however, can scarcely be maintained save by those who have only seen the title; the most superficial inspection will be sufficient to induce a very different conclusion. Arnold Blair may have, on some occasion, officiated as chaplain to Wallace, and, proud of the distinction, in imitation of his namesake, may have made the ill-arranged excerpts from Fordun, for the purpose of handing down his own name in connexion with that of the illustrious defender of his country: but the confident manner in which Henry refers to _his_ author, as evidence of facts which are not alluded to, even in the most distant manner, in the work of Arnold, shows the impossibility of its being the foundation of his narrative; for we cannot suppose that an author, wishing to pass off a tissue of fables for a series of truths, would act with so much inconsistency, as to court detection by referring for authority to a quarter where he was sure of finding none. When Henry introduced his translation to the public, the approbation with which it was received may very justly be viewed as the test of its correctness, there being no scarcity of men in the country capable of collating it with the original, and detecting the imposition, if any existed; and it may therefore reasonably be inferred, that the excellency of the translation was such as to supersede the original; being, from its language, more accessible to all classes than the other, which, on that account, was more likely to go into desuetude, and ultimately to disappear. The character of Minstrel which has been attached to Henry,--joined to the vulgar and disgusting translation of his work into modern Scotch, by Hamilton of Gilbertfield,--has, it is presumed, injured his reputation as a historian, more than any deviation he has made from the authentic records of the country. No other work of his exists, or is known to have existed, which might entitle him to rank as a minstrel; but being called upon--and possibly compelled by circumstances--to recite his translation in the presence of the great, he received a minstrel’s reward, and became, perhaps improperly, confounded with the profession. Had Barbour, Wyntown, Langtoft and other authors, who wrote their chronicles in rhyme, been quoted by subsequent writers as minstrels, it would no doubt have weakened their authority as historians. These men, however, professed to give, though in verse, a faithful register of the transactions of their country. Henry seems to have had only the same object in view; and thus endeavours to impress the reader with the fidelity of the translation, and the disinterestedness of his motives:--