been for the following three good and sufficient reasons: In the first place, it contains, scattered over various parts, such a defence of the recent conduct of the Highland proprietors, in regard to the aboriginal inhabitants, as a strenuous abettor of the demoralizing process now in operation has been able to offer for them. Secondly, the author's reputation as a scientific mineralogist seemed to entitle even his bad wit, bad writing, bad stories, and bad spirit, to some sort of notice and review. Lastly, the book being cast in the shape of letters, addressed to Sir Walter Scott, (whether with or without his permission, is of no consequence at present,) it is thus presented to the world in some measure under the sanction of that illustrious name, which, though blazoned only, as it were, on the pannels, can hardly fail to entice many who would otherwise have passed it over with neglect or indifference, to take a peep at the miserable and libellous trash deposited within. It is incumbent upon us to add, that the majority of his statements, anecdotes, and dissertations, is obviously intended to serve as an answer to, and, as far as the author's authority may extend, to counteract the effect produced by, Colonel Stewart's work; though, as far as we recollect, he has, in no instance, had the manliness and candour to avow that this was the principal part of his design. Indeed we should almost be inclined to believe that the book has been got up solely with this view, and at the suggestion of a certain noble Duke, who usually entertains the Doctor for six months in the year, and who is so much influenced by his opinions, that he has, at this moment, twenty-five farms in his own hands; the former occupants being ruined and rouped out, and no new adventurers being foolhardy enough to risk the same fate!

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In his "introductory letter," the Doctor says, " he will not deny that his prejudices are in favour of this people;" that he has " laboured hard to reconcile his wishes to his conviction ;" and that "he would fain imagine he had only one object-TRUTH." The bare-faced impudence of these allegations will be demonstrated, in the clearest manner, by our subsequent examinations. But in the meantime let us inquire of him, how he expects it to be believed, that " his prejudices are in favour of a people" whom he represents as barbarous, incurably indolent, eaten up with beggarly pride, sneaking sycophants, unconscionable extortioners, filthy, dishonest, inhospitable, nay cowardly, whom, upon every occasion, "he labours hard," in his clumsy, stony fashion, to hold up to ridicule, as the most wretched and contemptible of all God's creatures, for whose miseries, the real source of which no man knows better than he does, he can spare no word of sympathy or commiseration, while he lets slip no opportunity of extolling, and playing the apologist for their cold-blooded, unnatural oppressors? Call you this backing your friends," Doctor? Call you this being "prejudiced in favour of the people?" But the good man " laboured to reconcile his wishes to his conviction" it was to no purpose, however; love's labour was lost: so he ended by doing the very opposite of that which he intended, or rather laboured, to do; namely," reconciling his conviction to his wishes." And he tells us, or to speak more correctly, he tells Sir Walter Scott, (credat Gualterus!) that "he would fain IMAGINE he had only one object-TRUTH." "What is Truth?" said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer. We put the same question to the Doctor, and "pause for a reply." Is misrepresentation truth? Is slander truth? Is pure fiction truth? Is an assumed tone of insolent superiority truth? Is ingratitude truth? Are we to receive, and consider as truth, any unsubstantiated dictum the Doctor may chuse to utter ex cathedra, solely because it is he who delivers it? When he meets and quarrels with persons who exist only in his pages, are we to consider him as a bona fide expositor of his real and personal experience? We would pause a whole month, an entire lunation, as he would say, for a reply. But to come more closely still to the point: We do, without qualification, aver, that in every thing that regards the actual manners, character, and condition of the Highlanders, the Doctor is a prejudiced person, in the worst sense of the word; that one of the principal objects he had in view in manufacturing his book, and secondary only to his love of displaying his own pro

digious erudition, was to white-wash the Highland landlords, and to justify the proceedings to which they have had recourse, by representing the native population on their estates as brutalized beyond all hope of regeneration; and that, therefore, all his statements, connected with this subject, are to be received with extreme suspicion and distrust. A few examples will show, that the language we have now used is not by any means stronger than the circumstances of the case fully warrant and authorize.

