smith continuing in the same family for many ages. I myself know a smith who is the fourteenth in a direct descent that succeeded from father to son as hereditary smith in the parish of Callander, Monteith, where, during youth, he wrought at the same anvil which rung to the hammer of thirteen of his forefathers in regular succession, till he emigrated about forty years ago to Edinburgh, where he still lives. All the world has heard of Macnab the smith of Dalmaly in Glenorchy, Argyleshire, whose ancestors were hereditary blacksmiths, armourers, &c. for four hundred years back. It was of old a perquisite of the smith, to have the head of every cow slaughtered among the clan. And even in the lowlands, the smiddy or smith's shop constituted a branch of the services, to which tenants were bound to have their implements of husbandry made, horses shod, &c. and has only been abolished very lately in many parts of Scotland. What is called thirlage to corn-mills, another species of service highly prejudicial to agricultural improvement, is fast on the decline throughout every district where the proprietor is possessed of common sense, and has a due respect for the good of the community at large. At what particular period corn-mills were introduced into the Grampians and Hebrides, I am by no means certain. But, that such, of a very simple construction, were erected in many parts of the highlands, similar to those then in general use throughout the lowlands and islands of Orkney and Zetland, we have evident proofs. This species of water-mill has but one wheel, having its axle fixed to the mill-stones, which move at one and the same instant, when

the water-force is applied, which is at an angle of 45 degrees, and sometimes horizontal. A mill-stone of this description is to be seen at the side of a small brook called Altlarcih at Fhearsaid, a part of the Duke of Gordon's property in Lochaber. The person who is said to have erected the mill in this almost inaccessible part of the Grampians, is mentioned in a very ancient popular song, entitled, Orain na Comhachaig; which shows that water-mills had been in use among the Gael in very remote times; the precise period, however, is uncertain. But, querns, or handmills, for the most part, were preferred; and the compulsatory resort to water-mills, by that means, eluded. It is curious to reflect on the universal use of the hand-mills in different sections of the globe, and in ages very remote from each other. Thus, for instance, the ancient Egyptians, Jews, Greeks and Romans, as we learn from history, ground their grain with hand-mills and the inhabitants of Africa, and the Finlanders at this day, make use of the hand-mill, as appears by the latest travellers into the interior of Africa, and others toward the Arctic circle. Vide M. Park's travels, Acerbi's, &c. By the ancient law, or "Statutes of the Gild" of Scotland, "It is not leisome to grinne corns at hand-mills, but in time of necessitie." Stat. Gild. c. 19. Vide REGIAM MAJESTÁTEM, fol. 143. et index,

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Or praises challenge by some new-made verse.-P. 8. The natives of the Grampians and western islands have ever been celebrated for their attachment to song. Martin, in his "Description of the Western Islands of Scotland,"

notices this circumstance in the words following: "Several of both sexes have a quick vein for poesy, and in their language, (which is very emphatic) they compose rhyme and verse, both which powerfully affect the fancy," p. 198. And I have myself known many individuals of both sexes, very expert at making excellent verses, who were totally illiterate; and two of the best modern poets still living, know not one letter of the alphabet from the other, namely, ALLAN M'DOUGAL, a blind man at Fort William, whose songs were printed in the year 1798; and DUNCAN M'INTYRE, whose songs were first printed in the year 1768, and reprinted in 1790. "Oran BeinDourain," is perhaps one of the finest pieces of lyric composition to be met with in any language, ancient or modern, for variety and grandeur of local description.

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And gaze and wonder much, and much admire.-P. 8. THE avidity with which rustics swallow every species of intelligence, new or uncommon, has long been proverbial: this trait, however, among highlanders, has been on the decline for nearly half a century; and it was so much so in the year 1773, when Dr Johnson visited the Hebrides, that he remarked it as a thing little expected. "I did not meet with the inquisitiveness of which I have read,” says he, " and suspect the judgment to have been rashly made." The fact is, their curiosity is still very great; but being more enlightened by being better educated than formerly, they have means of being gratified in what is commendable to know; consequently their curiosity is managed with more circumspection; parti

cularly before a stranger; and they are too vain to be thought ignorant. At present, however, their means of acquiring useful knowledge, are ample beyond what their southern neighbours have the slightest idea. And the post-offices now established throughout the Grampians, and Western Isles, afford so ready a communication with the whole habitable globe, that the means of intelligence is uninterrupted, and wonderfully expeditious; nay, where even the post-town is at any considerable distance, thinly inhabited as the glens and hills at present are, the people, by a very simple yet ingenious contrivance, make shift to circulate the newspapers as regular as the news-men dispatch them to their customers; and the mode is, the reader in one glen ascends the hill next him, and leaves the paper under a stone, in a place agreed on betwixt the parties; and thus, except in the worst weather, what the great world is busy about, is known in the very wilderness of our empire; and our Grampian politicians are not a whit behind their neighbours in the south, in point of eagerness for information on every topic worthy of rational curiosity, free from that silly inquisitiveness which marks rustic ignorance or boorish importunity for what is new or strange.

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Where stood the aged OLLAMHAN's hallowed shed.-P. 8. THE OLLAMHANS, chief bards, or historiographers, or as Martin calls them, Isdane, or orators, were, he says, "in high esteem both in these islands and the contin"ent;" (meaning the main land of the western coast) "until these forty years" i. e. about the middle of the

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seventeenth century," they sat always among the nobles "and chiefs of families in the Streah or circle. Their "houses and little villages were sanctuaries as well as "churches, and they took place before doctors of physic. "The orators," (or Isdane) after the Druids were extinct, "were brought in to preserve the genealogy of families, "and to repeat the same at every succession of a chief, they made epithalamiums and panegyrics, which the poet or bard pronounced." Descrip. West. Isl. Scot. p. 115. "Of what consideration the old BARDS were "in the northern parts of Britain," says the Arch-Deacon of Carlisle," the reader will best learn from the eloquent "pen of one of the most famous humanists in Scotland,” meaning J. Johnston, author of the "Scottish Heroes," whom he quotes in the original, (vide Nicolson's Scot. Hist. Lib. chap. ii. et Johnst, ad Her. Scot. in prefat.) The celebrated Duan, or poem in the Gaelic language, preserved since the coronation of Malcolm III. (Macbeth's successor) A. D. 1056, which is said to have been composed by that monarch's bard or poet-laureat, is a striking proof of the high estimation that order was held in by our Scottish ancestors (vide Pinkerton's Enquiry, Vol. II. p. 321.) In this singular curiosity of antiquity, the royal bard traces the ancestors of Malcolm (Ceanmore, Great-head) up to Albanus the supposititious possessor of the crown of Alba or Scotland. "A great many "genealogies" says Nicolson," and pedigrees of the "Scottish kings have been drawn up; among which the "most famous (and most common in the libraries of great men) is that which was composed by a highlandof quality, and repeated to ALEXANDER III. at his

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