Ossian Collection > Morison's edition of the Poems of Ossian, the son of Fingal

246 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING
and their country CaeUoch, which the Romans foftened in.
to Caledonia. This, of itfelf, is fufficient to demonftrate,
that they are the genuine defcendents of the ancient Caledo-
nians, and not a pretended colony of Scots, who fettled firft
in the north, in the third or fourth century.
From the double meaning of the word Cael^ which figni-
^esjlrangers, as well as Gauls, or Celts fome have imagined,
that the anceftors of the Caledonians were of a different
race from the reft of the Britons, and that they received
their name upon that account. This opinion, fay they, is
fupported by Tacitus, who, from feveral circumftances,
concludes that the Caledonians were of German extraiSion.
A difcufficn of a point fo intricate, at this diftance of time,
could neither be iatisfadtory nor important.
Towards the latter end of the third, and beginning of
the fourth century, we meet Avith the Scots in the north.
Porphyrias * makes the fivft mention of them about that
time. As the Scots were not heard of before that period,
ir.oft writers fuppofed them to have been a colony, newly
come to Britain, and that the Pi£is were the only genuine
defcendents of the ancient Caledonians. This miftake is
eafily removed. The Caledonians, in procefs of time, be-
came naturally divided into two diflincl nations, as poflef-
fing parts of the country, entirely different in their nature
and foil. The weftern coaft of Scotland is hilly and barren ;
towards the eaft the country is plain, and fit for tillage.
The inhabitants of the mountains, a roving and uncon-
trouled 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 ano-
ther, as fuited bed with their convenience or inclination.
They were rot, therefore, improperly called, by their
neighbours
•^ St Hierom, ad Ctefiphon,