Blair Collection > Popular tales of the West Highlands > Volume 1

CXXXU INTRODUCTION.
I take to be gala, a harbour ; the word has no mean-
ing in French. Boulogne might be Beul Obhainn,
river's mouth ; Donau, the Danube, might mean the
brown river. Tana might mean the shallow, and both
are descriptive.
Rhine might mean the division, and there is a dis-
trict in Islay whose name is pronounced exactly as the
name of the great German river. Balaclava is exceed-
ingly like the name of an Islay farm, and might mean
kite's to^vn, Baile Chlamhain ; but though such re-
semblances can hardly fail to occur to any one who
knows the Gaelic language, it requires time and care-
ful study to follow out such a subject, and it is foreign
to my jiurpose. There are plenty of GaeHc words
which closely resemble words in other European lan-
guages. Amongst the few Sanscrit Avords which I have
been able to glean from books, I find several which re-
semble Gaelic words of similar meaning — Jwala, light
flame, has many Gaelic relations in words which mean
shining, fire, lightning, the moon, white, swan.
Dyu, day, is like an diugh, to-day ; Mirah, the
ocean, like muir mara, the sea ; but this again is foreign
to my purpose.
]My wish has been simply to gather some specimens
of the wreck so plentifully strewn on the coasts of old
Scotland, and to carry it where others may examine it ;
rather to point out where curious objects worth some
attention may be found, than to gather a great heap. I
have not sought for stranded forests. I have not
polished the rough sticks which I found ; I have but
cut off" a very few offending sj^linters, and I trust that
some may be found who will not utterly despise such
rubbish, or scorn the magic which peasants attribute to
a fairy egg.