INTRODUCTION 



It was hoped at one time, that a short preface to this work would 

 have sufficed, but in order to show properly the trend of the 

 author's intentions, it has had to be extended in the form of an 

 introduction farther than might be otherwise thought necessary. 



For a long time a treatise on the various subjects hereinafter 

 dealt with has been a "felt want," and the present work owes 

 its existence to the efforts as after detailed to supply that want, 

 as also the humble, but sincere, desire to assist by placing even a 

 small stone on the ever-increasing cairn of Celtic literature. 



A.life-long love of Celtic subjects enabled material to be collected 

 by me therefor from time to time, and the work might have seen 

 the light several years ago, were it not that many persons were 

 under the impression that the late " Nether Lochaber " intended 

 writing a special work on Celtic natural history, than whom, 

 indeed, no one was more capable. Alas ! he died without fulfilling 

 that expectation, and the material for the present work is the 

 labour of upwards of a quarter of a century, collected not only from 

 an innate love of the subject, but in the hope that it might prove 

 of some use in the event of such a work being undertaken by 

 " Nether Lochaber " as above referred to. In the course of inquiries 

 which were made as to this, and also as to whether " Nether 

 Lochaber" had left any MS. bearing thereon, it was suggested 

 that as I had made the collection, it should form the basis of such 

 a work, and great hopes were held out as to its ultimate educational 

 success. 



Though somewhat staggered at the suggestion, seeing no one 

 else was likely to take the matter up, I commenced the arrange- 

 ment of the material I had collected since 1873, and entered upon 

 a systematic search for more, with the result, after various vicissi- 

 tudes, and very great labour in the few intervals of a busy 

 professional life, latterly also much hampered by sickness, of 

 being now able to present to my fellow-countrymen, and others 

 at home and abroad, the first work of the kind. The work is not 



