cluded, and also such families or clans as had lost their chiefs. Those of the name of Stewart, for instance, whose estates lay in the district of Athole, and whose chief, by birth, was at a distance, ranged themselves under the family of Athole, though they were themselves sufficiently numerous to raise 1000 fighting men. When such unions took place, the smaller clans followed the fortunes, engaged in the quarrels, and fought under the chiefs of the greater, but their ranks were separately marshalled, and led by their own subordinate chieftains and lairds, who owned submission only when necessary, for the success of combined operations. From these, and other causes, the Highlands were, for ages, as constant a theatre of petty warfare, as Europe has been of important struggles. The smaller the society, and the more closely connected together, the more keenly did it feel an injury, or resent an insult offered by a rival tribe. A haughty or contemptuous expression uttered against a chief, was considered, by all his followers, in the light of a personal affront; † and the driving away the cattle of one clansman, was looked upon as an act of aggression against the whole. The rage for vengeance, and the desire of reprisals, spread throughout the little community, like the violence of an insult offered to an individual, heightened by the sympathy of numbers. Submission to insult would have been present disgrace, and would have invited future aggression. Immediate hostility

• In this manner the M'Raes followed the Earl of Seaforth, the M'Colls the Stewarts of Appin, and the M'Gillivrays and M'Beans the Laird of Mackintosh, &c. &c.

"When a quarrel begins in words between two Highlanders of different clans, it is esteemed the very height of malice and rancour, and the greatest of all provocations, to reproach one another with the vices or personal defects of their chiefs, or that of the particular branch whence they sprung; and, in a third degree, to reproach the whole clan, or name whom they will assist, right or wrong, against those of any other tribe with which they are at variance, to whom their enmity, like that of exasperated brothers, is most outrageous."-Letters from a Gentleman in the North of Scotland.

was therefore the result, and the gathering word of the clan found an echo in every breast. *

If no immediate opportunity of obtaining complete satisfaction occurred; if the injured party was too weak to repel attack, and to vindicate their honour in the field, or to demand compensation for their property, still the hostile act was not forgotten, nor the resolution of avenging it abandoned. Every artifice by which cunning could compensate the want of strength was practised; alliances were courted, and favourable opportunities watched. Even an appearance of conciliation and friendship was assumed, to cover the darkest purposes of hatred; and as revenge is embittered in all countries where the laws are ill executed, and where the hand of the individual must vindicate those rights which public justice does not protect, so this feeling was cherished and honoured when directed against rival tribes. +

To such a pitch were those feelings carried, that there are instances, both in tradition and on record, in which these feuds led to the most sanguinary conflicts, and ended in the extermination of one of the adverse parties. ‡

The spirit of opposition and rivalry between the clans perpetuated a system of hostility, encouraged the cultivation of the military at the expence of the social virtues, and perverted their ideas both of law and morality. Revenge was accounted a duty, the destruction of a neighbour a me

See Appendix, D.

In the present enlightened times, were the laws unable to afford protection, and were individuals, or collective bodies, forced to arm in order to redress their own wrongs,—would murder, turbulence, and spoliation of property, be less prevalent than they were in the Highlands when unprotected by the general laws of the realm? Were the return of such scenes of licence and rapine a probable occurrence, I fear much the warmest advocate of modern civilization would hardly venture to anticipate, that they would be blended with those frequent and softening traits of honourable feeling which distinguished the inroads of the wild mountaineers.

ritorious exploit, and rapine an honourable occupation. Their love of distinction, and their conscious reliance on their courage, when under the direction of these perverted notions, only tended to make their feuds more implacable, their condition more agitated, and their depredations more rapacious and desolating. Superstition added its influence in exasperating animosities, by teaching the clansmen, that, to revenge the death of a relation or friend, was a sacrifice agreeable to his manes: thus engaging on the side of the most implacable hatred, and the darkest vengeance, the most amiable and domestic of all our feelings,reverence for the memory of the dead, and affection for the virtues of the living.

As the general riches of the country consisted in flocks and herds, the usual mode of commencing attacks, or of making reprisals, was by an incursion to carry off the cattle of the hostile clan. A predatory expedition was the general declaration of enmity; and a command given by the chief to clear the pastures of the enemy, constituted the usual letters of marque. Such inroads were frequently directed to

