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382 THE CELTIC MAGAZmE.tliem all are those Avliicli carry our thoughts to other, and to distantclimes, where so many of the companions of our youth, and of the friendsof our childhood arc now located. We gaze upon the land of our birth, aswe would on the countenance of a loved and dying parent. 'J'he featuresremain the same ; but the cold hand of death is passing over them, andthe spirit which animated them is about to depart. xVll the bold outlinesof our country's scenery remain unchanged; but under a relentless mandatethe silence of death is fast passing over them. Yes, under a merciless andmercenary policy many a ojice happy vale has already ceased to be theabode of living men. And thus it is that our thoughts are at thismoment almost as vividly directed to tlie sunny plains of Australia, andto the sombre forests of Canada, as they are to the green glens of Argyle,or the lonely Ilebridcan Isles ! " Xo sight can be more sad to the eyesof the Higliland philanthropist than to traverse those desolated glens andto behold, here and there, the Ia racks of once social and happy clwellings,all dilapidated and clad with nettles and foxglove—melancholy mementosof ancient joyful homes !It is Avorthy of observation that the imprudent policy which has ledto all this is neitlier of a temporary nature nor of recent origin. It hasexisted for ages, and has taken a deep, and it is to be feared, a lastingroot. Hence it is that the procuring of a remedy, if at all within therange of possibility, is a matter for grave and anxious deliberation. Tlieunfortunate change which has thus been effected in the social conditionof the Highlands is the radical evil which has operated against tlie ameliorationor improvement of that condition. The Highlanders have notnow within themselves the means, or the instrumentalities whereby theymay expect to be raised, but very partially, in the scale of sacred andsecular knowledge. Preachers and teachers possessing a thorough acquaintancewith the Gaelic language, the mother tongue of the Highlanders, arebecome " few and far between." This is to be deplored, but not to bewondered at, under the system of management so long practised, particularlyunder that portion of the system wherein the Gaelic is not onlyneglected, but, frequently, is utterly despised 1)y the better classes of thecommunity themselves. Many of our Highland families in the presentday, whose ancestors were as ignorant of the English lai^guage as of Hindostaneeor Persian, are actuated by a sort of fashion, or perhaps rather of afalse pride, by which they are led to suppose that to know, or to speak,Gaelic is derogatory to their respectability. Hence the younger branchesof the household are strictly watched, and warned under the penalty of asmart castigation, against uttering one vocable of the despised tongue ! Itis not considered genteel to do so, as it contaminates, forsooth, their Englishaccent, and gives a peculiar Celtic twang to the tone of their speech.The same I'idiculous principle has frecj^uently been acted on by schoolmastersin the Highlands, who, instead of giving instruction in thatlanguage, utterly excluded it from their schools. It was (piite a commonthing on entering one of these schools to hear a boy address the master,and cry out, " Hector Beaton is speaking Gaelic here." Poor Hector isdragged up to the teacher's desk, and pleaduig guilty, receives at once adozen of sharp " pandies " for his crime !jS'ow, the result of all tlxiy is, that without doubt the Gaelic lauguays