Busby, and its Neighbourhood. By the Rev. W. Ross, LL.D.
(Bryce and Son, Glasgow.)—This is one of the books which are now becoming more and more common, and which are always welcome. These parish histories give us a better insight into the past as it really was, with the actual lives of the men and women who played parts in it, than the narratives of the great events of the world can furnish. Dr. Ross's lectures—the book consists of four lectures— give us abundance of facts, which are put in an interesting fashion. The third chapter, on "The Sufferings of the Covenanters," is, per- haps, the most interesting, even though it takes us over ground already more or less familiar. Dr. Ross is, of course, a staunch par- • -Haan of the persecuted, and we are quite in sympathy with him ; but he is really a little hard on the unlucky curate, Mr. Boyd, who ran away when his house was stormed by the mob. He ought to have stayed, thinks Dr. Ross, to defend his wife, who, it seems, was 'wounded. Perhaps he was foolish enough to think that his parishioners did not make war on women. Surely it is not correct to speak of "the defeat and fall of Claverhonse, at Killiekrankie ?" Fall there was, to Bing William's great advantage, hut no defeat.
Previous page
