reading 1826 birth register

[Gadget]

It could have been Walter. The date was 20th March.  If the headstone just gave ages, it is a strong possible. I've seen many stones with an approx age (and some down right wrong!)

[GR2]

You are Right, Gadget, that it's the name of the mother which is missing. I assumed, since only the end of the entry was shown that we were dealing with witnesses and that the parents' names had been given earlier.

[Gadget]

The snip is more or less the whole of the entry, GR.  I've just been looking at it again and it's as if the note of the baptism had been mislaid before it was entered in the register and done from memory. 

[pergamond]

I think it was Walter Riddle. There was only one birth in 1826 in Inverness with a father John Riddle, according to Scotland's People.

So the Inverness births:-
Helen born 1823 according to both the 1851 census and her 1854 gravestone
Walter born 1826 according to 1845 gravestone and this register (about 1825 according to 1841 census)
Thomas born 1829 according to 1851 census and 1898 death record.

Fantastic. I feel I'm getting somewhere inch by inch.