forinerly pragtifed in Scotland. 343 
Romans; and that fome Saxon coins have been alfo 
found in many of thefe Cairns ;* and likewife, that 
the inftruments of iron were in a _ ftate of 
high prefervation, it would appear very improbable 
they could have been ufed above eight or nine 
hundred years ago; a period at which the Saxons 
governed in this country, who might have 
borrowed the cuftom of burning the dead from 
the Romans.f¢ If thefe had been inftruments of 
torture 
* Several of thefe different articles were found in 
Cairns, in the parifh of Croffmichael, and a f{pecimen of 
eath were prefented fome years ago, by William Copland, 
Efq. of Collieftone, my brother, to the Antiquarian So- 
ciety of Edinburgh, with a view to their prefervation, Re- 
peated inftances occur in Sir John Sinclair’s Statiftical 
_Account, under the head of Antiquities, of circumftances 
corroborative of my opinions, particularly in the account 
of the parifh of Leflie, volume VI. page 52. A Hearth, 
exaétly fuch as that firft defcribed by me, was difcovered 
in the the bottom of a Cairn, with a quantity of burnt 
bones, rings, and points of {pears lying upon it. 
+ This agrees entirely with what we find in the Poems of 
Offian, The graves of his heroes were known by a 
few large ftones fet upright, and no notice is taken of 
the Funeral Pile, or of the Tumulus or Cairn, which muft 
have been introduced pofterior to the period in which thefe 
Poems were compofed. Some fuch ftones are ftill known to 
remain. A defcription of the Sepulchre of King Galdus, 
or Galgacus, was {ent by Robert Riddel, Efq. of 
Glenriddel, to. the Antiquarian Society of biiaiies and 
will piubably foon be publifhed, It is entirely of this kind; 
for he lived at the commencement of this period, 
