THE PILGRIM OF GLENCOE.

Page 352, line 17.

The vale, by eagle-haunted cliffs o'erhung,

The valley of Glencoe, unparalleled in its scenery for gloomy grandeur, is to this day frequented by eagles. When I visited the spot within a year ago, I saw several perch at a distance. Only one of them came so near me that I did not wish him any nearer. He favored me with a full and continued view of his noble person, and, with the exception of the African eagle which I saw wheeling and hovering over a corps of the French army that were marching from Oran, and who seemed to linger over them with delight at the sound of their trumpets, as if they were about to restore his image to the Gallic standard, I never saw a prouder bird than this black eagle of Glencoe.

I was unable, from a hurt in my foot, to leave the carriage; but the guide informed me that, if I could go nearer the sides of the glen, I should see the traces of houses and gardens once belonging to the unfortunate inhabitants. As it was, I never saw a spot where I could less suppose human beings to have ever dwelt. I asked the guide how these eagles subsisted; he replied, "On the lambs and the fawns of Lord Breadalbane." "Lambs and fawns!" I said; "and how do they subsist? for I cannot see verdure enough to graze a rabbit. I suspect," I added, "that these birds make the cliffs only their country-houses, and that they go down to the Lowlands to find their provender." "Ay, ay," replied the Highlander, "it is very possible, for the eagle can gang far for his breakfast."

Page 358, line 15.

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Witch-legends Ronald scorned — ghost, kelpie, wraith,

"The most dangerous and malignant creature of Highland superstition was the kelpie, or water-horse, which was supposed to allure women and children to his subaqueous haunts, and there devour them; sometimes he would swell the lake or torrent beyond its usual limits, and overwhelm the unguarded traveller in the flood. The shepherd, as he sat on the brow of a rock on a summer's evening, often fancied he saw this animal dashing along on the surface of the lake, or browsing on the pasture-ground upon its verge."Brown' History of the Highland Clans, vol. i. 106.

In Scotland, according to Dr. John Brown, it is yet a superstitious principle that the wraith, the omen or messenger of death, appears in the resemblance of one in danger, immediately preceding dissolution. This ominous form, purely of a spiritual nature, seems to testify that the exaction (extinction) of life approaches. It was wont to be exhibited also as “a little rough dog," when it could be pacified by the death of any other being, "if crossed, and conjured in time."— Brown's Superstitions of the Highlands, p. 182.

It happened to me, early in life, to meet with an amusing instance of Highland superstition with regard to myself. I lived in a family of the Island of Mull, and a mile or two from their house there was a burial-ground, without any church attached to it, on the lonely moor. The cemetery was enclosed and guarded by an iron railing, so high that it was thought to be unscalable. I was, however, commencing the study of botany at the time, and, thinking there might be some nice flowers and curious epitaphs among the grave-stones, I contrived, by help of my handkerchief, to scale the railing, and was soon scampering over the tombs; some of the natives chanced to perceive me, not in the act of climbing over to, but skipping over the burial-ground. In a day or two I observed the family looking on me with unaccountable, though not angry, seriousness; at last the good old grandmother told me, with tears in her eyes, "that I could not live long, for that my wraith had been seen." "And, pray, where?" "Leaping over the stones of the

burial-ground." The old lady was much relieved to hear that it was not my wraith, but myself.

Akin to other Highland superstitions, but differing from them in many essential respects, is the belief- for superstition it cannot well be called (quoth the wise author I am quoting) in the second-sight, by which, as Dr. Johnson observes, "seems to be meant a mode of seeing superadded to that which nature generally bestows; and consists of an impression made either by the mind upon the eye, or by the eye upon the mind, by which things distant or future are perceived and seen as if they were present. This deceptive faculty is called Traioshe in the Gaelic, which signifies a spectre or vision; and is neither voluntary nor constant, but consists in seeing an otherwise invisible object, without any previous means used by the person that sees it for that end. The vision makes such a lively impression upon the seers, that they neither see nor think of anything else, except the vision, as long as it continues; and then they appear pensive or jovial, according to the object which was represented to them."

There are now few persons, if any (continues Dr. Brown), who pretend to this faculty, and the belief in it is almost generally exploded. Yet it cannot be denied that apparent proofs of its existence have been adduced, which have staggered minds not prone to superstition. When the connection between cause and effect can be recognized, things which would otherwise have appeared wonderful, and almost incredible, are viewed as ordinary occurrences. The impossibility of accounting for such an extraordinary phenomenon as the alleged faculty on philosophical principles, or from the laws of nature, must ever leave the matter suspended between rational doubt and confirmed scepticism. "Strong reasons for incredulity," says Dr. Johnson, "will readily occur." This faculty of seeing things out of sight is local, and commonly useless. It is a breach of the common order of things, without any visible reason or perceptible benefit. It is ascribed only to a people very little enlightened, and among them, for the most part, to the mean and ignorant.

