Oft I gazed with saddened feeling On the weak that went astray; Men of outward name and promise Whom I sought to teach the way. When I entered they were sitting The enjoyment to begin, At the table where the Christian Cannot shun committing sin. They would rather have my absence For they felt a glow of shame: Stopping then they promised never To take up the godless game. With a pack of Satan’s leaflets There the husband’s hands between, They lost time and vainly wasted Light at wicked work, I ween. MacLauchlan’s poems have been considered at greater length than the mere quality of his poetry might warrant because they shed light on the life and manners of the Highlanders during a particular time in a circumscribed district, and because hitherto they, in common with those of several other religious bards, have received no attention whatever. On the other hand, the great bards of the secular life have been very abundantly written upon and their merits exhibited. DUGALD BUCHANAN. The Highlands produced several religious poets of considerable merit during the eighteenth century, although the areas of living religious activities were undoubtedly very limited. Chief among them was Dugald Buchanan, whose hymns have taken a very high place. He has been compared to Cowper, but he reminds us more of the celebrated Welsh bard Goronwy Owen, who has much in common with Buchanan. It is curiously suggestive that the sacred bard of Anglesea and the sacred bard of Rannoch, the religious representative poets of their respective countries, should be found composing highly spiritual poems, and at the same period writing elaborate ones on the awful theme of the “Day of Judgment,” while the polished Addison and ethical Johnson were delivering their well-finished articles on mere moral platitudes to a highly conventional generation. Perhaps the Highlanders have received, apart from the Bible, no greater gift than the holy and sublime strains of the muse of Buchanan, who impressed his personality and character on all the Gaelic-speaking portion of his countrymen who in his days were in the throes of painful political changes, and about to enter on a new era of severe trial and uncertainty. Much of what the world has admired in the Highland character since is due to the formative and healthy influence of Dugald Buchanan’s hymns.