There is no protection from weather on the island, whether it is wind, rain, or—rarely—sun. The power was down throughout my visit, though there was bottled gas for cooking and for the gas lights, which provoked childhood memories of the tilley lamps we had to pump to get started on my father’s boat. It’s a different kind of light, softer—not so good for reading, but more restful than electric. The woodburning stove was good, but didn’t throw out much heat and was a long way from the bedrooms. We were encouraged to use as little water as possible, even for the toilet, but the heavy rainfall before and during the visit meant this wasn’t a problem. The summer could be different.
The seagulls are never entirely quiet and occasional bouts of squawking continue all through the night. Basically, this is a seabird colony and the ten or so humans on the island are just visiting. The black cliff plunging a hundred feet or more down into the water are packed with birds in perpetual motion, paired on the narrowest of ledges at every level. A razorbill comes to sit near me, watching me constantly before toppling off the edge of the cliff, his wings whirring. Suddenly, one day the auks—razorbills, guillemots, puffins—vanish according to a logic of their own, though some reappear before we leave.
According to legend, St Adrian was martyred here in the year 895, together with 6000 monks, though the island could scarcely hold 6000 monks let alone feed them for any period of time. In fact, all the legends about St Adrian are confused, though some holy man was venerated here from the seventh century onwards and traces of the early church have been traced beneath the medieval monastery, whose foundations are still visible. It is almost impossible for us to imagine ourselves back into that life. Even today, the island can be cut off for days and even weeks from the mainland by wind or fog. Yet they lived here, possibly with a dozen or two goats, fish and fowl to catch, and some few vegetables; occasionally maybe offerings from the sick who came here for a miracle or—which I think more likely—who came to die and be buried close to the saint who would intercede for them and their sinful lives on the day of resurrection. And perhaps had been coming here to die since before Christianity.
Who can read the minds of those who lived before modern civilization and the modern ‘self’ appeared? And how will it be when that ‘self’ too disappears?
The island, of course, will continue—until in a hundred thousand or a million years the waves wear it down or drown it. Whether humans will witness that day must be doubtful.
Confessions of a devout European 