needed the interpreter, says O'Donnell (who compiled his life of Columba from original Irish authorities) was, "quia erat Scoticæ et Latinæ linguæ IGNARUS"—because he could speak neither Irish nor Latin !”—ah, cunning Mr. Skene!

Will it be believed that he has the hardihood (we are unwilling to use a harsher term) in the next paragraph to endeavour to quibble away this downright testimony of his own authority? This is the most imprudent attempt throughout, for it necessitates what no writer is justifiable in having recourse to a misrepresentation of the evidence. We give the passage entire :

"It may be proper here to notice an argument which has been frequently drawn from Adomnan, that the Picts and Scots must have spoken languages very different from each other. It has been urged as a conclusive argument by those who assert the language of the Picts to have been a Teutonic dialect, that on several occasions when Columba, who was an Irish Scot, addressed the Picts, he is described by Adomnan as using an interpreter. Now, although Columba is very frequently mentioned as conversing with the Picts, there are but two occasions on which any such expression is used, and in both passage. the expression of Adomnan is exactly the same, viz. Verbo Dei per interpretatorem recepto.' It will be remarked that Adomnan does not say that Columba used an interpreter in conversing with the Picts, but merely that he interpreted or explained the word of God, that is, the Bible, which, being written in Latin, would doubtless require to be interpreted to them; and the very distinction which is made by Adomuan, who never uses this expression when Columba addresses the Picts, but only when he reads the word of God to them, proves clearly that they must have understood each other without difficulty; and that there could have been but little difference of language between the two nations of the Picts and Scots."

6

Can Mr. Skene have read the passages? We trust not we hope not. Some ill-disposed person has given them to him at second hand in order to lead him into a scrape-perhaps insidiously designing to turn the whole Highland Society, through him, into ridicule. The words quoted are not those of Adomnan. The words of Adomnan are in the first passage, as we have seen, "verbo Dei a Sancto per interpretem recepto," making a clear distinction between Columba and the

interpreter-a distinction marked alike by the sense and the grammar of the passage-the second instance occurs in the 33rd chapter of the 2nd book (by-the-by, the very references of Mr. Skene to these passages are erroneous, which confirms us in our charitable disposition to believe that he has not garbled them himself) where Adomnan, speaking of a certain plebeian who dwelt in "Provincia Pictorum," says that he with his whole family "verbum vitæ, per interpretatorem, sancto prædicante viro, audiens, credidit." Grammar cannot make the distinction between the saint and the interpreter stronger. Columba stands, as it were, apart from the rest of the persons in the independence of an ablative absolute; the interposition of the interpreter is made manifest as in the former case by the use of the transitive preposition-words cannot be clearer. Neither can the "word of life" here mean the Bible: the expression is "while the saint preached." But, independent of all this, a fact has been communicated to us by the most distinguished Irish scholar of the present day, which we consider conclusive as

to the difference between the Scotic and Pictish languages. Cormac's Glossary, a work compiled in the ninth century, is remarkably full on Irish etymologies; yet, although many thou

sands of words are there traced to

their origins, the compiler has pre

served but

Pictish language, viz. cartait, a bodkin one solitary word of the or brooch, called by the Irish dealg.

But what Mr. Skene puts forward as the strongest proof of all, that the Picts spoke a Gaelic dialect, is the topography of the country. Topographical etymologies are perhaps the most illusive guides in history. There is no name in the world to which an ingenious etymologist could not assign a Gaelic root if he chose to take the trouble. In our own times we have seen all the gods and goddesses, rivers, seas, and mountains of antiquity derived from these accommodating elements: and, while Villaneuva's Hibernia Phoenicia, and some late Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy are extant, we need never be at a loss for Gælic roots for the topographical or personal nomenclature of any nation under the sun. With regard to the three Pictish names relied on by Mr. Skene, viz. Apurfeirt, Cairfuil, and Athan, we doubt not that an expert etymologist could prove them as he

