One of the greatest travellers in Scotland, Martin Martin was also a native Gaelic speaker. This text offers his narrative of his journey around the Western Isles, and a mine of information on custom, tradition and life. Martin Martin's wrote before the Jacobite rebellions changed the way of life of the Highlander irrevocably. The volume includes the earliest account of St Kilda, first published in 1697 and Sir Donald Monro, High Dean of the Isles, account written in 1549 which presents a record of a pastoral visit to islands still coping with the aftermath of the fall of the Lords of the Isles.

The islands of the Outer Hebrides are home to some of the most remote and spectacular scenery in the world. They host an astonishing range of mysterious structures - stone circles, beehive dwellings, holy wells and 'temples' from the Celtic era. Over a twelve-day pilgrimage, often in appalling conditions, Alastair McIntosh returns to the islands of his childhood and explores the meaning of these places. Traversing moors and mountains, struggling through torrential rivers, he walks from the most southerly tip of Harris to the northerly Butt of Lewis. The book is a walk through space and time, across a physical landscape and into a spiritual one. As he battled with his own ability to endure some of the toughest terrain in Britain, he met with the healing power of the land and its communities. This is a moving book, a powerful reflection not simply of this extraordinary place and its people met along the way, but of imaginative hope for humankind.

An introduction to and advice on book collecting with a glossary of terms and tips on how to identify first editions and estimated values for over 20,000 collectible books published in English (including translations) over the last three centuries-about half are literary titles in the broadest sense (novels, poetry, plays, mysteries, science fiction, and children's books); and the other half are non-fiction (Americana, travel and exploration, finance, cookbooks, color plate, medicine, science, photography, Mormonism, sports, et al).

Samuel Johnson and James Boswell spent the autumn of 1773 touring the Highlands and Western Islands of Scotland. Both kept detailed notes of their impressions, and later published separate accounts of their journey. These accounts of their great tour contain some of the finest pieces of travel writing ever produced: they are magnificent historical documents and also portraits of two extraordinary personalities. In the vivid prose of these two famous men of letters, the Highlands and the Western Islands spring to life. The juxtaposition of the two very different accounts creates an unsurpassed portrait of a society which was utterly alien to the Europe of the Enlightenment, and which was straining on the brink of calamitous change. These great masterpieces, entertaining, profound, and marvellously readable are also our last chronicles of a lost age and people.