
and every woman, woman-like, values least that of
which she is the secure possessor. On marriage,
a woman's legal identity (together with her worldly
possessions) is very largely merged in that of her
husband. ' I call that thraldom,' says her sister in
England. But is it so ?
Wise old heads solved these complexities ages
and ages ago, and rigidly excluded the priestly
touch. Marriage law, therefore, in the Isle of
Man, whether of custom or of statute, is a brave,
fair, and sane effort to hold the scales of justice.
A wife in Mona has inalienable rights in the posses
sions of her husband, and in widowhood it recog
nizes that a wife was just as much a bread-winner
as her late husband, though her duties have re
mained, for the most part, within the four walls of
her home.
Every household must have a head, and the law
recognizes that head to be the husband. Thus are
the statutes framed to hold the tie sacred, and as
free as possible from the temptation to severance
by refusing to admit of any dual authority. Divorce
has in some strange way disappeared from our ken.
Nothing short of aU the trials and difficulties of an
Act of Tynwald can sever the bond, and even that
is denied to the wife whose spouse has, without a

viii PREFACE
grievance and without a word, just passed out of
sight and gone hence — to Canada, Argentina, or
Australia — leaving no trace and no explanation,
though it is not unfair to assume that he is maldng
a home abroad, utterly regardless of the torture of
suspense he has left behind.
We have no justice to meet such a case, and
men of judgement and intelligence otherwise are to
be found ready to defend such iniquities, and to
talk of the ' sanctity ' of a contract thus cruelly
broken and defiled.
In the absence of all legal textbooks on the
subject, I doubt not that the chapter dealing with
this aspect of our law will be of interest and not
without value. Another chapter — nay, many
chapters — might be written of the curious customs
that precede marriage. A girl has her tests with
thimblefuls of salt, with ashes spread round the
grate or near the kitchen-door. On HoUantide
Eve, by the old calendar, she may solve a question
that possesses every maidenly heart. FilHng her
mouth with water and her hands with salt, she
stealthily steals out into the darkness, and listens
at the door or the window of the house next but one
to her own. The first man's name she hears is the
name that will be for ever memorable in her fife I

PREFACE ix
But there may be more than one possible suitor
of that name. Then she must eat a salt herring,
head, tail, bones and all, lifting no eyes, uttering
no word as she makes her piquant repast. Retiring
to bed backwards, she lies down to sleep, and
not less certainly to dream. She wiU quickly
identify the features of her future husband in the
apparition that approaches, bearing a pitcher of
water to moisten her parched tongue and throat.
The imaginative fancy of Mr. Gladstone was
quickened by these old customs and old folk-tales
as much as by scenery and cherished institution.
I take the reader in Mr. Gladstone's company over
ground otherwise untouched in these pages. In
the same way, when the King and Queen came to
Man, they saw as much of the island during their
aU-too-brief visit as could be possibly crowded into
one day. In such honoured company does the
reader refresh his memory of our Kttle land.
On the other hand, the summer life of the island
receives scant attention, and though I have widely
overstepped, in mere volume of words, the limits
set to my task, I camiot forbear to say that, despite
aU detractors, Douglas, in the height of the season,
is one of our greatest sights. Indeed, a gala night
at the Palace, with the ' Shadow Dance ' in full

X PREFACE
swing, is a spectacle it would be difficult to out
match in all Europe.
The men are in the easiest summer dress, the
women in muslins and hats. Half the company
hail from Lancashire ; all are workers who toil and
moil in factory, colliery, or mill. Yet no London
ballroom could show dancers who could excel
these workers from weaving-shed or coalpit.
The introduction to the Veleta has barely sounded
before the immense floor-space is filled. The great
arc-lamps overhead are extinguished, the band
starts, and the swaying throng moves forward and
backward to the dreamy languor of the violins, the
roU of the great drums. Gleaming colours shoot
out through powerful lenses, colour gives place to
colour, and every shade in combination. And so
the company pass round. The tone of the orchestra
is lowered ; it becomes no more than the murmur
of a summer breeze through the trees. AU that is
heard above the faint cadence of the music is the
muffled glide of the dancers' feet on the polished
floor. Look down upon the scene from the vantage-
point of the northern gallery. Was there ever a
more realistic picture of dancing elves in fairy
land ? No smile seems to brighten any face ; it is

PREFACE xi
an experience too intoxicating for mere amusement.
The tension for the moment is over aU. Relief
comes suddenly. The dancers discover a harmless
joke. The baton is beating time, but the orchestra
is dumb. A roar of laughter goes up in that
instant, as the great arc lamps once more flood the
immense glass house with light.
But this is not the Isle of Man ; we must seek
that neither in the Palace, nor in Douglas, nor in
the great houses of the rich, nor the great houses of
the ultra-proud who are not rich. A distinguished
lady, who had unusual opportunities of knowing
the lowly and the mighty of our 'lil oilan',' was
asked, on her return to London, her impression of
the island, of the classes, and of the masses.
' Oh, the island is beautiful, and the people are
remarkable,' was the reply. ' In the Isle of Man
all the common people are ladies and gentlemen,
and aU the ladies and gentlemen are common
people.' Need I say that this terse and cutting commit
ment reached the island on the wings of the wind ?
In the cottage, therefore, the plain, homely, and
hospitable Manx people must be sought, and, best
of all, after the last straggling tripper has resigned
our shores.

xii PREFACE
' You must summer and winter a stranger before
you can know him ' is one of our many proverbs
of caution. Let me turn the phrase round: 'A
stranger must summer and winter the island before
he can know either island or people.' To the
reader, however, to whom such leisurely study is
denied I trust these pages wiU not be without
advantage. Candour compels me to admit that much of our
history is unworthy of the name. Prior to the
twelfth or thirteenth century we are practically in
the domain of mere speculation, whUe of docu
mentary evidence we have nothing of earUer date
than the fifteenth century. If it is true, there
fore, as Johnson declared, that all history that is
not supported by contemporary evidence is mere
romance, the Isle of Man presents an almost
unrivalled field to the fictionist masquerading in
the guise of historian.
To these admissions I need not add another
qualifying word.

W. R. H. C.

The Hermitage, Limpsfield. viii. X. 'ix.

Contents

CHA">TFR I. Geographical Speculation
II. Geographical Fact
III. The Manx People
IV. The Early Faith,
V, Celtic Bondage
VI. The Coming of Christianity
VII. Fables of St. Patrick .
VIII. Our Viking Conquerors
IX. The Open-Air Parliament
X. English Suzerainty
XI. The Act of Settlement
XII. The Spiritual Courts .
XIII. The Revestment
XIV. Recent History .
XV. Marriage Law
XVI. Mr. Gladstone's Visit .

PAGE 1
7
14
21
273438
46505,6
64
lil81
86 89
101

XI v

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE
XVII. Mr. Gladstone at Port Erin and Peel . 1 12
XVIII. Mr. Gladstone at Douglas and Ramsey . 121
XIX. To the Summit of Snaefell . . .132
XX. — AND Thence to Ramsey . . . .143
XXI. The Legend of the Beautiful White Devil . 151
XXII. The King and Queen in Mona . . l60
XXIII. The Legend of the Buggane .... 172
XXIV. Point of Ayre  182
XXV. Wonder Stories . . . . . .186
XXVI Ancient Saws for Modern Instances . .190
XXVII. Manx Books  193
XXVIII. Manx Histories ... . . 205
XXIX. The Newspaper Press . . . . .212
XXX. A Night on the Calf  220
Index  231

List of Illustrations

1. Peel Harbour and Castle ....
2. Douglas Bay (a Midsummer's Night) .
3. Castletown. ....
4. Port St. Mary ....
5. Spanish Head ......
6. The Hamlet of Cregneesh and the Calf of Man
7. Bradda Head, Port Erin (Moonlight)
8. Glen Meay (Showery Weather)
9. Peel Bay and Castle
10. The Tynwald
11. Dhoon Glen
12. Ballaglass Glen .
13. Maughold Church
14. Maughold Head .
15. Ramsey Bay
l6. Sulby Glen and Snaefell

Frontispiece FACING PAGE 8

17
2441486572 89
9&
113
120 137
144 l6l
168

XVl

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1 7. The Ballaugh Curragh
18. Ballaugh Old Church .
19. Point of Ayre ....
20. The Calf of Man from Spanish Head

FACING P,*GE
. 185

192
209 216

MAPS
Reproduvtion of John Speed's Map of l605
General Map of the Island

FACING PAGE ]
At aid of book

1^

th:e; isle of_7^ian
Evdrilv MiM^ anl-iiito fn'cmlVarip-
Jlics Mlidri-n'ith acty^TM'iKsmiije,
rTyityc^ CrAr,anll nialr-ihmin cautry-,
ucd. rri'C Ijr.frinjo Co.j1i--ilWTC»'irfl
if ii cimitatd liirt.ir Slhiiu'im Jclt,ani
Iv tV Comjqii arccuitgly fmi'd- W»'
)M'\ ^ — ivitotliis islaiii W n Jnicrril  .
Mi! Smlc cljimaLj

ScotlAnde

^

jgfL r\ 1 1 J

Tlicpoyntof/,}'

t,A,uh,

d< poyn t

(=>

'ft-}'tMnG'_'inucn^ 1 Jncadc

r^!il-a-iTOfor(t«-:n;trfl—

^1^,

.^^

-t

i

3 Lon(.v-il,ltr//,'.l/l/«
r,\f-.,miKA ma--

='JJ

ii^[as cHaucn

-^3>uiiaalkHa[icn

Fl /Ir t.

Il(jU

DCpC rood

&i

VJriicpoyiU
I/' Laij^ciiumc I^I^J 0., W

^^^^^spTioy^&>;^g^^^^i^S^^s^^^aH^jS^E^g^^^i^s;.^sg&^5E3^^§E^^^^

0 of ¦jlE.'/il'

/V , 9_ \ G.H,S.HIJ!£ ^
¦_¦"' AllVAXJ ;¦ H I R \\ J

.•¦' !¦/ \ )i~

mi

MAN h CrfnrCJU Man^i.hvihn
>roi)abia , ly i^tjl Afonocck.iii;.-/ h'S"l'^-i^-'
Xvbonia , is m I/Lmi f?.itci{ in ihc Odwi he :
(-^tjlxt thc'l^iif.hnirs of Enflaiiti.Scollaml-
iuui h'daiiA.itfonmTly hin' the luvnc of a
iiihiihitid I'cry rhnujiill of Ctttf:!! ,Toiik njhi
^\fl}C ,itis noive ikiiiJtd inh fcnutTiftnc^
fiinfijrs, viany n^illa/^rSf tind le '

^PlRFORAIED 13 Y
yi^^OUN SPEE
[J^V \ Anno . j6'oj

K

^a=i^ ly?jjg)ag.;^j:°° j^

TH 1 S S CALE li f» tr n.-^Aira/ jV,,„. i/,,
Cenfapc ill th.mii,-foJ ii, jjiml llto
At ^rArinij Ccaih ofXiifflaniJ, Scot.
iaiiJ.lrd,i!i(l,flnilv'alLs . • ^

^^^gK^^SSS^^aSS

y^^a^^^g^^iSlS^^sS^^g!

MAP accompanying 'THE ISLE OF MAN.' BY A. HEATON COOPER AND W. RALPH HALL CAINE. (a. AND C. BLACK. LONDON. i

ISLE OF MAN
CHAPTER I
GEOGRAPHICAL SPECULATION
The tradition survives to this hour that the Isle of
INIan — the Mona, we believe, of Caesar, or the Elian
Vannin Veg Veen (the Dear Little Isle of Man)
of the patriotic islander — only came to existence
when Finn MacCoole, a great giant and magician,
in pursuit of a vanquished enemy, picked up
a portion of Ireland and threw it after his
Scottish foe.
Sceptics there were, even in the old days, who
hesitated to believe in the existence of such a
mighty power. They stood abashed when con
fronted with the proof — an outline map of Ireland
showing Ireland's lost territory in Lough Neagh,
and its corresponding area of land set in the
adjoining sea.
Another magician, of Irish ancestry also, to
whom the newly-formed island then became an
object of tender solicitude, was called Mannanan- 1

2 ISLE OF MAN
Beg Mac-y-Leirr, or Little Mannanan, Son of
the Sea.
Mannanan had wonderful powers of magic,
rather than great physical strength. He could
cover the sea with a dense white fog, or he could
call down from the hills a purple haze, and thus
hide his dear little land fr-om view. If robbers
persisted and penetrated this mist, he could set
a man on a hill and ' you'd think there were a
hundred there.'
We still live under the protection of Mannanan,
and no better testimony to our gratitude and
admiration could be offered than is contained in
one fact — our island continues to bear his name.
If the reader has misgivings regarding any of
these stories, I can assure him that much of our
so-called history — set out in solemn tomes, and at
unconscionable length — rests on no less slender basis.
Mystery and uncertainty seem to creep into every
statement. Reverently brushing aside all idle
tales of mighty and crafty magicians, I am con
fronted at the very outset with an inherited
suspicion : Was Mann always an island ?
There is, of course, hardly any doubt that at one
period our island, like all the surrounding ones,
was once a part of the European continent.

GEOGRAPHICAL SPECULATION 3
Otherwise we could not account for evidences
of animal life long since extinct found within our
little sea-girt land.
Among the innumerable traditions of St. Patrick
with which the island abounds — all of them apoc
ryphal, and, for the most part, fitting legacies of
the dark age to which they belong — we have one
by which it is made to appear that St. Patrick
came over to us on horseback.
I don't believe a word of it. But my incredulity
has no reference to any supposed physical obstacle
to such a journey. Probably the only basis of the
story lies in the conviction that, at some remote
period, a visitor from Ireland could reach our
shores in some such way, incurring no impossible
risks, fording streams, swimming the rivers.
As a boy I remember my father recounting a
strange tale of a great inland sea in the northern
half of the island, and recalling the tradition that
the land once stretched out from Ayre northwards
until it reached the Scottish coast.
It so happens that an old prophecy declared
that the Manx and the Scot would one day come
so close that each would throw his mallet at the
other. As a saying, the prophecy illustrates the
animosity subsisting in the minds of the two
1—2

4 ISLE OF MAN
peoples, an animosity too deep to be dispelled by
any proximity in a mere geographical sense. As
a prophecy regarding the changing conditions of
land and sea, it is rapidly attaining more success
than is usual with most prophecy. The island
grows towards Scotland, and Scotland grows
towards the island, the sea between showing a
tendency to silt.
With one exception, every map I have ever seen
or heard of gives Man as an island, and shows
at every point of the coast-line a margin of blue
sea sufficient to make invasion at any period of
modern history a responsible, if not exactly a
hazardous, undertaking.
Certain old maps, of which John Speed's of 1610
(somewhere described, wrongfully, though it bears
both names and both dates, as Durham's of 1595)
may be cited as an example, show the JNIull of
GaUoway a long way south, nearly halfway down
our western coast-line.
Only one map shows any Imk. This is found
in the Vatican in Rome, and privileged visitors
interested in the Isle of JNIan, and recalling the
close touch the Sovereign Pontiff kept with our
laud in pre-Reformation times, will note it with
a strange misgiving of historic data.

GEOGRAPHICAL SPECULATION 5
The Vatican map may be of no more value than
an intelligent guess at the conditions of the past, but
the great inland sea which quickened my youthful
fancy was no old wife's tale. Five or six centuries
ago there were not fewer than three, four, or five
lakes in the low-lying land of the Curragh, some or
aU of which received the always abundant waters
of the Sulby.
The largest was of sufficient consequence to be
included in a grant to the Bishop. His lordship,
in characteristic vein, with an eye in this instance
to the fishes rather than the loaves, obtained by
this grant, made as late as 1505, the right to one-
half of the fishing in what is described in the map
pubHshed about a century later as Malar Lough,
a sheet of water a mile in length and three-eighths
of a mile in breadth, and situated between Lezayre
and Ramsey, land now known as Lough Mollo.
The Sulby now empties itself into Ramsey Bay
on the east, near to a point at which there was
until late in the nineteenth century a considerable
stretch of bog-land, often flooded by the sea, and
called the Mooragh, The natural flow of the
waters, however, would be directly towards the sea
at Jurby, either to the north or north-west. The
Lhane Valley, directly in front of the waters as

6 ISLE OF MAN
they come down from the hills, seems to have been
made by a rich and abundant stream. There may
have been some prehistoric division, and geological
investigation shows that a considerable stream did,
as a matter of fact, flow through this valley north
wards to the sea.
Probably the Sulby was in former times a more
considerable stream than it is to-day, and lived up
to its most unkind reputation in later history by
occasionally overflowing its banks, joining lake to
lake, and forming a great inland sea. In that event
the stream would have on its westward course a
journey to the sea longer by a mile, or even two
miles, than is apparent to-day, the slow processes
of erosion accounting for a loss of territory to
this extent along the whole of the coast-line of
Jurby, Ballaugh, and Kirk Michael.
Otherwise the island stands everywhere like an
impregnable rock against the buffetings of the
waves.

CHAPTER II
GEOGRAPHICAL FACT
Man is an island in the Irish Sea, lying north-east
by north and south-west by south, and, speaking
roughly, about midway from the coasts of England,
Wales, Ireland, and Scotland. The nearest points
to the surrounding coasts are as follows : Point of
Ayre to St. Bee's Head, in Cumberland, 28 miles ;
Caigher Point on Calf Island, or Langness Point,
to Anglesey, 42 miles ; Contrary Head, Peel, to
Strangford Lough, in Ireland, 2Q^ miles ; Point of
Ayre to Burrow Head, in Wigtownshire, 16 miles.
The entire length of Man is about 33 miles ; the
breadth nowhere exceeds 12 miles.
The total area is estimated at 145,325 acres, of
which foreshores account for 4,025 acres ; roads,
1,667 acres ; and water, only 313 acres.
The rugged coast-line of Man starts from Maug
hold Head, on the south side of Ramsey Bay,
and proceeding southwards past Douglas and Port
Soderick, and round by Castletown, Port St. Mary,
7

8 ISLE OF MAN
the Calf Island, and Port Erin, ends a Uttle to the
north of Peel, on the west coast. This scenery is
unsurpassed in any part of the British Isles. The
cliffs, as at the Sugar-Loaf Rock, Black Head, and
Spanish Head, often rise from the sea and tower
high over our heads, presenting a sheer outline of
striking magnificence.
Maughold Head is rendered famiUar by the work
of many artists with brush and camera, but not so
the much more striking pictures of rugged beauty
to be found on the south. Here the coast for mUes
presents no vantage-ground for the photographer,
and the sea is not always kind to those who make
their voyage of discovery in a smaU boat.
I recall days when the waters slumbered, lying
like a lake, without so much as the tiniest wavelet
to disturb the glassy surface — nothing but the
almost imperceptible heave of the ceaseless tide.
Choosing such a day, the visitor may weU make a
trip in and out of the Chasms — spacious chambers,
galleries, and haUs, in which the nuptials of the
laughing mermaids and the merry mermen are
celebrated, with Father Neptune looking on, and
high carnival is held whilst the sun shines without.
From a point slightly to the north of Peel, and
round Point of Ayre to Ramsey, there is an almost

DOUGLAS BAY (A MIDSUMMER'S NIGHT)

GEOGRAPHICAL FACT 9
entire absence of rocky headland. A low sandy
cliff, with a sandy beach sloping gradually into the
sea, generaUy prevails. Sometimes the sand on
the beach is white and fine, and looks in the sun-
Ught, as at the White Strand, like the coral beach
of a tropical island.
The surface of Man, for the most part, is hUly,
and it might be spoken of as universally so, if
we excepted those flat tracts about Ballaugh and
Andreas, and the unbroken fields of shingly ground,
with a layer of sand, lying beyond the Bride Hills
down to the sea.
AU islands — certainly aU smaU islands — have a
marked and distinct beauty as we approach them.
In this respect no island presents a picture of
greater beauty and grace than the Isle of Man.
To a Manxman that first view of the land, lying
like a great sleeping lion with his head resting
upon his paws, never fails to bedim the eye. It is
more than a vision of beauty ; it is more holy than
any martyr's shrine — it is home.
The hills have their culminating point in Snae
fell, the centre of a group of hills covering the
middle part of the island. SnaefeU rises to an
elevation of 2,034 feet. It presents no lofty
precipices, or rude, jagged, rocky headland. The
2

10 ISLE OF MAN
feature of all the mountains is an outUne smooth
and rounded ; their feet are seemingly in the sea.
As we approach nearer, the impression is conveyed
of hiUs twice or thrice their actual height, losing
themselves in that purple haze which, as we have
seen, always clothes the uplands, ready, at the call
of the magician, to spread itself over the surface of
the surrounding sea.
North Barrule, sUghtly to the north of SnaefeU,
is an elevation of 1,842 feet, occupying a position
overlooking the town of Ramsey. Other eleva
tions in the same central range are Slieu Choar (or
Clagh Ouyre), 1,808 feet ; Pen-y-Phot (or Beinn-y-
Phot), 1.772 feet; Sartfell, 1,560 feet; Carraghan,
1,520 feet ; Slieu Reay (or Ruy), 1,570 feet ; and
Greeba, 1,383 feet.
A low-lying valley stretches across the island
from Douglas to Peel — so low-lying that no in
superable engineering difficulty would present itself
in an effort to connect the sea on either side, as is
affirmed was once the case, and as certain of the
place-names en route would go to prove.
South of this division of the island we have a new
range of hills, of which South Barrule (1,585 feet)
and Cronk-ny-Iree-Lhaa (1,449 feet) are the most
noteworthy elevations.

GEOGRAPHICAL FACT 11
At a point overlooking the sea at Dalby village
and the Niarbyl, on the west, we have the hill
known as the Round Table. It is of no great
elevation, but it often has a fleecy tablecloth of
white sea-mist laid upon its flat top, and, set in the
midst of beautiful stretches of moorland, it forms
one of the most charming, least discovered, and
wholly unspoiled picnic-grounds in the locality.
Within the bounds of so small an island it is
impossible to find rivers of any size, but such as there
are pass through glades of surpassing loveliness.
The Sulby, which drains the central mountain
range, shapes its course through the beautiful glen
formed by Slieu Monagh (1,257 feet) on the one
side and Mount Karran (1,084 feet) on the other.
The Awin-Glass (River Grey, Bright or Green :
Cregeen's Manx Dictionary suggests more than
one definition) drains the same high moorlands,
but flows south and east, and when joined by
the waters of the Awin Dhoo (River Dark, or
Black), flowing through the central division of
the island, forms a body of water from which salmon
and trout are drawn in astonishing numbers and
weight for the size of the stream. The waters of
the Glass and the Dhoo empty themselves into
Douglas Harbour. 2—2

12 ISLE OF MAN
The next most considerable stream of the island
is unhappily nothing more than a white, poison-
laden body of water, which empties itself into
Peel Harbour. The Neb rises in Foxdale. The
Rhenas, in confluence with the Blabae, joins it at
the foot of SUeu WhaUian (1,093 feet), near St.
John's, where the highroad runs along the foot of
the mountain towards Patrick.
The Rhenas and the Blabae come down from
the central mountain range through a glade now
known as Glen Helen, and so named after the
daughter of a former owner.
Glen Helen is a matchless picture of sylvan
beauty. High up we have the heather-clad moor
land, with patches here and there of cultivated land.
Gorse, bracken and rough grass, with here and
there a bed of dainty flowering plants, in which the
orchid has a place, gather where the plough and
the sickle may not do battle with the stony ground ;
but farther down, sheltered from the full fury of the
gales and yet in the gladsome light of the sun, we
find the banks of the glen covered with one closely-
knit forest of fir, sycamore, elm, and mountain -ash.
Near St. John's, where the Rhenas has merged
its identity with that of the Neb, the crystal stream
is polluted by the waters that come down from the

GEOGRAPHICAL FACT 13
Foxdale lead-mines. It is a strange irony of fate
that a river which rises in purity and is cradled
in such a joyous glade should end its career in
humiUating squalor.
Peel is stiU famed of the fisherman, and time
was when the fresh waters of the Neb yielded their
delectable harvest. The Neb's present contribu
tion to the happiness of the world is a poisonous
outpouring, which even the sea must find it difficult
to neutralize. Some day Peel will awake and
cherish every gift of the gods, but that time is
not yet.
The only other river of any consequence is caUed
the Silverburn, which drains the southern mountain-
range. The Awin Argid, or River of Silver, is
not without features of beauty, particularly in the
neighbourhood of Colby, a sweet village, hid away
from the sea and the rough swirl of an Atlantic
breeze. At Colby, the fuchsia, which is one of the
distinctions of the entire island, grows out of doors
in all the luxuriance of a greenhouse. The outlet
of the Silverburn is at Castletown, on the south.
Such are the chief geographical features of the
island. Having disposed of them as briefly as I
dare, we may pass to aspects human in character,
and therefore more human in interest.

CHAPTER III
the MANX PEOPLE
A NEW problem presents itself when we come to
ask ourselves, ' Of what race were the earliest
inhabitants of the Isle of Man V
The almost invariable reply is, ' Celtic'
The term is loose and wide, and does duty to
describe a vast number of people who were at one
time spread over the whole of Western Europe.
The observant visitor to our shores wiU not fail to
notice, however, types that obviously belong to an
altogether different category.
The exceptions to the Celtic rule are admittedly
not common, but certain of them are none the less
sufficiently striking and numerous to form an
interesting study. The survival of the physical
characteristics of an apparently alien race in our
midst may be explained, in odd mstances, as the
natural result of the infusion of Southern blood
that came to us in the veins of those warriors who,
setting sail in the proud galleons of invincible
14

THE MANX PEOPLE 16
Spain, resolved on the conquest of England, were
yet happy to escape the fury of the sea, and find
sanctuary in the homes of the Manx people.
But if that type, or some other type equally
strange, existed on the island long anterior even to
the rise of Spain, whence came the beauty from
the South — the witch, with her sun-kissed cheeks
and dark, flashing eyes, and hair so sleek and
black as to shame the raven into envy ?
Much learning might be expended in a con
scientious effort to solve all the problems to which
this question would give rise, and in the end, in
the face of the wide destruction of contemporary
evidence in remains, we should be probably no
nearer a final and convincing answer.
The earliest inhabitant of Man may have reached
our shores without touching the sea, or he may
have hazarded the stress of the sea in a mere
' dug-out,' impelled hither by force of circumstances
—the pressure of an enemy stronger and better
equipped, whose exactions he could no longer resist
by force of arms.
Robbed himself, he would a robber be, when
there was a chance to kiU and steal. But on our
island he probably found himself dependent for his
food upon his subtlety rather than his strength.

16 ISLE OF MAN
He fished with patience and skiU ; with precision he
marked down a bird with a shot from his arrow, or
a stone from his sling. In times of plenty he
imprisoned or domesticated his captures, and thus
replenished his larder at will. He had the crudest
tools, weapons, implements, and tackle, but they
sufficed. If we have no trace of a paleolithic ancestor,
we have some proof of the presence of man on our
island in neolithic times.
Judging by such unreliable indications as have
survived — at Fleshwick, on the slopes of Snaefell,
along the I^hane trench, and near the Meayll circle
— anything, to begin with, that sheltered him from
the falling rain seems to have served his purpose
very well. A desolate habitation was his security.
He was king in his castle, even if it was only
a crannog, or lake-dwelling — a mere shaUow cavity
hoUowed out of the rock and the earth by his own
strong hands and the rough stone implements he
had at command.
In 1660 we had for a brief wliile a Governor
named Chaloner, who relieved the monotony of his
office by a happy thought regarding the burial-
places of the ancient Manx. Forthwith he pro
ceeded to dig out certain of the barrows belonging

CASTLETOWN

THE MANX PEOPLE 17
to the later Stone Age. Justice would not be
done to Chaloner 's memory if we did not add that
he has left behind some account of his rather grue
some investigations.
He found a barrow ' environ'd with great stones
pitched end way es in the earth,' and from beneath he
brought to light ' fourteen rotten urns, or earthen
ware pots, placed with their mouths downwards ;
and one more neatly than the rest in a bed of fine
white sand, containing nothing but a few brittle
bones (as having pass'd the fire), no ashes left
discernible.' Stone chambers, sometimes with a passage lead
ing into them, have been dug out by other hands,
and found to contain a rough kind of cist or chest,
in which the body was interred in a crouching
position. On the island there are altogether about a score
of large upright stones, menhirs, or monoliths, such
as Chaloner described as ' pitched endwayes in the
earth.' The so-called ' Giants' Quoiting Stones,'
in Rushen, are particularly worthy of note, and it
is possible that at one time they formed part of
a stone circle long since destroyed, notwithstanding
the deeply-implanted superstition existing among
the Manx people against such acts of desecration. 3

18 ISLE OF MAN
' King Orry's Grave,' which was visible at
Gretch-veg, near Laxey, at a time when King
Orry was happy and well, has points of distinctive
ness from any other grave on the island. Its date
has been assigned to a transition period between
the later Stone and the succeeding Bronze Age.
Nothing, however, has been unearthed that
would properly answer the question with which
this chapter opened. The early Manx people have
been described as strangers in this strange land,
greater strangers even than were the Basques,
gathered together on the sunnier side of the
Pyrenees. Between the Basques and these early
Manx settlers points of affinity have been discovered.
The reader may be incredulous ; so am I.
Stranger, however, the islander was not at a
time when, richer in knowledge and resource, he
had, with all his fellows, developed into a herdsman
and tiller of the soil. He had possessed himself of
all of our domestic animals. He could (or his wife
could) spin and weave and mould in clay.
He had long known how to dress a hide, and his
skilful fingers could fashion a fabric out of coarse
wool, or create a stout and handy basket out of
a bundle of twigs.
His humour, when it suited him to play, was to

THE MANX PEOPLE 19
mimic himself with mock seriousness, to distort
the angularities of his fellows, or sportively imitate
the cries, the strut, and the antics of the animals
he had made subjects of his will. He invigorated
his mind and his body by laughter and song and
game. He danced as an act of gratitude or worship no
less than as a means of attesting his joy and his
sorrow. And, when he would a-wooing go, his
courtship was no sad reversal of the conditions of
his stern, breezy, manly life. There was no silent
holding of the hand. He manifested his love by
an exhibition of subtlety, agility, and strength.
He evoked the lady's interest by feats of prowess.
He called forth her admiration by proofs of bravery,
muscle, and powers of physical endurance. He
commanded her love by tenderness and devotion.
Non-Aryan these rough ancestors of ours may
have been, and therefore wholly dissimilar to the
people by whom they were, for the most part,
surrounded across the sea. We have no evidence
that the painted bodies of the Picts were ever seen
within our land.
Limits of time or date cannot be fixed, however,
to a period of history shrouded in such obscurity.
The later Stone Age probably continued in Man
3—2

20 ISLE OF MAN
several hundred years after the Celts on the con
tinent of Europe had advanced to a knowledge of
the smelting of iron-ore.
But whoever they were or whence they came,
we know they suffered the inevitable fate of a
weaker people, going down before the victorious
hosts of 'bronze men,' armed with weapons made
of an alloy of copper and tin.
It was no bloodless feud, and it would seem that,
when ultimately conqueror and conquered settled
down to such a life as represented a peaceful
existence in those troublous days, they proceeded
to evolve each his own story of the bitter war.
Struggles were idealized, valour was adored. The
splendour of men, the craft of women, the magic of
fairies, the fear of devils, the transmigration of the
souls of men and women into beasts of the field,
and all the rest of the wondrous tale, were established
as a deathless cult in our midst.
The influence is with us still, and if it no longer
dominates our intelligence, it sweeps a horizon
that knows neither material limits nor spiritual
bounds. We call it the distinguishing gift of the
Celt — the gift of imagination.

CHAPTER IV
the early faith
It has been asserted that the earliest form of
religion among the Manx people was a mere lowly
form of worship of animals, stones, trees, and weUs.
If, however, there is anything in the theory of
our non- Aryan descent, and all the other factors of
our ancestry, these early inhabitants of Man had
bred in their bones certain of the most treasured
doctrines of a later era.
It would be an easy and agreeable task to show
that an expanding intelligence led the early in
habitants of Man to reaUze their dependence upon
gifts of Nature outside their control, and to regard
with a veneration amounting to awe the light, the
warmth, and magical vivifying power of the sun's
rays. How could they faU to adore the Sun as truly as
those mundane gifts of Nature — the animal life on
which they fed, the stream that quenched their
thirst, and the trees whose burning embers gave
21

22 ISLE OF MAN
them light and warmth when the day was spent
and the night had closed in ? All that our ancestors
could realize in creation was visualized in the God
of Life.
Upon some such groundwork of faith, sane and
simple, we have been taught to believe that the
Druids came to our island, and buUt an elaborate
structure of religion, law, and morals. They
uprooted nothing. Their religion is represented
to us as a subtle code answermg aU human needs
save, perhaps, one. It had its standard of punish
ments, sacrifices, and rewards ; it had its teaching
of a life beyond all material definition. But it had
not the quality that prevaUs — the quality of charity
or love, upon which man and society can alone
develop. Druidism was regarded as a growth peculiar to
the soil in which it flourished, but the grounds
upon which such opinions were based have under
gone some strange transformations. That it was
a great force among the Goidelic branch of the
Celtic family is a feature of all the old histories.
The Druids, inspired by the learning of the
East, held as one of the first articles of their faith
that man did not perish in death and the destruc
tion of his body ; that there ^vas only one God, the

THE EARLY FAITH 23
Creator of the universe, and that it was an impiety
to typify God in any image. But a doctrine or
practice inherited by them from no ascertainable
source that I can identify was excommunication.
It proved a deadly weapon in the preservation of
Druidical authority.
One sacred duty of the priests was to hand on
to younger brethren the traditions of their office.
Everything had to be committed to memory, for
no one was permitted to set down in writing any
of the articles of their faith, the precepts which
guided their conduct, or the laws which controlled
their lives.
Sacrifices were made in sacred groves of oak.
Once a year a solemn procession was formed, in
which a human victim and two white bulls were
distinguished and honoured features. When the
oak was reached the two white bulls were bound to
the tree, and the Chief Druid, clothed in white,
ascended the tree, and, with a knife of gold, cut the
sacred parasite from the bark. Other priests, stand
ing below, would catch the branches of mistletoe
in the folds of their robes. The bulls and the
human victims were then sacrificed, and high
festival followed.
Great value was apparently set upon the sprigs

24 ISLE OF MAN
thus ceremoniously cut. Over the entrance to
a dwelling a tiny spray would be hung, as a means
of propitiating the deities of the forest during the
season of frost and cold.
An effort has been made to establish as fact that
Druidism in Man approximated itself more closely
to the faith of Druidical co-religionists in Ireland,
rather than in Britain, with a view of showing that
there were no human sacrifices in Ireland or
in Man.
But why this effort to exonerate Druidism in
Man from a supposed stigma ? ReUgion, like love
and the sea, ebbs and flows, and abnegation is
as characteristic of devout faith and profound
attachment as aggression and assertion.
The sacrifice of a man, woman, or chUd was
regarded by most nations laying claim to high
civilization as the most acceptable form of homage
by a human being to the Creator. The East was
fuU of it, and even among newly-discovered races
in America, as Prescott shows, there were the
same ceremonious offerings to the gods. Human
sacrifice was an essential feature of the Hebrew
code. It lies at the very root of the Christian
faith. To the Druids it was no less a great act of

PORT ST. MARY

THE EARLY FAITH 25
propitiation. In any event, it is less easy to
dispose of the supposed stigma of human sacrifice
offered to the Most High than the ridiculous tittle-
tattle of the scandalous old chronicler who reports,
as a tale he had heard, that in Ireland at this time
— and presumably in Man — we were camiibals
with enormous appetites, with a special relish for
the flesh of our defunct parents !
If the Druidical priests were the force they are
represented to be in all the old histories, they were
not merely the fountain-head of all religion : they
had arrogated to themselves every sacerdotal,
priestly, and magisterial function. To the priest
every dispute was referred, and no personal con
troversy was too private for his intervention.
Altogether, the story of the Druids in Man
makes a pretty tale. Historians in times long past
found that the period offered unlimited scope for
the gentle play of imagination, and each seems to
have added, out of the richness of his own fancy,
a little variation to the beautiful tale of wonder.
The pity of it all is that we have no reliable
knowledge that the Druids ever touched Man at
aU, or, in the alternative, if they did, that they
were ever anything more in Man than they were in
Ireland — a mere species of wizards, enchanters, or
4

26 ISLE OF MAN
sorcerers, without any organization worthy of the
name of a hierarchy, or distinguishable as a separate
class or cult.
Neither is there any proof that the old stone
structures which archseologists assumed to be
Druidical altars were ever dedicated to such a
purpose. Stonehenge itself is not whoUy free from
the shadow of suspicion.
In truth, after centuries, in which we have been
confidently adding fancy to fact and fact to fancy,
we emerge at length to find that we know a great
deal less than any previous generation of historians
and archaeologists fondly placed to our credit.

