The enchanted Scottish forest that created Peter Rabbit
SHE endured dark, dismal winters in anticipation of glorious summers and railway journeys from London to the Highland haven that had touched her soul, sowing the seeds of a phenomenon that would endear her to the world. From a young age, Beatrix Potter regarded London’s Kensington as ‘ my unloved birthplace’. Her spiritual home was in the Perthshire hills around Dalguise and Dunkeld, a place of magic that fuelled the imagination of a shy, awkward child.
In the popular mind, she is inextricably linked with the Lake District, where she spent her later years. But long before her death in 1943 at 77, she had a hidden life that was physically, emotionally and creatively linked to Scotland – and the long family holidays that began when she was five. For many years, they offered sanctuary and a refuge from rejection and tragedy. She credited Scotland with instilling in her a deep love of nature and as the place where she began to ‘see’ the wonderful pantheon of characters which to this day enthral children.
This most English of authors would write: ‘I do not remember a time in Scotland when I did not make for myself a fairyland amongst wild flowers, the animals, fungi, mosses, woods, and streams; all the thousand objects of the countryside.’
In childhood, Potter, whose first ambition was to be a botanical artist and scientist, was befriended by Charlie McIntosh, the Highland postie who delivered to the ‘Big Hoose’ at Dalguise, in which the wealthy Potter family spent their summers.
McIntosh, a leading light in the Perthshire Society of Natural Sciences, encouraged and mentored her, particularly in mycology, the study of fungi. In time, he was rewarded by becoming Mr McGregor in Potter’s first and most famous book, The Tale of Peter Rabbit.
But McIntosh was not her only Scottish friend who would one day be immortalised in her famous stories.
IN Cottar Cottage, where Potter listened to the lilting voice of Kitty Macdonald, she saw not just the aged laundress who ‘did’ for the family. She found the hedgehog washerwoman Mrs Tiggy-Winkle, a character who still delights youngsters today. Another local worthy, whose name is, sadly, lost to us, was known for his sartorial elegance and would be enshrined in literature as Jeremy Fisher, the most elegant of frogs.
The unknown life of Potter in Scotland is the focus of several events this summer.
There is a major exhibition in London of photographs taken by her lawyer father Rupert, a pioneer of the art whose images record the Perthshire holidays.
A three- day international study conference on the author’s close ties to the Highlands is being held in Birnam, Perthshire.
It is astonishing to realise that some of the most famous characters in children’s fiction might never have been created but for Potter’s bitter disappointment at being rejected as a scientist. Through her own diligence, and with the help of McIntosh, she became something of an authority on plants and began to formulate her own complex theories about them. An uncle tried to introduce her as a student at the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew, London – but she was rejected because she was a woman.
Undeterred, she wrote a paper in 1897, The Germination of the Spores of Agaricineae, which she was scheduled to present to the botanical Linnean Society.
Again, her gender was a barrier and she was not allowed to read the paper in person. The treatise was presented by her uncle and its contents were immediately rubbished by ‘experts’.
‘Ironically, many years later, she and McIntosh would be proved to be much more expert in the field than the men who rejected her,’ says Dave Amos, exhibition manager of Birnam Arts, where the study conference is being held. ‘In fact, she would come to be regarded as quite brilliant. However, her rejection served to drive her in another direction and that has left us with a wonderful legacy of beautiful stories and illustrations.’
After the snub, Potter retreated to her Scots sanctuary, now at Eastwood House, near Dunkeld. She began drawing on the years of inspiration of spending summers north of the Border, a tradition started by her grandfather. In his day, the journey to Scotland was long and arduous, but by the time Potter’s father was taking the family north, the railway had arrived, bringing rich English visitors to their Highland holiday homes.
She made her first journey to Scotland in 1871, leaving behind the London suburb of Kensington, which she had not realised was such a ‘soulless’ place until she visited Scotland.
‘Everything was romantic in my imagination,’ she would write. ‘The woods were peopled by the mysterious good folk. Half believing the picturesque superstitions of the district, seeing my own fancies so clearly that they became true to me, I lived in a separate world. It was a beautiful, happy time.’
Later, she would be joined by her younger brother, Bertram, who was six years her junior.
Highland manners prevented locals such as McIntosh and Miss Macdonald from expressing their opinion of the children’s parents, who were regarded as cold Victorian martinets who eventually demanded their daughter remain a spinster to look after them in their dotage.
Local folk were, however, loud in their praise of the adorable brother and sister. ‘They were fascinated by birds, bugs and animals,’ says Mr Amos. ‘The main thing is how being in Scotland influenced her view of the environment and ecology. It was something she would carry with her for the rest of her life.’
ON rainy days she would be inside, reading the tales of Sir Walter Scott. Writing of how Scotland ‘ captivated’ her, she said: ‘I remember I used to half believe in and wholly play with fairies. What heaven can be more real than to retain the spirit-world of childhood, tempered and balanced by knowledge and common sense, to fear no longer the terror that flieth by night, yet to feel truly and understand a little, a very little, of the story of life?’
She might have wanted to be a scientist, but Potter had the soul of a poet. It was not long before her Scottish ‘fairyland’ would be translated into the now famous stories.
It was Potter’s habit to write letters to the children of friends, lavishly illustrated with animal characters. Gradually the idea grew: could her letters be transformed into picture books for youngsters?
Jenny Akester, chairman of the Beatrix Potter Society, who has arranged the conference, says: ‘They contained the basic elements, punctuated by the charming illustrations Beatrix is now so famous for.’
In 1893, Potter had written a special ‘picture letter’ to Noel Moore, five-year-old son of a family friend. It narrated the adventures of a rabbit called Peter, a creature based on a beloved pet from childhood.
A day later, she wrote a similar letter to Noel’s brother, Eric, featuring a frog called Jeremy Fisher.
Potter decided the picture-letters would be the foundation of a new career. By 1902, the first letter had been expanded into The Tale of Peter Rabbit. But she struggled to find a publisher until Frederick Warne & Company decided to take a chance on her. Its faith was rewarded with a clamour for more stories by the author who has, to date, sold 35 million books, translated into almost every language.
But her success could not protect Potter from tragedy. She had found more than a publisher in the Warne family, falling in love with Frederick’s son Norman. They became engaged. But in 1905 he died from an illness related to pernicious anaemia – a condition that in the Edwardian era was invariably fatal.
Potter was devastated and retreated to Scotland with her par- ents, who now expected her to devote her life to their care.
‘I think it was kind of expected that the spinster daughters of Victorian households should sacrifice their lives in order to look after their parents,’ says Mrs Akester.
But she would not make that sacrifice. Eight years after the death of her first love, she married William Heelis, a Lake District solicitor. ‘She was 47,’ adds Mrs Akester, ‘and that was the beginning of her association with the area. She was happily married f or 30 years, weaving magical tales at Hill Top Farm, near Sawrey, until her death.
‘Beatrix tends to be most associated with the Lake District. She was, however, deeply attached to Scotland. She was inextricably linked to Scotland a long time before she ever went to the Lake District.’
Potter never returned to Scotland, but its influence remained strong. Shortly before her death, she wrote: ‘I remember every stone, every tree, the scent of the heather – oh, it was always so beautiful, home sweet home.’
Beatrix Potter and Scotland, Birnam, Perthshire, June 26-30. Visit beatrixpottersociety.org.uk. The World of Rupert Potter: Photographs of Beatrix, Millais and Friends, National Portrait Gallery, London, until November 1.