In a message dated 31/10/99 7:02:00 AM Central Standard Time, wlockhart@brooksdata.net writes: << Mark, As a Scottish descendant in the "Texas Colony", I have to admit we do deserve the horrible reputation in capital punishment and the expenditures on prisons now exceeds higher education. <MacSnipped Stuff> I was going to answer this in private, but I think I can destroy a wee Scottish myth here. First off Howdy Partner. Now draw you dirty pole cat, and I ain't ah smilin when I says it.( only found out last year a pole cat and a skunk are the same thing). For myself, and for most of the other wee boys and girls who grew up in post war Scotland, Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, and my personal favorite Mr. Tonto and Mr, Lone Ranger had a much greater influence on our lives than William Wallace, The Bruce or Even Queen Elizabeth or Bonnie Prince Chairly combined. I knew more about Dodge and Wyatt Earp than I ever knew about James the I. I never had to study the cowboys, it came natural. It took the strap to get me to learn about the Kings. Ah the Saturday Matinee at the La Scala in Inverness. We ran around with feathers and guns and cowboy hats, not kilts and claymoores etc. (Well the odd stick, properly held, did slaughter the English Army some days.) As Uncle Murdoch used to say in the Gaelic "We are all more similar than we are different," and he should know, he was so old God came to him for advice. Dave