has done, to be Gaelic; or as Pinkerton has done, to be Teutonic; or, as Chalmers has done, to be British; or, as any body else may have done or may hereafter wish to do, according as may best answer his own purpose-nay, we could name a distinguished Archælogist who, if they came in his way, would have then all to be the right Phoenician. They may be Gaelic, and very probably they are so; but they were never imposed on the places that bear them by men speaking the present language of the Highlands. No one of the race would call an æstuary "Aber." He was more likely a Cymri who gave it the name. Send the present Highland population into a new country without names, and let them invent a nomenclature suitable to the features of the land, and they will call the mouth of every river in it Inver." On this fact we are willing to stake the whole controversy. But, it will be said, "Inver" and "Aber” are essentially the same so are "Mac" and "MAp;" but, if there was as much difference between the " Aber"-namers and the "Inver"-namers, as there is between the Welsh and Irish of the present day, we do not wonder that Columba needed an interpreter; and are satisfied that the "Inver"-naming Highlanders are not descendants of the Aber"-naming Picts.

"But," says Mr. Skene, "the Highlanders can be traced back to the period when the northern Picts were in possession of their country," and that without any marks of a revolution. There is no difficulty in tracing the Highlanders back to the eleventh and twelfth century, and all that Mr. Skene has to do is to bring down the Picts to meet them. But here the great difficulty is to find Picts for the process. And now appears the object of all Mr. Skene's industry upon the borders of the Linnhe Loch. As might be expected he has not risked his reputation in defending Ross and Sutherland from Dalriadic incursions, without an ultimate object. This is his preserve; his officina; and although one might be led to imagine from the position of Drumalban, that the Picts had been routed out of this district in the first place by Fergus, and if any remnant had escaped to the other side of the Mound, along the coast of the German sea, that they had been in the number of the "penitus extincti" of Kenneth; yet Mr. Skene is determined that whoever he finds here shall

be Picts, and as Picts he leads them out to beget the whole kingdom of the clans, and obliterate, extinguish, and annul every trace of Scotic blood from the whole of Scotland north of Forth. He infers these destined fathers of the Gael, then, to be Picts, first because he finds them in the preserve; and secondly because he finds among them certain officers called Maormors, whom he asserts to be pure Pictish authorities.

"This title of Maormor," he says, "was quite peculiar to the Gaelic people, who, at this period, (i. e. the Pictish period) inhabited Scotland. It is impossible, on examining the history of this early period, to avoid being struck with this fact, and the remark has accordingly been very generally made by the latter historians. It was altogether unknown among the Irish, although they were also a Gaelic people; for although Tighernac frequeutly mentions Maormors of Alban as being engaged in many of the feuds in Ireland, yet we never find that title given by any of the annalists to an Irish chief. In Britain the title was

confined to the north of Scotland, and although many of the Saxon and Roman barons, and other foreigners obtained extensive territories in Scotland, and even at an early period frequently succeeded by marriage to the possessions and powers. of some of the Maormors; yet we never this it is plain that wherever we find a find them appearing under that title. From person bearing the title of Maormor, we may conclude that that person was chief

of some tribe of the Gaelic race which

inhabited the northern district of Scotland at this period."

He means the period immediately following the Pictish times, as we have marked above. The sentence which we have noted in italics contains the key to Mr. Skene's impression that the Maor was a purely Pictish functionary. Had he examined the annals as a prudent man might be expected to have done before risking so bold an assertion he would have found-" A.D. 1081. The death of Mac Rath O'Hogan, Maor of Kinel Fergusa. A. Ultoniæ. A.D. 923. The death of the Ardmaor of O'Neill. A. U. 948. The death of Fionnachta, Maor of the Muintir Patrick. A. Q. Magist." And again, had he turned to the catalogue of the Stowe manuscripts, a work as much to be consulted as any other on these subjects, he would have found (v. 1. p. 169) that the Ardmaor of Connaught was O'Flanagan, and that O'Connors

high stewardship (Ardmaoraidacht) belonged to O'Flanagan in preference to the three other chief Lords of Connaught; and that in addition to the Ardmaoraidacht, or high-stewardship, there was a Conmhaoraidcht or jointstewardship of O'Connor, under the control of Mac Brennain; and that O'Connor's "Maor as each" or steward of the horse, was O'Flinn. If then the Maormors were not exclusively Pictish functionaries, there is no evidence of Pictish inhabitation in the Highlands of Scotland in their times, so that Mr. Skene fails in this as well as in all other attempts at getting from under an Irish origin.

