• CURRENT LITERATURE.
The Misty Isle of Skye. By J. A. Macculloch. (Oliphant, Anderson, and Ferrier. 4s.)—One regrets to learn from the preface to this volume that "fell circumstances" compel the author, who has been eight years a resident in Skye, to leave it. For he writes in the spirit of the most tasteful, if not the greatest, of its poets :— " Lovest thou green glassy glades By the sunshine sweetly hist, Murmuring waves and echoing caves, Then go to the Isle of Mist."
If occasionally Mr. Macculloch is carried away into rhetoric by "the haunting presence, the magic lights, and the solemn grandeur" of the mountains of Skye, that rhetoric has at least the merit of being genuine. Not infrequently, too, it attains artistic precision, as when he tells us that "at dawn and sunset every scaur and hollow has all the definite clearness of a fine steel engraving." No more eloquent guide-book to Skye—not even Alexander Smith's admirable work—has ever appeared than this, or one which is more likely to attract visitors to the island. But Mr. Macculloch does more than reveal the scenic beauties of Skye ; he narrates its history—especially the tragic history of which Dunvegan is the centre—its folk-lore, and its geology ; he gives an account of the special Skye industry, the manufacture of diatomite, which goes on in a retired spot on the east side of the Trotternish Peninsula. Finally, he deals with the characteristics of the inhabitants, and of the crofting system as it is carried on by a section of them. Here is very nearly, if not quite, the con- clusion of the whole matter :—" A small croft, say of .433 rent, is probably better for the crofter than one of £10. On a large croft or small farm, a family can be supported without much exertion, and certainly without bringing the crofter into touch with those wider views of thing which keep life wholesome. He gets a sufficient living from his croft, and therewith he is content."
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