Jamie the Sixth, of Scotland, of the famous
and unhappy house of Stuart, became King James the First of England.
The kilted regiments, the Highlanders, belonging to the immortal
Highland Brigade, include the Gordon Highlanders, the Forty-second,
the world famous Black Watch, as it is better known than by its
numbered designation, the Seaforth Highlanders, and the Argyle and
Sutherland regiment, or the Princess Louise's Own. That was the
regiment to a territorial battalion of which my boy John belonged at
the outbreak of the war, and with which he served until he was killed.
Some of those old, famous regiments have been wiped out half a dozen
times, almost literally annihilated, since Mons. New drafts, and the
addition of territorial battalions, have replenished them and kept up
their strength, and the continuity of their tradition has never been
broken. The men who compose a regiment may be wiped out, but the
regiment survives. It is an organization, an entity, a creature with
a soul as well as a body. And the Germans have no discovered a way
yet of killing the soul! They can do dreadful things to the bodies of
men and women, but their souls are safe from them.
Of course there are Scots regiments that are not kilted and that have
naught to do with the Hielanders, who have given as fine and brave an
account of themselves as any. There are the Scots Guards, one of the
regiments of the Guards Brigade, the very pick and flower of the
British army. There are the King's Own Scottish Borderers, with as
fine a history and tradition as any regiment in the army, and a
record of service of which any regiment might well be proud; the
Scots Fusiliers, the Royal Scots, the Scottish Rifles, and the Scots
Greys, of Crimean fame--the only cavalry regiment from Scotland.
Since this war began other Highland regiments have been raised beside
those originally included in the Highland Brigade. There are Scots
from Canada who wear the kilt and their own tartan and cap. Every
Highland regiment, of course, has its own distinguishing tartan and
cap. One of the proudest moments of my life came when I heard that
the ninth battalion of the Highland Light Infantry, which was raised
in Glasgow, but has its depot, where its recruits and new drafts are
trained, at Hamilton, was known as the Harry Landers. That was
because they had adopted the Balmoral cap, with dice, that had become
associated with me because I had worn it so often and so long on
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