curious to see how Soult, the Minister at War, conducts himself.' On the 9th, Bagot wrote again, 'There is hardly a person of whatever principles or whatever party who does not declare aloud his entire belief that the English have not only connived at, but assisted Bonaparte in this project . . . folly; but universally believed.'

...

After the debates in both Houses, Bentinck's military career was ended. A day before Waterloo he was offered a command-too late. For twelve years he was laid upon the shelf. In 1827 remembrance of the administrative powers he had displayed and recognition of his nobility of character combined to give him India. Attacked, at one time, like Canning, by Whigs and Tories, he should perhaps be claimed by both as one of the honoured statesmen who are the glory of both parties. Of the private letters of 1815 which deplore his fall, those of Exmouth are best worth remembrance. The naval Commander-in-chief went out of his way, after declaring the strength of his personal friendship, to express in the strongest terms his complete agreement at every point with Bentinck in all the matters which had been criticised by their superiors or attacked by the Whig Opposition in both Houses.

The defence of Bentinck is now perhaps complete. That of Castlereagh lies in the incredible difficulty of the circumstances and in the profound distrust with which experience of Alexander, Metternich, and the Bourbons had filled the minds of British statesmen-'their allies.'

CHARLES W. DILKE.

Art. 12.-ANGUS.

1. Angus or Forfarshire, the Land and People. Five vols. By Alex. J. Warden. Dundee: Alexander, 1880-1885. 2. Memorials of Angus and Mearns. By the late Andrew Jervise: rewritten and corrected by the Rev. James Gammack. Second edition. Edinburgh: Douglas, 1885. 3. The Land of the Lindsays. By the late Andrew Jervise: rewritten and corrected by James Gammack. Second edition. Edinburgh: Douglas, 1882.

4. Historic Scenes in Forfarshire. By William Marshall, D.D. Edinburgh: Oliphant, 1875.

Of all the old provinces of Scotland none presents a greater variety of scenery, a more complete combination of rural and urban interests, or a history more illustrative of early ages, of feudal greatness, and of modern activity than ancient Angus, the area of which was more or less coincident with that of the modern county of Forfar. First known to history as the land of the Horestii invaded by Agricola, it was the kernel of the kingdom of the Picts, and its grand Abbey of Arbroath was the chief religious house of north-eastern Scotland. It is rich in old castles, some in ruins, some still inhabited by the descendants of their hereditary lords; it is associated with the early developments of the Reformation; it had its own share of the vicissitudes of the great Civil War, and its own romantic traditions of the '15 and the '45; while its quartette of industrial and residential burghs, Forfar, Brechin, Montrose, and Arbroath, are 'Four Maries' in the train of its commercial queen city of Dundee.

Variously described as approximately a square or a circle, and bounded generally on the east by the North Sea, on the north by the river North Esk, on the south by the estuary of the Tay and the Perthshire border, and on the west by the crest line 'where wind and water shears' of the Grampians, Angus contains four districts of distinctive character. Though Glenisla is the only portion actually within the highland line, and the only part which long preserved its Gaelic population intact, the country of the glens' and the 'braes of Angus,' including the part of the Grampians distinguished as the 'Binchin

nan Mountains,' embraces nearly a moiety of the superficial area of the shire. Next comes that portion of Strathmore—the great valley '-known as the Howe of Angus, which, though broken by lesser hills in the neighbourhood of Forfar, stretches between the Grampians and the Sidlaws from the vicinity of the Tay to the sea at Montrose. The elevated country forming the range of the Sidlaws has a separate character of its own, and the maritime region sloping gently to the sea successfully competes with Strathmore in the produce of the soil and the high standard of its agriculture. The coast-line has its own charm, as it changes from the waste stretch of sand at Buddon and Barry to the sandstone cliffs and caves where the land rises to the bold outline of the Redhead of Angus, and so on to the beautiful sweep of Lunan Bay with its golden sands and green background dominated by the ruins of the Red Castle, beyond which, again, lies the broad land-locked expanse of the basin of Montrose. Three rivers lend beauty to the shire, flowing at first through wild gorges and diversified highland scenery, and latterly by wooded banks and fertile fields. Forfarshire shares the Isla and North Esk, but the South Esk and its chief tributary the Prosen run their whole course from the Grampians to the German Ocean within its bounds. It has its lochs both highland and lowland, of which the principal are Loch Lee and Loch Esk, the sources of the two Esks, the chain of picturesque lakelets near Forfar, and the lochs of Lintrathen, Lundie, and Monikie, now impounded and controlled for the water supply of Dundee and the service of busy mills and manufactures.

