Many of the crofters on Fair Isle and Shetland know as much about the birds as the birders.

Not birds, you lamebrain, dey stole mongeese. Little animals from over in India, day kill da snakes, da cobras dere.

Yet unlike my era's greatest Afrindian brave, Jimi Hendrix, I have more often than not been an armchair gypsy, the Ezy Rider of interiors.

Then wept for woe the damsel bound With iron and with anguish round, That none to help her grief was found Or loose the inextricably inwound Grim curse that girt her life with grief And made a burden of her breath, Harsh as the bitterness of death.