It cannot admit of a doubt that the Norwegians on the Sudreyjar, who for centuries had taken fast root in the islands, and become mixed with the families of the Scotch chiefs, could not thus disappear all at once without leaving a trace behind them. In Lewis, as I have before proved, vestiges of a Norwegian population still exist. The best refutation of the tradition is, however, the circumstance that with the exception of Man, the Sudreyjar continued to be governed by the same chiefs who had ruled the islands under the Norwegian dominion; and who, being descended from Somerled himself, were in a great degree of Norwegian extraction. Somerled’s successors also continued, after the old fashion, to defy the Scotch kings, who often sought in vain to subdue the bold “Lords of the Isles,” so famed in song and legend. Sometimes they declared themselves independent, and sometimes they were compelled to yield to the superior force of the kings, and acknowledge them as their feudal lords; until at length, but not before the sixteenth century, the power of these island chieftains was entirely subdued. Even to the present day many Highland clans assert that they are descended from the Danes, or Norwegians. This much is at all events certain, that several clans have Scandinavian blood in their veins, as appears clearly enough from the names of Clan-Ranald (from Reginald or Ragnvald) and Clan-Dugal (from Dubhgall, “the dark strangers,” the usual name for the Danes); both which clans, it is expressly stated, are descended from Somerled. To these may be added the clan of Macleod in Skye, whose chiefs still commonly bear the pure Norwegian names of “Torquil” and “Tormod.” But the enduring influence of the Norwegian dominion in the Sudreyjar is best established by the fact that since the battle of Largs, the Isle of Man, through all the vicissitudes of fate, and after passing by sale into the possession of the English crown, has uninterruptedly retained its peculiar position as a kingdom, having its own originally Norwegian or Scandinavian constitution, and its annual assemblies on the identical Thing-hill, Tynwald (or, as it was formerly called Tingualla, “Þingavöllr”), from which, about a thousand years ago, the Norwegians governed the Sudreyjar. Although the British Parliament makes laws for England, Ireland, and Scotland, they are of no validity in the Isle of Man, unless they are in accordance with the ancient laws and liberties of the island, and, after being confirmed by its own Parliament, are proclaimed from Tynwald Hill.