Louis Simpson
A
LEAVE OF ABSENCE
I had been awarded a grant and was able to take a year off from
teaching. And it was time for a change of scene. London seemed a good idea
- there'd be no trouble finding schools for the children. Through an ad
in
the
Times
we rented an apartment
in
Primrose Hill. The ad said that it was close
to Regent's Park and a few minutes by bus or underground to the middle of
London.
We couldn't move in before the end ofJune, so we thought we
would spend the time between travelling. I had a friend in Edinburgh, Robin
Lorimer, who had edited my book on James Hogg. We flew to London,
spent a few days sightseeing, and took a train to Edinburgh.
The last time I had been there, doing research for the book, was in
March. It was wet and cold. I shivered in the streets and it was scarcely
better in my room. On Sundays everything was closed - I spent one Sunday
in bed waiting for Monday to come. But this time, thanks to
James Hogg: A
Critical
Study,
doors opened as ifby magic, and we discovered that behind
the gray stones of Edinburgh a lively, convivial life was going on. "Have
another slice of beef," said the hostess. "No thanks," I said, "it's very good
but ..." "I didna doot the roast," she said, giving me a lesson in Scottish
manners: you don't compliment the hostess on her cooking, it is always good.
We traveled to Inverness and the field of Culloden. I had read that
there was a connection between my ancestors and a clan that fought in the
battle. It had been a disaster, half-naked clansmen running onto English bay–
onets. They were buried at Culloden in a mass grave. Afterwards the En–
glish hunted the rebels among the hills, and some were shipped to the colonies
in chains. That may have been how my ancestor came to Jamaica.
On the other hand, he might have been a farmer who couldn't make a
living in Scotland. If so, he must have been desperate - Europeans who went
to the West Indies were likely to die of fever or some other tropical disease.
We traveled across the Highlands to the Isle of Skye. There among
the hills with their thistles and patches of heather you feel that, in all the cen–
turies, you may be the first to stand on this particular spot. Cities cease to
exist or have not yet come into being. An immense solitude broods over the
hills. There are no curtains between you and it.
We moved into the apartment in Primrose Hill, found a grocer and
butcher and arranged to have milk delivered. Chalk Farm lay in one direc–
tion, Regent's Park in another. At night the wind brought the howling of
wolves in the zoo.
There actually was a hill. People took their lunch there, children flew