The first specimen we shall produce of the "extent and accuracy" of the author's information is one which the gallant officer we have already so often named has (see Sketches, &c. Vol. II. p. 443-44.) exposed to our hand. One of Dr Macculloch's favourite positions is, that the warlike spirit of the Highlanders is extinguished; (would it be surprising if the assertion were true?) that they manifest a dislike to the service; and that this is particularly the case with the Islanders, who, during the last war, were defended by the manufacturers of the Lowlands. And in prosecution of the subject, he farther states, that "if recruits should be raised in the Islands, they would be found in Islay, not in Skye, or in the Long Island." Now, on a full knowledge of all the circumstances, Colonel Stewart states, that during the twenty-one years he was attached to the 42d and 78th Regiments, these Corps received not twenty men from Islay, while, for the 78th alone, 732 men, all good and exemplary soldiers, were enlisted from one landlord's estate in the Long Island! nay, that from the Island of Lewes, one portion of Lord Seaforth's estate on the Long Island, 240 men, good soldiers as ever left the Highlands," were enlisted for his battalion. Certainly, if these men, and the many thousands of Highlanders who enlisted into the different other regiments, were averse to a military life, their conduct, as Colonel Stewart remarks, displayed an inconsistency not easy to be accounted for on any of the common principles which rule the actions of mankind; and it will not be denied, that, supposing them to cherish the dislike ascribed to them, they took a very novel and original method of betraying it.

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as

But we must now, in prosecution of our purpose, take a ramble at large over these formidable tomes. The Doctor says he should have known much less than he actually does of the Highlanders, (and God wot, that is little enough,)" had he not made bosom-friends of the boatmen, acted King Pippin among the children, driven cattle with the drovers, listened to interminable stories about stots, and sheep, and farms,-partaken of a sneeshing with the beggar, drank whisky with the retired veteran, sat in the peak reek with the old crones, given ribbons to the lassies and pills to the wives, and fiddled to the balls in Rum." Now, it is really matter of regret that this boatmen-loving, Pippin-acting, cattle-driving, stot-story-listening, smeeshing-partaking, reek-dried, ribbon-giving, Rum-fiddling Doctor, did not, amidst all the good company into which he appears to have fallen, contrive to coax himself into good humour with the poor creatures whom he says he mingled with, but who we know were incessantly repelled from: any approach to communicativeness, by his caustic, disagreeable, overbear ing manners. He says, indeed," he knows not what other and better proof he could give of his esteem for Donald and all his race," than by degrading himself to the level of drovers, and playing merryandrew to the children. Perhaps he does not; but it occurs to us, that, by speaking with ordinary civility and decency, of people who almost invariably gave him a kind and cordial reception, he would have proved his "esteem for Donald and all his race," and rather more respectably too, than by coining, fictitious colloquies, and by invidious, unfounded remarks on the domestic economy and habits of the gentlemen at whose tables he made himself a guest. With regard to fictitious colloquies, the book abounds with them, and they merit this appellation par excellence, because they just are as unreal as those of Captain M'Turk in St Ronan's Well, with the additional disadvantage, that they are destitute of all verisimilitude, and give about as fair a representation of the broken jabber spoken by the lower Highlanders, as they do of the dialect of the cone-headed or dog-ribbed Indians. Take the following

sample, the first that has turned up. The Doctor meets a "snuffy-looking native" in Glen Lednach, "cutting hay with his pocket-knife," (a tedious enough operation, we should suppose), and he asks

