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the firfl conqueror down to the fifth century ; and the defcent 

 of the collateral branches is traced up to the royal ftem with fuch 

 precifion and confiftency, as fhews it to have been once a matter 

 of public concern. The later bards and fennachies could not 

 have fabricated tables that fhould have flood the teft of critical 

 examination as thefe will do; from whence I infer that they 

 have been a true tranfcript from antient records then extant, 

 but fince deftroyed. I am ready, however, to admit that the 

 hiftory of the tranfadions of thofe times is mixed with the 

 fidions of later ages,, and lefs to be depended on, as we have 

 at this day no fixed criterion to diftinguifh falfhood from truth ; 

 it is therefore neither to be received nor rejeded in the grofs, 

 but to be read with a fceptical caution, and to be admitted only 

 fo far as it is confiftent with probability, with the teftimony 

 of cotemporary hiflorians, and with itfelf. So far, and no far- 

 ther, I {hall therefore have recourfe to its authority on the prefent 

 queftion. Granting therefore, as I have before obferved, that 

 the antient inhabitants of Ireland might have come from the 

 adjacent coafts of Britain, and were not extirpated, but only 

 fubdued by the Milefian invaders, it is very probable that the 

 intercourfe between the natives of Caledonia, and thofe of the 

 province of Ulfter (which took its rife from their original con- 

 nexion and vicinity) might have continued to fubfift, notwith- 

 ftanding their having afterwards become abfolutely diftind na- 

 tions in a politicaf fenfe. This intercourfe would have much 

 increafed, and the alliance been farther cemented, when it be- 

 came their mutual intereft to join their forces againft the Ro- 

 mans : The Caledonians to preferve their liberty, and the Irifh 

 to keep the enemy from attacking their's ; which they were in 



no 



