inclines me to pay regard, not to what you shall say, but to what you shall prove. You may print this if you will.” We are told that the subject of the Pictish language has been thoroughly discussed by Dr. W. F. Skene in his _Four Ancient Books of Wales_, that, in addition to _Pean Fahel_, the sole Pictish word formerly known he has discovered four other distinct words, besides a number of syllables entering into proper names; and from all these he deduces the opinion that Pictish “Is not Welsh, neither is it Gaelic; but it is a Gaelic dialect partaking largely of Welsh forms” whatever that may mean. “More especially,” we are told, “he holds that Pictish as compared with Gaelic, was a _Low_ dialect, that it differed from the Gaelic in much the same way that Low German differs from High.” It is perhaps unnecessary to add that I regard this supposed solution of the Pictish difficulty as so much figment. It is simply the arbitrary conclusion of a man looking into a mill stone, and giving a deliverance in regard to which he is in no more commanding position than the most illiterate specimen of humanity to be found in the slums of the Northern Metropolis. On the other side of the question it is open to me to state that the Pictish words which Mr. Skene persuades himself he has discovered, and which on his own shewing are neither Welsh nor Gaelic but, belonging to a Low dialect of the latter may after all be only the obsolete remains of an early Gothic speech. The ruler of the Picts about the end of the sixth century, it is said, was _Brude_, the son of _Mailcon_, who died in 586. The most active of all the Pictish sovereigns, according to the received accounts, was _Hungus_ or _Ængus_ who began to reign in 730. In so far then as these names may not be absolute myth, they may be claimed as Scandinavian. With _Brude_ compare the Norse personal names _Brodi_, _Breid-r_, and _Brodd-r_ (the _r_ final separated by a hyphen being merely the sign of the nominative case). _Mailcon_ is the united Scandinavian personal names of _Miöl_ and _Kon-r_. With _Hungus_ or _Ængus_ compare the Scoto-Norwegian names _Magnus Anguson_, and _Angus Magnuson_. The Norwegians in Man, in the Hebrides, and in the North, and North-Western Highlands were confessedly the dominant and more numerous race, and there for upwards of four centuries held uninterrupted sway.