The Sun.
London, England, 1857-11-11 00:00:00

LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 11-, 1857.

TEE SEVENTY-EIGHTH HIGHLANDERS.

Scotchmen are often laughed at for the pride
they take in regiments composed of their own coun-
trymen. And while their vanity has sometimes led
them too far, it will be denied by none that the
Highland corps have splendidly sustained the mili-
tary renown of the land whence their ranks have
ever been filled. The tartan has fluttered in India,
Egypt, Spain, Belgium, and the Crimea ; and
wherever the men who wore it have gone they
have covered themselves with glory. Our atten-
tion has again bean particularly directed to one of
these gallant bands ; and, while we would with-
hold the laurel from none of the heroes now sus-

taming British rule in India, we cannot refrain
from particularly noticing the regiment whose
name stands at the bead of this article. Havelock
and his Highlanders rivet the attention of all who
seek in our columns the tale of that fearful strife
iu Hindostan, on whose results are staked the glory
and permanence of our empire. We will not
speak of their recent deeds ; these are in the minds
of all men ; we would simply sketch their story
from the tune of their embodiment till the present
crisis.
It was the elder Pitt who first directed the valour
of the Scottish Celt from making fruitless assaults
on the House of Hanover, to achieving for it some
of its proudest triumphs. To this fact he alluded
in the House of Commons on the 14th of January,
176 G :—" I have no local attachments. It is in-
different to me whether a man was rocked in his
cradle on this or that side of the Tweed. I sought
for merit wherever it was to be found. It is my
boast that I was the first minister who looked for
it and found it in the mountains of the North. I
called it forth, and drew into your service a hardy
and intrepid race of men. . . . These men in
the last war were brought to combat on your side.
They served with fidelity, as they fought with val-
our, and conquered for you in every part of the
world." Not till long after the era of this speech,
however, did the 78th, or Ross-shire High-
landers came into regimental being. It was
when Republican France had set the world on
fire, and Britain had bared the sword to oppose
her, that this corps was first raised. Some-
where about the year. 1793, warrants were issued
for raising fresh Highland levies. At that date
Kenneth, the last Earl of Seaforth, and the grand-
son of au inveterate Jacobite, still held the ancestral
estates in Ross-shire and Lowis. He was beloved
in the Mackenzie country. A Mackenzie h mself,
ho had avoided turning off his clan to make room
for black-faced sheep and south country drovers.
In one thing only did ho differ from his fathers—
he was a loyal subject of the new dynasty ; and
when the warrants were issued, he did his utmost
for the monarch to whom he had sworn allegiance.
His vast influence was speedily manifested. Two
mouths and nine days after he was empowered, be
had raised a regiment, nine hundred and seventy
of whom were Highlanders. one hundred and twen-
ty-nine Lowlaa lets, nine English, and five Irish.
The 78th were first sent to Guernsey. In 1797
they went to India, and on the 24th of September,
1803, they contributed largely to the Assaye victory,
to the budding glory of Arthur Wellesley, and to
the foundation of that vast dominion, which, after
the lapse of half a century, they are so nobly
agonising to sustain. A few years later, we find
them in Italy, conspicuous at the battle of Maida,
on which occasion the French had 7,600 men, and
the British only 3,819. Again, in 1811 we find
them wresting Java from the Dutch, at that mo-
ment under the rule of Napoleon. We believe
also, that they were in Brussels when the pacifies-
tion of Europe was achieved. They came, how-
ever, from India to Scotland about the year 1840,
on which obcasion they figured, to the great delight
of all boys young and old, with a very beautiful ele-
phant which always marched at thoirhead. They re •
mained, nevertheless, but a very sh ort time at home,
being sent again to ndia, their colonel of that date
happening to own land in Ceylon, which he could look
after more profitably by having his regiment some-
where on the neighbouring continent. They have
thus been absent from Britain for at least twenty
years at a stretch, duringwhich long period they have
done duty in Arabia as well as Hindostan. We need
not remind our readers of their brilliant services in
the late war with Persia, which country they only
left to meet the villains of Bengal. They have
been embodied for sixty years, and we believe we
are not far wrong in sayiu2 that fifty nut of the
sixty have been passed under the glowing skies of
the East.

That great injustice has been done this gallant
regiment cannot be doubted. Their story is one of
almost perpetual exile. Their time is, however,
coming ; and when they again reach Britain, they
will wear honours on their colours which shall se-
cure for them that attention which has hitherto
been lavished on more favoured but not more noble
battalions. " Cuidich an Rich," is their motto •
and as in times past, so will it still be their glory',
to make their battle cry—" Help the King." Suc-
cess to them and every brave heart which at this
moment is ready to bleed, a sacrifice to the glory
and the integrity of that empire of which our own
province forms no unimportant portion, and to
which we are daily drawn more closely by fell dis-
aster as well as glorious victory.—Toronto Globe.

in my possession ! It is really frightful to hear
witnesses talk in such a way, and I declare again
that they deserve to be punished. From what
they say the judges may form an opinion as to the
falsehoods that are told hers l" The trial was
proceeding when the renort was sent off.