{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_76961/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_76961","id":"gutenberg_76961","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/76961","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Other","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Celtic literature -- History and criticism","Ireland -- In literature"],"text":"THE LITERATURE OF THE CELTS\n\n\n\n\n                                   BY\n\n                             MAGNUS MACLEAN\n                           M.A., D.Sc., LL.D.\n\n\n                             _NEW EDITION_\n\n\n                        BLACKIE AND SON LIMITED\n                 50 OLD BAILEY, LONDON; GLASGOW, BOMBAY\n                                  1926\n\n\n\n\n                                PREFACE\n\n\nCeltic studies have grown apace within recent years. The old scorn, the\nold apathy and neglect are visibly giving way to a lively wonder and\ninterest as the public gradually realise that scholars have lighted upon\na literary treasure hid for ages. This new enthusiasm, generated in\ngreat part on the Continent\u2014in Germany, France, and Italy, as well as in\nBritain and Ireland, has already spread to the northern nations\u2014to\nDenmark, Sweden, and Norway, and is now beginning to take root in\nAmerica.\n\nA remarkable change it certainly presents from the days when Dr. Johnson\naffirmed that there was not in all the world a Gaelic MS. one hundred\nyears old; and the documents were so derelict and forgotten, so little\nknown and studied, that though this prince of letters travelled in the\nHighlands expressly to satisfy himself, Celtic knowledge of the existing\nmaterials and Celtic studies were so deficient that they proved wholly\ninadequate to the task of disproving his bold statement.\n\nIt was left to the scholarship of the nineteenth century to unearth the\nancient treasures and to show that Gaelic was a literary language long\nbefore English literature came into existence, and that there are still\nextant Celtic-Latin MSS. almost as old as the very oldest codexes of the\nBible.\n\nThere is undoubtedly a charm in the thought that all over the Continent\nof Europe, in the libraries of many of its romantic cities and towns,\nthere are scores of MSS., some of them upwards of a thousand years old,\nfugitives in the early times from these much harassed islands; and that\nEuropean scholars of the highest erudition, such as Zeuss, Ebel, Nigra,\nAscoli, Windisch, Zimmer, and Whitley Stokes, have been profoundly\ninterested in these literary relics, and have devoted much of their time\nto the work of studying, translating, elucidating, and editing the\nGaelic texts or glosses found in them.\n\nTo-day the number of those engaged in similar research at home and\nabroad is vastly on the increase, and augurs well for the future of this\ndepartment of knowledge.\n\nProfessor Kuno Meyer, Ph.D., himself a distinguished German Celticist,\nin reviewing the present state of Celtic studies last year at Dublin,\nmade the following significant statement:\u2014\n\n\u201cI cannot conclude without casting a glance into the future. I am\nconvinced that the present is but the beginning of an era of still\ngreater activity in all departments of Celtic studies. Everything points\nto that.\n\n\u201cThe more reliable text-books and hand-books will be published, the\ngreater will be the numbers of those taking up Celtic studies. As the\nfields of other more ancient and more recognised studies become\nexhausted, there will come a rush of students on to the fresh, and\noften, almost virgin soil of Celtic research, to study the great Celtic\ncivilisation at its source, to collect the last lingering remnants of a\nmighty tradition.\n\n\u201cAgain and again it has happened during recent years that workers in\nother subjects have in their researches finally been led on to the\nCeltic soil, where lie the roots of much medieval lore, of many\ninstitutions, of important phases of thought.\n\n\u201cAnd another thing, too, I will foretell. The re-discovery, as it were,\nof ancient Celtic literature will not only arouse abroad a greater\ninterest in the Celtic nations, but it will lead to beneficial results\namong those nations themselves.\u201d\n\nMr. W. B. Yeats, in the _Treasury of Irish Poetry_, 1900, gives pen to\nsimilar reflections and anticipations:\u2014\n\n\u201cModern poetry,\u201d he writes, \u201cgrows weary of using over and over again\nthe personages and stories and metaphors that have come to us through\nGreece and Rome, or from Wales and Brittany through the Middle Ages, and\nhas found new life in the Norse and German legends. The Irish legends in\npopular tradition and in old Gaelic literature are more numerous and as\nbeautiful, and alone among great European legends have the beauty and\nwonder of altogether new things. May one not say then, without saying\nanything improbable, that they will have a predominant influence in the\ncoming century, and that their influence will pass through many\ncountries.\u201d\n\nThe interest thus lately evolved in the literature of the Celts, who\nwere among the earliest inhabitants of the country, and whose blood\nstill courses in our British veins, has naturally awakened a desire in\nmany minds to know the nature and extent of the literary legacy they\nhave bequeathed\u2014its substance and quality, and also to gain some\nacquaintance with the opinions and results of recent scholarship on the\nsubject.\n\nBut, strange to say, notwithstanding the activity of Celticists, no book\nhas yet appeared which professes to give in short compass a general\nsurvey of the whole field. There is thus, I venture to think, room for\nsuch a volume as the present, which is intended to serve as a popular\nintroduction to the study of the literature. Containing, as it does, the\ngist of two series of lectures which I delivered under the Maccallum\nBequest in the University of Glasgow during the sessions 1900\u20131 and\n1901\u20132, it is now prepared and issued with a view to meeting the demands\nnot only of the general reader, but also of the private student in quest\nof a guide to the original sources, the authorities, and books on the\nsubject.\n\nIn its preparation, in addition to the numerous published works\nmentioned in the text, I have received valuable help from Professor\nMackinnon, Edinburgh University, and Dr. Alexander Macbain, Inverness,\nboth of whom supplied me not only with many of their printed papers\nembodying the fruits of their own personal research, but also with other\nuseful information. To the former I am still further indebted for\ninteresting details regarding the life and work of several of the\nscholars, and to Professor Rhys of Jesus College, Oxford, for kindly\nreviewing in MS. form the chapter on Welsh Literature.\n\nAnd, finally, I have to record my special indebtedness to the kind\nassistance of my friend, Mr. David Mackeggie, M.A., whose knowledge of\nCeltic history and literature is both extensive and accurate, and who,\nbesides giving me much suggestive aid in the preparation of the\nlectures, read the proofs of this volume.\n\n                                                         MAGNUS MACLEAN.\n\n  THE TECHNICAL COLLEGE,\n    GLASGOW, _May, 1902_.\n\n  This volume has already appealed to so wide a circle of readers that a\n  reprint is now called for; and it is very gratifying to the author to\n  find that his confidence in the growing demand for a book of this kind\n  has been amply justified.\n\n                                                         MAGNUS MACLEAN.\n\n    _November, 1906._\n\n  In the present reissue no alteration of the reprint has been required.\n\n                                                          MAGNUS MACLEAN\n\n    _June, 1926._\n\n\n\n\n                                CONTENTS\n\n\n                                CHAPTER I\n\n            THE ARRIVAL OF THE CELT IN HISTORY AND LITERATURE\n\n                                                                    PAGE\n\n The Celts in primitive Europe\u2014Advent in British Isles\u2014Two\n   branches\u2014Observations of C\u00e6sar and Tacitus\u2014Main facts of Celtic\n   progress on the Continent\u2014A vast empire\u2014Interview with Alexander\n   the Great\u2014Colony in Galatia\u2014Cup of conquest\n   full\u2014Disintegration\u2014The scattered remnants\u2014Recent statistics\u2014The\n   ancient Celts as seen through Greek and Roman eyes\u2014Literary\n   awakening\u2014Ogam writings\u2014First men of letters\u2014Earliest written\n   Gaelic now extant\u2014Modern linguistic discovery\u2014The place of\n   Celtic in the Aryan group                                           1\n\n\n                               CHAPTER II\n\n               ST. PATRICK, THE PIONEER OF CELTIC WRITERS\n\n The historical Patrick\u2014Authentic records\u2014Earliest known Gaelic\n   litterateur\u2014Dates elusive\u2014Birthplace\u2014Autobiographical details of\n   his youth\u2014Taken captive\u2014Escape\u2014Obscure wanderings\u2014Return\n   home\u2014The r\u00f4le of missionary in Ireland\u2014Epoch-making\n   career\u2014Remarkable Patrician Dialogues\u2014His own literary work\u2014The\n   \u201cConfession\u201d\u2014\u201cEpistle to Coroticus\u201d\u2014\u201cDeer\u2019s Cry\u201d\u2014Ireland\u2019s\n   oldest book\u2014Three other antique compositions from the Book of\n   Hymns\u2014A curious prophecy\u2014Personal character\u2014Death                  22\n\n\n                               CHAPTER III\n\n             ST. COLUMBA AND THE DAWN OF LETTERS IN SCOTLAND\n\n The fugitive MSS.\u2014Gaelic a literary language for ages\u2014Scotland\u2019s\n   first writer\u2014St. Columba one of the rarer master-spirits\u2014His\n   peculiar qualities\u2014Intellectual standpoint\u2014Birth\u2014Early life\u2014A\n   fateful incident\u2014Set sail for Pictland\u2014Motive\u2014Arrival in pagan\n   Scotland\u2014His missionary enterprise\u2014Light the lamp of\n   literature\u2014An ardent scholar, penman, and poet\u2014The famous\n   \u201cCathrach\u201d\u2014His Gaelic poems\u2014Latin hymns\u2014The Columban\n   renaissance\u2014Encouragement of bards and scholars\u2014The _Amra\n   Choluimcille_\u2014Iona as an educational centre\u2014European fame and\n   influence                                                          40\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IV\n\n                        ADAMNAN\u2019S \u201cVITA COLUMB\u00c6\u201d\n\n Oldest Scottish book in existence\u2014A sturdy survival\u2014Criteria of\n   age\u2014Dorbene the copyist\u2014Romantic history of the MS.\u2014Now in\n   Schaffhausen\u2014Adamnan, a rare personality\u2014Abbot and\n   scholar\u2014Influential career\u2014Attitude to the two great questions\n   that divided the Celtic churches\u2014Pathetic estrangement\u2014\u201cLex\n   Adamnani\u201d\u2014A mighty social revolution\u2014Death\u2014His writings\u2014\u201cThe\n   Vision of Adamnan\u201d\u2014His _Life of Columba_ in three\n   parts\u2014Remarkable contents\u2014Most valuable monument of the early\n   Celtic Church\u2014List of MSS. in which preserved\u2014Latin _versus_\n   Gaelic                                                             58\n\n\n                                CHAPTER V\n\n                            THE BOOK OF DEER\n\n An ancient curio\u2014Second oldest book of Scotland\u2014Where did it come\n   from?\u2014Its contents threefold\u2014Gaelic colophon from the ninth\n   century\u2014The work of a native scribe of Alba\u2014Peculiarities\u2014The\n   ecclesiastical art of the period\u2014The Gaelic entries\u2014\u201cLegend of\n   Deer\u201d\u2014Drostan\u2019s tears\u2014Some very quaint history\u2014The earliest\n   source for Scottish Gaelic\u2014Authentic glimpses into the Celtic\n   condition of Scotland\u2014Origin of shires, parishes, burghs,\n   individual freedom, and the use of the English language\u2014Three\n   editions of the Gaelic of the Book of Deer\u2014Now one of the very\n   oldest MSS. of native origin that Cambridge can boast of           79\n\n\n                               CHAPTER VI\n\n                       THE MS. LEGACY OF THE PAST\n\n A fresh start in the study of Celtic literature\u2014Advent of foremost\n   scholars\u2014The new basis found by Zeuss\u2014Resurrection of ancient\n   texts\u2014Unexpected light\u2014H. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville and his\n   mission to this country\u2014The numbers, dates, and localities of\n   Gaelic MSS.: (1) on the Continent; (2) in the British\n   Isles\u2014Subject matter\u2014Examples of the oldest written Gaelic\n   poetry in Europe\u2014The great books of saga\u2014Leabhar Na\n   h\u2019Uidhre\u2014Books of Leinster, Ballymote, and\n   Lismore\u2014Quotations\u2014Account of the Ancient Annals\u2014Tighernach\u2014The\n   _Chronicon Scotorum_\u2014The _Four Masters_\u2014Romance of the fugitive\n   documents                                                          96\n\n\n                               CHAPTER VII\n\n                 THE SCOTTISH COLLECTION OF CELTIC MSS.\n\n Cabinet in Advocates\u2019 Library\u2014Curious assortment of vernacular\n   literature\u2014Number and character\u2014Origin of the\n   collection\u2014Highland Society and Kilbride MSS.\u2014Subsidiary\n   additions\u2014Work for the expert\u2014Fate of some luckless\n   documents\u2014Value of MSS. XL., LIII., and LVI.\u2014Three literary\n   monuments of the Western Highlands: (1) The Book of the Dean of\n   Lismore\u2014History, description, value, contents, extracts, names\n   of contributors; (2) The Fernaig MS.\u2014Characteristics\u2014Interesting\n   details of supposed author; (3) The Book of Clanranald\u2014Quaint\n   relic\u2014Two MSS., the Red and the Black\u2014History and contents, with\n   specimen prose-poem and elegy                                     115\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VIII\n\n                         THE MYTHOLOGICAL CYCLE\n\n A rich and abundant saga literature\u2014Three leading periods or\n   cycles\u2014The myths and folk-tales\u2014Problems to men of science\u2014The\n   philologists and anthropologists take opposite sides\u2014Their\n   theories\u2014Attitude of the annalists and romancists of\n   Ireland\u2014Their craze for genealogy\u2014Early settlers in Erin\u2014Advent\n   of the Milesians or Gaels\u2014The Three Sorrows of Gaelic Storydom:\n   (1) \u201cThe Tragedy of the Children of Tuireann\u201d; (2) The\n   fascinating \u201cAided of the Children of Lir\u201d; (3) Story of\n   \u201cDeirdre and the Sons of Uisneach\u201d\u2014Extraordinary interest\n   evinced in this saga\u2014Marvellous output of texts and translations  134\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IX\n\n                            THE HEROIC CYCLE\n\n The golden age of Gaelic romance\u2014Number of the tales\u2014Cuchulinn\u2014His\n   early adventures\u2014The Wooing of Eimer\u2014Training in Skye\u2014The Bridge\n   of the Cliffs\u2014Tragedy of Conlaoch\u2014Elopement\u2014The \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3\n   Chuailgn\u00e9,\u201d and exploits of Cuchulinn\u2014Ferdia at the ford\u2014The two\n   champions of Western Europe\u2014Cuchulinn in the Deaf\n   Valley\u2014Death\u2014The Red Rout of Conall Cearnach\u2014Instruction of\n   Cuchulinn to a prince\u2014His \u201cPhantom Chariot\u201d\u2014Modern translations\n   of these rare sagas                                               153\n\n\n                                CHAPTER X\n\n                           THE OSSIANIC CYCLE\n\n The old order changes\u2014Who were the Feinn?\u2014Ossian, his name and\n   relation to the bardic literature\u2014The Ossianic tales and poems\n   very numerous\u2014Earliest references\u2014First remarkable\n   development\u2014Original home of the Ossianic romance\u2014The leading\n   heroes\u2014A famous tract\u2014Legends, regarding Fionn, and curious\n   details of his warrior-band\u2014The literature divided into four\n   classes\u2014Most ancient poems of Ossian, and the\n   Feinn\u2014Quotations\u2014\u201cThe Dialogue of the Ancients\u201d\u2014Ossian and\n   Patrick\u2014Story of Crede\u2014Miscellaneous poems\u2014Prose tales\u2014\u201cPursuit\n   of Diarmad and Grainne\u201d\u2014\u201cLay of Diarmad\u201d\u2014Norse Ballads\u2014Dream\n   figures, a remarkable Gaelic tradition                            174\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XI\n\n        THE INFLUENCE OF THE NORSE INVASIONS ON GAELIC LITERATURE\n\n The dreaded Vikings\u2014In English waters\u2014Descents on Iona\u2014Monasteries\n   favourite objects of attack\u2014Destruction of books\u2014Their own eddas\n   and sagas\u2014Modern discovery of the wonderful Icelandic\n   literature\u2014The Northmen in a new light\u2014Literary effects of their\n   invasions\u2014Arrested development\u2014Lamentable dispersion of the\n   literary classes\u2014Pilgrim Scots\u2014The rise of Scottish\n   Gaelic\u2014Present-day differences between it and Irish\u2014Introduction\n   of Norse words\u2014Decay of inflection\u2014Gaelic examples of Viking\n   beliefs and superstitions\u2014The Norseman still with us              198\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XII\n\n                     THE FOUR ANCIENT BOOKS OF WALES\n\n The _Myvyrian Archaiology_\u2014Oldest texts\u2014The Black Book of\n   Caermarthen\u2014The Book of Aneurin\u2014The Book of Taliessin\u2014The Red\n   Book of Hergest\u2014Gildas and Nennius\u2014The ancient Laws and\n   Institutes\u2014A great dialectic battle\u2014The princes of song\u2014\u201cI\n   Yscolan\u201d\u2014A Welsh Ossianic poem\u2014Characteristics of the early\n   poetry\u2014The medieval romances\u2014Their history\u2014Modern translations\n   of the Mabinogion\u2014Two classes of tales\u2014The legend of\n   Taliessin\u2014His curious odes\u2014Kilhwch and Olwen\u2014The Lady of the\n   Fountain\u2014Three striking features of the Arthurian romances\u2014Their\n   influence on Western Europe                                       217\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XIII\n\n                        CELTIC LITERARY REVIVALS\n\n Sixth century awakening throughout Celtdom\u2014Illustrious\n   names\u2014Brittany\u2019s wonderful cycle of song\u2014Charming\n   examples\u2014Dearth of tenth century\u2014A strange trait of Celtic\n   life\u2014The brilliant medieval renaissance\u2014Output of Ireland,\n   Wales, and Brittany\u2014The Cornish dramas\u2014Last speaker of that\n   dialect\u2014Period of inactivity and decline\u2014Recrudescence\u20141745\u20131800\n   the high-water mark of Highland production\u2014A galaxy of\n   poets\u2014Splendid lyrical outburst\u2014New Ossianic cycle\u2014Seana\n   Dana\u2014Caledonian Bards\u2014The Welsh Eisteddfod\u2014Latest Celtic\n   renaissance\u2014Some characteristic features, results,\n   manifestations\u2014Antiquity, thou wondrous charm!                    