Alf Young
George Osborne didn’t learn from Ireland before. Will he learn now?
Also on this page:
Bob’s People
Those awful chefs
Alison Prince
How Creative Scotland is hostile
to the essential nature of art
Also on this page:
The Midgie
A full and unqualified correction
Islay McLeod
launches an SR competition
Also on this page:
Rear Window
James Shaw Grant on second sight
The second excerpt from an article by James Shaw Grant, a former editor of the Stornoway Gazette, in the Christmas 1998 edition of SR.
A fishing boat caught fire in Stornoway harbour. A group of youngsters, being taken for a sail, were trapped in the engine room. One died. His brother was badly burned.
When the fire occurred, the mothers of the boys were gathered together at a tea party, to welcome a new matron who had come to Lews Hospital. In the course of the conversation they discovered she read cups. ‘You don’t know any of us. You must read ours!’
She found a strange ship without a funnel in several of the cups. She found tears and fire and people who got money they did not want. She told my mother she saw her in a state of terror, but, suddenly, anxiety gave way to joy.
While the cups were still being read, a messenger burst into the room with the news that one of the hostess’s sons was dead and another badly injured. He had no idea where my brother was. He hadn’t seen him since the blaze.
My mother raced to the quay where she found my brother standing in the crowd. Even as a child he had an instinct for mechanical things and refused to go into the engine room because he did not think it was safe. He had watched the attempt to start an old-fashioned engine with a blow-lamp, through a hatch, from the safety of the deck.
Ironically, the fishing boat was called The Children’s Trust.
The competition
Set by Islay McLeod
Last weekend, during one of my regular jaunts around Scotland, I came across the sight photographed below.
The competition question is in two parts:
I. Which famous Scottish landmark is to be found above this unedifying convenience?;
II. In which town is the lavatory situated?
There will be a Scottish Review pen for the first half dozen correct answers received – assuming there are any correct answers – by 1pm on Monday 27 September.
Email your answer to islay@scottishreview.net
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Bob Smith
