ABOUT a century ago there lived in the Island of Skye one of the most remarkable lay preachers that Scotland ever produced. He was Donald Munro, a native of the parish of Portree. His life and labours have been described by Mr. MacKinnon, Portree, in a Gaelic booklet, from whose interesting pages some of the information for this article has been culled.
At the age of 14 years (circa 1787) Donald suffered so severely from smallpox that he became totally blind. This affliction, aggravated by poverty, drove the unfortunate boy to earn his living as a wandering fiddler. Readers should not mistake him for the blind harper (An Clàrsair Dall); nor for Donald Munro, Dean of the Isles, who wrote “A Description of the Western Isles” in 1549. His lot was cast in the dark days of the Moderates, when vital religion was at such a low ebb in our land that this fiddler, literally and spiritually blind, was duly appointed catechist. Here, indeed, was the blind leading the blind, the latter attracted not only by his skilful playing but also by his eloquence and marvellous memory. Although he could read nothing, for Braille was not introduced till 1834, he could repeat most of the Bible and Shorter Catechism, and, it is said, could give chapter and verse anywhere between Genesis and Revelation.
In 1805 this blind but capable leader was led into the light of the Gospel under the preaching of Mr. Farquharson, a missionary sent out by the Haldanes. Donald not only flung away his fiddle but persuaded his audiences in Snizort to make “a mountain” of bagpipes and fiddles and set them on fire. Bitter persecution from former companions inevitably followed, and he was expelled from office; but he was aided and defended by a few influential Christians throughout Skye. At this time the Rev. Boderick MacLeod, a grandson of MacLeod of Raasay, was assistant to his father at Snizort and was a gay and light-hearted man of the world; but Donald, who had the secret of the Lord, would not listen to any criticism of this careless man. After his conversion, Mr. MacLeod became a mighty instrument in the hand of God. He now spent so much time with the despised catechist that some of his parishioners remonstrated with him. His reply, “I expect to spend eternity with Donald Munro,” silenced them.
Not one of Donald’s numerous converts was known to backslide; they were all bright Christians; and among them was a galaxy of Gaelic schoolmasters and catechists. To mention a few, Malcolm Nicolson, the Gaelic hymn-writer, laboured in Barvas, Lewis; John MacSween in Islay; Donald MacDonald in Duirinish; Neil Stewart in North Uist; and John Munro, his nephew, in Rona.
As the fame of this burning and shining light spread, friends of Truth throughout the Highlands and Islands came to see him—though he could not see them—and to rejoice in his light. “I never met a brighter Christian,” declared the Rev. John MacRae (Mac Rath Mor). John Morrison (Gobha na h-Earradh), the most famous of the Harris Men, visited him, eulogised him in one of his hymns, and called one of his sons after him. From Lewis came the saintly Murdo MacDonald who, while in Skye, fell seriously ill and became anxious about his place of burial. “You will be buried with me and we shall rise together,” was his friend’s prophetic assurance. Murdo expired in Donald’s arms. They are buried in the Old Churchyard of Snizort.
When this remarkable man died in 1830, his faithful friend, the Rev. B. MacLeod, standing beside the corpse, and shedding copious tears, exclaimed, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horse-men thereof” (II. Kings 2: 12).
On his tombstone, erected by many sorrowing friends, is an epitaph with the title, “The Father of Evangelical Religion in the Isle of Skye.” Justly does the Rev. J. S. MacPhail claim in “Disruption Worthies”: “When the history of living religion in Skye shall be written, one of its most interesting chapters will be the life and labours of this man of God.”—M.G.