239\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XIV\n\n                  HIGHLAND BARDS BEFORE THE FORTY-FIVE\n\n \u201cThe Owlet\u201d\u2014Three Macgregor songs\u2014The old bardic system\n   superseded\u2014Era of modern Gaelic poetry\u2014Mary Macleod\u2014Details of\n   her life\u2014Famous songs\u2014Iain Lom\u2014Ardent poet and politician\u2014His\n   \u201cVow\u201d\u2014Eventful career\u2014Poems\u2014Created Gaelic\n   Poet-Laureate\u2014Influence on Highland history\u2014Other minor bards\n   and bardesses\u2014Imitations by Sir Walter Scott\u2014The blind harper,\n   and the blind piper\u2014A comic poet\u2014Two major bards\u2014Maccodrum\u2019s\n   Muse\u2014Characteristics of the group before the Forty-five           262\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XV\n\n            THE INFLUENCE OF THE CHURCH ON GAELIC LITERATURE\n\n The origins of Celtic literature\u2014Two streams\u2014The Pagan\u2014The\n   Christian\u2014Influence of the early Celtic Church as patron of\n   letters\u2014Originates a written literature\u2014Attitude towards the\n   ancient sagas\u2014Medieval obscurantism\u2014The Dialogues between Ossian\n   and Patrick quoted and discussed\u2014Their significance\u2014Bishop\n   Carsewell and the Reformation\u2014The rival influences of Naturalism\n   and the Church\u2014Decline of Gaelic oral literature\u2014The Nineteenth,\n   a century of gleaning rather than of creative\n   work\u2014Reasons\u2014Present-day return to nature\u2014Splendid services of\n   individual Churchmen                                              286\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XVI\n\n             THE INFLUENCE OF CELTIC, ON ENGLISH LITERATURE\n\n Earliest contact\u2014Loan-words\u2014Three periods of marked literary\n   influence\u2014Layamon\u2019s \u201cBrut\u201d\u2014A fascinating study for critics\u2014The\n   development of the Arthurian Romance\u2014Sir Thomas Malory\u2014Question\n   as to origin of rhyme\u2014A Celtic claim\u2014Elements in Scottish\n   poetry\u2014in English literature\u2014Gray\u2019s \u201cBard\u201d\u2014Macpherson\u2019s\n   \u201cOssian\u201d\u2014Influence on Wordsworth and his contemporaries\u2014Moore\u2019s\n   \u201cIrish Melodies\u201d\u2014Sir Walter Scott\u2014Tennyson\u2014Interesting\n   comparison\u2014Arnold, Shairp, Blackie\u2014Novelists after Scott\u2014Living\n   writers                                                           304\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XVII\n\n               THE PRINTED LITERATURE OF THE SCOTTISH GAEL\n\n Two interesting bibliographies\u2014Surprising revelations\u2014First Gaelic\n   printed book\u2014Meagre output prior to the Forty-five\u2014Earliest\n   original works issued\u2014No complete Bible in type before\n   1801\u2014Nineteenth century activity\u2014The Highlander\u2019s favourite\n   books\u2014A revelation of character\u2014His printed literature mainly\n   religious\u2014Translations\u2014The two books in greatest demand\u2014Dearth\n   of the masterpieces of other languages\u2014The most popular of\n   English religious writers\u2014of native bards\u2014Gaelic poetry\u2014The\n   printed succession\u2014Notable books\u2014Account of the Gaelic\n   grammars\u2014Dictionaries\u2014Periodicals\u2014Value of the literature         325\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XVIII\n\n                  THE MASTER GLEANERS OF GAELIC POETRY\n\n The work of the gleaner\u2014Authors of the three most precious relics\n   of Celtic literature, Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre, Book of Hymns, and\n   Book of Leinster\u2014of the three Highland treasures, Book of the\n   Dean of Lismore, Fernaig MS., and Book of Clanranald\u2014Advent of\n   Macpherson\u2014Collections and collectors between 1750 and\n   1820\u2014First printed gleaning\u2014Four nineteenth-century monuments,\n   Campbell\u2019s Leabhar na Feinne, Mackenzie\u2019s Beauties of Gaelic\n   Poetry, Sinclair\u2019s Songster, and Carmichael\u2019s Carmina\n   Gadelica\u2014Other recent gleaners and their books                    347\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XIX\n\n                THE MASTER SCHOLARS OF CELTIC LITERATURE\n\n The bards and seanachies\u2014Six men of outstanding literary\n   eminence\u2014The earliest pioneer of the modern philological\n   movement\u2014Representatives of the older scholarship\u2014Those of the\n   new\u2014The brilliant Zeuss\u2014Foreign periodicals dealing with\n   Celtic\u2014Foremost scholars of the various\n   nations\u2014Italian\u2014German\u2014French\u2014Danish\u2014Scandinavian\u2014American\u2014British,\n   including English, Irish, Welsh, Manx, and Scottish\u2014Many\n   literary problems solved\u2014The promise of future harvests           367\n\n\n INDEX OF NAMES                                                      387\n\n\n INDEX OF SUBJECTS                                                   397\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER I\n           THE ARRIVAL OF THE CELT IN HISTORY AND LITERATURE\n\n  The Celts in primitive Europe\u2014Advent in British Isles\u2014Two\n      branches\u2014Observations of C\u00e6sar and Tacitus\u2014Main facts of\n      Celtic progress on the Continent\u2014A vast empire\u2014Interview with\n      Alexander the Great\u2014Colony in Galatia\u2014Cup of conquest\n      full\u2014Disintegration\u2014The scattered remnants\u2014Recent\n      statistics\u2014The ancient Celts as seen through Greek and Roman\n      eyes\u2014Literary awakening\u2014Ogam writings\u2014First men of\n      letters\u2014Earliest written Gaelic now extant\u2014Modern linguistic\n      discovery\u2014The place of Celtic in the Aryan group.\n\n\nEmerson, looking forth from the new time on the nations of Europe, gave\npen to the reflection, \u201cThe Celts are of the oldest blood in the world.\nSome peoples are deciduous or transitory. Where are the Greeks? Where\nthe Etrurians? Where the Romans? But the Celts are an old family of\nwhose beginning there is no memory, and their end is likely to be still\nmore remote in the future, for they have endurance and productiveness\u2014a\nhidden and precarious genius.\u201d\n\nA sweeping statement withal, yet the thoughtful finding of an eminently\nstudious and dispassionate mind.\n\nWhen the curtain lifts over primitive Europe, and authentic history\nfirst begins, the Celts are already there, and loom formidable in the\nheart of the Continent. Not the earliest inhabitants by any means;\narch\u00e6ology points to anterior races. These the ethnologists designate\naccording to the shape of their heads and supposed colour of their hair.\nTheir remains have been found in caves, and in what are known to science\nas the Neolithic or Stone Age barrows. And they present types of\nhumanity widely differing from the succeeding so-called Aryans.[1] But\nbeyond their material survivals, and the people who were supposed to\nhave been descended from them, there is absolutely no record of these\nvanished races. They belong to prehistoric times.\n\nSo do the Celts in great part, but unlike their predecessors they have\nemerged in history, and projected themselves on its pages to this day.\nThey have stepped out of the impenetrable haze, and appear at the\nopening of the written drama of Europe.\n\nHistory finds them for the first time located about the upper reaches of\nthe Danube, in the lands corresponding to modern Bavaria, Wurtemburg,\nBaden, and the country drained by the Maine to the east of the Rhine.\nThe idea of an ingress from Asia has lately been abandoned. Research\nseems to have effectively exploded it.[2]\n\nThey were barbarians from our point of view, not savages; not civilised,\nbut apparently a good stage onward from earlier types. It was they who\ngave names to many of the rivers and mountains of Europe\u2014\u201cnames which\nare poems,\u201d says Matthew Arnold, \u201cand which imitate the pure voices of\nnature.\u201d\n\nHyperboreans they seemed to have been called by the original Greeks, but\nsince the time of Hecat\u00e6us and Herodotus, that is, from about 500 B.C.,\nthey came to be known to the classic writers as \u03ba\u03b5\u03bb\u03c4\u03b1\u03b9 or \u03ba\u03b5\u03bb\u03c4\u03bf\u03b9\u2014a name\nwhich at that early period the Greeks applied indiscriminately to all\nthe people of north and west Europe who were not Iberians.\n\nTo them, as well as to the Romans, all that stretch of the Continent\nappeared to be occupied mainly by \u03ba\u03b5\u03bb\u03c4\u03bf\u03b9. And though the Germans lived\nfrom time immemorial beyond them in the north, not till the first\ncentury B.C. did the Romans discover that they were a different people.\nC\u00e6sar himself was one of the earliest to observe and chronicle the fact.\n\nBut there were reasons for this apparent ubiquity of the Celts. Apart\nfrom their chronic unrest and frequent migrations, we can well\nunderstand why the Germans appeared merged in them. The Germans were\nearly deprived of their independence, and held in slavish subordination\ntill they recovered their freedom about 300 B.C. For centuries before\nthat date, conqueror and conquered apparently lived under a common\nregime, obeying the same chiefs, and fighting in the same armies, though\ngenerally in the relation of dominant masters and subject slaves. In\nthis way they even came to have many words in common, as their\nrespective languages show.\n\nAt what time the Celts entered Gaul, Britain, and Ireland is a question\nunhappily beyond the knowledge of man. The seventh century B.C., or even\nthe tenth as the Irish tradition maintains, is given as an approximate\ndate. But of this there is no authentic record. Nor yet of a second\nimmigration assumed to have followed in the third century B.C.\n\nThat there were two such invasions of Britain with a considerable\ninterval between them is one of the pet theories of philology. For two\nbranches of an originally parent stock may be traced, known as the\nGadelic and the Brittonic, or more recently as the Q and P groups. The\none includes the Irish, Manx, and Gaelic-speaking peoples, and was the\nearlier to arrive; the other embraces the Welsh, Cornish, and Breton,\nwho came later.\n\nThis linguistic fact might be represented tabularly, thus:\u2014\n\n                               Celtic\n                                  |\n                      +-----------+-----------+\n                      |                       |\n                   Gadelic                Brittonic\n                      |                       |\n               +------+------+        +-------+-------+\n               |      |      |        |       |       |\n             Irish  Manx  Gaelic    Welsh  Cornish  Breton\n\nThe main difference between those two branches is, that in Gadelic the\noriginal guttural of the Aryan tongue came gradually to be _c_ with the\nsound _k_, ogam _qu_, and that in Brittonic it became _p_. So we say:\u2014\n\n                   English  Gaelic    Welsh    Latin\n                   Four    _c_eithir _p_edwar quatuor\n                   Five    _c_oig    _p_imp   quinque\n\nSuch a distinction points to a great change from the common speech of\nearlier Celtic times. It existed prior to the Christian era, and is\nstill strikingly in evidence. Edward Lhuyd, the illustrious Welsh\nantiquary, writing in the early part of the eighteenth century, noted\nthat there were scarcely any words in the Irish that began with _p_,\nbeyond what were borrowed from Latin or some other language. So much was\nthis the case, that in an ancient alphabetical vocabulary which he had\nbeside him, the letter _p_ was entirely omitted. Other instances might\nbe given. For example, in O\u2019Reilly\u2019s Irish Dictionary, out of upwards of\n700 pages, only twelve are occupied with that letter; and when we come\nto examine the most recent Gaelic collection of words\u2014the etymological\ndictionary of Dr. Macbain\u2014we find about 270 beginning with _p_ out of a\ntotal of well over 7000; and even of these, the majority are derived or\nborrowed from Norse or English. There is a MS. of the eighteenth century\nin the Laing collection of Edinburgh University, which puts the case\nsuccinctly, when in the sections of what promised to be a good Gaelic\ngrammar, it observes that of old no word, except _exotic_ words, began\nin Gaelic with a _p_. Fastening on so characteristic a distinction\nProfessor Rhys, some years ago, decided to call the Brittonic the P, and\nthe Gadelic the Q group, as the more simple and fundamental\nclassification.\n\nThus far philology helps to differentiate between the two branches, and\npoints to a remote advent of the Gael in Britain.\n\nBut when we turn to history we find there is nothing definite on this\nmost attractive subject till C\u00e6sar arrives and makes personal\nobservation. Speaking of the south\u2014for he had not penetrated the\nnorthern parts\u2014he tells us that he found two races in possession: one in\nthe interior, which considered itself indigenous; the other on the\nsea-coast, roving adventurers from the Continent who arrived later.\nTacitus, writing nearly a century and a half after C\u00e6sar, namely, about\n82 A.D., practically confirms C\u00e6sar\u2019s report of a double occupation, and\nadds the further interesting details, that the one race was dark\ncomplexioned and had curly hair, while the other, resembling the Gauls,\nhad red hair and were tall of stature. In the eighth century A.D. we\nknow, on the authority of Bede, that there were in these islands five\nwritten languages, viz. those of the Angles, the Brythons, the Scottis,\nthe Picts, and the Latins, the first four[3] of which were spoken. It is\nthe ever-puzzling yet fascinating work of philology and ethnology to\ntrace the origin and exact racial connection of these\u2014a work which\nhitherto has proved as elusive as the finding of the North Pole. Who are\nthe dark complexioned race of the South? and who the Picts of the North?\nare questions of perennial interest to the experts.\n\nBut though early British and German history is so elusive, we are on\nsure ground with the main facts of Celtic progress on the Continent from\nthe fifth century B.C. Authentic history then opens with the advent of\nthe classical writers just at the time when the Celts were entering upon\na series of conquests which for the next 200 years made them the\ndominant race in Europe.[4] It is needless to follow their various\nmigrations, even if it were possible. As their territories became\ncongested on the Danube, they sent forth horde after horde of conquering\ntribes who surged every way. Now westward for the most part, till, in\nthe graphic language of Galgacus, uttered centuries after, \u201cthere was\nnow no nation beyond\u2014nothing save the waves and the rocks\u201d (Nulla jam\ngens ultra; nihil nisi fluctus et saxa), then, like the back-rushing\ntides, they receded eastwards.\n\n\u201cTumults,\u201d the Romans called these irrepressible outbursts, and most\nfelicitously too, for they were the terror of Europe.\n\nA cursory glance at some of the more famous of their invasions suffices\nto show the restless energy of the Celts and their far-reaching\nconquests.\n\nFrom Gaul, where they appear to have established themselves north of the\nGaronne and about the Seine and Loire, the hungry tribes made a dash for\nSpain, shortly before 500 B.C., and wrested the peninsula from the hands\nof the Ph\u0153nicians. One hundred and twenty years later North Italy shared\nthe same fate. Surging through the passes of the Alps they overthrew the\nEtruscans on their own ground in the great battle of Allia, 390 B.C.,\nand annexed their territory. Flushed with the victory they pressed\nforward, and within three days stormed and sacked the town of Rome\nitself. Indeed, it is with this momentous incursion that authentic Roman\nhistory begins.\n\nOne more mighty invasion of the East, and the Illyrians along the Danube\nare vanquished, thus rendering the conquerors masters of a vast\nterritory extending from that river and the Adriatic to the Atlantic,\nand bounded on the north by the Rhine and Mid-Germany, and on the south\nby Mid-Italy and Mid-Spain, and including the British Isles\u2014a\nmagnificent empire rivalling that of Alexander or of C\u00e6sar in their\npalmy days. Goldsmith\u2019s lines might well apply to them\u2014\n\n              One only master grasps the whole domain,\n              And half a tillage stints the smiling plain.\n\nSo formidable, indeed, were the Celts during the period of their\nascendency that it served the purpose of the classic nations\u2014Greeks and\nRomans\u2014to keep the peace with them as best they could, and even to play\nthem off against their own hereditary foes. And so the expansive tribes\nwere for the most part on friendly terms with both, especially with the\nGreeks. We have an account in Strabo of an interview which Alexander the\nGreat had with their ambassadors. It is given on the authority of\nPtolemy, his general. The young potentate knew well the advantage of\ncultivating good fellowship with his powerful neighbours, and when the\ntribes of the Adriatic sent delegates he received them with all due\ncourtesy and respect.\n\nWhile they were drinking, says the general, Alexander asked them what\nwas the object of their greatest fear, thinking they would say himself.\nBut the imaginative Celts had quite other views. They feared no man. One\nthing only alarmed them, they replied, and that was lest the heavens\nshould one day fall and crush them. Still, they added, that they valued\nthe friendship of such a man as he was above everything.\n\n\u201cHow vainglorious these Celts are!\u201d muttered the young autocrat to his\ncourtiers, a little piqued, perhaps, at their rejoinder. Yet, if such\nwere really the object of their superstitious dread, the promise they\nmade was not without its own grim cogency. \u201cIf we fulfil not our\nengagement,\u201d they said, \u201cmay the sky falling upon us crush us, may the\nearth opening swallow us, may the sea overflowing its borders drown us.\u201d\n\nWith Alexander they kept their pledge, but in 280 B.C., when another\nking ruled Macedonia, they over-ran his territories, slew him in battle,\nand pillaged the temple of Delphi itself\u2014an act of vandalism so shocking\nto the Greeks that it roused their patriotism to such a pitch that they\nwere able to repulse the enemy in the neighbouring gorges.\n\nThus compelled to evacuate Greece, the Celts invaded Asia Minor in 278\nB.C., and established there the well-known colony of Galatia. It was to\ntheir descendants that St. Paul addressed his trenchant epistle, and the\nwords, \u201cO foolish Galatians, who hath druided you?\u201d\n\nFor six centuries after they continued to speak their language there, so\nthat St. Paul must have heard one dialect at least of the ancient\ntongue.\n\nIt may surprise students of the classics to learn that the Celts claim\nHercules as one of their own potentates. In an old Gaelic MS. in the\nAdvocates\u2019 Library, Edinburgh, we find the renowned hero figuring thus:\n\u201cErcoill mac Amphitrionis, mhic Antestis, mhic Andlis, mhic Mitonis,\nmhic Festime, mhic Athol, mhic Gregais, mhic Gomer, mhic Jafed, mhic\nNoe\u201d\u2014a truly wonderful genealogy, tracing him up to Noah through the\nCymric Gomer.