DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

lll (20) Britain. The expansion of Scotland can best be illustrated by a glance at its condition at the beginning of the eighteenth century. The Highlands were almost wholly inaccessible to the traveller, and were for the most part traversed only by rude horse-tracks. The peasants lived in cabins, with holes for chimneys. Manual labour was held to be a contemptible occupation for a man. Plunder was his passion and his trade. The field- work was done by women. The chieftain lived in a fortified castle, from which he only issued to engage on predatory raids. By law he had a hereditary jurisdiction over his vassals, extending to capital punishment. He had a regular executioner at his service, and promised any of his guests the pleasure of secing anyone who had offended him hanging next morning before his window, unless he preferred his head as a memorial of his visit. An English footman who had been lured to the Highlands by one of the chieftains found that his return to freedom was hopeless. Men and boys were kidnapped and sold as slaves to American planters. The Lowlands were infested with bands driving away, or ‘lifting’ the cattle, as it was then called. Of the impotence of the law the career of Robert McGregor, the well-known ‘Rob Roy,’ affords a striking instance. For twenty years he carried on a private war