In 1896 Major-General Thomason, already mentioned, issued for private circulation a small volume. In this he foreshadowed a larger, which has since been published.[8] Major-General Thomason is the possessor not only of the manuscript of Donald Mac Donald’s proposed second volume, but also of all the manuscript music left by Angus Mac Kay. Besides, he spent many years in collecting pibrochs from all possible sources, and at the present time he believes that he has almost every pibroch known to be in existence. He has spent much time and labour editing his collection, and the result is the volume referred to, which is published under the title of _Ceol Mor_ (the proper title of real pibroch music). Besides being an extraordinarily diligent collector of tunes, Major- General Thomason was imbued with the idea of rendering the reading of pibrochs more easy. He took notes of the difference in times and the different styles of playing, and became so proficient that he could note any strange tune from the playing of another piper. It was only a step further to decide that the signs which he could note down as the tune was being played would serve as a notation from which the tune could be replayed. He invented, in fact, a system of shorthand for pipe music, and then he set about endeavouring to publish a book printed after his own system, in the hope that pipers would learn it in preference to the old and cumbersome system. By this means he believes he will further popularise bagpipe music, but the ordinary notation has now got so firm a hold that it will be difficult to convince pipers that it will pay them to learn another. Like ordinary shorthand systems, _Ceol Mor_ is doubtless capable of improvement; but the idea opens up an altogether new field in the literature of pipe music, and as the book contains some two hundred and eighty tunes—the result of thirty years’ collecting—it is to be hoped that it will prove a success. Footnote 8: Messrs. S. Sidders & Co., Ball Street, Kensington, London.