CHAPTER V
CELTIC BONDAGE
The inhabitants were divided into distinct groups,
tribes, or clans, with a chief reigning over each
group or clan.
We are led to suppose that we had a King over
all, about whose person there was a grade of nobles,
whose business it was to put into execution the
will of their sovereign master. Nobles, growing in
influence, became something better than mere
lackeys, and developed into counsellors, permitted
to tender opinion and advice.
Next below was a grade of chiefs, formed in part,
no doubt, out of the grade next above them.
Every chief or elder had control of the vital affairs
of all the people claiming allegiance to his clan.
A chief had immense powers, and aU beneath his
sway were held in a process more or less difficult
to discriminate from actual servitude. Nominally,
the arable land on which a clan was settled belonged
to those of the higher status of freemen. It was
27 4—2

28 ISLE OF MAN
not owned by them separately, but as a community,
and at stated periods there was a redivision. Con
ditions were imposed that correspond to our ideas of
a rental. Return was made in dues in some form,
usually service in war, or a sharing of produce or
cattle. Pasture-land, however, whether in the lowlands,
amidst the homes of the people, or on the mountain
side, was held and farmed by the community as a
whole ; no tenant of arable land being entitled to
graze more cattle than corresponded to the area of
the land he held in tillage.
Servile dependents there were of lower grade,
bond-servants without land. Neither did they
escape the exactions of their chief or the levies of
their King. The privilege to Uve was granted to
these poor souls when they made humble obeisance
to their ruler and protector, and accompanied their
submission by such delectable contributions to his
table as wild honey or milk, or such other gifts as
lay within their slender means.
Dependents of every rank and station seem to
have been subjected to a further pruning process,
a kind of enforced hospitality caUed 'coshering.'
By it they were required to feed and entertain, as
occasion offered, their lord, with his wives, his sons,

CELTIC BONDAGE 29
and his daughters. ' All the King's horses and all
the King's men ' came within the pale of privileged
guests. Life had a brighter side, and the Celtic people
found delight and relief in tales of gods and men,
stories of wonder-workers in other lands, legends of
fairies and giants and mermaids. Clefts in the
mountain-side, caves by the sea, and even the
unfathomed depths of the sea itself, were all peopled
by those jugglers with human fancy who made
story-teUing an occupation and a livelihood.
Men and women dressed very much alike.
Those men who had attained some status wore the
lenn, a loose-fitting kind of old-fashioned night
shirt. It was made of coarse woollen cloth,
extended to the knees. Over the lenn was worn a
tunic or bolero bound at the waist by a cryss, or
richly-coloured girdle. The legs would be bare
the feet covered with tanned hide.
The lady wore her lenn down nearly to her feet
She had rings for her fingers, and necklets, some
times of gold. Like her spouse, she took immense
pains with her hair. While it was the man's vanity
zealously to comb his hair and entice it to form
long ringlets, to wear his beard long and twirl it
into what we should regard as grotesque pleatings,

30 ISLE OF MAN
it was his mistress's pleasure to give her rich tresses
a brighter sheen by judicious applications of cream,
scented with herbs.
She combed and plaited her hair ; she heightened
the colour and the arch of her eyebrows with
chalks and charcoal ; she tinted her finger-nails with
crimson clays ; and, if she had no mantiUa to weave
into graceful folds and hold admiration captive, she
soon learned, from her spiritual advisers from
Ireland, the coy uses to which a long flowing cloak
could be turned, particularly the cochuU, or cowlish
hood, from which just so much of gleaming eye or
saucy lips might be revealed as pleased her fancy
or her whim.
On occasions of high festival the people repaired
to some venerated mound or shrme to hear the
pleasure of their Prince.
The time came, however, when the people
murmured among themselves against wars of
conquest or revenge, or dues they deemed
oppressive. That murmur became a voice, the
voice an opposition, the opposition a force that had
to be recognized, and, in the hour of national peril,
reconciled. Thus was evolved on the lilliputian stage of Man
a feature that practically belongs to all Celtic

CELTIC BONDAGE 31
communities, our treasured rights of being heard in
open ParUament in the open air, face to face with
the King or lord over all in person.
That right is stUl a cherished piece of symbolism
in our midst. In the passage of centuries it has
bred into the bone and sinew of the race an eager
ness no less than a capacity intelligently to weigh
any question agitating the public mind. The
critical spirit is carried to such lengths that now-a-
days it seems to lose itself almost in positive
antagonism to every proposal open to the wit
of man.
What the Scotsman has given through long
generations to endless wrangling over the subtleties
of dogma and creed, expanding the mind, but too
often choking the heart, in the process, we, on our
small, poor, bare, wind-swept island, when the
battle for the harvest of the sea and the fruits of
the earth was done, have given to practical con
siderations belonging to the life that now is.
In early Celtic days this gathering of the people
was probably nothing better than a great fair, at
which racing and music and story-telling were part
of the amusements. And even at a later period
it is doubtful if any serious effort was made
to discriminate between judicial and legislative

32 ISLE OF MAN
business. Both were features stUl far from definite
classification. The law was part of the province of the chief
But he grew big and lazy with rich living and
absence from the wars, fat with the milk and honey
tendered by his dependents, or the barley cakes
and strong ale from his own store. He had almost
all that this world could give — a snug corner in
which to rest, a downy couch on which to sleep,
wives to anticipate every want, maids to stand and
wait, sons to guard zealously his prerogative.
What a bewilderment it was to him, good soul,
that people could not live and work in peace !
In thiswise a newrace of beings arose, out of which
the modern lawyer or judge has been, in a sense,
evolved. To such a one was committed the task
of examining the merits of a dispute and arbitrating
thereon. The office was hereditary, it being an
apparent assumption that intelligence was a quality
subject to a testamentary bestowal. He did not
take sides. In his deliberations he acted for both
parties and was judge and jury combined. We
caUed him the Briw.
The judge under Brehonic law, following upon
still more ancient Roman and Teutonic precedents,
had no power to execute judgement. Authority

CELTIC BONDAGE 33
stood aloof Family or group inflicted punishment
upon its neighbour according to its strength and
standard of justice, piUage and murder being
natural and integral parts of the procedure of
exacting reparation.

CHAPTER VI
THE COMING OF CHRISTIANITY
Bede is our venerable authority for the statement
that about the end of the fourth century Ninian, a
man of British birth, educated at Rome, estabUshed
a church, called Candida Casa, on the western
slope of Wigton Bay. The missionary ' White
House ' was dedicated to St. Martin of Tours.
The Picts inhabiting this lower corner of Scot
land came within the sphere of the teacher, but
older influences were stronger and were not soon
uprooted. Ninianism lapsed either about the
supposed time of the apostle's death, in 432, or soon
afterwards. Wigton Bay is within sight of the island of
Man, and it is thought likely, or at all events
possible, that Ninian, who sought to spread the
Gospel in Scotia, did not neglect the land lying
within his vision, and separated from him by fewer
than twenty miles of water.
The inference that Man was a part of the
34

THE COMING OF CHRISTLyMITY 35
kingdom of Strathclyde would explain the connec
tion. But at present this must be regarded as
vague conjecture. AU that is left to give the
story the faintest colour of probability is contained
in the fact that we have to this day an old roofless
church, in the midst of a large field adjoining the
Highlander Inn, at the foot of Greeba Mountain,
and on the main road leading from Douglas and
Peel, connected by long tradition with a saint
whom we call St. Trinian, and of whom we
find it impossible to provide any more authentic
history. The Church of St. Trinian belongs to the
thirteenth or fourteenth century, but the site may
be of much greater antiquity. The weather-
beaten old walls still stand, and until a year or
so ago great trees grew within its short and narrow
nave, and even within its tiny chancel, a single
stride from the spot at which presumably the
first altar to the Cross of Christ was ever raised
in Man. Some of the lower stonework still
survives. St. Trinian's used to present a strange sight.
The trees within, like those without, were the
growth of generations. They raised their proud
heads over the enclosing walls, and spread their
5—2

•66 ISLE OF MAN
branches over the roofless sanctuary like so many
protecting wings.
The church is a little over twenty yards in
length, and eight yards in breadth. The east
window contained two lights, sharply pointed.
Above the west window is a turret for two beUs.
On the north side of the chancel there was a door
for the priest. On the north and south sides of
the building, about a man's height from the
ground, the visitor will observe a number of holes.
These are presumed to have held the stone pegs by
which ropes of straw were to be bound to keep the
thatched roof in its place.
Tradition says the church was erected in fulfil
ment of a vow made by one who had narrowly
escaped the terrors of shipwreck, that it was
dedicated to St. Trinian (Ninian ? Ringan ?), the
missionary worker among the Picts, and that it
belonged to the Priory of St. Minian in Galloway,
the head of which was a Baron in Man.
The legend of the Buggane, ^^hich I recount on
a later page, tells how it comes that the church
remains roofless.
A less romantic explanation is that the church
M^as unfinished at the time of the conquest of the
island by Sir William Montacute in 1343, and that

THE COMING OF CHRISTIANITY 37
after ^the expulsion of the Scots none would com
plete the task.
As a matter of fact, the church was in use in the
first quarter of the thirteenth century, and probably
in the latter half of the twelfth.
So much for that story.

CHAPTER VII
fables of ST. PATRICK
The idea that Christianity was adopted in Man as
early as the fifth century is based on evidence that
would barely sustain one of our most improbable
folk-tales. Hardly less mythical are all the stories relating
to St. Patrick, whose name is preserved on the
island in many ways. Two churches are dedicated
to his memory.
Then, there is the so-caUed cromlech, which may
be an old tomb, but which popular imagination has
linked to a great personality, and is always known
as St. Patrick's Chair. From this central and
elevated position, which AviU be found about a mile
to the south from the old parish church of
Marown, St. Patrick is supposed to have given
the people of Man his last blessing on leaving the
island. Lonan and Rushen have been identified as
names of disciples. By tradition and Unks such as
38

FABLES OF ST. PATRICK 39
these it has been gravely urged that Patrick must
inevitably have been our first Bishop ; that he
visited our island on his way to Ireland ; that he
extirpated from our midst all reptiles, fulfilling a
like service to the Irish on his arrival in their midst ;
and that he left us in the spiritual charge of
St. Germanus, who was another of his disciples.
There is no indubitable evidence that the patron
saint of Ireland ever visited Man at aU ; but there
is, none the less, much to show that his influence, if
not direct and personal, was none the less close and
intimate, and that when his name was given to
that rocky headland, entirely surrounded by the sea,
lying off Peel HiU, on which the Cathedral of Man
was ultimately to be erected, it was given by the
priests to some early sanctuary as a mark of
profound veneration for the pious head of their
Order. Patrick's biography was not the work of a con
temporary. It was compiled long after his death,
when every incident of the preacher's career was
enshrined in such a halo of sanctity and mystery
that no hesitation was felt in attributing to him
even supernatural powers. The conversion, for
instance, of a wicked man named MacCoole, of
Ulster, who figures in all Manx histories, was

40 ISLE OF MAN
effected by Patrick, we are told, 'by means of a
miracle.' Then, we are informed that at Patrick's behest
MacCoole went out on the sea in a coracle of one
hide, leaving wind and tide to carry him whitherso
ever it was the Divine will he should be borne to
serve and work.
MacCoole's presence in our midst seems to have
brought us another visitor from Ireland, Brigit,
destined in later years to take the vows and achieve
distinguished rank in the religious life of her own
country. A woman never travels far without a reason,
says the sage. What, then, was the object of
Brigit's journey ? She would be a young woman
of twenty-three at the time of Patrick's death, and
it is presumed she made her journey about that
time. Was the inducement MacCoole the saint,
or was it, womanlike, MacCoole the sinner ?
AU the record now left us is that Brigit came
hither ; that, whatever the original purpose of her
journey, she fulfiUed an intention that is deductively
attributed to her by a chronicle A\Titten long after
her death — that of taking the veil at the hands of
MacCoole. Local tradition attributes to her the
foundation of a nunnery near Douglas. A parish

SPANISH HEAD

FABLES OF ST. PATRICK 41
also bears her name. In Ireland her religious
estabUshments are numbered by the score.
The Christian faith as then enunciated, no less
than the government of the Church and the social
life of the clergy, was widely dissimilar in Patrick's
day to that by which it was succeeded. There
seems to have been also an effort on the part of
Patrick to fit the organization of the Church to the
Celtic tribal customs of the people among whom it
was established.
All were Bishops, founders of churches, and they
observed ' one Mass, one celebration,' and, after the
manner of the Druids, ' one tonsure from ear to ear.'
The Bishops seem to have been pursued by a
problem as old as the world. Only a woman
understands a woman, it is said. The Bishops, no
less than other men, claimed opportunities for a
study of so absorbing a subject !
The good men appear to have had doubts of the
exact status of woman in the sacred hierarchy.
They distrusted their inclinations without defining
the cause ; so ' they rejected not the services and
society of women.'
But the sixth century was not half through
before a new Order prevailed. There were fewer
Bishops and more Presbyters, and these formed a
6

42 ISLE OF MAN
secular clergy, who ' refused the services of women '
and separated them from the monasteries. Side by
side with the secular clergy there arose another
Order of men, who sought to serve God by much
prayer and fasting, by mortification of the flesh and
studied aloofness from all society, whether of men
or of women. The assumption is that in Man this
Order found a favoured retreat.
Among the helpers of St. Brigit was one
St. Finian, who established the monastic school
at Clonard, at which St. Columba was educated.
St. Columba is reported to have founded 300
churches in Ireland alone and prior to the monastic
settlement at lona. The evidence of a Columban
church in Man shows probabUity, but it is by no
means conclusive.
The whole story has an academic, rather than a
practical, interest when we review the facts from a
later standpoint. In Ireland seeds of dissension
were sown over the controversy regarding the date
for the observance of Easter. It is difficult for us
to realize that the celebration of the anniversaries
of Christ's birth and death and resurrection formed
no part of the ritual of the early Church, and that
when the resurrection was recognized as a great
festival, the Church in the fourth, fifth and sixth

FABLES OF ST. PATRICK 43
centuries was torn asunder by the acrimonious
discussion of the proper date.
In the sixth century the Christian Church
observed the anniversary of Christ's resurrection as
early as March 21 and as late as AprU 26. In
England in the seventh century members of the
same household could be found celebrating Easter
tide and Palm Sunday concurrently.
Bede gives evidence of the bitter anger to which
the controversy gave rise. When the King of
Northumbria was caUed in to arbitrate upon this
singular dispute he was solemnly warned by Bishop
Wilfred against giving heed to the specious pleas
of Bishop Coleman, his adversary. ' This is a
momentous issue,' exclaimed the future St. Wilfred,
pointing his finger menacingly at the King, ' on
which may depend whether your Majesty will
spend eternity in hell or in heaven.'
No wonder that the King, despite his admitted
leanings the other way, was impressed by so severe
a caution, and gave his decision accordingly. But
the controversy was not silenced ; it crops up again
and again down to the eighth century. The decree
of Pius I. notwithstanding, the crucifixion of Christ
was not fixed on a Friday, and the resurrection for
the following Sunday, until the Council of Nice.
6—2

44 ISLE OF MAN
The special interest in this discussion that belongs
to our present narrative is in part due to the dis
astrous effect it exercised upon the essential life, no
less than the harmony, of the Church in Ireland.
In the South of Ireland authority was in closer
touch and sooner recognized ; but in the North, with
which the Church in Man was in keener sympathy
and to which it was more readily responsive, the
Roman time was not established among the Celtic
communities of the Columban persuasion tiU about
700, or later.
Into the midst of a people thrown into bewilder
ment by so extraordinary a discussion came the con
quering hosts of Scandinavia, bringing with them
the very name of Easter, the Goddess of Spring.
In Ireland, as in other kingdoms, the pagan
Norsemen bore down every obstacle to their rule,
and yet never wholly dominated the consciences of
the people settled at long distances from the sea
board. But Man was an easier conquest to a
valiant race of sea-dogs, brave even to defiance,
who seemed born to rule men with a mastery no
less complete than that of the angry waves over
whose crest they so proudly sailed. Every obstacle
they swept from their path, and established them
selves as the indisputable masters of our island.

FABLES OF ST. PATRICK 45
The Celtic Church, not too sure of itself, and
weakened by dissension within and the pressure of
authority from without, disappeared before the
Viking hosts, and by the middle of the ninth
century we had the unique spectacle of a people
of Christian birth or ancestry celebrating Easter
tide with high carnival, and yet attaching to the
observance no higher significance than that of the
opening of spring.

CHAPTER VIII
OUR VIKING CONQUERORS
' He only might with full truth be caUed a sea-
king that never slept under a sooty rafter and
never drank in the chimney-corner.' So says the
old saga.
King Orry was such a king, and tradition says
that when he cast ashore at the Lhane, near Jurby,
the native Manx came forward and asked him
whence he came.
' That path across the sky leads to my
country,' said the brave, vigorous, weather-beaten
sea-dog. Then King Orry came from Iceland — not from
Denmark, as invariably represented. The Milky
Way is stUl to us ' Yn Raad Mooar Ree Gorree '
(The Great Road of King Orry).
The Northmen, Icelandic, Danish and Norwegian,
had their own code of honour. They might pillage
the homes of a people whom they had conquered
46

OUR VIKING CONQUERORS 47
and scattered, but it remained a grievous dishonour
to come in secret and steal another man's goods or
take his wife and chUdren prisoners.
No sea-king must show fear. He must never
turn his back on an assailant of Uke power and like
arms. He must never bind a wound till the same
hour of the next day. He must slander no man
by a word he would hesitate to publish before his
face. A brother's cause must be his own. Charity
was a law rather than a virtue.
The Viking conqueror's first conquest was the
conquest of his own heart. He must face the
fiercest wind, and never furl his saU in the teeth of
the blackest storm. His ship must be his home ;
and when at length death claimed him for its
own, no prouder tomb could be found than the
ship in which the brave old warrior had faced and
overcome every enemy but that last one that
humbles aU.
Such was the character of our Viking conqueror.
Of the ship he saUed several examples have been
unearthed in Norway, but not one in the Isle of
Man. To Norway, no less than to Iceland, must
the eye turn if we would understand this early
period of Manx history.
The Norse people, out of the beaten track of

48 ISLE OF MAN
the tourist, are still easily the most unspoUt in
habitants of Europe. Sitting about a log-fire in
the cool of an autumn evening, no Manxman who
has broken through the reserve of a naturaUy
refined and highly imaginative people can fail to
realize in folk-tales the comiection of the Manx
with the Norse which even a thousand years have
not served to dissipate.
The Viking ship, as I remember it in the grounds
of the University at Kristiania in 1904, was a vessel
of about 100 feet length over all, width 16 feet,
low in the waist for the oarsmen, drawing about
3 feet 6 inches, and a fast saUer without doubt.
The carrying capacity would be no more than
30 tons, and she would be fuUy manned vsdth
a crew of 40 hands.
It was towards the close of the eighth century
when that inspiration suddenly stirred the Teutonic
people settled in Scandinavia to seek a wider field
of adventure and glory across the seas. The earliest
date at which the robbers appeared in the Irish
Sea was about 795. They came again and again,
and then, towards the close of the ninth century,
feeling the pressure of exaction and purposeless
warfare in the homeland, they began to settle in our
midst. Each had already made his own personal

THE HAMLET OF CREGNEESH AND THE
CALF OF MAN

'*Sfr *f

OUR VIKING CONQUERORS 49
conquest in Man. Here made he then, right
wUlingly, his permanent home.
Our Viking conquerors did not bring their wives.
By this fact alone I account for the absence of
aU Scandinavian terms of endearment from our
speech. By it I account for the survival of Norse
surnames, a few place-names, and a few political
terms. Yet the Northmen's invasion remains the greatest
epoch in our national history. It brought us
sturdy, manly physique, bigness of bone, breadth
of chest, and greatly increased height. It brought
us gentleness of manner no less than strength of
character, refinement no less than intelligence.
Celtic life was impregnated with great and noble
gifts — imagination, invention, bravery, initiative.
In a word, some of the least lovable traits of the
Celt were minimized, while others were almost
obliterated. Would that the conquest had been
more complete ! for all that is best in us we owe
to that big, burly, broad-minded, generous-hearted,
adventurous sea-dog, whose last success was the
most enduring — the conquest of the Celtic maiden's
heart.

CHAPTER IX
THE OPEN-AIR PARLIAMENT
The Norsemen, having destroyed every Christian
temple and put the priests to fUght, soon pro
ceeded to evolve order out of chaos. The land
was divided into sheadings, or ship districts, each
with its own authority. Justice was estabUshed,
and customs of the homeland were introduced.
They met in worship of the great AU- Father Odin,
in whose great hall, Valhalla, the noble dead were
guests at one glorious and eternal feast ; while in
the thunder they heard Thor the Strongest rattUng
past on his cart or beating heavy blows with his
great hammer on a mighty anvU.
When the need arose, such an assembly was made
the occasion of a court, or Thing, at which every
freeman had a right of speech. Disputes were
settled by this roughly constituted tribunal, games
forming thereafter the pleasure of the people.
Matters of graver moment, questions affecting
the whole community, slaying with provocation,
50

THE OPEN-AIR PARLIAMENT 51
etc., were referred to a court of all, or Al-thing.
This court was seemingly assembled twice every
year, but the important celebration was that of
Midsummer Day.
The elders met vsdthin the temple, and aided the
King in determining the cause. Thereafter the
king proceeded to the summit of the adjoining
mound, and there, with his face to the sun, pro
claimed judgement and law. AU the freemen
stood around, and their assent, given or implied,
was an integral part of the proceedings.
In an earUer age the people stood around and
Ustened like serfs, in ' awful silence,' to the pro
clamations of their Prince. Under Scandinavian
rule, sane and enUghtened, and an enormous
advance upon anything existing elsewhere, the
Norse-Celtic-Manxman had made an immense
stride in the direction of popular government.
We have to this hour the most direct survival of
this treasured emblem of our liberties in Tynwald :
Tyn, Tin, or Ting, court, forum or parliament ;
Wald (as in all cognate Teutonic languages :
German, Dutch and English), wood or forest. The
phUologist may suggest vallum, rampart or mound ;
and in Dano-Norwegian, whence the word came to
us, void is mound or dyke. Thing-void is therefore
7—2

52 ISLE OF MAN
Court -mound. And further, as confirming this
interpretation, we must remember that the Vikings
held their solemn assemblies among trees, not on
any bare plain or field as represented.
Whether our Norse ancestors ever possessed in
Man a venerated mound or tree-clad hill enclosing
sacred ashes we have no knowledge, but we know
that St. John's has been the meeting-place as far
back as we have any history, while the Tyn- wald
symbolizes the island as a whole, the tradition
being that the earth and sods of which it is
constituted were brought in equal proportions from
each sheading.
The old-time temple is now St. John's Chapel,
standing, according to ancient usage, to the east of
the mound. The order to be observed at the great
meeting and fair is set out for the particular benefit
of Sir John Stanley the second, and appears in
the first volume of the ancient ' Ordinances and
Statutes.' ' Our Doughtfull and Gratious Lord, this is
the Constitution of old Time, the wliich we have
given in our Days, how yee should be governed on
your Tinwald Day. First, you shall come thither
in your Royal Array, as a King ought to do, by the
Prerogatives and Royalties of the Land of 3Iann.

THE OPEN-AIR PARLIAMENT 53
And upon the Hill of Tynwald sitt on a Chaire,
covered with a Royall Cloath and Cushions, and
your Visage into the East, and your Sword before
you, with the Point upward ; your Barrons in the
third degree sitting beside you, and your beneficed
Men and your Deemsters before you sitting ; and
your Clarke, your Knights, Esquires and Yeomen
about you in the third Degree ; and the worthiest
Men in your Land to be caUed in ; before your
Deemsters, if you wiU ask any Thing of them, and
to hear the Government of your Land, and your
Will ; and the Commons to stand without the
Circle of the Hill, with three Clearkes in their
Surplisses,' etc.
For centuries there was no recorded law and no
schedule of fine or punishment. Consistency and
uniformity were secured by the King requiring the
Domesman or Deemster to call in the aid of the
elders and worthies of the land.
The Deemer or Doomer, Doomsman, Doomster
or Deemster (the local pronunciation is Dempster),
originally held on office of quasi-priestly, legal and
penal significance. His functions included those of
Court Crier, Clerk of the Arraigns, Spokesman, and
Executioner. He was the Scandinavian creation of
Teutonic freedom, not of Celtic serfdom, and was
chosen of the people. The awful solemnity of his

54 ISLE OF MAN
principal duties enabled the Deemster to magnify
his office. He became qualified to tender opinion
and offer advice, and thus shape the judgement of
the court, a privilege that belonged to freemen of the
soil. Amid warfare and social confusion the people
lost their powers of selection, but the judgeship that
was evolved never actually became hereditary,
though it often passed from father to son. {Deem-
steerer is a mere straining after philological effect.)
The Deemster, therefore, by a not unnatural
process of evolution, became the recognized de
pository of learning and procedure. The elders of
the land became ' the xxiiij ' out of which emerged
the Keys — Claves Mannice et Claves Legis, Keys of
Man and Keys of the Law.
The Council, consisting of salaried officials of
State or Church, which has now entrenched itself
as part of the Constitution, has no kno-wn history
prior to the fifteenth century, and its existence — a
legacy of the Stanley regime — is a violation of the
whole spirit of the enlightened form of government
handed down to us by our Viking ancestors.
Our servants have become our masters to an
extent that has hardly any parallel out of the realm
of comic opera.

CHAPTER X
ENGLISH SUZERAINTY
Christianity was probably re-introduced by some
ambulatory Bishop in the eleventh century. The first
monastic settlement of which we have any definite
knowledge belonged to the Cistercians at Furness.
Rushen Abbey, of which the ruined waUs may still
be seen, was established by them about 1135.
The Cistercians were, by virtue of their Papal
charter, freed from all episcopal rule. An Abbot
yielded obedience to those of his own Order. As a
community the Cistercians were subject to the
Pope alone. Thus arose our earliest connection
with the Apostolic See.
Absence from the sea and increasing comfort
seem to have demoralized our conquerors. Besides,
great and ever-growing powers were in process of
development on every side. Kings in Man found
it necessary to conciliate these mercenary powers,
whether civil or religious. Large tracts of land
were granted to the White Monks.
55

56 ISLE OF MAN
Olaf II., King and Saint, having established
Christianity in Norway by his last desperate battle
of August 31, 1030, the island came within the
ecclesiastical authority of Norway. The diocese,
which was first known as Sodor, or Southern Isles,
and included the Hebrides, Arran, and Man, had as
its metropolitan head the Archbishop of Trondhjem.
The Hebrides and the smaller western isles of
Scotland were separated from us in 1266. There
after it is nearly impossible to foUow the confusion
that arose, a confusion in which Tynwald itself
seemingly lapsed into oblivion.
When Man was united with DubUn under one
crown, the diocese found itself in the Archi-
episcopate of Canterbury. Then York was the
fountain-head of spiritual authority. But not tiU
the fifteenth century was the last Unk with Norway
finally severed.
Our national emblem, the familiar Three Legs
of Man, is traced to our Viking conquerors.
OriginaUy the sign was probably a complete circle,
from which radiated innumerable shafts, some of
them forked, representing the sun casting gleams
of light on every side. But, sun-worshippers
though they were, they did not invent the device.
It may have been an ogham cross, one of the

ENGLISH SUZERAINTY 57
mysterious hieroglyphics in use among the Irish
and other Celtic nations.
Oghams were once reputed to be of Persian or
Phoenician origin, but no modern scholar supports
that theory. One authority makes the deduction
that the Celts of these islands wrote their language
before the fifth century, the time at which Chris
tianity was supposedly introduced into Ireland,
while another finds points of resemblance between
the oghams of the Celts and the runes of the
Norsemen. If the oghams came from Scandinavia, we seem
to have barely begun our learning of that period of
our history. On the other hand, our invaders may
have brought the familiar sign from Sicily, where
it was already a fully-formed device for perhaps
a thousand years or more.
Or (and my last explanation is the most interest
ing and the most reasonable) it may have been
already familiar to them in a slightly altered form.
The three-forked device may be only a crude repre
sentation of the Svastika or Swastika, a very old
reUgious symbol among Aryans from Persia to
Scandinavia. Sometimes the sign was displayed
like two geometrical figures in combination : a plain
upright cross set in a square with parts of the latter
8

58 ISLE OF MAN
cut away. Sometimes the symbol was show^n as an
upright cross cast in a ring, the bend at the knee
being absorbed in the enclosing circle. (The Three
I^egs of Man used to be always shown in a circle.)
Both were identical, and as a sacred representation
of the Sun they are always found in connection
with Sun-gods like ApoUo and Odin (or Woden),
the Great All-Father and giver of life to our
Viking ancestors.
The motto which now surrounds the sign
Quocunqxie jeceris stabit (Whichever way you
throw me, I stand) has neither history nor merit
to recommend it.
The Three Legs, clad m armour and with spurs
on the heels (those of Man, following the rule of
SicUy, should be naked), are engraved on our ancient
sword of state, attributed to the thirteenth century.
A quaint representation of the Three Legs, not
clad in armour, but with what seems Uke a spur
attached to one heel, is still discernible in the
carved cross which stands in the open, near
the entrance to Kirk Maughold churchyard. The
Maughold cross is attributed to the fourteenth
century. Of the other bearing of the island, that of a ship
in ruff sables and the inscription Rex Mannice et

ENGLISH SUZERAINTY 59
Insularum (King of Man and the Isles), no more
satisfactory account can be given.
One old-fashioned writer credits us with a Prince
who, reigning in Man in the tenth century, used
this crest. For refusing to do homage to Edgar,
his EngUsh Overlord, we are told he was deprived
of his throne. Restored to favour, he was made
Admiral of the fleet and swept the seas of his lord's
enemies. The seal of King Harald of Man in
1245 was a Viking ship, with furled sails and the
same motto, from which it has been assumed that
this was the earliest bearing of the island.
Our Norse conquerors seem to have had a strange
fancy for these idle but significant embroideries.
They were fond of emblazoning on their ships many
strange and wonderful signs. They had a curious
regard for the raven. A mighty dragon was an
object of interest, while another favourite device
was that of two serpentine creatures engaged in
fierce combat, their heads facing, and their writhing
bodies intertwined at regular and exactly corre
sponding intervals.
A grave element of uncertainty belongs to
almost every statement of the Scandinavian period
in Man. The names of Godred, Olaf, Harald,
Macon, Reginald, Ivar, and Magnus figure in the
8—2

60 ISLE OF MAN
list of Kings. The kingship was supposedly subject
to the overlordship of Norway. The suzerainty was
often frankly of the most shadowy kind.
Reginald, for instance, was prepared to submit
himself anywhere, so long as he had efficient
protection and was left in peace. He submitted
himself to the Crown of England, and when King
John made his bow to Rome, he did the same by
formal deed, dated October 10, 1219.
But there was a long period in which the island
was the toy of rival crowns. Alexander III. of
Scotland supported his claim with vigour and
success — so much so that when a Princess ]\f ary,
as last of an old line, offered to do homage to the
King of England, she was answered : ' She must
claim it of the King of Scotland, who now holds it.'
By 1290 Edward I., 'the hammer of Scotland,'
had made good his authority in Man. In 1313
Lord Robert Bruce, King of Scotland, began his
successful incursions, and three years later a party
of Irish freebooters had their revenge on the
Scottish King — and on us — by a general piUage of
the whole island.
Another Mary, a granddaughter of the former,
came to England, with her deeds and her charters,
and threw herself at the feet of Edward III.

