X INTRODUCTION. 



circumstances, I deemed worthy of record in the following 

 pages. 



Let us first see how the evidence given before the Royal 

 Commission affects what appeared in my previous work, 

 and what I reproduce in the first portion of this volume. 

 When it first appeared, in my " History of the Highland 

 Clearances," few people believed that the description given 

 of the Social Upheaval and its results in the Braes and Glen- 

 dale were not greatly exaggerated. Indeed, that was quite 

 expected ; for it does appear incredible that the antiquated 

 customs and petty tyrannies inflicted upon a noble race by 

 factors and landlords in that part of the Queen's dominions 

 were possible, within the bounds of civilization, much less 

 in the British Isles, whose leading statesmen, in the past, 

 have in most cases secured the brighest" settings in their re- 

 putations by taking the side of oppressed races in what were 

 hitherto held to be much less favoured lands than our own. 

 The Royal Commissioners examining into the grievances of 

 the Highland Crofters have, during their Inquiry, not only 

 brought to light facts corroborative of all that has ever been 

 written or said on that subject, but disclosures have been 

 made in the Isle of Skye which no one unacquainted with 

 the facts could have believed, until, after hearing both 

 sides Crofters, Landlords and Factors, it has now been 

 placed beyond dispute. It is very remarkable, as well as 

 instructive, that the factors made scarcely any attempt 

 much less succeeded in rebutting any of the statements made 

 in my recently published " Highland Clearances " about the 

 state of affairs and what has led up to it, during the last 

 two years, in the Braes and in Glendale. 



All that I have written, and much more, about the 

 Braes has been corroborated by the witnesses examined 

 before the Commission; and the factor for Lord Macdonald, 



