land which were being lost in England, a further divergence between the two languages arose from the fact that the Romance influence, which followed as a result of the Norman conquest and affected in a marked degree the language of England, did not affect the language of Scotland to anything like the same extent. The consequence is that the language spoken north of the Tweed in the time of Barbour is purer Saxon than the English of the same period, and the student of English literature, whether he knows Scots or not, finds it easier to understand Barbour's Bruce than Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, written almost at the same time. The Scots language was not, however, without its French. influence, although it came at a later date. One of the results of the war of Scots independence was to drive the Norman French barons, who had established themselves in Scotland, out of the country, while it, at the same time, united Scotland and France in the closest friendship, and established what Sir David Lindesay calls that "Weill keipit ancient alliance Maid betwixt Scotland and the realme of France." This ancient League against their "auld enemy" was the great safeguard against English aggression, and had far-reaching social and political results during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, leaving traces in almost every department of national life. Scots scholars flocked to Paris, and when the Universities came to be founded in Scotland they were formed on the French model. The lawyers studied civil law at the French Universities, and to the present day the mass of the common law of our country is founded on the great code of Justinian to which they had been introduced in the French law schools. Even a thing so distinctively Scots as the Presbyterian system of the Reformed Church came from the Catholic country of France, and was drawn up under the influence, if not under the supervision, of Calvin. Such an intimate connection between the two countries could not fail to have an effect on the language, and while the tendency now is to consider this effect as much exaggerated and to trace much of what has been attributed to it to a Norman French origin, and still more to a Latin origin, there still remains much in the language of the sixteenth century that undoubtedly can only be explained by this French influence. In fact we find in all the poets, and in the prose writers too, a kind of French mannerism manifesting itself in French words and in forms of expression based on French models, wholly contrary to the usage of the earlier Scots writers. But, for the most part, these peculiarities are exotic, and never became properly assimilated with the native element in the language, and it is remarkable how little permanent effect they had on the language. This influence reached its height in the sixteenth century in the writings of the great Makars, but the Scots language had almost ceased to be wedded to a living literature before the Union of the Crowns, and never having reached the heart of the language, it left little trace on the later dialect. The language, however, was enriched by a few expressive words such as 66 dour," "douce," "corbie" for a crow, "houlette " for an owl, "fashed" for troubled, and such Scots legal terms as "spulzie" and "assoilzie." Nor must we omit two words which are always given as the stock examples, "ashet” and “gigot," for these are words not found in our English dictionaries, but are in every-day use in every household in Scotland, even in those where the use of a Scots expression would be looked on as vulgar. Closely allied to this French influence in the Scots language was the influence of Latin. To the Scots student Latin was not a dead language. It was the language in which his studies were carried on, in which his learned treatises were written, in which his professors addressed their students, and a great part of his conversation was conducted in Latin, and it is said that he even thought in Latin. One Scots writer, John of Ireland, apologises for the rudeness of his style, and explains that he was more at home with Latin. The effect of this intimate knowledge and familiar use of Latin is very apparent in the literary language, even more so than the influence of French, although it does not appear to have affected the spoken language of the uneducated to any material extent. Like the French, it was exotic, and however much it affected the diction of the sixteenth century writers, it left little permanent mark on the language. We have some idea of the extent to which Latin coloured the written language of that time if we read Dunbar's Ave Maria. The first verse is :— Hale sterne superne, Hale, in eterne, In God's sicht to shyne! Be glory and grace devyne; Our terne inferne for to dispern Haile fresche flour femynyne, Of reuth baith rute and ryne. One can hardly say whether the basis of the language is Latin or Scots. Of course that is an exaggerated example, but it shows what is found, in a lesser degree, in all the Scots writing of the period. This foreign mannerism also asserts itself in the prose writers, although perhaps hardly to the same extent. Here is the last sentence of the author's prologue to the Complaynt of Scotland:-"Now