Morewood, in his work, on page 339, pays a compliment to illicit whisky, in the following words:

They (the Government regulations) bound down the legal distillers in such a manner by injurious restrictions, that it was not in their power to produce a spirit equal in flavor to that manufactured by the smugglers, who lie under none of those restrictions which bind down the ingenuity of the legal trader. This superiority induces a corresponding desire in the inhabitants of Scotland to possess themselves of smuggled whisky, even at a higher price than that for which they can purchase the same article from the licensed distillers'. The smugglers, in consequence, are winked at, or rather encouraged, by a very considerable proportion of the inhabitants of the country. While this feeling existed, it was impossible to put an end to smuggling in Scotland. But Government of late has removed the restrictions by which the Scotch distillers were bound, as far as to allow them to distil from malt at nearly the same rate as they formerly did from raw grain. The consequence has been that the high reputation of smuggled whisky has gradually sunk, and smuggling has been nearly discontinued.