This was our cafe exactly, and if it had continued more than twenty four hours, the fhip was in fuch a condition, fhe could not live; but the winds and feas abated the fe'cond day, and we had a gale fuch as we' could wish, that brought us in a few days within fight of the western iflands. We fteered for St. Kilda, and intended to go from thence to Borera, which lies within three leagues of it, and at last pay our visit to Mr. Weft. But in a fog we mist them both, and came full upon a fine little country, called the Green Island, which lies ten leagues to the north-west of St. Kilda.

Uprais'd from its deep feat by th' adverse blaft
Of Eurus, and of Afer black with storms,
And Aufter fierce, they to the founding fhores,
Tumultuous drove the vast enormous waves.
Clamours of men refound, and rattling ropes.
Forthwith the clouds of heav'ns refulgent face
Bereave the Trojans ; darkness thick invests
The fea; from either pole loud thunders roar,
And quick in air the nimble lightnings flash.
All things confpire to urge immediat death.
-Mountains of water rise,

And fall with their own weight: on the high furge
Those hang; to these with horrid chasm the waves
The loweft deep disclose.

Here

Now for my part, I declare, that to my thinking, and experiences in many ftorms I have been in at fea, Lucan is the best painter; inferior tho his Pharfa

lia

319

Sept. 20.

1741.

A defcription of the

Green Inland.

Here we landed the 20th of September. All Mr. Martin fays of this land is, that he believes he faw it at a distance once, and a captain of a ship told him he had been on it.

The Green Island is three miles long, and more than two broad. The furface is beautifully unequal, and in every point of view quite charming. The ground is covered with trefoil, and flowery plants of the aromatic kind. There are a hundred little beautiful woods upon the hills, and the sweetest ftreams come murmuring down their fides.

any

It was fix o'clock in the afternoon when we went on fhore, and could fee no fign of inhabitants on this land. We therefore ordered the tents to be ftruck up, and in a delightfull valley, between two woody hills, by the fide of a water-fall, we refolved to pass fome days. Here fupper was to be served up, and as the evening was glorious, the scene folemn and fine, we thought ourselves prodigious happy in fo agreeable a change. It was agreed, while our repast was preparing, to have a concert, and the instruments were immediately brought; but before we

lia be to the Eneid of Maro: and if he had not been cut off at fix and twenty by Nero, but had been allowed to finish his defign, and to correct his poem as many years as Virgil did his, perhaps it would not have fallen very fhort of the Eneid; different as the language was between Auguftus and Nero.

could

we could begin, we heared some music, as of many hands, divinely played. This ftruck us all with astonishment, as there was not a house, or a foul to be seen. Our captain swore he had at last discovered the inchanted island. The wifeft of us could not tell what to fay to it; and the weakest, some failors, natives of the Western Islands, affured us very seriously, that it was the great men; fo they call fpirits, which refide, as these islanders think, in the beautiful vallies of these ifles: They affirmed, that in Benbecula, there was the finest glen in the world, which was full of these beings, and that only once in a year the inhabitants prefumed to enter it, to gather what cattle was there, after invoking the permiffion and favor of the great men; who were frequently feen there, and often performed in a musical manner, as we had heared. And what do you mean, I afked, by the great men? They answered, the fouls of the kings and champions, who lived and ruled in thofe islands, in former times, when they were as populous and flourishing countrys as any in the world.

Be they great men or great women, boblins, or goblins, fairys or genii of whatever station, (captain Scarlet replyed) I will foon give you a good account of them, ladys, and immediately went up the winding vale croffed the water, and proceeded to a charm

;

H

ing grove on the side of an easy hill, from whence the harmony in floods was poured. He foftly entered among the trees, and had not got very far before he came to the fofs of a garden of many acres, that was beyond every thing he had feen moft delightfully fine: In the center of this beautiful spot, he saw a vill, that seemed to him of wood, and confifted of ground-rooms. Many open little fummer-houses, various in charms, were fcattered up and down, by banks of flowers, and on the margins of ftreams, and in one of them, that was grandly lighted by a luftre that hung, were twenty ladys fitting round a table. Most of them had their inftruments in their 'hands, and others joyned their heavenly voices, in performing the oratorio you have heared by the echo of the hills fo plane. They are all divinely fair, (captain Scarlet continued) and look like favorite Seraphs performing a mufical religious act: He added, that he was within twenty yards of them, or thereabout, exclufive of the fofs, but dared not to discover himself, for fear he should fhock them, or offend.

This account amazed us as much as if he had told us he had feen the great men, and for fome time we were at a lofs how to proceed but determined at laft to go on with our music, and fee what effect that would produce. We began the delightful sympho

ny.

ny in the opera of Rowland, and eccho very quickly conveyed it to the place we defigned: The confequence was, the arrival of a black in a rich running dress, in a very little time, who came from his lady, Mrs. Harcourt, to know who we were, and then immediately returned: but had not been much more than a quarter of an hour away before he came back with her compliments, and an invitation to reft that night at her house. We immediately proceeded, and were with the greatest politeness and goodness received. All the ladys met us at a distance from the house, and seemed very greatly pleased at our arrival in that country. Our mufic had astonished them even more than theirs had furprized us; and and when they were told that the performers were ladys fitting by the cafcade, they could hardly credit the relater. A few gentlemen in a paffing fhip might come on fhore with their fiddles, they thought; though that, they fayed, never happened there, as the ifland is walled round with the most tremendous cliffs, and has only one fmall, fcarce vifible bay for a veffel to put in to, that is full of perils to a stranger that enters: but that so many ladys should be fafely feated by the water-fall, and fo happy as to think of forming a concert there; this seemed to them wonderful indeed. Nor did their wondering leffen, when I had related