• Another custom contributed to perpetuate this spirit of lawless revenge. Martin, who studied, and understood the character and manners of the Highlanders, says, "Every heir or young chieftain of a tribe was obliged in honour to give a specimen of his valour before he was owned and declared governor or leader of his people, who obeyed and followed him on all occasions. This chieftain was usually attended with a retinue of young men, who had not before given any proof of their valour, and were ambitious of such an opportunity to signalize themselves. It was usual for the chief to make a desperate incursion upon some neighbour or other, that they were in feud with, and they were obliged to bring, by open force, the cattle they found in the land they attacked, or to die in the attempt. After the performance of this achievement, the young chieftain was ever after reputed valiant, and worthy of government, and such as were of his retinue acquired the like reputation. This custom being reciprocally used among them, was not reputed robbery; for the damage which one tribe sustained by the inauguration of the chieftain of another was repaired when their chieftain came in his turn to make his specimen; but I have not heard of an instance of this practice for these sixty years since.”—Martin's Description of the Western Islands. London, printed 1703.

the Lowlands, where the booty was richest, and where less vigilance was exercised in protecting it. Regarding every Lowlander as an alien, and his cattle as fair spoil of war, they considered no law for his protection as binding. The Lowlanders, on the other hand, regarded their neighbours of the mountains as a lawless banditti, whom it was dangerous to pursue to their fastnesses, in order to recover their property, or to punish aggressions. Yet these freebooters, except against the Lowlanders, or a hostile clan, maintained, in general, the strictest honesty towards one another, and inspired perfect confidence in their integrity. In proof of this, it may be mentioned, that instances of theft from dwelling-houses scarcely ever occurred, and highway robbery was totally unknown, except in one case so recent as the year 1770, when a man of education, and of respectable family, but of abandoned character, formed and headed a gang of robbers. In the interior of their own society, all property was safe, without the usual security of bolts, bars and locks. An open barn, or shed, was the common

• This was a man of education, and knowledge of the world, who disgraced the family from which he was descended, and the community to which he belonged. He was bred in a school such as the Highlands had rarely witnessed. His father, who, by a base stratagem, had usurped possession of an estate to which he had no right, lived, after the death of his wife, in a kind of seraglio, despised and shunned by the neighbouring gentry, though his abilities were good, and his manners prepossessing. He was the Colonel Charteris of, his district, with this honourable distinction in favour of the Highlanders, that he was shunned as much as the other was countenanced. This example accounts too well for the bold profligacy of his heir, who excelled in all personal accomplishments, possessed engaging and elegant manners, and was remarkably handsome. The last exploit of this man was an attempt to rob Sir Hector Munro on his journey to the north, after his return from India in 1770. Mackintosh escaped to America, and afterwards joined Washington's army. Three of his accomplices were taken and executed at Inverness.

† A late scientific tourist gives an unintentional testimony to the probity and honesty of the people towards one another. Noticing the wretched dwellings of the inhabitants of St Kilda, with an interior dark and smoky, he adds, "Each house has a door with a lock and key, a luxury quite unknown in other parts of the Highlands." It were well that this

summer receptacle of their clothes, cheese, and every thing that required air; and although iron bars and gates were necessary to protect the houses and castles of the chiefs and lairds from hostile inroads, when at feud, no security was required in time of peace; and while the castle gates were open, the dwellings of the people had no safeguard.*

But,

luxury should long continue unknown, and that the people should remain ignorant of the necessity of securing their houses. If the progress of civilization compel the Highlanders to lock their doors against nightly depredators, it may create a question, whether ignorance and integrity, or knowledge and knavery, be preferable; or whether people can indeed be called ignorant, who are attentive to their religious duties,—who exercise the moral virtues of integrity and filial reverence,—who are loyal to their king, brave and honourable in the field, and equally firm in opposing an enemy and in supporting a friend. If these traits of character are exhibited by a people called ignorant and uncivilized, the terms may have perhaps been misapplied. On this subject Martin says of the Highlanders of the seventeenth century, "I am not ignorant that foreigners have been tempted, from the sight of so many wild hills, to imagine that the inhabitants, as well as the places of their residence, are equally barbarous, and to this opinion their habit as well as their language has contributed. The like is supposed by many that live in the south of Scotland; but the lion is not fierce as he is painted, neither are the people here so barbarous as people imagine. The inhabitants have humanity, use strangers hospitably and charitably. I could bring several instances of barbarity and theft by stranger seamen in the Isles, but there is not one instance of any injury offered by the islanders to any seaman or stranger. For the humanity and hospitable temper of the islanders to sailors I shall only give two in

stances.".

My father, still adhering to old customs, does not lock his doors to this day. I know not how long this custom may with safety be continued: recent symptoms of a deplorable change in morals will undoubtedly compel people to guard their property with more care. It will then be no longer, as I have known it, that gentlemen have been half their lives in the commission of the peace, without having occasion to act against a criminal, unless in issuing warrants to recover the fines of Excise Courts, or on account of assaults on Excise officers, and accidental frays. Clothes and linens will no longer be seen drying and bleaching in all parts of the country, and at all hours, without guard or protection; nor open sheds bung round with all the Sunday's apparel of the lads and lasses. The rude • See Appendix F.