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xii Inverness-shire in 1738, he was sufficiently familiar with the Celtic language and character, while an education for the kirk at the universities of Aberdeen and Edinburgh had furnished him with the scholarship necessary for the selection and translation of such works of merit as might be discovered. He had also already shewn some evidence of literary taste. A few poetical pieces by him had appeared in the Scots Magazine; he had published in 1758 a poem in six cantos, entitled The Highlander; and he had written an ode upon the arrival of the Earl Marischal in Scotland. All these facts pointed him out as qualified in a marked degree for the task, and accordingly he was commissioned to undertake a tour through the Highlands for the purpose of collecting and preserving the remains of Gaelic poetry.

Before the rebellion of 1745 the chief amusement of the Highlanders during the long dark nights of winter had been the recital of ancient tales and poems; and many old people who remembered these still survived when Macpherson made his enquiries. He travelled through such remote parts of north-west Inverness-shire, Skye, and the western isles as were most likely to retain these traditionary remains in their most perfect form; and it was not long before he discovered that the finest of the