At about the same time Jock Scot was having his kilt jacket made, so was I but further south by Hector Russell in Greenock. Parents and guardians decided that my weedy 11 or 12-year-old body was too slight for Harris tweed or gauntlet cuffs, so the jacket was made from lighter English tweed with single button cuffs. Apparently sooth moother tailors were more accommodating than Jock's highlanders. However, what was obvious was that this was a kilt jacket. It really could not be mistaken for anything else and it was well tailored to fit even my scrawny frame.

MacMillan of Rathdown has it petty well taped but the European ban on using sealskin for sporrans, due to be introduced next year, means that the bovine, rabbit fur (or even synthetic fur) options are likely to dominate future sporran making in Scotland. I am told that only the old white seal-fur sporrans were the product of clubbed seal pups on the ice flows and that gray and black seal-fur sporrans were made from humanely culled animals. So if you want to buy a traditional Scottish seal-fur sporran, you have only about 11 months until their sale is banned.

Iain