336 Timehri. 
“ forced into exile and who are living in St. Christopher’s and the neighbouring 
islands.’ They asked for the assistance of clergymen of their race and faith. 
Who were these mysterious Irish exiles in St. Kitts and what became of 
them? Were they at this time bond or free and did Father O’Hartigan 
hearken to their appeal? These and similar points I hope to deal with 
in this or in a succeeding paper. 
Tue Rep Lees or BarBapos. 
In the last issue of Timehri an interesting article on Negro Dialects appeared 
from the pen of Mr. Cruickshank which contained some references to Irish 
settlers in Barbados and Montserrat. The talented writer of the article has I 
believe given considerable attention to the origin and present condition of the 
famous “‘ Red Legs,” that rapidly dwindling population of poor whites, de- 
generate and unloved, who are to be found in the parish of St. James in Barbados 
and who seem to have preserved few or no traditions of their original stock. 
The district in which they live is called “ Scotland ”’ and the names point rather 
to the descent of the inhabitants from the deported “ Red Shanks ” or High- 
landers and other royalist Scots of Worcester, the Fifteen, and the Forty-Five. 
They are Protestant in religion and I think this point cannot be ignored. 
While the Scottish Highlanders were largely Roman Catholic even as late as 
1745 their attachment to the older faith seems to have been determined by 
the attitude of their chiefs more than by any retention of strong religious con- 
viction. When the chiefs conformed or the supply of priests fell off, the High- 
landers, unlike their Irish kinsmen, followed their chiefs or listened of their own 
accord to the ministrations of those who wore the Geneva gown. Now-a-days 
few disapprove more strongly of the wiles of the Scarlet Woman than the 
Highland Host of the larger kirks or the litigious and triumphant Gaelic 
remnant known as the “ Wee Frees.”’ In Ireland the name Redshank was 
used to distinguish the Antrim glynnsmen, chiefly McNeils and McDonnels, 
who were Scots Highland immigrants of the 15th and 16th centuries, 
clearly marked off however by Catholic religion and Gaelic race from 
the Presbyterian Lowlanders of mixed blood, who followed in the 17th 
century and who have given a characterisation of their own to par.s 
at least of Ulster. That any depth of degradation could destroy the 
attachment of any folk of Irish Gaelic stock to family and racial tradition 
is not easily conceivable to those who know the breed. ‘‘ The Barry is an 
Englishman ”’ asserts Standish O’Grady’s Ulric the Ready, “‘ Why, he has 
been in Ireland only five hundred years.” 
An analysis of the family names may reveal some further details, O’Neals 
and Lynches being numerous enough among the population at large, but even 
this investigation must take into account the number of Irish and Scots names 
left in later times by soldiers of the various garrisons. If Mr. Cruickshank can 
be induced to publish his studies, they will be welcomed by many Irishmen 
anxious to recover some fragments at least of one of the lost chapters of Irish 
history. Government records of that date in the West Indian islands have 
largely disappeared—destroyed through party feeling from t’me to time as 
Cavalier or Roundhead in turn gained the upper hand, or lost in the 
