Hi Joan, I presume you are looking at the National Index for the Census on CD-Rom. As the name is Mackay try looking at all the variations available for the surname. Some could be M'Kay (a lot of enumerator used an apostrophe instead of a c), McKay, Macay and even one I found recently looking at another name....try looking at someone called say John M. Kay. The enumerator putting the M as a middle initial. There are a lot of transcription errors in the 1881 CD. You have to try every variation you can think of (and some you can't), as the transcribers usually had no knowledge of the area they are looking at. Some of the handwriting can be attrocious and there can be a lot of scoring over words that can make the job even more difficult. The major error is when looking at Sutherland county. It's in the first version of the CD as Sunderland (I dont know about more recent versions of the index). You have to remember that the index is no substitute for looking at the original or the microfilm copy of the original. If your agent was generally trust-worthy and produced work of a good quality then I'd go with the transcription he or she gave you. Regards Sara Donaldson