ENGLISH SUZERAINTY 61
The King promised his aid, and he was even
better than his word. He found a husband for the
lady, marrying her, we are told, to her own kins
man. Sir WiUiam de Montacute, who is sometimes
described as • of the Royal Family of Man,' and as
one who was held in the highest esteem by his
monarch. Sir William and his lady were also
provided with ' soldiers and shipping to make good
her right.'
Sir William was apparently unable to defend the
island against the Scots. The people themselves
longed for any form of settled government, and, to
get even one year's brief respite, they agreed to
pay their Scottish foes a fine of 300 marks.
Edward III. assented to this bargain, being at
that time so fully engaged in war with France.
But in 1346 his hands were freer, and with the
defeat and capture of King David he practically
ended aU serious efforts on the part of Scotland to
regain possession of the island.
From Sir William Montacute, first Earl of
Salisbury, the island passed to his son, whose style
was 'Lord of Man.' In 1394 the island, 'with
the crowne,' was sold to Sir William Le Scroop,
an under-chamberlain of Richard 1 1., who was
promptly beheaded on the succession of Henry IV.

62 ISLE OF MAN
All claimants being now dead, or otherwise
disposed of, the island was an unencumbered
appendage of the British Crown.
Henry IV. made a grant to Henry Percy, Earl
of Northumberland, and his heirs of
'the isle, castle, peel and lordship of Man, with
all such islands and seignories thereunto belonging
as were Sir William de Scrope's, knight, deceased,
whom in his life we conquered, and do declare to
be conquered,' subject to the service of carrying at
every coronation 'that sword naked (which we
wore when we arrived at Holderness), caUed
Lancaster Sword.'
A year or two later the Earl rebeUed, was
defeated and banished, and though the attainder
was taken off, he was deprived of the island.
The King now made, in 1405, a fresh grant to Sir
John de Stanley for life. The deed was canceUed
within a year, and regranted to Sir John Stanley and
his heirs, ' together with the castle and peel of Man,
and all royalties, regalities, franchises, etc.,' together
with the patronage of the bishopric, in as full and
ample a manner as it had been granted to any
former King or Lord, to be held of the Crown of
England on paying homage, in lieu of all demands
and customs whatsoever, and providing a cast of

ENGLISH SUZERAINTY 63
falcons at every successive coronation of a King of
England. James I., by letters patent in 1609, settled the
island upon WiUiam, the sixth Earl, and Elizabeth
his Countess for their lives and the life of the
survivor, with remainder to their son and heir-
apparent, James (afterwards seventh Earl), and his
heirs. By an Act of Parliament in 1610 the
succession was again varied to the heirs male of
James, Lord Stanley, instead of the heirs general.
FaiUng such issue, the island was to pass to the
heirs male of WiUiam, the final remainder being to
the rightful heirs of James, Lord Stanley.
The succession passed to four descendants of
WiUiam, and then, in 1736, upon the death of
James, the tenth Earl, the sovereignty passed to
James, the second Duke of Athole, the heir general
of James, seventh Earl of Derby.

CHAPTER XI
the act of settlement
Sir John Stanley does not seem to have ever set
foot on the island, but the son, who bore the same
name, hastened here in 1417, and again in 1422, to
settle serious manifestations of unrest. To this
latter sovereign, who proved himself a wise but
autocratic ruler, we are indebted for the first serious
effort to record the ancient laws and customs.
Neither did the first Baron Stanley come to
Man, and interest in his successor lies in the fact
that at Bosworth he (or it may have been his
brother) took the crown of the dead Richard, and,
putting it on the victor's head, proclaimed him
King as Henry VII. The King created him Earl
of Derby.
The second Earl was a grandson of the preceding
holder of the title, and he figures in Manx history
in connection with one interesting fact. He dis
continued the title of ' King of Man and the Isles,'
substituting therefor the title of ' Lord.'
64

BRADDA HEAD, PORT ERIN (MOONLIGHT)

THE ACT OF SETTLEMENT 65
' A great Lord,' he said ' is more honourable
than a petty King.' But there is more than a
suspicion that the change was not made without
a plain hint that the continued use of the royal
title would be an offence.
For a whUe the succession was in dispute.
The island was in the control of nominees of Queen
EUzabeth and of James I. during the first part
of this period. The suzerainty of the Earl of
Northampton and the Earl of Salisbury, acting in
conjunction, foUowed.
Then we come to the rule of James, seventh
Earl of Derby, called in Manx history ' the Great
Stanley ' — not for any ' greatness ' he ever displayed
in the administration or development of the island,
but because he was the most considerable figure
that had thus far taken any lot or part in our story.
' He aped the manners of his own monarch, and
quenched opposition by securing his opponents in
gaol. ... His land laws . . . left a legacy of hate,
which explains the revolt of the island after his
death. . . . His defects were perhaps the defects
of his age; his virtues were his own.' So writes
Sir Spencer Walpole.
He had a genuine interest in the island that had
faUen to his charge, and, with his wife, Charlotte de
9

66 ISLE OF MAN
la Tremoille, daughter of the Duke of Thouars, he
made a home among those subject to his rule.
The lady was destined to prove one of the most
striking and picturesque figures of a great epoch of
national history.
When Charles II. marched from Scotland, the
Earl and 300 Manxmen set out to join their force
to his. They met the ParUament men at Wigan,
and were defeated and scattered. At Worcester
the Earl was captured, and though he petitioned
Parliament and openly recommended the Countess
to surrender the Isle of Man, his execution at
Bolton followed on October 15, 1651. Authorities
leave us in doubt as to whether CromweU was
resolved on ' Darbie's ' destruction or disposed to
forgive. The Countess took refuge in Castle Rushen, and
the presumption was that she was preparing for a
stubborn defence, though the ultimate result was
in no doubt. Rumour, however, said that her
ladyship was secretly arranging with Parliament
terms favourable only to herself. A body of
Manxmen, with William Christian, who held the
office of Receiver, at their head, anticipated any
such bargain, if any existed, by themselves negoti
ating the surrender on the condition that the Manx

THE ACT OF SETTLEMENT 67
people should not be disturbed in their ancient
laws and liberties, many of which the Countess's
own husband had ruthlessly cast aside.
The Commonwealth gave the island to Lord
Fairfax, and WiUiam Christian (who must not be
confused with Edward Christian, another sterling
champion of the people's heritage) was promoted to
the office of Governor. At the Restoration the
tables were turned, and WUliam Christian, despite
the Act of Indemnity, was brought to trial for
rebeUion — not against the King of England, but
technicaUy against the Countess.
In a court shamefuUy packed with his enemies.
Christian was declared guilty and sentenced to be
shot. Two days later the sentence was carried out
at Hango HUl, near Castletown. Thus perished
lUiam Dhone (Brown WilUam), as he was affec
tionately caUed by his fellow-countrymen, one of
the most patriotic Manxmen who ever lived.
Christian, from his prison-cell, had appealed to
the King, and a week after the execution of
sentence Lord Derby was ordered to produce his
prisoner. His sons claimed redress. The Privy
Council declared the Act of Indemnity applied
to the island, and ordered entire restitution of
Christian's estate, while the Deemsters were to
9—2

68 ISLE OF MAN
remain in prison as ' condign punishment ' for their
offences. But we may search the records in vain
to find any adequate humiliation upon the high and
dignified authors of the atrocity.
The reign of the House of Stanley did not close,
however, without the passage of one Act which
does much to redeem their memory. The Act
of Settlement of 1704 is sometimes called the
Manxman's Magna Charta. It converted tenants
at the wiU of the Lord into the virtual owners of
the soil. The Lord's rent became fixed and un
alterable, and with the appreciation in land values
the rent payable to the Lord became merely
nominal. Bishop Wilson, who took a leading part in
effecting this beneficent settlement, presided over
the diocese for fifty-seven years (1698 - 1755).
His character has been to some extent idealized,
chiefly because no other Bishop has approached
him in simple piety, goodness of heart, and real
attachment to the island and the people.
The bishopric has in modern days unfortunately
developed a reputation as ' a jumping-off ' board,
each new - comer regarding Bishopscourt as a
house from which he must escape at the first
opportunity.

THE ACT OF SETTLEMENT 69
Bishop Wilson declined further preferment. He
shared with nearly all Bishops the conviction that
the people were made for the Church, and not the
Church for the people. His jealousy of the en
croachment of the State upon the ecclesiastical
domain, at a time when the Church was legally
entitled to meddle and muddle with purely State
affairs, was an uncontrolled obsession.
In the Isle of Man the Ecclesiastical Courts, with
aU the powers of terror behind them, survived long
after they had been swept to the dust-heap in
England. We remember how the Druids, draw
ing, it is presumed, upon rites and ceremonies be
longing to the Far East, introduced with deadly
force the power of excommunication. The Church
of Rome, following upon the era of our Scandi
navian conquerors, did not allow so keen a weapon
to faU into disuse.
The Reformation, which with us was a gradual
rather than a violent process, did not obliterate this
flagrant iniquity ; and Bishop Wilson, despite his
human qualities, as ecclesiastic saw nothing in
' discipUne ' that corresponded with the rack and
the thumb-screw, that was not ' commendable.'
What is it that obliterates in a Bishop the simple
instincts of justice and humanity ? What is it that

70 ISLE OF MAN
leads him to condone — nay, to bless— the prison-
house and the torture-chamber? What qualifies
him to judge, though he may not be judged?
What kind of vindictive God has he created out
of his own imaginings ? Is it not aU the result
of that strange arrogance and blind intolerance,
bred of some obscure process of reasoning, which
leads him to regard himself as the physical embodi
ment of the wUl of the Most High and the humble
instrument of God's holy purpose ?
On no other hypothesis can one read Bishop
Wilson's own words : ' People are never excom
municated but for crimes that wiU shut them out
of heaven.' The mercy of God had well-defined
limits in those days ; yet certain of his ' crimes '
would pass without remark to-day.
' Offenders of all conditions, without distinction,
are obliged to submit to the censures appointed by
the Church, whether for correction or example
[commutation of penances being abolished by a
late law], and they generally do it patiently.'
The Bishop is not conscious of a single touch of
sardonic irony, though the ' patience ' was born of
the knowledge that if the offender did not submit
he was ' delivered over to the Lord of the Isle, both
body and goods.'

THE ACT OF SETTLEMENT 71
Black as is the record of the Church in Man,
presenting such a story of cruelty, exaction, and
intolerance that one is left wondering that at
Bishopscourt one stone has been left standing upon
another. Bishop WUson is largely, very largely, a
grateful memory. It would be still more so if we
could but forget the pious thanksgiving for the
fidelity of a wife to her marriage vows or blot out
the savage lust of revenge which the Church, under
the guidance of Bishop Wilson, took upon one poor
woman, Katharine Kinrade, who was dragged after
a boat in the sea at Peel, at full tide, for an offence
which leaves aU men dumb.

CHAPTER XII
THE SPIRITUAL COURTS
A WHOLE book might be written on the iniquities
of the penal side of the Establishment. Manuscript
copies of the ancient records of the Ecclesiastical
Courts have been made, and these form in the eyes
of Manxmen in America an interesting souvenir
of the land of their ancestry, so widely separated
are we in mind and outlook from the stern pro
cesses of servitude of Bishop Wilson's * discipline '
of little more than a century and a half ago.
Sir James Gell, one of the clearest - headed
lawyers we have had, did a generous and a graceful
thing in 1871, when Mr. Richard Jebb, on the
abolition of his office as counsel to the PubUc
Works Commission in London, was unexpectedly
appointed Vicar-General. Mr. Jebb was an able
lawyer, but he was utterly bewildered when
suddenly required by the duties of his office to
thread his way through the intricacies of Manx law.
In the dilemma Sir James Gell came to Mr. Jebb's

GLEN MEAY (SHOWERY WEATHER)

THE SPIRITUAL COURTS 73
aid, and prepared a clear and succinct explanation
of the leading features of our jurisprudence.
From the manuscript copy before me I find that
the Episcopal Courts had jurisdiction in all matters
relating to the Church, the clergy, religion, and
morals — the latter term covered a wide field,
including heresy, Sunday labour, sexual sin, etc. —
slander, matrimonial causes, probate of wUls,
appointment of guardians, etc. In criminal cases
the court punished the offenders by excommunica
tion, open penance, imprisonment, and by requiring
a bond with sureties.
The priestly power in temporal matters was
much more extensive than that exercised by the
English Ecclesiastical Courts, at all events since
the Reformation. Then in the Isle of Man the
offender found it impossible to escape. He must
not leave the island or someone else would
assuredly come under censure for having aided him
in his wicked flight.
The infallibility of the Church was a natural pre
sumption of the theocracy. By a regulation passed
at Convocation in 1617, it became a serious offence
on the part of a victim to cast doubt upon an
accusation laid to his charge. To slander the
clergy, to question their word, to traverse even the
10

74 ISLE OF MAN
sworn testimony of a churchwarden were offences
subject to the 'payne of the churches censure in
the highest degree.' And further, the Church did
not merely seek to hold the people in slavery, but
endeavoured to convert them into common spies,
by directing them to ' keep watch upon their parson
and upon the clerk ' to see that each should do his
duty. If an offender refused to accompany the sumner
to gaol, he was apprehended by a soldier of the
garrison, by whom he was lodged in the loathsome
cell called the Crypt, beneath the Cathedral of
St. Germain at Peel Castle. The so - caUed
' Bishop's Prison ' was, however, under the charge
of officers of the Lord. An Act of T5mwald
in 1737 imposed limitations on the priestly power,
but the Spiritual Courts were not to be so easUy
reduced, and there are various instances subsequent
to 1737 showing how penalties were still imposed
according to the former practice.
The truth is that the decline of the Episcopal
Courts dates, not from any growing sense of justice
or mercy in the mind of Bishop Wilson, as has
been so constantly said, but from 1704, when Bishop
Wilson, in the first flush of his zeal, sought, by
virtue of the powers of an Act of 1691, to abolish

THE SPIRITUAL COURTS 75
commutation, and to permit no distinction in the
treatment of offenders, irrespective of their station
or rank.
So long as Church * discipline ' was reserved for
the poor and the weak, it was suffered to remain ;
but when Bishop Wilson sought higher game, he
came into violent coUision with the civU power,
and at the first opportunity the Governor clapped
him into gaol, and kept him there untU the Privy
CouncU ordered his release.
This attempted usurpation of the sovereign
power is a feature of the autocratic reign of nearly
aU the Bishops. Respecting the sixteenth, seven
teenth, and the first half of the eighteenth century
we have abundant data. Let one instance suffice.
In England marriage by mere consent was a
legal and binding arrangement down to 1753, when
the Act of 26 George IL, c. 33, was passed. It
was a civil contract even in those Christian com
munities who regarded it as a sacrament, and not
in any way affected by the superinduction of
religious ceremony, except so far as the sovereign
power had so annexed it.
In early Christian times the custom grew up of
making the marriage promise in public, the parties
obtaining at the same time the benediction of the
10—2

76 ISLE OF MAN
priest on the union. But even this slight reUgious
observance was neither desired nor practised when
one of the parties had been married before, the
attitude of the Church towards second marriages
being that of toleration without approval. The
Church would not yield to that more ancient faith
which asserted marriage to be eternal, covering
this life and the life to come ; neither did it declare
against remarriage or polygamy, though there is
no question as to its abhorrence of polyandry.
Human frailty thrust into the hands of the
priests a weapon of which they were not slow to
learn the use. The invocation of God's blessing
came to be regarded in the minds of the ignorant
as an essential feature of the marriage rite.
In the Isle of Man there is a lamentable lack of
early information on marriage customs. There is
no record of the decline of polygamy, and only by
a process of deduction am I led to conclude that it
was never universal, and that monogamy established
itself as a matter of convenience rather than of
custom or of law. (There is an instance that
approximated to polygamy as late as 1868.)
Not until the Stanley regime are we entitled to
draw any reliable conclusion. Then we find the
priests using the marriage rite, without any scruple.

THE SPIRITUAL COURTS 77
to suit their own ends. Even in later history we
see the Church, under Bishop Wilson, exerting the
whole weight of its prestige and power to thwart
the legitimate aspiration of the people in marriage,
save on hard-and-fast terms drawn up by the
Bishop's own hand — terms that were as much a
violation of Christian usage as they were of the
laws of charity, civilization, and human nature.
By reference to the Canons of February, 1704,
we find the ' good ' and ' saintly ' Bishop Wilson
ordaining that no one should be permitted to ' enter
into the holy state of matrimony tiU he had received
the Holy Sacrament of the Lord's Supper.' Then
the candidate could not attend the Communion
unless he had been first confirmed by the Bishop.
Confirmation next had its obstacles. He had to
be prepared and examined by a priest of his parish,
and he had to give evidence of his instruction and
knowledge, learning by heart various prayers. He
had to give proof of entire freedom from ecclesi
astical censure — of having performed all the
' discipline ' set down for his misbehaviour, non-
attendance at Church, labour on saints' days, and
the like. Baptism, too, had its difficulties. The
sponsors must be communicants also.
Marriage, therefore, was conditional on Com-

78 ISLE OF MAN
munion ; Communion was conditional on Confirma
tion ; Confirmation was conditional on Baptism ;
Baptism was conditional on qualified sponsors.
Round the whole fabric of the human family the
Church wove its web.
The presumption of Bishop WUson was that he
was promoting virtue and godly living. He was
in reaUty engaged in an elaborate scheme for
promoting vice, irregularity of union, or hypocrisy.
I find it not a little difficult to realize the basis
of the adoration with which Bishop Wilson's
memory has been enshrined even in the most
modern history. Charity covers a multitude of
sins. Bishop Wilson gave in charity with both
hands. But it requires more than ordinary charity
to cover his offences. And I should have liked him
better if he had been just before he was generous.
The most conspicuous case of vdlful and woeful
wrong-doing laid to the charge of the spiritual courts
in general, and of Bishop Wilson in particular for
his degrading punishment of a woman, was that
of Katharine Kinrade, to whom reference has been
already made. The records provide many others,
earlier and later, but this one cannot escape more
detailed mention, partly because it has seized the
popular imagination, and partly because it is now

THE SPIRITUAL COURTS 79
rendered for ever memorable in a poem of search
ing pathos, deUcacy, and boundless charity.
Katharine Kinrade was a poor, frail, and beautiful
woman, comely even when the bloom of youth was
only a legend. It is unnecessary to account for
her fraUty, though the student of our village Ufe —
with its repeated story of consanguineous marriage —
has not far to seek for a solution of that part of the
riddle. Without subscribing to all that is said of
the evils of endogamy, I feel that marriage and
remarriage within the bounds of a small parish,
until everybody was related, had much to answer
for in the prevalence of moral sin, consumption,
and other growths springing from that common
stem. According to the records, Katharine Kinrade
was affected with such ' a degree of unsettledness '
and ' defect of understanding ' as to evoke pity
rather than censure. But the Bishop, turned
Inquisitor, imposes his torture, and elects that his
victim's degradation shall be, as I have described,
at high market on the Fair of St. Patrick, with the
constables and soldiers of the garrison aiding and
assisting in seeing the penance duly performed ;
and penalties on all who shall refuse their help.
With ' submission and discretion ' was the punish-

80 ISLE OF MAN
ment suffered ; but the Bishop's prophecy of ' utter
destruction ' is not fulfilled.
The Rev. T. E. Brown never penned anything
more audacious, tender, and true than this vision
of Heaven, with which the subject may fittingly
end:None spake when Wilson stood before
The throne, —
And He that sat thereon
Spake not ; and all the presence floor
Burnt deep with blushes, as the angels cast
Their faces downwards. Then at last.
Awe-stricken, he was 'ware
How on the emerald stair
A woman sat, divinely clothed in white.
And at her knees four cherubs bright.
That laid
Their heads within her lap. Then, trembling, he essayed
To speak : — ' Christ's mother, pity me !'
Then answered she : —
' Sir, I am Catherine Kinrade.
Even so — . . .
And from her lips and from her eyes there flowed
A smile that lit all Heaven ; the angels smiled ;
God smiled, if that were smile beneath the state that glowed
Soft purple — and a voice : — ' Be reconciled !'
So to his side the children crept.
And Catherine kissed him and he wept.
Then said a seraph : ' Lo ! he is forgiven.'
And for a space again there was no voice in Heaven.

CHAPTER XIII
THE REVESTMENT
Twenty years after Bishop Wilson's death
Wesley anism began to take root on the island.
It forms the outstanding feature of the reUgious
life of the succeeding century. John Wesley
braced his adherents by a personal visit in 1777,
and again in 1781, when the preacher was in his
seventy-ninth year. (Reference to these visits are
contained in Wesley's ' Journal,' of which a com
plete edition is now in preparation by the Rev. N.
Curnock.) Christianity was no longer associated with ecclesi
astical discipline and the crypt of St. Germain's
Cathedral, and it prospered amazingly as a conse
quence. Bishop Richmond bitterly assaUed ' the
new Society '; but forbearance, even to generous re
cognition, prevaUed during the greater part of the
nineteenth century, when members of a household
might be found at church in the morning and at
chapel in the evening, without seriously imperil-
81 11

82 ISLE OF MAN
ling their eternal welfare. If no such cathoUcity
has been everywhere maintained, Methodism gener
ally must bear its share of reproof for this mis
fortune. With the tenth Earl of Derby the direct line
failed, and the sovereignty passed to James
Murray, second Duke of Athole, as descended
from Amelia Sophia Stanley, the third daughter
of James, seventh Earl of Derby,
In 1765 the British Government, with a view of
curtailing smuggling from the island into Great
Britain, entered into a compact with John, the
third Duke of Athole, and Charlotte his wife (the
succession was through the latter as Baroness
Strange), by which, in consideration of the payment
of £46,000 for the island, £24,000 for the Customs,
and an annuity of £l,740, the Duke and Duchess
relinquished aU their rights of sovereignty.
By statute, 5 George III., c. 26, known among
us as ' The Revestment Act,' the island was re
vested inalienably on the King of England and his
successors ; and on July 11, 1765, the Manx flag was
ceremoniously hauled down, without anyone having
any proper notion of what flag was to be hoisted in
its stead !
All that liad occurred was this : the regalities

THE REVESTMENT 83
of the Atholes reverted to King George. The
King of England had one more title. The change
of Sovereign had in no way destroyed or varied by
a hair 's-breadth the constitutional independence of
the island.
Our Attorney-General (Mr. G. A. Ring), in an
article in the Law Magazine, 1902 — which, together
with the companion article appearing in 1905, no
student of our law and history dare neglect — in the
elucidation of this point, has reminded us that in
1763 the enactment was made ' by the most Noble
and Puissant Prince James Duke of AthoU, Lord
Strange, Lord of Mann and the Isles, etc., with the
advice and consent of the Governor, Council, Deem
sters, and Keys of the said Isle,' etc.; while in
1776 we get the following : ' We, therefore, the
Lieutenant-Governor, Council, and Keys of the
Isle of Man in Tynwald assembled, do, with the
permission of the King's most excellent Majesty,
ordain and enact,' etc.
The Act of Revestment remains a great turning-
point in our island story, and it roughly marks a
great upward movement in the comfort and]weU-
being of the community. Practically no reliable
testimony regarding the social conditions of the
island is of earlier date than the sixteenth century.
11—2

84 ISLE OF MAN
Bishop Meryck in 1577 found the larger farmers
very much like those of similar station in Lanca
shire. ' The poor were honourably poor and averse
to begging from door to door.' Blundell, a
member of the well-known Lancashire family,
declared the native Manx of much possessions to
be 'gentle, courteous and affable,' and not dis
tinguishable from those of his own county in
' countenance, carriage, apparel, diet, or house
keeping.' Of the farming folk he had no such
praise. They were ' tall and big, slow-witted, surly,
grasping, and penurious, and as austere and strict
in their religious observances as abstemious in their
living.' But Blundell came of a suspected class.
In the eighteenth century we were found to be
jovial and sociable, 'much inclined to music, very
loving among ourselves, good-natured, but choleric'
We had attained great skill in the use of the bow
and arrow, and dancing was our diversion. Wesley's
tribute was : ' A more loving, simple-hearted people
I never saw.'
But perhaps the best picture of the old-time
Manxman — a picture not very wide of the mark
even to this hour — was that given by a parson who
attained the rank of Vicar-General of his native
isle. He described his fellow - countrymen as

THE REVESTMENT 85
' orderly, religious, and industrious, patient and
persevering ; anxiously careful in gathering riches,
which they know well how to take care of when
got ; not prone to quarrelling, nor revengeful but
by the law, to which they are more addicted than
any other people I ever knew ; not given to theft ;
very cheerful over a glass, of which they are very
fond ; great lovers of music and dancing.'
The conclusion of the island story is told in a
few words. We were not done with the Atholes
by the Act of Revestment. In 1793 the fourth
Duke was made Governor. From 1804 he made
his home at Castle Mona, now an hotel on the sea-
front at Douglas. He pressed certain manorial
rights and claims to tithe ; argued that his pre
decessors had made a bad bargain, and that he
should have something more ; and generally made
himself disagreeable. The dispute lasted tiU 1830.
The British Government put an end to all
further haggling with the Scotsman by a payment
of £417,114 — a heavy price admittedly, but it has
proved a better bargain and a sounder investment
than at the time was deemed possible.

CHAPTER XIV
RECENT HISTORY
Of recent history the most conspicuous incidents
have been the establishment of the House of Keys
on an elective basis, in lieu of the process of self-
election which came into vogue in the confusion at
the Commonwealth ; and a financial adjustment
with the Imperial Treasury, by which the island,
for an annual payment of £10,000, has control of
its surplus revenues.
Thus, after a lapse of four centuries and a half,
a certain semblance of constitutional government
has been restored to us, and the Stanley- Athole
regime in many ways obliterated. And at a time
when in England the House of Commons, as the
elective chamber, is claiming sole control of finance,
we have in the House of Keys an elective chamber
that has not even attained the power of financial
initiation. In our so-caUed ' land of Home Rule '
the man who pays the piper does not call the tune.
Yet in 1874, when Governor Loch was disposed
86

RECENT HISTORY 87
to treat that most ancient symbol of our freedom,
the Open-Air Parliament, as a mere idle ceremony
that had long since outlived its day, he received a
lesson under circumstances of which any Manxman
has a right to feel proud.
His Excellency wished to push through a
measure taxing fishing-boats for harbour accom
modation. The accommodation was not provided,
and the fishermen at Peel had a shrewd suspicion
that the money so collected would disappear in
promenades and other showy schemes in Douglas.
In a body they rose, and from widely-separated
points — Peel, Ramsey, Port St. Mary, Port Erin
— they marched to Tynwald HiU on the day (Mid
summer Day by the old calendar) on which, by
immemorial usage, they were empowered to make
known their dissent to an offensive measure.
Governor Loch foresaw the danger in which he
might be placed, and assembled on the spot the
infantry from Castletown. The men at his com
mand were armed with ball-cartridge. Law and
order were to be maintained by establishing terror.
Never was the proud institution of free men so
degraded. The soldiers, however, in mere numbers
made a sorry show in the face of a body of fisher
men numbering 2,400, empty-handed it is true.

88 ISLE OF MAN
but every one a man fresh from the sea, strong,
brave, and resolute.
The strategy of the undisciplined force was
admirable. Three men were told off to every rifle,
and 500 men barred the return route of the Governor
if the contest were pushed to the extreme.
Not till the men had assembled at the ancient
mound did the Governor realize that, arrived there,
he was no better than a rat in a trap if he ignored
the inalienable right of the Manxmen to be heard
in Open Parliament and to refuse their sanction.
His Excellency wisely and promptly grasped the
situation, and ignored the foolish counsel by which
he had been hitherto misguided. The harbour
dues were dropped and a deputation was sent by
him to negotiate the peace. Thereafter Governor
Loch was the friend rather than the foe of the
fishermen. Who, in the face of such an incident,
can say Tynwald is obsolete or that our institutions
are vain ceremonies ?
The loss to the people of the mountain lands for
grazing, quarrying, and cutting turf, belongs to the
early sixties, before the people were invested with
any constitutional power of resistmg the armed
force brought up to effect their submission. It is
a sorry story.

PEEL BAY AND CASTLE

CHAPTER XV
MARRIAGE LAW
' Breast law,' or the law of custom, of which the
oracles were the Deemsters with ' the xxuij ' (some
times described as ' viij of the Out Isles and xvj of
the Land of Mann '), guided all justice in the Isle
of Man in early times and down to the fifteenth
century. When Sir John Stanley, the son of him to whom
the first grant was made, came to the island, he
asked for enlightenment. Nothing having been
recorded ' since King Orryes Days,' to the
Deemsters and the Keys he set the task of
putting down in writing usages of hoary antiquity.
In 1419 we find the Deemsters, 'by the Advice
and CounceU of xxiiij of the Ijaxid,' giving for law a
strange medley of judgments and general principles
of law. Deemsters and Keys, therefore, were law
makers and law-givers. Sometimes the Lord him
self tried his prentice hand at legislation.
For the better administration of justice. Sir John
89 12

90 ISLE OF MAN
Stanley also directed that on all doubtful points
the decision ' be always registred upp, and laid in
my Treasurie, that it may be ready when such a
Chance falleth, that one Doome or Judgment be
(not) given at one Time, one Way, and another
Tyme contrary.'
In the passage of centuries statute law has
absorbed rather than varied the law of custom,
until at the present time usage is a means of inter
pretation rather than a law itself.
A husband is liable for debts contracted by his
wife before marriage, and also after marriage,
where it can be shown that the indebtedness has
been contracted by her m his name, and with his
knowledge or authority, express or implied.
A widow is entitled by right (after the payment
of his debts) to half the personalty of her dead
spouse absolutely, and a Ufe interest to the extent
of one-half of his real estate. Under the old law
this was limited — so long as she remained a widow
and chaste. The respective rights of husband and
wife are now covered by the statute of 1852, which
repeals previous Acts ' on the subject, and is the
existing law.'
If the will of her deceased husband varies her
' widow-right,' she is put to her election, and may

MARRIAGE LAW 91
choose to stand either by what the law gives her by
right of dower or by what her husband desired that
she should have. A second wife takes a fourth.
After the discharge of her husband's debts, there
fore, a widow has a right which nothing but her
own act can destroy.
On the other hand, a woman engaged to marry
cannot by any deed aUenate her possessions
(whether in Man or, as we say, ' beyond the seas,'
meaning England or elsewhere) from her husband's
control during their joint lives, or his life, if he
survives her. The law seems to refuse to believe
that the marriage tie could exist if it were to create
or permit two heads to one household ; and the
effect in law is to merge the personality of the wife
in the husband during marriage, and to give him
an absolute right to her personal estate and, in case
he survives her, a life interest in her realty, termed
' a tenancy by the courtesy.'
A trust, corresponding to the marriage settlement
in England, may be made, but it must have the
assent of the intended or actual husband, as the
case may be, and any deed without such assent
would be nuU and void.
An Englishwoman marrying a Manxman — or
Enghshman domiciled in the Isle of Man — forfeits
12—2

92 ISLE OF MAN
her rights of dower by English law in England, the
nationality of the husband prevailing. Merely by
residence out of the Isle of Man a Manxman
does not relinquish his nationality, unless, having
neither home, nor property, nor expectation here,
the abode abroad is of such a character as to
constitute a domicile in the country of actual
residence. Neither does mere residence in the
Isle of Man for the summer months, or even
the taking of a permanent house, constitute on
the part of a foreigner a domicUe here, unless
no other home exists, and the circumstances
show that a fixed domicile in our island has been
intended. A woman on marriage to a Manxman has no
further control of her own real or personal estate,
unless settled by deed before or after marriage.
But the husband has been under varying limita
tions. Unless the wife remained Avith her husband
for a year and a day, the husband had, by an old
Act, no interest in his wife's real estate. This law
is now probably obsolete.
Of a wife's real estate the husband has no powers
of disposal, but of her personal estate it vests on
marriage in the husband, uiUess it is settled by deed
for her separate use ; and it is immaterial where the

MARRIAGE LAW 93
personal estate may be, whether in the island or
out of the island.
Another very material point may be thus ex
pressed : There is no doubt that a husband can, by
mortgaging his own lands and contracting debts,
on death practically dispossess his wife of her
widow-right in his real and personal estate. But — •
and it is a very large 'but' — in actual experience
no one wiU wisely lend money without the wife's
signature to a deed of mortgage. As a mortgage
deed contains a personal covenant by the husband
for the principal and interest if the land proves
insufficient, it is presumed that his personal estate
is liable for any deficiency.
The law endeavours to be fair : creditors must
be satisfied before the widow takes her share.
Except, therefore, under circumstances of practical
bankruptcy, a widow cannot in the Isle of Man
find herself portionless, as she might in England.
The position of a married woman in the Isle of
Man is simUar to that of a married woman in
England prior to the passing of the Married
Woman's Property Act, save that her interests in
Man are safeguarded to an extent of which her
sister in England has not dreamed.
Certain of the old laws are curious and inter-

94 ISLE OF MAN
esting. For instance, a woman taken by constraint
could, if she were a wife, caU down upon the offender
the vengeance of the law ; but if she were a single
woman 'the Deemster shall give her a Rope, a
Sword, and a Ring; and then shall she have her
choice to hang him with the Rope, cut off his
Head with the Sword, or marry him vvdth the
Ring.' The Church had its own special discipline, and
used the rite of marriage without remorse to enforce
its will, glorify its prestige, and add to its exchequer.
The Church in Man was by no means unique in
this assumption of priestly prerogative, but nowhere
was its wUl imposed with greater vigour or less
stubbornly resisted. Those who anticipated the
invocation of the blessing were required to stand
in a white sheet at the church door on three con
secutive Sundays as an act of penance, ' and if
they marry, that they go from the Sheet to the
Ring.' They had ' to perform these censures and satisfy
the law' before admission to Holy Communion.
Seeming virtue was made easy to the hypocrite.
Thus was the most sacred rite of the Church
degraded. The payments were : to the minister
threepence for writing a certificate of each day's

MARRIAGE LAW 95
penance, twopence to the sumner, and fourpence
for the sheet ; and ' no appeal from the Church.'
The Magdalen oftentimes performed her penance
with a light heart, and like a true recalcitrant
daughter of Eve, vied with her fellow under censure,
not in the depth of her sorrow, but in providing
herself with a sheet of purer Unen, white, and
without spot or blemish, hole or frayed edge !
In 1594 the Deemsters and the xxiiij Keys gave
for law a custom of immemorial usage on the
island. It exists to this day, and provides that
when parents of a child marry within ' a year or
two,' such child shall be legitimate, provided the
mother has been ' never slandered or defamed with
any other man before.'
This merciful law, which has, I venture to
believe, the sanction of all men free of priestly
taint and ultra pious zeal, has shielded from cruel
slander many of those whom we, in all charity, caU
'love children.'
One attempt has been initiated in the Council
of our Legislature to repeal this law ; and substitute
for it the cruel distinction of ' a stranger in blood,'
as adopted in England, ' Holy ' Russia, Brunswick,
and two cantons of Switzerland. In Scotland,
where much of the Roman and Pontifical doctrines

96 ISLE OF MAN
of marriage and legitimacy have been adopted, the
law regarding the relation of the sexes is often far
in advance of English intelligence. But in Scotland,
where the sins of the father are visited upon his
innocent offspring, one must remember that there
are absolutely no impediments in the way of those
qualified and willing to incur the marriage tie.
The reasons given to us for the suggested change
were curious and remarkable : first, that the law as
it stood was an incentive to immorality ; and second,
that it was incapable of strict definition.
Surely no law was ever threatened for such
oddities in reasoning. The term ' a year or two '
is to be interpreted in the sense of the men who
used it, with the further knowledge that they were
only recording a customary law even at that time.
They did not mean to put any hard-and-fast limit
of one year, or of two years, from the time the
parents came together ; they used a loose phrase to
mean what it still means — several years, if need be —
the one object being, not to promote immorality, as
suggested, but to offer every inducement to bring
parents together in regular marriage, with as Uttle
delay as under the particular circumstances of each
case was found reasonably possible, and remove all
stigma from innocent offspring.

