the changes which he must have witnessed in his long and not uncreditable life. We are more fortunate in this respect at a later period. We learn from the reminiscences of Sir Archibald Grant, of Monymusk, in Aberdeenshire, that in his early days, soon after the Union, husbandry and manufactures were in low esteem. Turnips in fields, for cattle, grown by the Earl of Rothes and a very few others, were wondered at; wheat was almost confined to East Lothian; enclosures few, and planting very little; no repair of roads; all bad, and very few wheel carriages; no coach, chariot, or chaise, and few carts to the north of Tay. Colonel Middleton was the first person who used carts or wagons at Aberdeen; and he and Sir Archibald were the first to the north of Tay who had hay, except a very little at Gordon Castle. Mr. Lockart of Carnwath, the author of the memoirs, was the first who attempted raising or feeding cattle to size. A Mrs. Miller was the first who attempted thread or fine linen; and the Miss Walkenshaws the first who succeeded; these manufactories were first established about Glasgow and Renfrew, by which, and other industry, those towns made rapid increase; Edinburgh and most other towns having at that time but little retail trade. Aberdeen was then poor and small, having some Dutch and French trade, by salmon, and stockings, and serges, and plaiding; it had the first use of tea, then very scarce and little used at Edinburgh; it supplied Edinburgh with French wines, where, notwithstanding the town duties, it sold in retail in and from taverns, at tenpence per choppin, or English quart. Few families, except dealers, had it in cask for use; it was generally sent in from taverns, which were then much used. Table and bodylinen were seldom shifted, and were but coarse, except for extraordinary occasions; moving necks and sleeves of better kinds being then used by the upper classes of society. Many wooden, mud, and thatched houses were to be found within the gates at Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Aberdeen; few houses of any better kind stood without the gates. [It should be mentioned, however, that a letter in the "Spalding Miscellany," dated so early as 1693, speaks of a design at Edinburgh to cast a bridge of stone over the North Loch, to build on the other side, and to enclose the new taken-in ground with a wall, and extend the city privileges to the enclosure.] The churches, abbeys, castles, and all large stone edifices, the existence of which might be thought inconsistent with a state of poverty and depression, are said by Sir Archibald to have been reared by foreign contributions, or the slavery and want of other employ of the people, and all in friendship aiding each other." Nobles and chiefs he thinks were tyrants under the old Scottish government, and so, by their means, were the kings. 'He remarks, that after the union of the crowns, be'fore that of the nations, the privy council was tyrannical, and neither fixed property nor liberty existed. He states in conclusion, that "all improvements of security, husbandry, manufactures, commerce, or police, are since 1707, with which literature in any extensive degree, except school jargon, hath kept pace." Sir Archibald Grant's account of his own paternal estate, is exceedingly important, (the county of Aberdeen, in which it is situated, was by no means behind the greater part of Scotland.) By the indulgence of a very worthy father, I was allowed, 1716, though then very young, to begin to enclose, and plant, and provide, and prepare nurseries. At that time, 66 66 there was not one acre upon the whole estate enclosed, nor any timber upon it, but a few elm, sycamore, and ash, about a small kitchen-garden adjoining to the house, and some straggling trees at some of the farm-yards, with a small copse-wood not enclosed, and dwarfish, and broused by sheep and cattle. All the farms ill-disposed and mixed; different persons having alternate ridges; not one wheel carriage on the estate, nor indeed any one road that would allow it, and the rent about £600 sterling, per annum; grain and services converted to money. The house was an old castle, with battlements, and six different roofs, of various heights and directions, confusedly and inconveniently combined, and all rotten, with two wings, more modern, of two stories only; the half of windows of the higher rising above the roofs, with granaries, stables, and houses for all cattle and of the vermin attending them close adjoining, and with the heath and moor reaching in angles or goushets to the gate, and much heath near, and what land near was in culture belonged to the farms, by which their cattle and dung were always at the door. The whole land raised and uneven, and full of stones, many of them very large, of a hard iron quality, and all the ridges crooked in shape of an S, and very high and full of noxious weeds, and poor, being worn out by culture, without proper manure or tillage. Much of the land and moor near the house, poor and boggy; the rivulet that runs before the house in pits and shallow