--Why Norwegian Invasion
ceased--Straw-plaiting--The Lassies of Orkney--Orkney Type of
Countenance--Celtic and Scandinavian--An accomplished
Antiquary--Old Manuscripts--An old Tune-book--Manuscript Letter of
Mary Queen of Scots--Letters of General Monck--The fearless
Covenanter--Cave of the Rebels--Why the tragedy of "Gustavus Vasa"
was prohibited--Quarry of Pickoquoy--Its Fossil Shells--Journey to
Stromness--Scenery--Birth-place of Malcolm, the Poet--His
History--One of his Poems--His Brother a Free Church Minister--New
Scenery.

The "upper story" of the bishop's palace, in which grim old Haco
died,--thanks to the economic burghers who converted the stately ruin
into a quarry,--has wholly disappeared. Though the death of this last of
the Norwegian invaders does not date more than ten years previous to the
birth of the Bruce, it seems to belong, notwithstanding, to a different
and greatly more ancient period of Scottish history; as if it came under
the influence of a sort of aerial perspective, similar to that which
makes a neighboring hill in a fog appear as remote as a distant mountain
when the atmosphere is clearer. Our national wars with the English were
rendered familiar to our country folk of the last age, and for centuries
before by the old Scotch "_Makkaris,_" Barbour and Blind Harry, and in
our own times by the glowing narratives of Sir Walter Scott,--magicians
who, unlike those ancient sorcerers that used to darken the air with
their incantations, possessed the rare power of dissipating the mists
and vapors of the historic atmosphere, and rendering it transparent. But
we had no such chroniclers of the time, though only half an age further
removed into the past,

"When Norse and Danish galleys plied
Their oars within the Frith of Clyde,
And floated Haco's banner trim
Above Norweyan warriors grim,
Savage of heart and large of limb."

And hence the thick haze in which it is enveloped. Curiously enough,
however, this period, during which the wild Scot had to contend with the
still wilder wanderers of Scandinavia in fierce combats that he was too
little skilful to record, and which appears so obscure and remote to his
descendants, presents a phase comparatively near, and an outline
proportionally sharp and well-defined to the intelligent peasantry of
Iceland. _Their_ Barbours and Blind Harries came a few ages sooner than
ours, and the fog, in consequence, ros