THE TYNWALD OR COURT HILL

MARRIAGE LAW 97
Happily the Keys realized the sacred trust of the
ages and held to the ancient law. Inspired by the
example of Norway, whence this law came to us,
and jealous of canon law being engrafted upon our
jurisprudence, they repUed in the proud manner of
the EngUsh barons assembled at Merton : ' We
wUl not consent to change the laws of Mona
hitherto used and approved.'
Among the people themselves there was an old-
fashioned impression that all ' love children ' who
could be gathered, at the ceremony of marriage,
beneath their mother's ample skirt were thus
legitimatized. But so far from the peasant idea
obtaining any legal sanction, the courts have
extended, most unwillingly, the maximum of two
years from the birth, not the begetting, but refused
to go farther.
' Divorcement ' came within the purview of the
old spiritual courts ; but whatever the practice of
these tribunals, we have no recorded law bearing on
the subject. Further, the whole spirit of the statute
law is not merely to make divorce difficult, as in
England, but to remove the temptation on either
side to desire it. A special Act of Tynwald is
required for every divorce.
The Ecclesiastical Courts of the island had
13

98 ISLE OF MAN
jurisdiction to grant separations, a mensa et thoro
(styled a judicial separation), on the ground of
infidelity, or to decree restitution of conjugal rights
in cases of desertion. The former proceeding was
necessary in order to obtain an Act of Tynwald
annulling the marriage.
The ecclesiastical jurisdiction no longer exists,
and is now by the Judicature Act of 1884 trans
ferred to the Chancery Division of the High Court,
which follows, generally speaking, the old pro
cedure. The merest shadow of the old spiritual
courts alone remains, taking cognizance of nothing
save purely Church affairs, faculties, etc., with one
somewhat curious exception, affiliation coming
within the purview of the Vicar-General.
By a recent Act, called the Married Woman's
Protection Act, magistrates in petty session can
grant a separation order on the ground of desertion
and cruelty, and award maintenance to a wife,
similar to the analogous Act in England.
But, speaking generally, separations are granted
with such a measure of grave hesitation as would
commend itself to Lord Gorell, Avho rightly sees in
them a profound and perhaps lifelong injustice to
the innocent party. No wonder, therefore, that
separation by what is facetiously called ' mutual

MARRIAGE LAW 99
consent' (though one party may be entirely
unwiUing), such as the Divorce Law Reform
Association show to be sapping the foundations of
family life in England, has no existence in the
Isle of Man, and if entered into, either party could
destroy it — first because it never had any legal
existence, a married woman not being qualified
to sign such a deed; and secondly, because such a
deed is against the laws of morality and public
interest. In other words, the marriage law of the Isle of
Man, for which we have in a measure to thank our
Viking conquerors, holds out every inducement to
married people to remain together ; and the Council
wisely resisted a recent effort on the part of the
Keys to introduce into Man a measure correspond
ing to the Married Woman's Property Act of
England — admittedly a clumsy effort to remedy an
acknowledged grievance — on the ground that the
law of the island already gives a wife rights which
outweigh the wife's rights under that Act, without
the temptation to a wife of private fortune to
break away for no ascertainable cause, or at her
own whim and caprice, giving her husband no
right to a final release in divorce, such as obtains
in Scotland after four year's absence, 13—2

100 ISLE OF MAN
The Legislature has not always proved sufficiently
strong to resist ecclesiastical interference in the
administration of simple justice in the relation of
the ^exes ; but it has held tenaciously to its firm
principle to forgive an offence which marriage can
atone, to draw into matrimony those whom love
or passion has already united, to obliterate all
shadow of taint from the chUdren of irregular
unions, and to hold the marriage contract sacred,
against lawyer or priest, where doubt has crept in,
by refusing to hear any plea that would besmirch
the fair fame of the dead, and nullify a union
already terminated by the death of one partner.

CHAPTER XVI
MR, Gladstone's visit
On Tuesday afternoon, October 1, 1878, a private
telegram was received in Douglas, saying that
Mr. Gladstone, accompanied by his son, the Rev.
Stephen Edward Gladstone, was that day one of
the passengers of the steamer King Orry.
The message, which was unconfirmed by any
other agency, had been handed in at Southport, in
Lancashire, about fifteen mUes from the point of
embarkation. There was on the part of some
persons, therefore, a certain disposition to treat the
matter as a rather silly hoax ; but there were others
who, Manxman-like, saw not only truth in the
legend, but a dark and sinister motive in the advent
of so distinguished a stranger. What could that
motive be ?
Liverpool Churchmen languishing for funds,
despite long periods of unexampled prosperity, for
their pet scheme of a bishopric independent of
Chester, had not scrupled to foUow the example of
101

102 ISLE OF MAN
Carlisle, and advocate the confiscation of the in
come of the diocesan head of Sodor and Man. It
did not seem to concern these good people that
what they caUed ' an amalgamation ' was to Manx
eyes nothing better than barefaced robbery.
The connection of Manchester with the Isle of
Man is even closer and more widespread, and the
people of that city could have suggested, with no
greater lack of reason, a like plan of incorporation.
All that the advocates of the scheme could say was
that Liverpool was the principal port of arrival and
departure for passengers passing to and from the
Isle of Man.
They might have laid claim, with equal honesty
and specious plea of good intent, to the funds of
any like establishment in New York, Boston, or
Philadelphia. Mr. Gladstone, however, was at that moment
the very last man in England to whom the
Government of the day would have entrusted any
such delicate commission as that of which he was
suspected. Overwise Englishmen may laugh at
the Manxman for his conceit in supposing that in
a year of great European unrest — ' a tumultuous
year,' to borrow a term from Lord Morley's
biography — when war with Russia was once more

MR. GLADSTONE'S VISIT 103
hanging in the balance, the British Government
should be planning so startling a coup — ^the
annexation of the Isle of Man ! But surely they
forget their own history.
Did not the King's Ministers busy themselves
with appalling zeal over all the absurd details of the
Customs tariff of our little island kingdom, and
determine on the acquisition of the rights of
sovereignty of the Duke of Athole, at a time when
they were, by their fatuous acts, paving the way
for the loss of half an entire continent ? No
kingdom was too small to obtain consideration,
no continent too large to escape intelligent
appreciation. Mr. Gladstone soon relieved public feeling on
the island. The European crisis had reached a
phase at which silence was golden, and his visit to
the Isle of Man had no other purpose than that of
passing a few days in quiet, so far as the larger
affairs of the nation were concerned, amid varied
and charming scenery, and in a bracing climate
which could be reached by a short sea-voyage, his
favourite mode of travel.
The Southport telegram was the work of an
overzealous but well-informed admirer, who was
anxious that Mr, Gladstone, now within nine or

104 ISLE OF MAN
ten weeks of his seventieth year, and the virtual
leader of his party, should receive a fitting
welcome on our island. Its effect was to give
the visit a character different from that which
Mr. Gladstone himself had intended or desired.
And now, looking back through the vista of thirty
odd years, the trite observation obtrudes itself —
what extraordinary developments may hang upon
the trifling incident of a holiday at the sea-side !
Mr. Gladstone was a former Prime Minister of
England, and an old servant of the Crown. He
had a few years before yielded up the leadership of
his party to a younger man. From his retreat at
Hawarden there had issued ' The Vatican Decrees,'
a publication which brought about the head of the
author a veritable storm of vituperation. The
storm had abated. Now it was the foreign poUcy
of the Government, frightening to a sagacious
member of the Cabinet like Lord Derby, which
had brought Mr. Gladstone once more into the
arena of party warfare. The windows of his
London home had been smashed by the mob for
his pains.
It was not humanly possible for a political
gladiator, whose opinions had given rise to such
outbursts of popular fury, and in whose personality

MR. GLADSTONE'S VISIT 105
so much interest was centred, to visit our shores
without attracting notice ; but is it too much to
say that the faUure of that Southport telegram
might have altered the whole course of English
pohtics from that time to the present ? Let
us see.
Mr. Gladstone might have come to the Isle of
Man, and spent a delightfully invigorating week,
walking over hiUs and chatting with farming folk,
and have returned without any intimate knowledge
of the history or traditions of the island. More
important stUl, his imagination might never have
been quickened by intimate contact with the
leaders of a people to whom self-government is a
natural inheritance, despite the shadowy semblance
of the thing which is all we enjoy down to this
hour — to our sorrow, if not also to our disgrace.
As it was, every facihty was afforded him of
observing the life of the people and the picturesque
country in their possession, of learning every
revered tradition, and acquainting himself with
every treasured relic of the past. He left, after
rather less than one week's stay on the island,
' knowing more,' as I am told by one who had
special opportunities of judging by his conversa
tion, of the old customs and legends, and of every-
14

106 ISLE OF MAN
thing connected with the working of our form of
Home Rule, ' than the oldest inhabitant.'
Mr. Gladstone passed on board the King Orry at
the Liverpool landing-stage without attracting any
public notice, but he had not travelled far before
the keen glance of the sailors assured him that, as
he remarked to his son, ' We shall be found out
ultimately.' And it was so. On reaching Douglas
a large body of people had gathered to bid the
distinguished visitor a respectful welcome. Cheers
were raised as soon as Mr. Gladstone was identified,
dressed in the bottle-green cut-away coat which
was destined to form part and parcel of his fame.
From the steps of the Peveril Hotel he was
induced to address a few words of thanks to the
people. ' It is no small pleasure to me, though
late in life, to pay this, my first, ^asit to your
beautiful island.' And then, noting the harbour,
pier, and promenade buUdings in course of con
struction, which were the feature of Governor
Loch's regime, Mr. Gladstone added a word of
gratification at observing such ' evidences of public
spirit and progress.'
Mr. Gladstone was not on the island more than
an hour when a telegram reached him as he sat at
tea in the coffee room. The telegram was from

MR. GLADSTONE'S VISIT 107
the Governor. His ExceUency tendered the
hospitaUty of Government House to both visitors.
Mr. Gladstone, however, declined the invitation, on
the ground that he desired his visit to be kept as
'private as possible,' and that his arrangements at
the Peveril ' could not very well be interfered with.'
Colonel Paul, the chief of poUce, next brought a
special message from Government House, and Mr.
Gladstone was induced to so far depart from his
plans as to accept an invitation to meet certain
leading residents at dinner on Thursday, and sleep
the night there.
Visitors poured into the hotel on the evening of
arrival, and Mr. Gladstone was in such high spirits
that he resented no intrusion. On no more formal
introduction than a visiting-card, many residents
had an opportunity of a talk. No one was turned
away ; everyone was received freely and frankly.
But not every caUer was quick enough to perceive
that in 'interviewing' Mr. Gladstone the plain
truth was that, in the result, Mr. Gladstone had
interviewed him.
Mr. WilUam Dalrymple, a member of the House
of Keys, became sponsor to a deputation with the
request that Mr. Gladstone should assent to a
formal address of welcome. Making the condition
14—2

108 ISLE OF MAN
that the address should be politically colourless, and
bear no reference to the eternal Eastern Question,
Mr. Gladstone agreed to receive the formal
welcome shortly before setting out for the
Governor's dinner-party.
Strenuous at work or play, Mr. Gladstone was
up betimes on Wednesday morning, and left by
train, in the company of the Lieutenant-Governor,
for Castletown. Here the party was met by Sir
.James Gell, for many years Attorney-General, after
wards Clerk of the Rolls, and for a speU Acting
Governor, Mr. J. M. Jeffcott, H. B., and others.
Mr. Gladstone first paid a visit to King WUliam's
College, rendered familiar to many generations of
schoolboys through the pages of 'Eric' Dean
Farrar, the author, was a former pupil, and his
name appears in several ' Honours Lists ' of the
early fifties ; in that of 1854 alongside that of our
great poet, the Rev. T. E. Brown.
After the usual outburst of hearty cheers from
the boys assembled in the big schoolroom, Mr.
Gladstone ascended the vice-principal's desk. The
Rev. Canon Kewley, now Vicar of Arbory, but
then only a schoolboy, seized the opportunity of
recording in shorthand the almost unreported
speech of the distinguished visitor.

MR. GLADSTONE'S VISIT 109
' I have prepared no homily or discourse on
which to engage your attention,' said Mr. Gladstone,
by way of relieving the tension and alarm, ' but
Dr. Jones, with pleasing and generous instinct, has
suggested to me that you will expect a lecture
on Homer. The theme, the place, and the
surrounding circumstances may be suitable, but
though I welcome the suggestion no less than the
cordiality of your approval, as an unmistakable
evidence of appreciation of the great poet, I feel I
cannot do more on an occasion like this than make
you this offer : that I will endeavour to answer any
question that you may care to put forward ; other
wise I should not know when to leave offi
' Meanwhile, let me say that it has been a source
of great pleasure to me to hear such good accounts
of King William's College. I have long since
realized that the main cause of success in schools is
to be found in the teachers, and that the mainspring
of the teacher's varied activities lies in the mind
and heart of the head-master. The whole aspect
of education has changed since the days of my
youth, and the teacher's requirements, in all their
wider scope and variety, have extended with the
higher standard of education to be found among
the whole community. And remembering that, I
would ask you boys to bear in mind that it lies in
every one of you, by leading a life of wiUing
dUigence, to be a help to your masters, to cheer
them in their labours, and sweeten their lives.

110 ISLE OF MAN
' Avail yourself of your present advantages ; let
not opportunity slip through your hands ; give to
every hour that devotion and self-absorption which
shall produce the fruit of an enduring character.
Cricket, football, and other games require no
advocate. Let the same be said of your books.
Give to your indoor work the same earnest effort
you give to your play. Be resolute and manly in
all that God has set you to do. And, finaUy, as
one closing on the allotted span of human Ufe, as
one who has been a witness of different activities
of the world of affairs, let me exhort you on the
threshold of life, with your careers stiU unformed,
to remember that the principles of courage, duty,
and perseverance are among the highest requisites
of mankind.
' I wish King William's College a long con
tinuance of prosperity, and I pray that God wiU
grant to each of you the blessing of a life of useful
ness, health, and happiness.'
The boys formed a line on each side of the road
way, down which Mr. Gladstone passed amid
ringing cheers. The cordial send-off was not
unnatural : the unexpected visit had secured for
them an extra half-holiday, in which, presumably,
they were to digest the essence of the homily —
diligent study.
Thereafter Mr. Gladstone made a tour of the

MR. GLADSTONE'S VISIT 111
sombre apartments of Castle Rushen, and then
inspected the caves on the rugged coast. He
lunched vnth Sir James and Lady Gell at The
Green, Castletown, meeting, at a rather hasty
repast, only the members of the Attorney- General's
own family, including Mr. .James Stowell Gell, now
High Bailiff of Douglas and Castletown, Mr. Hugh
StoweU Gell (who died in 1898, leaving many
sweet memories among his friends), and, I think,
the present Archdeacon GiU — a mere difference in
the speUing of a surname does not on the Isle of
Man necessarily indicate a separate family.

CHAPTER XVII
MR, GLADSTONE AT PORT ERIN AND PEEL
Mr, Gladstone and his son proceeded by an
afternoon train to Port Erin. They stayed that
night at the Falcon's Nest Hotel, where a rather
amusing incident occurred the following morning.
The visitors ordered breakfast early, that a friend
might be seen off by the steamer train.
Mr. Gladstone had not swallowed more than one
cup of tea when he saw by the clock that he must
hasten to the station. But he was not to be
cheated out of his meal on that account. He laid
aside the silver teapot in a corner of the hearth, and
hurried away.
The waiter was surprised at the sudden dis
appearance of a guest, and his suspicions were
aroused. When he saw that the sUver teapot, too,
had gone (though we have no pawnshops at which
to dispose of stolen goods), his worst fears were
confirmed. With all speed he rushed down to the
proprietor's office. 112

. ...^ ...... _ .'¦V «*^***- .*, «i»'>-.^r ^

DHOON GLEN

MR. GLADSTONE AT PORT ERIN AND PEEL 113
Mr. Trustrum was too amused to spoil so good a
joke. ' Whose loss is this ?' he asked with as much
severity of countenance as he could assume.
' But, bless me, how could I tell the gentlemanly-
looking old chap was going to sneak a potful of
hot tea ?'
Ere long Mr. Gladstone returned, and quietly
sauntering to the fireplace, picked up the teapot
and resumed his meal.
The waiter went back to his employer with more
agreeable tidings, and Mr. Trustrum tried his best
to look relieved.
That morning Mr. Gladstone walked over the
mountain road from Port Erin to Peel. This
route may be traversed in the very height of the
season, and, for the most part, a meeting with any
other vehicle, save for the farmer's cart, will be a
most unusual occurrence. Yet this ' Gladstone
Road ' is unequalled in Man.
From the highway views of striking magnificence
may be obtained of land and sea and rocky coast
line. Break away from the direct route, and what
a reward there is at such retreats as Fleshwick
Bay! I have already spoken of the Round Table, but
it would take a whole chapter to describe the un-
15

114 ISLE OF MAN
explored glories of the Niarbyl. This rocky head
land has its own tiny fishing industry. Without
the smallest notion of biology, one's interest is
quickened by the examples of marine Ufe to be
observed in the miniature tarns, or ' dubs,' as we
call them, found in glorious profusion on this coast
on the retreat of the tide.
A story, mythical perhaps, but too good to be
missed, is told of this part of the journey.
Mr. Gladstone was near the viUage of Dalby,
when he observed a woman pitching corn from
a cart to a stack. This is, as anybody who
has attempted the task knows, extremely hard
labour. Mr. Gladstone stood admiring the woman's
strength, and then crossed into the open field.
' My good woman,' he said, ' that is exceedingly
hard work, and you look well and strong : may I
ask how old you are ?'
' 'Deed ! and how ouF is yerself, yer bould,
imperent oul' man ?' was the reply !
Beyond Dalby we come to a sharp bend, the
road making at the same time a sudden dip in
bridging the mouth of the Aalley we call Glen
Meay. At the bottom of the dip we observe
on the right our most famous I\Ianx honey-farm.

MR. GLADSTONE AT PORT ERIN AND PEEL 115
It is not everybody, however, who desires a ' calling
acquaintance ' with bees. We pass.
The Glen itself is one of the show-places of the
island, and if time allows, the visitor will find it
worth his while to pass through the turnstiles.
There is, however, a free and open approach to the
seashore by the narrow roadway that forms a
decline near the cottages on our right hand.
A walk of a quarter of a mUe, past some old
thalthans — a Manx word for abandoned dwellings
of which the ruins alone remain — and we come to
a point where the river flows noisily over obstruct
ing boulders and shingly bed.
Deep and dark pools, where the trout may be
seen darting hither and thither, or lazily enjoying a
sun bath, occur here and there. The unfenced
roadway runs parallel with the stream. Above our
heads the crags rise sheer, in rude majesty and
magnificence. Getting back to the main road, an easy walk of
two or three miles, downhill all the way, and we
are in the market-place of the small but ancient
city of Peel — the city of sunset and shadow,
history and romance.
Mr. Gladstone, hot and dusty, but deUghted
with his long trudge, found Peel in gala attire.
15—2

116 ISLE OF MAN
Bunting was floating in the breeze, and a cordial
welcome awaited him from the townsfolk, at whose
head was Mr. R. J. Moore, the High Bailiff;
Mr. Robert Corrin ; Mr. John Joughin, M.H.K. ;
Mr. Joseph Clucas ; and other prominent citizens.
At the farther end of the quay he proceeded down
a flight of stone steps and got into a boat, from
which the whole party was nearly precipitated by
the overanxious care of one admirer.
The boatmen were James Morrison and WilUam
Cashen, both of whom were destined to attain as
much honourable distinction as the little city
can reaUze. Morrison has been for many years
Harbour-master. Cashen, who has sailed the
stormy sea, has now a peaceful job in port, being
custodian of the old Castle. The visitor may
eagerly embrace an opportunity to hear him talk.
Born of an imaginative race, and cast mto conflict
with the stern forces of Nature, there is in Cashen's
speech the natural gift of poetry. His forehead
towers upwards as none other save Scott's, and the
likeness to the great magician does not end there,
for he is the same inexhaustible mine of folk-lore
and amusing quip.
Tediously long descriptions of the Cathedral and
Castle were listened to by Mr. Gladstone with

MR. GLADSTONE AT PORT ERIN AND PEEL 117
winning courtesy. Only when Paulin, the veteran
guide, who has long since passed to his rest, in
cautiously submitted a faulty translation of a
Latin inscription was Mr. Gladstone tempted to an
interruption. ' He showed most interest, I thought,' says one
of the group to whom I am indebted for various
personal facts of the visit, 'in viewing the rift in
the wall through which, according to tradition,
Fenella of " Peveril of the Peak " was wont to pass
in and out of the Castle.'
The party later met on the green of the Castle
grounds, and the High BaUiff was then enabled to
fire off an address of welcome which had been the
product of much anxious toil in the earlier hours of
that day.
No proper warning could be given to Mr. Glad
stone of the presentation. Therein the conscience
of the High Bailiff was touched.
' Was it right,' he queried, ' to put Mr. Gladstone
in a position of such disadvantage, giving him so
Uttle time to prepare a reply ?'
It was a weighty problem, and on the lips of my
friend the late Mr. Robert Corrin in after-years it
made a highly amusing tale to everyone in the least
degree familiar with Mr. Gladstone's flow of speech.

118 ISLE OF MAN
Hot and fussy and anxious, the High Bailiff at
the first hearing of Mr, Gladstone's coming made
off to the home of Mr. Corrin.
Mr. Corrin was a highly respected citizen of the
old fishing -village. He amassed a large fortune,
chiefly in the manufacture of fishing-nets, for use in
what was then a flourishing industry, and in con
nection with the discovery of the Kinsale fishery,
of which he was a prime factor.
The High Bailiff was all for a public address.
Then, thought Mr. Corrin, Mr. Gladstone might
very well look after himself in finding a few words
of acknowledgment.
The few sentences of which the address con
sisted, inscribed on a single sheet of foolscap, were
the result of that conference. The High Bailiff
recalled the fact that, as Clerk of the House of
Keys, he had in a former year corresponded with
Mr. Gladstone, then Chancellor of the Exchequer,
on the island's fiscal relations with England. He
closed with a whispered intimation that, taking
him in this way unawares, such non-political words
as he found handy were aU that the ancient city of
Peel required of him that day !
Mr. Gladstone's face was a picture of stoical
gravity. He bowed slightly in acknowledgment

MR. GLADSTONE AT PORT ERIN AND PEEL 119
of Mr. Moore's anxious concern ; his reply was
truly typical of the limitless resource of Glad-
stonian eloquence. He paused for no word, he
hesitated for no apt illustration to give colour and
point to his reasoning. There was the ease that
was proper to a comparatively small audience ;
there was the touch of dignity that was the
courteous rejoinder to the formality of his host.
Mr. Gladstone spoke for half an hour, but there
were no shorthand writers present, and the address
is only a memory to a few now living.
Truly this was, they thought, a veritable magician
if only of mere words.
From contemporary notes, I find that Mr. Glad
stone declared that he had formed a very high
opinion of the Manx people, and of the Constitu
tion of the island. He complimented us on the
very proper feelings of pride in which we regard
our independent position as an ancient kingdom.
But of exact words I have found no trace.
A moment later Mr. Gladstone was engaging
Mr. Corrin in less formal conversation.
' I have noticed,' he said, ' that among the
fisher-folk of your island blue eyes seem to pre
dominate.' ' Blue eyes are common in aU communities of

120 ISLE OF MAN
Norse ancestry,' said Mr. Corrin, by way of explana
tion. ' Would you say blue eyes are a distinguishing
trait of the Northmen ?'
Mr. Gladstone in the pursuit of knowledge was
perseverance itself.
' I would rather say that they are a distinguish
ing trait of those who live on the sea or near the
sea, almost regardless of ancestry.'
' I feel sure that is the correct interpretation,'
said Mr. Gladstone.

Naao ssvTovnva

CHAPTER XVIII
MR. GLADSTONE AT DOUGLAS AND RAMSEY
Mr. Gladstone received the promised address of
welcome at Douglas that same evening.
' We have a particular and special reason for
welcoming you to our shores,' said the address.
' We remember with gratitude the ready and
willing service you rendered to the island when, in
the year 1853, certain fiscal regulations, materially
and unjustly affecting our insular revenue, were
sought to be enforced against us. When appealed
to by a deputation from the Legislature of this
island, your sense of justice and public right, the
animating principles of your political career, availed
to protect the Manx people from oppression and
ruin, and your name has, in consequence, been
ever since treasured in our memories.'
Mr. Gladstone's reply contained a repudiation of
the idea that his visit had any political motive.
' The people of the Isle of Man cherish the tradi
tion of Uberty, . . . and you may rely upon it that no
121 16

122 ISLE OF MAN
rational Government or rational party in England
will ever attempt to apply to you constraint or
coercion ' (prolonged cheering). ' Your freedom will
be respected as much as our own ' (cheers).
The words are significant as showing the bent of
Mr. Gladstone's mind in the solution of the Irish
problem long before it had become a pressing
question in Parliament, and, by obstructive tactics,
so serious an impediment to the transaction of aU
other business.
' I beg you believe that your local institutions
are a matter of deep and profound interest to
me. , . . I do not beUeve myself that any institu
tions can be thoroughly or entirely satisfactory
unless they rest upon principles of freedom. There
are times in the life of nations when the human
inteUigence has been so little developed that a
despotic Government can be regarded without
dissatisfaction. But here we have inlierited fr-om
ancient times the principles of freedom ' (cheers).
' We camiot abandon them. They are at the root
of aU our ideas and all our affections. . , . The
throne itself has its paramount place in our hearts,
because it is connected with all our associations of
freedom. It does not bring to us recoUections of
power exercised with violence and against the wUl
of the people. Here, also, you have institutions of
antiquity.'

MR. GLADSTONE AT DOUGLAS AND RAMSEY 123
And then, by way of prophetic anticipation of
a speech on Dublin Castle rule many years later,
he said :
' There is no greater danger to a country than to
have its political force incorporated in one single
organ, working from the centre. It is an immense
danger.' The meeting at the beginning included persons
who were critical almost to chilliness. I cannot
think that a speaker of Mr. Gladstone's experience
and keen sensibility was for many moments uncon
scious of a strong divergent element. It was here
in force.
Nothing ever aroused Mr. Gladstone's anger like
querulous opposition, and his tongue was capable
of scathing rebuke, which could leave a noisy
opponent crushed, if not convinced. A few years
before, there was the memorable instance on the
hustings at Liverpool, where, in the election for
South- West Lancashire, he did not hesitate to
humble to the very dust a local brewer who was
acting as ringleader to a senseless and persistent
interruption. That voice, so far as public affairs
were concerned, was silenced for ever.
Mr. Gladstone's attitude in the Isle of Man was
throughout a revelation of the more concUiatory
16—2

124 ISLE OF MAN
side of his nature. On this occasion it was the
height of courtesy to those friends who had planned
the public greeting, and the incident, which, as an
islander, I regret for its studied inhospitality, if
not positive indelicacy, is worthy of recaU now
only because it serves to reveal to a later age
one aspect of the many-sided explanation of that
remarkable magnetic grip — a grip intensified rather
than weakened by the passage of time — which
Mr. Gladstone possessed over a large mass of his
feUow-countrymen. Douglas, it should be remembered, is wholly
given over to the business of catering for visitors.
There are many hotels at which visitors lodge, and
still more Ucensed victuallers on whose premises
visitors do not lodge. Mr. Gladstone's record in
England towards the industry of the pubUcan of
either grade was regarded as bad. What better
opportunity could be provided by a merciful
Providence for showing sympathy with coUeagues
in England than by turning the public welcome of
the island into ridicule and contempt ? Besides,
Mr. Gladstone's injunction to avoid political bias
was not strictly maintained.
There are on the island still those who can testify
to the wholly indefensible campaign of that evening.

MR. GLADSTONE AT DOUGLAS AND RAMSEY 125
It was an opposition animated with but one object
— that of converting the proceedings into a bear
garden. The ringleader was to give the sign, and
then the bellowing, catcalling, and all the rest of
the humiliating insult, was to begin in earnest.
An appearance of fair dealing was to be preserved;
Mr. Gladstone was not to be interrupted by irrelevant
questioning until the moment he had reached the
substance of his discourse. Therein the opposition
committed itself to one fatal error : they took no
count of the subtlety of Mr. Gladstone's mind and
speech. Mr. Gladstone never got beyond the Isle of
Man. It was all Isle of Man — an island fair and
beautiful, and endeared to our eyes by a thousand
memories ; a Government whose aloofness and
independence we must, despite its shortcomings,
jealously guard against encroachment from that
great nation that had grown up across a narrow
stretch of sea.
What Manxman could cavil at sentiments like
these ? An opposition that was dumb became
appreciative, and soon broke out in unmeasured
applause !
Truly they who had come to damn had remained
to bless.

126 ISLE OF MAN
An inconspicuous incident admittedly, but I
trust I am not straining the perspective unduly
when I rank it as great a triumph of skilful speech
as Mr. Gladstone ever attained in his long life on
the floor of the House of Commons. And it does
not detract from its significance because Mr. Glad
stone was addressing an audience so widely separated
from him in mind, outlook, and occupation.
Thereafter Mr. Gladstone addressed a large
crowd gathered outside the hotel. Later in the
evening he met, according to arrangement, certain
distinguished visitors at dinner at Government
House. Regarding the incidents of that evening, and of
the visit generally, I am told that Mr. Gladstone's
visit produced a good deal of apprehension among
his friends on the island.
' Everybody was afraid of it, as Mr. Gladstone
was not popular on the island. But he won over
everyone with whom he came into personal contact,
and everyone who heard him speak in praise of the
island, the people, and its ancient Government.
' In the north of the island, where it was thought
he would have a cold reception, he made an
excellent speech. They took the horses out of the
carriage, and were most enthusiastic.

MR. GLADSTONE AT DOUGLAS AND RAMSEY 127
' Mr. Gladstone made some inquiry about
Onchan Church. He proposed to attend twice.
' " I am afraid, Mr. Gladstone," said my informant,
" we must rather apologize beforehand for the
sermons to which you must submit. You must
be famUiar to words of inspiration from the most
eloquent lips,"
' Mr. Gladstone's reply was characteristic.
' " No earnest preacher," he said, " stands in need
of excuse or apology. I have never heard a sermon
in my long life without deriving some good from it." '
On Friday afternoon Mr. Gladstone, accom
panied by the Governor, drove to Laxey by a
route along the sea-coast. From Laxey, Mr.
Gladstone and his son started out on foot for
Ramsey ; but they had barely passed the Hibernian
Inn at Kirk Maughold, when they were met by a
carriage belonging to Dr. Clucas, sent on by
Mr. Arthur KayU, a member of the House of
Keys for one of the northern sheadings.
Ramsey was at this moment suffering bitterly
from the fall of the City of Glasgow Bank, of
which the Bank of Mona was a branch. Mr. Hardy
Summers, then editor of the Isle of Man Telegraph,
who was the moving factor in the visit, tells me
how, hearing of the advent of the ex-Premier, he

128 ISLE OF MAN
made off late at night to Milntown to interrogate
the member for Ramsey, the Rev. William Bell
Christian. ' I am a Liberal in Imperial politics,' said Mr.
Christian, ' but I cannot countenance the man
who has so unpatriotically opposed Lord Beacons-
field's foreign policy. Have you the slightest idea
what the assets of the City of Glasgow Bank will
prove ?'
Mr. Summers found ready help from Mr. Robert
Teare, the member for Ayre, who, without liking
Mr. Gladstone too much, loved opposition to
Mr. Christian still more. Significant, too, is the
remembrance that Mr. Alured Dumbell, then
High Bailiff, and later Clerk of the Rolls, identified
by name and interest with Dumbell's Bank, whose
failure on February 3, 1900, was the worst disaster
the island has ever suffered, also repudiated all
concern in a welcome. He ' disapproved ' of
Mr. Gladstone, and refused the promoters the use
of the Court House. The whirligig of time was
destined to bring some strange variations of fate
and fortune.
Mr. Teare and Mr. Summers had got from JNIr.
Gladstone, at Peel, his promise to visit Ramsey.
They returned from Douglas with Mr. J. C.

