mysterious designs on great rocks among the neighbouring hills. {4} What
man of artistic skill, no conscience, and a knowledge of archaic patterns
is associated with the Clyde?

The "faker" is not the mere mischievous wag of the farm-house or the
country shop. It is possible that a few "interpolations" of false
objects have been made by another and less expert hand, but the weight of
the problem rests on these alternatives,--the disputed relics which were
found are mainly genuine, though unfamiliar; or a forger not destitute of
skill and knowledge has invented and executed them--or--there is some
other explanation.

Three paths, as usual, are open to science, in the present state of our
knowledge of the question. We may pronounce the unfamiliar relics
genuine, and prove it if we can. We may declare them to be false
objects, manufactured within the last ten years. We may possess our
souls in patience, and "put the objects to a suspense account," awaiting
the results of future researches and of new information.

This attitude of suspense is not without precedent in archaeology.
"Antiquarian lore," as Dr. Munro remarks by implication, _can_
"distinguish between true and false antiquities." {5a} But time is
needed for the verdict, as we see when Dr. Munro describes "the Breonio
Controversy" about disputed stone objects, a controversy which began in
1885, and appears to be undecided in 1905. {5b} I propose to advocate
the third course; the waiting game, and I am to analyse Dr. Munro's very
able arguments for adopting the second course, and deciding that the
unfamiliar relics are assuredly impostures of yesterday's manufacture.

II--DR. MUNRO'S BOOK ON THE MYSTERY

Dr. Munro's acute and interesting book, _Archaeology and False
Antiquities_, {6} does not cover the whole of its amusing subject. False
gems, coins, inscriptions, statues, and pictures are scarcely touched
upon; the author is concerned chiefly with false objects of the
pre-historic and "proto-historic" periods, and with these as bearing on
the Clyde controversy of 1896-1905. Out of 292 pages, at least 130 treat
directly of that local dispute: others bear on it indirectly.

I have taken great interest in this subject since I first heard of it by
accident, in the October or November of 1898. As against Dr. Munro, from
whose opinions I provisionally dissent, I may be said to have no _locus
standi_. He is an eminent and experienced archaeologist