Children of Tempest, a Tale of the Outer Isles

by Neil Munro

There was a woman years ago in Uist who had two sons, one to her first husband, one to his successor. They dwelt in Corodale. That place, remote and little, is like the enormous world and life itself—a mingling of meaningless hills and hollows, suffering the fury of eternal seas incomprehensible; to-night, it may be, wet with tears, to-morrow smiled on by the most jovial sun, and once, though now forlorn, it was exceeding busy with betrothals and bridals and births, and blythemeats, and burials in Lamasay yard, strife among the folk of it as well as great love. Two mountains stand behind the house where dwelt the widow and her sons—Hecla and Benmore the names of them; close beside in Usinish Glen is a lake so blue that no other water in the Long Isle can compare with it for loveliness. A prince well known in story fled here once from his enemies and hid him in a cave.

Genres: Historical Fiction

331 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1903

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.

Neil Munro was a Scottish journalist, newspaper editor, author and literary critic. He was born in Inveraray and worked as a journalist on various newspapers.

He was basically a serious writer, but is now mainly known for his humorous short stories, originally written under the pen name of Hugh Foulis. (It seems that he was not making a serious attempt to disguise his identity, but wanted to keep his serious and humorous writings separate.) The best known were about the fictional Clyde puffer the Vital Spark and her captain Para Handy, but they also included stories about the waiter and kirk beadle Erchie MacPherson, and the travelling drapery salesman Jimmy Swan.

