Spelling of Gaelic .Nmnes. 103 



In order to popularize the subject as much as possible, papers 

 are read monthly before the members of the Society and their 

 friends for nine months every year. Most of the explorers who 

 have read papers before the Royal Geographical Society of Lon- 

 don are willing to speak before us in Edinburgh as well as at 

 our branch societies at Glasgow and Aberdeen. The first speaker 

 to address our new-born Society was Mr Stanley after his return 

 from one of his earlier travels of exploration in the great African 

 continent ; and the session this year was expected to close by an 

 address from Lieutenant Peary, on his projected expedition in 

 the direction of the North Pole. Unfortunately a letter arrived 

 from him shortly before I left home expressing regret that owing 

 to unforeseen circumstances he was obliged to abandon his 

 scheme of coming to lecture in Great Britain before the de- 

 parture of his expedition. 



I ought not to omit to mention that though we are a private 

 society and receive no aid from the government, our library and 

 the privilege of consulting maps, books and consular reports is 

 freely opened to the public. Considerable use is made of these 

 facilities by persons engaged in commerce, and almost daily our 

 librarian is consulted by those who are not members of the 

 Society, but are desirous of obtaining commercial information 

 in regard to foreign countries. In this way the Society distinctly 

 benefits the public. Another way in which the public may re- 

 ceive instruction free of cost is by courses of lectures on physical 

 geography or geology in relation to geography, on the distribu- 

 tion of plants and animals over the globe, and other kindred 

 subjects. These lectures are given either by a member of the 

 Society or by some other competent person, and are generally 

 well attended, especially by the young and by the fair sex. 



The most important work on which a committee of my Society 

 is now engaged is a thorough and complete revision of the spell- 

 ing of the Gaelic and worse names in northern Scotland, in con- 

 junction with the director of the Ordnance Survey of the United 

 Kingdom. On existing maps the Gaelic names are not always 

 given correctly ; the spelling is irregular, and when given cor- 

 rectly cannot be pronounced properly b}^ a person ignorant of 

 Gaelic and its remarkable spelling. For instance, in the island 

 of Skye the Culin hills are spelt on the ordnance map Cuchulin, 

 as if they were called after the old Irish hero of that name, 

 though they have never received that designation from the people 