MR. GLADSTONE AT DOUGLAS AND RAMSEY 129
LaMothe and Mr. C. B. Nelson, mightily pleased
with the success of their mission, rivalry to the
larger town entering, admittedly, into their joy.
By some oversight, Mr, Arthur KayU, M.H.K.,
was deputed to fill the chair, instead of Mr. J. C.
LaMothe, who, besides being a strong politician of
views different from those of their guest, was, as
member for Garff", more entitled to the honour.
After dining at the Mitre Hotel, Mr. Gladstone
spoke to a densely packed and enthusiastic throng
assembled in the Skating Rink. No non-partisan
gathering of his own countrymen ever formed a
more cheering and excited audience. Again the
interest of the speech lies in the freedom with
which he spoke to Manxmen on the merits and
advantages of self-government, 'so freely and
convincingly,' as one of his supporters on the
platform has told me, ' that from that moment to
this I have been certain that the so-called con
version of Mr. Gladstone to the principle of Home
Rule was an almost unconscious incident of his
visit to the Isle of Man, and at least seven years
before the political world of England was aware of
the settled drift of his convictions.'
On Saturday morning Mr. Gladstone walked out
to Kirk Maughold. Here a local 'character,' 17

130 ISLE OF MAN
named James CreUin, but known as ' Jim Jairg '
(Red Jim ; or was it Jim Jeeagh, Godly Jim ?) enter
tained the distinguished visitor with many stories and
legends. To his amusement and surprise, Crellin
was rewarded with the gift of a threepenny-piece.
Mr. Gladstone had more than once in speech and
conversation urged Manxmen in the administration
of their insular affairs to practise economy, without
any fear of the taunt of ' cheese-paring ' or ' candle-
ends ' policy. Mr. CrelUn, whatever his appearance,
was in reality a farmer, and sufficiently prosperous
to preserve on his watch-chain the tiny coin as a
humorous evidence of Gladstonian thriftiness.
The return journey was by way of SiUby Glen.
The weather was too misty for the ascent of SnaefeU.
On Sunday Mr. Gladstone was a pattern visitor,
attending church twice — at St. Thomas's in the
morning, Onchan in the evening. In the afternoon,
according to wider convention, the weather being
magnificent, he walked on the Douglas headland.
On Monday, having decUned a special steamer
which the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company
had whispered a desire to place at his disposal,
Mr. Gladstone left by the Snaefell, the regular
morning mail-boat. Crowds gathered to see him
off; stiU greater crowds gathered at Liverpool to

MR. GLADSTONE AT DOUGLAS AND RAMSEY 131
see him disembark. He was prevaUed upon to
speak a few words from the paddle-box — of thanks,
of the beauty and invigorating air of the island he
had left behind, and of the cordial welcome he had
everywhere experienced.
A homely touch was not wantiag from the
scene. Mr. Gladstone's flowing periods were easily
surpassed by the gastronomic tribute to Mona he
bore under one arm — a box of Manx kippers !
Mr. Gladstone sought refuge from the throng in
the Bank of Messrs. Arthur Heywood and Sons,
and later proceeded to Hawarden, whence came the
next day a letter to the Isle of Man Times, extend
ing his acknowledgments ' to the people at large,
from whom I receiA^ed in every quarter a welcome
aUke exceeding my expectations and my deserts.'
' In conclusion, I must express the concern with
which I have read, when in the island, the failure
of the bank at Glasgow, in which the Manx deposits
were of so large an amount. I sincerely trust that
they may be found to be abundantly covered by
the assets and responsibilities of the bank, and that
no like event may hereafter impede, even for a
moment, the progress of trade and industry, or cast
a gloom over society in the island.'
' The like event,' with greatly accentuated
severity, came twenty-two years later. 17—2

CHAPTER XIX
TO THE SUMMIT OF SNAEFELL
Snaefell — the ' mere Saxon ' may not object to
being told that the accent is on the first, and not on
the last and less important, syllable — presents no
terrors to the climber.
Much of the ascent can be made in a carriage
and pair, or, better still, in a motor-car, traversing
what we caU 'the Mountain Road' (connecting
Douglas, via Keppel Gate, The Bungalow, and
BaUure Glen, with Ramsey) — a model, by the way,
of what a road should be, presenting a smooth,
well-kept surface all the way. It is a veritable joy
to the motorist, without a pedestrian in sight.
This route leaves the visitor A^dth an ascent of
rather less than 1,000 feet to be made on foot.
Convenience, even to luxury, is, however, the
portion of the visitor who chooses to make the
journey in the electric tramway, which, starting
from Laxey village, glides round the cone until it
reaches a point within 40 feet of the apex.
132

TO THE SUMMIT OF SNAEFELL 133
This raUway, which was opened on July 28, 1894,
was the first mountain railway in the British Isles.
As the trip to the summit still remains not merely
the most important day excursion in the Isle of
Man, but one in beauty and variety of interest
unrivaUed in any other part of the kingdom, it calls
for more than passing mention.
We begin our journey from Douglas by betaking
ourselves to a tramcar station which we shall find
at the lower end of the Victoria Pier, near the
Clock Tower. I confess at the outset that I must
offer some explanation, and even apology, for so
unpropitious an opening to the day.
The tramcar looks like an interesting survival.
And so it is. The horse to which it is attached
seems wholly conscious of the unkindly fate that
has Unked his fate to so time-worn a thing.
It a piece of strange irony that, though Douglas
can boast at its very door a railway that gently
and speedUy carries you up heavy inclines and
down steep declivities, through cuttings and across
ravines, with electricity as the motive power, tolera
tion of modern ideas should suddenly terminate at
that front-door on the town's northern boundary.
I remember Mr. Alexander Bruce, who was
then in the heyday of his influence and popularity —

134 ISLE OF MAN
being at that time the moving factor in Dumbell's
Bank, a magistrate, projector-in-chief of the tram
way to Laxey and Ramsey and the extension to
the summit of SnaefeU — telling me how stubbornly
he had contended with the gas interest in the
]Municipal Council to secure the right to run the
electric cars the whole margin of the bay, to a
convenient point in direct contact with the in
coming and outgoing steamers.
He pinned his faith on meeting the convenience
of five or ten times as many passengers, speedier
transit, and penny fares — cheap enough and
sufficiently amusing to induce many visitors to
make the journey round the bay, backwards and
forwards, for an entire morning.
Monopolists, however, were sharp enough to
perceive that theatre and hotel proprietors and
boarding-house keepers were not going to see a
brUliantly iUuminated electric tramcar running
past their front-door of an evening without desiring
to secure the same brilUant Uluminant for their
own estabUshments,
Mr. Bruce's last offer to the Corporation was, as
he represented it to me, to light the whole length
of the Douglas promenades, without charge to the
ratepayers, in return for the right of substituting

TO THE SUMMIT OF SNAEFELL 135
electric power on the tram -route for the anti
quated and wasteful one-horse arrangement stUl in
vogue. No better result followed. If you don't Uke
the gas in Douglas — well, you can always get a
candle !
Mr. Bruce's name and fame have suffered a bad
eclipse since those days, but on this trip it seems
bare justice to the memory of the man who, once
the idol of a fawning multitude, passed out of
this life amid a cloud of suspicion and a perfect
avalanche of bitter reproach, to say that, despite
the failure of many of his cherished schemes, the
island is at this hour deriving real advantage from
work he took in hand and strenuously pushed to
completion, and that, if he had had his way,
Douglas Bay on a summer evening would be now,
from topmost window to water-edge, one glittering
blaze of light.
On this sunny morning Douglas is a striking
spectacle. Every window is thrown open, every
door is thronged, the promenade is crowded,
and waggonettes are starting upon excursions to
popular resorts. Even the bay itself is alive with
Ufe — from the margin of the water, where the
chUdren are paddling in the surf, to the white

136 ISLE OF MAN
wings of yachts out at sea, starting betimes to
cruise the coast.
It would be impossible even to indicate aU the
features of interest. We start outside the VilUers
Hotel, and proceed via the Loch Promenade, so
named after a former Lieutenant-Governor, who, by
the happy chance of a visit from Mr. Gladstone,
was destined to end his days a Governor of the
Bank of England and a Peer of the realm.
At the first bend of the line we come to the
Hotel Sefton, part of the large possessions of the
late Henry Bloom Noble, whose estate is ad
ministered by trustees, of whom the late Dean
Lefroy of Norwich was one. The house is now
in the hands of Mr. Walter Keig, whose name,
with many curious variations of initial (represent
ing so many distinguishing ' keys '), was formerly
known to every visitor through the agency of the
Government Board of Advertising.
The Gaiety Theatre, adjoining the hotel, marks
the beginning of the Harris Promenade, so caUed
to perpetuate the memory of an aged and respected
High Bailiff. The Central Promenade, in which
the chief features are the Castle Mona Hotel and
the Palace, brings us to the Queen's Promenade, at
the end of which stands Derby Castle, once a

MAUGHOLD CHURCH

TO THE SUMMIT OF SNAEFELL 137
private dweUing, now an hotel, with a dancing-
palace and a stage covering the pretty gardens of
a former age.
At Derby Castle a transfer is made to the
electric car alongside. The line beginning at this
point, sea-level, ascends the hiU surmounted by the
Douglas Bay Hotel (another enterprise in which
Mr. Bruce took a more or less sympathetic interest),
of which every window affords wondrous views of
land and sea.
Rounding the corner, one gets a glimpse of a
little cove, Onchan Bay or Onchan Harbour, and
though both names are too imposing for so tiny an
inlet, these high banks, with comfortable nesting-
places, make it a happy place for an idle afternoon.
On the right we pass the Mansion House, erected
from plans by Mr. BaiUie Scott to the order of
another Scot, Mr. McAndrew. At Mr. McAndrew's
death, the place, in some unaccountable way and
for some unaccountable reason, became a kind of
club-house, with sources of income no one could
explain — one of the many premonitions of the
coming of the island's financial storm. Mr. Richard
Prestwich, of Manchester, is now the owner of this
superbly-placed dwelling.
On the other side is the Howstrake Golf-
18

138 ISLE OF MAN
Links, originally laid out by two golf celebrities
whom Mr, Bruce brought over — Tom Morris of
St. Andrews and George Lowe of Lytham,
Nowhere could be found more healthful condi
tions for play. The air up here is laden with
ozone, dustless and pure.
Thereafter the electric tram route makes a cut
direct, instead of hugging the coast-line of Clay
Head. The first regular stopping-place is Groudle,
It is a picturesque spot, with a stream flowing down
the ravine. Lhen Coan is a miniature canon
formed by a brook that flows into the Groudle
below the hotel. But if there are young members
of the party, there must be counted above aU such
beauty the unique experience of travel in the
midget railway. This is a deUght when the sheer
abyss, the glittering waterfaU, the rushing waters,
and every variety of tree, fern, bush, or flowering
plant, are not even a remembrance.
Neither must Garwick be passed without a halt.
Here is Glen Gawne, and close at hand, in the
corner of a field, there will be found an ancient
burial-place, now described as ' the Cloven Stones.'
Tradition says that the Cloven Stones clash
together, and living persons are declared to have
observed this remarkable performance.

TO THE SUMMIT OF SNAEFELL 139
Another legend teUs how a farmer, about to
remove such an obstruction to agriculture, was
warned by fire to let the great dead sleep the great
sleep in peace.
Down on the sea-shore, under Clay Head, is the
Hermit's Cave. Once, we are told, it was the
home of a monk, who sought to serve God by much
mortification of the flesh. And once (with even
less foundation in fact) it was the hiding-place of
Eleanor Cobham, Duchess of Gloucester, when she
was making a vain effort to regain her liberty —
a pretty tale, of which the chief merit is that it is
whoUy untrue. The Duchess was never a prisoner
in Peel Castle. She never set foot on our island.
At the next bend of the line inwards we enter
the Laxey Valley. Houses are dotted about both
banks. Every cottage, resplendent in a fresh coat
of limewash, set in its own Uttle patch of garden,
amid traiUng creeper and flowering plant, is a
picture of homely pride and sweet content.
Laxey is weU worthy of a visit. There is the
never-failing beauty of the Glen, on which Mr,
Williamson has expended so much intelligent
thought. Then, Manx homespuns have a reputa
tion which even the island of Harris might envy.
A visit should be made, therefore, to the St.
18—2

140 ISLE OF MAN
George's Woollen MiUs, which Mr, Egbert
Rydings has established at this spot on lines that
commended themselves to the heart of John
Rusldn, A practical industry that produced big
dividends in the old days of high-priced silver and
lead is found in the old-established Great Laxey
Lead-Mines, which may be also inspected. And
last, but not least, there is the Big Wheel.
The Mountain Railway, from its station in
Laxey to the end of the line immediately below
the summit, is four and three-quarter mUes in
length. For two-thirds of the distance the line
pursues a route directly upward. Objects on the
eastern side of the island have faded from definite
vision, or have been altogether obscured by inter
vening hills, when there bursts upon our view a
glorious panorama of the island to the south and
the west. The car glides on, ever upward, now in
the full blaze of the sunUght, and now m the shade.
We feel the keen air of the uplands ; we scent
the nutty odour of the gorse ; we drink in the
freshening exhalation of the soil ; our eyes are
cheered by the rosy bloom of the new heather.
Then the car comes to a stop. We step out
into a pure, dustless, rarefied, breezy atmosphere of
2,000 feet up. From this elevation Ramsey lies at

TO THE SUMMIT OF SNAEFELL 141
our feet to the north, partly shielded from our
gaze by the intervening heights of North Barrule.
Farther away, at a point where land and sea seem
almost one, the white and rather ghostly figure of
Point of Ayre Lighthouse faiutly emerges from
the fleecy clouds of sea-mist. Beyond an apparently
narrow stretch of purple sea we see the hiUs of
Scotland. Eastwards St. Bee's Head is easily discernible,
and colour on the fields can be distinguished in
the hills standing in the forefront of that glorious
range of hills we find in the English Lake District,
Douglas is not within our ken, but we can see
the steamers speedily beating their way to the bay.
Westward and southward there are such land
marks as Corrin's Tower on Peel Hill, the stern
slope of Greeba, with South Barrule and Cronk-ny-
Iree-Lhaa beyond.
Across the sea we can readUy discern the Mourne
Mountains of Ireland, and the glittering sun on
the waters of Belfast Lough. To the south we
perceive the island's limits in the Calf, and, away
over the sea, the rough outUne of Snowdon.
But interesting as it is to note the territory of
every surrounding kingdom, it is stiU more so to
glance over our island and evolve the identity of

142 ISLE OF MAN
every cherished object — house, field, road, river,
church. Then the sea itself! It is no longer the sea in
ceaseless movement. From this height it is a
sheet of burnished silver. Not a ripple seems to
disturb its gleaming surface, and steamers are
dotted about like toys on a baby pond.
All make-believe ! It is we who are afloat.
See the white foam breaking about our stout huU.
It is we, proud and aloof, who are saUing this sun-
Ut summer sea. Our island is a great ship, moving
silently to its invisible destiny.
A glorious panorama — a whoUy unforgettable
vision of beauty of earth and sea and sky.

CHAPTER XX
— ^AND THENCE TO RAMSEY
The so-caUed King Orry's Grave wiU be found in
the sweetly clean, whitewashed village of Minorca,
overlooking Old Laxey. The ancient burial-place,
consisting of two chambers of huge stones, rudely
cut, is of prehistoric date. The bones or the
calcined ashes of no Orry King ever rested here.
Beyond Laxey Head wonderful views of mountain,
wood, and rugged coast are obtained, Bulgham
Bay is famous for shell-fish. Barony HiU revives
old memories, much of this land being once the
property of the Priory of St. Bee's, in Cumberland.
Returning from the summit of SnaefeU, and
proceeding on our northward journey, we reach the
entrance to the Dhoon. Locally the mispronuncia
tion is ' Dood'n' — two clear syllables, with the first D
almost elided. It is also spoken of as ' Thoon ' or
' Thune ' — a close approximation to the Norse ; but
visitors, brushing aside aU etymological technicalities,
regard the h in such a position as unnecessary and
143

144 ISLE OF MAN
unsoundable. Without any equivocation, therefore,
the visitor gives it as ' Doon,' and everybody knows
what he means — which cannot always be said of his
struggles with Maughold, Lewaigue, or BaUaugh.
The Glen is well worthy of a visit. It has many
waterfaUs, of which the chief are some 60 and
70 feet respectively.
The Dhoon granite-quarries are close at hand.
Some day the docks of another Rosyth naval-base
may be faced with hard granite quarried on this
spot, (The steps of St. Paul's Cathedral were for
centuries of Manx stone.)
Farther on we reach The Corony, the birth
place of Kennish, author of 'The MeUiah,' or
Harvest Home, and ' Oie'l Verrey,' a corruption of
' Oie feaUl Vofrrey ' (Eve of Mary's Feast).
Ballaglass Glen is one of the sweetest glens of
the island, and untU recent years it was a veritable
glimpse of paradise, whoUy free from the intrusion
of man's handiwork. I cannot pause to attempt
any measure of justice to these exquisite sylvan
retreats, which are truly the distinguishing glory of
Man. I remember that the Rev. T. E. Brown,
whose love for the island was a complete absorption,
if not a religion, often made this the point of
studious walk. Sometimes it was a rendezvous.

MAUGHOLD HEAD

AND THENCE TO RAMSEY 145
His joy in meeting old friends amid beautiful sur
roundings on such a day as is typical of our June
was, as I weU remember, as wonderful as it was
exhUarating. His laughter was as heartsome as
that of any boy, his conversation as vivacious as
that of any girl, always with this difference: behind
every look, every laugh, every word, there was a
great heart, the tenderness of a woman with the
wisdom and learning of an intellectual giant.
Glen Mona, another stopping-place, is a succes
sion of surprises. Its unexplored beauty is its
greatest charm.
Thereafter we leave the tramcar route at Balla-
jora to visit Kirk Maughold, where a wonderful
coUection of Runic crosses dating from the eleventh,
twelfth, and thirteenth centuries wUl be found
under cover on the right of the churchyard gate.
Of the church itself, and aU the haUowed souls
that gather round, what can I compress into a
word or two ? If you wish to be rid of the world,
of aU its vain and strenuous strivings for what
matters not a jot, come up here on Sunday evening,
and let your spirit pass into that realm of ' higher
absorption,' of which Brown speaks ('Letters,' i, 152).
I dare not attempt another defining word.
Wander over the face of the great headland — at
19

146 ISLE OF MAN
some hazard, admittedly— with the salt spray from
the waves breaking on the rocks below, leaping into
our faces on the wings of the wind. Or let us sit
down in such shelter from a friendly bush as we
can find, leaving the ladies to search out for them
selves a tiny well, variously called the Holy WeU,
St. Patrick's WeU, St, Maughold's WeU, and the
Ladies' Wishmg WeU.
Narrow paths, in bewildering profusion, wind
through the tall grass, heather, and pigmy gorse.
But the true daughter of Eve does not lightly
resign the quest that is hers alone, even though the
blusterous gusts of wind, rushing over the surface of
the sea and up the face of the headland, threaten
her discomfiture. Near a narrow gate there are
steps over the stone waU. A steep path through
the bracken leads direct to the well.
Found at last ! Now touch your lips with the
waters of the crystal stream. Pay homage to the
good fairies by dropping into the dark abyss any
thing of value — it need only be a halfpenny, or a
farthing, or merely a pin, if you count your good
luck of so little account — and you wiU return to
Man within the twelve months a radiantly happy
bride. Favours there are to the bride. But observe

AND THENCE TO RAMSEY 147
caution. Drink not of the waters too deeply, or a
year hence it may take both arms to hold the
fairies' blessings.
Maughold has many historic and personal associa
tions. It was here the early Christian missionaries
from lona made a settlement. Two or three
centuries ago the Quakers came, but Lord Derby,
gravely distrusting any form of faith of which he
was not a revered head (he would not admit of
appeals to York), made bitter war upon the un
offending people. He seized one of the leading
converts by way of warning. William Callow was
lodged in Peel Castle, and his offence was ' religious
contumacy.' Callow was a man of station, education, and
influence ; but even Prince Rupert, who interceded
for him, could not induce the Lord of Man to
relax the cruel punishment of banishment from the
island. This was mild treatment, however, com
pared with that which the Quakers suffered else
where. Their offence, however, was not so much
their religious views as their refusal to acknow
ledge royal or civil supremacy. The old Quaker
cemetery above BaUajora is still an object of
interest — and of neglected beauty too.
But there are many 'twists' in the pre-' nuptial
19—2

148 ISLE OF MAN
song,' and CaUow did not go without his reward.
The exile found sympathetic ears for his tale of
suffering. Consolation came to him in marriage
with a great heiress.
A sundial on the village green is inscribed ' Evd.
Christian, a.d. 1666.' This Edward was the son of
the Captain Christian whose name and fame are
imperishably preserved by Scott in ' Peveril of the
Peak.' CrowviUe is linked with the memory, not always
of the tenderest, of Hugh, known throughout the
West Indies aforetimes as ' Cap'n Crow,' or ' Mind
your Eye Cap'n.' Our island and its near waters were
not spacious enough for so daring an adventurer.
Cap'n Crow sailed from the Mersey to the West
Coast of Africa, and there engaged in the cruel
iniquities of the slave traffic ; sailing thence with his
human freight to the West Indies, where the half
of his cargo that survived were engaged on the
highly remunerative sugar plantations.
' Massa Crow ' was, I fear, more than a merely
passive witness of certain of the nameless horrors
of ' The Middle Passage.' He pictures himself as
a paragon. The exploits of the adventurous old seadog are
recounted in the vivid, stirring pages of Mr. Gomer

AND THENCE TO RAMSEY 149
WUUams, in a volume entitled ' The Liverpool
Privateers,' a veritable storehouse of inspiration for
the writer of boys' stories.
As to the present-day literary interest of this
country — Kirk Maughold, Port Moar, Port-y-
VuUin, Lewaigue, etc. — I need not say a word of
what is so familiar. But I recaU an incident as I
write. The author, during a period of Ul-health
in his early manhood, fUled up a gap by acting
as master at the viUage school. In his leisure
hours he wrote deeply serious articles for The
Mona's Herald on questions that were European
rather than insular in their interest. They were
good enough to enlist the encouragement of John
Ruskin. The writer, however, then a budding architect,
found more suitable occupation and a physical
tonic in work in the open air. A man who could
design houses ought to be able to buUd them. So
he turned a hand, as practical mason, on a cottage
on the main road, facing the old Hibernian Inn.
A stone over the porch, on which ' Phcenix Cottage '
was engraved, became in later years so much an
object of scrutiny and comment on the part of
visitors that the old lady inhabiting the little
house became very angry. She deemed so much

150 ISLE OF MAN
attention an intrusion, and had the face of the
stone redressed.
We pick up the tram-route at Lewaigue, and
after snatching a pretty panoramic view of the bay
en route, we are in a few minutes in the heart of
Ramsey town (I am quoting from Boosey's
' Manx National Songs,' edited by my fellow-
countryman, Mr. W. H. GiU) : —
' Ramsey Town, O Ramsey Town,
Shining by the sea !
Here's a health to my true love,
Wheresoe'er she be !'
' 'Twas once I loved a lass,
I swore I loved her true,
And that did I, so long as we
Held Ramsey still in view.
' Her hair was like the gold.
Her eyes, like clouds, were grey ;
We sailed away for the blazing south,
All on a summer day.
' No grey eyes southward are.
Nor locks of curly gold.
But in the flash of eyes of jet.
Lies wealth of love untold.
' My heart is not so small
To stop at one, good lack !
I'll love 'em all, or twenty such
Grey eyes, or brown, or black !'

CHAPTER XXI
the legend of the beautiful white DEVIL
The hunting of the wren was until quite recent
years the cruel and eager pursuit of boys. The
legend, however, from which all the mock ceremonial
takes its rise is of almost world-wide currency, and
has a history and an application outside aU boyish
fancy. It concerns the winsome lady who lures
gaUant, love-hungry, over- confiding men to their
doom, and with us is probably of Norse origin.
In the northern half of the island this ancestry is
very evident. A waterfall may be ' a foss,' and our
glens and streams may be peopled at nightfall by
the same magical little people you find in the folk
lore of Norway. Even the name of our northern
capital, Ramsey, is merely a corruption of the
Norse ' Hraftisa,' or Raven's Water, while physical
and mental affinities obtrude themselves in a
thousand different ways.
Norwegian folk-lore tells of Huldren, a young
woman of surpassing beauty and charm, who lives
151

152 ISLE OF MAN
in a great castle hid away in the forest on the
mountain-side. She is never visible save at night, and then
reveals herself only to a young man, disconsolate
and alone. Beneath a wide-open neck she wears
a red corsage embroidered with pearls. A skirt of
black, reaching nearly to her ankles, is bordered
with ribbon and silver lace. Gleaming gems are
about her pretty neck and snow-white shoulders.
Her white apron is edged with Hardanger em
broidery, and her shapely feet are in shoes with
silver buckles.
Her voice is a caress, her kiss a dream of
honeyed bUss. She laments her single state, and,
with promises of unbounded love and joy and
wealth, lures the unsuspecting young hero to his
doom. He has wedded a horrid vampire. By daylight
she is a hideous monster with a cow's tail. But he
is in her power now, and she has sucked away his
blood, to his eternal hurt.
Even the negroid inhabitants of West Africa
and the West Indies have their own version of the
cruel charmer. With them she is a fair and beau
tiful woman with shining hair. She has one
human foot and one cloven hoof, which she

LEGEND OF THE BEAUTIFUL WHITE DEVIL 153
cautiously conceals from observation. She inhabits
' a pretty little house, bery nice put away ' on the
mountains. She is supposed to be the * duppy,' or spirit, of
a child that has died in innocence, and to have
reached maturity in Jumbidom, or some hidden
sphere of the negro imagination. Returning to the
scene of her birth, she bewails her virginity in tears
of ravishing beauty, and pleads her cruel destiny —
that of riding a white horse in hell — should she pass
hence finaUy unblessed with child.
The lonely wanderer is fascinated by her exquisite
beauty. Eye and ear are enslaved.
The awakening comes on apace ; the black man's
cup of bitter anguish is fiUed to rumiing over : the
fair charmer is only an alluring devil.
In the Isle of Man the charmer is a beautiful
maiden, disconsolate and alone, eager to embrace a
man worthy of her person, her riches, and her love.
She is never seen save in the pale moonlight,
and then reveals herself only to some young and
gaUant man who, heart-sore and weary, forms an
easy conquest.
The attention of the lonely wanderer is first
arrested by the tinkle of tiny sUver bells, that acts
upon his downcast spirit Uke a token of good cheer.
20

154 ISLE OF MAN
Then the music of a merry voice converts the cold,
pale light into an atmosphere of sunshine and
warmth and love. At the next turning his eyes
are arrested by the engaging picture of a sprightly
lady, clad in virgin white, gaUy dancing on the
flowery mead with all the tender grace of a fairy.
Their eyes meet. Her tender look of sympathy,
admiration, and love, is an invitation to tarry awhile.
' Thou brave man ! WUt thou not listen to my
pretty song ?' she says vsdth a merry roguish laugh.
' Right gladly, graihagj he answers boldly,
adding after a moment's hesitation, in doubt if he
might venture so far, ' and to thy pretty speech,
most beautiful maiden,' eyes of admiration eating
up every feature of the vision of grace and delight.
' But thou art a bold boy, unless thy word beUes
thee,' she makes reply, flattered by the speed of
her conquest ; ' though methinks I might love thee
for aU. Did ever any true dooinney-sooree need a
dooinney-moyllee to win a woman's heart ?'
' Nay, myrneen, cuishlin-my-chree, and thy love
for me is not a thousandth part of mine for thee,'
he says, taking her into his arms. ' I am thy slave
for ever,' he rapturously declares, pressing hot kisses
on lips and cheeks and eyes. ' Thou, Ben-jee ! I
adore all of thee.'

LEGEND OF THE BEAUTIFUL WHITE DEVIL 155
Alas ! no man who has yielded obedience to the
dazzUng lustre of those bright eyes, or trusted in
those promises of unfathomed depths of love, or
listened with hungry ears to legends of uncounted
gold, has ever returned to tell his tale. Mystery,
like a pall, lies on his hard and bitter fate.
The beautiful deceiver is an alluring devil, whose
food is a victim's soul. Conquest is her pleasure
and play, hunger an eternal quest.
' Whence has she taken him ?' cries sweetheart
and maid through her tears. ' I beg thee say,
that I may reclaim him, and make speech of
forgiveness.' ' He is gone, and would not return for the shame
he has done thee, m'doodee,' answers one.
' He is lost in the sea, and cannot come back if
he would,' says another.
' Count thyself a chUd of good fortune, inasmuch
as thou art not mated to so frail a thing.'
' He is unworthy of thy tears. Forgive !
Forget !'
But the Beautiful White Devil does not die.
She is here stUl, eager for another conquest, hungry
for another soul. Hither and thither the lonely,
love-hungry traveUer may see the alluring vision
of passionate delight flitting across the fields at
20—2

156 ISLE OF MAN
night, that she may, vfith presumed unconscious
intent, intercept the path of unrequited lover or
angry and disappointed husband,
' When the heart is alienated and empty, conquest
is easy,' she says.
Wife or sweetheart parting from her lover in
anger has need of that remembrance.
The pretty play of tender sympathy, the bright
eyes, the endearing word, the coy kiss, the ravishing
splendour of her person, the merry song, the gay
music of sUver ferret-beUs, the feet that trip in
cadence on the grass with a touch so Ught that
a materialized spright from fairyland might envy
so gentle a tread — these and aU else never fail to
encompass another victim. Eyes, mind, and heart
are enslaved in adoring love.
Over the door of the inner porch he reads his
fate : ' He who seeks all loses alV
His soul is lost. Adoring love is turned to
bitter hate.
At length there arose a brave knight who made
a proud boast that he would destroy the charmer.
We know he was brave, because he carried a great
sword against a defenceless woman ! and we know
his boast was vain, because his sword was a material
weapon against a spirit enemy.

LEGEND OF THE BEAUTIFUL WHITE DEVIL 157
Yet the winsome lady had her own misgivings in
the face of so strong a man — strong and happy in a
good woman's love, strong in his fixed resolve for
vengeance. Tempted at length to reveal herself,
she endeavoured to enslave this victim by artifice.
But the knight had no eyes for her beauty, no ears
for her endearments, no passion which she might
appease. Hurt and humiliated, she hastened to hide the
shame of her defeat. But the knight was in pursuit.
She quickened her footsteps down to the river brink.
StiU he pursued, and his naked sword flashed in the
moonlight. The knight went forward and endeavoured tr
seize the lady by her flowing hair. At that
moment her feet touched the water. She was
gone. The knight stood as one dazed. There was no
splash of the waters, nor was any strange form
visible in the bosom of the crystal stream ; but in
the same instant that he gazed at the place at
which the fair lady had passed from his sight, there
was a flutter in the water near the opposite bank.
Out of the river emerged a wren. With a chirp of
triumph, the bird took to the wing, and in a moment
was lost in the trees.

158 ISLE OF MAN
Such is our story of the Beautiful White Devil.
Anthropomorphism pictures God in our image.
Is it unlikely that the Devil, as first created in the
mind of primitive man, took the guise of a beautiful
and enticing maiden ?
The wren was ' the king of birds ' to the Druids,
and has been deeply revered in most parts of Europe.
It was probably the same in the Isle of Man. Yet
for many centuries the bird has been hunted and
stoned and killed in our island by men and boys in
the hours of breaking day on December 25, a date
that suggests New Year's Day by certain pagan
calendars of sun- worshippers.
Boys StiU sing an old song, ' Hunt the Wren,'
and go from door to door exacting some gift in
exchange for a feather of the dead bird. Mock
ceremonial used to attend solemn interment in
a corner of the churchyard, but this custom has
disappeared, though a feather of the dead bird may
be still treasured by the fisherman — that most
superstitious of all men.
A new confusion has arisen. The festival has
been put back one day, December 26 being the
festival of the stoning of St. Stephen. The two
celebrations have no other reference or relationship
whatever.

LEGEND OF THE BEAUTIFUL WHITE DEVIL 159
The wren may have been a family or tribal
totem, and the hunting, death, and burial, a form
of sacrificial worship. I leave the reader to form
his own solution of the problem. My own convic
tion is that the story of the beautiful lady who
turns out to be an alluring devil is in aU probability
as old as our human intelligence.
Lastly, that mysterious power of evil that would
encompass our ruin never found direct reference
on our tongue. All that we dared to venture was
NoiD NY Hanmey — the Enemy of the Soul.
Gkaihag (graih-ag), beloved lady.
DooiNNBY-sooREB {dohn-yah-soor-ee), a brave, resolute, or confident wooer
Strictly a lady's man or courting man.
DooiNNEY-MOYLLBE [dohn-yah-inoil-yoh), a matrimonial go-between. Strictly
a praising man, one wlio actually does a part of the wooing for a
diifident suitor, and keeps the lady in companionship in the absence
of the recognized lover. This last duty ia sometimes so zealously
fulfilled as to make the return of the afBanced wanderer an
unnecessary and unwelcome intrusion.
Myrneen {m'r-neen), darling.
CuiSHLlN-MT-CHREE {koosh-Un-m'-kree), my heart's core, a companion
expression to the more familiar ben-my-chree = woman of my heart.
Ben-jee {ieii-jee) : ben = woman {not girl, wife, or sweetheart) ; jee = god.
Goddess.
DooDEE {dthoo-dthee, sometimes more colloquially vvd-dee), sweetheart.
Kelly's Dictionary suggests 'a. girl, a lass, a sloven.' The word
conveys no suspicion of ating. It was used by a mother for her
girl child ; it was the favourite expression by a father for the
beloved infant in her cot or on his knee. The priest would use it
as 'my poor child' or 'my suffering child.' It was therefore an
expression of mingled admiration, endearment, and sympathy, and
ranks above myrneen.
Pronunciation varies widely, and those given approximate to the general
rule.

