Third. Henry de Baliol was chamberlain in the reign of Alexander
the Second, and not of Alexander the Third. Thomas Hostarius
belongs to the same reign, and has been succeeded by his son Alan
long before the date of this charter."

Dr Skene adds that if the Earl of Cromartie was not himself the
actual inventor of the whole story, it must have taken its rise not
very long before his day, for, he says, "no trace of it is to be
found in the Irish MSS., the history of the Geraldine family knows
nothing of it, and MacVureach, who must have been acquainted with
the popular history of the western clans, was equally unacquainted
with it." ['Celtic Scotland,' Vol. III., pp. 351-354.]

This fully corroborates all that was said in the preceding pages
regarding the Fitzgerald-Irish origin of the Mackenzies and which
every intelligent clansman, however biassed, must now admit in his
inner consciousness to be fully and finally disposed of. Having,
however, quoted Skene's earlier views on the general claim by
the Highland chiefs for alien progenitors it may be well to give
here his more mature conclusions from his later and greater work,
especially as some people, who have not taken the trouble to read
what he writes, have been saying that the great Celtic historian
had seen cause to change his views on these important points in
Highland genealogy since he wrote his 'Highlands and Highlanders'
in 1839. After examining them all very closely and exhaustively
in a long and learned chapter of some forty pages, he says -

"The conclusion, then, to which this analysis of the clan pedigrees
which have been popularly accepted at different times has brought
us, is that, so far as they profess to show the origin of the