Lord Lovat's Memorial to George I. their ancient habit, convenient for their wandering up and down, and peculiar way of living, which inures them to all sorts of fatigue. Their language, being a dialect of the Irish, is understood by none but themselves ; they are very ignorant, illiterat, and in constant use of wearing arms, which are well suited to their method of using them, and very expeditious in march- ing from place to place. These circumstances have, in all times, produced many evils, which have been frequently considered, and many remedies attempted, as it ap- pears from the Scots acts of parlia- ment. Their living among themselves, unmixt with the other part of the coun- try, has been one of the causes that many of their families have continued in the same possessions during many ages, and very little alterations hap- pen in the property of land ; there are few purchases, and, securities for debts are very uncertain, where power hap- pens to be wanting to support the legal right. The names of the inhabitants are confined to a small number, partly from the little intercourse they have had with other people, and partly from the affectation that reigns among them, to annex themselves to some tribe or family, and thereby to put themselves under the protection of the head or chief thereof. These several names of families are respectively associated together in friendship and interest, each name under such person as is, or is reputed to be, the head of the family, who has very great authority over them, quite independent of any legal power, and has, in severall instances, continued great numbers of years after that the lands where they live has been alien- ated from the chiefs whom they serve. There happened two surprising in- stances of this at the late rebellion ; the one was concerning the Erasers, who, upon the Lord Lovat's arrival in Scotland, though he had been ane exile for many years, another family, viz. Alexander Mackenzie of Fraser- dale, in possession of the estate, who had marched a number of them, form- ed into a regiment, to Perth, where the rebel army then lay. Yet not- withstanding all this, the moment they heard that their chief was assembling the rest of his friends and name in the Highlands, they got together, and 399 made their retreat good, till they join- ed Lord Lovat, and others, who were in arms for his Majesty. The other example was that of the Macleans, whose lands had been vest- ed for debt in the family of Argyle, above forty years before ; their chief had not ane inch of ground, but after living and serving in France most part of his lifetime, had come over to Lon- don, where he had been maintained by the charity of Queen Anne. Yet, un- der all these circumstances, Sir John Maclean got together 400 of these men, out of a remote island in the west seas of Scotland, who fought under him at Dumblain, against his Majesty's troops, though commanded by their own landlord. This extraordinar state of the coun- try has, in all times, produced many mutual quarrels and jealousies among the chiefs, which formerly amounted to a continual scene of civil warre; and to this day there remains both person- al and hereditary feuds and animosities among them, which have a great in- fluence over all their actions. The law has never had its due course and au- thority in many parts of the Highlands, neither in criminal nor civil matters ; no remedy having proved entirely ef- fectual, and one of the most usefull having been disproved. Schemes of this nature have been often framed, but with too little knowledge of the country, or the true rise of the abuses to be reformed, and very often with too much partiality, and views of resent- ment or private interest ; all which tend only to create disorders and discontents, to exasperate some, and too much en- courage others, and to make all more proper and reasonable expedients the more difficult to execute. The families in the Highlands are divided (besides the disputes arising among themselves) in principles be- tween the Whigs and the Jacobites ; and that so near in equality, that the authority of the government, by giving countenance or discouraging, and by rewards and punishments properly ap- plied, and all centering in the advance- ment of the Whig interest, united to- gether, might easily produce a vast superiority on the side of those who are well affected, there being in the country a great party who, ever since the names of Whig and Tory have been known, have been always ready to ven- ture their lives in the protestant cause.
