620 MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 



Scenes and Legends of the North of Scotland, or the Traditional 

 History of Cromarty. By HUGH MILLER. 1 vol. Adam and 

 Charles Black, Edinburgh. 



The plan of this work is excellent. It is not the first attempt (hat has 

 been made to write the Legends and Traditions of peculiar localities : but 

 the idea lias never before been so completely worked out. A most in- 

 teresting, and not interesting alone, but useful set of books might be 

 written on this plan, as there are many places, rich in legendary associa- 

 tions, and having still within them traces of manners and feelings of other 

 times, which are rapidly disappearing. Mr. Miller's work has immor- 

 talised Cromarty, and it does him infinite credit; indeed, we do not know 

 when we were more pleased with a book. Its style is good, and its 

 details easy and natural in their narration ; and there is a store of thought 

 developed in it, which shows a mind of no ordinary powers. 



That extraordinary man, Sir Thomas Urquhart, very properly occupies 

 a prominent place in the pages of a traditional history of Cromarty. A 

 better subject Mr. Miller could not have had, and we trust his notice 

 of him will bring out something more particular about one of the most 

 remarkable characters that ever figured on the stage of human life. The 

 subjoined extract will show one characteristic of the book : 



" On the summit of Knock-Farril, a steep hill, which rises a few miles 

 to the west of Dingwall, there are the remains of one of those vitrified 

 forts, which so puzzle and interest the antiquary, and which was originally 

 constructed, says tradition, by a gigantic tribe of Fions, for the protection 

 of their wives and children, when /hey themselves were engaged in 

 hunting. It chanced in one of these excursions, that a mean-spirited 

 little fellow of the party, not much more than fifteen feet in height, was 

 so distanced by his more active brethren, that leaving them to follow out 

 the chase, he returned home, and throwing himself down on the side of 

 the eminence, much fatigued fell fast asleep. Garry, for so the unlucky 

 hunter was called, was no favourite with the women of the tribe: he was 

 spiritless, and diminutive, and ill-tempered ; and as they could make little 

 else of him that they cared for, they converted him into the butt of all 

 their severer jokes and less agreeable humours. On seeing that he had 

 fallen asleep, they stole out where he lay, and, after fastening his long 

 hair with pegs to the grass, awakened him with their shouts and their 

 laughter. He strove to extricate himself, but in vain,' until at length 

 infuriated by their jibes, and the pain of his own exertions, he wrenched 

 up his head, leaving half his locks behind him, and, hurrying after them, 

 set fire to the stronghold into which they had rushed for shelter, and 

 then fled away. When the males of the tribe returned, they found only 

 a huge pile of embers, in which the very stones of the building were 

 sputtering and bubbling with the intense heat, like the contents of a 

 boiling cauldron. Wild with rage and astonishment, and yet collected 

 enough to conclude that none but Garry could be the author of a deed so 

 barbarous, they tracked him into a nameless Highland Glen, which has 

 ever since been known as * Glen-Garry,' and there tore him to pieces." 



The Sultan Mahmoucl and Mehemet Ali Pasha. By the Author of 

 '* England, France, Russia, and Turkey." Ridgway, London. 



The opinions of the writer of this pamphlet are well worth attention. 

 He advocates, with considerable knowledge of the a Hairs of the East, the 

 cause of the Sultan against the Pasha of Egypt. We recommend his 

 pages to careful perusal. 



