THE BOOK OF MACKAY.
The Book of Mackay. By Angus Mackay. (Norman Macleod, Edinburgh.)—This is an excellent specimen of literature of the family history character. To the ordinary reader its size— it runs to nearly five hundred pages of large type—and amplitude of genealogical detail may prove unattractive ; but these will doubtless be appreciated by members of the Clan Mackay, which owns as chieftain that accomplished sociologist, diplomatist, and scholar, Lord Reay, and which is identified mainly with the northern region of Strathnaver. Mr. Angus Mackay, who is responsible for the letterpress of the book, and who has in its preparation had the advantage of examining the hitherto un- published papers of the Reay family, does ample justice to all distinguished, and not a few obscure, members of his clan, including General Mackay, the trusted friend of William of Orange, who was defeated at Killiecrankie and killed at Steenkirk. He writes as a rule a level, sensible style, but occasionally gets into raptures, as when he dears with the Mackay poet, Rob Donn :- " There are pieces of Rob Donn that put him in the front rank of eighteenth-century poets, be they English or Gaelic. Take, for instance, his ode to the aged Ian MacEachan, now no longer able to go south to the markets as of yore. It is a splendid piece of imagery, the work of a master-hand. The ideas fly like sparks of fire from an anvil, and the touch is as airy as a feather. Or for humour take Macroy's Breeks, or for razor-like sarcasm Rob Gray—the lashing of the latter is Byronic." Such enthusiasm is pardonable ; and as a rule Mr. Mackay is content to he a scrupu- lously accurate historian and painstaking genealogist. The value of the work is greatly enhanced by its illustrations, which include portraits and book-plates.
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