Having, through Lord Shaftesbury’s kindness, received the benefit of Mr. Loch’s corrections to this statement, I am permitted to make a little further extract from his reply.  He says,—­

“In addition to what I was able to say in my former paper, I can now state that the Duke of Sutherland has received, from, one of the most determined opposers of the measure, who travelled to the north of Scotland as editor of a newspaper, a letter regretting all he had written on the subject, being convinced that he was entirely misinformed.  As you take so much interest in the subject, I will conclude by saying that nothing could exceed the prosperity of the county during the past year; their stock, sheep, and other things sold at high prices; their crops of grain and turnips were never so good, and the potatoes were free from all disease; rents have been paid better than was ever known. * * * As an instance of the improved habits of the farmers, no house is now built for them that they do not require a hot bath and water closets.”

From this long epitome you can gather the following results; first, if the system were a bad one, the Duchess of Sutherland had nothing to do with it, since it was first introduced in 1806, the same year her grace was born; and the accusation against Mr. Sellar dates in 1811, when her grace was five or six years old.  The Sutherland arrangements were completed in 1819, and her grace was not married to the duke till 1823, so that, had the arrangement been the worst in the world, it is nothing to the purpose so far as she is concerned.

As to whether the arrangement is a bad one, the facts which have been stated speak for themselves.  To my view it is an almost sublime instance of the benevolent employment of superior wealth and power in shortening the struggles of advancing civilization, and elevating in a few years a whole community to a point of education and material prosperity, which, unassisted, they might never have obtained,

LETTER XVIII.

LONDON, Sunday, May 8.

MY DEAR S.:—­

Mr. S. is very unwell, in bed, worn out with, the threefold labor of making and receiving calls, visiting, and delivering public addresses.  C. went to hear Dr. McNeile, of Liverpool, preach—­one of the leading men of the established church evangelical party, a strong millenarian.  C. said that he was as fine a looking person in canonicals as he ever saw in the pulpit.  In doctrine he is what we in America should call very strong old school.  I went, as I had always predetermined to do, if ever I came to London, to hear Baptist Noel, drawn thither by the melody and memory of those beautiful hymns of his[N], which must meet a response in every Christian heart.  He is tall and well formed, with one of the most classical and harmonious heads I ever saw.  Singularly enough, he reminded me of a bust of Achilles at the London Museum.  He is indeed a swift-footed