of the army who have been interested in this subject have made their own criticisms thereon, and it is highly improbable that their views will be changed by Mr. Forbes' remarks.

Hitherto I have carefully abstained from any mention of names, and I have avoided all allusion to the controversy that has been carried on with regard to the late Colonel Durnford's participation in the affairs of the campaign. I cannot, however, refrain from mentioning what will, perhaps, surprise many-that he remarked to an officer (from whom I have the information) shortly before leaving the base for the front, that 'Lord Chelmsford was a man for whom one would gladly lay down one's life.' Knowing Colonel Durnford as I did, I feel sure that this expression of feeling towards his General would be acceptable to him, as proving his loyal feeling which existed up to the date of his death.

Most military men have more than once in their lives, probably, been struck by the decided views expressed by civilians on military questions; and this is more particularly noticeable in men who have had the good fortune to accompany an army in the field, and who pride themselves, on that account, on their knowledge of these subjects. Mr. Forbes says, at the commencement of his Article, ‘In these days men read fast, think fast, and forget fast;' might he not have added, and criticise fast? With all due respect for Mr. Archibald Forbes' undoubted ability, I cannot but class him among those critics who are swift to find fault without due consideration; and I feel that he has made a mistake in taking up the challenge which he avers Lord Chelmsford has deliberately' and 'wantonly' thrown down. Mr. Forbes undertook the task of proving Lord Chelmsford's incapacity as a General 'reluctantly' and 'compulsorily,' he informs us. Would it not have been better in every way, and more really public-spirited, to have left this self-imposed task unfulfilled, and not again to have agitated the public mind by recalling a past which is necessarily painful, while it cannot be truly said to reflect blame on anyone? The idea that a critic, in condemning the conduct of a general entrusted with a command, should suggest a preferable procedure' is not so absurd as Mr. Forbes would have us believe. The critic, in condemning the conduct of a general, must have, in his own mind, a 'preferable procedure.' Why, then, should he not give it to the world as freely as he gives his condemnation? It is only by a comparison with his own ideas of what the campaign should have been that the value of his criticism can be fairly tested. ARTHUR HARNESS.

6

IT

THE CROOKIT MEG:

A STORY OF THE YEAR ONE.

XIII.

was the forenoon of the day on which the Achnagatt harvesthome was to be held; and Mrs. Mark and her daughters were busy in the kitchen preparing 'sowens' and other delicacies for the entertainment. I have not got a copy of Mrs. Dods in the house, and cannot therefore give you any authoritative recipes for the dishes that were being made ready. There were bannocks, and oat cakes, and piles of fresh butter, and basins of yellow cream, and an ample supply of Glendronoch. The girls were pictures of health; their short petticoats disclosed serviceable, though by no means clumsy feet and ankles; their arms were bare and bespattered with the flour and oatmeal which they were baking into the delicious home-made bread of the farm-house,-not the arms more white than milk of which the poet sings, but good, honest, sturdy arms, tanned a little by the sun while milking, and reddened a little by the fire when cooking. The girdle was suspended over the peats, and there was a constant running to and fro between it and the baking board. Cousin Kate was considered the prettiest of these unsophisticated Graces; but Kate was the housewife too; and indeed a sort of commander-in-chief, who looked after her father's accounts, and took charge of the dairy. Mrs. Mark's exertions in bringing these nice girls, and one or two rather violently disposed schoolboys, into the world, associated as they had been with a growing tendency to plumpness, had induced her to hand over the active duties of preparing for the feast to her slimmer daughters; while she and Miss Sherry-who had been brought out from Peelboro' by Mark on the previous evening-sat in the ingleneuk with their spinning-wheels, the constant companion of gentle and simple at the time of which I am writing. Altogether the kitchen was highly picturesque. The girls flitting to and fro, with their sparse petticoats and upturned sleeves, in the frisky mettlesomeness of earliest maidenhood; Miss Sherry, with her old-fashioned spinning-wheel (which is being again introduced into our drawingrooms in an inane and irrelevant way); the long array of shining pots and pans and willow-pattern plates suspended in a haik above the dresser; the gipsy-looking girdle; the wide, homely, hospitable fireplace; the ruddy glow of the peats; the gathering shadows of the October night; it is one of those 'symphonies' in light and shade which are not easily forgotten, especially by children, artists, and

lovers.

Miss Sherry was an institution of Peelboro', where she and her

of the army who have been interested in this subject have made their own criticisms thereon, and it is highly improbable that their views will be changed by Mr. Forbes' remarks.

Hitherto I have carefully abstained from any mention of names, and I have avoided all allusion to the controversy that has been carried on with regard to the late Colonel Durnford's participation in the affairs of the campaign. I cannot, however, refrain from mentioning what will, perhaps, surprise many-that he remarked to an officer (from whom I have the information) shortly before leaving the base for the front, that 'Lord Chelmsford was a man for whom one would gladly lay down one's life.' Knowing Colonel Durnford as I did, I feel sure that this expression of feeling towards his General would be acceptable to him, as proving his loyal feeling which existed up to the date of his death.