streams, often varying channels, with banks always ragged and broken. The people poor, ignorant, and slothful, and ingrained enemies to planting, enclosing, or any improvements or cleanness; no keeping of sheep, or cattle, or roads, but four months when oats and beans, which was the only sorts of their grain, was on the ground. The farm-houses, and even corn-mills, and manse and school, all poor, dirty huts, pulled in pieces for manure, or fell of themselves, almost each alternate year. Peter the First of Russia had more trouble to conquer the barbarous habits of his subjects, than in all the other great improvements he made." It is stated in "Burt's Letters from the Highlands," written previous to the Forty-Five, that the further north you go, the smaller the cattle are. At the present day, among the largest and finest fat cattle in the London market are those which come direct by steam from the north of Scotland. The learned and intelligent editors of the "Spalding Miscellany" observe, that "The judicious measures adopted by Sir Archibald Grant for the improvement of his estate are in nothing more observable than the noble masses of plantations, which, under his fostering care, arose on hill and dale. The appearance of the country must have been wonderfully changed for the better as these woods advanced. Indeed, it is difficult now to conceive that bleakness of which Sir Archibald complains; and among the many thousands of acres of wood which were planted by this indefatigable improver, there are trees of a size so gigantic, that few, if any, can be found to equal them in Scotland.” Sir Archibald's account of the carriages and roads receives some countenance from Lord Lovat's account* of a journey from Inverness to Edinburgh in 1740, twenty-four years later. "I came off on Wednesday, the 30th of July, from my own house, dined at your sister's, and *Miscellany published by the Spalding Club, vol. ii. in effect minister for Scotland under Sir Robert Walpole; to his levee, therefore, Lovat repaired, but Lord Ilay received him coldly, and after the first greeting, allowed him to remain several days unnoticed, and intimated, when he at length granted an audience, that the prime minister had intelligence from abroad of his correspondence with the pretender; and notwithstanding that Lovat “answered with a little warmth, that those stories were but damned calumnies and lies, and that I did not for many years write a letter beyond sea; which indeed is true," yet Lord Ilay did not say a word of politics to him, and they did not meet again. The Duke of Argyle, on the other hand, who was in opposition, saw Lord Lovat frequently, and so won his heart, that the latter declares he would rather serve that worthy great man without fee or reward, than others with fee and reward; and although when he came to Edinburgh he was not determined to dispose absolutely of himself for some time, yet, when he found the Duke of Argyle at the head of the greatest, the richest, and the most powerful families in the kingdom, openly proclaiming and owning in the face of the sun, that he and they were resolved in any event to recover the liberty of their country, enslaved by a wicked minister, his heart and inclination warmed very much to that side; and being at the same time discouraged and cast off by the government, from whom he found that he had nothing to expect, he would at once have joined the country interest, "which he always loved." did not halt at Inverness, but came all night to Corribrough, with Evan Baillie and Duncan Fraser, and my chariot did very well. I brought my wheelright with me the length of Avimore in case of accidents, and there I parted with him, because he declared that my chariot would go safe enough to London; but I was not eight miles from the place, when, on the plain road, the axletree of the hind wheels broke in two, so that my girls were forced to go on bare horses behind footmen, and I was obliged to ride myself, though I was very tender and the day very cold. I came with that equipage to Ruthven late at night, and iny chariot was pulled there by force of men, where I got an English wheelwright and a smith, who wrought two days mending my chariot; and after paying very dear for their work, and for my quarters two nights, I was not gone four miles from Ruthven, when it broke again, so that I was in a miserable condition till I came to Dalnakeardach, where my honest landlord, Charles McGlassian, told me, that the Duke of Athol had two as good workmen at Blair as were in the kingdom, and that I would get my chariot as well mended there as at London. Accordingly I went there and stayed a night, and got my chariot very well mended by a good wright and good smith. I thought then I was pretty secure till I came to this place. I was storm stayed two days at Castle Drummond by the most tempestous weather of wind and rain that I ever remember to see. The Duchess of Perth, and Lady Mary Drummond, were excessively kind and civil to my daughters, and to me; and sent their cham- It appears, however, that he had great