nt of the river in its thirty miles of course is not much. The
surface of Loch Earn, James' Square in Crieff, and the Manse of Muthill,
across the valley, are as nearly as possible on the same level. The Earn
may be sectioned as follows:--From Loch Earn to the Bridge of Comrie;
thence to the Bridge of Crieff; thence to the Bridge of Kinkell; thence
to Bridge of Earn; thence to junction of Earn with Tay. For our present
purpose we may stop near Forteviot, at the Earn boundary of the
Presbytery of Auchterarder.

Before we can rightly appreciate the more or most ancient Christian
history of the Strath, we require to lay aside, and partly reverse,
certain modern associations as to lines of travel. We think of
Strathearn as running westward from Auchterarder, which lies on both the
turnpike and railway route from Stirling to Perth. But in the days of
our early Christianity it was mainly the sea on each coast that joined
north and south of Scotland; whereas the more frequented routes were
across country from west to east, because the west was then the seat of
government and source of culture. Our early Christianity came from
Ireland, and the route was by the Firth of Clyde, where Kintyre, Arran,
Cumbrae, Bute, Kilmun, Dumbarton, Luss, and Balquhidder were all already
provided with places of worship. The Vale of Leven and Loch Lomond were
the natural approaches from the west to the upper end of Loch Earn and
Strathearn. Another route connecting Perthshire with Iona was by Loch
Etive, Dalmally, Tyndrum, and Glendochart. But the Leven and Loch Lomond
route, judging by the saints to whom the oldest churches were dedicated,
was the actual one usually traversed in reaching the valley of the Earn.

The oldest settlement is that of S. Fillan, at Dundurn. His day in the
Kalendar is June 22, and he died about 520 A.D. Dundurn=Dun d'Earn. In
the martyrology of Donegal (for he was a pure Irish Celt) he is called of
Rath Erann--_i.e._, the fort on the Earn. Besides the old chapel and
burial-ground, a memorial of the Saint is in Dunfillan, where are his
chair and well. A fine eye for the picturesque the good man must have
had to select a hill of so striking aspect and commanding so charming a
landscape as Dunfillan. A little later Dunfillan became a king's seat or
fort. S. Fillan is called _an lobar_, leper, or perhaps stammerer, to
distinguish him from S. Fillan the abbot, connected with Strathfillan and
Killin, whose day