274 EXTRACTS FROM NOTE-BOOKS. CH. XXXVII. 



on this coast. Their names are frequently Danish 

 or Swedish. In fact they are altogether a different 

 people from the Celtic inhabitants of the neighbour- 

 ing mountains. There is an almost regular line 

 drawn through the country, where the Gaelic lan- 

 guage ends and the English commences. The town 

 of Nairn is divided by this line, one half of the inha- 

 bitants being talkers of Gaelic and the other speak- 

 ing only English. It is said that one of our prime 

 ministers boasted to a foreigner that his master, the 

 King of England, possessed a town so extensive that 

 the inhabitants of one end spoke a different lan- 

 guage from those of the other end. Nairn was the 

 town in question ; and whatever the merit of the 

 joke may be, it corroborates what I stated. 



To return, however, to our Highland fishermen. 

 Wearily and heavily the poor fellows labour along 

 the road, and by the time they reach Forres, Nairn, 

 and the other towns near the shore, they are sadly 

 knocked up, their food during the journey having 

 been poor and scanty, consisting generally of pota- 

 toes, and perhaps oatmeal, mixed up frequently 

 with cold water, a sorry mess for a Highlander who 

 is taking the unaccustomed exercise of tramping 

 along a hard road. Many of these men know 

 pretty well where, and by whom, they shall be hired, 

 but others have to seek employment where they 

 can. Their faces grow visibly shorter as soon as 