"How far is it to Killin ?"-"It's a fine day."-" Aye, it's a fine day for your hay.""Ah! there's no muckle hay; this is an unco cauld glen."-" I suppose this is the road to Killin ?" (trying him on another tack).—" That's an unco fat beast of yours."-" Yes, she is much too fat; she is just from grass."-" Ah! it's a mere, I see; it's a gude beast to gang, Ise warn you."—" Yes, yes, it's a very good pony." "I selled just sie another at Doune fair, five years by-past: I warn ye she's a Highland-bred beast?"-" I don't know; I bought her in Edinburgh.”—“ A weel, a weel, mony sic like gangs to the Edinburgh market frae the Highlands.”—“ Very likely; she seems to have Highland blood in her."-" Aye, aye; would you be selling her ?"-" No, I don't want to sell her; do you want to buy her ?"—" Na! I was na thinking of that; has she had na a foal ?"" Not that I know of."—" I had a gude colt out of ours when I selled her. Yere na ganging to Doune the year?" "No, I am going to Killin, and want to know how far it is."-" Aye, ye'll be gaing to the sacraments there the morn ?"-" No; I don't belong to your kirk." "Ye'll be an Episcopalian than ?"" Or a Roman Catholic."- "Na, na ; ye're nae Roman."" And so it is twelve miles to Killin ?" (putting a leading question.)— "Na; it's na just that."- "It's ten then, I suppose ?"-"Ye'll be for cattle then, for the Falkirk tryst ?"— "No; I know nothing about cattle."-" 1 thocht ye'd ha been just ane of thae English drovers. Ye have nae siccan hills as this in your country?"-"No; not so high."-" But ye'll ha'e bonny farms ?"-" Yes, yes; very good lands."-"Ye'll nae ha'e better farms than my Lord's at Dunira ?"—" No, no; Lord Melville has very fine farms."-" Now, there's a bonny bit land; there's na three days in the year there's na meat for beasts on it; and it's to let. Ye'll be for a farm hereawa' ?"—" No, I'm just looking at the country."-" And ye have nae business?"—“ No.”—“ Weel, that's the easiest way."-" And this is the road to Killin ?”—“ Will ye tak' some nuts ?” (producing a handful he had just gathered.) "No; I cannot crack them."-" I suppose your teeth are failing? Ha'e ye any snuff?"-" Yes, yes; here is a pinch for you."-" Na, na; I'm unco heavy on the pipe, ye see, but I like hair of snuff: just a hair :" touching the snuff with the end of his little finger, apparently to prolong time, and save the answer about the road a little longer, as he seemed to fear there were no more questions to ask. The snuff, however, came just in time to allow him to recall his ideas, which the nuts were near dispersing. "And ye'll be from the low country ?"—" Yes; you may know I am an Englishman, by my tongue."-" Na; our ain gentry speaks high English the now."-" Well, well, I am an Englishman, at any rate."-" And ye'll be staying in London ?"—"Yes, yes."—" I was ance at Smithfield mysel' wi' some beasts: it's an unco place, London. And what's yere name? asking your pardon."-The name was given. "There's a hantel o' that name i' the north. Yere father 'll may be be a Highlander ?"—"Yes; that is the reason why I like the Highland. ers."-" Weel, (nearly thrown out,) it's a bonny country now, but it's sair cauld here in the winter."" And so it is six miles to Killin ?"-" Aye, they call it sax."-"Scotch miles, I suppose ?"-" Aye, aye; auld miles."-"That is about twelve English ?"" Na, it'll not be abune ten short miles, (here we got on so fast, that I began to think I should be dismissed at last); but I never seed them measured. And ye'll ha'e left your family at Comrie ?""No; I am alone.”— "They'll be in the south, may be ?"-" No; I have no family."-" And are ye no married ?”—“ No.”—“ I'm thinking it's time."—" So am I.”—“ Weel, weel, ye'll have the less fash."-" Yes, much less than in finding the way to Killin."-" O, aye, ye'll excuse me; but we countra folk speers muckle questions.". "Pretty well, I think.""Weel, weel, ye'll find it saft a bit in the hill, but ye maun had wast, and it's na abune tan mile. A gude day."

