his activity is occasionally called forth to the utmost stretch, in conducting his boat through boisterous waves, or in traversing the wildest mountains amidst the storms of winter. But these efforts are succeeded by intervals of indolence equally extreme. He

is accustomed to occasional exertions of agricultural labour, but without any habits of regular and steady industry; and he has not the least experience of sedentary employments, for which, most frequently, the prejudices of his infancy have taught him to entertain a contempt.

To a person of such habits, the business of a manufactory can have no attraction. except in a case of necessity; it can never be his choice, when any resource can be found more congenial to his native habits and disposition. The occupations of an agricultural labourer, though very different, would not be so great a contrast to his former life; but the limited demand for labour leaves him little prospect of employment in this line. Both in this, and in manufacturing establishments, every desirable situation is pre-occupied by

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men of much greater skill than the untutored Highlander. He has therefore little chance of finding employment but in works of the lowest drudgery.

To this it is to be added, that the situation of a mere day-labourer, is one which must appear degrading to a person who has been accustomed to consider himself as in the rank of a farmer, and has been the possessor even of a small portion of land. In America, on the contrary, he has a prospect of superior rank; of holding his land on a permanent tenure, instead of a temporary, precarious, and dependant possession. It is not to be forgotten, that every motive of this nature has a peculiar degree of force on the minds of the Highland peasantry. The pride, which formerly pervaded even the lowest classes, has always been a prominent feature of their national character: and this feeling is deeply wounded by the distant behaviour they now experience from their chieftains-a mortifying contrast to the cordiality that subsisted in the feudal times.

It has sometimes been alleged, that these motives of preference have been enhanced by the ignorance of the people, and their expectation of procuring in America lands like those of Britain, fit for immediate cultivation. That such ideas may have been. entertained, and even that individuals who knew better may have been unprincipled enough to circulate such falsehoods, is not impossible but certainly there is no need of recurring to delusions of this kind, for an explanation of the universal preference of the Highlanders for America. I know, indeed, from personal communication with them, that they are aware of the laborious process that is necessary for bringing the forest lands into a productive state. But this is not sufficient to deter men of vigorous minds, when they are incited by such powerful motives to encounter the difficulty.

It is indeed very probable, that the fashion, being once set, may influence some who are under no absolute necessity of emigrating. That this cause, however, has any very extensive operation, I can see no ground for

believing. Those who represent the emigrations as arising from capricious and inadequate motives, argue from the circumstance of tenants having occasionally relinquished advantageous leases several years before their expiration, in order to go to America. This, I believe to be fact, though a very rare occurrence; but were it ever so common, it would afford no proof in favour of the argument which it is brought to support.

Do the gentlemen who urge this argument, suppose the tenantry so blind as to perceive no danger till they are overwhelmed? The fate of their friends and neighbours is a sufficient warning of that which they must sooner or later expect. It is surely with good reason they are convinced that they cannot long continue to retain the possessions they now hold; and under this conviction the simplest dictates of prudence would lead them to anticipate the evil day, if they meet any uncommonly favourable opportunity for executing the plans to which sooner or later they must have recourse.

The price of cattle has of late years been so fluctuating, and at some periods so extremely high, that opportunities have occurred for tenants to sell off their stock at two or three times their usual and average value. Those who availed themselves of this advantage have acquired so great an increase of capital, that a few remaining years of an expiring lease could be no object when put in comparison. Such instances, so far from implying capricious levity in the people, are rather a proof of the deep impression which the circumstances of the country have made on their minds, and of the deliberate foresight with which their determinations are formed.

If there were no other proof that emigration arises from radical and peculiar causes in the circumstances of the country, it might be strongly presumed from the fact, that while this spirit is so prevalent in the Highlands, it has made no impression, or a very inconsiderable and transient impression, in the adjoining Lowlands. The labourer in the South may occasionally feel the stimulus of ambition; but this affects comparatively few: the great