Download Volume 12 here

102 Gaelic Society of Inverness.
intention of entering into the political aspect of it here, but I
should like, with your leave, to say one or two words, so far as I
think this Society can bring to l^ear influence on the general question
without, I hope and believe, doing itself any harm, but doing,
I am cei-tain, a very great deal of good to the country at large,
which, I am convinced, is the earnest wish of all of you. (Hear,
hear.) I have often of late thought, and my views have been
strengthened and confirmed by my conversations with different
members of the Gaelic Society, that a Society like this, embracing
among its members some of the foremost Celtic students of the
day, could, if they individually took the matter up, do much in
helping to dispel some of the erroneous statements which have
been of late circulated amongst the people, and in the present
state of the Highlands, where the people seem suddenly to have
placed their trust in those gentlemen who have gone amongst them
promising much, and making these promises, too often quite impracticable,
in that great boon, " the Gaelic tongue " — (Hear, hear)
and as we all see that there must be legislation for the Highlands,
I do think that the members of this Society should not be
content with making speeches full of good advice and kindly
feeling to their fellow countrymen, but, pushing on one side all
party feeling, for I maintain that this is no party question, let
Whig and Tory, aye, and downright Liberal, stand shoulder to
shoulder, take every opportunity of talking with the people in
their native language, and try and get them to meet the proposed
legislation in the spirit in which it will be offered, by whatever
Government bring-s it forward, be it Liberal or be it Conservative.
I think this is the more incumbent on this Society, as I noticed
the other day that a large section of the people in the Highlands
have agi'eed only to read the papers which they, or, at least, their
self-elected advisers, chose to call fiwourable to their cause. I
hope I shall not be misunderstood here, and to be thought that I
am at all referring to the editors of those papers, for from my
personal knowledge of one or two of them, I am quite certain that
they rather like opposition, and would be the last tocibject to both
sides of the question being placed before those whose cause they
advocate— (Hear, hear)—and I may also add that they are well
able to give and receive as hard a blow as most of us. (Applause.)
It seems to me the duty of every one who desires the happiness of
his country to prevent such a rebound as will have the effect of
injuring the Highlands instead of doing the people good. I am
suro T need not say tliat I am far from desiring that the mem])ers of
this Society should either individually or collectively commit them
—