Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1873-01-04
vIeIssitudes of Highland clans.

vIeIssitudes OF Highland clans.
From the Glasgow Mail.l
Appin, the inheritance Of the Stew
arts, whose exile is bewailed in one Of
the most pathetic Of the Jacobite lays,
is now owned by Greenock sugar mer-
chant (R Macfe, OF Airds). An estate
of few hundred acres in extent, beside
the beautiful little town Of Oban, is all
that remains of the vast territory of the
MacDougalls, the powerful Lords of
Lorn, who once contended on terms of
equality with Robert Bruce, and whose
fine old castle of Dunollie, even in its
ruins, attests the ancient greatness of
the family. The chief of the Macleods,
the descendants of brave Torqnil, from
Dunvegan high" and of the famous
Rorie More, now possesses not an acre
of the extensive island of Clews, once
the heritage Of his clan, or in Glenelg,
or on the Gairloch, and only mere
fragment of the misty hills Of Skye"
which his ancestors shared with the pow
erful Macdonalds. Raasy, too, where
Prince Charley found a temporary refuge
in his wanderings, and which DR.. Samuel
johnson visited in his memorable tour to
the Hebrides, and Boswell described so
graphically, passed thirty years ago from
the Jacobite Macleods to Demerara
planter, and has just been disposed of
again to an Inverness railway contrac-
tor (G. G. Mackay, Esq, of Rosehall
and Oban) while the clan have found an
asylum beyond the Atlantic. Wild
Barra knows nothing now of its an
cient thane" MacNeil, nor Colonsay the
MacDuffies, and though the clan Chilean
the Maclaines-retain Quart and Loeb
buy a moiety Of their estates in Null,
the Campbells long ago expelled from
TREE and Cell. tA4rroehar, the mansion
house of the chief Of the wild MacFar-
lanes plaided clan" has been trans
formed into an inn. AS might have
been expected from their character, the
sons of Brown Dermi, who slew the wild
boar, the powerful and pushing Clan
Campbell, have Jared much better than
most of their Celtic brethren in the strug
gle against Southern intrusion into their
Businesses. Yet evel they have not come
quite scathless. The Bredalbane branch,
in spite of the strange vicissitudes which
have befallen their chiefs, and the curse
of Glencoe" resting on them, still possess
\ territory which stretches nearly one
hundred miles in extent, from Alber
feldy on the east to the Atlantic Ocean
on the west. But the wings of MacCal
lean More have been considerably clip
ped. Not only have such .outlaying
pendicles as Castle Campbell and Har-
Weston been alienated, along with $780,
600 worth of land and timber, during
the spendthrift regime Of Duke George
the Handsome, uncle Of the present
Indian Secretary, but in consequence of
the rebelIions and the forfeitures of the
Covenanting struggles, large tracts Of
their old patrimonial estates in Argyle
shire have passed into other hands. A
Manchester merchant-(Mr. Pender, OF
Minard), once e pattern drawer in the
Vale of Leyen-has acquired a fine
estate on Lochfyneside itself. Kilmun
on the Holy Looh, the ancient burial
place of the Campbells, with large
tract of land adjoining, is the
property of a London sugar reiiner.
Dnnoon Castle, of which the Duke of
Argyle is hereditary keeper, along with
the surrounding ground has been sold and
resold again and again; and Roseneath,
which, in former days, was the southern
extremity of the Campbell country
stretching in an unbroken line from
Glen 0rohy to the Garelooh, is now
merely an isolated mansion and
grounds, from which it is indeed "a far
cry to Lochow" Generally speaking,
so far as the clansmen are concerned, it
appears to be matter of indifference
whether their country remains in the
hands of their chiefs or passes into the
possession of strangers, for the former
have had as little scruple as the latter in
evicting the men who used 20 be the
bone and muscle of our armies, in or
der that their estates may be converted |
- - Ill y L.. rn-a-L.