The drift of this, as we learn, is to prove that the Highlander combines the indirectness of the Lowland Scot with an inquisitive curiosity peculiar to himself. Nobody denies that the low Highlander is inquisitive, particularly if he chance to meet with a Sassanach flat inquiring the way to the moon; but even in that extreme case, he is respectfully so; and never accosts a stranger with the blunt, surly, bull-headed assurance of the Gaul na machair; and it is something too much for a writer, who cannot hit off a single characteristic phrase, to attempt a dramatic delineation of peculiarities which

he does not understand, and cannot appreciate. Indeed, were we to form a judgment of the Highlanders from this execrable lingo-worse, if possible, than their own broken English, which has generally infused into it all the raciness of the Celtic idiom-we should pronounce them the most arrant blockheads extant, excepting, perhaps, the peasantry of Old England, whose pre-eminent stupidity, and brutal indifference to all that passes around them, has never yet, we believe, been called in question. Yet the Doctor-who has a knack of contradicting every body, and by way, we presume, of establishing his exemplary impartiality, himself too-assures us, on another occasion, that" whoever thinks Donald a dull fellow, never made a greater mistake in his life."

Like many other travellers, the Doctor has a wonderful fortune in falling in with adventures. He tells us, that in Jersey he was seized by a corporal and a file of men, and introduced to the main guard; that in Cornwall he was apprehended as a horse-stealer; that in the same sensible and discriminating county he was taken for the merryandrew of a quack-doctor; that in Plymouth he was carried by a Frenchman before the Port-Admiral; and that in Wales, a jackass, "whom" he met in the ruins of Lamphey, was the only "person" who seemed to take any interest in his fate-probably from the principle of natural sympathy which subsists among all animals of the same species. No such moving accidents" appear to have occurred to him in the Highlands; but his adventures there, though less exclusively personal, are equally marvellous. In Glenlyon, for example,

A flock of little boys and girls happened to be coming from their school, and I called to the biggest of them, a creature of ten years old, to shew it him, and to ask him where his father obtained his lime for his farm. He not only described to me the quarry whence I knew it to come, but every known bed of limestone in the country, for many miles round; some of which I then knew to be truly indicated, and others which I was thus led to examine. But this was a philosopher in an egg-shell, in many more shapes. His school was one where English was taught, and where it was prohibited to speak Gaelic. He explained to me the whole discipline, and spoke of the reputed policy of this measure, and of general education, as if he had been a reader of Reviews!!! I had a quantity of pence in my pocket, and as pence are shillings at this age, I gave them to him to divide among his followers, who seemed all to hold him in reverence, and were all silent whenever he spoke, or appeared about to speak. Unluckily there were fourteen children, and only thirteen pennies; and as he was about to retain the last for himself, he saw one little girl, who was so small that she had been overlooked. He immediately gave her his own, and seemed happier than the rest when he had done it. Such a hero as this might become a Rennel, or a Malthus, or a Bayard: but he will flourish and fade unseen, at the plough or the mattock, unless Lord Breadalbane or Colonel Stewart should discover in him the germ of a Simpson, a Ferguson, or a Burns.

This unfortunately affords the Doctor no opportunity of figuring as the hero of his own tale; so at Killin he meets with "a man of reputed education, and, by grace, a philosopher, and, as he doubtless flattered himself, a man of taste," who accosts him at the inn-door-abuses Killin as the ugliest place he ever saw in his life-and applies to the Doctor, who " he knew was a person of taste, and understood these things," to shew him what there was to look at. The Doctor, of course, is all pity and contempt for the nameless wight whom he introduces here, merely to hang a compliment to himself about the poor fellow's neck, and that he may make an occasion to abuse "the people who travel and write tours." "I dare say," adds he, "he returned from his Highland tour as well informed on all points as he was on the subject of Killin." But the Doctor is not yet done with the "man of reputed education, and, by grace, a philosopher :" he produced him once more at Lochearn, that he may have the pleasure of fairly hammering him to death. After some deplorable rant about "Geology, divine maid,” hammers, and so forth, he proceeds

The philosopher whom I met at Killin seemed to think it (his hammer) an ornament and an honour; like a red ribband or a blue garter. By what innate property is it, that, when a man is a fool, he discovers it even before he speaks; nay, before ha

VOL. XVI.