:

It is now our turn to sum up. We have shown-1st, that Mr. Skene has no evidence for limiting the Dalriadic kingdom to the southern parts of Argyle 2nd, that he has no evidence for denying the extension of the Dal riadic kingdom during the next 340 years: 3rd, that he has no evidence for the division of the Pictish kingdom into two states of Cruithne and Piccardach; 4th, that if he had such evidence he has none to show the escape of the Cruithne from the calamity which finally befell the Piccardach, much less to infer that the Cruithne were aiding in its infliction; 5th, that he has no evidence of the Picts having spoken the Gaelic language, but the contrary and 6th, that he has no evidence of Pictish inhabitation in the Highlands subsequent to the Scottish conquest.

:

But whether successful or not in the establishment of this theory, Mr. Skene lays claim at least to the credit of originality. "A glance at the table of contents," he says, "will show that the system is entirely new." If we have read our history aright, the attempt to identify the Gael and the Picts, origiginated with that par nobile the Macphersons; was taken up by Henry, and credulously embraced by Gibbon; "which last," says Pinkerton, "instead of bestowing even the slightest examination on the subject, has been led by the Macphersons, whose little local designs his large mind could not even suspect." This may be Scotch origi. nality—in Ireland it would go by

another name.

But although Mr. Skene has no direct acknowledgment of his obligation to Macpherson, he is sensible of the debt, and even goes out of his way to make some return. In his chapter on the poetical genius of the High

66

landers, he remembers that he owes something to Ossian. To say that the hint of Pictish and Gaelic identity had originated with the King of woody Morvern, could not be expected after the assertions in the preface: but the manes of Macpherson may be appeased without so mortifying an admission.Ossian," says Mr. Skene, "corroborates Tighernach," and therefore cannot be the work of an impostor. Let us see. Tighernach gives the death of Cucullin in the 27th year of his age in the year after Christ, 2; and the death of Fin Mac Comhal at Athbrea, upon the Boyne, on the 5th of the kalands of January, in the year of the world 4230, or according to his chronology, in the year of Christ 278. Macpherson (we really put our paper to the blush by writing Ossian) makes Cucullin and Fin Mac Comhal contemporaries! Tighernach makes Fin Mac Comhal an Irishman of the race

of Ua Baiscne. Macpherson makes him a Caledonian Briton! Tighernach makes Cormac Mac Art the King of Ireland in the time of Fin Mac Comhal. Macpherson will have this Irish Monarch to be "Conar of the Shields!" This may be Scotch corroboration: if so, commend us to our Irish evidences.

In fine, the Pictish sophism has reached its height in the hands of Mr. Skene, just as the north British sophism attained to its final inflation, and burst in those of the Macphersons. Reluc

tance to confess an Irish descent has English superiority was the origin of been the origin of both. Jealousy of that exploded fable which both have been designed to make amends for. Pride and spite have held the pen time about from the commencement, and

although we can no longer say that

66

selves, and writing in a country reour Scotish antiquists, ignorant themmarkable for ignorance of antiquities, darkness; and venture on tricks that are, like other rogues, emboldened by the most unprincipled man of learning, would, in a learned country, tremble at would recommend Mr. Skene who is a as if disgrace stood before him;" we learned man living in a learned country, and whom we really believe incapable of most of the practices of his predecessors, not to count too confidetly on Irish ignorance (although he may perhaps on the patronage of the Highland Society) when, for the consolation of Caledonian pride, he sets up his next theory in the teeth of Roman, British, and Irish history.