CHAPTER XXII
the king and queen in mona
On Sunday, August 24, 1902, incredulous eyes
discerned on the horizon the approach of the King's
yacht, with a cruiser and a couple of destroyers
following in her wake.
The Victoria and Albert, showing the Royal
Standard at the main and the White Ensign fore
and aft, steamed round Douglas Head shortly after
five o'clock in the afternoon, and came to an
anchorage in the north bay. The escort consisted
of the Cf'escent (a cruiser of the first class, 7,700
tons and 10,000 horse-power, carrjdng 13 guns), and
the torpedo-boat destroyers Gipsy and Lively.
From the Fort Anne Hotel a royal salute was
fired. Douglas was instantly cast into a state of
ferment. Bunting was quickly displayed from every
point of vantage. An eager, expectant throng
crowded the pier and promenades encircling the bay.
' Will the King land ?' was the inquiry on every
tongue. 160

3- -¦

RAMSEY BAY

THE KING AND QUEEN IN MONA 161
' The Lord comes to Man for the first time for
untold centuries, and there is no Governor to receive
him or bid him welcome.'
The welcome, however, which awaited the King
was exactly the spontaneous outburst of popular
enthusiasm any monarch might envy. The people
stood in one great mass on the Victoria Pier.
They crowded every yacht, fishing or rowing boat
standing for hire in the bay. Nothing in the
harbour that would float and carry frenzied sight
seers to a nearer view of the royal yacht and her
distinguished passengers was left at its moorings.
The Victoria and Albert was soon the centre of an
immense flotilla, every unit in the fleet of small
boats carrying its eager, admiring, inquisitive
freight. Sir James Gell, the aged and revered Clerk of
the RoUs and Acting Governor, was at his home
at Castletown. In his absence the Speaker of our
elective House of Keys made his way to the royal
yacht. The King received the spokesman of Man with
cordiality, and after presenting him to the Queen
and Mr. Austen Chamberlain, the Minister in
Attendance, desired the address of the Acting
Governor. The King may have been dismayed at
21

162 ISLE OF MAN
the surging throng gathered on the pier. For the
magnificence of the bay, with its background of
purple hUls, the King had only words of admiration.
Government House, then unoccupied, on the
hUls near Onchan, was pointed out. When Castle
Mona, the palace of the Duke of Athole, as the last
Lord or King in Man, had to be identified on the
sea-front amid a group of boarding-houses and in
proximity to another palace — the great glass
house devoted to dancing — the King was greatly
amused. The Speaker left at 6.20 p.m., as the royal yacht
drew away from her moorings and steered a north
east course, wide of Bank's Howe.
Off Ramsey, an hour later, the yacht came to a
safe anchorage, about a mUe fr-om the Queen's Pier.
Signal guns were fired from the Ufeboat house, and
soon our northern capital was ablaze with the
surprising inteUigence of the King's arrival.
Evening services were interrupted by the booming
of cannon. Sermons were curtaUed in the face of
such unwonted excitement ; elsewhere the preacher
found his congregation vanish as by the play of
magic art.
The Queen's Pier was besieged by the enthusiastic
people, and when the darkness of a beautiful

THE KING AND QUEEN IN MONA 163
summer evening fell upon the scene, every window
on the sea-front was Uluminated. Even the Albert
Tower sent forth its gleam of light for this gala
night. The King had not forgotten the occasion of
which the beacon is a lasting memorial.
' I weU recaU the incidents of that visit,' said the
King in conversation next day. ' It was in 1847.
I was a Uttle boy of seven, and the Queen was
unweU. We children were not allowed to land ;
but the Prince Consort did so, I remember, quite
unexpectedly, and there was no one here to receive
him. So, in the guidance of the local hatter or
barber, he marched up the hUl for a better survey
of the surrounding country.'
Immediately the Acting Governor was apprised
of the arrival of the King on board the royal yacht
he came up to Douglas, proceeding thence to
Ramsey. It was now after 10 p.m., but the genial
and gaUant old Manxman, who has long since passed
to his rest, did not hesitate to row out and have an
audience of the King.
Sir James Gell returned to Ramsey with the
news that it was the King's intention to land.
Should the weather continue favourable the King
and Queen would come ashore next day, and their
21—2

164 ISLE OF MAN
Majesties would make a brief tour of the island.
The visit, however, was merely a health or holiday
excursion, and it was the King's desire that no
formal address or welcome should be presented,
Ramsey did not sleep a wink that night. When
the morning broke, the purple haze of the uplands
faded in the warm sunshine.
Certain leading residents gathered on the Queen's
Pier, and there was a profusion of bouquets for
presentation to Her Majesty. At about 11.30
eager eyes caught sight of the steam launch round
ing the stern of the royal yacht, and soon the chief
occupants were identified. The party consisted of
the King and Queen, Princess Victoria, the
Portuguese Minister (the Marquis de Soveral),
Mr. Austen Chamberlain (ChanceUor of the Ex
chequer and Minister in Attendance), Sir Francis
Laking (Physician to the King), Captain the Hon.
Seymour Fortescue and Captain F. Ponsonby
(Equerries), the Hon. Charlotte KnoUys (Lady in
Waiting), the Hon. Derek Keppel and Mrs. Keppel,
On arrival at the pier, the Queen, attired in a
tailor-made costume of black cloth, with embroidered
grey revers and French sailor hat, was the first to
land. The Princess foUowed,
The King, bronzed by the sun, and rapidly

THE KING AND QUEEN IN MONA 165
regaining strength after the dangerous operation
that had delayed the Coronation and menaced a
precious Ufe, was in high spirits. His hoUday dress
consisted of a Ught grey tweed suit, grey overcoat,
and bowler hat of like shade.
The Acting Governor tendered the island's
welcome, and the Queen graciously accepted several
gifts of flowers.
The King shook hands with Sir James GeU.
' It was very good of you,' said the King, ' to have
come such a long way last night.'
The King next greeted the Bishop. The Mayor
of Douglas was presented. His Majesty com
manded the Acting Governor, the Speaker, and a
certain other resident whose name and work are
associated with the life and romance of the island,
to join the excursion.
The visitors entered carriages in waiting. Coast-
guardsmen drew the vehicles down the pier.
Round the gates there was a frantic mass of people,
tourists trying to rival, if that were possible, the
islanders in the cordiality of their welcome to the
Lord and Lady of Man. The singing of the
National Anthem was lost in the ringing cheers.
Their Majesties showed every appreciation of
this great popular ovation. The King repeatedly

166 ISLE OF MAN
raised his hat, and the Queen bowed and smiled her
acknowledgments again and again.
In the midst of such a swaying, tumultuous
throng the horses were harnessed with no little
difficulty. Thus the royal picnic in Mona began
under the most happy auspices.
The route from the pier was via Waterloo Road
and Parliament Street into the country. There
after the road is a leafy archway for mUes, Giant
trees, protected from the fury of our winter gales,
thrive along this road as they thrive nowhere else
save in the heart of our glens.
Northward and westward the country lies like a
plain, broken on the skyline by such landmarks as
the campanile at Kirk Andreas and the promontory
on which stands the parish church of Jurby,
Southward we have an almost unbroken terrace
of hUls, aU a part of our central mountain group.
At certain points the hills rise from the roadway,
rugged and bare. Elsewhere they are clothed in
fern, and bracken, and gorse, and pine.
Past the ivy-mantled tower of Lezayre, over
Sulby Bridge (presenting a sharp turn, and a terror
of motorists speeding the other way), through the
newer Ballaugh village (the old village and the
beautiful and quaint old church, which no visitor

THE KING AND QUEEN IN MONA 167
should miss, lie a mile or so nearer the sea) and
over another narrow bridge to Kirk Michael,
At Bishopscourt a halt was made, and the King
and Queen made an inspection of the chapel and
ancient home of the Bishops of Manxland.
His Majesty assented to a photograph being
taken. ' There are two good folk one cannot escape if
one would,' said the King — ' the photographer and
the journaUst.'
The King smilingly took up a position, with the
Queen alone standing at his side. His Majesty,
however, desired his friends and guests to take
places on either hand. An interesting memento of
the King's visit has been thus preserved.
The drive was resumed, passing on the left the
White House, the old home of ' the Manx Diamond
King.' Mr. Mylchreest has left an imperishable
memory among his countrymen. He was essen
tially a man, in mere physical proportions not less
than boundless heart.
In the village of Kirk Michael, an incident
occurred, trifling in itself, but worthy of record
because it is typical of many like acts of kindly
instinct which must pass without remark.
A Uttle boy made an effort to throw a sprig of

168 ISLE OF MAN
white heather into the royal carriage. The little
chap failed, and regained possession of the precious
token which had cost him that morning no little
anxious search. The King stopped the carriage,
and the youngster handed up his tiny favour.
' Thank you very much, my boy,' said the King.
' This will bring me luck.'
At Peel, which was reached about two o'clock,
there was an impression that the King and Queen
would cross the harbour by the little ferry. The
carriages, however, were driven round by the
railway-station, over the bridge and along the
quay, under the hill, to the gates of the old
castle. Luncheon, sent on from the yacht, was set out
on a table in front of the nave of the tiny old
Cathedral, to the left of the guard-room. To the
list of guests already named or indicated there
must now be added Miss Gell and Miss Amy Gell,
daughters of the Acting Governor.
The King confesses his surprise that he has a
distinct Kingship in IVIan, and admits Norse
geography does not enable him to locate 'Sodor.'
Why are Judges in Mona called ' Deemsters '? Is
Tynwald a court of law or a Parliament, or do its
functions partake of both ? and is there any Norse

SULBY GLEN AND SNAEFELL

tzsi^yr ¦¦¦^MK'^.'v<'-!'f!.^&

THE KING AND QUEEN IN MONA 169
prototype of the ancient ceremony surviving to
this day ?
The Queen shows by her conversation that
through the medium of the printed page she is
already famUiar with a good deal of Manx lore,
character, and custom. Can she look into the
prison chamber beneath their feet ? But having
inspected the rather gruesome approach to the
subterranean vault, both the King and Queen
agree to take much for granted, and accept the
vivid description of Cashen, the custodian, without
question. Luncheon over, cigars are served. The King
asks the custodian of the old castle to talk in
Manx. Cashen gives some splendid examples of
the strong, rude, guttural accents of a dying speech.
He recounts some of the legends associated with
the historic islet. The custodian's humour is fresh
and irresistible, and the King is touched with
merriment. Cashen has his reward. Both King and Queen
favour him with their autographs, and the King
supplements this mark of appreciation by the gift
of a sovereign.
The Venerable Hugh S. GiU, the Archdeacon
of Man; Mr, Alfred N, Laughton, the High
22

170 ISLE OF MAN
Bailiff of Peel (both have rendered the community
long service in their different capacities) ; Lieutenant-
Colonel WilUam Freeth, the Chief of Police ; and
other presentations are made. Meanwhile the
Princess is busy taking a number of snapshots.
The royal party return to the carriages, and a
fresh start is made via St. John's and Greeba. At
the Quarter Bridge the turning to the left was
taken, in order that a halt might be made at
Cronkbourne ; this visit being interpreted as a
compliment to the Speaker, whose office is more or
less practicaUy in the gift of the people or their
elected representatives.
After tea the King and Queen inscribed their
names in the visitors' book, and resuming the drive,
traversed the chief streets of the upper town and
the whole length of the front — Woodbourne Road,
Buck's Road, Prospect HiU, and Victoria Street, to
the Loch Promenade — a cheering multitude lining
the entire route.
At the electric-car station at Derby Castle there
was a wholly inadequate body of police to cope
with the immense throng, and some of the less
easily recognized members of the yachting party
had no little difficulty in making their way through
the crush.

THE KING AND QUEEN IN MONA 171
At Ramsey the King expressed his delight with
Mona to one of the guests whose presence I have
indicated. ' I have found the island perfectly
beautiful,' said His Majesty, ' and most interesting
in every way.'
The same evening Mr. Chamberlain, writing from
the yacht by command of the King to the Acting
Governor, said : ' Their Majesties highly appreciate
the loyal welcome everywhere offered to them on
this the first occasion of their landing in Man, and
greatly admired the beauty of the scenery through
which they drove, the richness of the landscape,
and the healthy appearance of the inhabitants.'
The concluding act of the Sovereign was an
intimation of His Majesty's desire to include in the
Victorian Order, according to grade, the names of
those gentlemen who had so successfuUy made out
the arrangements for the holiday trip.
The visit forms a great episode in our history.
Not for 600 years had the supreme Ruler set foot
in Man. And how long before that — who can say ?

22—2

CHAPTER XXIII
the legend of the buggane
The story of our childhood was that the roofless
Church of St. Trinian, at the foot of Greeba
Mountain, was never dedicated to sacred uses by
the celebration of a single Mass. The Buggane
(Bhug-gaane, not Bog-gahne) was set at defiance
by rude workmen who, in quarrying for stone,
ruthlessly invaded his retreat on the mountain-side.
The Buggane arose in his wrath and vowed that
the building to which poor weak mortals had
set their hands would never be completed, and
that he would avenge the wanton invasion of his
home. The men said they were not to be intimidated,
and pretended that they did not care for the evU
threat. Did they not teU themselves that the
sacred uses of their handiwork rendered them im
mune from the Buggane's anger ? And, fortified
by strong liquors, they worked together quite fear
lessly at their task by day. Nothing, however,
172

THE LEGEND OF THE BUGGANE 173
would restrain them from making good their escape
ere came the faU of night.
The Buggane, from afar off, watched their work
in suUen silence ; then, when the walls were up, he
approached in the darkness, and at one point cast
all the stones down again, leaving the workmen to
begin the repair of the damage he hfd done on
their return next morning.
But one day, by rare diligence, the men got the
waUs aU up and the thatched roof completed, when,
with the oncoming of darkness, they hastened away.
That night the rain was faUing in heavy showers,
and a mighty vnnd was whistling through the
trees. Suddenly there was heard above the tumult
of faUing rain and whistUng wind a fierce, fiendish,
demoniacal laugh.
' Ha, ha, ha !'
It echoed and re-echoed along the valley, and
thundered up the sides of the hills, tUl it was lost in
the scudding clouds passing close overhead.
People rushed affrighted to their doors, and
neighbour sought explanation from neighbour.
Then they remembered the ugly foreboding of
the Buggane.
Lo ! it was true. He had fulfiUed his vow.
The Church of St. Trinian was roofless.

174 ISLE OF MAN
Everyone who remembered that bitter, angry
laugh ; everyone who saw the fragments of the
thatched roof swept like chaff before the storm,
across road and river, over meadow and ploughed
field, went back to his home stricken with terror.
' It was foolish,' they said, ' to make the Buggane
angry. It was wicked to desolate his home.'
But when daylight came the rain had ceased,
and the wind was no longer howUng ominously
under the thatch and in the trees ; then every man
laughed at his wife's fears, and every boy was
brave. 'Who but women make siUy chatter of the
Buggane V said the men.
' Who but nervous old grandmothers and Uttle
girls were afraid of the Buggane ?' said the boys
proudly. Once more the buUders made their thatch.
They sang gay songs to test their courage and
prove their indifference. AU the while they were
filled with the fear that the Buggane's anger might
be multipUed as they sought to repair the damage
he had done. This time the ropes of straw were
in double and treble strands. They bound the
thatch by many knots, and they cut heavy stone
pegs to make assurance doubly sure.

THE LEGEND OF THE BUGGANE 175
The Buggane looked on from his hiding in the
hill. He was amused to see all these redoubled
efforts to thwart his will. At night, when peace
lay over the valley, he strode down to his task.
The bands of straw broke like whipcord in his
hands. Then, with one supreme effort, he lifted
the roof bodily from its fastenings, and cast it in
one confused heap on the field below.
' Ha, ha, ha !' laughed the Buggane. ' Surely
they wUl not defy my anger once again,' he said,
as he went back to his cave in the mountain-side.
That fierce laugh was known to all. Men were
awakened from their rest ; children were startled
out of their sleep. Everybody knew what had
happened ; no one sought explanation from his
neighbour, ' The Buggane !' whispered the children in their
cots, as they clasped each other in a fond, protect
ing embrace, puUing as they did so the clothes
tight about the shoulder and neck,
' It is sinful to defy the Buggane,' said the
mother to her spouse, thinking harm might come
next to her children if the Buggane was not soon
pacified. Every man repented the evil to which he had
put his hand, but when daylight came again he

176 ISLE OF MAN
was ashamed to admit his repentance or confess his
fear. For a third time were the waUs built up and
the roof put on, and for a third time was the
thatch lifted from its fastenings and cast to the
ground. Then the people took counsel together.
' Who is this Buggane,' asked one, ' that he wiU
not let us complete the holy sanctuary ?'
' Whence comes his mighty power ?' queried
another. ' May we not kUl or maim the evU one ?' asked a
third. But it was easy to ask questions which have
bewildered men's minds for untold ages, easy to
ask when there was none to answer.
Had not the Buggane the gift of perpetual life ?
Did he not live in the days of our fathers and of
their fathers aforetime ? And would he not stiU Uve
when our little boys would be toothless, and gi'ey,
tottering old men ? It was not given to mere
mortals to kiU the Buggane. Who dare hazard
his life by attempting to maim a giant ?
Then up spoke Timothy the tailor, a man of
great sanctity. Schemes of revenge and personal
violence on the Buggane would surely fail, he said.

THE LEGEND OF THE BUGGANE 177
but he knew how to keep the roof on the walls of
the holy temple.
' How ? How ? TeU us, Timothy ?' cried many
voices. Timothy was flattered by the hubbub his words
had created, and way was made for him into the
midst of the bewildered group.
' Last night as I slept my beautiful guardian
angel came and whispered in my ear ; but though
I knew not she had come till she was gone, I
remember her words. " Go into the sanctuary,
Timothy," she said, " as soon as the roof is next
completed, and, seated within the chancel, make
there in aU haste a pair of breeches." '
A wave of impatient scorn passed over the faces
of the men.
' He trifles with us,' they said.
But Timothy heeded no interruption.
' " If thou art finished thy task," said the guardian
angel, " by the time the roof is lifted off, the Bug
gane wiU have lost his power of continuing this
revenge for ever." '
Many were disposed to scoff at Timothy, but he
held firmly to the truth of his story.
' Let the little tailor have his way,' said a crafty
man, who was greatly in the taUor's debt. ' If
23

178 ISLE OF MAN
Timothy succeeds,' he argued with his feUows, ' we
shall be happy ; if he dies by the mighty hand of the
Buggane, his blood be on his own head. Besides,
if he dies, we may thus appease the wrath of the
evil one.'
To Timothy, therefore, was assigned the task he
had so bravely claimed. When the appointed time
arrived, he proceeded to the church, and within the
chancel squatted, tailor-like, with his legs doubled
under him, with his work spread out over his knees.
He had long repented his foolhardiness, yet had
not dared to let one word of fear escape his lips.
Bright shafts of sunshine gave him courage,
however, and he worked in hot haste tUl the day
light failed. Then Timothy lit liis candle. To his
dismay, the grease spluttered meaningly as it was
reached by the flame, and gave little or no Ught.
Timothy's fear and anxiety were redoubled. ' The
candle will not burn ; surely some unholy spirit is
near,' thought Timothy, as he commenced his task
afresh. Suddenly there was a violent tremor of the earth,
and the candle burned low. The walls groaned
and the ground heaved ; the pavement floor broke
open a few yards in front of him, and, to Timothy's
horror, there arose out of the depths of the earth

THE LEGEND OF THE BUGGANE 179
the head of a mighty giant, whom the tailor knew
at once, though he had never seen so terrifying a
sight. ' The Buggane !' he said to himself, never daring
to let his eyes rest for a brief moment on that
mighty head, nor look into those eyes of rolling
fire. ' Man,' said the thunderous voice of the Buggane,
' do you see my great head V
' Yes, yes !' said the quaking tailor.
' My large eyes V continued the giant, rising up
by slow degrees.
' Yes, yes !' answered Timothy, but never daring
to glance at the terrifjdng embodiment of the evil
spirit before him.
' And my long teeth V said the giant, whose head
and shoulders were now clear above the ground.
' Yes, yes !' answered Timothy once more, bend
ing over his task with redoubled zeal.
There was an awful pause, in which the giant
figure was looming before him in steadily increasing
size. ' Man,' began the Buggane once more, ' do you
not see my great body, my strong arms, my large
hands, and my long nails V
' Yes, yes I' replied the tailor, in an agony of fear.
23—2

180 ISLE OF MAN
' And my great limbs ?'
' Yes, yes !'
' And my large feet ?'
' Yes, yes 1'
' And my  '
The mighty Buggane was now entirely risen from
the ground, when the tailor, drawing the needle
through the cloth for the last time, broke the thread,
dropped the needle, and threw the breeches on one
side. At that moment the giant made a grab at the
little man, but Timothy suddenly ducked his head,
raced down the nave, and escaped by the door.
The Buggane was surprised at the unexpected
agility of the little tailor. Down the path, over
the field, and into the curragh, Timothy fled with
the incredible haste of a hunted hare, the Buggane,
in great strides, following in hot pursuit.
But Timothy had jumped the river at one bound.
The Buggane could not follow. No evU spirit has
been known to cross water : the sea, a river, a lake,
or even a few drops sprinkled on the doorstep when
the dead has passed out to the fire or to interment
forming an effectual barrier against the return of
the ghostly presence. The giant yelled in bitter
anger and disappointment. Clasping his great head
between his two palms, the Buggane wrenched his

THE LEGEND OF THE BUGGANE 181
head from his shoulders and threw it violently at
the tailor.
The giant's head struck the stones of a wall on
the opposite bank, and burst with a terrific explosion
that shook the very earth,
Timothy, however, was safely over. With the
pride of a great hero, he told the story of his
adventure that night oft and oft again, adding a
little here, and glossing a little there, but never
a hint of fear did he admit.
Timothy has long since gone to his rest, but the
Buggane still lives on, though none can surely
point to his retreat at the foot of Greeba.
Headless ? Oh yes ; but old men say that two
small fiery eyes have grown just where his chin
used to rest on his breast. There is a siUy, flat
Uttle nose, which looks so absurd on the breastplate
of a giant ; but the mouth of the Buggane is like
a yawning cavern, while the flapping ears near the
armpits make up the ridiculous figure of the head
less giant.
Is the Buggane's spell broken ? Who can say,
for none there be who wiU incur again the risk of
the Buggane's anger by attempting to roof the old
walls of St. Trinian's.

CHAPTER XXIV
POINT OF AYRE
Ramsey is wholly distinct in its features from
Douglas. The two towns have nothing in common,
save that they are both hoUday resorts and are
both in the Isle of Man. There is nothing of the
swirl of excitement that belongs to mere crowds,
thronged promenades, and congested traffic.
Ramsey knows no more excitement on a week
day than is involved in securing an early copy of
an English morning newspaper just arrived by the
mail steamer, or getting a good seat in church on
Sunday morning.
Promenades are not thronged, and there is no
congestion, unless it should chance to be at the
baths on the sea-shore, where, immediately after
breakfast, aU and sundry meet to chatter, gossip,
drink tea, make ' eyes ' to-day and love to-morrow,
with the most amiable detachment.
Ramsey has the advantage of a multitude of
half-day excursions, of which the drive to Point of
Ayre Lighthouse, a distance of about eight mUes,
182

POINT OF AYRE 183
is only one. The route is via Bowring Road. We
pass St. Olave's Church on our right hand, and
note a turning to the left, by which we may later
return via Kirk Andreas. But, keeping a direct
course, we come to another good road branching off
to the right. It is easily distinguishable by a large
sign directing the visitor en route to the Ramsey
Hydro. This is the Bride Road, along which we
proceed without another turning until we reach the
village from which it takes its name.
Even when the island has its human freight of
tens of thousands arriving in one day, peace and
enjoyment may be found on this drive. Rabbits,
playing like kittens in the very roadway and in the
fields on either side, close up to the very hedge, and
the sandy hiUs above us, tell their own tale of
seclusion. Bride Church faces us as we descend a steep hill.
To the right of the porch wUl be found interesting
fragments of Runic crosses weU worthy of in
spection. Our route is now to the right, and then,
some distance farther on, through a gateway to the
left, with the lighthouse and aU the clean white-
limed cottages, engine-houses, etc., already in view.
There is no hedge ; we are driving along a path
laid down upon a veritable desert of shingle and

184 ISLE OF MAN
sand, over which, in the passage of ages, a thin
covering of soil has been spread.
Ages ago this land was covered by the sea. Now
it is a fragrant garden of pigmy gorse, purple
heather, and tiny flowers of delicate hue — a
veritable paradise for rabbits and bees.
The eternal winds of the sea sweep across this
low-lying territory without let or hindrance ; the
beat of the waves on the shingly beach is in our
ears ; the salt spray is on our lips. We are at the
end of our journey, the northernmost Umit of the
Isle of Man, the troubled waters of the ' Streeus '
(Strife) lying between us and the Scottish coast.
Having made shelter and provision for our
horses within these whitened waUs, we can first
note the distance of the light chamber from the
ground, some 100 feet (106 feet above the level of
high-water), and note its distinguishing feature by
day — two dark bands.
One of the keepers next conducts us to the top,
up the seemingly endless steps (there are 159 of
them), all spotlessly clean. Within the Ught
chamber, with its encasement of glass on all sides,
we note the amazingly heavy and complex
machinery required for a revolving beacon. Point
of Ayre shows, according to the navigator's chart.

THE BALLAUGH CURRAGH

POINT OF AYRE 185
a red and white light alternately, completing the
revolution every two minutes.
Tiny vent-holes are shown in the sides, and
opening a short heavy iron doorway, we step out,
with bent heads, on to a closely-railed balcony.
Wonderful views are obtained of land and sea. The
Mull of GaUoway is only twenty-one miles away,
and some points of the Scottish coast-line are nearer
stiU. Whitehaven is twenty-eight miles distant.
Tea in a keeper's cottage, a visit to the engine-
house of the fog-signalling apparatus, a thrill of
magnetic current, a short walk of 100 yards or so
to taste of the salt lake beneath our feet, by com
parison with which the salt on the dinner -table
seems saccharine itself, and we are ready for the
drive home.
The route (if time is stUl available) may be varied
at Bride, where the road to Andreas may be taken.
A glance at the road-map will soon show how this
extension may be made.
Thus may we be enabled to see something of the
crannogs, or lake-dwellings, of a very remote age,
and inspect at closer quarters the tall campanile
which, dominating the plain, does honour to the
present. Andreas, however, is entirely worthy of
an afternoon to itself. 24

CHAPTER XXV
WONDER STORIES
In the Isle of Man we have mermaids and mermen.
Late at night, when the moon is shining clear and
bright, we sometimes see them playing together
among the rocks or on the sandy beach. They
talk and laugh together quite merrUy, but dive into
the sea the instant any mere human ventures to
approach. One day a Manxman, thinking he might marry a
beautiful mermaid and make her very happy in his
little home in sight of the open sea, laid down a
great herring-net across rocks where he had seen
a certain lonely and beautiful creature make a
practice of coming to rest, combing her long shining
golden tresses as she sang her sad song in the cold
pale light.
He waited and watched in secret for the lady's
coming. Out of the water she raised herself, and,
taking her familiar place, began to comb her hair
and sing her plaintive song. 186

WONDER STORIES 187
The Manxman jerked the rope. The mermaid
was completely involved in the net. He ran to
secure his prize, and was enraptured. Her eyes
were like shining stars, her teeth were pearly white,
and her lips as tender as a rosebud. Her shoulders
were white and beautiful, but at the waist the soft
skin became silver scales.
Lifting her in his strong arms, he carried her to
his cottage. There he laid her gently on a couch,
and, giving her meat and drink, told her she would
be denied nothing in his home — nothing save her
Uberty. But the mermaid was unhappy. She would not
touch the food, and she refused to be comforted by
his endearments. Not a word escaped her lips ;
her eyes were fiUed with supplicating tears.
At the end of the third day fear seized the man.
Some terrible Ul-luck would surely befall his little
home, or maybe the island.
' Dear lady,' he said, ' if you wiU not wUlingly
share my home, I wUl not detain you another
instant : you are free.'
She raised herself from the couch, and away
she glided through the open door. In the water
close in shore, amid the rippUng waves of the
rising tide, there was a great company of friends
24—2

188 ISLE OF MAN
awaiting her coming. Great was the joy on her
return. ' What do you think of the people of the earth ?'
said one sprightly little mermaid, who thought she
would just love such an adventure on the dry land.
' Nothing very much,' was the reply, ' And —
would you believe it ?' she added teasingly — ' they
are so ignorant, so very ignorant, they throw away
the water in which they have boiled their eggs,'
But the mermaid was herself the wooer in another
instance. This time the Manxman, thinking that
the lady, as she passionately embraced him, was
going to draw him into the sea, struggled violently
to disengage himself, and then ran off. The lady
was indignant, and threw a stone after the retreat
ing figure. She returned to the water, whUe the
man sickened and died.
Another Manxman had no such fears of the sea.
Encased in leather and glass, he was let down
beneath the waves. He signalled for more and
more rope, until it was computed he had traveUed
below the surface of the sea twice the distance of
the moon from the earth. Then, having no more
rope, he was recalled to tell the wondrous tale of
the world hidden from our gaze : of great broad

WONDER STORIES 189
streets and squares, of tall buildings constructed
of mother-of-pearl, of tables made of amber, and
floors decorated with rubies, diamonds, and pearls.
It was a blissful realm, he said, but the happy
mermen and beautiful mermaids would hold no
converse with him. They hastened from his path,
affrighted at the sight of so monstrous a creature.
The Fenodyree is described as a satyr, and the
name is so used in the Manx Bible, in Isa. xxxiv. 14,
where the curious misspelling Phynnodderee is
adopted. The frequent misinterpretation is of a
fairy fallen from grace for his love of domestic bliss
with a Manx maiden who dwelt in a pretty secluded
glen. He is described as a something between a
man and the lower animal, having long black
shaggy hair and fiery eyes. But Fenodyree can
be an invaluable friend, saving crops and rescuing
sheep. As we say, ' This has not been a merry world
since Fenodyree lost his estate, his buried love, and
his long-lost fairy bower.'
This is all modern confusion. Fenodyree was a
giant and strong enough to thresh in a single night
with a flail what would require the labour of
several men.

CHAPTER XXVI
ANCIENT SAWS FOB, MODERN INSTANCES
' The sea feedeth more of the Manksmen than the
soU,' was the testimony of BlundeU, who was on
the island during the years 1648 to 1656. No
wonder, therefore, that the sea is responsible for
some striking phrases.
' It is better to be waiting on the crest of the
wave than on the churchyard stUe.' Proverbs, by
reason of their highly condensed form of imparting
human wisdom, are often open to widely dissimUar
explanation, and are very much a matter of in
dividual experience or idiosyncrasy ; but I am
tempted to explain that sometimes a fishing-boat
has to beat about in the rough sea, waiting for
the rise of the tide to reach the harbour. The
grumbling fisherman, impatient for his own fire
side, is reminded that his fate is not so bad as that
of the man who, in the language of the fo'c'sle,
' dead and boxed,' is awaiting formal interment.
' Life tQ man, death to fish,' is a popular toast.
190

ANCIENT SAWS FOR MODERN INSTANCES 191
Caution has many proverbs, of which the best
is : ' Bind as an enemy and you wUl hold as a
friend.' We also say : ' A wise man often makes
a friend of his enemy.'
Wanderers high up on the mountains came
upon a great stone, on which was engraved :
' Turn me over and thou wilt gather gain.'
Unable to move the immense boulder, and
beUeving the gain to be hidden gold, they sought
the aid of friends pledged first to secrecy, and next
to a modest proportion of the recovered treasure.
The great stone was overturned, and on its lower
surface was found a new legend :
' Hot broth softens hard bread.
Now turn me back into my former bed.'
I see this admittedly enigmatic sophism inter
preted to mean : ' A soft answer turneth away
wrath.' I never understood it to have any such
charitable meaning. Rather is it a subtle lesson
in the dignity of honest labour and contentment.
Otherwise all the irony of the situation is lost.
' Do not marry an heiress unless her father has
been hanged,' by which we imply that the woman
with an inheritance is an intolerable shrew in the

192 ISLE OF MAN
home, unless her famUy pride has suffered humUia-
tion at the hands of the executioner.
' Traa dy liooar I traa dy liooarf (Time enough!
time enough I) is perhaps the most common of all
our saws.
' A hasty man is seldom out of trouble.'
Of stolen kisses and other costly pleasures —
' Sweet to take, but bitter to pay.'
' No herring, no wedding,' means a promise to
wed is conditional on good fishing.
The scapegrace never pined for the love of a
woman, so we say : ' Black as is the raven, he'U get
a partner. ' A short courtship is the best courtship.'
' When a man wants a wife, he wants but a wife ;
but when he has a wife, he wants a great deal.'
' There are many twists in the nuptial song.'
Of the crafty lover wooing the portionless widow,
that he may better his position, we say : ' He's
going to the goat's house seeking wool.'
'Death never came without an excuse.'

