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Memoirs of Sir Ewen Cameron of Locheill, Chief of the Clan Cameron
Memoirs of Sir Ewen Cameron of Locheill Chief of the Clan Cameron Author:John Drummond Subtitle: With an Introductory Account of the History and Antiquities of That Family and of the Neighbouring Clans General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1842 Original Publisher: Maitland Club Subjects: History / Europe / Great Britain History / Europe / Ireland Reference / Genealogy Notes: This is a black and... more » white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION. The singular manner in which the feudal and patriarchal systems were for long blended in Scotland, is one of the many circumstances which have combined to throw so much varied and romantic interest around its dark and chequered history. The nature of the feudal system has been so fully and ably illustrated by Guizot, Hallam, and other modern writers, that it would be out of place here to make any observations upon it. Unfit as it was for a permanent and perfect form of Government, it must yet be acknowledged to have been admirably adapted for accomplishing the regeneration of society, after the destruction of ancient civilization. The patriarchal system, which in Europe was almost exclusively confined to Scotland, has attracted comparatively little attention ; and the effects of the superinduction of the one system on the other has been left almost wholly unnoticed ; although it certainly opens a field of both curious and interesting inquiry to the student of ancient manners. No formal investigation of this subject can here be attempted ; but the following desultory remarks may possibly render much of the present volume more intelligible to the general reader. It would certainly appear, that at a very remote period the patriarchal system alone existed in Scotland, and that the feudal was afterwards gradually introduced, -- and this introd...« less