\n\nThe Greek version of the myth is interesting. It tells how Hercules, on\nhis expedition against Geryon, turned aside into Gaul and married there\na handsome Gaulish lady, by whom he had a son, Galates. This Galates,\nsurpassing all his countrymen in strength and prowess, led the way to\nconquest, and exercising a wide sway, his territory and subjects\neventually came to be named after him\u2014the one Galatia, the other Galat\u00e6.\n\nIn whatever way the classic story originated, it is matter of history\nthat after the Celtic invasion of Greece, Galat\u00e6 became the popular\nGreek name for the people hitherto known as \u03ba\u03b5\u03bb\u03c4\u03bf\u03b9, even as Galli was\nthe favourite Roman one.\n\nBut already, before the Greek repulse, the Celtic cup of conquest was\nfull, and their vast empire began to crumble and disintegrate. The first\ngreat shock was given by the revolt of their born thralls, the Germans,\nabout 300 B.C. In the struggle for independence these recovered their\nliberty and big stretches of territory. Besides falling out with the\nGreeks, the flurried tribes in that wild consternation of defeat came to\nblows with the Romans also, who in two different battles got the victory\nover them. Forced to ally themselves with former foes, now with the\nEtruscans, again with the Carthaginians, the Celts still fought\ndesperately, but all in vain. Their dominion was doomed. And as if to\nhasten the swift debacle, the various sections of the same great people\nattacked and dispossessed each other. It was probably in the pressure of\nthose times that the Brittonic invaders surged into Britain and elbowed\ntheir Gaelic kinsmen into more straitened circumstances; for all the\ncontinental Celts were simultaneously in the throes of a lamentable\ndispersion. Reverse followed reverse with singular fatality. Every\nattempt to redeem their desperate fortunes seemed to fail. \u201cThey went to\nthe war, but they always fell,\u201d said their own sad bard afterwards,\nsumming up in one terse antithesis the history of their collapse.\n\nThe failure was crushing and irretrievable. They lost Spain, they lost\nthe north of Italy, they lost Gaul, and subsequently Britain.\n\nThe story of C\u00e6sar\u2019s conquests needs no rehearsal. By 80 A.D. all\nBritain south of the Firth of Forth figured as a Roman province.\n\nMeantime the Celtic dialects of Gaul and Spain were gradually being\nsuperseded by the Latin, and even the laws, habits, and civil\nadministration of the people were becoming Roman, until in the third\ncentury of our era scarcely a vestige of the ancient r\u00e9gime remained\noutside of the British Isles and Brittany, except to the south of the\nlatter, where the influence of the discarded dialect on the adopted\nLatin might be traced.[5]\n\nIn Britain the Romanising process was suddenly arrested by the hasty\ndeparture of the conqueror; and in the helpless abandonment that ensued\nthe Saxons found an open door. The same fate that they had themselves\nformerly inflicted on their kinsmen now overtook the Britons, who were\nhustled in great numbers into the wilds of Cornwall, of Wales, and\nStrathclyde. And the last stage of the driving west remained to be\naccomplished in the case of the Irish, when the Anglo-Celts arrived in\nthe twelfth century.\n\nSince the great debacle of their race the Celtic remnants have continued\nto speak one or other of the dialects bequeathed from their ancestors.\nFive of these are living tongues. Apart from the number that speak them\nabroad, it is estimated there are upwards of 3,000,000 people in\nBrittany and the British Isles whose mother tongue is Celtic. The\ndistribution and proportion, according to the latest available\nstatistics,[6] are full of interest, in view of the long struggle for\nexistence of the language and people, and the extraordinary vitality\nthey have evinced in defying the tooth of time. These facts may be\ncrisply tabulated thus:\u2014\n\n Gaelic.[7]   254,415. Chiefly in the Highlands of Scotland.\n Irish.       679,145. West of a line in Ireland from Dungarvon Bay to\n                         Loch Swilly.\n Manx.          3,000. West Coast, Isle of Man.\n Welsh.       900,000. Over Wales.\n Cornish.     Extinct. Formerly Cornwall.\n Breton.    1,300,000. In Brittany, N.W. corner of France.\n\nA sadly dwindling minority are these fag-ends of once so mighty a race.\nThere can be no doubt that we see the isolated parts gradually expiring\non the horizon, and with more accelerated speed within the last few\ndecades than for centuries before. Modern industrialism now woos them\naway from the strongholds of their own characteristic life, and the\nseparate units get absorbed in the common national life and the common\ncivilisation. Numbers of them\u2014of the Irish especially\u2014are still seeking\na home, following the hereditary instincts of their ancestors, and\nhiving westwards to America, only to lose their distinctive Celtic\nexistence and to be merged in the larger life of that great nation.\n\nThe facts are sufficiently patent, but to show the rapidity with which\nthe disintegration is going on it may be mentioned that since 1851,\n3,925,133 persons have emigrated from Ireland alone\u2014a number larger than\nthat of all the remaining Celtic-speaking population in Europe. In 1899\nthe number was 43,760; in 1900, 47,107; in 1901, 39,870, the vast\nmajority of whom were from the western Irish-speaking provinces; and, as\nin the depopulation of the Highlands, it is largely a drain of the best\nblood, the land being left in the hands of the old and the feeble.\n\nThere are those who still write and dream of laying the foundations of a\nnew Celtic civilisation, but in view of the present subtle and swift\ndissolution it is hard to know what they mean, unless indeed it be a\nleavening of the existing civilisation by a recrudescence of the Celtic\nspirit and Celtic aspirations.\n\nIn the main the race has already become fused with the population of\nEurope, disappearing as Gallo-Grecians in the east, as Celt-Iberians in\nSpain, as Gallo-Franks and Anglo-Celts in the north-west\u2014all but the\nCeltic fringes that are shedding their past.\n\nThus far the history, and from what we have said it will appear that the\nCelts first emerge in literature in the fifth century B.C., from which\ntime the classical writers make frequent, though generally short and\nmeagre allusions to them. Dr. W. Z. Ripley,[8] one of the latest\nauthorities on ethnology, would discount their evidence as of little\nvalue for the purposes of modern scientific research into race origins\nand affinities, yet, nevertheless, so far as it goes, it is highly\ninteresting and important.\n\nThe earliest of all the Greek authors to mention the Celts, if we except\nthe geographer Hecat\u00e6us (520 B.C.), is Herodotus (484\u2013425?), who twice\nrefers to them in his history as dwelling at the sources of the Danube\nand bordering on the Kunesii, the westermost inhabitants of Europe.\nXenophon, at a later period (390), speaking of them as mercenaries with\nDionysius of Syracuse in 368 B.C., remarks that \u201cthe ships brought\nKeltoi and Iberes.\u201d Plato, Ephorus, Pytheas, and Scylax all furnish\nhints in the same century. Aristotle also knew about this extraordinary\npeople, who, he was told, feared \u201cneither earthquake nor floods,\u201d living\nin a country so cold that even the ass did not thrive there, yet putting\nlittle clothing on their children. It appears he had also heard that\nthey had sacked Rome. Tim\u00e6us popularised the new name Galat\u00e6 in bringing\ninto notice Galatia, which, he avers, is named after \u201cGalates, son of\nCyclops and Galatia.\u201d\n\nFrom this time onward we get fuller details of the Celtic character,\nmanners, and customs. And to show the number and variety of authorities\nfrom which information may be gleaned, the following may be selected:\nPolybius, a Greek writer of the second century B.C., and Posidonius of\nthe first. Julius C\u00e6sar and his contemporary Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, a\ngeographer of the early part of the first century A.D., Virgil, Cicero,\nLivy, Tacitus, Dion Cassius, Pliny, Ptolemy, and Ammianus Marcellinus,\nthe latter bringing the list down towards the end of the fourth century,\nwhen the Roman Empire in its own turn began to break up, and the Gaels\nwere at length prepared to enter the arena of literature and speak for\nthemselves.\n\nIt is outwith the scope of this chapter to go into many of the\ninteresting details which these various authors furnish, but a few of\nthose which astonished the writers may be noted in passing, such as, the\nCelts\u2019 intellectual cleverness; their numbers and great size; the\nmagnificence of their funerals, and their belief in the immortality of\nthe soul. Their cities were forests, and though otherwise cleanly in\ntheir eating, lion-like, they were wont to take up huge joints and gnaw\nat them. Other features of striking peculiarity were their figurative,\nexaggerated language; the functions of bards and druids; their chariots\nand excellent horsemanship; the fierceness and noise of their first\nonset in battle; their readiness to be disheartened by reverse; their\nastounding clothes,\u2014dyed tunics, flowered with various colours, flaming\nand fantastic, striped cloaks buckled on their shoulders, and breeches.\nTheir chiefs generally appeared with a retinue of followers. Of old, the\nCelts devoted themselves to plundering other people\u2019s countries. The\nheads of their fallen enemies they cut off and hung to their horses\u2019\nmanes; they were warlike, passionate, and always ready for fighting;\notherwise simple, frank, hospitable to strangers, but vain, quarrelsome,\nfickle, and ever prone to waste their strength on personal feuds and\nfactions. Such were some of the curious traits and customs of our Celtic\nprogenitors as seen through Greek and Roman eyes.\n\nScarcely had the Romans finally abandoned Britain than the Celts enter\nupon a new r\u00f4le. They annex the Roman script, the Roman language for\nliterary work, and the Roman art of writing. And thus equipped, they\nproceed to produce a literature of their own in Latin and Gaelic. The\nwonder is that with their natural quickness and thirst for knowledge\nthey did not achieve a record in this direction before.\n\nWhen we reflect on the other great nations of antiquity, we find that\nthey generally had a literature of some kind, written down, if not in\nbooks, then on skins or slabs and in temples. The Egyptians had their\n\u201cBook of the Dead,\u201d the Indians their \u201cRig-veda,\u201d the Persians their\n\u201cZend-avesta,\u201d the Chinese and Hebrews their \u201cSacred Books,\u201d the Greeks\nand Romans their classics, and we naturally ask, \u201cWhat had the Celts in\nthe zenith of their power?\u201d say between 500 and 300 B.C. No writing at\nall that we know of. At this day only a few inscriptions remain in the\nGaulish language of C\u00e6sar\u2019s time and later, but nothing earlier. These\nnomadic warrior populations may have had their bardic compositions and\ntales floating by oral tradition, but we have no evidence that they\ndeveloped a literature, though some of them may have known Greek\nletters.\n\nIt is to the insular Gaels, to those of Ireland and Scotland in the\nfifth and sixth centuries of our era, that we have to look for the early\nbeginnings of Celtic literature. The Irish first showed signs of a rude\nawakening to activity in this direction. They invented a system of\nwriting peculiar to themselves, simple and ingenious, and good enough\nfor rough inscriptions on stones, but too cumbrous for the needs of\nliterature.\n\nTheir earliest records are to be found in this Ogam script, which\nconsists of a number of short lines drawn straight or slanting, either\nabove, below, or through a long stem-line. Thus\u2014\n\n             |     ||     |||     ||||     |||||\n             +-----++-----+++-----++++-----+++++----------\n             h      d      t      c          qu\n\nrepresents the letters h, d, t, c, qu, being the first letters of the\nfirst five numerals in Gaelic, h\u2019aon, dha, tri, ceithir, coig; the last\nin Manx is queig; in Irish cuig; and in Latin quinque.\n\nThe vowels are similarly represented, broad vowels, a, o, u; small\nvowels, e, i\u2014\n\n             |     ||     |||     ||||     |||||\n             +-----++-----+++-----++++-----+++++----------\n             |     ||     |||     ||||     |||||\n             a      o      u       e         i\n\nOver two hundred stones have been found inscribed with Ogam writing,\nmost of them in the south-west of Ireland, from twenty to thirty in\nWales and Devonshire, and ten in Scotland. The Book of Ballymote, a MS.\nof the fourteenth century, fortunately contains a key to some of these\ninscriptions, so that many of them have been read, though not all.\n\nWho introduced this peculiar mode of writing? and when? are questions\nthat have never yet been determined. Brash, who made personal inspection\nof most of the stones, was of opinion that they are of pre-Christian\norigin, whereas Dr. Graves has attempted to prove that they belong to a\nperiod between the fifth and seventh centuries A.D.\n\nReferences to Ogam inscriptions are frequently met with in the earliest\nCeltic literature, and some examined contain grammatical forms alleged\nto be older than those of the most ancient MSS., and corresponding even\nwith the archaic forms of the antique Gaulish monuments.\n\nThe Ogam used to be written on wood and stone, and it is not improbable\nthat many of the genealogies and bits of legendary lore may have been\nhanded down from generation to generation in this way, as well as by\noral tradition.\n\nIt is with the great wave of Christian evangelisation that passed over\nIreland and Scotland successively, through the labours of St. Patrick\nand St. Columba, that the use of the Roman script became widely general,\nand we trace the dawn of letters. Round the names of these two men there\nshines a lustre which the lapse of ages has failed to dim. They not only\nkindled the torch of a higher faith and purer life among their Celtic\nbrethren, but they lighted also the lamp of literature, which has\ncontinued to burn with more or less radiance for 1500 years.\n\nSt. Patrick, as the earlier of the two, is really the C\u00e6dmon of Gaelic\nliterature. Born in Scotland, probably, as the later critics think, at\nOld Kilpatrick, near Dumbarton, he was, while yet a youth of sixteen,\ncarried captive to Hiberio, and though he escaped after six years from\nhis hard fate as his master\u2019s thrall and feeder of cattle, his\nmissionary zeal, new kindled, urged him to return as evangelist to the\nland of his former oppression. The visions of his early captivity, as he\nlay down to rest of nights near the cattle, remind us of C\u00e6dmon\u2019s vision\nin the stable at Whitby, upwards of two hundred years after\u2014a vision\nwhich issued in the birth of English literature, as did those of St\nPatrick in that of Gaelic.\n\nAnd so the unassuming herd emerges as the first known writer of the\nancient Celtic people, the first of whom we have any definite authentic\nknowledge.\n\nThree literary compositions stand in his name, namely, his \u201cConfession,\u201d\nwritten in rugged Latin, his \u201cEpistle to Coroticus,\u201d in similar language\nand style, and the \u201cDeer\u2019s Cry,\u201d a lorica or prayer in Gaelic. This hymn\nhas always been regarded, and rightly too, as a gem of sacred song.\n\nThe religious and literary dawn that lit up Ireland in the fifth century\nreached Scotland in the sixth through the advent of the heroic Columba.\nHe too, by unhappy circumstances driven over sea, lived an exile in \u201cthe\nland of his adoption tried,\u201d and with even more brilliance and learning\ndid for Scotland what St. Patrick did for Ireland. So that the school of\nIona became for centuries after his death a centre of light and leading\nin religion and letters, not only for Scotland and Ireland, but also for\nmany parts of Europe.\n\nHis own special contributions to literature include several beautiful\npoems in Gaelic and Latin, and many transcripts in Latin of parts of\nbooks of Scripture, such as the Cathrach, a copy of the Psalter believed\nto have been made while he was yet a student, and perhaps also the Book\nof Durrow and the Book of Kells\u2014two wonderful specimens of penmanship\nand early Celtic art. If these latter are not exactly the work of his\nown hands they belong at least to the Columban period, an era of great\nliterary activity, which produced, among other well-known works, the\n_Amra Choluimcille_ of Dallan Forgaill, Adamnan\u2019s _Life of Columba_, and\nthe Book of Deer.\n\nIt will thus be seen that the earliest written MSS. of the Celtic people\nare essentially a Christian literature, which ignored almost entirely\nthe pagan traditions of the race in its effort to supersede them. But\nthe atmosphere was heavy with these, and apparently from pre-Christian\ntimes there had come floating down by oral transmission a great mass of\nheroic saga which at length found written expression in the seventh or\neighth century A.D. So that now to the purely Christian literature there\nwas added the purely pagan, which much more faithfully reflected the\ncharacteristic flavour of the race, its strength, and its weakness, its\nfacts, its fancies, and its foibles. Professing to go back to a remote\nantiquity, it is significant that the setting of this ancient saga is\nconfined exclusively to these islands. None of the stories belong to\nEurope or the doings of the parent stock in its palmy days. As compared\nwith the Christian, this pagan contribution is by far the more important\nfrom a literary point of view. Yet it must be borne in mind that though\nthere are still extant in Ireland Celtic Latin MSS. which reach up to\nthe time of St. Patrick and St. Columba, there is none existing which\ncontains actual Gaelic writing prior to the eighth century.\n\nAlmost the only specimen of continuous prose written by the end of the\neighth century now known to exist is a portion of a Gaelic sermon on\ntemperance and self-denial from the text, \u201cIf any man will come after\nme, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.\u201d This\ncurious relic is in the town library of Cambray, in a MS. containing the\ncanons of an Irish council held in 684. The MS., however, bears direct\nevidence that it was not written until about a century afterwards.\n\nThe earliest written Gaelic is contained in MSS. on the Continent, such\nas those at Milan, Cambray, Vienna, St. Gall, and other places. And even\nthese are not books of saga, but generally Latin books with some Gaelic\npoems jotted on the leaf margins, or glosses, and other explanatory\nwriting. There are a few such literary monuments also in the British\nIsles, containing ancient Gaelic. The Book of Armagh, for example, dates\nfrom 807, and in addition to vernacular notes, preserves the Latin\n\u201cConfessions\u201d of St. Patrick, copied, it is believed, from the apostle\u2019s\nown autograph MS. The Book of Deer, almost equally venerable, with a\nGaelic colophon, belongs to the same century. To its original contents\nwere added in the eleventh and twelfth centuries Gaelic entries which\nare of uncommon philological and historical interest and value.