difficulberlain to conduct me to Dunblaine, who happened ties to encounter, as he was regarded with avowed to be very useful to us that day; for I was not enmity and suspicion by the leaders of the party, three miles gone from Castle Drummond, when the heads of the great houses of Hamilton, Montthe axletree of my fore-wheels broke in two in the rose, Buccleuch, Queensberry, Roxburgh, Tweedmidst of the hill, betwixt Drummond and the dale, Annandale, Aberdeen, and Marchmont. He bridge of Erdock, and we were forced to sit in the considered, however, that if he could but effect a hill with a boisterous day, till chamberlain Drum- cordial union with them, it would make his family mond was so kind as to go down to the Strath, and a leading family on all occasions for the future, so, bring wrights, and carts, and smiths to our assist-after many serious thoughts and mature deliberaance, who dragged us to the plain, where we were tions, he resolved to join himself to the great body forced to stay five or six hours, till there was a of the nobility of Scotland, provided they would new axletree made; so that it was dark night be-receive him as their faithful brother and friend. fore we came to Dunblaine, which is but eight The junction was negotiated by Lovat's cousin miles from Castle Drummond; and we were all and faithful friend, Lord Grange, who had belabormuch fatigued. The next day we came to Lith-ed so long at his entail; (the judge who spirited gow, and the day after that we arrived here, so that we were twelve days on our journey by our misfortunes, which was seven days more than ordi nary." This truly disastrous journey was undertaken, not only for the purpose of executing an entail of the Lovat estate on which "my Lord Grange had labored for three years, till he could say that it was one of the best entails in Scotland," but also with a political object. Lord Lovat, known in England for the audacity of his death, and long remembered in Scotland as having practised, in various situations in life, every iniquity which each successive stage admitted of, was at this time the tyrant of the north, and, aged as he was, expected to receive a great increase of dignity and power, as Duke of Fraser and Lieutenant of the North, whenever the house of Stuart should be restored. But in the mean time, he was regarded with great suspicion by the government, and he felt desirous to secure himself by joining one of the great political connexions of the day. His letters to his cousin, Fraser of Inverallochy, explain the game he was playing, and strongly mark the craft and violence of his character. The Earl of Ilay, brother of the Duke of Argyle, was away his own wife at St. Kilda, because she threatened to betray his Jacobite intrigues ;) and though some of the party, at first, could hardly believe his intelligence, yet when they were convinced of the truth they received Lovat very readily, and he writes to his cousin, in great delight, "that he is now embarked over head and ears with the noble army of the patriots, (most of whom were whigs and revolutioners,) so that he thinks that by God's help he had done the greatest possible service to his son and family, which he hopes will redound to the interest, honor, and glory of his kindred." As an earnest of his good will to the great men who had received him with open arms, he told them that he would not only give them his vote, but that he hoped to gain them the shire of Inverness, by choosing his cousin, the Laird of Macleod, as member. This election then being his affair more than Macleod's, he begins to create votes with the utmost zeal and activity. "I wish with all my heart," he says, I had made you, and Strichen, and Faralane, barons two years ago; I would not be so much troubled as I am now about the election of Inverness. It was the fault of my damned lawyers that it was not done. However, I am re solved that the Lord Lovat shall be always master | for deserting of me to serve any Grant that ever of the shire of Inverness in time to come. I have was born, or any Scotsman. William Fraser, my signed, a fortnight ago, a disposition to Strichen, doer, having told me that the Laird of Grant had to you, and to Faralane, to be barons of the shire, and your charters will be expede in February." The Laird of Grant was at the head of the opposite interest in the county, and Lovat tells, with great glee, a disparaging story of him. promised him an ensign's commission for his son, providing that he would vote for his father, and that he believed if I would secure an ensign's commission for his son, that he never would vote for the Laird of Grant, this made me resolve to "The Laird of Grant and Dalrachany, and one speak to him before his cousin, Mr. Cumming, and or two more having drunk a hearty bottle, Grant my doer William Fraser. I told Fairfield that I received a letter by express from the earl of Mur- was far from desiring his loss or any hurt to his ray; and after reading it, he said that it was an family; that since the Laird of Grant promised impertinent insolent letter; and