speaks of battle and conquests, and the advance of a victorious army.

These are not the only things which help to make foreigners believe the
Highlanders some uncommon kind of creature. In addition, the costume they
wear is so strange, that it is easy to understand how terrible they must
appear to foreign eyes.

They are dressed in the old Scotch fashion, with short stockings, bare
knees, and kilts (a short skirt which comes nearly to the knee). Over
their shoulders hangs the "plaidie," which is a long shawl. They wear a
tight coat, and in front of them hangs the sporran, a pocket made of white
fur. The crowning glory of the Highland regiment is the bonnet. This is a
hideous structure of brown beaver; it is over a foot in height, and from
the side hang three mournful black plumes. This curious dress makes the
men look about eight feet high, and as they are all strong,
broad-shouldered fellows, they seem like giants.

At the battle of the Alma, in the Crimean war, the Forty-Second
Highlanders turned the fate of the fight by their appearance.

They were ordered to attack a position held by the Russians, and when they
sprang forward to the charge, their kilts and plaids floating around them,
their bare knees glistening, and their huge bonnets and waving plumes
making them look so tall, the Russians were terror-stricken. Seeing their
white sporrans wave as they ran, the Russians mistook them for small
horses, and could not believe that these terrible-looking creatures were
but men running.

Crying out to each other that the Angels of Death on their snow-white
horses were riding them down, the Russians dropped their arms, and fled in