S

is seen!! And, secondly, why does he take so much more trouble to display his folly, than a wise man to shew his knowledge? Is it the only gem worth wearing? is it the only quality of which we ought to be vain? While at breakfast, I received a message from a "gentleman with a hammer," as mine host announced him, requesting the honour of a conference, as he was in search of knowledge, and expected much illumination from so celebrated a personage; as well known through all the Highlands as Jack Pudding himself. The hammer was bright from the anvil; raw as the philosopher that bore it; but was displayed in great state, as if to gain consequence, as well in my eyes as in those of Mr Cameron, and of all the waiters and ostlers of Killin, and Tyndrum, and Loch Earn, and Callander. The folly and the hammer were equally visible: for he wore both on the outside of his coat: the more prudent conceal them in their pockets. When it was the fashion for gentlemen to be angry," and to fight, every tailor carried his sword by his side. Now, every blockhead who has cracked a stone at Salisbury Craig must display a hammer about the country, to the astonishment of innocent people and his own vast inconvenience. The world will never be the wiser for all their hammers. My philosopher requested to know what the opposite mountain was "made of." I answered, neglectingly, I know not what; but the word was not very long. He looked as much confounded us if I had spoken in heathen Greek: and thus, with one little word, not half an inch in length, I fathomed the depth and bottom of his mineralogical understanding! Yet he will write a book. And, what is worse, he will tell the world his name. It is not for every man has a right to perform this ceremony on his own per

me to gibbet him; son, if he pleases.

Now, seriously, this is too bad. The story, as told by the Doctor, proves that he is both a puppy and a brute, and that he ought to have been kicked for his insolence; but as we have a tolerable guess whom he points at, motives of delicacy alone prevent us from "gibbetting" the name of an accomplished and meritorious individual, and from calling down on the head of this impertinent, gasconading Anglo-Scot the indignation and contempt of every honourable mind. These examples were necessary to our purpose, as they sufficiently demonstrate his intolerable pedantry and conceit, and, what is of more importance at present, the spirit in which he writes. He is eternally aiming at wit, without being witty, labouring an antithesis, when he should be stating a fact; and fancying that he is extremely smart, tranchant, and sarcastic, when he is only heavy, malignant, and dull. But to proceed: After various rambles, counter-rambles, and doublings, the Doctor finds himself at Blair-in-Athole, where he tells us " he must say something, or it would be ingratitude to a place of which he knows each dingle bush and alley green; ingratitude to its lovely scenes and to its hospitable towers; to the Noble Owner of which this country owes a deep debt, for the unwearied activity of his exertions and example, and of whom it is praise enough to say, that he is a pattern of a truly British Country Gentleman." In this instance, at least, we are not disposed to question the sincerity of the Doctor's gratitude to the "place," the "hospitable towers," and the "Noble Owner:" the place is beautiful, the towers are hospitable, and the Duke of Atholl is one of the very best men extant; but till we read the Doctor's puffery, we had not the slightest conception that his Grace was so great a public benefactor, that the "country" was so "deeply in his debt," or that "the unwearied activity of his exertions" had extended farther than regenerating his own tenantry, and maintaining his political ascendancy in the county. And verily he has had his reward. Has he not, at this present writing, twenty-five farms in his own hands,-and is not his portrait suspended in the CountyHall at Perth? What could his Grace, or his "shadow" the Doctor, wish for more? But how comes it that this grateful mineralogist is so surly with the "Noble Owner" of Taymouth, who, with only one exception, has done more in the way of regenerating, or rouping out, than any other proprietor in the Highlands, and who, therefore, on his own shewing, must be a public benefactor," and a pattern of a truly Scotch Country Gentleman?" Is the Doctor's motto "no pudding, no praise?" Not a whisper of the "hospitable towers" of Taymouth," of which he knows not that he can say aught which has not been said by others, and which was never said by any one worse than by BURNS, who, whenever he attempted to describe natural sce