Inverness is the tenth chapter of Samuel Johnson's book Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland, about a trip he took in 1773. The previous chapter was Fores, Calder and Fort George and the next is Lough Ness.
Inverness was the last place which had a regular communication by high roads with the southern counties. All the ways beyond it have, I believe, been made by the soldiers in this century. At Inverness therefore Cromwell, when he subdued Scotland, stationed a garrison, as at the boundary of the Highlands. The soldiers seem to have incorporated afterwards with the inhabitants, and to have peopled the place with an English race; for the language of this town has been long considered as peculiarly elegant.

Here is a castle, called the castle of Macbeth, the walls of which are yet standing. It was no very capacious edifice, but stands upon a rock so high and steep, that I think it was once not accessible, but by the help of ladders, or a bridge. Over against it, on another hill, was a fort built by Cromwell, now totally demolished; for no faction of Scotland loved the name of Cromwell, or had any desire to continue his memory.

Yet what the Romans did to other nations, was in a great degree done by Cromwell to the Scots; he civilized them by conquest, and introduced by useful violence the arts of peace. I was told at Aberdeen that the people learned from Cromwell's soldiers to make shoes and to plant kail.

How they lived without kail, it is not easy to guess: They cultivate hardly any other plant for common tables, and when they had not kail they probably had nothing. The numbers that go barefoot are still sufficient to show that shoes may be spared: They are not yet considered as necessaries of life; for tall boys, not otherwise meanly dressed, run without them in the streets; and in the islands the sons of gentlemen pass several of their first years with naked feet.

I know not whether it be not peculiar to the Scots to have attained the liberal, without the manual arts, to have excelled in ornamental knowledge, and to have wanted not only the elegancies, but the conveniences of common life. Literature soon after its revival found its way to Scotland, and from the middle of the sixteenth century, almost to the middle of the seventeenth, the politer studies were very diligently pursued. The Latin poetry of Deliciae Poetarum Scotorum would have done honour to any nation, at least till the publication of May's Supplement the English had very little to oppose.

Yet men thus ingenious and inquisitive were content to live in total ignorance of the trades by which human wants are supplied, and to supply them by the grossest means. Till the Union made them acquainted with English manners, the culture of their lands was unskilful, and their domestick life unformed; their tables were coarse as the feasts of Eskimeaux, and their houses filthy as the cottages of Hottentots.

Since they have known that their condition was capable of improvement, their progress in useful knowledge has been rapid and uniform. What remains to be done they will quickly do, and then wonder, like me, why that which was so necessary and so easy was so long delayed. But they must be for ever content to owe to the English that elegance and culture, which, if they had been vigilant and active, perhaps the English might have owed to them.

Here the appearance of life began to alter. I had seen a few women with plaids at Aberdeen; but at Inverness the Highland manners are common. There is I think a kirk, in which only the Erse language is used. There is likewise an English chapel, but meanly built, where on Sunday we saw a very decent congregation.

We were now to bid farewell to the luxury of travelling, and to enter a country upon which perhaps no wheel has ever rolled. We could indeed have used our post-chaise one day longer, along the military road to Fort Augustus, but we could have hired no horses beyond Inverness, and we were not so sparing of ourselves, as to lead them, merely that we might have one day longer the indulgence of a carriage.

At Inverness therefore we procured three horses for ourselves and a servant, and one more for our baggage, which was no very heavy load. We found in the course of our journey the convenience of having disencumbered ourselves, by laying aside whatever we could spare; for it is not to be imagined without experience, how in climbing crags, and treading bogs, and winding through narrow and obstructed passages, a little bulk will hinder, and a little weight will burthen; or how often a man that has pleased himself at home with his own resolution, will, in the hour of darkness and fatigue, be content to leave behind him every thing but himself.

Known as the capital of the Highlands, Inverness lies at the mouth of the River Ness as it flows into the Moray Firth in northwest Scotland. The river flows south into nearby Loch Ness via the Caledonian Canal, which connects Loch Ness, Loch Oich, and Loch Lochy. Loch Ness is the home of the famous Loch Ness Monster, commonly known as Nessie.

The buildings of Inverness include Inverness Castle and St Andrew’s Cathedral. The castle was built on the site of a previous building from 1835 and is now a Sheriff Court – an older wooden castle was located further east in the 11th century, and may have been the basis for the castle in Shakespeare’s Macbeth. St Andrew’s Cathedral has a curiously square-topped look to its spires, as funds ran out before they could be completed.

Inverness was granted city status by the Queen in December 2000, and celebrated its new status officially in March 2001. Its population was approximately 62,000 in 1991. The city’s economy relies mainly on tourism, with its many bed and breakfast establishments, and is boosted by tweed production, leather tanning, engineering, and distilling. Salmon fishing is also popular, and smoked salmon is a local delicacy.

Culloden moor lies nearby, and was the site of the Battle of Culloden in 1746, which ended the Jacobite rebellion.

Inverness's football team, Caledonian Thistle won a famous 3-1 victory against Celtic in a third-round Scottish Cup tie in February, 2000.

Sources:
Chronicle of Britain, Chronicle Communications Ltd
http://www.scotland-info.co.uk/inverness.htm?source=espotting

In`ver*ness" (?), n., or In`ver*ness" cape".

A kind of full sleeveless cape, fitting closely about the neck.

Robert's wind-blown head and tall form wrapped in an Inverness cape.
Mrs. Humphry Ward.

 

© Webster 1913

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