nothing to be desired. The printing is clear; the outward get-up of the book is tasteful, and entitles it to a place on the drawingroom table, altogether irrespective of its great intrinsic merit. It should be mentioned that the volume is printed in both the old and the new notations, and is arranged for four voices, with very effective pianoforte accompaniments. ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE IN THE ISLE OF SKYE. FOR years past the Skyeman's knowledge of civil law has been confined pretty much to the fact that it has the power to evict him and his family from their home. This, perhaps, is not entirely the fault of the law, but the law gets the principal share of the odium consequent upon the proceedings which it authorises. One consequence of this is, that the agitation in Skye has hitherto been directed, not so much against factors and landlords, who are responsible for the wrongs from which Skyemen suffer, as against the law which empowers them to act. There has been no question with them about the purity of the administration of justice, although the justice meted out to them has sometimes been scant enough. A case which recently occurred suggests, however, the existence of a state of matters which may change the current of feeling on this subject. Skye is a slumbering volcano, but those who should be most alive to the mutterings around them seem utterly deaf. The Island rejoices in a Sheriff-Substitute and ProcuratorFiscal all to herself, and in the voluminous evidence led before the Royal Commission, nothing was said which in any way affected the honour or integrity of these gentlemen, but the case to which reference has been made, which came before the Inverness Sheriff Court a few days ago, raises a question which does not seem to have come before the Royal Commission, and it very seriously affects the administration of criminal law in Skye. The facts, so far as they came to light, seem to be these :-Mrs Macdonald, the wife of a schoolmaster, living near Broadford, managed a croft tenanted by her husband at some distance from his school. Sometime between the winter of 1882 and the spring of 1883, she lost a ewe, and in June 1883, two neighbouring shepherds brought her a ewe and a lamb which they said they had found on the hill grazing, and had brought to her in consequence of their recognition of her husband's mark on the ewe. She recognised the mark also, and kept the ewe and the lamb, had the former fleeced and the latter marked. On 7th August 1883, a neighbouring crofter, John Macinnes, came to Mrs Macdonald's house in her absence, and carried away the ewe and the lamb, saying they were his property. Between that time and the month of May 1884, Mrs Macdonald repeatedly claimed re-delivery of the ewe and the lamb, but Macinnes refused to give them up. In the month of May 1884, he wrote Mrs Macdonald a letter, requesting delivery of the fleece of the ewe, or of another fleece equally good. To this letter Mrs Macdonald replied by a letter, produced by Macinnes, and read in Court, substantially saying that neither ewe, lamb, nor fleece were Macinnes's, but that she was willing to refer the question of property to a third party, and to abide by his decision. Macinnes then, as he stated in the witness-box, spoke to the district policeman on the subject, and, on 16th of July 1884, Mrs Macdonald was apprehended, and conveyed as a prisoner to Portree, at the instance of the Procurator-Fiscal of Skye, charged with stealing a sheep, a lamb, and a fleece. On the following day she was brought before Sheriff Speirs at Portree, and emitted a declaration, in which she explained that the ewe and the lamb were her own property, that the former had gone amissing between the winter of 1882 and the summer of 1883, and was recognised as hers by neighbours, who brought it to her, and that, although she believed both ewe and lamb were her property, that they had been in Macinnes's possession for nearly twelve months before she was charged with stealing them. One would have thought that an explanation of this sort would have made the Sheriff-Substitute hesitate before committing to prison a respectable woman of nearly 50 years of age, who had lived in the Island all her life, without even the suspicion of crime attaching to her, and whose husband held an important public office in the Island, on such a serious charge as sheepstealing, but the Sheriff-Substitute seems to have had no hesitation, and, apparently without waiting for a precognition of the witnesses, committed Mrs Macdonald to prison on the very grave charge preferred against her. An application was immediately made to him for her liberation on bail, but this he had no power to grant, and for eight days she remained in prison in Portree, until the consent of the Crown Office was obtained to the acceptance of bail. What the nature of the precognition afterwards taken by the Procurator-Fiscal and sent to the Crown Office may have been, it is impossible to say, but the result was, that a trial by Sheriff and jury at Inverness was ordered. The trial came off on 5th September 1884, and the result was, that, in the middle of the cross-examination of John Macinnes, the first witness for the Crown, the principal Procurator-Fiscal for the County of Inverness, who had nothing to do with the getting up of the case, abandoned the charge, asked the jury to return a verdict of Not Guilty, and stated that Mrs Macdonald left the bar without the slightest stain upon her character, a remark which was concurred in by Sheriff Blair, the principal SheriffSubstitute of the County, who presided at the trial. Macinnes, in his cross-examination, stated that he did not then charge, and never had charged, Mrs Macdonald with the theft of the ewe and lamb, which he had taken possession of. When she refused to give up the fleece, he spoke to the policeman on the subject, but apparently there