\n\nBut setting aside these Latin books in which the Gaelic jottings are\npurely incidental and secondary, we need to come down as far as the\neleventh century to reach the existing sources of the earliest written\ncompositions in the native tongue. It is in such MSS. as the Leabhar Na\nh\u2019Uidhre, the Book of Hymns, and the other great MiddleAge gleanings of\nafter days that we find the Patrician and Columban literature as well as\nthe ancient sagas.\n\nTill within very recent times the Celt had no idea that he was heir to\nsuch a vast literary inheritance as really exists. As in the olden times\nmen sometimes buried their wealth to save it from the hands of ruthless\nfoes, and, dying themselves or falling in the fray, lived not to\nindicate to others the site of their hid treasures, so it has happened\nin the case of Gaelic literature. Much of it perished at the hands of\nthe enemy and the avenger. What was saved from the wreck of the more\nstormy and turbulent periods of our history owes its existence to-day\nvery largely to concealment and neglect. And as the plough or the spade\noccasionally turns up an old stone cist, or a casket of ancient coins,\nor a canoe of primitive man, so the casual researches of antiquarians\nand scholars have brought to light a hidden mass of ancient writings\nwhich appear to have been scattered broadcast over Europe and the\nBritish Isles. These Gaelic relics are now jealously preserved in\nvarious countries, and within the last century have been made the\nsubject of the most interested scrutiny by leading Continental and\nBritish philologists, with the result that they have thrown a welcome\nlight on some of the darker problems of history, philology, and\nethnology. For example, as late as the first quarter of last century few\npeople had any idea that the Celtic populations were allied with the\nsouthern nations of Europe, or that their language had any connection\nwhatever with the Romance and Teutonic tongues. One solitary scholar,[9]\nindeed, threw out the hint as early as 1786, but offered no proof; and\nit remained a visionary hypothesis until the long list of documents\nreappearing one by one enabled scholars to establish the point beyond\nquestion, that linguistically the Celtic people are a branch of the\ngreat Aryan family, and thus closely allied with the Teutonic, and still\nmore nearly with the Greek and the Latin peoples. Roughly, this\nrelationship may be represented as under. The table is not meant to\nindicate race affinities, which it is very far indeed from doing, but\nsimply to exhibit the affinities of language which modern philological\nstudies have traced:\u2014\n\n                                   Aryan\n                                     |\n          +--------------------------+-----------------------------+\n          |                                                        |\n European Branch                                           Asiatic Branch\n          |\n          +------------------------+-----------------------+\n          |                        |                       |\n          |                    Slavonic                Teutonic\n          |                       |                       |\n          |                 +-----+--------+              |\n          |                 |              |              |\n          |             Russians    Old Prussians         |\n          |                                               |\n   +------+-------+                               +-------+--------+\n   |      |       |                               |       |        |\n Greek  Latin   Celtic                        English   Germans   Norse\n\nIt is this important and surprising discovery, that we are a part of a\nvast Indo-European family spread to the east over a great part of Asia,\nand to the west over the most of Europe including Russia, that has given\nsuch impetus to Celtic studies within recent years. The Gaelic has been\nfound to have roots which go far down towards the parent stock. And its\nliterature, therefore, is of the utmost value to all who seek to read\nthe riddle of the past and to push back the horizons of knowledge beyond\nthe age even of Herodotus, \u201cthe father of history.\u201d\n\nThere is a fascination and refining influence in the study of the Greek\nand Roman classics, but for the man of large outlook and broad human\nsympathies there is much also to interest and attract in the literature\nof the Gael\u2014so old, so weird, so fanciful.\n\nWordsworth, as he listened to the song of the Highland maid in the\nharvest field, felt the pathos of the past in that moving Gaelic\nproduct, and would fain learn its story. Hence his reverie\u2014\n\n                  Will no one tell me what she sings?\n                  Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow\n                  For old unhappy far-off things,\n                  And battles long ago.\n\nThat is just what they do; dealing with much brighter things too. For\nthe spirit of the race is enshrined in these old writings, and the\nfortunes of the race in their history.\n\n                          APPENDIX TO CHAPTER I\n   NUMBER OF PERSONS SPEAKING GAELIC AND ENGLISH, AND GAELIC ONLY, IN\n                       SCOTLAND IN 1891 AND 1901.\n \u250c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2510\n \u2502      County.      \u2502                   \u2502  Gaelic and   \u2502             \u2502\n \u2502                   \u2502    Population.    \u2502   English.    \u2502Gaelic only. \u2502\n \u251c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2524\n \u2502         \u201e         \u2502  1891.  \u2502  1901.  \u2502 1891. \u2502 1901. \u25021891. \u25021901. \u2502\n \u251c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2524\n \u2502Inverness          \u2502   89,317\u2502   89,796\u2502 44,084\u2502 43,179\u250217,276\u250211,721\u2502\n \u2502Ross and Cromarty  \u2502   77,810\u2502   76,135\u2502 37,437\u2502 39,235\u250218,577\u250212,171\u2502\n \u2502Argyll             \u2502   75,003\u2502   73,083\u2502 36,720\u2502 34,224\u2502 6,042\u2502 3,313\u2502\n \u2502Lanark             \u25021,046,040\u25021,337,886\u2502 22,887\u2502 26,695\u2502    84\u2502   101\u2502\n \u2502Sutherland         \u2502   21,896\u2502   21,239\u2502 14,786\u2502 14,076\u2502 1,115\u2502   469\u2502\n \u2502Perth              \u2502  126,199\u2502  123,276\u2502 13,847\u2502 11,446\u2502   304\u2502    78\u2502\n \u2502Renfrew            \u2502  290,798\u2502  268,459\u2502  8,435\u2502  5,585\u2502    63\u2502    40\u2502\n \u2502Edinburgh          \u2502  434,159\u2502  487,702\u2502  6,308\u2502  5,745\u2502    19\u2502    75\u2502\n \u2502Caithness          \u2502   37,177\u2502   33,623\u2502  4,068\u2502  2,865\u2502    76\u2502    20\u2502\n \u2502Dumbarton          \u2502   94,495\u2502  113,627\u2502  3,556\u2502  3,040\u2502    36\u2502    14\u2502\n \u2502Bute               \u2502   18,404\u2502   18,641\u2502  3,482\u2502  2,713\u2502    29\u2502    20\u2502\n \u2502Nairn              \u2502   10,019\u2502    9,291\u2502  2,487\u2502  1,325\u2502    53\u2502    10\u2502\n \u2502Elgin              \u2502   43,453\u2502   44,749\u2502  2,263\u2502  1,860\u2502    12\u2502     2\u2502\n \u2502Stirling           \u2502  125,608\u2502  141,847\u2502  1,840\u2502  2,021\u2502     2\u2502    10\u2502\n \u2502Ayr                \u2502  226,283\u2502  254,165\u2502  1,827\u2502  1,654\u2502    14\u2502    16\u2502\n \u2502Aberdeen           \u2502  281,332\u2502  303,908\u2502  1,534\u2502  1,331\u2502     8\u2502     8\u2502\n \u2502Forfar             \u2502  277,773\u2502  283,736\u2502  1,461\u2502  1,303\u2502     8\u2502    13\u2502\n \u2502Fife               \u2502  187,346\u2502  218,347\u2502    726\u2502    840\u2502     6\u2502     3\u2502\n \u2502Banff              \u2502   64,190\u2502   61,440\u2502    639\u2502    499\u2502     3\u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Haddington         \u2502   37,485\u2502   38,656\u2502    575\u2502    459\u2502     7\u2502     7\u2502\n \u2502Linlithgow         \u2502   52,808\u2502   64,796\u2502    486\u2502    575\u2502     2\u2502     5\u2502\n \u2502Clackmannan        \u2502   28,432\u2502   31,994\u2502    215\u2502    170\u2502     1\u2502     1\u2502\n \u2502Dumfries           \u2502   74,221\u2502   72,564\u2502    201\u2502    176\u2502      \u2502     1\u2502\n \u2502Roxburgh           \u2502   53,741\u2502   48,804\u2502    177\u2502    132\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Kincardine         \u2502   35,647\u2502   40,896\u2502    116\u2502    103\u2502     1\u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Berwick            \u2502   32,406\u2502   30,793\u2502     89\u2502     74\u2502      \u2502     1\u2502\n \u2502Orkney             \u2502   30,453\u2502   27,727\u2502     88\u2502     70\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Selkirk            \u2502   27,353\u2502   23,356\u2502     73\u2502     57\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Peebles            \u2502   14,761\u2502   15,066\u2502     70\u2502     72\u2502      \u2502     1\u2502\n \u2502Kirkcudbright      \u2502   39,985\u2502   39,335\u2502     69\u2502     98\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Wigton             \u2502   36,062\u2502   32,593\u2502     68\u2502     84\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Shetland           \u2502   28,711\u2502   27,736\u2502     67\u2502     52\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Kinross            \u2502    6,280\u2502    6,981\u2502     56\u2502     55\u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502Persons on Board   \u2502         \u2502         \u2502       \u2502       \u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502  Ship in Scottish \u2502         \u2502         \u2502       \u2502       \u2502      \u2502      \u2502\n \u2502  Waters           \u2502         \u2502    9,856\u2502       \u2502    887\u2502      \u2502     6\u2502\n \u251c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2524\n \u2502       Total       \u25024,025,647\u25024,472,103\u2502210,677\u2502202,700\u250243,738\u250228,106\u2502\n \u2514\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2518\n\nIn the census of 1901 the schedule restricts the entries in the Gaelic\ncolumn to persons over three years of age. According to the previous\ncensus the number of persons under three years of age amounted to 7\u00bd per\ncent of the whole population. This must be taken into account in order\nto institute a fair comparison between the returns of the\nGaelic-speaking population in 1891 and 1901.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER II\n               ST. PATRICK, THE PIONEER OF CELTIC WRITERS\n\n  The historical Patrick\u2014Authentic records\u2014Earliest known Gaelic\n      litterateur\u2014Dates elusive\u2014Birthplace\u2014Autobiographical details of\n      his youth\u2014Taken captive\u2014Escape\u2014Obscure wanderings\u2014Return\n      home\u2014The r\u00f4le of missionary in Ireland\u2014Epoch-making\n      career\u2014Remarkable Patrician Dialogues\u2014His own literary work\u2014The\n      \u201cConfession\u201d\u2014\u201cEpistle to Coroticus\u201d\u2014\u201cDeer\u2019s Cry\u201d\u2014Ireland\u2019s\n      oldest book\u2014Three other antique compositions from the Book of\n      Hymns\u2014A curious prophecy\u2014Personal character\u2014Death.\n\n\nIt is a characteristic of our age to doubt, if not to deny, the\nhistorical reality of many of the heroic figures that hover in the\nbackground of history. And such a doubt has extended even to St.\nPatrick, due largely to the fact that he is not mentioned by the early\nhistorians Prosper of Aquitaine (402\u2013463) and Bede (673\u2013735), both of\nwhom attribute the conversion of Ireland to Palladius.\n\nBut this seeming omission has been explained on the highly probable\nassumption that Patrick[10] was the Palladius of these writers; and\nagainst the merely negative inference there is the positive and almost\noverwhelming voice of history and tradition, which puts the essential\nfeatures of Ireland\u2019s apostle beyond all doubt.\n\nThe authentic records of his career are numerous and very old, dating\nback, we may say, to his own handwriting. For in the Book of Armagh we\nhave what professes to be a copy of the autobiographical \u201cConfession\u201d\nwhich he wrote himself late in life. This Book of Armagh, one of the\nmost ancient and exquisite of the Irish MSS., is itself nearly 1100\nyears old, having been written in 807 by a scribe Ferdomnach, and, in\naddition to the \u201cConfession\u201d and other interesting contents, it has\npreserved to us various Patrician documents. That the writer had before\nhim the actual autograph MS. of the saint when copying the \u201cConfession\u201d\nis inferred from his own words, \u201cThus far the volume which Patrick wrote\nwith his own hand. On the seventeenth day of March was Patrick\ntranslated to the heavens.\u201d And also from his frequent marks of\ninterrogation and casual hints, such as, \u201cThe Book is uncertain here,\u201d\nshowing that during the intervening centuries since Patrick wrote the\nwriting must have become faded and even illegible in some places.\n\nBesides his own personal account, there is no lack of early lives by\nother authors. Among those that may still be consulted are: (1) the\nbiographical Hymn by Fiacc of Sletty, one of the saint\u2019s own\ncontemporaries; (2) two seventh-century Lives known as Tirechan\u2019s and\nMuirchu Mac Cumachteni\u2019s, found in the Book of Armagh; (3) the\nTripartite Life, largest of all, from three very ancient Gaelic MSS.,\nbelieved by Colgan, though not by later critics, to belong to the early\npart of the sixth century, and translated by him in his _Trias\nThaumaturga_, 1645; (4) the Monk Jocelin\u2019s memoir, twelfth century; and\n(5) other MSS. of the eleventh and fifteenth centuries. Subsequent\nauthors, of course, are mainly dependent on these.\n\nA great historic character was this St. Patrick, who could not be buried\nin documents. His own words have far-reaching significance, beyond even\nwhat he himself meant to convey when he wrote, \u201cHe who is mighty came\nand in his mercy supported me, and raised me up and placed me on the top\nof a wall.\u201d On this eminence St. Patrick is great, not merely as apostle\nof Ireland, but also as occupying a niche in the origins of Celtic\nliterature. Essentially a man of religious initiative, and making no\nclaim to distinction as a writer, he is nevertheless the earliest known\npioneer of letters in Ireland\u2014the first of whose work we have definite\nrecords to attest the authenticity.\n\nWhat share he had in making the latter a literary country it is\ndifficult to say; but from his missionary advent in Ireland a knowledge\nof letters seems to have spread rapidly over the land. His monasteries\nand churches were centres and nurseries of learning. \u201cHe used,\u201d as\nTirechan tells us, \u201cto baptize men daily and to read letters and\nabgatoriae with them.\u201d\n\nThere is a high probability that the Ogam writing peculiar to Ireland\noriginated before his time, and even the beautiful modification of the\nRoman alphabet found in Irish books. These are still matters for\nresearch. But one thing, at least, is claimed for the saint and his\nChristian followers, that they made the use of the Roman script for the\nfirst time widely general. And this had far-reaching results for the\nfuture, since only by its adaptation, as apart from the rude and\ncumbrous though ingeniously simple Ogam, was any real literature\npossible.\n\nIn view of the mass of biographical material that has collected round\nthe venerated name of St Patrick, it might be supposed that every event\nof his life would stand out clear and luminous. Yet such is the\nperversity of historic authorship, that names and dates and even\noft-told incidents are hard to get at in their true setting. The career\nof the apostle is inextricably jumbled up and confused with that of two\nothers\u2014the traditional Palladius and another Patrick, both of which\nsemi-mythical characters appear and disappear again and again, crossing\nhis path like his double; insomuch that it has been conjectured that the\nincidents of one life are often transferred to another, and the saint is\ncredited with experiences which really belonged to the history of the\nother two, such, for example, as his alleged mandate from the Pope and\nthe superior continental training under Germanus.\n\nDates especially are wonderfully elusive. The usual chronology for St.\nPatrick\u2019s career is given as follows: Birth, 387; missionary advent in\nIreland, 432; death, 492 or 493. Yet each of these dates is still under\ndiscussion. Dr. Whitley Stokes puts the advent as early as 397; Dr. Todd\nas late as 439 or 440. And so, after all that has been said and\nsearched, we are dependent for the essential features and outstanding\nfacts of his life upon the apostle\u2019s own writings.\n\nSuch historical details as are generally accepted may be briefly given.\nBut in this case there is an advantage in quoting the _ipsissima verba_\nof the saint, and thus allow him to tell his own tale at critical points\nof his career, for his style and matter are themselves a revelation of\ncharacter.\n\nHe first projects himself on the canvas of literary history by relating\nearly circumstances and the pregnant event which changed the whole\naspect of his life, and gave it the direction it afterwards took. Thus\nhe begins:\u2014\n\n  I, Patrick, a sinner, the rudest and least of all the faithful and the\n  most despicable among most men, had for my father Calpornius a deacon,\n  son of the late Potitus a presbyter, who was of the town of Bonaven\n  Taberni\u00e6; for he had a farm in the neighbourhood where I was taken\n  captive. I was then sixteen years old. I knew not the true God, and I\n  was carried in captivity to Hiberio with many thousands of men\n  according to our deserts, because we had gone back from God and had\n  not kept His commandments, and were not obedient to our priests who\n  used to warn us for our salvation.\n\nBonaven Taberni\u00e6 has been the subject of much eager inquiry to this day.\nWhere is it? or Nemthur, the alternative name furnished by Fiacc of\nSletty? Many places claim the honour of being the birthplace of the\nsaint. Boulogne, Bristol, Glastonbury, Carlisle, Tours, Caerleon, and\nIreland have all contended at one time or another for the prestige. But\nthe best authorities in recent times seem to favour Old Kilpatrick, near\nDumbarton, as the most likely locality from which sprung the saint, and\nas fulfilling better than any of the others the actual suggestions of\nthe records. In the river opposite the town there is a rock visible at\nlow water, called St. Patrick\u2019s stone, tradition alleging that the ship\nin which he sailed away to Ireland struck against it, but continued its\nvoyage unharmed.