The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1890-10-19
SCOTTISH HICH[ANDERS.
Musings in Land Once Peopled
by Grand and Noble
Race
Now q Sheep and Cattle Range
for the Butchers Of
London.
Loyal to their Traditions. the Simple
Folk Believe That Adam Spoke
the Gaelic Language.

FANsAKYLE, Scotland, Sept. 15.-Leaving
the little railway station at Beauty, we saw,
not an hundred feet away, at the road-head
of long flight of stairs, huge wagonette,
already filled with people. This was the
Strathglass coach" 80 my companion said.
Two seats were reserved beside the driver.
These We scrambled into, and before the
train had steamed out of the depot our
coach was rolling heavily away toward a
region OF silence eternal. For when the
thirty or forty miles west of Beauty, in
every direction save that from whence it
came, is land that has never known a
road or wheeled vehicle. Once under the
old clan system it was peopled with grand
and noble race. From clearance after clear
ance and eviction after eviction it is now
more lone and silent than when skin clad
helots huddled in it's straths and
elens and savage Pagan rites were
celebrated within its olden stone circles
and clachans. To-day its very foot-paths
and bridle-paths are given over to the game
keeper. the gillie and the red deer. Perhaps
an hundred grave-faced crofters may occu-
py every hundred square miles of land.
Landlordism has exterminated the grandest
portion of the Scottish people throughout
the entire north of Scotland, precisely as,
with famine and Balfourism, it is gradually
but surely numbering an entire race in Ire
land. The green isle is being transformed
into sheep and cattle range for London
butchers; and the Scottish Highlands from
the Grampians to the ocean rim around the
whole north of Scotland and to the outer
cliffs of the western isle. is already simply
vast game preserve for London sports
men. But Gods sunlight never shone on
SO economically beautiful land; and the
inexpressible pathos of it all mists your
ewes as they look in vain for the homes
where a whole race has been plundered of
its heritage.
Of the scattering remnants of these
people who, despite all injustice and loss.
still cling to the mountain eeries which
gave them birth, our coach load was com.
pletely typical. One huge. grave fellow wal
up the strath where he still starved along
now and then getting driblet of work il
ehOein0 the horses kept at the gentry's
hunting lodges. Another man held few
acres of land and dreary old inn at the
edge of the strath, where occasionally gillie
loitered and dropped few pence, or, at ode
intervals, lords and ladies, from freak, o.
accident of requiring shelter, hung few
pounds into his groveling hands. THREE
were crofters pure and simple with Tam o.
Shanter hats, bushy boards, hollow cheeks
bloodless faces, and deep-set blue ewes tina
seemed ever set upon some far object. as il
intently endeavorino to solve the riddl'
Of their lives of endless want anG
vretchedness. There were two women
Ono was . oottar's wife, miserably clad
With an ailing child which had been takel
score Of miles to Beauty that a physician
might see it. a. NO doctor lived in all thi
vast region from sea TO sea. The other val
ecraRgy old guild wife. travel-worn. bu
braysly making her way back TO some High
land croft. With few pounds in her pocket
fsen aAsng The hsFEiae- curing crsw .