BALLAUGH OLD CHURCH

CHAPTER XXVII
MANX BOOKS
Though Manx was the language of the people, we
have the remarkable fact that up to a period in the
seventeenth century no attempt was ever made
to set it down in writing. While Manx was the
language of the tongue, English was the language
of the pen.
Bishop Barrow — unaware apparently of the
existence of one translated work, the Prayer-Book
of Bishop Phillips, 1604— declared that up to 1663
nothing had ever been written or printed in Manx.
Further, ' Neither can any who speak it best write
to one another in it, having no character or letter
of it among them.'
' The Principles and Duties of Christianity,' by
Bishop Wilson, was the first work published in
the Manx language. 'Instructions, Directions,
and Prayers,' foUowed. During the succeeding
century there were various publications in the
native tongue. Chief among these is the Bible,
193 25

194 ISLE OF MAN
which was the great feature of Bishop Hildesley's
episcopate. In 1762 the Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge handed him £100 'for the purpose of
printing the Scriptures and other good books in the
Manks tongue.'
In the year following this grant there appeared
the following : ' Lewis's Catechism ' (translated by
the Rev. Henry Corlett), ' The Christian Monitor '
(translated by the Rev. Paul Crebbin), and
Bishop Wilson's ' Form of Prayer for the Herring
Fishing.' The first issue of the New Testament was com
menced in London. Then, for some reason, the con
clusion of the work was transferred to W. Shepherd,
a Whitehaven man, who had set up a printing-press
in Ramsey. The Epistles and Revelation were
issued by him in 1767, To Shepherd was also
entrusted a small edition of an entirely fresh
translation of the Book of Common Prayer
(1768). Bishop Hildesley did not gather subscriptions
for his enterprise without meeting discouragement
at home and rebuffs abroad. ' If I were not fraught
with full conviction of its utility, and with resolu
tion to pursue my undertaking, what with the

MANX BOOKS 195
coolness of its reception by some, and the actual
disapprobation of it by others, I should be so
discouraged as to give it up.'
The plain truth seems to have been that the
Bishop was feared for his ecclesiastical thunder —
and worse — rather than respected as a father-in-
God, by those who had earned his displeasure.
Marriages solemnized otherwise than according to
his rule were rendered ' null and void to aU Intents
and Purposes whatsoever.' By this Act of 1757 (the
natural corollary to Lord Hardwicke's Marriage
Act of 1753) the Church was virtually established
as supreme authority in marriage. Measures were
also adopted against those who were irregular in
their attendance at church, or did not make proper
preparation for Confirmation, whilst those who
yoked their cattle on saints' days. Ash Wednesday,
and Good Friday, were proper subjects for condign
punishment. Indeed, no one but a self-sufficing Bishop could
feel surprise if any considerable body of the Manx
people viewed with suspicion every enterprise that
promised to add prestige or authority to Bishops
court. Yet we find his lordship petulantly writing:
' This, I believe, is the only country in the world
25—2

196 ISLE OF MAN
that is ashamed of, and even inclined to extirpate,
if it could, its own native tongue.'
The Bishop persevered, however, in his purpose
of ' furnishing the Church of Mann (the only Church
in the Christian world destitute of them) with the
Divine oracles in the Vulgar Tongue,' though friends
across the water told him that the Isle of Man was
'nothing but a nest of smugglers,' and that we
could have ' no reUgion,'
The translations represented the learning of the
whole body of the Manx clergy. The chief burden
fell upon the Rev. Phillip Moore and John (after
wards Dr.) Kelly, both of whom fulfiUed their task
with no smaU measure of success, 'the beautiful
expression of the Manx ' being declared to be
' visible to every Celtick scholar.'
The work of revision and correction of the text
was begun by KeUy in 1768. By 1770 the Penta
teuch had been printed on a Whitehaven press.
Deuteronomy to Job inclusive, completing the
first volume, was issued in 1771. The second
volume, completing the old Testament, with a
portion of the Apocrypha, was ready in 1773, the
New Testament foUowing in 1775. A copy of
Bishop Hildesley's Bible is now worth about £2.
Thereafter the story of the printing-press in the

MANX BOOKS 197
Isle of Man is continued by the brothers Joseph
and Christopher Briscoe. The first named, setting
up business in Douglas, issued in 1783 a collection
of eighteen Acts of Tynwald, belonging to the
legislative years of 1776 and 1777. A key was
given to the elucidation of the text of the Acts !
The first Manx novel was either ' The Manks
Monastery, or the Loves of Belville and Julia,' by
Captain Thomas Ashe (a love-story of the realistic
order, to which the date of 1792 is assigned), or
' Literary Lovers,' a volume issued from the press
of Joseph Briscoe, and alluded to by Feltham in his
'Tour' (1798). The first is a scarce little book;
of the latter no copy is apparently extant.
There have been two Manx dictionaries —
Cregeen's (1835), with interleaves, now worth not
less than £l 5s. ; Kelly's, worth about 15s. The
market in scarce Manx books, plates, maps, etc., is,
London booksellers tell me, a rising one, owing to
the competition among collectors.
Passing from books memorable only because
they were printed and published in the Isle of Man
to those concerning the island — its history, scene,
life, legend, and so forth— I cannot even name aU
those worthy of recall stiU read or eagerly sought
by the collector. The reader must await the

198 ISLE OF MAN
bibliography now in preparation by Mr. John
Taylor, the librarian of the Douglas Free Library.
It wUl reveal great gaps in the coUection at the
British Museum, no less than in that of the
Douglas Corporation.
Sir Walter Scott never set foot in Man, but
he drew inspiration therefrom for both ' Guy
Mannering' and 'PeverU of the Peak,' altering,
admittedly, historic fact to suit his own high
purpose. The wreck of a vessel in the Calf Sound
was used by another master of romance in ' Arma
dale,' by Wilkie CoUins.
Of the many books which, proceeding from one
pen, have served in our own day to make the
island familiar and famous, it is neither fitting nor
necessary for me to say many words ; but some
record must be made, or my silence might be
misunderstood. Kinship with the author only serves to heighten
my pleasure and my pride. These stories, in aU
their variety of edition and translation, have
famiharized and endeared the land of Mona to
countless hosts of readers who have never set foot
on her soil. Tricks of speech, terse phrase, and
fragments of condensed wisdom peculiar to our
island, have been rendered as familiar to the

MANX BOOKS 199
tongue of the stranger and friend as only a lifelong
residence in our midst could otherwise have pro
duced. They have given to the Man islander, in
any company and in any land, a proud and distinc
tive niche among the nations of the earth.
For that service the Isle of Man is, in its heart
of hearts, no less grateful to the author than the
author is grateful to the Isle of Man, Each has
done well by the other.
The series began with ' The Deemster,' which is
not primarUy a love-story at aU. ' The Manxman '
fulfilled that condition. It has love, passion, and
pride for its central motif ; a weU-defined scene for
its setting, untrammelled by history or difficulties
of patois. ' The Manxman ' is the island, and to
the reader of that book I fear I have not been able
to present one fresh fact or Uluminating idea.
' The Christian ' is only partly Manx in scene.
' The Little Manx Nation ' is a coUection of three
lectures deUvered at the Royal Institute, Albemarle
Street. ' The Little Man Island ' was written at
the suggestion of Mr. John A. Mylrea, the Chair
man at the time of the Isle of Man Steam Packet
Company, through whose agency, and that of the
English raUway companies, the booklet has been
circulated everywhere.

200 ISLE OF MAN
There have been other works of mingled fact
and imagination having the Isle of Man for their
setting — some that would have stood a better
chance of finding wider favour had they dealt with
any other land than that which the public have
insisted on regarding as the exclusive domain of
one writer.
Mr. Hugh Coleman Davidson, in ' The Green
HiUs by the Sea,' deals with times when Castle
town was the centre of civU and military govern
ment. Mrs. A. E. Barr has a Manx background
in ' Feet of Clay.' Miss Norma Lorrimer has
achieved fame farther afield, but ' Mirry Ann '
shows that early days spent in the Isle of Man,
when the parental roof was at Mount Rule, were
days of unconscious study and inteUigent observa
tion. Mr, S. R. Crockett's 'The Raiders' revives aU
the movement and excitement of smuggling days.
The Rev. J. Quine, in ' The Captain of the Parish,
recalls the time when the Latter-Day Saints were
active propagandists of what is called JMormonism.
(In the hills between Rhenas and Little London the
pedestrian may be interested to observe the moss-
and grass -covered steps leading down to the
Mormon's baptismal pool. In a neighbouring

MANX BOOKS 201
mUl count was kept of every convert by a
notch cut in an old timber. Fifty yards lower
down, where two streams meet, there is a larger
and deeper pool. Here I recall more than one
refreshing plunge into the crystal stream without
any fear of disturbing the memories of Joseph
Smith or his missioners to the Manx.) Mr. Richard
Nicklin Hall has an attractive story and an Onchan
background in ' Gilbert Vince, Curate.'
Mr. W. J. Clucas Joughin, whose love and
knowledge of the island out of doors are above
all words of praise and appreciation, has revealed
a pen both plausible and compelling as a writer
for boys, young and old, in ' Gorry, Son of Orry '
and ' The People of the Caves,'
Of ' Manx Tales ' in the native dialect, those of
Mr, Egbert Rydings easily take the foremost
place. They are not merely vivid and true : they
have humour, no less than penetration, to recom
mend them to anyone in the least degree familiar
with our insular speech.
The Rev. T. E. Brown, son of a former Vicar of
Kirk Braddan, and Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford,
whose winsome personality is one of my most
fragrant memories, beginning long before he left
CUfton CoUege and ' retired ' to the Isle of Man,
26

202 ISLE OF MAN
is now with us a cult. But there was a day, and
that not long past, when his work was not read,
or, when read, was not understood.
Even those plain countryfolk who are whoUy
free from cant or affectation of any kind were dis
trustful. How could any man of high culture and
ripe scholarship speak to them in their own rude
speech unless he were a mimic or poking fun ?
Was Tom Brown conscious of offence ? Only
partly. A single reference wiU show (' Letters,' ii. 7).
But Mr. Brown loved the island, and all that
was of the island a part, with a love that was
sincere, single-hearted, and profound. And yet —
how can I confess it ? — the island never returned
that love in the same overflowing measure : never,
at all events, until it was too late to cheer the
angel spirit that had passed from our midst, and
its visible tabernacle had found a last resting-place
in, to us, an alien land.
No one can presume to even a nodding acquaint
anceship with the literature of our island without
knowing Tom Brown — letters no less than poems.
^'\'^as it not the Spectator which said, on the death
of the author of ' Fo'c'sle Yarns,' ' Not so great
a poet as Browning or Tennyson, but a greater
story-teller in verse than either '?

MANX BOOKS 203
Brown was in his own person, no less than in his
poetry, an exposition of the island, its life, and all
its varied idiosyncrasy. Nowhere can I find more
of the man — the real man and all of him, scholar as
weU as humorist — than in his ' Letters.' For a
personal picture let the reader turn to Brown's
eulogy of another (ii. 240-5). It is Brown as truly
as Archdeacon Moore, Lastly, as a witness to the
ages in which his honour will grow, we shall soon
see on Kirk Maughold Head a beacon to his
memory — not a tribute to one close literary and
personal comradeship merely (though it wUl in
evitably be that first), but a tribute to one whose
name and work the island will not soon let die, even
though both should be momentarUy imperilled by
the cloying, effervescing enthusiasm of a cult.
Tom Brown's brother, the Rev. Hugh Stowell
Brown, was by some unhappy chance lost to the
Church in Man by the ineptitude of a Bishop. He
was the Spurgeon of the North of England, where,
towards the end of an entirely useful and honour
able career, one of his lieutenants at a little branch
church near St. Helens, in Lancashire, was the
brUliant- minded, silver-tongued Rev. Charles F.
Aked, now of Fifth Avenue Baptist Church, New
York, and his organist, a master of melody, was
26—2

204 ISLE OF MAN
Mr, W. H, Jude, whose songs are so widely
known. Once Mr, Brown gave a Manx audience in
Liverpool more keen thrusts than were either true
or fair. My remembrances, however, are only those
of a boy, but I recall the striking John BuUish per
sonality and the gruff exterior that was the armour
of a tender heart. He gave me a copy of Bunyan
— the model, I believe, of much of his own terse,
vigorous and eloquent speech, as may be gathered
by any reader who cares to turn up his ' Lectures
to Working Men,' or his 'Autobiography,' edited by
W. S. Caine, M.P., who was, as a result of Brown's
two marriages, both brother-in-law and son-in-law.
Miss Agnes Herbert's bright and vivacious volume,
' Isle of INIan,' so called after the manner of a raUway
announcement, a statistical abstract or a mere guide
book, occupies a distinct place in INlanx literature.
She writes with the inteUigence of a traveUer — the
generous instincts of a woman of culture and refine
ment. Why will she not be more serious ?
And this is my last tribute. I never heard on the
Island any but words of praise of Miss Herbert and
her work. In a community so largely Celtic, and there
fore so slow to praise, so quick to belittle what it can
either not realize or not imitate, this is praise indeed.

CHAPTER XXVIII
MANX HISTORIES
The somewhat cynical observation of Dr. Johnson
that ' all history, so far as it is not supplied by
contemporary evidence, is romance,' derives no
little confirmation from an examination of Manx
histories. The question as to the identity of Mona was
responsible for some confusion. If we assume that
Cffisar meant the Isle of Man and that Tacitus
meant Anglesey, there were other writers who
meant both, under the impression that they were
one and the same.
I have not been led, however, to enter upon any
purposeless discussion of a problem that was thread
bare even in 1702, the date of the appearance of
' A Short Dissertation,' etc, by ' Mr, Thomas
Brown, Address'd in a Letter to his learned friend
Mr, A. Sellars,' supplementing 'An Account,' by
' Wm. Sacheverell, Esq., late Governour of Man.'
We constantly speak of our land as ' Mona's Isle.'
205

206 ISLE OF MAN
Mona is the sweetest and most acceptable name
for a Manx girl. If that is not proof of identity, I
can claim it as a token of affection, only to be
excelled by the fact that our Manx fleet is never
without a Mona, Mona's Isle, or Mona's Queen.
Joseph Train, in his ' Historical and Statistical
Account' (1845), gave us, as a result of this con
fusion of names, an entire line of Welsh Kings to
whom we have no shadow of claim. His book
cannot be passed over on that account. It prob
ably ranks as the next most considerable story of
the island following upon George Waldron's scarce
volume, ' A Description ' (1731).
All recent historians have worked under the
Buggane-ish, awe-inspiring shadow of an avenging
sword wielded by the Rev. TheophUus Talbot, a
close student of our history, shrewd, learned, and
profoundly earnest.
Mr. Talbot began life as a Wesleyan minister.
He was a hot-tempered man, and did not readily
yield obedience to authority, particularly when that
authority was in the hands of a man less intellectu
ally gifted than himself. He soon broke away from
his superintendent, and retired from the Connexion.
Taking Orders in the Church of England, he became
curate at St. Olave's in Ramsey, then a chapel of

MANX HISTORIES 207
ease to the parish church of Lezayre ; but, reUeved
from the pressure of earning his daily bread, he
erelong established himself at Douglas, devoting
himself to study, chiefly of Manx history and
geology. He estabUshed himself also — and this is
more to my present purpose — as a veritable terror
to the historian who, yielding to grievous tempta
tion, put forth idle fable as fact.
He laboured under no Ulusions, and he had no
fears or preferences. His knife was as keen and
far-reaching as that of Father Time himself Mere
dignity could not redeem falsity. Our island story
fell before the reaper Uke so much ripe corn. Every
treasured anecdote seemed, when Mr, Talbot was
done, to be founded on misconception or error, and
every celebrated figure fondly linked to our history
was shown never to have set foot on our isle.
Indeed, the wonder is that we have any island
story left at all.
Sir Spencer Walpole, who was Lieutenant-
Governor during the years 1882 to 1893, pubUshed
in the latter year ' The Land of Home Rule : an
Essay on the History and Constitution of the Isle of
Man,' The object was, of course, to give a fillip to
Mr. Gladstone's Irish proposals, by showing that
Home Rule was not such a terrible Buggane after

208 ISLE OF MAN
all, and that it represented neither a danger nor an
innovation, Mr. Gladstone's conversion to the principle of
Home Rule may have been the unconscious in
cident of his visit in 1878, a supposition that does
not necessarily rest upon extracts from pubUc
speeches. It was not political antagonism, however,
that brought Mr. Talbot into the arena. He arose
in his anger, and in the columns of the Manx Sun
poured forth week after week the vials of his
wrath. What, he asked, were we to think of Mr.
Walpole's ' curious manner and method of writing
history ' ? of ' the worse than worthless character
of what he puts forth as history and historical
criticism, and the utter unseemliness, on the
ground of his lacking both inteUigence and in
tegrity, of his posing either as an historian or
historical critic V
Mr. (afterwards Sir Spencer) Walpole had
lamented the lack of early information and the
unreliable character of much of the evidence which
he could not disprove. The Re^ . TheophUus Talbot
regarded this as so much subterfuge, which must
be promptly exposed. Documents were examined
and retranslated ; authorities were quoted ; and,
truth to say, no point was made against Mr.

POINT OF AYRE

MANX HISTORIES 209
Walpole that was not liberally supported by
evidence. Our historical fabric shows signs of
crumbling at all points.
Mr. A. W. Moore has shown very praiseworthy
industry in the collection of material for Manx
history. He has contributed to the series of
' Diocesan Histories ' the Uttle volume dealing
with 'Sodor and Man' (1893), the substance of
which (and often the words) may be found in his
larger work, ' A History of the Isle of Man ' (1900).
It was, however, a mere fragment of historical
work that brought Mr. Talbot from his lair to
speak in what he called ' restrained terms ' of Mr.
Moore's ' history ' as ' largely consisting of guess,
fable, and invention.'
A mere lecture on Peel Castle by a local divine
was sufficient to stir Mr. Talbot to the very depths
of his soul. His righteous anger could barely pause
to find coherent expression on paper. This time,
however, the old war-horse might hear the bugle-
caU, but had not the physical strength to enter the
fray. Now that Mr. Talbot has gone, we are enabled
to realize that, despite all the unmeasured and un
reasonable invective which he called to his aid, he
has rendered a great service to the cause of truth.
27

210 ISLE OF MAN
Let us not judge too harshly if a bludgeon was
used where a rapier would have done as well.
Mr. Walpole received his rebukes in silence, and
Mr. Moore, bearing no grudge, has opened an
exhibition of the critic's literary and geological
treasures ! The fact is that in the Isle of Man
we use hard words without always attaching to
them the full significance they bear on the Ups
of the Englishman ; that in death we forgive our
worst enemy, attend his funeral, and sing hymns
over his body — partly as an act of atonement for
our share in the quarrel, partly as an act of pardon,
gathering much flattering unction to our souls
thereby. We can be very bad friends ; we are
positively superb at funerals.
The pamphlets of Mr, Talbot, in which he so
ruthlessly laid bare the sins of omission and com
mission of our historians, are now unobtainable,
while the books he attacked stUl find a place on
the booksellers' shelves. The remembrance of
these old controi'ersies reminds one that in the
Isle of Man, as in England, there are depraved
people who delight in reading an ill-natured review,
who positively revel in the spectacle of idols in
fragments at their feet. The larger public has a
heart above all petty spite, and grows weary of the

MANX HISTORIES 211
worker who, with all his earnestness and good
intent, is always a destroying agent, and never a
builder. Mv. Talbot is fairly so described, and
there inevitably came a time when his violent
fulminations were passed over unread.
Mr. Walpole's ' Land of Home Rule ' is a sound
and able piece of work, entirely worthy of a place
beside his larger historical study of England. It
has lucidity and decision and vigorous expression.
Mr. Moore's more ambitious work is exhaustive and
dry. It strikes me as a painstaking work, full of
useful material, but wholly uninspired in treatment,
lacking aU dramatic presentment of moving scene
and decision — as a work, in short, that somehow
feU into the hands of the printer at the very
moment the literary hand should have commenced
its task.
Mr. G. W. Wood, who has already figured as
a writer of a few fragments of Manx history, has
made in London a collection of Manx books,
manuscripts, maps, prints, etc., of unrivaUed com
pleteness. If he does not find himself positively
submerged in data, we shaU one day have another
history, upon which even the shadow of the sword
of Damocles may not fall. 27—2

CHAPTER XXIX
THE NEWSPAPER PRESS
The first newspaper pubUshed in the island was
the Manks Mercury and Briscoe's Douglas
Advertiser, which Christopher Briscoe started on
November 27, 1792, 'Price 2d. British' — the
English shUling being equal to the fourteen Manx
pennies then in circulation. The Briscoes also
printed a coUection of Manx hymns (1795).
A Manx printer whose name was destined to
be known among navigating officers in the farther
most corners of the earth was George Jefferson,
who on August 8, 1801, started the Manx
Advertiser. In the same year a rival printer,
Thomas Whittam, issued his Manks Almanack
for 1802. In after-years this publication passed
through various changes of fortune. For successive
seasons the Almanac was issued respectively by
the Phcenix Press, the office of the True Manx
man, and the office of the Rising Sun. In 1825
it became the property of Jefferson. In 1833
212

THE NEWSPAPER PRESS 213
J. Quiggin began his opposition Almanack and
Tide-Table; but in 1851 this was merged into
Jefferson's venture, and 'Jefferson's' it remains
to-day, a tide-table authority to every captain in
the merchant service.
The Rising Sun, or Mona's Herald, was first
published on AprU 24, 1821, In December, 1824,
the title was altered to the Manx Rising Sun.
In April, 1826, another alteration was made. As
the Manx Sun it continued its independent
existence until October 27, 1906, when it was
merged in the Isle of Man Weekly Times. The
Mona's Herald dates from 1833, when it was ' Price
3d. British.'
The press in the Isle of Man enjoyed from 1834
two unique privileges: (1) exemption from stamp
duty, and (2) free postage.
It would be impossible for me to record all the
tiny sheets and broadsides that appeared in the
guise of newspapers during the period following
upon the Act of 1834. Oddfellows, Irish Nation
alists, temperance advocates, religious enthusiasts,
and other propagandists whose real aim was to
influence, not our regeneration, but opinion in
England, Ireland, or elsewhere, printed their news
papers in Douglas, and issued them to the public

214 ISLE OF MAN
through the medium of the insular post. About
the year 1845 there were probably not fewer than
300 printers in the town, a number totally out of
proportion to the needs of a small watering-place,
or of the island as a whole.
Mr. James Brown came from the office of the
Liverpool Mercury, where he had been a com
positor, and joined the merry party of printers with
two such remarkable privileges at their command.
Ultimately, zeal for the pubUc purse and internal
jealousy led Sir John Bowring, Mr. Robert
Faragher (the editor of the Mona's Herald), and
others, to make representations to the Imperial
authorities. Free postage became in 1848 by
Imperial enactment a thing of the past so far as
Great Britain and Ireland were concerned. But
the unique privilege was retained for some years
by those newspaper proprietors or societies whose
field of operation was either a British colony or
certain Continental countries — France, Belgium, or
Spain. The Manx Lion, a four-page demy foUo, was
printed by Mr. Brown on a wooden hand-press.
The lively Lion came to an end when the advertise
ment manager decamped with the bulk of the
funds. Brown's Adve?'tising Circular soon began

THE NEWSPAPER PRESS 215
its career, enlisting the aid of Mr. Livesey, the
great temperance advocate, subsequently editor of
the Preston Guardian, and other residents gifted
with the pen.
On May 4, 1861, the Circular was merged into a
new publication, called the Isle of Man Weekly
Times. The new Times had no relation to the
Times started by Messrs. Sherreff and Russell in
1846, notwithstanding the statement of authorities
to the contrary. The earlier Times had ceased
publication one or more years when Mr. Brown
appropriated the title.
The new paper went through some exciting
experiences in the early part of its career, and often
only narrowly escaped the attentions of the coroner,
who on our island is the counterpart of the Sheriffs
officer in England, fulfilling duties that present a
curious and interesting relic of a once powerful
official. But within three years a golden oppor
tunity arrived.
In 1864 the Town Commissioners of Douglas,
elected on a popular franchise, asked for powers to
effect certain improvements. The self- elected
Keys were very contemptuous, and they even
forgot their manners and became abusive. They
said the Commissioners were ' mere tradesmen '

216 ISLE OF MAN
who were ' usurping ' the government of the town,
that they ought to be called ' Governors,' and that
the brow of the chief of them should be sur
mounted by a diadem as a visible token of his
kingship. Still more foolish chatter was indulged in. One
Key, in a fit of confidence, disclosed his conviction
that the Commissioners might be allowed to have
' control of the donkeys on the sand,' a remark
which the Isle of Man Times said ' elicited
marks of approval from all the donkeys round
him.' Perhaps Mr. Brown's language was no more
excusable than that of the Keys, but in those days
controversialists did not mince their words, and the
Times retaliated on the Keys in their own broad
way, and told the rude gentry to go to the people
for their election before they presumed to speak
with authority.
Mr. Brown was summoned to the bar of the
House for his contempt, and, by some oversight,
the Keys, sitting in the discharge of their legisla
tive functions, sentenced the offender to a definite
period of six months' imprisonment. The island
was cast into quite a ferment. Appeal was made
to the Court of Queen's Bench, which, on a review

THE CALF OF MAN FROM SPANISH HEAD

THE NEWSPAPER PRESS 217
of musty law and ancient precedent, found that the
Legislature had no such power as they had claimed
and put into practice. On a writ of habeas corpus,
Mr. Brown's immediate release was ordered.
But Mr. Brown, taken to Castle Rushen by
force, declared that he must be expeUed from his
prison-ceU by force. What humorous confusion
would next have arisen had he chosen to remain
we cannot tell. He spent another Sunday in gaol
(six weeks and five days in aU), and on Monday he
reached Douglas, a great popular hero and martjrr,
with the fortunes of his paper estabUshed, and the
further consolation of substantial damages already
in sight.
Mr. John A. Brown was his father's right-hand
man in aU these tribulations and triumphs, and
succeeded to the editorship after Thomas John
Ouseley had led everybody a pretty dance with his
Uterary pranks as ' Paul Pry in Douglas.'
Ouseley was a remarkable man, with great gifts
but sad deficiencies. As a journalist at Shrews
bury he had the luck to faU in with Disraeli, who,
seemingly, was attracted by the genius, enthusiasm,
and fidelity of the man.
Disraeli never forgot a friend, and even when in
Douglas, Ouseley, as poet, prose-writer, and man,
28

218 ISLE OF MAN
was disappointing everybody, practising a liberty
that knew neither satiety nor restraint, and earning
by his editorship a mere pittance of thirty shillings
a week, the statesman who was steadily rising to
dazzling heights of fame and power never failed to
write in the journalist's hours of sickness or depres
sion words of comfort and good cheer. Ouseley is
one of those instances which convince me that the
newspaper press is a vast engine of destruction,
and that it has sapped more genius than it has ever
produced or discovered.
The Isle of Man Examiner, sometimes described,
but no longer appropriately either in essence or
limitation, as the organ of militant Nonconformity,
which Mr. S. K. Broadbent conducts with such
percipiency and success, belongs to 1880. Mr.
Broadbent would tell us that the Examiner has
fulfilled its pioneer work, and that it is now frankly
Progressive and Liberal, though neither term has,
in my judgement, any real significance on the island.
The Isle of Man Daily Times was started in 1897.
There have been innumerable other attempts
at periodical publications, such as the Gazette,
Standard, Star, Telegraph, Manxman, and Punch.
In 1824 we had a Manks Patriot ; since 1906 we
have had a newer Manx Patriot — and a bitter thorn

THE NEWSPAPER PRESS 219
he has proved in the side of presumption and
pretence. The Ramsey Courier, Mr, A. H, Teare's valiant
champion of the claims of the North, commenced
in 1884, The Peel City Guardian belongs to
December, 1882, In March, 1891, Mr. Palmer
began his Chronicle as a special advocate of the
candidature for the House of Keys of Mr. Joseph
Mylchreest, the Manx ' Diamond King,' newly
returned to his native isle. By January 26, 1895,
the Chronicle had absorbed the Guardian, but the
older title was retained in the amalgamation.
The latest addition to serial issues is the Manx
Quarterly (1908), a publication of present interest
and permanent value. No one busying himself
with the portentous affairs of our little island or
interested in our history (or the many idle tales
that pass as such) can neglect so invaluable a
repository of speculation and information.

28—2

CHAPTER XXX
A NIGHT ON THE CALF
' The desolate island caUed the Calf of Man ' was
once the retreat of a man named Bushel, who was
a sort of appendage of the great Lord Bacon.
When Bacon died, Bushel's mining speculations
were beyond hope, and Bushel himself was a ruined
man. It was then that Bushel bethought himself of the
Calf. ' In obedience to my dear lord's philosophical
advice,' Bushel resolved to test his repentance of
his ' former debauchedness ' by leading a life of
self-abnegation, subsisting on ' herbs, oU, mustard,
and honey, with water sufficient.' The old legend
was revived : ' The DevU was sick ; the Devil a
saint would be.'
Certain old guides give descriptions of ' Bushel's
grave,' but it is doubtful if this is an5rthing more
than the site of an ancient post of observation in
days when the Calf had some strategic value.
Relics of a remoter past, however, have been dis-
220

A NIGHT ON THE CALF 221
covered. One of these is sometimes described as a
coffin-lid. It is a stone fragment, bearing engraved
figures and symbols, of which it would be hazardous
to attempt an interpretation.
The Calf Island was for long years the property
of the Stevensons of Balladoole, in Arbory, In
1643 James, seventh Earl of Derby, secured it by
an exchange of Intack lands {in-take lands from
the commons) in the parish of Lezayre, known as
Close Chairn, or The Lord's Close. The Earl
further agreed to render the Stevensons 5,000
puffins annually.
The Lord's interests passed to the British Crown
at the purchase of the rights of sovereignty fr-om
the Duke of Athole in 1765.
The Crown next appeared as sellers, and the
Calf was bought at public auction in the Douglas
Market-Place by Sir George Drinkwater. By the
marriage of the daughter of the latter the island
passed into the possession of Colonel Carey,
whose successor is the present holder — and, maybe,
seUer. The lonely land has an interest, a history, and a
beauty peculiarly its own. I have made the islet
my home for a week at a time, and nowhere in the
wide world have I experienced, within the space of

ISLE OF MAN
one week, a tonic so refreshing to health, spirits,
and imagination.
Any visitor with the leisure and taste for such a
holiday should endeavour to stay at least a night
or a week — a month, if time aUows. The Calf is
unique. The atmosphere is as dustless as on the
deck of a ship in mid- Atlantic. As an antidote to
hay-fever or ailments of the throat and nose it is
a priceless boon. As a relief to sleeplessness and
tired nerves it is without a rival.
The islet lies to the south of the Isle of Man,
and is separated from the main island by two
narrow but dangerous channels, known as The
Sound and The Little Sound. The distance be
tween the two islands cannot be more than a
quarter of a mile, and in the height of the season,
when the weather is favourable, boatmen wiU row
visitors across this narrow streak for a shiUing per
head. The passage, however, is encumbered with rocks,
each of which has its own tale of disaster to tell.
Tidal currents meet, and on fine days a distinct
line of ruffled water marks the place, presenting
the strange phenomenon — the sea at two levels.
But there are many days when strong north-west
winds prevail, and it becomes a hazardous — nay.

A NIGHT ON THE CALF 223
a foolhardy — experiment to attempt to reach the
Calf at all. The tide rushes through these narrow
passages with great velocity, eight, or ten or more
miles an hour, breaking in wild fury upon jagged
rocks and hidden shoals. Under no circumstances*
therefore, should the trip be made without the aid
of skUled seamen thoroughly familiar with these
treacherous cross-currents.
The lessee of the Calf Island is Mr. Thomas
Clague, who lives at Port St. Mary. With him
arrangements should be made. Take train from
Douglas to Port St, Mary, Here Mr, Clague wUl
find fishermen who will row or sail over to the Calf
for about eight shiUings.
If the boat is smaU and the tide favourable, the
fishermen will take visitors through the Chasms,
adding thereby one more delightful experience to
an altogether delightful holiday. We pass under
KaUow Point and cross Perwick Bay. Rounding
the Sugar-Loaf Rock (of which every photographer
is eager to secure a plate), we enter Stacka Bay,
vdth Black Head marking its western boundary.
The coast-line is an unbroken series of mountainous
cUffs. Spanish Head is the southernmost point of the
Isle of Man. Doubt is sometimes cast upon the

224 ISLE OF MAN
legend that any of the ships of the Spanish Armada
were wrecked here in 1588. It is pointed out that
Speed's map, ' only seven years later than the date
of the Armada,' gives this headland as Spaloret.
' Spanish Head is evidently a corruption of that
name.' Passing the slip regarding the date of
Speed's map, I am tempted to observe, as Max
Miiller has wittily put it, ' sound etymology has
nothing to do with sound.' It is not conclusive
evidence by any means, but I have seen an old
carved chest presumed to be made from the timbers
of the ill-fated vessel that struck here, and afford
ing some proof of authenticity.
Between the main island and the tiny rocky
islet Kitterland — so called after one of our adven
turous Norse ancestors, of whom various strange
tales are told — is the narrow passage known as
The Little Sound. At low- water hardly more
than fifty yards separate island from islet.
Between Kitterland and the Calf Island is the
more considerable passage known as the Calf
Sound, four or five times as broad as its namesake.
The Thotisla Rock, which stands midway in this
channel, is a mere rock, hardly larger than a dining-
table, and is visible only at low-water. It has its
own tale of sorrow.

A NIGHT ON THE CALF 225
The Calf Island is faced on every side by steep
cliffs. A landing may be made at Cow Harbour,
on the north coast, directly opposite the Thoiisla
Rock. There is a road up to the farmhouse, and
thence on to the two disused lighthouses, which
stand in a line directly facing the Chickens.
Visitors are received at the farm and in the lower
of the two lighthouses. Choosing the lighthouse,
and mounting the circular staircase, and, lastly, the
ladder to the old light-chamber, a glorious view
may be obtained of islet and sea. The Mull Hills,
with the little vUlage of Cregneesh (as well as one
of the historic stone circles in this neighbourhood)
perched on the side, and facing the eternal sun, are
nearest at hand. Beyond, there rises Bradda Head.
SUeu Carnane, Cronk-ny-Arrey Lhaa, and South
Barrule. More westward we have a glimpse of the
Niarbyl and Contrary Head, with Corrin's Tower
on the saddle of the round- backed horse.
When darkness has come down upon the scene,
and the only iUumination is the fitful glare of the
new Chickens Lighthouse in the sea, it is a weird
and strange experience to see big ships, chiefly
those from Canada, taking from the St. Lawrence
the North of Ireland route to the Mersey, come up
out of the darkness, and, rounding this rock at close
29

226 ISLE OF MAN
quarters, pass from us into oblivion without a
sound. In the daytime there are other vessels — coasting
steamers, colliers, and the like — making this point
at almost a stone's-throw. Jack afloat, like Jack
ashore, woman-lover always, does not mind ex
changing playful signals with the ladies of the party.
But to know the Calf in its impressionist mood
one must be up betimes — four o'clock — on an
autumn morning. The opening of doors, the
shuffling of the dog as he rises and shakes himself
free of his sleepy self, our own footfaU, reverberate
along the stone-paved passage and up the chilly
stairway. The whole place fUls one's imagination
with the oppression of a tomb, from which one
must instantly seek deliverance into the open air.
Steal out into the darkness. Not a gleam of
breaking day has shown its first pale cold light on
the horizon ; the wind sighs round the house with
mournful insistence; the sea looks sombre, heart
less, and cruel ; and the flashing light of the beacon
in the sea only serves to cast a ghostly glamour on
every object it gathers in its far-reaching sweep.
Soon the light on the horizon grows brighter, and
the sun clothes the whole scene with reaUty and
refreshing warmth. Another day has begun.

A NIGHT ON THE CALF 227
A simple experience admittedly, but one not
easUy outmatched, so far as I know, save on the
bridge of a ship in mid-ocean at break of day.
The islet is barely more than a mile and a half
across at any point, or, roughly speaking, some
five miles in circumference. The surface is
pleasantly undulating. Swept by the full force of
every wind that blows, there is not within my
remembrance a single tree on the island, if I except
a struggling stem that gathers courage in the pro
tecting shield of the farmhouse.
The population consisted at the time of my
visit of the shepherd, his wife and daughter, and
two farm-servants.
Two men and a maid on a desolate island !
What story might not be evolved ? WiUiam
Black used to say the stories were not all told, and
that whUe two men and a maid were left on the
earth the novelist had aU the essential materials
for the exercise of his craft. Then I leave the
reader to pick up the threads of my lost romance.
There are a few fields under cultivation within
sight of the windows of the farmhouse. Cattle are
reared for the island market, and outside the fencing
there is ideal pasturage for a considerable flock of
sheep. Most of the islet is overrun with rabbits,
29—2

228 ISLE OF MAN
which may be numbered, seemingly, by the ten
thousand. I found the rabbits coy and keenly aUve to sound
and smell, requiring as much stalking almost as
deer. But life on the Calf is close to the conditions
of primitive Nature. Days begin at sunrise, and
close an hour or two after sunset. The rabbit
affords excuse for long hours spent in the open,
resting at full length on the grass, and shielded by
some friendly gorse-bush or large boulder.
If shooting is the one objective, walk through
the tall bracken. Every twenty or thirty yards
there is a patch of open green lawn, and never a
one may be encountered without sighting a rabbit
as he darts across the gun.
The rabbits are in the grass, they are in the
midst of the bracken, they are among the rocks —
they are everjrwhere. On the cliffs, looking down
to the shining sapphire sea, more rabbits may be
shot than can be safely secured. Leave the place
for an hour. A myriad birds wiU digest the meal,
and not leave a scrap of fur to teU the tale of their
repast. If the reader is a candidate for shooting honours,
let him bring a silent-cartridge magazine-rifle, and
try his skill with rabbits as they gambol at distances

A NIGHT ON THE CALF 229
of 250 yards. Or, for variety, let him match his
wiles with the wild-duck as they settle about a
small lake in the centre of the islet.
These are the features of the sport on the Calf as
I have encountered them.
Of the restfulness of the place what can I say ?
No letters or telegrams (unless you give the fisher
men directions to leave all such at Cow Harbour) ;
no shrieking trains ; no racing motors to leave you in
clouds of choking dust ; no newspapers ; no parsons,
poUcemen, or publicans ; no taxes and no laws — no
anything at all, except the air of heaven and the
food of man in plain but rich abundance.
In a word, Utopia — with a return ticket !

