131 account of antiquities iii Sc6tland. *Jan. i'^- 



for the silence of our profefsed critics. His volumes 

 are in cverj hand, and his praises on every tongue, 



BoMBARDINION. 



Laurencekirk, January ». 179a. 



AN ACCOUNT OF ANTIQUITIES IN SCOTLAND «. 



Nothing seems to be so well calculated for throwing 

 light on the origin of nations, as an attention to the 

 radical construction of the language of the people, and 

 to the nature of those monuments of remote antiquity 

 that have escaped the ravages of time. 



Much has been written about the origin of the Scot- 

 tifh nation. And although some attention has been 

 paid to the nature of the language of the natives, 

 the antiquities of the country have been, in a great 

 measure, disregarded ; though it fhould seem that tile 

 last would be of greater utility in this discufsion, than 

 the first of these particulars. For a language may 

 have been spread through so many nations at a very 

 remote period, and is subject to such perpetual vasi- 

 ations, and it is so difficult to trace these variations 

 before the discovery of letters, that there is no pofsi- 

 bility of pointing out, by any vinequivocal peculiarities 

 <.'f language, the particular nation from wliich any 

 particular tribe may have descended. But the mechanic 

 arts, discovered by any particular nation, especially 

 before commerce was generally practised, were in a 

 preat measure confined to the orijiinal discoverers 



* Some pr.rts of tlie following description have been published, but 

 a great part of the observations never before appeared in prir.t.. These are 

 now given for the sake of conocction. 