Reviews

[J.C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Children of Tempest: written in 1903, set in 1795 and 1796, fifty years after the Jacobite Rising that culminated in the defeat at Culloden of the Highland clan army. The novel centres on the lost treasure of Bonnie Prince Charlie, supposedly buried in Loch Arkaig in Lochaber, which has been on my mind lately, as it has been mentioned in the last couple of books I have read. I was taken by this rather less romantic description of the treasure, from this book:
“that vile trash tarnished by intrigue, and known in history as a relic of defeat and degradation and ideals long abandoned.”
Children of Tempest is set on “The Dark Isle” (Uist in the Outer Hebrides) and includes the neighbouring isles of Barra, where I live, and Mingulay, a now uninhabited island, which, for its dramatic and barely accessible cliffs, rivals Hirta in the isles of St Kilda far out to the west. The front cover of my edition shows the steep fall to the narrow arm of the sea, about 250 metres.
Ronald Renton’s is the most enlightened introduction I have ever read! Simple factual detail on the author’s life and writings is followed by a warning to the reader that “the next section reveals some of storyline and readers may therefore prefer to read this after they have finished the novel.” Yes! How many years have I waited for such consideration from the writers of introductions!
Based on former experience I had already read the novel and so was happy to read on in the introduction, stopping only to type these few lines of appreciation. A page further and I have to stop again with another exclamation of delight. The back cover describes this story as “a romantic and melodramatic love story”. I was unhappy with this and had intended checking the Oxford Shorter Dictionary for a full definition of ‘melodrama’ so that I could take issue with it in this review – but Ronald Renton has resolved this for me:
“Although the superficial narration of the plot suggests melodrama with stage villains opposed to saintly characters a closer examination shows that the stark contrast of “good” and “evil” invests the novel with the qualities of a parable on the destructive power of human greed. Munro himself referred to his novel as a “fable”.”
Oh, thank you also, Ronald Renton, for your deferential portrayal of the legendary priest of South Uist and Eriskay, Father Allan MacDonald (1859 to 1905), on whom Munro’s character of the priest in the story is based. Munro had met Maighstir Ailein while on a trip to Uist and owes to him his accurate portrayal of life in the isles at that time. Father Allan is still loved in the islands for his dedication to the people and to their language and culture. In his image Neil Munro creates Father Ludovick, supposed priest of Stella Maris, Our Lady Star of the Sea, a church on a hilly rock; this is actually in Barra, but Neil Munro has obviously been enchanted by the name and location. In transporting it to Boisdale in South Uist Neil Munro reveals immediately that he treats these isles, now in some ways more separate, as the same community. He continues to do so, appropriate to an age before scheduled ferries and administrative separation, when anyone could travel more freely between the isles in their own or a neighbour’s boat. I was a little confused by his placing of MacNeils in South Uist instead of MacDonalds, the Lords of the Isles in history, while the castle in the sea in Barra, Kismul, is the seat of Clan MacNeil; but my neighbour across the road tells me that at that time South Uist was part of the MacNeil estate. Less historical is their supposed claim to the treasure, but we have to have a story somewhere!
I love this introduction; the very next paragraph sums up Munro’s ability to connect proverbial folklore to the events of his narrative. I don’t want to give the example, as it will reveal too much of the story, but it concerns “the spoil of the sea” and Renton likens it to Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Merry Men”, which I have read and reviewed. Connections fascinate me and make my reading experience more meaningful. I agree entirely with this comparison but would make the case for Munro’s description of “The Merry Men” (forceful waves and breakers) being much more powerful.
The reading experience begins with a step into old-fashioned and highly romanticised narration, which is however authentic in detail and in atmosphere. I was quickly captivated by the descriptions of crossing the dangerous fords between South Uist and the flat isle of Benbecula, and between Benbecula and North Uist. I have a CD by the group “Calasaig” where one of the songs, Baleshare, commemorates a great-aunt of one of the group, Cairistiona MacMillan, drowned in 1907 at the age of sixteen, crossing the treacherous sweeps of quicksand and fast-filling tides at the North Ford.
The weight of the book is in its authenticity, provided by Father Allan and by Alexander Carmichael’s Carmina Gadelica, “a collection of hymns, invocations and prayers which cover every aspect of Hebridean life”, and to which Father Allan contributed. The charm of Children of Tempest lies in descriptions of such things as the feast of St Bride in early February, whose fertility ritual was still followed in Barra when I arrived here in 1977 : an image of St Bride, a sheaf of corn, was kept in an island home, cared for and put to bed in a vestige of a pagan ceremony. The last time I visited an old chapel in the north of the island a sheaf doll for St Bride was still there.
But charms can be dark, and the people of this story live out their lives at the mercy of the tempest. The story culminates on the dangerous isle of Mingulay, where dark forces of old beliefs come into play. I can’t say more on this, but I was spellbound by the descriptions, the sea a live thing, the cliffs a terror. Ronald Renton likens the book to Shakespeare’s The Tempest, in its characterisation and narrative.
The old-fashioned writing may be difficult for anyone for whom English is not their native tongue, although the smatterings of Gaelic are explained in English. I was interested in the word “ulaidh”, which I have heard used as an endearment in this island today. It means “hidden treasure”, which, for me, applies to this book as well as to Bonnie Prince Charlie’s ‘tarnished’ gold. Local interest, yes, and a traditional tale; but the age-old battle of good and evil is fought out with the tempest as its metaphor, and – something that Ronald Renton did not pick up – damage is done to the characters here by the propensity of people in a small community, then or today, to pick up any stray bit of gossip that comes their way and elaborate it, with little regard for the consequences of their enjoyment. The story provides a spine for a plot that is indeed ‘romantic’ in the old sense but which, in its laying bare of human folly and greed, is relevant to any age, and which, in its dark battles of the human spirit and the tumultuous sea, is timeless.

[Kirsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an atmospheric, exciting melodrama, just like something out of an old Gaelic song. Cleverly mingling history and folklore, Munro spins a tale of star-crossed lovers, scheming brothers, whisky smugglers, and above all, the fate of the Loch Arkaig treasure that disappeared after the Jacobite rising of '45. The tale is peopled with vivid characters (my favourites were the smugglers!) and lively dialogue, but it has to be said, the main character is definitely the sea. Munro evokes the Outer Hebrides the way George Mackay Brown does for Orkney, and his descriptions of the sea - beautiful and menacing, live-giving and perilous, all at once - are utterly spellbinding. I definitely found myself longing to take a trip up the coast and go island-hopping for a bit!

[Russell Stamets · Rating 5 out of 5]

beautifully written

[Laura JC · Rating 4 out of 5]

Intriguing story in interesting setting of the Western Isles of Scotland.
"Is set on South Uist and deals with the Loch Arkaig treasure, French money which had been intended to support the Rising but had mysteriously been moved to a cave on the island of Mingulay. This becomes an object of greed and leads to the kidnapping of the heroine and [spoiler] in a dramatic scene on the cliffs of Mingulay."

[Jenny Cooper · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very good story but it is not an easy read. The language is archaic and very Scottish and the writing style is flowery, lyrical and descriptive (why use one word when ten will do).