XVI INTRODUCTION. 



taken place between himself and me in a railway train, 

 in reference to the appointment of the Royal Commis- 

 sioners, so grossly inaccurate that it appears quite inexpli- 

 cable, but for his constitutional defect of memory. Whatever 

 effect my efforts may have had in securing the Royal Com- 

 missioners, as Tormore puts it, I have no hesitation in 

 admitting that it would be most unfair not to give him full 

 credit for his share in our success, and that the Commis- 

 sion would yet be in the distant future, were it not for 

 the impetus given to our efforts by the imperious con- 

 duct of Tormore in the Isle of Skye ; and I only trust 

 that he is as satisfied as I am with, the result of the inquiry 

 hitherto. Tormore, as a man, was a very good fellow, 

 and one is sorry to find him placed in a position in which, 

 by contact with a pernicious system, he not only becomes 

 a changed man, but is, on occasions, driven to the com- 

 mission of acts unworthy of a gentleman of his position 

 and pretensions. 



In connection with this case he brought upon himself, 

 at Portree, a singularly severe, but well-merited rebuke 

 from the chairman of the Royal Commission. Having, 

 as he thinks, discovered qualities in others which clearly 

 are not such as he can fairly lay claim to, if I may judge 

 by the exhibition which he made before the Royal Com- 

 mission at Portree ; and after giving me credit for having 

 "to answer for a lot of sins," over and above any of 

 the others whom he was pleased to designate as "the 

 instigators of the rebellion in Skye and the West," he 

 elegantly exclaimed, that I " had got a broad back and 

 a very thick hide"; whereupon Lord Napier peremptorily 

 rebuked him, and told him that such language was " not 

 permissible," and then, appealing to qualities which did not 

 appear predominant in the particular case before him his 



