and the way to the university is now open to every Gaelic-speaking youth of good principles and exceptional ability.

The Inverness branch of the Young Men's Christian Association chose Mr. Matheson as their president. He was not often able to meet with them during his all too brief holidays in Strathpeffer; but he was present at the opening of their new rooms, July 12, 1869, presided at the social meeting, declared the rooms open, congratulated the Inverness people on having such a good house, and expressed his sympathy with the work of the Y.M.C.A. They had a series of evangelistic meetings at the same time, and Mr. Matheson took part in them. The late Dr. Donald Fraser told Mr. James E. Mathieson, a long time ago, that as that opening meeting was dispersing one man was overheard saying to another, with reference to the chairman: "Yon's a man! He's gotten a' the ten commandments written on his face."

At a Christian conference held in Inverness in August, 1876, Mr. Matheson presided for two hours, the subject being "The Spread of the Gospel."

The county of Sutherland always held a very warm corner of his heart; and, especially during the last few years of his life, he occasionally made a tour among its hills and lochs, and visited the scenes of his father's boyhood by Loch Shin, and other places connected with his ancestors.

During one of these tours, taken with his wife in

September, 1893, he consented to give an address on a Sabbath evening at Scourie, where, at that time, there was seldom any preaching in English. This was much appreciated by the people who gathered in the school-house. During his address he said :—

We should thank God that this gospel of His grace has been faithfully preached for so many years in this dear land of Sutherland-dear to you, I cannot doubt, and very dear to me because of ancestors who loved the truth of God, and some of whom preached in it the doctrines of grace, Christ and Him crucified, and had many fruits among the people.

In the autumn of 1896 he made his last tour of a few days in Sutherland. He had gone to Lairg to see Achany, and was seized with a desire "to cross these hills once more," evidently feeling it was for the last time.

The following letter to Mrs. Matheson, from a Highland cousin, will be read with interest in this connection :

Mr. Matheson and his younger brother frequently spent a portion of their holidays in youthful days at Keoldale, when they came under the influence of my revered grandmother, Mrs. Mackay Scobie, who lived to make others happy, and shed over all the bright attractiveness of her unique Christian character.

As illustrating Mr. Matheson's tender and almost womanly sympathy in times of trouble, my mother could never forget how, on meeting him after the death of her

first-born baby boy, Mr. Matheson, who had nursed and played with the child some months before, could not control his feelings, and wept as if the little one had been his own. He must then have been a youth of about nineteen or twenty.

You know he could be stern when needful; but if this side of his character was ever discussed in my mother's hearing she could not abide it, and would always maintain that he was the man of tenderest sympathy she had ever known.

I cannot help thinking that Mr. Matheson had always a great attractiveness in the eyes of children. It was certainly so in my own case. I must have been six or seven years old when I first remember seeing him, though he must have seen me at an earlier stage. We then lived at Invercharron. I fancy it must have been about 1850 or a year earlier. I was a very shy and sensitive child, and not quickly won by a stranger. He was spending the day with us on his way to or from Achany, and in the shortest time my shyness vanished; and when, on his leaving, he forded the river on horseback so as to avoid a long round, I begged hard to be allowed to accompany him, which I did, to bid farewell with an aching little heart on the other side.

I may add, as it may not be personally known to you, that my grandfather, Captain M. J. Scobie, and Captain. Donald Matheson, of Shiness, were close friends, and had intimate relations in various spheres. There was also a blood relationship, the exact degree of which I cannot verify, being from home.

This brings up another feature in Mr. Matheson, viz., his ardent love of the Highlands, and his strong clannish feel