\n\nIn captivity in Antrim he remained for six years, his daily employment\nbeing to feed cattle. Then the love of God entered his heart, he tells\nus, and a spirit of prayer grew upon him. Often he would say a hundred\nprayers in a day, and rise of nights to resort to the woods and\nmountains in snow, and frost, and rain, for the same purpose.\n\nWhile thus exercised, one night, in a dream, a voice came to him saying,\n\u201cThy fasting is well; thou shalt soon return to thy country.\u201d Later on,\nthe dream was repeated, the same voice assuring him that the ship was\nnow ready, 200 miles away.\n\nWaiting no longer, the poor enthused slave fled from his master, and,\nafter long wandering, reached the port, where he found indeed a ship,\nbut the captain of it proved rough and hostile, and refused to have\nanything to do with him. On the way back to his hut he was recalled by a\nsailor, the upshot of the parley being that he accompanied the crew on\nthe voyage. Afterwards he seems to have been detained by them on shore,\nperhaps in Gaul, as they wandered in a desert and suffered great\nhardships. \u201cHow is it, Christian?\u201d said the captain one day when no food\ncould be had. Patrick gave a characteristic reply, and he tells us that\nthey were saved from starvation on that occasion by a herd of swine soon\nafter appearing, some of which they killed and ate.\n\nThere is no mention in his account of any Continental sojourn,[11]\nthough almost all the Lives make reference to such. Fiacc of Sletty\nwaxes poetical over it:\u2014\n\n He went across all the Alps\u2014great God, it was a marvel of a journey\u2014\n Until he staid with German in the south, in the south part of Latium;\n In the isles of the Tyrrhene Sea he remained, therein he meditated,\n He read the Canon with German; it is this that writings declare\n To Ireland God\u2019s angels were bringing him in his course,\n Often was it seen in vision that he would come thither again.\n\nIf such wandering took place, it was probably after he escaped from the\nmariners. For, over twenty-two years of his life at this period seem to\nbe a blank, unless accounted for by some such sojourn in this country or\nabroad. At length, after great privations and lonely struggle, he made\nhis way back to his parents, who received him \u201cas a son, and earnestly\nbesought him not to expose himself to fresh dangers, but to remain with\nthem henceforth.\u201d\n\nFor a while he did stay, and then the apostolic spirit came upon him.\n\u201cIn the dead of night,\u201d he says, \u201cI saw a man coming to me as if from\nHiberio, whose name was Victoricus, having innumerable epistles. And he\ngave me one of them, and I read the beginning of it, which contained the\nwords, \u2018The voice of the Irish.\u2019 And whilst I was repeating the\nbeginning of the epistle, I imagined that I heard in my mind the voice\nof those who were near the wood of Foclut, which is near the Western\nSea, and then they cried, \u2018We pray thee, holy youth, to come and\nhenceforth walk amongst us.\u2019\u201d\n\nHe is supposed to have been forty-five years of age then. His mission,\nwe see, he attributed solely to an inward call or divine command. There\nis no mention of any authority from the Pope, of any visit to Rome or\nGaul, or even of the superior education he is credited with having\nreceived on the Continent under Germanus. On the contrary, he speaks of\nhimself in his early condition as \u201ca rustic, a fugitive, unlearned, and\nnot knowing how to provide for the coming day;\u201d spiritually, \u201clike a\nstone lying in the deep mud.\u201d And in later life, in reference to the\n\u201cConfession,\u201d \u201cWherefore I thought of writing long ago, but hesitated\ntill now, for I feared I should not fall into the language of men;\nbecause I have not read like others who have been taught sacred letters\nin the best manner, and have never changed their language from infancy,\nbut were always adding to its perfection; for my language and speech is\ntranslated into a foreign tongue. Indeed, it can be easily perceived\nfrom the childishness of my writing after what manner I have been\ninstructed and taught.\u201d\n\nHe had used Latin, no doubt, as his mother tongue in boyhood, but, not\nhaving received much instruction in it, he had never cultivated it as a\nliterary language, and consequently it had, during his captivity, fallen\nvery much into abeyance, so that it was difficult for him in later days\nto write this language of the learned as fluently as he would wish.\n\nHis father was of Roman descent. His mother is said to have been\nBritish\u2014a merely conjectural statement.\n\nLike St. Columba in after years, St. Patrick addressed the tribesmen\nthrough their chiefs and kings, and was tolerant of contemporary\nsuperstitions, seeking rather to graft the new faith upon the old. He\nadopted the pagan festivals and associated them with Christian events.\nAt Tara, however, he attacked paganism in its stronghold and burnt the\ndruidical books, extorting from King Laoghaire a reluctant acquiescence\nin his work. From the chief, Daire, he obtained the site for his famous\nmonastery at Armagh, which became his headquarters. He threw down, in\nwhat is the present county of Cavan, the great idol Crom Cruach\u2014object\nof immemorial veneration and savage rites. From the huge stone, which\nbowed westward on that day of doom, the demon is reported to have fled\nto hell, leaving his fallen image leaning over, so that what was once\ncalled \u201cThe Chief of the Mound\u201d was henceforth known as \u201cThe Crooked one\n[Crom Cruach] of the Mound.\u201d\n\nAs his work advanced, a vast following of missionaries, bishops, and\neven chiefs and sub-kings, with their subjects, came under his\ninfluence. He had a share also in reforming the ancient druidical laws\nof Ireland, and bringing them more into harmony with Christian\nprinciples. According to the \u201cFour Masters,\u201d it was in 438 the part of\nthe Brehon Law known as the Seanchus Mor, and still preserved in\nvenerable documents, was redacted. Much of the work may be of later\ndates, but tradition credits St. Patrick with having undertaken the task\nalong with others, and with having effected a drastic purification in\nhis own lifetime.\n\nMany legends have gathered round his name during the ages, and\nsuperstitious beliefs, as one might expect. Yet, so great is his\nprestige in the land of his adoption to this day, that not only are\nthousands called by his name, but the peasantry of Ireland actually\nbelieve that St. Patrick banished snakes from the island.\n\nThe historical records know nothing of any meeting between Ossian and\nthe saint; yet in some of the older MSS. there are Dialogues[12] in the\nheroic style reported as having been carried on between them, the bard\nrepresenting the pagan ideal of his ancestors, the saint the Christian\nideal of the Church. They are evidently the work of later times, some\ncenturies, no doubt, after the saint\u2019s time. But, both from a literary\nand religious point of view, they are profoundly interesting.\n\nBesides these characteristic Dialogues reported in the Book of Lismore\nand other ancient MSS., and assumed to have taken place between St.\nPatrick and Ossian, there is a romantic and beautiful one recorded by\nTirechan, and repeated with more or less variations in the Lives of St.\nPatrick, and consequently of great antiquity. It is taken from the Book\nof Armagh.\n\nThe saint had come to the well called Clebach, and before sunrise sat\ndown beside it with his followers.\n\n  And lo! the two daughters of King Laoghaire, Ethne the fair and Fedelm\n  the ruddy, came early to the well to wash after the manner of women,\n  and they found near the well a synod of holy Bishops with Patrick. And\n  they knew not whence they were or in what form or from what people, or\n  from what country; but they supposed them to be divine sidhe, or gods\n  of the earth, or a phantasm, and the virgins said unto them, \u201cWho are\n  ye! and whence come ye?\u201d And Patrick said unto them, \u201cIt were better\n  for you to confess to our true God, than to inquire concerning our\n  race.\u201d\n\n        The first virgin said,\n        \u201cWho is God?\n        And where is God?\n        And of what (nature) is God?\n        And where is His dwelling-place?\n        Has your God sons and daughters, gold and silver?\n        Is He ever living?\n        Is He beautiful?\n        Did Mary foster His Son?\n        Are His daughters dear and beautiful to men of the world?\n        Is He in heaven or in earth?\n        In the sea?\n        In rivers?\n        In mountainous places?\n        In valleys?\n        Declare unto us a knowledge of Him,\n        How shall He be seen?\n        How is He to be loved?\n        How is He to be found?\n        Is it in youth?\n        Is it in old age that He is to be found?\u201d\n\nWith swift strides the narrative goes on to tell how the saint\nenlightened the two maidens, how they believed and were baptized, how\nthey received the eucharist of God and slept in death. Thereafter they\nwere laid on the same bed, covered with garments, while their friends\nraised great lamentation for them.\n\nSuch is a summary of the chief events in St. Patrick\u2019s long and\nepoch-making career in Ireland, taken generally to have lasted sixty\nyears, so that he must have lived to a ripe old age, if the records\nreport with any exactness.\n\nLeaving now the biographical and coming to the purely literary aspect of\nhis life, we find that there are three pieces of literature assigned to\nhim, namely, the \u201cConfession\u201d and the \u201cEpistle to Coroticus,\u201d both in\nLatin, and the \u201cDeer\u2019s Cry\u201d in Gaelic. The two former are sometimes\nstyled his epistles, numbered I. and II., the history of whose\npreservation to our own time is not without its peculiar interest.\n\nBesides the copy of the \u201cConfession\u201d in the Book of Armagh, there are\nfour other MSS. in existence: (1) the Cottonian, in the British Museum;\n(2) two MSS. in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, formerly preserved in the\nSalisbury Cathedral; (3) one MS. in the Public Library of Arras. The\ntext of the Bollandist Fathers was taken from the Arras MS. and\npublished at Antwerp in 1668 in their _Acta Sanctorum_. A copy of the\n\u201cEpistle to Coroticus\u201d accompanies each of the above except that in the\nBook of Armagh.\n\nOf the \u201cConfession,\u201d the style and gist may be gathered from the\nextracts given as we recounted his life. It is perhaps the earliest\npiece of authentic Celtic literature we have, inasmuch as it is the\nfirst of which the authorship can be definitely and historically\nasserted. Its Latin is rude and archaic, answering to the description\nSt. Patrick gives of his own writing. It quotes from the pre-Vulgate\nversion of the Scriptures, and contains nothing inconsistent with the\nperiod in which it professes to have been written.\n\nThe saint appears to have penned this document as a kind of defence of\nhis apostolic work against the attacks of men who regarded the whole\nundertaking as arrogant and presumptuous in view of his own rusticity.\n\u201cThe rustic condition was created by the Most High,\u201d he gently reminds\nthem, and adds some plain truths which show that, like Jesus, and St.\nPaul, and St Francis of Assisi, and other great master-spirits of the\nChristian Evangel, he did not disdain poverty, but voluntarily assumed\nit for the promotion of the Gospel. It would be tedious, he says, to\nrelate even a portion of the many toils and dangers he had gone through.\nTwelve times his life was in imminent peril. Never one farthing did he\nreceive for all his preaching and teaching. He challenges his detractors\nto say if he did and it will be returned. The people, indeed, were\ngenerous and offered innumerable gifts, which, out of principle, he\nrefused, lest it might furnish an opportunity for cavil against the\ndisinterestedness of his mission. On one occasion, on being told that\nhis own nephew declared that his preaching would be perfect if he\ninsisted a little more on the necessity of giving, he gave the noble\nreply, that \u201cfor the sake of charity he forebore to preach charity.\u201d\n\nThe \u201cEpistle to Coroticus\u201d is evidently from the same pen. The Latin and\nthe literary style are similar. It also quotes from the pre-Vulgate\nversion, and there is no internal evidence against the assumption that\nit was written by the saint. Though not found in the Book of Armagh, it\nis preserved in the other MSS. cited, some of which may be as old as the\neleventh and twelfth centuries.\n\nCertain authorities identify Coroticus with the Welsh prince Caredig.\nOther more recent scholars, such as Drs. Skene, Whitley Stokes, and\nDouglas Hyde, contend that he was a prince of Strathclyde, Ceretic by\nname, who had his capital at Alclwyd, the modern Dumbarton, and thus\nthat he hailed from St. Patrick\u2019s own district.\n\nAt any rate, the soldiers and allies of this nominally Christian king\nsuddenly made a descent on the eastern shores of Ireland, which they\nharried, carrying away many of St. Patrick\u2019s converts to be sold as\nslaves, and ruthlessly killing numbers of them on the very day after\ntheir baptism, while the symbol of their faith, as he says, was still\nwet upon their foreheads, and these neophytes were yet clad in their\nwhite vestments. The letter was sent as a remonstrance against such\nbarbarous conduct, and to urge the lawless prince to restore the\ncaptives. But to little effect, for the invader treated messengers and\nletters alike with ridicule and contempt, delivering the converts\nabducted into the hands of the Picts and Scots.\n\nIn this letter, as in the \u201cConfession,\u201d St. Patrick gives interesting\npersonal details. A few extracts are worth quoting. For example:\u2014\n\n  I, Patrick, an unlearned sinner do truly acknowledge that I have been\n  constituted a bishop in Ireland. I accept it of God that I am. I dwell\n  among barbarians a proselyte and an exile for the love of God.\n\n  I have written these words to be given and delivered to the soldiers\n  and by them to Coroticus.... I do not say to my fellow-citizens nor to\n  fellow-citizens of pious Romans, but to fellow-citizens of demons,\n  through their evil deeds.... I was of noble birth according to the\n  flesh, my father being a Decurio. For I bartered my nobility\u2014I do not\n  blush nor regret it\u2014for the benefit of others. No thanks to me. But\n  God hath put in my heart the anxious desire that I should be one of\n  the hunters or fishers who as God formerly announced should appear in\n  the last days.... What shall I do, Lord? I am greatly despised. Lo thy\n  sheep are torn to pieces around me and plundered by these aforesaid\n  marauders under the command of Coroticus.\n\nIn this letter he mentions also that he is constrained by the Spirit not\nto see any of his kindred.\n\nFor St. Patrick\u2019s beautiful hymn, the \u201cDeer\u2019s Cry,\u201d we are indebted to\nthe Book of Hymns of the eleventh century, which, like the Book of\nArmagh, contains several Patrician pieces. It is a Gaelic composition\nalleged to have been made by the saint while on his way to the great\nCourt of Tara. It was celebrated for generations before the English\nconquest as a _lorica_ or prayer for protection. Dr. Todd says, \u201cThat\nthis hymn is a composition of great antiquity cannot be questioned. It\nis written in a very ancient dialect of the Irish Celtic. It was\nevidently composed during the existence of pagan usages in the country.\nIt makes no allusion to Arianism or any of the heresies prevalent in the\nContinental Church. It notices no doctrine or practice of the Church\nthat is not known to have existed before the fifth century. In its style\nand diction, although written in a different language, there is nothing\nvery dissimilar to the Confession and the letter about Coroticus, and\nnothing absolutely inconsistent with the opinion that it may be by the\nsame author.\u201d Beyond this no positive proof can be given.\n\nIn the _Liber Hymnorum_ it is prefaced by the following distinctive\naccount in Gaelic:\u2014\n\n  Patrick made this hymn. In the time of Laoghaire son of Nial it was\n  made. The cause of making it however was to protect himself with his\n  monks against the deadly enemies who were in ambush against the\n  clerics. And this is a corselet of faith for the protection of body\n  and soul against demons and human beings and vices. Every one who\n  shall say it every day with pious meditation on God, demons shall not\n  stay before him. It will be a safeguard to him against every poison\n  and envy; it will be a comna to him against sudden death; it will be a\n  corselet to his soul after dying. Patrick sung this when the\n  ambuscades were sent against him by Laoghaire that he might not go to\n  Tara to sow the faith, so that there seemed before the ambuscaders to\n  be wild deer and a fawn after them, to wit, Benen;[13] and faed fiada\n  (guard\u2019s cry) is its name.\n\nApparently the assassins mistook the chanting of the lorica for the cry\nof the deer. This saved the party, and furnished a name for the hymn.\n\nA very remarkable and striking piece of literature it is, and one that\ndoes credit to the language in which it is clothed. \u201cFor its glow of\nimagination and fervour of devotion,\u201d says Dr. Dowden, the author of the\n_Early Celtic Church in Scotland_, \u201cit will always challenge a high\nplace in the history of Christian hymnology.\u201d\n\nIt it well worth transcribing also as exhibiting the saint\u2019s creed, his\nbelief in contemporary superstitions and attitude towards them, his\npiety and poetic gift. In all probability we have here a very fair\nrepresentation of the gist of his teaching. Like the authors of the\nVedic hymns, and the votaries of all primitive religions, he invokes the\npowers of nature, a phase of the religious spirit which seems to have\nfallen devotionally in abeyance in modern times. What strikes our age\nperhaps as more curious and superstitious, he prays for protection\nagainst the spells of women, smiths, and Druids, like any good heathen.\n\n I[14] bind myself to-day to a strong virtue, an invocation of (the)\n    Trinity. I believe in a Threeness with confession of an Oneness in\n    (the) Creator of (the) Universe.\n I bind myself to-day to the virtue of Christ\u2019s birth with his baptism,\n   To the virtue of his crucifixion with his burial,\n   To the virtue of his resurrection with his ascension,\n   To the virtue of his coming to the Judgment of Doom.\n I bind myself to-day to the virtue of ranks of Cherubim,\n   In obedience of angels,\n   (In service of archangels),\n   In hope of resurrection for reward,\n   In prayers of patriarchs,\n   In predictions of prophets,\n   In preachings of apostles,\n   In faiths of confessors,\n   In innocence of holy virgins,\n   In deeds of righteous men.