INDEX

Advertising, the Government
Board of, 136
Africa, West, legends of, 152-53
Aked, Rev. Charles P., 203-4
Albert Edward, Prince Consort, in
Mona, 163
Albert Tower, the, 163
Alexander III. of Scotland, 60
Alexandra, Queen, in Mona, 160-
71
Al-thing, the, 51
Andreas, Kirk, 183, 185; the cam
panile, 166
Anglesey, 7
Arbory, 221
Argid, the, 13
Armada, the, relics, 223-24
Arran Island, 56
Ashe, Captain Thomas, author of
the first Manx novel, 197
Athole, James, second Duke of,
63, 82 ; John, third Duke of,
compact with the English
Government, 82, 83, 103, 221 ;
fourth Duke of, becomes Gover
nor, 85, 162
Awin Argid, the, 13
Awin Dhoo, the, 11
Awin-Glass, the, 11
Ayre, see Point of
Bacon, Lord, 220
Ballaglass Glen, 144-45
BaUajora, 145, 147
Ballaugh, 6, 9, 144
Ballaugh, village of, 166-67
BaUure Glen, 132
Bank of Mona, 127
Bank's Howe, 162
Baptist Chapel, Fifth Avenue,
New York, 204
Barony HiU, 143

Barr, Mrs. A. E., ' Feet of Clay,'
200
Barrow, Bishop, quoted, 193
Barrows, 16
Basques, the, and the Manx,
18
'Beautiful White Devil,' legend
of the, 151-59
Bede, cited, 34, 43
Belfast Lough, 141
Bible, the, in Manx, 193-96
Big Wheel, Laxey, 140
Bishopscourt, 68, 71 ; visit of the
King and Queen, 167
Bishops, St. Patrick's, 41
Blabae, the, 12
Black Head, 8, 223
Black, WUliam, cited, 227
BlundeU, on the Manx, cited, 84,
190
Books, Manx : Translations of
the Bible, etc., 193-96 ; novels,
197 ; dictionaries, 197 ; books
on the Isle of Man, 197-204;
Manx tales in the native dialect,
201-4
Boosey, ' Manx National Songs,'
' Ramsey Town,' quoted, 150
Bosworth, 64
Bowring, Sir John, 214
Bradda Head, 225
Braddan, Kirk, 201
Breast Law, 89
Brehonic Law, powers of the
judge, 32-33
Bride, 185
Bride Church, 183
Bride HiUs, 9
Brigit, St., in Mona, 40 - 41 ;
helpers of, 42
Briscoe, Christopher, 197; his
newspaper, 212

230

INDEX

231

Briscoe, Joseph, 197
Briw, the, his powers, 32-33
Broadbent, Mr. S. K., The Isle of
Man Exa/miner, 218
Brown, Mr. James, of the Liver
pool Mercury, 214; Isle of
Man Weekly Times, 215-16;
summoned by the Keys, 216-17
Brown, Mr. John A., 217
Brown, Mr. Thomas, ' A Short
Dissertation,' etc., 205
Brown, Rev. Hugh Stowell, per
sonality, 203-4
Brown, Rev. T. E., 108 ; lines of,
quoted, 80 ; his love for Mona,
144 - 45 ; his ' Letters,' 145,
202-3; his Manx Tales, 201-3
Brown's Advertising Circular,
214-15
Bruce, Lord Robert, 60
Bruce, Mr. Alexander, his enter
prises, 133-35, 137, 138
Brunswick, marriage law in, 95
Buggane, legend of the, 36, 172-
81
Bulgham Bay, 143
Bungalow, The, 132
Burial places, ancient, 16-18, 138,
143
Burrow Head, 7
Bushel, his grave, 220-21
Caesar and Mona, 205
Caigher Point (Langness Point), 7
Caine, Mr. W. S., M.P., 204
Calf Island, 7, 8, 141 ; former
owners, 220 - 21 ; description,
221-29
Calf Sound, 198, 222, 224
CaUow, WiUiam, Quaker, 147-48
Candida Casa, 34
Cannibalism, tales of, 25
Canterbury, diocese of, 56
Carey, Colonel, 221
CarUsle, 102
Carraghan, height of, 10
Cashen, WiUiam, boatman, 116 ;
custodian, 169

Castle Mona Hotel, Douglas, 85,
136, 162
Castletown, 7, 13, 67, 200 ; visit
of Mr. Gladstone, 108-111 ; The
Green, 111
Cathedral of St. Germain, 39, 116;
the crypt, 74, 81
Celts, the, in Mona, 14, 20;
Druidism of, 22 ; the ogham, 57
Cemetery, Quaker, 147
Chaloner, Governor in 1660, in
vestigations of, 16-18
Chamberlain, Mr. Austen, visit to
Mona, 161, 164 ; expresses the
King's thanks, 171
Charles II., march from Scotland,
66
Chasms, the, 223
Chester, bishopric of, 101
Chickens Lighthouse, the, 225
Chiefs, early Manx, 27-28
Christian, Captain, 148
Christian, Edward, 67, 148
Christian, Rev. WiUiam BeU,
quoted, 128
Christian, William, his offer to
CromweU, 66-67
Christianity : Introduction into
Mona, 34 - 37 ; dissension re
garding Eastertide, 42-45 ; de
stroyed by the Norse invasion,
50; re-introduced into Mona,
55 ; established in Norway, 56 ;
introduced into Ireland, 57
Chronicle, the, 219
Cistercians in Furness, 55
Cists, 17
City of Glasgow Bank, failure,
127, 128
Clague, Mr. Thomas, 223
Clay Head, 138, 139
Clifton CoUege, 202
Clonard, monastic school of, 42
Close Chairn, 221
' Cloven Stones,' the, 138
Clucas, Dr., 127
Clucas, Mr. Joseph, 116
Coastline of the Isle of Man, 7-9

232

ISLE OF MAN

Cobham, Eleanor, Duchess of
Gloucester, 139
Cochull, use of the, 30
Colby, viUage of, 13
Coleman, Bishop, 43
Collins, WUkie, 'Armadale,' 198
Columba, St., churches founded
by, 42, 44
Common lands, loss of, 88
Contrary Head, 7, 225
Corlett, Rev. Henry, translation
of Lewis's Catechism, 194
Coroner in Mona, his duties, 215
Corony, the, 144
Corrin, Mr. Robert, of Peel, re
ception of Mr. Gladstone, 116-
20
Corrin's Tower on Peel HiU, 141,
220
' Coshering,' 28-29
Courts, Norse, 50-54
Courts, Spiritual r Influence of
the, 69, 72 ; penalties imposed
by, 74, 78-80, 94-95, 195 ; dis
cipline regarding marriage, 94-
95; control of 'divorcement,'
97-98, 100
Cow Harbour, 225, 229
Crannogs, 185
Crebbin, Rev. Paul, translation
of ' The Christian Monitor,' 194
Cregeen, Manx dictionary, 11,
197
Cregneesh, vUlage of, 225
Crellin, James, and Mr. Gladstone,
129-30
Crescent, the, cruiser, 160
Crockett, S. R., 'The Raiders,' 200
Cromlechs, 88
Cromwell and 'Darbie,' 66
Cronkbourne, 170
Cronk-ny Iree-Lhaa, 10, 141, 225
Crosses, Runic, 145, 183
Crow, Captain Hugh, adventure
of, 148-49
CrowviUe, 148
Cumbrian Hills, the, 141
Curnock, Rev. N., 81

Curragh, the, 5
Customs, English control of the,
82, 103
Dalby village, 11, 114
Dalrymple, Mr. William, deputa
tion to Mr. Gladstone, 107-108
Dancing, Manx, 19
Davidson, Mr. Hugh Coleman,
' The Green HiUs by the Sea,'
200
' Deemster, The,' author of, see
under ' Manxman '
Deemster, the : His functions, 53-
54,67-68; as law-maker, 89-90,
95 ; King Edward's question
regarding, 168
Denmark, 46
Derby Castle, 136-37, 170
Derby, Charlotte de la TremoUle,
Countess of, 65-67
Derby, first Earl (Baron Stanley),
64 ; second Earl, ' Lord ' of
Man, 64-65 ; WiUiam, sixth
Earl, and EUzabeth his Coun
tess, 63 ; seventh Earl, see
Stanley; eighth Earl, 67;
James, tenth Earl, 63, 82
Derby, Lord, 104
Dhoo, the, 11
Dhoon, the, 143-44
Dictionaries, Manx, 197
Diocese of Man, 56
Disraeli and Ouseley, 217-18
Divorce Law Reform Association,
99
' Divorcement,' the Manx Law
concerning, 97-98
Douglas : Nuimery of St. Brigit,
40-41 ; Castle Mona, 85 ; Mr.
Gladstone's visit, 106, 121-27 ;
the mountain road to Ramsey,
132 ; Victoria Pier and the
Clock Tower, 133 ; the tram-
car, 138-35 ; a sunny morning,
135 - 36 ; Central Promenade,
136 ; Gaiety Theatre, 136 ;
Harris Promenade, 136 ; Loch

INDEX

233

Promenade, 136 ; Queen's, Pro
menade, 136; Sefton Hotel,
136; VUUers Hotel, 186;
Derby Castle, 136-37 ; Douglas
Bay Hotel, 187 ; the Mansion
House, 137 ; the Howstrake
Golf-Links, 137-38 ; reception
of King Edward, 160 ; charac
teristics, 182 ; Free Library,
198; Town Commissioners of
1864, 215; the Market Place,
221
Douglas Bay, 135
Douglas Harbour, 11
Douglas Head, 130 ; arrival of the
royal yacht, 160
Dress of the early Manx, 29
Drinkwater, Sir George, 221
Druidism, tenets, 22-26
DumbeU, Mr. Alured, 128
DumbeU's Bank, 128, 134
Durham, his map (1595), 4
Eastern Question, Mr. Gladstone
and the, 108
Eastertide, dissension regarding,
42-45
Ecclesiastical Courts of England,
73
Ecclesiastical Courts of Mona.
See Courts, Spiritual
Edgar, King, 59
Edward I., his authority in Mona,
60
Edward III., conquest of Mona,
60-61
Edward VII. in Mona, 160-71
Elizabeth, Queen, 65
' EUan Varmin Veg Veen,' 1
Emblems, Manx, 56-59
England : Suzerainty over Mona,
59-71 ; the Revestment Act,
82-83 ; payment to the fourth
Duke of Athole, 85 ; marriage
law in, 95
Excommunication exercised by
the Druids, 23, 69; in the
Church, 70-73

Falcon's Nest Hotel, Port Erin,
112-13
Faragher, Mr. Robert, 214
Farrar, Dean, 108
Fenodyree, story of, 189
Finian, St., monastic school of,
42
Fishing, 11
Flag, the Manx, hauled down, 82
Fleshwick, 16
Fleshwick Bay, 113
Flowers, Manx, 12, 13
Forests, Manx, 12
Fort Anne Hotel, salute to the
King, 160
Fortescue, Captain the Hon. Sey
mour, 164
Foxdale, 12 ; lead-mines of, 12-13
Free Library, Douglas, 198
Free-men, privUeges of, 53-54
Freeth, Lieutenant-Colonel
WiUiam, Chief of Police, 170
Furness, 55
Gaiety Theatre, Douglas, 186
Galloway, 36
Garff, 129
Garwick, 138
GeU, Lady, 111
GeU, Mr. Hugh StoweU, 111
GeU, Mr. James StoweU, 111
Gell, Sir James, on Manx Law,
72-73 ; Mr. Gladstone and, 108,
111 ; reception of King Edward,
161, 163, 165, 171
GeU, the Misses, 168
George II., 75
George III., the Revestment Act,
82-83
Germanus, St., 39
' Giants' Quoiting Stones,' the, 17
Gill, Ven. Hugh S., Archdeacon
of Mona, 111, 169
GiU, W. H., 150
Oipsy and Lively, torpedo-boat
destroyers, 160
Gladstone, Rev. Stephen Edward,
101, 112
30

234

ISLE OF MAN

Gladstone, Right Hon. W. E:
Visit to Mona, 101 - 36 ; the
Southport telegram, 102-5; at
Douglas, 106-7 ; the Governor's
hospitality, lO'Z - 8 ; speech at
King William's CoUege, 108-10;
at Castletown, 108-11 ; and the
' Vatican Decrees,' 104 ; at Port
Erin, 112-13; incident at Dalby,
114 ; his reception in Peel, 115 ;
in Douglas, 121-27 ; his power
of scathing rebuke, 123 ; his
observance of Sunday, 130; his
departure and appreciation, 130-
31; attitude towards the Irish
question, 207-8
Gladstone Road, the, 113-15
Glass, the, 11
Glen Gawne, 138
Glen Helen, 12
Glen Meay, 114-15
Glen Mona, 145
Golf-Links, Howstrake, 137-38
Gorell, Lord, 98
Government, early Manx : the
King and his nobles, 27-30 ; the
first ideas of a Parliament, 30-32
Government House, 162
Granite quarries of Dhoon, 144
Great Laxey lead- mines, 140
Greeba Mountain, 13, 35, 141, 170,
172
Groudle, 138
Hall, Mr. Richard Nicklm, ' GU-
bert Vince, Curate,' 201
Hango HUl, 67
Harald, King of Mona, 59
Hardwicke, Lord, his Marriage
Act of 1758, 195
Harris, Island of, 189
Harris Promenade, Douglas, 186
Hawarden, 131
Hebrew tenets, 24
Hebrides, the, 56
Heights of the Island, 9-12
Henry IV., suzerainty over Mona,
61, 62

Henry VII. at Bosworth, 64
Herbert, Miss Agnes, 'Isle of
Man,' 204
Hermit's Cave, the, 139
Heywood, Messrs. Arthur, and
Sons, 131
Hibernian Inn at Kirk Maughold,
127, 149
Highlander Inn, Greeba, 35
Hildesley, Bishop, translation of
the Bible into Manx, 193-96;
his discipline, 195
Histories, Manx, 205-11
Home Rule Question, Mr. Glad
stone's attitude towards, 122,
123, 129, 207-8
Homespuns, Manx, 139-40
Honey-farms. 114 15
HospitaUty, forced, 28-29
Howstrake GoLk-Links, 137-38
Huldren, legend of, 151-53
Human sacrifices, 23, 24 25
Iceland, 46, 47
Indemnity, Act of, Charles II.,
67-68
Indies, West, legends of, 152-53
lona, missionaries of, 147
Ireland : Legends of, 1-3 : dis
tance from Mona, 7 ; Druidism
in, 24-26 ; cannibaUsm, 25 ;
nurmeries of St. Brigit, 41 ;
churches of St. Columba, 42,
44 ; the dissensions regarding
Eastertide, 44
Islands on the coast of the Isle of
Man, 9
Isle of Man Daily Times, 218
Isle of Man Examiner, 218
Isle of Man Steam Packet Com
pany, 130, 199
Isle of Man Telegraph, 127
Isle of Man Times, Llr. Glad
stone's letter to. 181
Isle of Man Weehly Times, 213,
215, 216
James I., suzerainty over Mona,
63, 66

INDEX

235

Jebb, Mr. Richard, appointed
Vicar-General, 72
Jeffcott, Mr. J. M., 108
Jefferson, George, the Manx
Advertiser, 212-13
John, King, submission to Rome,
60
Johnson, Dr., quoted, 205
Jones, Dr., of King WilUam's
College, 109
Joughin, Mr. John, of Peel, 116
Joughin, Mr. W. J. Clucas, books
on Mona, 201
Jude, Mr. W. H., 204
Judicature Act of 1884, 98
Jurby, 5, 6, 46
KaUow Point, 223
Karran, Mount, 11
KayU, Mr. Arthur, 127, 129
Keig, Mr. Walter, 136
Kelly, John, afterwards Dr.,
translation of the Bible into
Manx, 196
KeUy's Manx Dictionary, 197
Kennish, author of ' The MeUiah,'
144
Keppel Gate, 132
Keppel, Hon. Derek, 164
Keppel, Mrs., 164
Kewley, Rev. Canon, reports Mr.
Gladstone's speech, 108-110
Keys, the : Institution, 54, 83 ;
as law-makers, 89-90, 95, 97,
99 ; attitude towards the Com
missioners, 215-16; the sentence
on Mr. J. Brown, 216 - 17 ;
established on an elective basis,
86
King, early Manx, his prerogative,
51-53
' King of Mona and the Isles,' title
discontinued, 64
King Orry, steamer, 101, 106
' King Orry's Grave,' 18, 143
King WUliam's College, Castle
town, visit of Mr. Gladstone,
108-110

Kinrade, Katherine, punishment
of, 71, 78-80
Kinsale fishery, the, 118
Kitterland, 224
KnoUys, the Hon. Charlotte, 164
Kristiania, the Viking ship at,
48
Ladies' Wishing WeU, Maughold,
146-47
Lake District, the, 141
Lake Dwellings, 185
Laking, Sir Francis, 164
La Mothe, Mr. J. C, 128-29
Lancaster Sword, the, 62
Land : Proprietorship in, 28 ; Act
of Settlement, 68
Langness Point, 7
Language, Manx : Absence of
Scandinavian terms of endear
ment, 49; Celtic love -words,
169 ; Manx books, see Books
Latter-Day Saints, 200
Laughton, Mr. Alfred N., 169-70
Law, the : Powers of the judge,
82-33; intricacies of, 72-73;
the law of custom and statute
law, 89-91 ; the marriage law,
89-100
Laxey, 18, 127, 132, 134 ; woollen
mills of, 139-40 ; the lead-mines,
140 ; the Big Wheel, 140
Laxey Head, 143
Laxey Valley, the, 189
Lead - mines, Foxdale, 12 - 13 ;
Great Laxey, 140
Lefroy, Dean of Norwich, 136
Legends : Irish, 1-8 ; Manx, 86,
172-81, 186-89; Norse, 46, 151-
59; West African, 152-53
Lenn, use of the, 29-80
Lewaigue, 144, 149, 150
Lezayre, 5 ; tower of, 166 ; church
of, 207 ; parish of, 221
Lhane VaUey, the, 5, 16, 46
Lhen Coan, 138
Little London, 200
Little Sound, the, 222, 224
30—2

236

ISLE OF MAN

Liverpool, 106 ; the scheme for
a bishopric, 101-102 ; Mr. Glad
stone at, 128, 130-31
Liverpool Mercury, 214
Livesey, Mr., 215
Loch, Governor, and the Peel
fishermen, 86-88; his regime,
106; career, 136
Loch Promenade, Douglas, 136
Lonan, disciple, 38
' Lord of Man,' title, 64
Lorrimer, Miss Norma, 'Mirry
Ann,' 200
Love-children, the Manx Law re
garding, 95-97, 100
Lowe, George, of Lytham, 138
McAndrew, Mr., 187
MacCoole, legend of, 1 ; conver
sion of, 39-41
Magna Charta, the Manxman's, 68
Malar Lough, 5
Manchester, connection vidth the
Isle of Man, 102
Manks Almanach, 212
Manlcs Mercury and Briscoe's
Douglas Advertiser, 212
Mannanan, legends of, 1-2
Mansion House, the, 187
Manx Advertiser, 212
Manx Lion, 214
' Manxman, The,' the author's
association with Kirk Maug
hold, 149-50; books on Mona,
198-99
Manx Patriot, 218
Manx people, the : Southern tj'pes,
14-15 ; the earliest inhabitants,
15-16 ; early burial-places, 16-
18 ; early occupations, 18-19 ;
the gift of imagination, 20 ;
early faith-sun-worship, 21-22 ;
Druidism, 22 26 ; early dress
of, 29 ; their blue eyes, 119-20
Manx Quarterly, 219
Manx Sun, 208, 218
Maps of the Isle of Man, ancient,
4-6

Marown, church of, 38
Marriage : Binding by consent,
75-76 ; second marriages, 76 ;
marriage law in Mona, 76-80,
89-100 ; in various countries,
95 - 96, 97 ; Lord Harwicke's
Marriage Act of 1753, 195;
Bishop Hildesley's discipline,
195
Married Woman's Property Act
93,99
Married Woman's Protection Act,
98
Martin of Tours, St , 84
Mary, Princess, of Scotland, 60
Mary, Princess, married Sir
WUham Montacute, 60-61
Maughold Head, 7, '208 ; beauties
of, 8
Maughold Kirk, 127, 144, 149;
churchyard, 58 ; visit of Mr.
Gladstone, 129-80 ; beauties of,
145-47
Maughold : the Ladies' Wishing
WeU, 146-47 ; historic and per
sonal associations, 147
Meayll circle, the, 16
Mermaid, the, Manx legend, 166-
89
Merton, the barons' meeting, 97
Meryck, Bishop, cited, 83-84
Methodism in Mona, 82
Michael, Kirk, 6, 167; King
Edward at, 167-68
Milky Way, legend of the, 46
MUntown, 128
Minorca, viUage of, 143
Mistletoe, the, 23-24
Mitre Hotel, Ramsey, 129
MoUo, Lough, 5
' Mona,' the term, 1, 205-6
Mona's Herald., 149, 218, 214
MonoUths, 17-18
Montacute, Sir WiUiam, 36-37, 61
Mooragh, the, 5
Moore, Archdeacon, 203
Moore, Mr. A. W., works on
Manx history, 209-211

INDEX

237

Moore, Mr. R. J., High BaUiff of
Peel, reception of Mr. Glad
stone, 116-18
Moore, Rev. PhUip, translation of
the Bible into Manx, 196
Morley, Lord, ' Gladstone,' 102
Mormonism in Mona, 200-201
Morris, Tom, of St. Andrews, 138
Morrison, James, boatman, 116
Motoring in Mona, 132
Mountain lands, loss of, 88
Mountain Railway, the, 132-42
Mountain road, the, from Douglas
to Ramsey, 182
Mourne Mountains, the, 141
MuU HiUs, the, 225
MuU of GaUoway, 4, 185
Miiller, Max, saying of, quoted,
224
Murray, James. See Athole,
second Duke of
Mylchreest, Mr. Joseph, 167, 219
Mylrea, Mr. John A., 199
Names, Scandinavian, in Mona,
59-60
Neagh, Lough, 1
Neb, the, 12 ; fish of, 13
Nelson, Mr. C. B., 129
Newspapers, Manx, 212-19
Niarbyl, the, 11, 114, 225
Nice, CouncU of, 43
Ninian, St., 84, 36
Ninianism, 34
Noble, Henry Bloom, 136
Nobles, early Manx, 27
Norse invasion of Mona, destruc
tion of Christianity, 50
Norse legends, 151-59
Norsemen, the : In Ireland, 44 ;
early ships of, 47 ; character
istics, 47-48 ; influence on the
Manx character, 48-49
North Barrule, 10 ; the view, 140-
41
Northampton, Earl of, 65
Northumbria, King of, decision
regarding Eastertide, 43

Norway, ecclesiastical authority
in, 56 ; marriage law in, 97
Novels, Manx, 197
Odin, worship of, 50, 58
Ogham cross, the, 56-58
Olaf IL, King and Saint, 56
Old Laxey, 143
Onchan, 162, 201
Onchan Bay, 137
Onchan Church, 127, 130
Open - Air ParUament, 50 - 54 ;
Governor Loch's lesson, 87-88
Orders, religious, 41-42, 55-56
' Ordinances and Statutes,' extract
from, quoted, 52-53
Oriel CoUege, Oxford, 201
Orry, King, 18, 46, 143
Ouseley, Thomas John, and
DisraeU, 217-18
Palace, Douglas, 186
Palmer, Mr., the Chi onicle, 219
Parliament, earliest ideas, 30-32;
the Open-Air, 50-54
Patrick, 12
Patrick, St., legends of, 2-3, 38-45
Paul, Colonel, Chief of Police,
107
Paulin, gui^e, 117
Peel, 7, 8, 35, 87 ; flshermen of,
13, 87-88 ; the road into, 115 ;
reception of Mr. Gladstone, 115 ;
King Edward at, 168
Peel Castle, 74, 189, 147, 209;
visit of Mr. Gladstone, 116
Peel City Guardian, 218-19
Peel Harbour, 12
Peel HUl, 39, 141
Pen-y-Phot (Beinn-y-Phot), 10
Percy, Henry, Earl of North-
imiberland, 62
Perwick Bay, 223
PeverU Hotel, Douglas, 106, 107
Phillips, Bishop, translation of
the Prayer-Book, 193
Phcenix Cottage, 149-50
Phoenix Press, the, 212

238

ISLE OF MAN

Picts, the : Characteristics, 19 ; re-
' ligion, 34
Pius I., Pope, decree of, 43
Point of Ayre Lighthouse, 141 ;
the road to, 182-84 ; description,
184-85
Point of Ayre, position, 3, 7, 8
Polygamy, instances of, 76-77
Ponsonby, Captain F., 164
Port Erin, 8, 87; visit of Mr.
Gladstone, 112-13 ; the moun
tain road to Peel, 118-15
Port Moar, 149
Port St. Mary, 7, 87, 228
Port Soderick, 7
Port-y-VuUin, 149
Postage, free, on newspapers, 213-
14
Presbyters, 41-42
Prescott, cited, 24
Press, Manx privileges, 213-14
Preston Guardian, 215
Prestwich, Mr., of Manchester,
137
Pronunciation, Manx, 143-44
Prophecies, Manx and Scot, 3-4
Proverbs, Manx, 190-92
Quakers in Mona, 147-48
Quarter Bridge, 170
Queen's Pier, Ramsey, arrival of
the King's yacht, 162-68, 164
Quiggan, J., Almanack and Tide-
Table, 213
Quine, Rev. J., ' The Captain of
the Parish,' 200
Ramsey, 5, 8, 10, 87 ; visit of Mr.
Gladstone, 12'7-30; his speech
at the Skating Rink, 129 ; the
mountain road into, 132
'Ramsey Town' (song), 150
derivation of the name, 151
visit of the King and Queen,
163-68 ; excursions from, 182
characteristics, 182-83
Ramsey Bay, 5, 7
Bamsey Courier, 218

Raven, emblem of the, 59
Reformation, the, effects, 69, 78
Reginald, King, submission to
Rome, 60
Restoration, the, suzerainty of
Mona, 67
Revenue, Manx, 86
Revestment Act, the, 82-83
Rhenas, 200 ; the river, 12
Richard IL, 61
Richard III., 64
Richmond, Bishop, and ' the new
Society,' 81
Ring, Mr. G. A., on the Act of
Revestment, 83
Bisimg Sun, the, 212
Rivers, Manx, 11-13
Round Table, the, 11, 113-14
Royal Institute, Albemarle Street,
lectures at, 199
Rule, Mount, 200
Runes, Norse, 57
Runic crosses, 145, 183
Rupert, Prince, and the Quakers,
148
Rushen Abbey, 55
Rushen Castle, 66, 217 ; visit of
Mr. Gladstone, 111
Rushen, disciple, 38
Rushen, the ' Giants' Quoiting
Stones ' in, 17
Ruskm, John, 140, 149
Russia, marriage law in, 95
Rydings, Mr. Egbert, 140 ; Manx
Tales, 201
SachevereU, WiUiam, Governor,
205
Sacrifices, Druid, 23-25
St. Bee's Head, 7, 141
St. Bee's, Priory of, 143
St. George's WooUen MUls, 189-
40
St. Germam's Cathedral, 89, 116 ;
the crypt, 74, 81
St. Helens, 203
St. John's, 12, 52, 170
St. John's Chapel, 52

INDEX

239

St. Maughold's WeU, 146
St. Minian, Priory of, 36
St. Olave's Church, Ramsey, 183,
206-7
St. Patrick's Chair, 88
St. Patrick's WeU, 146
St. Paul's Cathedral, steps of, 144
St. Thomas's Church, 180
St. Trinian, Church of, 35-87 ; the
legend of the Buggane, 172-81
SaUsbury, Earl of, 61, 65
Salmon, ll
Sartfell, height, 10
Scandinavia, 44
Scandinavian rule in Mona, 51 ;
the ogham, 57
Schools, monastic, 42
Scotland : Manx and Scot pro
phecies, 3-4 ; religion in, 35 ;
suzerainty over Mona, 61;
marriage law in, 95-96, 99 ;
Scots expeUed from Mona, 36-
87
Scott, Mr. BaiUie, 137
Scott, Sir Walter, 116 ; ' PeverU
of the Peak,' 148, 198
Scroop, Sir WiUiam Le, Mona
sold to, 61, 62
Sefton Hotel, Douglas, 136
SeUars, Mr. A., 205
Settlement, Act of, 1704, effect in
Mona, 68
Shepherd, W., printer, 194
Sherreff and Russell, Messrs., 215
Ships, Norse, 46, 48 ; emblem of
the ship in ruff sables, 58-59
Sicily, the ogham of, 57, 58
Silverburn, the, 13
Slave - trade, the, ' The Middle
Passage,' 148
Slieu Carnane, 225
SUeu Choar (Clagh Ouyre), 10
Slieu Monagh, height, 11
Slieu Reay (Buy), 10
Slieu WhaUian, 12
Smith, Joseph, 201
Smuggling, English Government
and, 82, 108

SnaefeU : Description, 9-10, 16'
130; a journey to the summit
132-42
SnaefeU, the mail-boat, 130
Snowdon, 141
Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge, grant to Bishop
Hildesley, 194
' Sodor,' King Edward and, 168
Sodor and Man, diocese of, 56, 102
South Barrule, 10, 141, 225
Southport, the telegram, 101, 103,
105
Soveral, Marquis de, in Mona, 164
Spanish Head, 8, 223-24
Spanish types in Mona, 14-15
Spectator, tribute to Tom Brown,
202-3
Speed, John, his map, 1610, 4,
224
Staka Bay, 223
Stanley, Amelia Sophia, 82
Stanley, Sir John, 1405, granted
the isle of Man, 62-63, 64
Stanley, seventh Earl Derby, his
regime, 63, 65 67, 76-77, 147,
221
Stanley, Sir John, the second, 52,
89-90
Stephen, St., Feast of, 158
Stevensons of Balladoole, 221
Stonehenge, 26
Stones : Ancient, 17-18 ; Druidical
altars, 26 ; stone circles, 225
Story-tellers, professional, 29
Strange, Baroness, 82, 83
Strangford Lough, 7
Strathclyde, kingdom of, 35
Sugar Loaf Rock, 8, 223
Sulby Bridge, 166
Sulby Glen, 130
Sulby River, 5-6, 11
Summers, Mr. Hardy, editor, 127,
128
Sun-worship, 21 22, 56-58
Surface of the Isle of Man, 9-11
Swastika, the, 57
Switzerland, marriage law in, 95

240

ISLE OF MAN

Tacitus and Mona, 205
Talbot, Rev. Theophilus, on Manx
histories, 206-7, 208-10, 211
Taylor, Mr. John, librarian, 198
Teare, Mr. A. H., the Bamsey
Courier, 218
Teare, Mr. Robert, 128
Thalthans, 115
Thing, the, 50
Thing-void, the, 52
Thor, 50
Thoiisla Rock, 224, 225
Three Legs of Man, origin of the
emblem, 56-58
Times, the, 215
Timothy the TaUor, story of, 176-
81
Train, Joseph, ' Historical and
Statistical Account,' 206
Tramway, the electric, up SnaefeU,
132-84, 137-40
Trinian, St., legend of, 35-37
Trondhjem, Archbishop of, 56
Trout, 11
True Manxman, 212
Trustrum, Mr., 113
Tynwald, the, 51, 52, 56; an
Act of 1737, 74 ; Act for
Divorcement, special needed,
97-98 ; King Edward's question
regarding, 168 - 69 ; eighteen
Acts of, translated, 197 ; the
meeting of the fishermen on
Tynwald HUl, 87-88
ValhaUa, 50
Vatican, the map in, 4
Victoria and Albert Yacht, the,
at Mona, 160-62
Victoria, Princess, in Mona, 164
Viking ship, the, at Kristiania,
48

Vikings, the, in Mona, 44-45;
principles, 46-47 ; tribute of in
debtedness to, 49
ViUiers Hotel, Douglas, 136
Waldron, George, ' A Description,'
206
Walpole, Sir Spencer, quoted, 65 ;
' The Land of Home Rule,' 207-
11
WeUs, Holy, 146-47
Wesley, John : Visits to Mona, 81 ;
his tribute to the Manx, 84 ;
Wesleyanism in Mona, 81
White House, the, 167
White Monks, the, 55
White Strand, the, 9
Whitehaven, 185
Whittam, Thomas^ Manks
Almanack, 212
Wigan, RoyaUst defeat at, 66
Wigton Bay, 84
Wigtownshire, 7
WUfred, St., 48
WiUiams, Mr. Gomer, 'The
Liverpool Privateers,' 148-49
Wilson, Bishop : Account, 68-71 ;
his discipUne, 72, 74-75, 77-80 ;
death, 81 ; ' Principles and
Duties of Christianity,' 193 ;
' Form of Prayerfor the Herring
Fishing,' 194
Woman : Early status, 41-42 ; her
legal position in Mona, 90-100 ;
the Married Woman's Protection
Act, 98
Wood, Mr. G. W., work on Manx
history, 211
Worcester, Battle of, 66
Wren, the, legend of, 151-59
York, diocese of, 56

BILLING AND SONS, LTD., I'RTNTEES, GUILDFORD

KAP ACCOMPANYING "ISLE OF HAN," BY W. RALPH HALL CAINE AND A. HEATON COOPER (A. & C. BLACK, LONDON) CcHpiji»-JolaBmM»«.tc«,l

"ALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

3 9002 08561 9287