"Soldiers of the Forty-Second, Seventy-Ninth, and Ninety-Third!--old Highland Brigade with whom I passed the early and perilous part of this war, I have now to take leave of you. In a few hours I shall be on board ship, never to see you again as a body. A long farewell! I am now old and shall not be called to serve any more; and nothing will remain to me but the memory of my campaigns, and the memory too, of the enduring, hardy, generous soldiers with whom I have been associated, and whose name and glory will long be kept alive in the hearts of our countrymen. When you go home, as you gradually fulfil your term of service, each to his family and his cottage, you will tell the story of your immortal advance in that victorious _échelon_ up the heights of Alma, and may speak of the old brigadier who led you, and who loved you so well. Your children and your children's children will repeat the tale to other generations, when only a few lines of history will remain to record all the enthusiasm and discipline which have borne you so stoutly to the end of this war. Our native land will never forget the name of the Highland Brigade, and in some future war the nation will call for another one to equal this, which it never can surpass. Though I shall be gone, the thought of you will go with me wherever I may be, and cheer my old age with a glorious recollection of dangers confronted and hardships endured. The bagpipes will never sound near me without carrying me back to those bright days when I was at your head and wore the bonnet which you gained for me, and the honourable decorations on my breast, many of which I owe to your conduct. Brave soldiers, kind comrades, farewell!" This address, delivered with much feeling, was received with manifest emotion by the troops, who regarded as final the separation from the chief they had learned to regard with affection. They did not know that the farewell was to be but temporary, and that ere long the three regiments would be under his command in another continent, ready there to display the same soldierly virtues which had already earned them the gratitude of their chief and countrymen.