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SCOTLAND
It is barely 12 miles across the sea from Fair Head on the north-western tip of Ulster to the cliffs of
the Mull of Kintyre, rising above the waves of the North Channel. Scotland is bounded on three
sides by the sea: by the wild Atlantic to the west and north and by the temperamental North Sea
beyond the eastern coastline. Across its historically fluctuating southern land boundary lies
England, at different times enemy and friend, but never indifferent neighbour. The western sea
boundary is fringed with several large, inhabited islands and hundreds of small ones deprived of
inhabitants. Off the north coast lie the Orkney Islands, and 60 miles further to the north-east and
halfway to Norway are the Shetlands. The total land area, including the islands, is just over 30,400
square miles, only slightly smaller than Ireland. Mountains dominate the mainland, with the rugged
Scottish Highlands reaching to over 1,300 metres. Ben Macdui (1,309 metres), highest of the
Cairngorms in the north-east, and Ben Nevis (1,344 metres) in the west are the highest mountains in
the whole of the Isles.
The mountains continue all the way to the northern coast of Scotland, especially on the west
side, where millions of years of erosion, compounded by the gouging action of the glaciers, which
covered the whole of Scotland in the last Ice Age, have left a dramatic landscape. In the far northwest,
Old Red Sandstone peaks like Suilven and Stac Pollaidh stand isolated above featureless
country of bog and lochan. In the extreme north, the mountains relent, leaving a fertile coastal strip
where the thin, acidic soil of the Highlands is invigorated by calcium-rich limestones and
sandstones.
The effect of limestone, wherever it occurs, is always dramatic. It neutralizes the otherwise
acidic soils and in so doing transforms the colour of the landscape from a yellow-brown to a vivid
green. In the Highlands and the Hebrides, the occasional limestone outcrops are marked out by the
rich growth of grass and wild flowers. But nowhere is the effect of neutralizing the soil more
noticeable or more delightful than in the Western Isles, the long chains of islands that protect the
mainland from the full force of the Atlantic. On the western edge of these islands are some of the
most beautiful beaches in the world. Brilliant white in the sunlight and lapped by turquoise,
translucent seas, they are not made of the usual sands to be found on the crowded holiday beaches
of southern England. The white beaches of the Western Isles are composed of the pulverized shells
of countless billions of sea creatures that have been ground to a coarse powder by the pounding
waves of the Atlantic. The wind, which for 300 days out of 365 roars in from the ocean, has blown
the shell sand inland for a mile or two. And there it works its magic on the soil, neutralizing the
acid and supplying essential phosphates that are otherwise entirely lacking. The result is the