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lviii He adduces, further, the testimony of geology, the finding of primitive boats in gravelly deposits at Stobcross and Glasgow Cross, high above present sea level, and the absence of Celtic names from the lower lands about the vale of Clyde. To this may be added the support of the latest Scottish historian. Dr. Wylie remarks, "In the face of the cliff that bounds the carse (of Stirling) on the north, at an elevation to which the tide never rises in our day, is still visible the iron ring to which the fisherman made fast his boat at eve." It may also be remembered that the Roman road to the north stopped at Camelon, near Falkirk, now three miles from the sea, but then doubtless washed by the tide, for the tradition still lingers in the village of ships being moored to its street. A sea-passage, therefore, within Roman times, must have existed over Crinan. This fact, living still in Ossian's poetry, but forgotten otherwise for the last thousand years, and certainly unknown to James Macpherson, Dr. Waddell considers sufficient to establish both the antiquity and the authenticity of these "tales of the times of old."

For the introduction to "Berrathon," the same author finds both confirmation and locality in the geography, antiquities, and traditions of Arran. Macpherson did not know this island, and confesses himself unable to localise the passage.