Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1964, Blaðsíða 3

The Personal Impact of Jakobsen in Shetland and Orkney J J
that he came originally for three months, but found so
much material that he stayed three years.
As I grew up I always encountered affectionate remem<
brance of Jakobsen among all who mentioned him. One of
the Shetland men with whom he had most to do was the
blind scholar and author J. J. Haldane Burgess, whom I
knew well, and who died in 1926. Burgess told me him«
self that Jakobsen’s death was to him a great personal blow,
quite apart from considerations of the loss to scholarship,
because, as Burgess put it, »he was such a fine soul.æ
I would like here to recount a little incident told to me
by Burgess which reveals Jakobsen’s sense of humour, a
side of his nature which is too seldom mentioned.
I have already said that Burgess was blind — he actually
went blind during his student days. As often happens with
blind people, his other senses became developed to an
extraordinary degree, and his ability to walk about unaided
and yet know exactly where he was, often puzzled people,
including Jakobsen.
One day Jakobsen resolved to see if he could take Burgess
past the limit of his sense of locality. He took Burgess
a long, circuitous walk around Lerwick, and when they
had reached the extremity of the town furthest away from
where Burgess lived, Jakobsen suddenly asked him where
they were. To Jakobsen’s astonishment Burgess gave an
absolutely correct reply. The explanation was that Jakob*
sen had unwittingly led the way to the vicinity of a par«
ticular oil store, and Burgess recognised his whereabouts
by the smell!
Next to Burgess, the two most outstanding Scandinavian
scholars in Lerwick in my time were William W. Ratter,
and John Nicolson, poet and writer, who both outlived
Burgess by about 20 years. They both told me themselves
that they owed their interest in and knowledge of Scandb
navian language initially to Jakobsen, who taught them as
young men. Both spoke of him with great affection.