MEMOIR OF DR. WALKER. 35 



Uist, where he has officiated ever since. The parish 

 of South Uist contains two thousand two hundred 

 people, of whom only two hundred and fifty are 

 Protestants ; and besides the island of South Uist, 

 it comprehends the islands of Benbecula and Erisca, 

 which altogether compose a parish between thirty 

 and forty miles long. The charity school is at pre- 

 sent, and has been kept for two years past, in the 

 village of Kilbride, at the south extremity of South 

 Uist ; but for three years before it was settled here, 

 it was kept in the island of Benbecula, and unless it 

 be thus removed from place to place at proper pe- 

 riods, it cannot have its full effect in instructing the 

 inhabitants of such an extensive country. On the 

 foresaid day, this school contained twenty scholars, 

 most part of whom were very well instructed in 

 reading and speaking English. The master's cha- 

 racter and diligence were well attested by Colin 

 M 'Donald, Esq. younger of Boysdale, who is ruling 

 elder, and by Ronald M c Donald, Esq. younger of 

 Clanronald. He received a box of books from the 

 society in- the year 1738, containing a dozen of 

 Bibles and a dozen and a half of New Testaments, 

 but he has received none since that time ; and is at 

 present in such want of catechisms for teaching 

 the children the alphabet, that he is forced to make 

 use of the leaves of other books for that purpose. 



" As the charity school kept at Balliloch, in 

 North Uist, receives a vacation of twenty days in 

 the beginning of August, this deprived me of an 

 opportunity of visiting the school, or of conversing 



