The Express.
London, England, 1860-08-10 00:00:00

LONDON, FRIDAY, AUGUST 10.

Tax Quaszt will not regret her determination
to review the Scottish Volunteers. That decision
has produced an outburst of ardent loyalty and
devoted patriotism such as Scotland has rarely
known, and few monarchs on either side of the
border have ever witnessed. Never, perhaps,
indeed, since the union of the two Crowns has the
fine old metropolitan city of the north been
the scene of such a stirring and enthu-
siastic demonstration as that which took
place in the presence of her MAJIMITY on Tuesday
last. It was in all respects thoroughly national,
and well represents the most striking features of
the national character. Though ardent to a
proverb, the Scotch, as all the world knows, are
not usually a demonstrative people. Their fervid
temperament is combined with a large amount of
constitutional caution and prudent reserve.
This is in fact only one of the natural
results of a proud and self-reliant temper. The
depth and concentration of the Scottish charac
ter appears in a certain habitual self-control
which checks unrestrained intercourse, and makes
the people reserved in manner, and chary of
speech. But their real feelings are ardent and
fervid. They have courageous hearts, and are
capable of the strongest attachments. The pecu-
liarities of the national character are summed up
in the saying that a Sootchman, while frozen on
the surface, is at a white-heat at the centre—a
volcano covered with snow ; but once thawed,
the ice once broken, the fire of an
ardent and impassioned nature is revealed.
The feelings of the nation are, like those of the
individual, deep and strong, and they are as natu-
rally moved by the central objects of national in-
terest. These are of course home and freedom,
the land of their birth, and the Government under
which they live. The Scotch have accordingly
always been a profoundly loyal and patriotic race.
Of late years there has been little occasion for
any direct appeal to these sentiments. But
the Volunteer movement, which has developed
so nobly the patriotism of the empire, has
been responded to with characteristic fever and
intensity north of the Tweed. As usual, however,
the national energy has hitherto expressed itself
in local action, in quiet organisation, and silent
work, rather than in anygreat public demonstration,
so that it was difficult for those at a distance to
estimate the real extent of the movement. The
grand display of Tuesday last proves that,
like every impulse which really stirs the
fervid temperament of the Scotch, the Volun-
teer movement is amongst them a thoroughly
national one. The nation assembled through its
representatives in the capital, and the joyful capital
put on holiday attire and appeared in festive glad-
lieu to welcome the nation. Such a meeting it
was as Scotland and Edinburgh had rarely seen
before—a meeting such as the city and the nation
had probably never known. Both were to meet
their Q UMW, and they showed themselves equally
anxious to do full justice to the occasion. The
city was astir and in great activity from the dawn.
At an early hour it was dressed to receive its
troops of martial visitors—gay with flags and
floral arches, and festive decorations of every kind..
It was a holiday, and the streets were filled
with crowds. Even the Presbyterian steeples
sympathised with the general excitement, and for
once what might be called the ringing in-
stead of the dismal tolling of bells was heard.
Soon the streets were vocal with the sound of
rolling drums and the measured tread of advancing
companies, which from eight o'clock in the morn-
Mg till three in the afternoon arrived in rapid sue-
cession from all points of the compass. The country
was equally excited and in earnest. Visitors
arrived in multitudes from every district. The day
was kept as a holiday throughout the country ;
While every town of any size sent its corps and its
contingent of visitors. The larger towns sent
not one but many companies, Glasgow
being represented, for example, by a body
of four thousand volunteers, Perth by nearly
a thousand, and Aberdeen by more than half that
number. Altogether there were upwards of twenty
thousand volunteers who marched to the ground
during the morning and took part in the review.
These men represented the nation more completely
than any company ever yet assembled together
at one time within the country. They in-
cluded men of all ranks, of all profes-
sions, and of all occupations—the active
representatives of the enterprise, energy,
and intelligent)e of the country. All the moral
and intellectual powers at work throughout the
land, the forces that will give character and form
to the national life for years to come, were there.
These twenty thousand are, in fact, the very pith
and manhood of the nation. They came from all
parts, from the extremeat north to the farthest
south, front John &Groats to the Tweed. The
meeting-place was worthy of the occasion
—a grainy level iu the midst of an
amphitheatre of kills and crags densely
crowded with spectators, who filled every green
hollow and lined every jutting ledge of rock that
commanded the moving scene below. More than
twenty thousand Volunteers and more than two
hundred thousand spectators were gathered in the
Qneen•s Park and on the adjacent crags and hills.
The Q EIN must have beheld the sight with no
common emotions of pride, and joy, and thankful-
ness. Everything went well, and the Review was