Had such an observer studied the character of the Highlanders, he would doubtless have found in it closely intermingled the good and the bad qualities of an uncivilised nation.

He would have found that the people had no love for their country or for their king; that they had no attachment to any commonwealth larger than the clan, or to any magistrate superior to the chief.

He would have found that life was governed by a code of morality and honour widely different from that which is established in peaceful and prosperous societies.

He would have learned that a stab in the back, or a shot from behind a fragment of rock, were approved modes of taking satisfaction for insults.

He would have heard men relate boastfully how they or their fathers had wreaked on hereditary enemies in a neighbouring valley such vengeance as would have made old soldiers of the Thirty Years' War shudder.