THE HEATHER AS A CLAN BADGE 



Not safe were they who rashly met 



Thy warriors stern and true, 

 When the proud heather-badge was set 



In all their bonnets blue. 



Ian Lorn. 



WHEN we reflect upon the many unique charac- 

 teristics of the Heather its stern beauty of 

 delicate purple bells nestling to a green- 

 mantled burly growth of brushwood; its distinctive 

 vitality and strength of endurance; the wild, rugged 

 solitude of its native home in the Scottish Highlands, 

 and the untamed spirit of independence which over- 

 broods this hermit flower of the mountain crags it 

 is not to be wondered at that the Heather should have 

 been adopted as a symbol, or badge, by several of the 

 leading clans of Scotland. Indeed, in olden times such 

 badges were superstitiously regarded, and the clans 

 adopting specific subjects as their symbols were sup- 

 posed to be descended from these subjects. And who 

 more proud of their ancestors than the descendants of 

 the Heather! 



Grighair is croic, 

 Domnuil is freuc, 

 Macgregor as the rock, 

 Macdonald as the heather. 