In the whole history of Highland superstitions, there is not a more curious fact than that Dr. James Brown, a gentleman of the Edinburgh bar, in the nineteenth century, should show himself a more abject believer in the truth of second sight than Dr. Samuel Johnson, of London, in the eighteenth century.

Page 359, line 28.

The pit or gallows would have cured my grief.

Until the year 1747, the Highland Lairds had the right of punishing serfs even capitally, in so far as they often hanged, or imprisoned them in a pit or dungeon, where they were starved to death. But the law of 1746, for disarming the Highlanders and restraining the use of the Highland garb, was followed up the following year by one of a more radical and permanent description. This was the act for abolishing the heritable jurisdictions, which, though necessary in a rude state of society, were wholly incompatible with an advanced state of civilization. By depriving the Highland chiefs of their judicial powers, it was thought that the sway which, for centuries, they had held over their people, would be gradually impaired; and that by investing certain judges, who were amenable to the legislature for the proper discharge of their duties, with the civil and criminal jurisdiction enjoyed by the proprietors of the soil, the cause of good government would be promoted, and the facilities for repressing any attempts to disturb the public tranquillity increased. By this act (20 George II. c. 43), which was made to the whole of Scotland, all heritable jurisdictions of justiciary, all regalities and heritable bailieries, and constabularies (excepting the office of high constable), and all stewartries and sheriffships of smaller districts, which were only parts of counties, were dissolved, and the powers formerly vested in them were ordained to be exercised by such of the king's courts as these powers would have belonged to if the jurisdictions had never been granted. All sheriffships and stewartries

not dissolved by the statute-namely, those which comprehended whole counties, where they had been granted either heritably or for life were resumed and annexed to the crown. With the exception of the hereditary justiciaryship of Scotland, which was transferred from the family of Argyle to the High Court of Justiciary, the other jurisdictions were ordained to be vested in sheriffs-depute or stewarts depute, to be appointed by the king in every shire or stewartry not dissolved by the act. As, by the twentieth of Union, all heritable offices and jurisdictions were reserved to the grantees as rights of property, compensation was ordained to be made to the holders, the amount of which was afterwards fixed by Parliament, in terms of the act of Sederunt of the Court of Session, at one hundred and fifty thousand pounds.

I cannot agree with Brown, the author of an able work, "The History of the Highland Clans," that the affair of Glencoe has stamped indelible infamy on the government of King William III., if by this expression it be meant that William's own memory is disgraced by that massacre. I see no proof that William gave more than general orders to subdue the remaining malcontents of the Macdonald clan; and these orders, the nearer we trace them to the government, are the more express in enjoining that all those who would promise to swear allegiance should be spared. As these orders came down from the general government to individuals, they became more and more severe, and, at last, merciless, so that they ultimately ceased to be the real orders of government. Among these false agents of government, who appear with most disgrace, is the "Master of Stair," who appears in the business more like a fiend than a man. When issuing his orders for the attack on the remainder of the Macdonalds in Glencoe, he expressed a hope in his letter "that the soldiers would trouble the government with no prisoners."

It cannot be supposed that I would, for a moment, palliate this atrocious event by quoting the provocations not very long before offered by the Macdonalds in massacres of the Campbells. But they may be alluded to as causes, though not excuses. It is a part of the melancholy instruction which history affords us, that in the moral, as well as in the physical world, there is always a reaction equal to the action. The banishment of the Moors from Spain to Africa was the chief cause of African piracy and Christian slavery among the Moors for centuries; and since the reign of William III. the Irish Orangemen have been the Algerines of Ireland.

The affair of Glencoe was in fact only a lingering trait of horribly barbarous times, though it was the more shocking that it came from that side of the political world which professed to be the more liberal side, and it occurred at a late time of the day, when the minds of both parties had become comparatively civilized, the whigs by the triumph of free principles, and the tories by personal experience of the evils attending persecution. Yet that barbarism still subsisted in too many minds professing to act on liberal principles, is but too apparent from this disgusting tragedy.

I once flattered myself that the Argyle Campbells, from whom I am sprung, had no share in this massacre, and a direct share they certainly had not. But, on inquiry, I find that they consented to shutting up the passes of Glencoe, through which the Macdonalds might escape; and perhaps relations of my great-grandfather - I am afraid to count their distance or proximity - might be indirectly concerned in the cruelty.

But children are not answerable for the crimes of their forefathers; and I hope and trust that the descendants of Breadalbane and Glenly on are as much and justly at their ease on this subject as I am.

Page 367, line 24.

Chance snatched them from proscription and despair.

Many Highland families, at the outbreak of the rebellion in 1745, were saved from utter desolation by the contrivances of some of their more sensible members, principally the women, who foresaw the consequences of the insurrection. When I was a youth in the Highlands, I remember an old gentleman being pointed out to me, who, finding all other arguments fail, had, in conjunction with his mother and sisters, bound the old laird hand and foot, and locked him up in his own cellar, until the news of the battle of Culloden had arrived.

