IN THE HIGHLANDS 3 



Uncle Jolin Mackenzie was called Hector, thought two 

 of the same name in the family might be confusing, so, 

 when we reached England and I was christened, the 

 name of Osgood was given me, after my maternal 

 grandfather, Osgood Hanbury, of Holfield Grange, 

 Essex, and also after my cousin, who was my godfather. 

 The eldest sons of these Hanburys were always called 

 Osgood from 1730, when John Hanbury, son of Charles 

 and Grace Hanbury, of Pontymoil and other estates 

 in Monmouthshire, married Anne, daughter and heiress 

 of Henry Osgood, of Holfield Grange, who held 3,392 

 acres of land in the parish of Coggeshall. I have always 

 rather regretted that my original name of Hector was 

 not adhered to, as our family has, since about 1400, 

 been known as Clan Eachainn Ghearloch (children of 

 Hector of Gairloch), and Eachainn I\IacCoinnich would 

 have been so much more appropriate when writing my 

 signature in Gaelic. 



My readers may wonder at my writing anjrthing 

 about a place which I could not possibly have viewed 

 with intelligent eyes when I left it, but I renewed 

 acquaintance with it many years later. When I was 

 about thirty my mother and I made a tour through 

 Normandy and Brittany, one of the chief aims of which 

 was to visit my birthplace. I remember we arrived at 

 Quimperle on a Saturday evening, and I soon found out 

 that the following day there was to be a religious festival, 

 what they called in Brittany a " Pardon," finishing up 

 in the evening with unlimited music and dancing in the 

 Grande Place of the town. Thousands of peasants had 

 come in from the surrounding country, many of the older 



