In his History of the County of Down, published in 1875, Alexander Knox MD (1802-1877) made the following observation about the state of the Scotch language in county Down at that time:
The Scottish idiom is most observable in the baronies of Ards and Castlereagh, and their confines, although extending as far as Hillsborough and Dromore. Until recently it was spoken as broadly as in Ayr or Wigtonshire, but it is gradually dying out, although innumerable words imported from Scotland are in daily use in the northern part of the county.
[History of the County of Down p 48]
Comments such as this help us to develop a picture of the survival and decline of Ulster-Scots across the province.
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