for conclusion of this prolog, I exort the, gude redar, to correct me familiarly ande be charite, and til interpreit my intentione favorablye, for doubtles the motione of the compilatione of this tracteit procedis mair of the compassione that I hef of the public necessite nor it dois of presumptione or vane gloir. Thy cheretabil correctione may be ane provocatione to gar me studye mair attentivlye in the nyxt werkis that I intend to set furtht, the quhilk I beliefe in God sal be verray necessair til al them that desiris to lyve verteouslye indurand the schort tyme of this our fragil peregrinatione.” There we have words such as intention, compassion, provocation, correction, fragil, peregrination, familiarly, proceeds, and others, which are not true Scots, but Latin words appropriated into the language, some of them in a French dress. We find a similar process going on in our own time in German; but with this difference, that it is more apparent in the spoken language than in the written. Numerous French and English words have been germanised and adopted into the German language, even where there is an appropriate native word at hand. We have "arrangiren," to arrange; "interessiren," to interest; "corrigiren," to correct; "amusiren," to amuse; and many others. The use of such words is now, however, being more and more discouraged, with the result that, while they are still in common use in the spoken language, they are not looked on with favour and are not often found in literature except where the style is designedly colloquial. The connection of the people of Scotland with the Celts of the North also left its mark on the language of the people, and there are Scots words which can be traced to a Celtic source, but it is now generally accepted that the number of these is small, and that Celtic has only to a trifling extent permanently affected the language. To those influences which have been mentioned as creating in Scotland a distinct language with characteristics of its own, distinguishing it from its sister language in England, we may add the patriotic spirit engendered by the war of independence, and the growth of the sentiment of Scots nationality, and we have the chief factors in the development of the Scots vernacular up to the time of the Reformation. But, distinct and national as this language was, we must not lose sight of the fact that it was a development of an English dialect, and was, by the writers themselves, spoken of as English. Wyntoun, in his Rhyming Chronicle (about 1420), calls his language Ynglis. Blind Harry (about 1460) describes one of Wallace's French friends as being such a fine fellow that he might have passed for a Scot, had he been able to speak English: 66 Likely he was, manlike of Countenance Sauf if his tong, for Inglis had he none." Barbour, too, who lived about the same time, writes in what he himself calls "The Inglis tong." In fact, if any of these writers had used the word "Scots" it would have meant what we call "Gaelic." When we come to the writers of the sixteenth century we find the same term applied. Gavin Douglas seems to have been the first poet to call his language Scots. In the pro logue to his translation of the Aeneid he says his object is to give Virgil in the language of the "Scots" nation, but it is to be noted that the reason he gives for his having undertaken the task is the untrustworthy nature of Caxton's English translation, which, he says, is no more like Virgil than the Devil is like St. Augustine. Even the anonymous author of the Complaint of Scotland, although he makes it a special appropriation of his own good parts that he has not "fardit and lardit his treatise with exquisite terms not in daily use," and has avoided "lang-taillit wordis half ane myle in length," and confined himself to "domestic Scottis language maist intelligible for the vulgar pepil," even he has to admit the English character of the language of the people. In one of his virulent attacks on the English he says, "There is nocht twa nations under the firmament that are mair contrar and different fra utheris nor is Inglismen or Scottismen, howbeit they are within ane ile and nychbours and of ane language." It is remarkable that these last two writers, Gavin Douglas and the author of the Complaint of Scotland, both of whom call their language Scots, feel constrained to lament the poverty of their language, and to apologise for the introduction of many expressions derived from the Latin, on account of the impossibility of expressing their meaning without such foreign aid. But the most striking evidence that we have that the language of Scotland was looked upon as English is to be found in an Act of the Scots Parliament itself. In 1551 the fifth Parliament of Queen Mary, in view of the inconveniences arising from the practice of unlicensed printing, and "the defamation and slander of the lieges of the realm to which it gave rise, ordained "that na prenter presume attempt or take upon hande to prent ony buikes, ballats, sanges, blasphemations, rimes or tragedies, outher in Latin or English toung, in ony times to cum, unto the time the samin be seene viewed and examined be some wise and discreit persons, depute thereto be the ordinares quhatsumever, etc." James Sixth, how |