About four centuries after the Roman invasion, a colony of Scots (Irish) migrated to {250} the opposite coast, under Fergus, and set up their little kingdom in Argyleshire, taking with them, perhaps, the sacred "Stone of Destiny" upon which a long line of Irish kings had been crowned, and which tradition asserts was "Jacob's Pillow." The Picts and the Irish Scots were both of the Celtic race, and if they fought, it was as brothers do, ready in an instant to embrace and make common cause, which they first did against the Romans. A common enemy is the surest healer of domestic feuds, and there were many of these to bring together the two Celtic branches dwelling on the same soil after the fifth century. Then came the more peaceful fusion through a common religious faith. St. Columba had been preceded by St. Nimian. But it was the Irish saint from Donegal who did for the Picts what St. Patrick had done for the Irish Scots. In the history of the Church there has never been an awakening of purer spiritual ardor than that which irradiated from Columba's monastery at Iona. Why the Irish Scots, occupying only a small bit of territory, should have fastened their name upon the land of their adoption {251} is not known. Perhaps it was the magic of that Stone of Destiny! The Picts had the political centre of their kingdom at Scone, on the river Tay. It was in 844 that Kenneth M'Alpin made war upon the Irish Scots, the little kingdom in Argyle was merged with that of the Picts, and by the eleventh century the latter name had disappeared and the name Scotland was applied to the whole country. In the two centuries following this union there were four reigns, in which wars between hostile clans were diversified by wars with invading Danes, and with the Angles near the border, with whom there was a chronic struggle, caused by aggressions upon both sides. Malcolm II. succeeded in defeating the Angles on the Tweed, seized Lothian, incorporated this bit of old England with his own kingdom, then died, in 1034, leaving his throne to his grandson, Duncan. There was the same play of fierce ambitions upon this small stage as on larger ones. Scottish thanes strove to undermine and supplant other thanes, just as Norman barons and Scotch-English earls would do later, and as in other lands and at all times, the dream of aspiring, intriguing nobles {252} was by some happy chance to snatch the crown and reign at Scone.