ions separated from our island by great
continents and oceans. Numerous books were printed describing the
laws, the superstitions, the cabins, the repasts, the dresses, the
marriages, the funerals of Laplanders and Hottentots, Mohawks and
Malays. The plays and poems of that age are full of allusions to
the usages of the black men of Africa and the red men of America.
The only barbarian about whom there was no wish to have any
information was the Highlander....

"While the old Gaelic institutions were in full vigor, no account
of them was given by any observer qualified to judge of them
fairly. Had such an observer studied the character of the
Highlanders, he would doubtless have found in it closely
intermingled the good and the bad qualities of an uncivilised
nation. He would have found that the people had no love for their
country or for their king, that they had no attachment to any
commonwealth larger than the clan, or to any magistrate superior to
the chief. He would have found that life was governed by a code of
morality and honor widely different from that which is established
in peaceful and prosperous societies. He would have learned that a
stab in the back, or a shot from behind a fragment of rock, were
approved modes of taking satisfaction for insults. He would have
heard men relate boastfully how they or their fathers had wracked
on hereditary enemies in a neighboring valley such vengeance as
would have made old soldiers of the Thirty Years' War shudder.

"He would have found that robbery was held to be a calling not
merely innocent but honorable. He would have seen, wherever he
turned, that dislike of steady industry, and that disposition to
throw on the weaker sex the heaviest part of manual labor, which
are characteristic of savages. He would have been struck by the
spectacle of athletic men basking in the sun, angling for salmon,
or taking aim at grouse, while their aged mothers, their pregnant
wives, their tender daughters, were reaping the scanty harvest of
oats. Nor did the women repine at their hard lot. In their view it
was quite fit that a man, especially if he assumed the aristocratic
title of Duinhe Wassel and adorned his bonnet with the eagle's
feather, should take his ease, except when he was fighting,
hunting, or mar