was no charge of theft, even as regarded the fleece. In the face of such evidence, it is hardly to be wondered at that the Procurator-Fiscal should have made haste to stop the cross-examination, and abandon the charge. But it may be asked how the charge ever came to be made? This is a question which probably only the Procurator-Fiscal of Skye is able to answer, and the public are entitled to get his answer. The Report of the Crofters' Commission contains a recommendation that Procurators-Fiscal "should be prohibited from doing any professional work, or any business for profit, other than their proper business." Probably, if that recommendation were adopted as regards the Island of Skye, it would have little practical effect, the attention of the Procurator-Fiscal there being as it is, pretty much confined to his official duties. But in Skye, and in some other parts of the Highlands, the terms upon which Procurators-Fiscal hold office are such as should not attach to the holding of any public office involving the exercise of the enormous powers for evil entrusted to those officers. It is somewhat singular that it never seems to have been mentioned to the Royal Commission that several Procurators-Fiscal in the more sparsely peopled districts of the Highlands are paid, not by a fixed salary, but by fees for specific work performed. The Government in this way offers a premium for the multiplication of criminal business, and it is too much to expect a public officer, with, perhaps, nothing to depend upon but his official income, to deal in an entirely disinterested spirit with every complaint made to him in his official capacity. We do not know the exact state of the facts, but we believe there is also a higher scale of payment for the more important class of cases which are reported to Crown Counsel, than for unreported cases. In this way a direct inducement is held out to magnify trifling cases into the appearance of important ones. We do not mean to say that any Procurator-Fiscal who is paid in this way is consciously biassed in the performance of his public functions by the fact that his remuneration depends upon the amount of crime in his district, or that that element enters in any way into the case now in question; but we do say that a public office of such responsibility as that of Procurator-Fiscal, an office, the holder of which has the power to blast the happiness and reputation of innocent members of the community, should not be held on terms which provoke to the prostitution of public functions for purposes of private gain. When the recommendation of the Crofters' Commission already referred to, was brought under the notice of the House of Commons, the Lord Advocate stated as a reason for not giving effect to it, the additional expense which the adoption of the recommendation would involve upon the public. The reformation we now advocate, namely, the placing of all ProcuratorsFiscal on salary, is one which can be carried out without an additional penny of expense to the public; and we trust that the ensuing Session of Parliament will see an end put to a system which is liable to such terrible abuse. The House of Commons last year, on the motion of Mr Fraser-Mackintosh, M P., asked for a Return of all the cases brought for trial to Inverness from the Western Isles and the Fort-William district during the last twenty years, the number of convictions obtained, and the cost of these cases. Why has this Return not been printed? We look forward to the information which it is sure to disclose with much interest, and trust that its appearance will not be further delayed. It will have a most important bearing on the subject discussed in this article. GLENCAIRN'S DUEL. THE following incidents occurred at the time of the Earl of Glencairn's Highland expedition in 1653. After having, with considerable trouble, raised a large body of men, he had to give up the command to General Middleton, who was appointed commander-in-chief. This appointment appears to have been very unpopular with Glencairn's men, who were greatly attached to him, and also to have caused considerable irritation on the part of the officers, which found vent in more than one duel. On General Middleton assuming command, he ordered a review of the Earl's forces, to inspect the men, horses, and arms. As was to be expected among irregular troops so hastily gathered together, there were many deficiencies, which General Middleton's officers were not slow to observe and openly comment upon, much to the annoyance of Glencairn and his officers. Their angry feelings were, perhaps, still more inflamed by the fact of their having just at this time an unusual quantity of wine at their disposal; for, a day or two before, an English ship, laden with about forty tuns of French wine, had been driven ashore on the coast of Sutherlandshire, and was seized by General Middleton, who distributed the wine among the different officers. While the men were all assembled, Glencairn rode along the ranks, and told them that he now held no higher command than a Colonelcy, and while thanking them for the ready obedience they had given to him, he trusted they would serve their new commander equally well. The men were much moved by this address, and plainly showed they did not like the change; but vowed they would follow Glencairn to any part of the world. The Earl then invited the General and all the principal officers to dine with him at his quarters, which were at the house of the Laird of Kettle, four miles from Dornoch, where the headquarters were. After having entertained them to the best of everything the country afforded, he turned to the General, and pledging him in a glass of wine said, "My Lord General, you see what a gallant army these worthy gentlemen here present and I have gathered together, at a time when it would hardly be expected that any number durst meet together: these men have |