\n I bind myself to-day to the virtue of Heaven,\n   In light of sun,\n   In brightness of snow,\n   In splendour of fire,\n   In speed of lightning,\n   In swiftness of wind,\n   In depth of sea,\n   In stability of earth,\n   In compactness of rock.\n I bind myself to-day to God\u2019s virtue to pilot me,\n   God\u2019s might to uphold me,\n   God\u2019s wisdom to guide me,\n   God\u2019s eye to look before me,\n   God\u2019s ear to hear me,\n   God\u2019s word to speak for me,\n   God\u2019s hand to guard me,\n   God\u2019s way to lie before me,\n   God\u2019s shield to protect me,\n   God\u2019s host to secure me,\n     Against snares of demons,\n     Against seductions of vices,\n     Against lusts (?) of nature,\n     Against every one who wishes ill to me,\n     Afar and anear,\n     Alone and in a multitude,\n So have I invoked all these virtues between me (and these)\n   Against every cruel, merciless power which may come, against my body\n      and my soul,\n   Against incantations of false prophets.\n   Against black laws of heathenry,\n   Against false laws of heretics,\n   Against craft of idolatry,\n   Against spells of women, and smiths, and Druids,\n   Against every knowledge that defiles men\u2019s souls,\n     Christ to protect me to-day.\n   Against poison, against burning, against drowning, against death\n      wound,\n     Until a multitude of rewards come to me!\n Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ in me!\n Christ below me, Christ above me, Christ at my right, Christ at my left,\n Christ in breadth, Christ in length, Christ in height!\n Christ in the heart of every one who thinks of me,\n Christ in the mouth of every one who speaks to me,\n Christ in every eye who sees me,\n Christ in every ear who hears me.\n I bind myself to-day to a strong virtue, an invocation of (the) Trinity,\n I believe in a Threeness with confession of an Oneness in (the) Creator\n    of (the) Universe\n Domini est salus, Domini est salus, Christi est salus,\n Salus tua Domine, sit semper nobiscum.\n\nThe oldest book in Ireland is now believed to be the _Domhnach Airgid_,\na copy of the four Gospels in Latin presented, according to the\n\u201cTripartite Life,\u201d by St. Patrick to St. Aedh Maccarthenn of Clogher.\nFor protection it has a triple shrine of yew, silver-plated copper, and\ngold-plated silver. Shrine and MS. are to-day among the most prized\ntreasures of the Royal Irish Academy. It is highly probable, says\nProfessor G. T. Stokes and Dr. Wright, that it was the veritable copy\nused by St. Patrick himself.\n\nThe Book of Hymns has also three other very interesting compositions,\nwhich profess to date back to his time.\n\nFirst there is Sechnall\u2019s Hymn in praise of St. Patrick, supposed to\nhave been written during his lifetime, and generally regarded as\ngenuine. St. Sechnall, or Secundius as he is sometimes called, was the\nnephew and disciple of Patrick, and associated with him in the See of\nArmagh, either as contemporaneous bishop or as his successor. It was he\nwho annoyed the saint by his sordid remark about preaching on the\nnecessity of giving. To condone for the pain he gave his uncle, the\npenitent Sechnall composed this poem of twenty-two stanzas in his\npraise, thus constituting himself, if written before the \u201cDeer\u2019s Cry,\u201d\nthe first known poet of Christian Ireland. In view of its alleged\nacceptance by St. Patrick, the hymn has been held in great veneration,\nand sung as one of his honours on the days of his Festival.\n\nA second Patrician piece in the Book of Hymns is Fiacc of Sletty\u2019s\nmetrical life\u2014also called a Hymn. It is purely biographical, and written\nafter St. Patrick\u2019s death, according to the introduction in the above\nancient MS. Here we are told in Gaelic, with Latin words curiously\ninterpolated, that Patrick said to Dubthach, chief bard of Ireland,\n\u201c\u2018Seek for me a man of rank, of good race, well-moralled, one wife and\none child with him only.\u2019 \u2018Why dost thou seek that, to wit a man of that\nkind?\u2019 said Dubthach. \u2018For him to go into orders,\u2019 said Patrick. \u2018Fiacc\nis that,\u2019 said Dubthach, \u2018and he has gone on a circuit in Connaught.\u2019\nNow while they were talking, it is then came Fiacc from his circuit.\n\u2018There,\u2019 said Dubthach, \u2018is he of whom we spake.\u2019 \u2018Though he be,\u2019 said\nPatrick, \u2018yet what we say may not be pleasing to him.\u2019 \u2018Let a trial be\nmade to tonsure me,\u2019 said Dubthach, \u2018so that Fiacc may see.\u2019 So when\nFiacc saw he asked, \u2018Wherefore is the trial made?\u2019 \u2018To tonsure\nDubthach,\u2019 say they. \u2018That is idle,\u2019 said he, \u2018for there is not in\nIreland a poet his equal.\u2019 \u2018Thou wouldst be taken in his place,\u2019 said\nPatrick. \u2018My loss to Ireland,\u2019 says Fiacc, \u2018is less than Dubthach\u2019s\n(would be).\u2019 So Patrick shore his beard from Fiacc then, and great glee\ncame upon him thereafter, so that he read all the ecclesiastical ordo in\none night\u2014or fifteen days, as some say\u2014and so that a bishop\u2019s rank was\nconferred on him, and so that it is he who is Archbishop of Leinster\nthenceforward and his successor after him.\u201d\n\nDr. Todd thinks it impossible to attribute so high an antiquity to the\nHymn as Fiacc\u2019s own time, since it contains an allusion to the\ndesolation of Tara. Colgan 250 years previously met the difficulty by\nregarding the latter reference as prophetic.\n\nWe must not omit a very curious prophecy regarding St. Patrick which the\nScholiast on Fiacc\u2019s Hymn has preserved. It is in the copy of the Book\nof Hymns now in the convent of St. Isidore at Rome, a MS. of the\neleventh or twelfth century. From internal evidence it may be recognised\nthat the stanza cannot be older than the beginning of the seventh\ncentury, but it is written in a very ancient dialect of the Gaelic, and\npurported to be an old-time prediction by a pagan Druid.\n\n                       Ticfa tailcend\n                       Tar muir murcend,\n                       A brat tollcend,\n                       A crand chromcend,\n                       A mias in iarthur a thigi,\n                       Frisgerad a muinter uili\n                           Amen, Amen.\n\n He comes, he comes, with shaven crown, from off the storm-toss\u2019d sea,\n His garment pierced at the neck, with crook-like staff comes he,\n Far in his house, at its east end, his cups and patens lie,\n His people answer to his voice. Amen, Amen, they cry.\n                                     Amen, Amen.\n\nA third Patrician fragment in the Book of Hymns, eleventh century, is\nentitled Ninine\u2019s Prayer, with the explanatory head-line, \u201cNinine the\npoet made this prayer, or Fiacc of Sletty.\u201d It runs:\u2014\n\n We put trust in St. Patrick, chief apostle of Ireland,\n Conspicuous his name, wonderful; a flame that baptized Gentiles,\n He fought against hard-hearted Druids; he thrust down proud men with the\n    aid of Our Lord of fair heavens.\n\n He purified the great offspring of meadow-landed Erin,\n We pray to Patrick, chief apostle, who will save us at the Judgment from\n    doom to the malevolences of dark demons.\n God be with me with the prayer of Patrick, chief apostle!\n\nIn all this varied literature, reaching from his own time till ours, the\nApostle of Ireland stands forth a commanding personality, as different\nfrom St. Columba as St. Francis was from St. Bernard. Genial, earnest,\nhumble, sensitively sympathetic, with commanding force of character and\nirresistible determination as the agent of a Divine Mission, his\nenthusiasm made way for him. Less impulsive, less warlike, and less\nlearned than Columcille, he carried on his spiritual campaign in a\nspirit of self-denying devotion and love of men. \u201cPatrick, without\nloftiness or arrogance,\u201d as Fiacc describes him, \u201cit was much of good he\nthought.\u201d At the end of the day we find him in poverty and misery\nwriting his Confession, not sure but the morrow of his life may bring a\nviolent death, or slavery, or some other dread evil.\n\nYet true to the last in his unquenchable zeal, his own words seem to sum\nup the high aim of his life: \u201cTherefore it is very fitting that we\nshould spread our nets that a copious multitude and crowd may be taken\nfor God, and that everywhere there may be clergy who shall baptize a\nneedy and desiring people.\u201d\n\nHe died at Saul, while on a visit there from Armagh, and his grave is\nbelieved to be at Downpatrick, to which place tradition says the remains\nof St. Columba were transported from Iona in the more troublous times,\nand re-interred beside those of his great forerunner.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER III\n            ST. COLUMBA AND THE DAWN OF LETTERS IN SCOTLAND\n\n  The fugitive MSS.\u2014Gaelic a literary language for ages\u2014Scotland\u2019s first\n      writer\u2014St. Columba one of the rarer master-spirits\u2014His peculiar\n      qualities\u2014Intellectual standpoint\u2014Birth\u2014Early life\u2014A fateful\n      incident\u2014Sets sail for Pictland\u2014Motive\u2014Arrival in pagan\n      Scotland\u2014His missionary enterprise\u2014Lights the lamp of\n      literature\u2014An ardent scholar, penman, and poet\u2014The famous\n      \u201cCathrach\u201d\u2014His Gaelic poems\u2014Latin hymns\u2014The Columban\n      renaissance\u2014Encouragement of bards and scholars\u2014The _Amra\n      Choluimcille_\u2014Iona as an educational centre\u2014European fame and\n      influence.\n\n\nModern research and historical criticism have done much for Celtic\nliterature. Not long ago the subject might be regarded as a tangled web\nof fact and fiction. Inquirers found it hard to thread their way through\nthe unsifted mass of materials, to know the true from the fabulous,\nauthentic history from myth and legend.\n\nAll the more because the original documents, like the graves of a\nhousehold, were \u201csevered far and wide by mount and stream and sea,\u201d and\nfor the most part inaccessible. It must be matter of astonishment to\nmany to learn that very few of our older Celtic MSS.\u2014MSS. written in\nthese islands\u2014have found a home in Scotland. They have long ago been\ntransferred to the Continent, to France, Italy, Holland, Switzerland,\nAustria, and Germany. So that to-day scores of these venerable relics\nare preserved in places as distant and far apart as Milan, St. Gall,\nW\u00fcrzburg, Carlsruhe, Brussels, Turin, Vienna, Berne, Leyden, Nancy,\nParis. Even the oldest MS. now existing that can be proved to have been\nwritten in Scotland, is kept not in Edinburgh or Glasgow, but in the\npublic library of Schaffhausen in Switzerland.\n\nOne reason for this seems to have been that the Irish or Scots gave so\nmany evangelists and professors in those early days to the Continent,\nmen like Columbanus and St. Gall, and their followers; and another, when\nthe books were in danger in the British Isles from the depredations of\nthe Norsemen, they were removed for security to the monasteries and\nseats of learning presided over by these Celtic scholars.\n\nThe records thus available, here and there, carry us back over a period\nof well nigh 1500 years to the days of St. Patrick and St. Columba. As\nC\u00e6dmon was the pioneer of English literature, so is St. Patrick the\nfirst known litterateur of Ireland, and St. Columba the first of\nScotland. From the time of the introduction of Christianity by these\nmen, Celtic literature has a history, continuous and verifiable. Beyond\ntheir day all is uncertain and cloudy. Pagan Scotland lies in the dim\nbackground enveloped in haze. Sagas and myths and poems and romances it\nundoubtedly had in abundance, floating by oral tradition, but no written\nrecord. In almost every instance of its old-time lore, authorship is\nunknown. That by-past is the region of conjecture, and we can be as\nlittle certain of the origins as Greek scholars are of the genesis of\nthe _Iliad_ or of the _Odyssey_.\n\nIn this study, then, we go back to the march between Pagan and Christian\ntimes, and leaving behind at present the doubtful and uncertain, we\nshall endeavour to trace the dawn of letters in Scotland.\n\nOn that far horizon the first man we encounter with a pen and a passion\nfor writing is the wonderful St. Columba. Across the ages his impressive\nfigure still stands out massive and strong in the background of history.\nAmong the men of fame\u2014the rarer master-spirits who have helped to make\nScotland what she is\u2014Columcille stands earliest. Vividly and terribly in\nearnest himself, he stamped his religious convictions not only upon many\ndistricts of Ireland, but also upon heathen Alba.\n\nHe possessed just the qualities that were best fitted to give him an\nascendancy over men in that rude age. Unlike most of the great\nevangelists of Christianity, he was of princely origin, descended both\non his father\u2019s and his mother\u2019s side from illustrious Irish kings. This\nnoble lineage, combined with the patronage of his own kinsman Conall,\nKing of Dalriada\u2014our modern Argyllshire\u2014gave him an immense influence in\nan age when the tribes, even in matters of religion, followed their king\nor chief.\n\nBut Columcille was personally a born leader of men. Physically and\nintellectually he towered above his fellows. Of a tall and commanding\nappearance, powerful frame, broad face, close and curly hair, his grey\neyes large and luminous, he looked the saint he was, joyful and radiant,\nwith a love for everything beautiful in nature, animate and inanimate.\nWithal he had a loud and resonant voice, well adapted for impassioned\nspeech. When preaching, tradition says that he could be easily\nunderstood across the Sound of Mull. And Adamnan assures us that when\nsinging with his brethren in the church, the venerable man raised his\nvoice so wonderfully that it was sometimes heard at the distance of 1000\npaces, while from the \u201cOld Irish Life\u201d we learn that his reading carried\neven farther. A voice to soothe the savage breast with its plaintive\nsweetness, and yet of power and range sufficient to awe the pagan mind.\n\nFor this apostle of Scotland, despite his name, was no mere cooing dove.\nHe could be very terrifying when roused. Of a hot and passionate temper,\nhe was in reality a perfervid Celt; stern and even vindictive at times,\nhe would fight his battles with the carnal weapons, if need be, just as\nreadily as he would with the spiritual. Three battles at least, fierce\nand sanguinary, stand to his account in history, he their instigator,\ntwo of these even after he became Abbot of Iona.\n\nAltogether a strange character to contemplate was this father and\nfounder of monasteries, especially when viewed from our scientific\nage\u2014the intellectual standpoint of his time was so wholly different from\nours. He continually moved in a halo of miracles, prophecies, and\nangels, as real to him as physical laws and nerves and germs are to us.\nSo credulous was he that he never seemed even to question the magical\nimpostures of his opponents, the Druids. He is not represented as trying\nto expose their marvels, but rather as endeavouring to outrival them by\ngreater miracles of his own. The one set he believed to be from the evil\none, the other of God. For him the seen always merged in the unseen; the\nnatural is construed in terms of the supernatural. Science, of course,\nhad not then formulated laws or facts as we know them, and St. Columba\nwas a child of his age, imbued with the same credulity as the\ncontemporary heathen around him, and very much the same superstitions.\nHe believed he could bless men or blight them by his intercessions, and\nsometimes in the exercise of this power he did not even hesitate to\ncurse irreconcilables and consign them to future destruction.\n\nOn one occasion, exasperated with a thief of noble birth who had twice\nplundered the house of a man of humble condition, and mocked and laughed\nat the rebukes of the saint himself, the irate Columba\u2014and this is a\npicture for an artist\u2014followed him to the water\u2019s edge, and wading up to\nthe knees in the clear green sea-water, raised both his hands to heaven\nand solemnly invoked a curse on the man. Returning to the dry ground he\nsat down, and forthwith told his companions what the fate of the scamp\nwould be. No maudlin saint was the imperious Columcille. Gentle,\naffectionate, and kind, yet a man to impress the wild Pictish tribes\nwith awe and reverence.\n\nBorn at Gartan, Donegal, in the north of Ireland in 521, and brought up\nfrom youth in Christian principles, he was trained under the best\nmasters, and apparently caught up in the wave of evangelisation that\nswept over Ireland from St. Patrick\u2019s time. At any rate, when\ntwenty-five years of age he founded the Church of Derry, and seven years\nlater the Monastery of Durrow. Other establishments soon followed,\nspringing up here and there under his initiative and fostering care,\nuntil when full forty years old an event occurred which in a manner\nchanged the whole aspect of his career, and gave a new direction to his\nenergies. This was the battle of Cooldrevna, of far-reaching import.\n\nTwo causes are usually assigned for the fight. St. Finnian of Moville,\nunder whom the future abbot first studied, brought back with him from\nRome a copy of the Psalms, supposed to be the first copy of St Jerome\u2019s\nVulgate that appeared in Ireland. This the master treasured, and wished\nto keep private and reserved. But Columcille, then an ardent student and\nrapid writer, sat up for nights together and surreptitiously transcribed\nthe book for his own use. Hearing of this, Finnian claimed the copy, but\nin vain. His disciple refused to part with it, and the matter was\nreferred to King Diarmad at Tara. This monarch, to whom no doubt a legal\nquarrel over a book was new, could find nothing in the Brehon Law to\nadjudicate the case by, except the practical adage, _le gach boin a\nboinin_ (with every cow her calf), and being perhaps more disposed to\nfavour Finnian, as of his own kin and jurisdiction, he, not unnaturally,\nadapted this precedent to the case in point, giving the judgment, \u201cAs\nwith every cow her calf, so with every book its son.\u201d\n\nThis decision is the first we know in the law of copyright. It gave dire\noffence to Columba, which was greatly heightened some time after by\nanother regal affront. It happened at the Great Convention of Tara that\na young prince, in utter violation of the law of sanctuary, slew the son\nof the king\u2019s steward, and knowing the penalty to be certain death, fled\nfor refuge to the northern princes, who placed him under the sheltering\nwing of their kinsman, the sacred Columba. Ignoring the saint\u2019s\nauthority, the king had the refugee promptly seized and put to death.\nThis, it appears, exasperated the imperious Columcille to the last\ndegree, and he immediately made his way north, and roused to arms the\nrace of Hy-Neill, the northern branch against the southern. And with the\nKing of Connaught, whose son had been slain, they marched their forces\nsouthward. A furious battle ensued at Cooldrevna, in the red ruin and\ncarnage of which King Diarmad was defeated with the loss of 3000 men.