Ladies’ Edinburgh Magazine > Volume 5

A i Home and A broad. 447
us at first, from fear of the cattle which roamed about the
island. The nearest farmer warned us upon our arrival, that
though his beasts were, of course, as quiet as well-beliaved
cattle ought to be, still they had a dislike to strangers, and
he would not recommend us to go too near them until they
had become accustomed to us. It was in following this
advice that we acquired the habit of walking on the extreme
edge of the rocks, and this for two reasons—first, so as to
leave our enemies every room to pass us unmolested; and
then, because we were all firmly convinced that it would be
better to plunge at once into the ocean, than to face the anger
of an infuriated bull.
We grew braver after we had been some weeks in the
island, and at last the most courageous amongst us used
adventurously to cross a field with cattle in it, which made
a short cut to some cottages we were in the habit of visiting.
I cannot say that her courage was rewarded. At first we
used to watch her over the dangerous corner in much fear
and trembling ; but in time we got used to the adventure,
and thought no more of it, until one unlucky day when she
started for her walk with her hands full of eggs, intended as
a present for an invalid, and a volume of Sir Walter Scott's
Pirate under her arm, which she was in the habit of reading
to an interested cottage audience. She had hardly entered
the field when the beasts began to watch her, and before she
was half-way across, an angry cow was in full pursuit of the
unwelcome stranger. There was no time to reach the gate;
she rushed towards the high stone wall which surrounded
the field, and, with breathless interest, we saw her endeavour
to clamber over a place which wotild certaiidy have seemed
insurmountable in cold blood. Now, however, spurred on
by the feeling that the cow's horns were already at her back,
she reached the top of the wall by a superhuman effort, and
was presently standing on the other side, hatless, dishevelled,
covered with broken eggs, and much irritated, as she after¬
wards confessed to us, by the frank laughter of her cottage
friends at the forlorn appearance she presented. One of
them went so far as to declare that the cow only wanted to
be milked, but we would never listen to such a base ex¬
planation of our terrible adventure !
I think it was in consequence of this that we all solemnly
determined that in future, young and old, we would always
ride about instead of walking. There were several good-
sized Shetland ponies roaming over our island, not exactly
wild, of course, but left to wander over the hills, winter and