Dalrachany, think-him an ensign's commission for his son, that I ing to mitigate and soften the laird, said that there would do better. Grant's promise was precarious, were some things in that letter that were not so much but that, that moment, before his cousin, Mr. Cumamiss. Upon which the laird called him rogue and rascal, and took up his hand, as some say, with a cane, and gave Dalrachany a blow. Dalrachany got up, and told him that he would suffer that blow from him as his chief, but that he would not suffer the second blow of any subject; and the laird, redoubling his blow, Dalrachany engaged with him, and took him by the collar, and endeavoring to throw him down, he tore the laird's coat, waistcoat, and shirt down to his breeches; and when he threw him down, he thrashed him most heartily, till the laird roared and cried. Upon which Lady Margaret that was in the next room, came in, and seeing her husband in that pickle, she roared and cried, and was so frightened that her head turned, and is since delirious." ming, I would give him my bond for 5007. sterling, In the great contest in which he was now engaged, Lord Lovat met with an unexpected defection which roused him to unextinguishable wrath and indignation. He naturally thought himself, he says, very sure of all his own clan, the Frasers, "and particularly of Fairfield, whom you know Itleman was so insolent as to tell me that both always treated like a brother, and his lady like my these letters were false. I told him that he durst sister. But" (alas for the falsehood and ingrati-not say so to the gentlemen that wrote them, who tude of man!) "He took his journey by Castle Grant, and for a promise that the laird made him of an ensigncy to his son, the poor, covetous, narrow, greedy wretch has renounced his chief and his kindred, and forgot all the favors that I did him. When he came to this town, he came to my house with the same affectionate behavior that he used to have, and with the greatest protestations of friendship, and I received him with open arms, and thought I was very sure of him, since McLeod had writ to me, that he swore to him that he never would do anything contrary to his chief's inclinations; and that Thomas of Gortuleg, who is my ballie and chamberlain, and chief trustee in that country, whom I sent about to speak privately with my friends in favor of McLeod, had writ to me that Fairfield desired him twice to acquaint me that when he came up to Edinburgh he would be absolutely determined by me as to the election. But I was surprised that, some days before he went away, having come here with his cousin, Mr. Cumming, the minister, who I believe has likewise poisoned him very much, for he is a sworn creature of my Lord Ilay's, who made him professor of church history in this university, [Edinburgh,] he then discovered himself to be an unnatural traitor, an infamous deserter, and an ungrateful wretch to me, his chief, who had done him such signal services. And if I never had done him any other service but getting him one of the best ladies in the world, your worthy sister, to be his wife, (which cost me both pains and expense,) who had borne him good children, he should be hanged were men of honor and integrity, and I bade him go to the devil, and call himself a Grant, and live in Strathspey; that I would resent his behavior as far as I could by law. I doubt not but Fairfield will tell all this to the Laird of Grant, and that Mr. Cumming will write it to the Earl of Ilay, his patron, so I may expect all the resentment that they are capable of; and so he went away. Mr. Cumming and William Fraser seemed very much concerned for his behavior." Their morality probably was shocked. But instead of wishing any evil to Fairfield, (except that he is determined immediately to enforce a certain old claim of considerable amount against his estate,) the meek and patient chief is only solicitous for the personal safety of his mutinous clansman. "All my fear at present is, that my cousin Gortuleg, who certainly is the prettiest fellow of my kindred in the Highlands, [and who was also his balie and chamberlain, and chief trustee,'] will fall foul of Fairfield, who, I believe, is stout, which is the only good quality that I can imagine he has; and in all events if they fight, Fairfield is undone, for if Gortuleg kills him there is an end of him; or if he kills Gortuleg, the universe cannot save his life if he stays in this island; for Gortuleg has four cousin-germans, the most bold and desperate fellows of the whole name, who would take off Fairfield's head at the cross of Inverness, if they were to be hanged for it next morning. I know them well, for they have been very troublesome to me by their bloody duels. I beg you ten thousand pardons, my dear cousin, for this very long letter; but I entreat you seriously consider of all that is in it, and after mature delib- | humbler persons continued to despise "King eration, I beg you may send an express to your George's laws," and we need wonder the less at sister, and write to her and to Fairfield, what you think proper