Ossian Collection > Life and letters of James Macpherson

34 JAMES MACPHEKSON.
in the possession of his descendants an impor-
tant document giving the same date/
Macpherson's birthplace, Ruthven, is a village
•on the north side of the Grampians, about half
way on the great Highland road between Perth
and Inverness. It is a village of some antiquity ;
and that it was anciently celebrated is probable
from the fact that it is one of the very few places
in the far North which Ptolemy (a.d. 140) men-
tions in his account of Britain. In the neigh-
bourhood may be found the remains of Druidical
circles and the vestiges of a Roman camp ; and it
is said that a Roman vase was once discovered
there. The old monastery of the parish had
long disappeared even in Macpherson's time ; but
enthusiastic antiquaries, not a great many years
ago, pointed out the ruins of it, or at least of
some ancient building devoted to religious uses.
^ In Nicholls' Literary Anecdotes, ix. 525, the date on
the tomb is, by a curious mistake, given as 3rd. July, 1728.
The document now in the possession of Mr. Brewster Mac-
pherson is a inemorandum sent by a notary at Kuthven to
one of Macpherson's executors, the minister at Kingussie ;
and in view of the fact that the document is addressed to
his executor in the year following that of his death, it is fair
to conclude that the information which it supplies is the
source of the date given on the tomb in the Abbey, and that
this date is correct.