Oliver Brown once observed that the surest way to weaken a man's backbone was to pat him vigourously and continually on the back. Could Scotland's problem be that our collective back has been patted overmuch? Why and by whom have the pats most abundantly been bestowed? "By whom?" is a fairly easy question to answer. By England and the English-speaking world. In America's Deep South you will hear the term "the Highland conscience" testfying to the respect which many citizens there are ready to extend to any visitor whom they identify as coming from Scotland. They expect Scots who come among them to display all the virtues which they think are ours - an austere lifestyle based on thrift, and a readiness to practise self-denial; to be a strong, reticent people, with their emotions firmly disciplined and their tongues well guarded.

The fact that we are commonly noisy sprendthrifts is our delicious little secret. Our good fortune is that our forebears handed down to us a pattern of behaviour which we don't now adhere to, but which we still respect as a target at which we aim. We accept reflected glory and the pats on the back which it brings.

But when you consider our merits as viewed by our admirers you find that their regard is prompted by Scottish service to the British Empire. We have long dodged any proper debate on the concept and experience of Empire. Now, quite suddenly, we have two informed and shrewd commentators offering their judgement on the imperial past in which Scots were thoroughly involved. Michael Fry indeed writes of the "Scottish Empire". His research is most admirable, but as a good Tory he misses the point which to Nationalists is so obvious. While many Scots found good jobs around the Empire; while Scottish companies landed construction contracts; while Scottish manufacturing found raw materials in the Empire, the benefits remained reserved to the individuals concerned. The dividends and wages which they received according to their functions brought them prosperity, but for Scotland there was no collective gain. There was no Scottish political entity and so no Scottish power to control decisions. The heyday of Empire was precisely the moment when living and working in industrial Scotland was at its most intolerable. Ask the workers who processed the jute and the cotton on which the better fortunes of others were founded.

Most hearty of all pats on the back brings us to the recent study by Professor Tom Devine. The Empire was won and then guarded and patrolled by a disproportionate number of Scottish soldiers. Just as Gauls and Syrians served Rome, Magyar cavalry served the Hapsburgs and Cossacks served the Czar, so Sikhs and Gurkhas were joined by Scots in service to the British Crown. Scotland's traditions seemed to gentlemen in England, safe abed, to be essentially martial. English encouragement and congratulations inspired Scots of this tradition to ever more brave and determined displays of military powess and excellence.

As so many of these soldiers were enlisted in the Highland regiments we can surely find here a major explanation of the Highlandism which Professor Devine emphasises.