134 THE HIGHLAND CLEARANCES. 



permitted to visit them ; that they might receive food 

 from outside, if they, or their friends, chose to supply 

 and pay for it ; that they could have any books and news- 

 papers supplied to them, at their own expense or at that 

 of their friends ; and that they were to take their exercise 

 separately from the criminals in the prison. Instead of the 

 hard boards, as they had for the first night, to sleep on, they 

 were supplied with excellent beds and bedding ; they were 

 placed together in a large room, and amply provided with 

 fire, and other conveniences ; while the only work of any 

 kind they had to perform, was to scrub out their own room 

 twice a week ; and this the regulations permitted them to 

 get done by others, if they preferred to pay for it. Their 

 food was suppled daily, three times a day, from a neighbour- 

 ing restaurant, by the Edinburgh Highland Land Law Re- 

 form Association, through Mr. Dugald Cowan, Secretary, 

 who also supplied them with books, magazines, and news- 

 papers, and such other little comforts as the prison regula- 

 tions admitted of. 



We paid them a visit in the jail, on the 6th of April, and 

 intimated, among other items of news, that we succeeded 

 in collecting about ^20 among Inverness friends, to aid in 

 their own maintenance in prison, and the support of their 

 families at home, during their incarceration. They expressed 

 themselves extremely grateful for the interest taken by out- 

 siders in their case, and in their families, and desired 

 us to intimate to their friends that they were more com- 

 fortable in prison than they could possibly have expected ; 

 that every official was as considerate as the regulations 

 would allow ; and that they had nothing but good to say of 

 everyone connected with the prison. We found them all 

 in the same room, provided with the best bedding and a 

 good fire. They strongly urged that their friends at home 