A device pleasanter to the reader of the anecdote, though not to the sufferer, was prac tised by a shrewd Highland dame, whose husband was Charles-Stuart-mad, and was determined to join the insurgents. He told his wife at night that he should start early tomorrow morning, on horseback. "Well, but you will allow me to make your breakfast before you go?" "O, yes," She accordingly prepared it, and, bringing in a full boiling kettle, poured it, by intentional accident, on his legs!

NOTE TO THE VERSES ON WINKELRIED.
Page 387.

The advocates of classical learning tell us that, without classic historians, we should never become acquainted with the most splendid traits of human character; but one of those traits, patriotic self-devotion, may surely be heard of elsewhere, without learning Greek and Latin. There are few, who have read modern history, unacquainted with the noble voluntary death of the Switzer Winkelried. Whether he was a peasant or man of superior birth is a point not quite settled in history, though I am inclined to suspect that he was simply a peasant. But this is certain, that in the battle of Sempach, perceiving that there was no other means of breaking the heavy-armed lines of the Austrians than by gathering as many of their spears as he could grasp together, he opened a passage for his fellow-combatants, who, with hammers and hatchets, hewed down the mailed men-atarms, and won the victory.

FUGITIVE POEMS.

QUEEN OF THE North.
Page 401.

These extracts are from the poem which Campbell planned soon after the completion of The Pleasures of Hope, and which he intended to write on his first visit to Germany. In the portion following the asterisks the scenery of Roslin and Arthur's seat is sketched with a truth and felicity of expression which may well excite regret that the patriotic theme was never resumed. Dr. Beattie.

HYMN.
Page 404.

This hymn on the advent, so far as I know, is one of his original poems, which has never been publicly acknowledged. The poet's copy, however, has an autograph inscription, stating that he wrote it at the age of sixteen. The original has been forty years in the possession of Dr. Irving. - Dr. Beattie.

CHORUS FROM THE CHOEPHORE.

Page 405.

The third prize awarded to Campbell was for his translation of passages from the Coephorce of Eschylus; a copy of which has been sent me by a lady to whom it was shortly afterwards presented by Campbell, in the Island of Mull. It was written in 1741. — Dr. Beattie.

ELEGY WRITTEN IN MULL.
Page 407.

This is the elegy with which Dr. Anderson was so much pleased, on the author's introduction to him in Edinburgh (July 1794), and from the perusal of which he predicted his success as a great poet.

ON THE GLASGOW VOLUNTEERS.

Page 408.

Among the productions of his college life Dr. Beattie places this poem and that on the Queen of France. Of the last, on Marie Antoinette, inspired by one of the most atrocious events of the day, - an event over which he wept at the time, and the mere recollection of which, after the lapse of forty years, still made him shudder, — Dr. Beattie says, it "excited much attention, and met the public sympathy, so universally felt at the time." It was published in the Glasgow Courier. Of the first spirited lyric, he says that it obtained much local celebrity, particularly among the friends and members of the household troops.

THE DIRGE OF WALLACE.
Page 413.

We publish the version of this poem given by Dr. Beattie, the opening stanzas being omitted in the Galignani edition of 1829. When Mr. Redding was assisting the poet in preparing the edition of his works of 1828, he pleaded for the insertion of the Dirge, for which he expressed great admiration. Campbell objected, -"There were inaccuracies in it it was only written for the newspapers." Walter Scott, it was said, had it by heart, and thought it one of his finest things; but Campbell "did not care- he would not take it-he disliked it."

Great diversity of opinion prevails among the critics as to the merits of this poem. The Quarterly Review (July, 1849) says: "Excepting the close of one stanza, we see little in it beyond an echo of the then fashionable strains of Alonzo the Brave, and the like." The stanza in question is the one alluding to the sword of Wallace. The North British Review (February, 1849) agrees with its contemporary:-"It is quite unequal to Campbell's usual style. There is a boyish accumulation of the stock imagery of the 'Tales of Wonder.' Ravens, nightmares, matin-bells and midnight tapers, are scattered in waste profusion at the opening of the poem, to the consternation of the English king and the affright of Wallace's wife. Nothing well can be worse than all this. What follows is better, and there are some lines worthy of Campbell."

A writer in Blackwood's Magazine for the same month, on the other hand, agrees in his estimate of the poem with Mr. Redding and Sir Walter Scott: "In the foreign edition of his works there is inserted a poem called the Dirge of Wallace, which, with a very little concentration, might have been rendered as perfect as any of his later compositions. In spirit and energy it is assuredly inferior to none of them. We hope to see it restored to its proper place, in the next edition; in the mean time we select the following noble stanzas." The critic then quotes nearly the whole poem, Italicizing the lines which follow : "When he strode o'er the wreck of each well-fought field, With the yellow-haired chiefs of his native land;