And, even in this age of steam and electricity, they will still cherish their romance. It was but the other day that there was pointed out to the Gordon Highlanders in the Transvaal the expediency of exchanging the garb of old Gaul for a uniform of khaki: the one would be less of a shining mark for the enemy than the other, and, its adoption would probably result in saving many lives. You know their decision. I think I hear them say, "All this may well be true; but we stand by the kilt and the tartan." That, a critical world may say, is magnificent, but it is not war. We say, magnificent or not, it is war; for the kilt and the tartan are inseparable from the sentiment that makes these men the redoubtable soldiers they are. Take those away, and you break their touch with a continuous tradition which transforms every man in the regiment, be he Scottish, English or Irish, into a Gordon, with all the dash and vim and dare-devil courage that centre around the name. The Gordon blood in him helped Byron to understand and express the potency of the Highland tradition:-- "But, with the breath that fills Their mountain pipe, so fill the mountaineers With the fierce native daring which instills The stirring memories of a thousand years. And Evan's, Donald's fame rings in each clansman's ears." May there never come a time when the mind of our race will be closed against such a sentiment as that! Let us go on doing our share, resolutely, faithfully, conscientiously, of the work of the world; let us keep well to the front with the same success that we have done of yore; but let us not forget that we owe the unconquerable spirit in us to our Auld Mither Scotland, that it is from her breast there has been drawn the celestial ichor which has nourished genius in the cottage as generously as in the Hall, and that has made the inheritance of the ploughman's son more precious than a Dukedom. We shall, as your President has said, be better, and not worse citizens of this great Republic; we shall play our part all the more worthily, in public or private station, if every fibre of our being thrills to an auld Scotch sang, and we feel in our inmost heart that-- "Where the caller breezes sweep Across the mountain's breast, Where the free in soul are nurst, Is the land that we lo'e best." SIMEON FORD ME AND SIR HENRY [Speech of Simeon Ford at a banquet given to Sir Henry Irving by the Lotos Club, New York City, October 29, 1899. The President, Frank R. Lawrence, occupied the chair.] GENTLEMEN:--I cannot but envy you the intellectual treat in which you are revelling, in being permitted to listen to the resistless eloquence of both me and Sir Henry Irving. It is not often that two such stars as me and Sir Henry will consent to twinkle in the same firmament. But your gifted President can accomplish wonders. He is what Weber and Fields[3] call a "hypnotister."