upon the subject of this letter." Again "There is no man that has betrayed, deserted, and forsaken his chief and his kindred, but the ungrateful regenade Fairfield. If my information from Inverness, from honest men there, holds true, he is as mad as ever his brother Jonathan, or John was. But I do assure you it is not him that I regret, though he was drowned in the river of Ness, or in Lockmurrie, where it was said his brother Jonathan was drowned; by which he saved his portion; for, [observe Lovat's conscientiousness!] when great narrowness and greed are joined together in one man, and come to a height with him, there is no crime but that man is capable of. A little money, or an advantage to his private interest, would not only make him sell all mankind, but Christ Jesus, if he was again upon earth; for he has no belief in God, nor in a future being. My great concern is for your dear sister, who is one of the best women in the world, and for her children, for they must be all ruined by this madman's villanous behavior; and if it had not been for my positive and express orders, he had been cut in pieces before now, for it is impossible to express the zeal and the violence with which he is hated by all the kindred. But, besides that I could never allow a drop of the Frasers' blood to be shed, of those very men that were contriving to take away my life, I know that the meddling with him now would wrong our affair, and if an Arabian killed him, it would be called my deed. But I hope to live long enough to see him chastised with as great a punishment as death would be to him at present. 66 "If I thought that the miserable wretch could be retrieved, I would beg of you to go and see your sister for a day or two, and try what you and she can do with him; but as he is an ignorant, obstinate blockhead, as most madmen are," &c., &c. * Upon reflection, I am afraid I must put you to the trouble and expense of going for two or three days to Inverness, to see what you can do with that obstinate greedy brute; and if you and your sister cannot retrieve him and bring him back to his duty, I humbly beg that you may wash your hands of him; for I am very certain that you'll never put him in balance with me; and when you abandon him I shall leave him to the resentment of his kindred, which I am afraid will be fatal to him." [It would seem, however, that Fairfield was quite irreclaimable, for it is stated, somewhat later, that] "Fairfield is the only renegade of the lordship of Lovat, to the great dishonor of the clan. Duke Hamilton and several other lords, asked me, in a joking way, whether that fellow that has deserted his chief and his clan is still alive or not. I answered that he was, by my precise and express orders, and I said but what was true." And this is the man full of moral sayings, pious and patriotic sentiments-the man who talks of "belief in God, and a future being," who could console himself in the pangs of gout, by repeating Buchanan's Translation of the First Psalm, "Felix ille animi, quem non de tramite recto,' &c.-the man who laid his gray head on the block with "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori !" When a great chief, like Lord Lovat, could think, and write thus, it is not surprising that their rising so readily against him, when we consider how very little they enjoyed of that protection of life and property which constitutes the chief claim of a government upon the allegiance of its subjects. Where there is no protection, attachment cannot exist. The inhabitants of the Highlands generally, and of the country adjacent to them, were grievously oppressed by gangs of lawless thieves and robbers, inhabitants of the remote Highlands, who stole or openly carried off their horses and cows; and as Badenoch, in particular, lay near the seats of those ruffians, great numbers of its inhabitants had been entirely ruined and reduced to beggary. The gentlemen of that district made several attempts to obviate this evil by a watch kept up at their own expense, but they could not support a sufficient force for their protection. Feeling the absolute want of that security which the government was too negligent to afford them, they held a general meeting, and applied to Macpherson of Cluny, Lovat's son-inlaw, but a man of a very different character. Cluny told them that unless his majesty would protect them, he saw no means for their relief, but one, viz., a subscription of all the suffering districts towards making a sufficient fund for setting up a strong watch for the mutual security of all; the fund to be paid to one undertaker, and the undertaker to become liable for the losses of all contributors. Cluny himself became undertaker, though the fund was very small. He set out his watch on the 22nd of May, 1744, all picked men, and stationed them to watch night and day at all the passes and inlets used by the robbers, and to intercept, seize, and imprison the villains, not suffering them on any pretext to pass or repass, even to or from the districts which were not included in the league. The thieves, finding