The genuine history of the Britons asserted against Mr. Macpherson ...

266 THE GENUINE HISTORY OF
Mr. Macpherfon, however, has taken the former
queftion for the latter, and argues from that.
Not attempting to prove, that no Irlfh palTed
over hito the Highlands, and communicated their
own name of Scot to the Highlanders, he cndea-
Tours to prove only, that the Highlanders do
not now acknowledge any Irifli appellation for
their own. This, we fee, is foreign to his pur-
pofe. The Highlanders may not do it, and yet
may have been conquered by the Irifh Scots, and
may therefore be denominated Scots by others.
The Welih do not acknowledge the appellation
of Englifh, though they have been conquered bv
them, and are therefore reputed as Englifh
in every nation abroad. And the Saxons of all
Valentia, being now reduced under the dominion
of the Scots, are regularly confidered as fvich
even among their brethren of England.
But there is ftill another remark to be made
upon this argument, which evinces ftill more the
great want of precifion and diflinftnefs in Mr.
Macpherfon's ideas and reafonings.—Even if the
Highlanders had been peculiarly denominated
Albanich or Albanii, even if this had proved
them the peculiar progeny of the iirfl colonifts
of Britain, and even if the queftion had been,
whether the whole body of the Caledonians was
derived from the Irlili ; all theie conceffions
jft'ould not have enabled the argument to prove
the