posed to take place by the intervention of vesicular bags, with minute external orifices along each side of the body, from one extremity to the other, unconnected internally with the mouth, and having simple walls. In the lamprey, the male and female organs of generation appear, from the observations of Sir Everard Home, to be united in the same individuals, so as to render conjunction unnecessary; the eggs, when expelled, are naked, and each contains a single fœtus:-in the leech, the hermaphroditism requires the union of two individuals; the eggs, when expelled, are covered with a spongy matter, and each contains several young. In the lamprey, progress is made through the water by a laterally undulating motion of the body :-in the leech, progress is made through the water by a vertically undulating motion, or, over hard substances, by a sucker on the tail, acting alternately with the one on the head, like the geometers among caterpillers. In the lamprey, rest is secured by the sucker at the mouth, the tail being free: -in the leech, rest is secured by the caudal sucker, the head being free, or by both suckers acting simultaneously. Such being the vast differences existing in the organization of the two animals, we may well be astonished that any individual who had ever made the comparison should have been able to perceive very evident affinities,' where there existed only a few very remote and insignificant analogies. Nor need we hesitate to conclude that the hiatus between the vertebrata and annulosa is as great as that acknowledged to exist between the former and the mollusca. These defects in the system occur in those parts of the circle which are best known, and where the organization of the species is least obscure. In connecting the other circles, defects equally remarkable and extensive might be pointed out, were it necessary to enlarge; for whenever a relation of affinity is wanting, analogical resemblances are eagerly sought after, and incautiously employed; the judgment is deceived; and the imagination, unchecked, rears an edifice, which the breath of truth may destroy in a moment. In the course of the efforts which have been made to establish the quinarian system, we have witnessed a classification of animals, founded on the characters of their circulating and respiring organs, sacrificed, with scarcely the shadow of apology, to hypothetical views. The division of animals into vertebral and invertebral, founded on considerations connected with the nervous system, has likewise been rejected, because it does not state enough; and that the young naturalist, placing full reliance on it, may be led to conceive that animals have been formed on only two distinct plans.' This statement, however, exhibits a very inaccurate view of the subject: for, while the vertebral group is > declared declared as formed on a plan (and this no one will deny), the invertebral group is distinguished only by the negative mark, being destitute of a vertebral column, and concomitant characters. Nay, so much convinced is the author of the Hora Entomologica' of the existence of only two plans in the animal kingdom, that he acknowledges that the vertebrata are the perfection of one plan of organization, as the annulosa may be of another.' From thus overlooking the dichotomous method, on the one hand, as the only natural guide to discrimination, primary groups occupy the same station with such as are of subordinate rank; the logical genus is confounded with species, the major with the minor proposition: while, from disregarding the physiological groups or systems of organs, on the other hand, as the index of affinities, one set of organs are employed to establish a connection here, another to accomplish the same object there; confounding together analogy and affinity in that very system which calls most loudly for their separation. Under such a mode of management may the circles selected be so connected, by some one of the various organs, as always to exhibit a relationship; and even, if their juxtaposition be altered, they may still display new bonds of connection, leading the author of the quinarian circle to exclaim, with him of the tripod, stabit quocunque jeceris.' If we abandon the principle by which subordination of rank among our groups is preserved, and attempt, by the exclusion of all negative characters, to have each of our classes or circles founded on some positive feature of organization, then will our primary groups be co-extensive with our genera. By limiting the primary groups to five, the quinarians thus abandon, in some measure, their own principles; and the same means which they employ to divide a group when a fifth is wanting, might enable them to subdivide others to the destruction, however, of the harmony of their system. What, but the most obvious prejudices in favour of hypothetical views, could induce Mr. Macleay to divide insecta into mandibulata and haustellata, and leave entire the arachnidæ ? Of this system, indeed, it has been well said by one of the most distinguished naturalists of the age- Mr. Macleay's whole system, upon paper, appears very harmonious and consistent, and bears a most seducing aspect of verisimilitude; but it has not yet been so thoroughly weighed, discussed, and sifted, as to justify our adopting it in toto at present.' Enough, we trust, has been advanced, in the preceding observations, to prove that its weakness is most apparent where its triumphs should have been the greatest, and that its author, while indulging the dream of being supported by evident affinities,' was in fact relying on very deceitful analogies. The The advocates for the existence of the law of continuity' among created beings in their mutual relations, have experienced no small degree of pain from those chasms which so frequently present themselves, and which prove so destructive to their speculations, as they occur, in equal abundance, among the best known groups as in those of most difficult investigation. They have attempted to train Nature to walk over a course, which they have marked out, with an equal pace. But, greatly to their annoyance, she occasionally makes a halt-as when she refused retractile claws to the hunting tiger; indulges in frolicsome leaps, as in passing from the vertebral to the invertebral animals; and completes the confusion of those who wish to train her, by bolting off the course, to convey Man to his rational throne. They have endeavoured to soothe their feelings by imagining that the unexplored regions of the globe may yet yield forms calculated to supply present deficiencies, and connect the detached links of the linear or circular chain. Much, no doubt, remains to be done in the discovery of species, and, perhaps, still