56 Transactions. 



climate was more severe than it is now. Since then bogs have 

 been drained, and the hills in many parts have been clothed with 

 wood ; the temperature has in consequence been moderated and 

 equalised, the full sweep of the winds has been broken, and now, 

 on elevated table-lands, where grain refused to ripen, heavy crops 

 are secured. 



If the condition of the Lowlands was so wretched, that 

 of the Celtic population of the Highlands was much worse. 

 "The last kings of the Stewart race," says Burton, "for their 

 own ends, tolerated and even caressed the Highlanders, but the 

 previous Stewart kings would have put every human being to 

 death who spoke the Gaelic language had it been possible. 

 James VI. made a bargain with Argyle in the south and Huntly 

 in the north to exterminate the barbarous people, each taking 

 his department and fixing a time within which the thing was to 

 be accomplished ; but it was found that it could not be done." 

 The Gael were not regarded by the Teutonic Lowlanders as 

 fellow-countrymen, and the rule was to show no more considera- 

 tion to them than to wild beasts. And after the Rebellion of 

 1745 they were turned out of their holdings by the chiefs they 

 had too faithfully served to make room for sheep-farmers and 

 deer-stalkers. Of late, however, Donald has come to the front. 

 Scott's novels misunderstood, or some other inscrutable reason, 

 has led the ordinary Englishman to look on all Scotsmen as 

 Highlanders, and the War Office authorities to indue the Scottish 

 regiments in tartan continuations, even the Border regiments. 

 The scanty uniform of a Central African warrior would hardly 

 be a grosser solecism. 



It was the Legislative Union of 1707 that put an end to 

 Scottish poverty. In 1695, says the Duke of Argyle in his 

 " Scotland as it "Was and Is," the Scots threw themselves with 

 enthusiasm into the Darien scheme, founded, as the Bank of 

 England had been, by William Paterson (born in the neighbour- 

 hood of Dumfries). It was intended to open a new trade route to 

 India, but the enterprise was thwarted and ruined by the jealousy 

 of England, being opposed with passionate resentment by the 

 English Parliament and commercial companies, although lialf the 

 shares were generously granted to Englishmen and subscribed 

 for by them. It almost seemed as if Scotland would have to 

 return to her old historic union with France. In 1703-4 the two 



