bank. I have a mind to complete my account of Royal and Noble Authors, for which I have amassed a great number of additions, both of works and omitted writers. I shall therefore be much obliged to you, if, without interrupting your own much more valuable writings, you can favor me with that list.

All I know of Lord Elibank's publications are the following:

1. Inquiry into the Origin and Consequence of the Public Debts.

2. Thoughts on Money, Circulation and Paper Currency, Edinburgh, 1758.

3. A pamphlet on the Scotish Peerage, 1771. (I do not know the title.)

I have a very imperfect memorandum, made long ago, and which, being only written with a pencil, is almost effaced, so that all that remains legible are these words, "Lord Lyttleton's correspondence-Lord Elibank's answer to." I recollect that it alluded to some remarkable anecdote; but my memory grows superannuated, and I cannot recover it: have you any idea?

I do not even know Lord Elibank's Christian name: was it Patrick?

In 1778 I cut out of a newspaper almost a whole column, containing an account of the death and character of Patrick, Lord Elibank; and, as he is there described as a very aged man, I conclude it was the lord I remember, who married the widow of Lord North and Grey, and was brother to Mr. Alexander Murray, imprisoned by the House of Commons.

When I have the pleasure of seeing you here, (which I shall hope will be in about a fortnight, when I shall be free from all engagements), I will, if you care to see it, trouble you with a sight of my intended supplement, to which, perhaps, you can contribute some additions, as I think you told me. I am in no haste: for I only intend to leave it behind me, and have actually put all the materials in order, except the article of Lord Elibank. I do not pretend to show you any thing worthy of your curiosity, for nothing is more trifling than my writings; and I am glad to lay you under a sort of debt of communication in which I am sure of being overpaid.

I can tell you, what is truly curious; I have a list (over and above those whom I shall mention, being dead) of at least thirty living authors and authoresses: Would not one think this a literary age? Perhaps, you was not aware of what a mass of genius the House of Lords is possessed-I ought rather to say the peerage of the three kingdoms; and of all, except of two of the ladies, (who are five) the works are in print: I will show you the catalogue-nay, you shall have a copy, if you please; lest so many illustrious names should be lost, when I, their painful chronicler, am not alive to record them. Nor is there an atom of vanity in that expression: books of peerage are like the precious spices that embalm corpses and preserve the dead for ages.

REV. DR. CHARLES O'CONOR TO MR.

PINKERTON.

June 30th, 1787.

Unremitting rheumatic pains prevented my writing to you as early as I would wish on the subject of the Scots kings of North Britain; and indeed I am still unable to write but very slowly. In the course of the last winter I have remitted to Colonel Vallancey, for your inspection, a copy (with an annexed translation) of the verses which recite a list of the kings of the Albanian Scots, from Loarne and Fergus, the sons of Erk, to Malcolm III.

Of the poem (the duain) I never could find a second copy; nor did Mr. O'Flaherty meet with any copies more just to the original: perhaps a more genuine copy may yet be discovered in Oxford, or in some manuscripts of the Chandos Collection. The ancient manuscripts of your own country have long since been carried away, perhaps destroyed, by Edward I., king of England.

According to the Ancient Documents still preserved in Ireland, the Scots had no considerable settlement in Albany, before one made by Carbry, otherwise Eocho Riada, a son of Conary II., king of Ireland, and the cousin-german of Cormac, who was one of the best and wisest monarchs that ever reigned in Ireland. That Cormac, about the middle of the third century, assisted Carbry Riada with troops, conducted by the celebrated

Finan Mac Cumhal, his son-in-law, a commander so highly celebrated in our Irish romances.

The establishment then made was in course of time weakened.

The Dalriada family were necessitated to retire for some time to their principality in the Irish Dalriada (the county of Antrim at present),

In the beginning of the sixth century, the race of Conary II. re-established themselves, and extended their limits in Britain. Their expedition was conducted under the sons of Erk, then strengthened by matrimonial connexions with this royal family, which then swayed and for 500 years after possessed the crown of Ireland. On the revolution under the sons of Erk, Loarne obtained the title of the king; but, being at the time past his seventieth year, the administration was wholly in the hands of his brother Fergus: accordingly, some of our senachies omit Loarne in the Scotch Catalogue, and name Fergus as first monarch; and properly enough they extend his reign to twenty-six years. By an ignorance in history easily demonstrated, Buchanan and most of your countrymen antedate the expedition under Fergus a hundred years; and the catalogue they give of their kings, down to Keneth Mac Alpine, is partly false and partly deranged.

The verses I sent you would be our best document relating to the succession of the Scots kings, had we a genuine copy: vitiated as it has been, it is remarkable that the list given in those verses agrees exactly with that in our annals, from Fergus to the decease of Ambkellach (your Am

berkelethus), through a period of 216 years, under the government of seventeen monarchs.

After the decease of Ambkellach to the reign of Donall, A. D. 895, the poem has been vitiated. There is a derangement in the succession, and an omission of kings to complete the number required in the concluding lines of that poem. Here is a disorder of 176 years. From the death of Donall, the Irish and Scotch agree, to the end of the Scotish line, A. D. 1689.

MR. PINKERTON TO THE EARL OF BUCHAN.

Knightsbridge, July 30th, 1787.

I am glad to hear that Barbour is about to be published from the manuscript, and shall with pleasure give a Preface, Life of the Author, Notes and Glossary, as I promised, to Messrs. Morison. The greatest object of this edition must be to print it from the manuscript literatim; so as to say in the title-page, "The First Genuine Edition, printed from a manuscript of the year 1489." Perhaps it would be well if your lordship requested Lord Hailes to inspect the transcript and collate it, if he would take the trouble. He might perhaps also add a few notes, which must of course be sent to me, that I may not repeat what he has said. It will be better not to hurry this work; and Messrs. Morison can go on with Dunbar's Poems in the mean time. There is no necessity for sending the proofs to me; but I should like to see the first