more in comprehending the structure, functions, and distribution of those which systems have already recognised; but the boldest advocate of this scheme has not even ventured to hope for the discovery of a semirational species to fill up the greatest gap "which exists. Some misgivings seem to prevail even with respect to this supposed fertility of unknown regions. These naturalists have therefore ventured to call upon the hills and mountains to give up the organic remains which they possess, in order to furnish forms and structures calculated to connect anomalous groups, inclose aberrant genera, and give harmony and continuity to the system. Geology, however, in all its bearings, opposes the bold requisition. The strata present to the student the relics of various groups of organized beings; but these must be examined in the peculiar compartments which have been allotted to them. The fossils of the chalk rocks must not be mingled with those of the carboniferous limestone, nor with the species which now exist. All these must be studied as separate systems—the works of the same Omnipotent Creator-formed for particular purposes, and existing during different epochs ' of the capacious plan Which heaven spreads wide before the view of man.' ART. 328 ART. III.-History of Scotland. By Patrick Fraser Tytler, . Esq., F.R.S.E. and F.A.S. Volumes 1 and 2. 8vo. Edinburgh. IN 1829. N our last Number, we made some remarks on the history of the northern part of this island during those ages in which the light dawns slowly as the sunrise on a morning of mist. The present author has adopted for the subject of his work a period somewhat later than that at which we left off, and thus escapes the dim and doubtful discussion over which our heads have ached, and our readers' eyes have perhaps slumbered. Feeling our own optics a little too much dazzled by passing at once from the darkness of Kenneth Mac Alpine's period into the comparative full light of Alexander the Third's reign, we shall introduce our readers more gently to the latter era; nor can we do so without expressing our hope that Mr. Tytler may find time, before completing his projected labours, to furnish us with some preliminary matter in the shape of introduction, or otherwise, so as to inform his readers of what royal race Alexander sprung, and over what people he reigned. On this point it is singular to discover that the Scots, whose fabulous history represented them, down to the end of the eighteenth century, as a nation of the purest blood and most ancient descent in Europe, cair, notwithstanding that vaunt, be easily traced as a mixed race, formed out of the collision and subsequent union of several different populations, which remained slightly connected or occasionally dissevered, till the difference in their manners was worn away by time, and they coalesced at length into one people and kingdom. We have formerly shown that, in the year 496, a body of Irish, then called Scots, had colonised Argyllshire, and made fierce wars on the decaying province of Rome, by the assistance, doubtless, of those called Meatæ, or Middle Britons, who, subjected by the Romans during their power, rose against them when it began to decline. These Scots, moreover, made war upon the Caledonians, more latterly called Northern Picts or Deucaledonians, who had for ages been in possession of the greater part of Angusshire, Perthshire, Fife, and the north-east of Scotland up to the Moray firth. Beyond that estuary it would appear the Scandinavians had colonies upon the fertile shores of Moray, and among the mountains of Sutherland, of which the name speaks for itself that it was given by the Norwegians; and probably they had also settlements in Caithness and the Orcades. When, therefore, Kenneth finally defeated, dispersed, and destroyed the Picts, he obtained possession of the middle provinces of Scotland from sea sea to sea, having joined his original dominions on St. George's Channel to the eastern shores washed by the German Ocean. Behind him, to the north-east, lay the warlike and poor Scandinavians; but in front of his kingdom, and between that and the present English frontier, lay three states, enjoying a boisterous and unsettled independence, and each peopled by a mixed race. The first of these was Galloway, then extended considerably beyond the limits of the shires of Wigton and Kirkcudbright, to which the name is now limited. This remote and desolate region ere long acknowledged a vassalage to the crown; but being inhabited by a very brave and barbarous people, continued, substantially, a separate state till about 1234. Secondly, bounded on the east, and partly on the north, by Galloway, lay Strathclwyd, inhabited by British tribes, of the nation generally called Meatæ. These also were compelled to acknowledge the superiority of the throne. They may be generally described as occupying the territory from the castle of Dunbarton to near the village of Melrose; but their limits, like those of all savage nations, were variable and uncertain, as they failed or succeeded in wars with their neighbours. The last mention of the inhabitants of Strathclwyd, as a people having a separate kinglet or prince, occurs in 1018. Thirdly, still to the eastward of the Strathclwyd Britons lay the provinces now called Berwickshire and the three Lothians. This fertile country was the object of cupidity, in a much greater degre than the barren mountains of the more western frontier; and, after the decay of the Roman power, it lay peculiarly exposed to the inroads of the Picts, who appear to have settled there a large division of their nation, called Vecturiones, who mingled, doubtless, among such remains of Britons as might still dwell to the south of the Firth of Forth. But when the sword of the Saxons drove back the Pictish incursions, the victors appear to have won from the Picts all the flat country comprehending Berwickshire and East Lothian, and the greater part of West Lothian, which they joined to the Saxon kingdom of Deiria, or Northumberland. The Northumbrian Saxons being in their turn hard pressed by the Danes, their kingdom was so much weakened, that the Scots were tempted to cross the Firth of Forth, then called the Scottish Sea, for the purpose of occupying Lothian; and about SSO they made themselves masters of the keys of that province, Dunbar and Edwinsbury (Edinburgh). At a later period (961), Edgar, king of England, in a council held at York, divided the territory hitherto designated as Northumberland, into two parts: the more southern half corresponds with the modern county of Northumberland, the northern moiety comprehended Lothian and the district now called Berwickshire. Finding this latter division of |