e very instant of the departure of the foreign foes (in
all cases starved out of a burned and devastated land), laid hold of by
the harpies of intestine wars. The strong resilient energies of the
country could have thrown off the effects of one attack, however severe
and however protracted; but a series of incursions of the same disease,
at intervals allowing of no time for recruiting her powers, produced a
political marasmus--a confirmed famine--one of the most dreadful evils,
including in itself all others, that ever was visited on mankind.

It would be difficult to draw a picture--because imagination falls short
of the powers of a proper portraiture--of the misery and desolation of
Scotland at the time we have mentioned. The land had got gradually out
of cultivation, and the herds of black cattle and sheep, on which the
people relied, in default of the productive powers of agriculture, had
been either driven into England, or consumed by the myriads of soldiers
of the English invading armies. Great numbers of the people, having
nothing wherewith to allay the pangs of hunger, though they had plenty
of money, quitted their country in despair, and took refuge in Flanders.
Those who had no money to pay their passage, left their homes, and
betook themselves to the woods, where, to appease their agonies, they
lay on the ground, and devoured, like the inhabitants of their sties,
the acorns and the nuts that had fallen from the trees. In the want of
these, the very branches were laid hold of and gnawed; and many poor
creatures were found lying dead, with the half-masticated boughs in
their clenched hands. The only remedial influence that was experienced,
was the growth of dysenteries and other intestine diseases, which,
produced by hunger and becoming epidemic, kindly swept off thousands who
would otherwise have died of protracted famine.

At a wild spot near the Grampian Hills, a number of destitute beings had
collected, for the purpose of catching deer (a few of which still
remained), to keep in the spark of life. They agreed to associate
together, and divide their prey, which was dressed in a mountain cave,
where they had assembled. Every morning they sallied forth, women and
all, on the dreadful errand of taking advantage of chance, in supplying
them with any species of wild animals that came in their way, to satisfy
the imperative demands of hunger. They got a few creatures at first,
consisting chiefly of hares and foxes