The Sun.
London, England, 1850-10-17 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
TIMES.—The Duke of Atholl has been lately die tin-
guishiog himself ie his vale of Glen Tilt. The Scotch
Dukes are determined to keep up the credit of the order.
►A letter hes recently appeared in our columns which
contains a recital of the adventures of two Cambridge
students in that perilous defile which separates Castle-
town of Braemar from Blair Athol]. We have to pre-
tension to rival the plain simplicity of the story as it has
been recounted by one of the principal actors in the
scene. There is such a thing as too ludicrous a theme,
and such an one is the recent squabble between the Duke
of Atholl and the two young students who were endea-
vouring to make their way through a portion of his do-
main. The decision of the Court of Session which
opened the vale of Glen Tilt to the public iF, of course,
matter of notoriety. But it seems the Duke of Athol! is
prepared to snap his fingers at the sentence of that tri-
bunal, or at least to resist all travellers who may
endeavour to make use of their legal and most en-
doubted right of way through his romantic glen.
We will not, however, anticipate, but rather take the
story in the form in which we find it in the letter
of our correspondent. On the 30th of August two
y( ung Cianhritike students, who were engaged in a pe-
destrian tour of the Highlands, 1; ft Castietown with the
iottntion of walking to Blair Atholl through the vale of
Glen Tilt. Before starting, they made inquiries, and
found, that although the Duke of Atholl might endea-
vour to throw obstructions in the way of travellers, yet
practically he would not, or dared not, proceed to any
act of violence, in defiance of the sentence of a legal tri-
bunal. We shall soon see how far this supposition was
justified by the event. The first hindrance the travel-
lers met with in their attempt to penetrate into this
mysterious region was at a rapid mountain stream,
where they found the remains of a wooden bridge, which
had been broken down ,in order to obstruct the psegress
of foot passengers. The two travellers, however, con-
trived to scramble across on the remains of the demo-
lished bridge, and proceeded on their . way until they
reached the Duke of Atholl's hunting-lodge. Theeewere
now about twenty miles distant from Castletown, and
ten from Blair Athol], and were beginning th cobgratu-
late themselves upon the successful issue of their enter-
prise. This was, however, reckoning without theii
host, in the most literal sense of the phrase. They
were met by a tall fellow without his trousers, but
with an " imperial" and mustachios, who was driving
a gig, and who called upon them in an insolent
tone to stop. The name of this lightly-dressed indivi-
dual was Sandy Maclarran, and it appeared, after some
altercation, that he was acting by the orders of the
Duke of Atholl, who was down below in
.the glen. The
travellers absolutely refused to turn bank, and at-last it
was arranged, by way of compromise, that Sandy should
conduct them into the august presence. They soon
found the Duke of Atholl standing below, equally with-
out trousers, but with mustachio and " imperial " simi-
lar in all respects to those of his henchman. The Duke
no sooner caught sight of the two travellers, who were
proceeding quietly on their way, than he roared out to
them to stop. This they refused to do. The Duke
then ran round to them, in a state of great excitement,
and barred their further progress. They represented to
him in vain that the Court of Session had decided that
the public had a right of way through Glen Tilt. "It is
not a y
publicou
shan'tway , '
c'
o repliedme
down—the t heD u k edeer are coming, the, "it is my private
drive;
deer are coming !" Now at this point it is impossible not
to remark that the Duke of Atholl—hurried away, no
doubt, by the impetuosity of his feelings—was guilty
of a gross misrepresentation of a simple fact which was
twellhe tthat
the regular path
which had been the subject of litigation until they were
withinwo travheilsiers knowledge.
were
passing We
along presume, of course,
led away to the spot where the Duke of Atholl was
standing. If this be so, in what sense was it that the
Duke of Atholl used the words, " This is not a public
way, it is my private drive"? Surely he was not igno-
rant of the legal decision of a competent tribunal against
his claim. The public have as perfect a right to a
" way" through the vale of Glen Tilt as the Duke of
Athol' has to the possession of any acre of the property
which constitutes bis estate. The right in the one case,
as the title in the other, is the mere creature of law.
No explanation, of course, can be offered, but that the
Duke of Athol' is prepared to refuse submission to the
laws of his country, ignore the Court of Sessions and its
decisions, and hold the Vale of Glen Tilt by the strong
hand against all persons who may venture to insist
upon their right to a passage through his do-
mains. But to go on with the story. The two
young men who had been so uncivilly addressed
by the Duke expressed their perfect readiness to
keep themselves in the background if their advance in
any way interfered with the day's sport. No gentleman
would have refused such a concession, and there are few
gentlemen who would not have been softened by the
courtesy of strangers whom they were attacking con-
trary to all right and law. Not so the Duke of Atholl.