The region is rich in memorials of prehistoric times. It has, or had, its Druidical circles, its 'rocking stones,' its Picts houses,' its hill forts, its chain of Roman camps, showing the course of disciplined invasion, and its varied and numerous sculptured stones. The names of a succession of shadowy Mormaers ruling one of the seven great provinces of the Picts appear from time to time, till their possessions pass by marriage to a Norman house. Tradition and local nomenclature record the first Christian mission, the settlement of the royal St Drostan in Glenesk, and how at Glamis St Fergus 'consecrated new cœnobia to God and chose the place of his rest.' In the

straits of inaccessible mountains' the Saxon arms were stayed at Nechtansmere, and the flood of Danish invasion was broken on the low coast of Barry. The close connexion with the royal house of Celtic Scotland is indicated by the number of 'thanages' and royal forests, and the beautiful round tower of Brechin preserves the memory of a long established Culdee community and of King Kenneth, 'who gave that city to the Lord.' The Augustinian Priory of Restenneth succeeded an earlier Pictish foundation, and the records of the monastery of Cupar illustrate the labours of the Cistercian order in the cause alike of Christianity and civilisation. Red, Black, and Grey Friars, grey sisters and magdalenes had their habitations in Dundee, and Black Friars were located at Montrose, but the greatest ecclesiastical establishment was the magnificent Abbey of Arbroath, dedicated in 1178 to St Thomas the Martyr, by King William the Lyon, who was buried before the high altar. With fortysix dependent churches, many baronies and fishings, the right of ferry over the North Esk and Tay, and the custody of the 'Brecbannoch,' or consecrated banner of St Columba, under which its tenants were led to war, it soon became the most powerful and opulent religious house of the North. Within its precincts was held the Parliament of 1320, at which the Scottish barons addressed to the Pope their memorable letter asserting the independence of the realm, and among its later abbots was the famous Cardinal Beaton.

The first historic event in the annals of Dundee is the foundation of the church of St Mary by the gallant David, Earl of Huntingdon and Garioch, on reaching Scottish land after ransom from captivity among the Saracens and escape from shipwreck. The royal burgh then erected by his brother King William has experienced many vicissitudes. It was taken and pillaged, and the church, in which the inhabitants had deposited their treasures, burnt by Edward the First. There Wallace, when attending the grammar school, struck down the son of Selby the English Governor. Thrice taken by the Scots under Wallace, Scrymgeour, and Edward Bruce, it was the scene of the National Council of Scottish clergy who, in 1309, pledged their fealty to Robert Bruce. It was burnt by the troops of Richard II and by those of

Somerset in 1547. It was the first burgh in Scotland that declared for the Reformation, earning the name of 'the second Geneva' There Wishart, 'a man of tall stature, black haired, long bearded, comely of personage, well spoken after his country of Scotland,' preached in time of plague on the east gateway, attended on one occasion by young John Knox carrying a two-handed sword, and from Dundee the Wedderburn brothers launched the fierce satire of the 'Gude and Godlie Ballates.' It was taken by Montrose's Highlanders, but its darkest day came in 1651, when it was stormed by Cromwell's army under Monk, the garrison put to the sword, many citizens, men, women, and children, slaughtered, and the Governor, and those who had taken refuge with him in the steeple of the church, starved into surrender and butchered in the market-place. The sack and slaughter lasted for three days, and Monk's chaplain described the spoil as 'the best plunder that was gotten in the wars throughout the three kingdoms.' In more peaceful times Dundee has, as Juteopolis, become the fourth city in Scotland.

6

In 1291 Umphraville, Earl of Angus, held out the castles of Forfar and Dundee against Edward the First till he received a letter of indemnity from the claimants to the throne and the guardians of the realm. The castle of Forfar fell to Wallace and was surprised and captured for Bruce by Philip the Forester of Platane.' The town was recognised as a royal burgh in 1261, and is described as 'bone ville' in the diary of Edward I's progress. Its provost, Alexander Strang, almost alone, in 1647 protested against the sale of King Charles the First to the English rebels:

'In loyal heart, in pithie words, though few,

I disagree, as honest men should do.'

It was pillaged by the soldiery of Cromwell, who 'broke open the charter room, took forth all their rights and records, and cancelled and destroyed the same.' It was strongly Jacobite in sentiment, and in 1745 a party of Forfar men went under cover of night to Glamis, where the Duke of Cumberland's army was resting, and cut the girths of the horses. Forfar was for long famous for the manufacture of shoes. It is the county town, the seat of the Sheriff Court, and the great market centre of the