ditions and manner, and the general ha-
bits of thought and motives of action
still prevailing among the unsophisticat-
ed highlanders, form a body of evidence,
which will in a great degree corroborate,
if not establish the hypothesis I have
ventured to advance. I have endeavour-
ed to point out,

First, That a people accustomed to
freedom, ably contending for it, and
finally flying to the fastnesses of their
country to secure it, must needs have
carried with them high and indepen-
dent feelings, such as cherish noble sen-
timents, and produce heroic actions:
That common dangers and privations,
the dread of a common foe, and sharing
the common honours due to the utmost
exertion of courage, patience, and forti-
tude, must have greatly endeared them
to each other.

Second, That their conscious origin
from one common stock, and that in their

apprehension la noble one, must have mingled pride with that affection, which bound them to each other, and taught them to consider this common origin, and those warm affections which bound them to each other as the chief earthly good: As a dignity and privilege to be preserved at all hazards, and an abundant recompence for the severest privations.

Third, That the entire exclusion of science, and all the objects of interest and ambition, from the rocky abodes of these primitive hunters and graziers, left them free to the illusions of the imagination and the emotions of the heart. And that these circumstances, combined with the love of fame, derived from their past exploits, and only to be gratified in war or hunting, raised their minds to a highly sensitive and poetical state: That valour thus sublimed, affection thus concentrated, and imagination unchecked

by sober and cultivated reason, and fed by all the peculiarities of awful and gloomy scenery, sounds of horror, and sights of wonder, furnished abundant materials for the loftiest flights of the poet, and the darkest fears of the visionary.

Hence, poetry was earlier born, and sooner matured here than in any other country; and hence, the native poetry nourished superstition by kindling enthusiasm. The native superstition, in return, enriched poetry with images of unequalled tenderness and sublimity.

Poetry conducted the warrior to the field of battle, and from thence to the grave, with all the eulogies due to preeminent valour, patriotism, and generosity. For superstition, it remained to give a new theme to the poet, and open new sources of sorrow and tenderness to the fair mourner, who sat in solitude by some roaring stream, deploring her lost hero.

This dreary power brought the ghost of the departed, like a moon-beam, to the window of the bard's repose, to challenge the permanent reward of never-dying praise. On the blast of night, it brought the whispers of an unseen form, to warn the visionary maid of her speedy re-union with the " dweller of "her secret soul;" and to furnish themes for dreams of mingled hope and terror.

The unbroken lineage, the unaltered language, the unconquered country, and the ties of affinity, daily renewed, and hourly strengthened and endeared preserved, unchanged, and undiminished, every tribute paid by affection, or by genius to departed worth or valour.

Those plants of fair renown, which, in a less genial climate of the heart, are nipped by chilling indifference, or which wither, like Jonah's gourd, before the too ardent beams of public exposure, were here perennial evergreens, che

Fished by those who felt a dear connection with the tombs they sheltered.

The state of society was so very different from any thing we have either seen or imagined, that no conclusions could be more erroneous, than those which we should draw from our own experience and observation of life, when applied to their modes of thinking and acting. I do not speak now of the views. which the light of science enables us to take, but of that fluctuation in modes of apparel, habits of civility, &c. which we insensibly acquire from our association with various nations, and which as insensibly draw us away, not only from the customs, but from the opinions of our forefathers. These, in diminishing our respect for their way of thinking and acting, diminishes our reverence for their memory, and unconsciously slackens. those relative ties which derive their