Although the scene was passing in the
presence of his
wife
and another lady, he commenced cursing and swear-
ing, and caught hold of one of the young men by the
collar of his coat. A scuffle ensued, and the Duke of
Atholl, like a gallant hero as he is, finding that he could
make nothing of his antagonist single-handed, invoked
the assistance of four of his own grooms. Four to one
—we leave the heroic Duke out of the question— are too
formidable odds for any man—and so the young Cam-
bridge student allowed himself to be led to the back of
the lodge. Ilis companion was similarly entrusted to
the care of four other grooms, and so the Duke of
Atholl was permitted to enjoy his sport without the fear
of personal consequences. As the Duke of Atholl here
disappears from the scene, we will not follow
the story to the end with the _same particu-
larity. Be it sufficient to say that when
the day's sport was over he caused the young travellers
to be warned that they must return to Castletown by the
way they came, and that if they diverged either to the
right or the left of the path he would cause them to be
arrested as trespssers. It would give us very sincere
pleasure to be furnished with any contradiction which
would place the conduct of the Duke of Atholl in a less
odious and less ludicrous light. Dues he mean to say
that he is determined to resist the laws of his country
by open violence? The days of Highland chivalry are
at an end. The Duke of Atholl with a " tail" of Sandy
chieftain,
is very
amssaunmtoptgfoond down Maclarrans would be most surely and most ingloriously
defeated by a batch of policemen in the course of an
autumn's day. ntbtoe
the Scottish hills, lock up his trousers, and begin to play
Highland
character must at least be a harmless one. There is little
enough of poetry left in the world, and certainly it would
be hard to deny a man the privilege' of masquerading
among his own hills. But here wa must stop. The
kilt may be a ridiculous anachronism, but resistance to
the law is a serious matter. The two Cambridge students
would have an easy remedy agaidst the Duke of Atholl
if they cared to bestir themselves in the business. Cer-
tainly it would be rendering the public a service to bring
this hotheaded, foolish man, to his sense&
POST.—While we disclaim in our present observa-
tions any formal discussion of the proceedings
cent convention of Irish Romanish ecclesiastics, which they
were pleased to dignify by the name. of the National
Synod of Thnrles, it is impossible for us not to direct
the attention of our readers to some singular facts con.
netted with the assembling of that Sy nod which have
been brought prominently forward in
a very powerful
article in the last number of the Dublin University
Magazine. The article itself will well repay an atten-
tive perusal. Our purpose now, however, is merely to
present the facts to which it directs our notice. The as-
sembling of this Synod was the first act of the newly-
appointed Primate of the Roman Catholic Church in
Ireland. So far as we can tax our memory, the con-
vening of a solemn convocation of the whole of the
Roman Catholics of Ireland has been a step never ven-
tured on since the days of Charles I. Nothing was
left undone that could give dignity or solem-
nity to the occasion. The new Primate brought
with him a special delegation from the Pope.
Gorgeous ceremonies heralded the commence-
ment of the meetings of the Synod. Troop* of ec
clesiastics, regular and secular, paraded the public
highways in the dresses of their orders. The smoke of
incense censers perfumed the air; and, that nothing
might be wanting to impress the mind as well as the
senses of the multitude whom these irennaing ceremo-
nials attracted round the fathers of their faith, the most
renowned orators of the Romish Church addressed them
from the pulpit upon topics the most exciting to the
Irish mind. Amid the splendour of these ceremonials,
with regulations observing the most minute punctilios of
ecclesiastical etiquette, and with devotions and ob.
servances of the strictest aseeticisars the assembled
bishops and those few priests whom they associated
with them proceeded in their deliberations. The subject
that principally engaged attention was that_ of the new
educational institutions founded for Ireland by the
British Sovereign—institutions in which every conces-
sion appeared to have been made to meet the preju-
dices of the Roman Catholic people—concessions, in-
deed, of such an extent as to provoke the loudly ex-
pressed indignation of the sterner and more unbending
of her Protestant subjects. So far as the result is
known, a majority of the Synod have, in obedience to a
Papal rescript, condemned these institutions. The doubt,
indeed, appears only to exist as to the meaning of the
rescript—all proclaim their readiness to render a perfect
and an unreasoning submission to the commands of the
See of Rome. We are not now about to discuss the
question involved in this condemnation. It is impos-
sible, however, not to feel that this unusual step of con-
vening a synod—a step which in none of the couti-
nental states would be attempted without the consent
of the civil power—and the further step of submitting to
the decision of the See of Rome a law relating to educa-
tion in Ireland, derive very gro
e.aiditiculal _import-
,
e
import-
ance frdm the incidents cell-- cted With the ap • pointment
of the new Primate by wham that Synod was convened.
The mode in which Irish Roman Catholic Bishops have
been appointed, it seems, is, by a species of election by
the priests of the vacant diocese and
,the bishops of the
province. Theta assembled; and se leCted three twines,
which were forwarded to Rome. The Pope appointed
the bishop: He was not bound, indeed, to select him
from the three recommenced, but it is said there had
never been an instance in which the practice of electing
one of these had been deputed from before the recent
appointment of a Primate ; while so generally was the
recocam,edation acted on that almost invariably the first
name of the three was the individual appointed.
The writer in the Dublin University Magazine, evi-
dently ono thoroughly acquainted with the subject
of which he treats, cites various passages from the
evidence of Roman Catholic prelates before the Par-
liamentary CuminitTes of lii2s. to prove that this mode
ef nomination was then regarded as an established usage,
and, Outlier, was stronglyrelied upon by these Roma,
. Catholic witnesses, as ofl,rieg a perfect pledge of fis
' delity. on the part of the elected bishops, to the country
' and the Government; excluding mutually a,ll foreign in-
' fluence in the nomination, and ensuring, further the SO.
leetion of resident British subjects, bound, as well
as
the
electors, to the Sovereign by the oath of allegiance. It
1
. appears, however, that when the Roman Catholic peimaQ,,
became vacant by the death qt 41:Abishop orony4