themselves intercepted by land, began to convey the stolen cattle in boats across Loch Ness, but Cluny set guards on all the ferries, he recovered and restored the cattle of persons living far beyond the bounds of his district, and he reduced the robbers to such straits that they proposed in vain to give him security for the safety of his own country of Badenoch, if he would give up being concerned for any other district. In short he acted strictly upon the theory of the old black-mail system, which had never been practically adhered to before. This species of engagement, says Sir Walter Scott, was often undertaken by persons like Rob Roy, who prosecuted the trade of a freebooter, and was in the habit of stealing at least as many cattle as he was the means of recovering. But Cluny pursued the plain and honorable system expressed in the letter of his contract, and by actually securing and bringing to justice the malefactors who committed the depredations, he broke up the greater part of the numerous gangs of robbers in the shires of Inverness and Aberdeen. So much was this the case, that when a clergyman began a sermon on the heinous nature of the crime of theft, an old Highlander of the audience replied *See Account of Cluny's Watch, Spalding Miscellany, vol. ii. + Prose Works, vol. xxvi., p. 103. Though justice compels us to adopt Sir Walter's remark, we mean no disrespect to Rob Roy, who was an eminent patron of historical literature, as appears by his name being on the original list of subscribers for Spottiswoode's History. that he might forbear treating of the subject, since Cluny with his broad sword had done more to check it than all the ministers in the Highlands could do by their sermons. 66 Gibbon mentions* a valiant tribe of Caledonia, the Attacotti, who are accused by an eye-witness of delighting in the taste of human flesh, and of whom it is said in the scandalous chronicles of the times, that they hunted the woods for prey, they attacked the shepherd rather than his flock. "If," he continues, "in the neighborhood of the commercial and literary town of Glasgow, a race of cannibals has really existed, we may contemplate in the period of the Scottish history, the opposite extremes of savage and civilized life. Such reflections tend to enlarge the circle of our ideas, and to encourage the pleasing hope, that New Zealand may produce, in some future age, the Hume of the southern hemisphere." We will not speculate upon the literary destinies of the New Zealanders, nor can we bring in contrast, like the great historian, the two extreme points of the national existence of Scotland. But so far as materials serve, we have ventured to glance along the stream of time: exhibiting at intervals some of those detached specimens of Scottish life from which its general spirit may be inferred; stating some of the original evidence upon which the reader may found that unwritten history, that systematic historical belief, which is gradually constructed by a thinking mind, which matures itself insensibly in the understanding, and exercises, unperceived, a control over the feelings, long after dates and names, and all the mere scaffolding of history have been, not perhaps forgotten, but dismissed from the mind. How many days would we not give for the privilege of living but a day in each century that has gone by, and testing the progress, physical and moral, of a whole nation. During many ages, the progress of Scotland was tardy enough; there was less difference than might have been looked for between the country for which the early Jameses legislated, and the country which Sir Archibald Grant recollected; between the men of Cullen's day, and the men whose excesses were prompted by Lovat, or repressed by Cluny. But within the last hundred years how rapid has been the national advancement! The brown heath has become green, and the barren hill waves with foliage; nor have the inhabitants been without their share of moral and social improvement. May their course ever be onwards. With emotions our lips may not tell, eye Must silently speak our farewell. The sunshine of friendship fell not on our hearts Not a beam of its light but has faithfully traced The past comes before us, and fain would we stay On the shadowy forms that are gathering fast When we met, that we looked for in vain ; They but tasted the sweetness and freshness of life, And left us the goblet to drain. Long and earnest our gaze as each moment re turns, Enchanted we linger, as pictures of youth But it is not for us, with our hand on the plough, With to-day and to-morrow our strife! A STUDENT'S FANCY. D. S. C. OH! could I write as I can think, And earnest mind afford the scroll. No worldly song should wake my lyre, As David soothed the Jewish king, Whose echo childhood leaves behind. Had spent its force in contrite tears: And mem'ry had the picture brought Of all the hopes of early years; I'd bid prophetic record tell God's promise to the race of Shem, My fingers, which at first might creep The mighty tide of perfect love Would overwhelm imperfect words, |