\n\nTwo years after, the Hegira took place, when the saint fled or migrated\non his great mission to Scotland\u2014henceforth an exile from Erin.\n\nSpeculation has been rife as to the real motive that drove this\nintensely patriotic Irishman over the wave. Many would fain believe, in\nview of its epoch-making significance, that this momentous step was\npurely voluntary \u201cfor the love of Christ,\u201d as the \u201cOld Irish Life\u201d puts\nit. Adamnan, while connecting it with the battle, also puts this\nconstruction upon it. \u201cIn the second year after the battle of\nCuldreimhne,\u201d he says, \u201cand in the 42nd year of his age, St. Columba\nresolving to emigrate for Christ sailed from Scotia (that is Ireland) to\nBritain.\u201d Many other saints had wandered elsewhere on similar missions.\nBut there is a persistent tradition that this unique missionary was\nbanished by the Synod of the Saints in Ireland for the bloodshed he had\ncaused; and that this sentence was confirmed by St. Molaise, whom the\nunhappy Columba consulted, and who advised him to seek as many souls in\nconversion among the heathen as there fell of men in battle. Some, on\nthe other hand, construe his action as a voluntary penance,\nself-inflicted. Others find mainly a political motive in his removal to\nDalriada, where he might be of immense service to his kinsmen in helping\nto avert the ever increasing and harassing incursions of the Picts.\nCertainly he became a bulwark to them.\n\nImbued with a high missionary zeal, there is no doubt that ultimately he\nwent forth to the new spiritual campaign voluntarily, but, as in the\ncase of most fateful careers, it is evident that circumstances wound him\nup to the task, the most conspicuous and compelling of which was\nCooldrevna. That the parting from Erin was bitter, a very tearing of the\nheart, is matter of history. The verses, the records attributed to\nhimself on this occasion, reveal the depths of his feelings. \u201cHow rapid\nthe speed of my coracle and its stern turned toward Derry. I grieve at\nthe errand over the proud seas, travelling to Alba of the Ravens. There\nis a grey eye that looks back upon Erin, it shall not see during life\nthe men of Erin nor their wives. My vision over the brine I stretch from\nthe ample oaken planks; large is the tear from my soft grey eye when I\nlook back upon Erin. Upon Erin is my attention fixed, upon Loch Leven,\nupon Lin\u00e8, upon the land the Ultonians own; upon smooth Munster, upon\nMeath.\u201d\n\nAs Dr. Douglas Hyde has sympathetically observed, \u201cColumcille is the\nfirst example in the saddened page of Irish history of the exiled Gael\ngrieving for his native land and refusing to be comforted, and as such\nhe has become the very type and embodiment of Irish fate and Irish\ncharacter.\u201d\n\nA pity it is that history has not photographed the dramatic scene when\nthe great monk, forty-two years old, tall and powerful, lands from his\ncurach the \u201cLiath Bhalaidh,\u201d with twelve followers on the island of Hy,\nnow the famous Iona. It was in 563 that he took possession of this\nfuture home, of which he had received a grant from the King of Dalriada,\nwhich was afterwards confirmed by King Brude. Modern Scotland had not\nyet emerged, being in early fragments. And it is important to note, for\nit has been very confusing to historians, that in Columba\u2019s day Ireland\nwas Scotia, from whence in earlier days the Scots had come, who then\noccupied Dalriada, or, as it is known to-day, Argyllshire. North and\neast were the Picts, possessing the body of Alba, as modern Scotland was\nthen called; and in Strathclyde the Britons. Not till centuries after\nwas the name of Scotia or Scotland finally transferred from Erin to\nAlba.\n\nThe Dalriadic Scots, though not destitute of a primitive civilisation,\nwere rude and barbarous. Slavery and polygamy were common, blood feuds\nincessant. Women fought side by side with the men in battle, until first\nColumba and afterwards Adamnan obtained exemption for them. The heathen\nPicts were even more degraded, under the tyranny of a Druid regime, full\nof sorcery and superstition. No ray of Christianity seemed as yet to\nhave penetrated their darkness.\n\nSuch were the wild and waste lands into which the devoted Columba threw\nhimself as a deliverer. For two years he remained in Hy, organising his\nbase, and, it is thought, learning the Pictish language, before setting\nout on his visit to \u201cthe powerful king of the Pictish nation.\u201d\n\nHis missionary labours for the next thirty-two years, in collaboration\nwith the devoted band of men who imbibed his spirit and adopted his\nmethods, have caught the eye of the world.\n\nBut there is another aspect of his enterprise, far-reaching and\nmagnificent, which has been largely overlooked and overshadowed by our\none-sided veneration for his religious genius. And that is the\nsignificance of his literary work. It is not so generally known that the\nApostle of Scotland was a patron of letters, intensely interested in\nliterature, an ardent writer and disseminator of knowledge\u2014one in fact\nwho has left his literary mark on the ages, and who was the first to\nhelp to raise Scotland to the proud eminence in education which she\noccupies to-day.\n\nAs in the great awakening in Europe in the sixteenth century there were\ntwo movements, independent of each other and yet going on side by side\u2014a\nrevival of religion and a revival of learning, known as the Reformation\nand the Renaissance; so, in St. Columba\u2019s enterprise two similar\nmovements were fostered, not as separate and hostile to each other, but\nas mutually helpful and conjoined.\n\nThe abbot was from youth a great lover of books and an unwearied scribe.\nHis standard biographer, Adamnan, says that he never could spend the\nspace even of one hour without study, or prayer, or writing, or some\nother holy occupation, watching or fasting. This love of books continued\nin his case to the very end. Not till the day of his demise was the pen\nfinally laid aside. On that day, after blessing the Monastery, he\ndescended from the hill and sat in his hut transcribing the Psalter. But\nthe vitality of that once deft hand and brain was now well-nigh spent,\nand answered feebly, like the diminishing flow of water from a spout.\n\u201cHere,\u201d cried the saint, at length, conscious of the impending change,\n\u201cat the end of the page I must stop, and what follows let Baithene\nwrite.\u201d\n\nIt was his love of literature that got him into trouble with St.\nFinnian, and in the \u201cCalendar of Aengus\u201d the story goes that he once\nvisited a man, Longarad, noted for his collection of books. In\nanticipation of the visit, and mindful perhaps of Cooldrevna, the _sai_\nor saoidh (wise man) hid his treasures, whereupon Columba left \u201ca word,\u201d\nthat is, a curse, on the books, so that when in after ages they had\nbecome unintelligible from various causes, this was deemed the full and\nsufficient reason. \u201cMay your books be of no use after you, since you\nhave exercised inhospitality in withholding them.\u201d\n\nHe composed a book of hymns for the office of every day in the week, and\nin the \u201cOld Irish Life\u201d he is credited with having written \u201cthree\nhundred gifted, lasting, illuminated noble books.\u201d It is highly probable\nthat those thus referred to were simply transcribed by him, for we have\nno evidence that he wrote any prose literature.\n\nThe three books still existing in Ireland which tradition and some high\nauthorities regard as the work of his own hand are simply transcripts.\nThey are certainly very ancient, even if they do not quite reach up to\nhis day. Two of them are in Trinity College, Dublin, and the third in\nthe Royal Irish Academy. The former, known as the Book of Durrow and the\nBook of Kells,[15] are copies of the Gospels in Latin, the one finished,\nthe other not, but the Book of Kells, which is the unfinished one,\ncontains on its blank pages copies of charters of the eleventh and\ntwelfth centuries, connected with the endowment of the Institution. The\nother book referred to as in the Royal Irish Academy is the famous\n\u201cCathrach,\u201d believed to be the identical copy of the Psalter that\nColumba made when he was a student. The skill displayed in the\npenmanship and decoration of these ancient MSS. is astonishing, and they\nhave covers which are brilliant specimens of early Celtic art. The Book\nof Kells, in particular, is spoken of as \u201cthe unapproachable glory of\nIrish illumination.\u201d In fact, the codex known as the \u201cFour Masters\u201d\nalleges that \u201cit was the principal relic of the western world on account\nof its remarkable cover.\u201d\n\nGreat interest attaches to the celebrated \u201cCathrach\u201d or \u201cBattler,\u201d so\ncalled from the circumstance that a battle was fought on account of it.\nIt continued an heirloom in the successive generations of the saint\u2019s\nfamily, the O\u2019Donnells, until a comparatively recent representative,\nexiled as a supporter of James II. carried it with him to the Continent\nin the beautiful shrine prepared for it at the end of the eleventh\ncentury. In early days it used to be carried three times round the army\nwhen Cinal Conaill went to battle, in the belief that if thus carried on\nthe breast of a cleric free from mortal sin it would get them the\nvictory.\n\nIn 1802 the precious relic was recovered from the Continent and opened.\nWithin was found a decayed wooden box covering a mass of vellum stuck\ntogether and hardened into a single lump. By careful moistening\ntreatment, the various leaves at length came asunder, and proved a real\nPsalter, written in Latin in a \u201cneat but hurried hand.\u201d Fifty-eight\nleaves remained, containing from the 31st to the 106th Psalm, and an\nexamination of this text has shown that it is precisely a copy of the\nsecond revision of the Psalter from the Vulgate of St. Jerome, which\nstrengthens the belief so long and tenaciously held, that this may have\nbeen the very book for which 3000 warriors fell.\n\nFrom very early times Columba was spoken of as a poet. That he wrote\nverse and befriended the bards is attested by the oldest tradition and\nsome of the most ancient records. Many Gaelic poems are attributed to\nhim. \u201cThrice fifty noble lays,\u201d says one poet\u2014\n\n                  Some in Latin which were beguiling,\n                  Some in Gaelic, fair the tale.\n\nAmong his reputed Gaelic poems may be mentioned three that Colgan\nconsidered genuine, 250 years ago, and were printed by Dr. Reeves in his\nfirst edition of Adamnan\u2019s _Life of St. Columba_: his \u201cFarewell to Ara,\u201d\npublished in the _Gaelic Miscellany_ of 1808; and another on his escape\nfrom King Diarmad, reproduced in the _Miscellany of the Irish\nArch\u00e6ological Society_. There are three verses composed as a prayer at\nthe battle of Cooldrevna, ascribed to him in the _Chronicon Scotorum_;\nand there is a collection of fifteen poems in the O\u2019Clery MSS. at\nBrussels. But by far the largest collection is contained in an oblong\nMS. of the Bodleian Library at Oxford. This document embraces everything\nin the shape of poem or fragment anywhere believed as his, and that\ncould be collected about the middle of the sixteenth century.\n\nNone of these are found in the oldest MSS., though not a few are\napparently very ancient and beautiful, breathing the intensity of\nfeeling and passion so characteristic of the Gael. Dr. Hyde is perhaps\nnot far off the mark when he says that of the great number of Irish\npoems attributed to him, only a few\u2014half a dozen at the most\u2014are likely\nto be even partly genuine. It is very hard to say how much or how little\nis his. But this authority is inclined to agree with Dr. Healy, author\nof _Ireland\u2019s Schools and Scholars_, that at least the three considered\ngenuine by Colgan represent substantially poems that were really written\nby the saint. \u201cThey breathe his pious spirit,\u201d says Healy, \u201chis ardent\nlove for nature, and his undying affection for his native land. Although\nretouched, perhaps, by a later hand, they savour so strongly of the true\nColumban spirit that we are disposed to reckon them amongst the genuine\ncompositions of the saint.\u201d\n\nA few specimens are worth quoting, by way of illustrating Columba\u2019s\npoetic genius:\u2014\n\n  Were the tribute of all Alba mine, from its centre to its border, I\n  would prefer the sight of one house in the middle of Derry. The reason\n  I love Derry is for its quietness, for its purity and for the crowds\n  of white angels from the one end to the other.... My Derry, my little\n  oak-grove, my dwelling and my little cell, O eternal God in heaven\n  above, woe be to him who violates it.\n\nAra was a little isle, like Iona, in the west of Ireland, where St. Enda\nlived, and was visited by the saints.\n\n  Farewell from me to Ara. It anguishes my heart not to be in the west\n  among her waves, amid groups of the saints of heaven. It is far, alas!\n  it is far, alas! I have been sent from Ara West out towards the\n  population of Mona to visit the Albanachs. Ara Sun, oh Ara Sun, my\n  affection lies buried in her in the west, it is the same to be beneath\n  her pure soil as to be beneath the soil of Paul and Peter. Ara\n  blessed, O Ara blessed, woe to him who is hostile to her, may he be\n  given shortness of life and hell.\n\nThe next, so characteristic of the saint\u2019s love of nature, is taken from\nthe poem on Cormac\u2019s visit\u2014one of the three considered genuine:\u2014\n\n  It were delightful, O Son of my God, with a moving train,\n  To glide o\u2019er the waves of the deluge fountain to the land of Erin,\n  O\u2019er Moy-n Eolarg, past Ben-Eigny. O\u2019er Loch Feval,\n  Where we should hear pleasing music from the swans,\n  The host of gulls would make joyful, with eager singing,\n  Should it reach the port of stern rejoicers, the _Dewy Red_,\n  I am filled with wealth without Erin, did I think it sufficient.\n\n  In the unknown land of my sojourn of sadness and distress,\n  Alas, the voyage that was enjoined me, O King of secrets,\n  For having gone myself to the battle of Cuil.\n  How happy the son of Dima of the devout church\n  When he hears in Durrow the desire of his mind\n  The sound of the wind against the elms when \u2019tis played,\n  The blackbird\u2019s joyous note when he claps his wings,\n  To listen at early dawn in Ros-grencha to the cattle,\n  The cooing of the cuckoo from the tree on the brink of summer,\n  Three objects I have left, the dearest to me on this peopled world,\n  Durrow, Derry, the noble angelic land, and Tir-Luighdech,\n  I have loved Erin\u2019s land of cascades, all but its government.\n  My visit to Comgall and feast with Cainnech was indeed delightful.\n\nOf his Latin hymns only three remain. They are preserved in the _Liber\nHymnorum_, a MS. probably of the end of the eleventh century, and are\nknown as the \u201cAltus,\u201d \u201cIn te Christo,\u201d and \u201cNoli Pater.\u201d No doubt exists\nas to the genuineness of the \u201cAltus.\u201d It is the most famous of the\nthree, and is supposed to have been written after the battle of\nCooldrevna. The poem takes its name from the first word, and each of its\ntwenty-two stanzas begins in order with a letter of the alphabet,\nprobably as a help to the memory. The stanzas are rudely constructed,\nwith a kind of rhyme between every two lines. The poem has enjoyed a\ngreat reputation, and has been variously rendered into English. Perhaps\nthe best translation is that of the Rev. Anthony Mitchell:\u2014\n\n                  Ancient of Days; enthroned on high;\n                  The Father unbegotten He,\n                  Whom space containeth not nor time,\n                  Who was and is and aye shall be;\n                  And one-born Son and Holy Ghost,\n                  Who co-eternal glory share.\n                  One only God of Persons Three\n                  We praise, acknowledge and declare.\n\nAttention has been directed by Dr. Dowden, Bishop of Edinburgh, to the\nsaint\u2019s curious conceptions of the physical causes of clouds, and rain,\nand tides, in the stanza beginning with I:\u2014\n\n               In the three quarters of the sea,\n               Three mighty fountains hidden lie,\n               Whence rise through whirling water-spouts,\n               Rich-laden clouds that clothe the sky:\n               On winds from out his treasure house,\n               They speed to swell bud, vine, and grain;\n               While the sea-shallows emptied wait\n               Until the tides return again.\n\nIn the R stanza we have a picture of the judgment not unlike the \u201cDies\nIr\u00e6\u201d:\u2014\n\n                Riseth the dawn:\u2014the day is near\n                Day of the Lord, the King of Kings;\n                A day of wrath and vengeance just,\n                Of darkness, clouds, and thunderings:\n                A day of anguish, cries, and tears,\n                When glow of women\u2019s love shall pale;\n                When man shall cease to strive with man,\n                And all the world\u2019s desires shall fail.\n\nWhat now are we to think of this new literature and the other\nproductions, Latin and Gaelic, to which the monasteries of the period\ngave rise? Is the Columban renaissance really a decadence in comparison\nwith what went before, the old unwritten inheritance? \u201cYes,\u201d says\nDarmesteter, and if we accept the antiquity of the oral tradition, I\nthink we must admit the truth of it. The sagas and historic tales, and\nthe poetry that is mingled with them, are of far greater importance from\na purely literary point of view. With a wild freedom of imagination and\nan old-time conception of life untouched by Christian thought, they\nbreathe the spirit of pre-Christian ages, very much in the primitive\nmanner of Homeric poetry; and being intensely human and heroic, they\nhave a charm even for minds set to later ideals.\n\nFor example, in the _Colloquy or Dialogue of the Ancients_, it is\nrecorded that St. Patrick himself felt a little uneasy at the delight\nwith which he listened to the stories of the ancient Feinn, and in his\nover-scrupulous sanctity he feared it might be wrong to appreciate and\nenjoy so much, these worldly narratives. But when he consulted his two\nguardian angels they not only assured him that there was no harm in\nlistening to the tales, but even desired him to get them written down in\nthe words of ollamhs, \u201cfor,\u201d said these wise counsellors, \u201cit will be a\nrejoicing to numbers and to the good people to the end of time to listen\nto these stories.\u201d\n\nYet for all this the Columban period _was_ a renaissance. You cannot\nspring a new creed and new ideas upon a nation without a reawakening of\nthought and corresponding progress.\n\nOver and above his own personal contributions to literature, Columba\nhelped forward the cause of letters in two other ways, namely, by\nencouraging the bards and the scholars.