Page:Once a Week Volume 7.djvu/634

 626 The twenty thousand inhabitants have a more precarious subsistence than the inhabitants of almost any other part of the United Kingdom. Their soil is barren, except in a few valleys, and at the heads of the interior lochs; and from the mountains the traveller may see how scanty is the tillage. There are strips of cultivation in the levels and by the margin of the lakes, and patches here and there on the moorlands; and there are a few scattered farms, very poor, and difficult to manage. The climate is such that nothing is attempted beyond oats and potatoes. These and the fishery constitute the maintenance of the country and shore people; and the tradesfolk depend, of course, on the custom of their neighbours. Everything that is imported is dear; and almost everything is imported,—even to butchers’ meat. Peat from the moorland is the fuel used. It is not many years since the resources of the island failed, and the people were reduced to the most dreadful straits before we heard of their condition. It was a terrible spectacle, we were then told, to see the famine-stricken crowds snatching from one another the shell-fish on the shore,—the only thing they had to eat. There was a large emigration from Skye that year; and, as soon as the misery of the place was heard of, provisions were shipped thither.

The same thing must be done now, and without delay. The oats have almost altogether failed to ripen this year; and a considerable proportion has never been cut at all. It lies swamped under the snow. The potatoes are the main resource of the people, from autumn to midsummer, and the potatoes are this season a mere mass of putridity. The inhabitants are sitting amidst their hurricanes, and hail, and snow, without fire as well as without food; for the continual rains of this year have so flooded the moorland that no peat could be got. The ministers of Skye are in despair about saving the people without immediate help; and already the children are down in measles, and their parents wasting away in low fever. The fever is creeping on from house to house, and from village to village. Such is the account which lies before me, from the hand of the minister of Sleat. The name will call up recollections in the minds of tourists, who may perhaps feel that their summer pleasures so far bind them to the place and people as to constitute some sort of obligation to help them in their fearful stress. In the absence of a Count Rumford, we must use our own wits about how to go to work: and we ought to have both wit and heart enough to ship off some cargoes of potatoes, meal, and fuel (peat if possible, to suit the island-hearths). Unless this is done, there will be something worse in Skye than we have been dreading in Lancashire.

Will some one go, and cross that strip of stormy sea, and learn the extent of the need, and show us how to meet it, in the quickest and best way? If so, that explorer will look back, all his life, on that winter trip with more satisfaction than on any autumn touring, from the peaks of the Alps to the depths of Mammoth caves. 2em

[ readers may rely on the authenticity of the following narratives, though for the real names of the actors imaginary names have been substituted.—] No one not “on the turf,” and but few of those who are, can realise that bewildering sort of anxiety, and that alternation of hope and fear, which is experienced by the owner of a horse that is a prominent favourite for a great race. He, or rather his horse, is as it were a target for every rogue to shoot at; and constant and crafty must be the vigilance exercised to elude their aim,—so well concealed and cunningly devised are the ambushes behind which danger lurks. The favourite is to the turf nobbler what the full-pursed traveller is to the footpad, and he seeks to make him safe, either for the sake of the money he can bet against him, or in order materially to improve the chance of other horses by which he stands to win, or both. To ensure success, it is not sufficient to have the best horse in the race, without you can shield yourself against the endless efforts that are made to undermine your interest; on one occasion, for instance, when every attempt to bribe those about the horse, from the trainer and jockey downwards, had failed, an act of diabolical treachery was even practised on the jockey at the risk of his life. This occurred some years since, before the Derby; the plan succeeded, but very nearly failed, as the horse was beaten by only about half a length. But it is not of successful but of unsuccessful attempts at roguery I am about to speak.

On occasions when a considerable sum of money is required to be laid out by the owner and his friends, it is usual to call in the assistance of some clever speculator to effect their investments to the best advantage with solvent men, and also to watch the movements in the market, and closely and continuously observe who are the principal opposers and supporters of the horse in which they are specially interested. In return for this care and attention, he is compensated by the fullness of the information supplied him, and the opportunity he has offered him by the owner of sharing a portion of his investments. This Argus-eyed watchfulness as to the state of the market is of the utmost importance, and to it specially may success be often attributed; at all events, such was the case in the following instances, out of many others of minor importance that occur to me.

A gentleman of large fortune, living in Scotland, but who had a considerable racing establishment in the South of England, had a horse of great merit, whom we will call Cockcrow, engaged for the Goodwood Stakes. The owner of Cockcrow felt confident that his horse could win this race; and as he was a very heavy better himself, and had also a very large circle of friends who generally stood a portion of these investments, the amount that he required to be laid out was very large indeed. The gentleman whom he generally selected as his agent and confidant on these occasions was Mr. S, a speculator of considerable standing on the Turf Exchange; and he