Most military men have more than once in their lives, probably, been struck by the decided views expressed by civilians on military questions; and this is more particularly noticeable in men who have had the good fortune to accompany an army in the field, and who pride themselves, on that account, on their knowledge of these subjects. Mr. Forbes says, at the commencement of his Article,' In these days men read fast, think fast, and forget fast;' might he not have added, and criticise fast? With all due respect for Mr. Archibald Forbes' undoubted ability, I cannot but class him among those critics who are swift to find fault without due consideration; and I feel that he has made a mistake in taking up the challenge which he avers Lord Chelmsford has deliberately' and 'wantonly' thrown down. Mr. Forbes undertook the task of proving Lord Chelmsford's incapacity as a General 'reluctantly' and 'compulsorily,' he informs us. Would it not have been better in every way, and more really public-spirited, to have left this self-imposed task unfulfilled, and not again to have agitated the public mind by recalling a past which is necessarily painful, while it cannot be truly said to reflect blame on anyone? The idea that a critic, in condemning the conduct of a general entrusted with a command, should suggest a 'preferable procedure' is not so absurd as Mr. Forbes would have us believe. The critic, in condemning the conduct of a general, must have, in his own mind, a 'preferable procedure.' Why, then, should he not give it to the world as freely as he gives his condemnation? It is only by a comparison with his own ideas of what the campaign should have been that the value of his criticism can be fairly tested. ARTHUR HARNESS.

IT

THE CROOKIT MEG:

A STORY OF THE YEAR ONE.

XIII.

T was the forenoon of the day on which the Achnagatt harvesthome was to be held; and Mrs. Mark and her daughters were busy in the kitchen preparing 'sowens' and other delicacies for the entertainment. I have not got a copy of Mrs. Dods in the house, and cannot therefore give you any authoritative recipes for the dishes that were being made ready. There were bannocks, and oat cakes, and piles of fresh butter, and basins of yellow cream, and an ample supply of Glendronoch. The girls were pictures of health; their short petticoats disclosed serviceable, though by no means clumsy feet and ankles; their arms were bare and bespattered with the flour and oatmeal which they were baking into the delicious home-made bread of the farm-house,-not the arms more white than milk of which the poet sings, but good, honest, sturdy arms, tanned a little by the sun while milking, and reddened a little by the fire when cooking. The girdle was suspended over the peats, and there was a constant running to and fro between it and the baking board. Cousin Kate was con

sidered the prettiest of these unsophisticated Graces; but Kate was the housewife too; and indeed a sort of commander-in-chief, who looked after her father's accounts, and took charge of the dairy. Mrs. Mark's exertions in bringing these nice girls, and one or two rather violently disposed schoolboys, into the world, associated as they had been with a growing tendency to plumpness, had induced her to hand over the active duties of preparing for the feast to her slimmer daughters; while she and Miss Sherry-who had been brought out from Peelboro' by Mark on the previous evening-sat in the ingleneuk with their spinning-wheels, the constant companion of gentle and simple at the time of which I am writing. Altogether the kitchen was highly picturesque. The girls flitting to and fro, with their sparse petticoats and upturned sleeves, in the frisky mettlesomeness of earliest maidenhood; Miss Sherry, with her old-fashioned spinning-wheel (which is being again introduced into our drawingrooms in an inane and irrelevant way); the long array of shining pots and pans and willow-pattern plates suspended in a haik above the dresser; the gipsy-looking girdle; the wide, homely, hospitable fireplace; the ruddy glow of the peats; the gathering shadows of the October night; it is one of those 'symphonies' in light and shade which are not easily forgotten, especially by children, artists, and lovers.

Miss Sherry was an institution of Peelboro', where she and her

of the army who have been interested in this subject have made their own criticisms thereon, and it is highly improbable that their views will be changed by Mr. Forbes' remarks.

Hitherto I have carefully abstained from any mention of names, and I have avoided all allusion to the controversy that has been carried on with regard to the late Colonel Durnford's participation in the affairs of the campaign. I cannot, however, refrain from mentioning what will, perhaps, surprise many-that he remarked to an officer (from whom I have the information) shortly before leaving the base for the front, that 'Lord Chelmsford was a man for whom one would gladly lay down one's life.' Knowing Colonel Durnford as I did, I feel sure that this expression of feeling towards his General would be acceptable to him, as proving his loyal feeling which existed up to the date of his death.

6

Most military men have more than once in their lives, probably, been struck by the decided views expressed by civilians on military questions; and this is more particularly noticeable in men who have had the good fortune to accompany an army in the field, and who pride themselves, on that account, on their knowledge of these subjects. Mr. Forbes says, at the commencement of his Article, In these days men read fast, think fast, and forget fast;' might he not have added, and criticise fast? With all due respect for Mr. Archibald Forbes' undoubted ability, I cannot but class him among those critics who are swift to find fault without due consideration; and I feel that he has made a mistake in taking up the challenge which he avers Lord Chelmsford has deliberately' and 'wantonly' thrown down. Mr. Forbes undertook the task of proving Lord Chelmsford's incapacity as a General 'reluctantly' and 'compulsorily,' he informs us. Would it not have been better in every way, and more really public-spirited, to have left this self-imposed task unfulfilled, and not again to have agitated the public mind by recalling a past which is necessarily painful, while it cannot be truly said to reflect blame on anyone? The idea that a critic, in condemning the conduct of a general entrusted with a command, should suggest a preferable procedure' is not so absurd as Mr. Forbes would have us believe. The critic, in condemning the conduct of a general, must have, in his own mind, a 'preferable procedure.' Why, then, should he not give it to the world as freely as he gives his condemnation? It is only by a comparison with his own ideas of what the campaign should have been that the value of his criticism can be fairly tested. ARTHUR HARNESS.

6