Bede was born and spent the most of his days in the neighbourhood of the Firth of Forth. He died in the year 734.

If the "Ecclesiastical History of the English," as it is now published, were to be considered as all the original production of Bede, it would be a truly wonderful work for the time and country in which he lived. That it is largely interpolated, however, is borne out by several circumstances. The most cogent of these is the silence of the later English annalists regarding events which are treated of in Bede's work at great length. These writers all quote from the Ecclesiastical History frequently, and praise Bede highly, but they omit all notice of several important incidents which the later ancient English historians would assuredly have referred to if they had had a place in the genuine work of Bede. Roger of Wendover even quotes the work always under the title of the "History of the English" only; and a minute comparison of his history and Bede's shows that most of the ecclesiastical notices in the work have been engrafted with the original history after Wendover's time. This does not much concern us at present, however, but if English writers care to take the trouble of comparing the two works, word by word, they would be astonished to find to what an extent the early ecclesiastical history of their country had been tampered with.

As none of the original manuscripts of Bede's work seem to be extant, it is now difficult to trace all the interpolations; but the first version in modern English, which was published in 1565, immediately after the Reformation in England and Scotland, was issued under the auspices of a priesthood who cannot be regarded as free from the suspicion of having tampered with other

works than that of the Venerable Bede. It was dedicated to Queen Elizabeth, and the following passage occurs in the dedication: "In this History Your Highness shall see in how many and weighty points the pretended reformers of the Church in your Grace's dominions have departed from the pattern of that sound and catholic faith planted first among Englishmen by holy St Augustine our apostle, and his virtuous company, described truly and sincerely by Venerable Bede, so called in all Christendom for his passing virtues and rare learning, the Author of this history."

In analysing the passages in the Ecclesiastical History relating to Scotland and Ireland, an endeavour will be made to separate the genuine from the spurious, though this may not always be successful. Notwithstanding this, we hope to be able to show that Bede's Scots were the inhabitants of north-eastern Scotland, and that this district was the country known to him by the name of Scotia. To accomplish this the passages referred to will be compared with parallel ones in the Saxon Chronicle, and the works of Gildas, Ethelwerd, Florence of Worcester, Henry of Huntingdon, William of Malmesbury, and Roger of Wendover. This will throw additional light on the Ireland-Scotia controversy, and probably lead to a settlement of it. Considered along with the proofs already produced, and those to follow, they point clearly to the fact that Ireland never was called Scotia or Scotland.

It may be as well to say that several of those later annals are interpolated as well as Bede's work. Separate estimates of their value in this respect will be afterwards given, in producing the testimony they afford on the question at issue. Suffice it to say, in the mean

time, that Florence of Worcester's Annals, and Henry of Huntingdon's History (this latter being first printed in England along with Bede's work), are very largely interpolated. Henry of Huntingdon affirms that he had relied principally on Bede's information in writing his history, but he does not generally copy it literally, except in the interpolated passages. The others are very sparsely interpolated; Gildas and Ethelwerd being apparently almost entirely free from this plague.

Roger of Wendover's work is the most valuable for the purpose on hand, as although it has been interpolated with the view of identifying Hibernia with Ireland, or perhaps written after the former name had been transferred from Iceland, it seems to have escaped being tampered with in order to connect the Scots and Scotia with Ireland. This is perhaps owing to an original manuscript of the work which had escaped the hands of the manipulators of early Scottish history having been discovered at a late date.

In the comparison, the translations of the works named, published in Bohn's Antiquarian Library, have been principally used, as they are accessible to the majority of readers. Of course Ireland nearly always appears in the original editions as Hibernia, but the translated name has been used, in order to avoid confusion between the ancient and modern Hibernia, and to show which country it is supposed to refer to by the translators.

A FABRICATED CHAPTER.

The first chapter of the "Ecclesiastical History" is entitled: "Of the situation of Britain and Ireland, and

of their ancient inhabitants." At the beginning of it, we are told that Britain was formerly called Albion; and a description of that country is then given. After which the following passages occur:

"This island at present, following the number of the books in which the Divine Law was written, contains five nations, the English, Britons, Scots, Picts, and Latins, each in its own peculiar dialect cultivating the sublime study of Divine truth. The Latin tongue is, by the study of the Scriptures, become common to all the rest. At first this island had no other inhabitants but the Britons, from whom it derived its name, and who, coming over into Britain, as is reported, from Armorica, possessed themselves of the southern parts thereof. When they, beginning at the south, had made themselves masters of the greatest part of the island, it happened that the nation of the Picts, from Scythia, as is reported, putting to sea, in a few long ships, were driven by the winds beyond the shores of Britain, and arrived on the northern coasts of Ireland, where, finding the nation of the Scots, they begged to be allowed to settle among them, but could not succeed in obtaining their request. The Picts, accordingly, sailing over into Britain, began to inhabit the northern parts thereof. Now the Picts had no wives, and asked them of the Scots; who would not consent to grant them upon any other terms, than that when any difficulty should arise, they should choose a king from the female royal race rather than from the male; which custom, as is well known, has been observed among the Picts to this day. In process of time, Britain, besides the Britons and the Picts, received a third nation, the Scots, who, migrating from Ireland under their leader, Reuda, either by fair means, or by force of arms, secured to themselves those settlements among the Picts which they still possess. From the name of their commander, they are to this day called Dalreudins; for in their language, Dal signifies a part. Ireland, in breadth, and for wholesomeness and serenity of climate far surpasses Britain. It is properly the country of the Scots, who, migrating from thence, as has been said, added a third nation in Britain to the Britons and the Picts. There is a very

large gulf of the sea, which formerly divided the nation of the Picts from the Britons; which gulf runs from the west very far into the land, where, to this day, stands the strong city of the Britons, called Alcluith. The Scots, arriving on the north side of this bay, settled themselves there."

As the information given above will be found to be contradicted by more reliable testimony, it seems probable that the greater part of this chapter is fabricated. Only one of the ancient English annalists, besides Bede, appears to take notice of these events, and that one is the least trustworthy on such a subject, namely, Henry of Huntingdon. Something similar appears in copies of the Saxon Chronicle, but these are known to be of a late date. It is awanting in the earliest manuscript extant. But this is not the greatest objection to these passages; and it is questionable whether a single line of the whole chapter be genuine or not. Albion, for instance, is not mentioned as the ancient name of Britain by any trustworthy writer, and Alban or Albany is confined in authentic records and the Celtic legends to a part of Scotland. The word English (Anglorum), too, used twice in this chapter, is not likely to have been a word used by Bede to designate the Anglo-Saxon inhabitants of England in his day. It was an ambiguous word then; and it will be found to occur generally, if not only, in the fabricated passages of the Ecclesiastical History.

In addition to this, it was not till the eighteenth century that Riada and his colony of Scots appeared in the pages of historians of Ireland. Kennedy, whose genealogical dissertation on the family of Stuart was published at Paris in 1705, and, though brief, is the most accurate work known on Irish history, as he