Ossian Collection > Critical dissertation on the poems of Ossian, the son of Fingal

A DISSERTATION. v
of the Britons, and that they received their name upon tliat ac-
count. This opinion, fay they, is fupported by Tacitus, who,
from feveral circumltances, concludes, that the Caledonians were of
German extra(5lion. A difcuilion of a point fo intricate, at this
diftance of time, could neither be fatisfadory nor important.
Towards the latter end of the third, and beginning of the
fourth century, we meet with tlie Scots in the north. Porphyrins gj rrj
makes the firft mention of them about that time. As the 6'«/ia''^*«fiphon.
were not heard of before that period, moft writers fuppofed them
to have been a colony, newly come to Britain, and that the Pi^s
were the only genuine defcendents of the antient Caledonians.
This miftake is eafily removed. The Caledonians, in procefs of
time, became naturally divided into two diflindl nations, as pof- j
felfirtg parts of the country, intirely different in their nature .
and foil. The weftern coaft of Scotland is hilly and barren; to-
wards the eaft the countr)' is plain, and fit for tillage. The inhabi-
tants of the mountains, a roving and uncontrouled race of men,
lived by feeding of cattle, and what they killed in hunting.
Their employment did not fix them to one place. They removed
from one heath to another, as fuited beft with their convenience
or inclination. They were not, therefore, improperly called, by
their neighbours, Scuitf, or, the li'andering nation -^ which is evi-
dently the origin of the Reman name of Scott.
On the other hand, the Caledonians, who pofleffed the eaft coaft
©f Scotland, as their divifion of the country was plain and fertile,
applied themfelves to agriculture, and vaifing of corn. It was
from this, that the Galic name of the Pi^s proceeded ; for they
are called, in that language, Crukhnkh, i. e. the ivheat or corn-
eaten.