\n\nIn his day the bards in Ireland had become an intolerable nuisance\u2014idle,\nnumerous, and insolent; in fact they had developed into a loafing class,\nwho quartered themselves on the working-classes, on the chiefs and\nfarmers. They went about the country in bands, carrying a silver pot,\nnicknamed by the people \u201cthe pot of Avarice.\u201d Their tyranny was such\nthat he who refused to contribute was mercilessly satirised and\ndisgraced. Three attempts had been made to suppress them, but hitherto\nto no purpose. At length Aedh, the High King of Ireland, considering\nthem to be too heavy a burden on the land, resolved to banish the whole\nprofession. Summoning a great Convention of all Ireland to Drumceat in\n590 to settle important national affairs, he made this one of the chief\nitems. And the fate of the bardic institution would most certainly have\nbeen sealed had not Columcille averted it. With 140 followers he had\ncrossed over to attend the Conference, and besides obtaining exemption\nfrom military service for the women, and independence and freedom from\ntaxation for Dalriada, which was henceforth simply to help the parent\nkingdom in affairs of war, he also succeeded in moderating the fury of\nthe chieftains against the bards. Their numbers were reduced and their\nprestige abated, but the profession was amply compensated for this by\nacquiring a new and recognised position in the State. No bards except\nthose specially sanctioned were to pursue the poetic calling. But for\nthe maintenance of these latter distinct public estates in land were set\napart for the first time, in return for which they were obliged to give\npublic instruction to all comers in the learning of the day, after the\nmanner of university professors. The rate of reward for their poems was\nalso legally fixed, so that from this time down to the seventeenth\ncentury the bardic colleges, as distinct from the ecclesiastical ones,\ntaught poetry, law, and history, educating the lawyers, judges, and\npoets of the Irish nation.\n\nIn recognition of the service rendered them on this occasion the bards\nappeared before Columba in a body, with Dallan Forgaill, their chief, at\ntheir head, bringing the famous \u201cAmra\u201d or elegy which the latter had\ncomposed in his praise. This poem is in the Fenian dialect, so ancient\nand obscure as to be very baffling and almost unintelligible to\nscholars. It has come down to us heavily annotated with gloss and\ncommentary in the eleventh century MS. (Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre). So far as\ncan be made out, it speaks of the saint in relation to the people as\n\u201ctheir soul\u2019s light, their learned one, their chief from right, who was\nGod\u2019s messenger, who dispelled fears from them, who used to explain the\ntruth of words, a harp without a base chord, a perfect sage who believed\nin Christ; he was learned, he was chaste, he was charitable, he was an\nabounding benefit of guests, he was eager, he was noble, he was gentle,\nhe was the physician of the heart of every age; he was to persons\ninscrutable, he was a shelter to the naked, he was a consolation to the\npoor, there went not from the world one who was more continual for a\nremembrance of the cross.\u201d\n\nBut a recent writer, Dr. Strachan of Manchester, casts doubts upon the\nantiquity of its present form, thinking it belongs, as transcribed, to a\nlater date.\n\nThe other way in which St. Columba helped forward the cause of letters\nwas by encouraging the scholars. The monasteries became great schools of\nlearning as well as missionary centres. In all the institutions he\nfounded, ample provision was made for the multiplication of books. The\nknowledge of Hebrew and Greek was fostered among the monks as well as of\nLatin and Gaelic. To the monastic houses founded throughout Pictland by\nthe Columban clergy the tribes sent their youth to be trained. And for\nseveral centuries, as Skene has observed, there was not a Pictish boy\ntaught his letters but received his education from a Columban monk. In\nlater times students from the Continent flocked to the more famous of\nthe Celtic seats of learning in Ireland and Scotland, and we even hear\nof Iona sending professors to Cologne, Louvain, and Paris.\n\nThere is no evidence that the northern Picts had a knowledge of letters\nbefore Columba taught them. There is even doubt as to what language\nthese tribes spoke. Yet in 710 A.D., a little more than a hundred years\nafter his death, a knowledge of letters was common in Pictland. With\nreference to subsequent ecclesiastical changes, it is known that King\nNaitan sent a proclamation \u201cby public command throughout all the\nprovinces of the Picts to be transcribed, learned, and observed.\u201d This\nwe have on the authority of Bede, a statement which shows that learning\nmust have made considerable progress among the people even at that early\ndate. So that in this respect we may very well endorse the opinion of\nProfessor Mackinnon, when he says that \u201cwe have not yet perhaps fully\nrealised the part which the School of Iona had in shaping the destinies\nof the Scottish nation.\u201d When in Scotland we discuss the past history of\nour national education, the figure of John Knox invariably rises before\nus as prime inaugurator of the first real system, but the great Abbot of\nIona was at it 1000 years before him.\n\nShaping the destinies of the Scottish nation; ay, and might we not add\nof literature? For a further striking claim has been repeatedly put\nforward on behalf of the Celtic poets in the Columban period, namely\nthis, that they taught Europe to rhyme. And this claim has been made not\nso much by partisans as by some of the foremost European scholars,\nincluding Zeuss and Nigra, who have remarked and pointed out that the\nLatin verses of Columcille and other early saints, either rhyme or have\na strong tendency to rhyme. Referring to the advance towards final\nassonance in later times made by the English in their Latin poems, Zeuss\nsays, \u201cWe must believe that this form was introduced among them by the\nIrish, as were the arts of writing and of painting and of ornamenting\nmanuscripts, since they themselves, in common with the other Germanic\nnations, made use in their poetry of nothing but alliteration.\u201d It is\nonly some 500 years after Columba that we find rhyme beginning to appear\nin English literature.\n\nThe other foreign writer of note, C. Nigra, with equal emphasis asserts\nthat \u201cfinal assonance or rhyme can have been derived only from the laws\nof Celtic phonology.\u201d Meanwhile this must be regarded as a moot point.\nFor other eminent scholars, Thurneysen and Windisch, have professed\ntheir opinion that it may be traced to the Latin. But \u201cthis at least is\nclear,\u201d observes Dr. Hyde, who has gone very carefully into the matter,\n\u201cthat already in the seventh century the Irish not only rhymed, but made\nintricate Deibhidh and other rhyming metres, when for centuries after\nthis period the Germanic nations could only alliterate.\u201d\n\nIt is our proud boast as an English-speaking people that we can go back\nas far as C\u00e6dmon to the beginnings of our literature; yet how few\nBritish subjects realise that Gaelic was a literary language long before\nthen in the hands of men like St. Patrick, St. Columba, and Dallan\nForgaill, and that there are Latin MSS. still extant associated with\nColumba and the School of Iona which are almost as old as the very\noldest existing codex of the Bible.\n\nIt is worth our while to think of this, and of the remarkable man who,\nin the obscurity of his island home, recognised the value and permanence\nof his own work, giving utterance to a sentiment which the ages have\namply verified: \u201cSmall and mean though this place is, yet it shall be\nheld in great and unusual honour, not only by Scotic kings and people,\nbut also by the rulers of foreign and barbarous nations, and by their\nsubjects; the saints also even of other churches shall regard it with no\ncommon reverence.\u201d And it is so. Systems and dynasties have since\nfallen, yet the fame of Iona still stands secure, and continues to\nattract the saint and the foreigner.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IV\n                        ADAMNAN\u2019S \u201cVITA COLUMB\u00c6\u201d\n\n  Oldest Scottish book in existence\u2014A sturdy survival\u2014Criteria of\n      age\u2014Dorbene the copyist\u2014Romantic history of the MS.\u2014Now in\n      Schaffhausen\u2014Adamnan, a rare personality\u2014Abbot and\n      scholar\u2014Influential career\u2014Attitude to the two great questions\n      that divided the Celtic churches\u2014Pathetic estrangement\u2014\u201cLex\n      Adamnani\u201d\u2014A mighty social revolution\u2014Death\u2014His writings\u2014\u201cThe\n      Vision of Adamnan\u201d\u2014His _Life of Columba_ in three parts\u2014Remarkable\n      contents\u2014Most valuable monument of the early Celtic Church\u2014List of\n      MSS. in which preserved\u2014Latin _versus_ Gaelic.\n\n\nMany Scottish visitors visit Schaffhausen, on the Rhine in Switzerland,\nand perhaps few of them are aware that in the public library there, is\ndeposited one of the rarest and most interesting relics of Scotland.\n\nIt is a parchment MS. of sixty-eight leaves, each about eleven inches by\nnine. The volume looks as if in the original binding. Its sides are of\nbeechwood, greatly worm-eaten and covered with calfskin, the sewing of\nthe back very rude and curious, and the front would seem to have been\nformerly secured by clasps.\n\nThis is not a Gaelic work, though Gaelic names appear in it. It is\nwritten in Latin in double columns. Capital letters abound, some of them\nof great size and adorned with red and yellow paint. The summaries at\nthe beginning, the headings of chapters, and the colophon of the scribe\nare all in rubric which on the whole is wonderfully fresh and beautiful.\n\nThree handwritings may be traced: the first, that peculiar to the\ngreater part of the book; the second, in evidence towards the end, in\nall probability the work of the same writer, but with different pen and\nink and in smaller, rounder letters; the third, corrections in spelling\nby a later and much inferior penman.\n\nThe ink is dark, almost jet-black, except in some places where it has\nturned brown.\n\nSuch is the general appearance of the relic. And marvel not if a vague,\nfar-away look steals into the eye when one reflects that this book which\nhe sees and handles is well nigh, if not quite, 1200 years old; that it\nis, in fact, the oldest now existing, known to have been written in\nScotland, and separated by the lapse of 100 years from the next most\nancient.\n\nA copy of Adamnan\u2019s _Life of St. Columba_, made by one of his\ncontemporaries in Iona\u2014this, the sturdy survival is taken to be. And if\nthe criteria of its age are not misleading, it dates from before 713\nA.D. These criteria are in themselves profoundly interesting.\n\n1. It is recognised that the handwriting is that peculiar heavy kind\nfound in the oldest Gaelic MSS.\u2014not quite so round as that in the Books\nof Kells and Durrow, but possessing many features in common, and\ncertainly anterior to that of the Book of Armagh, fixed at 807.\n\n2. Similarly the Latin spelling corresponds with that of the more\nancient Celtic MSS. at home and abroad.\n\n3. The Greek characters which appear in the text are in the semi-uncials\nof the period, without accents or breathings.\n\n4. The later corrections, supposed to have been made on the Continent,\nare reckoned by Dr. Ferdinand Keller, an expert in the handwriting of\nCharlemagne\u2019s time, to belong to the period between 800 and 820.\n\n5. The parchment is in goat-skin, in colour and condition extremely\nancient.\n\n6. But more conclusive still is the remarkable colophon of the scribe at\nthe end of the volume, where he says, \u201cI beseech those who wish to\ntranscribe these books, yea, rather, I adjure them by Christ, the judge\nof the world, after they have diligently transcribed, carefully to\ncompare and correct their copies with that from which they have copied\nthem, and also to subjoin here this adjuration: \u2018Whoever readeth these\nbooks on the virtues of St. Columba let him pray to the Lord for me\nDorbene that after death I may possess eternal life.\u2019\u201d\n\nHere we have actually the name of the scribe\u2014a splendid clue to the age\nof the MS. which critics have not been backward in availing themselves\nof. The name is so rare in the records that they had only a choice\nbetween two, one anterior to Adamnan\u2019s day, the other his contemporary,\nand Abbot-elect of Iona in 713. But this latter Dorbene died that same\nyear before assuming office, and only nine years after Adamnan himself.\nHe in all probability it was who copied the _Life_.\n\nTo the objection, Why not by another of the same name? Dr. Reeves\nreplies in effect, \u201cNot likely, as the name is almost unique and\npointedly connected with the Columban society.\u201d And to the further\nobjection that it might possibly be by a later hand from the autograph\nof this Dorbene, he answers, \u201cEven less likely, as the colophon in Irish\nMSS. is always peculiar to the actual scribe, and usually omitted by\nother transcribers. And this is the only MS. of Adamnan\u2019s _Life_ that\nhas the name and the colophon.\u201d\n\nThe interest attaching to it on account of its extraordinary age and\nsubject-matter is greatly enhanced when we consider its history. For the\nold document had hairbreadth escapes and adventures, and if it could\nspeak for itself doubtless could unfold a tale infinitely more\nsurprising, because more real and tragic, than many of the miraculous\nincidents it does record. All the long agony of the early, the middle,\nand the modern ages has transpired since first it went a-wandering.\nInvasions, crusades, and revolutions, the rise and fall of systems and\nnations\u2014whole populations passing swiftly and stormfully across the\nbosom of Europe into oblivion, and the book in the heart of the troubled\narea survives them all and emerges at length, as if from the debris, to\nreassert that \u201cthere lived a man.\u201d\n\nAdamnan, ninth Abbot of Iona, wrote the original in the years 691 to\n693\u2014that is, ten or twelve years before his death, which occurred in\n704. In the second preface\u2014for there are two\u2014he tells us that it is the\nsubstance of the narratives learned from his predecessors, and is\nfounded either on written authorities anterior to his own time or on\nwhat he heard himself from ancient men then living. And we know that he\nwas sufficiently near the fountainhead, both in time and place, to be\nable to draw from authentic sources; for he wrote just a century after\nSt. Columba\u2019s death, and at the urgent request of his brethren. In his\nboyhood he had frequent opportunities of conversing with those who had\nseen and known the saint, and he was surrounded in the monastery and in\nthe island with all the halo of association and piety in which the\nmemory of his hero was enshrined.\n\nThe written material he could rely on was not meagre even at so early a\ndate. There was the narrative of Cummene the Fair, seventh abbot of\nIona, and thus one of his own immediate predecessors. His account\nAdamnan transferred entire and almost verbatim into the third book of\nhis own work. It was really a tract entitled _De virtutibus sancti\nColumb\u00e6_. In addition to this he had at least one other Latin memoir and\nvarious Gaelic poems in praise of the saint, such as the \u201cAmra\u201d of\nDallan Forgaill, and those of Baithene M\u00f2r, and perhaps of St. Mura.\n\nIn another of his books (_De Locis Sanctis_) the author informs us how\nhe generally set about composing his literary efforts. He wrote the\nfirst draft on waxen tablets, revised and corrected it, and then from\nthe text so prepared, a clean copy was neatly written out on parchment.\n\nDorbene the Scribhnidh may have copied the _Life_ in Adamnan\u2019s own time;\nif not quite so early, then shortly after his death. And whatever became\nof Adamnan\u2019s original, Dorbene\u2019s copy appears to have remained in the\nmonastery till the beginning of the ninth century, when it was probably\ntaken to Germany. At that time a strong tide of Scotic pilgrims set in\ntowards Central Europe, owing no doubt to the Norse invasions, which\nrendered life and property insecure in Iona and elsewhere.\n\nIn 825 Blathmac was murdered in the monastery, along with several of the\nbrethren, because he refused to tell where the Columban relics were hid.\nThe likelihood is that after that narrow escape one of the fleeing monks\ncarried the book to St. Gall or Reichenau on the Rhine. At any rate it\nis significant that Walafridus Strabus, formerly Dean of the Irish\nmonastery of St. Gall in Switzerland, and then Abbot of Reichenau from\n842\u2013849, knew of the tragic event and wrote a poem in Latin on the death\nof Blathmac. And it was in this very house of Reichenau, that used to be\nfrequented so much by Scotic missionaries, that the MS. was ultimately\nfound. And quite casually too.\n\nAges had elapsed when, in the beginning of the seventeenth century,\nStephen White, a learned Irish Jesuit in search of Gaelic documents on\nthe Continent, luckily discovered it. He immediately transcribed the\nvenerable codex, and gave Ussher, Colgan, and the Bollandists the\nbenefit of his copy. Both the latter published the text\u2014Colgan in 1647,\nthe Bollandists in 1698.\n\nThereafter, a second time the original vanished. When or how it was\nremoved from Reichenau is not known, but it must have been before that\nmonastery was suppressed in 1799. Once more it emerged, this time at\nSchaffhausen, rediscovered by Dr. Ferdinand Keller of Zurich, the\ndistinguished arch\u00e6ologist.\n\nWriting of the interesting find in January 1851, Dr. Keller tells the\nstory of its reappearance, showing into what sorry neglect it had fallen\nbefore it reached its ultimate coign of vantage. \u201cThe present\n_proprietor_ of the MS. of St. Columba,\u201d he says, \u201cis the town-library\nof Schaffhausen. Here I found this codex in 1845 at the bottom of a high\nbook-chest, where it lay pell-mell with some other MSS. and old books\ntotally neglected, bearing neither title nor number.\u201d It was twice\nborrowed by Keller, and on the last occasion in 1851 he made a valuable\ncollection of facsimiles from it.\n\nFinally the aged record, after well-nigh 1200 years\u2019 vicissitudes, was\npublished by Dr. Reeves, Bishop of Down, in 1856, and his work\nrepublished in 1874 by the publishers of the Series of Scottish\nHistorians, this time with English translation and re-arrangement of the\nNotes, which Dr. Reeves permitted in order to adapt the book to a wider\ncircle of readers.\n\nA truly romantic history, taking it all in all, is this story of the\nancient wanderer which has come to honour in a foreign land, but has not\nyet found a way home to its native soil. What would Schaffhausen take\nand part with it? Scotland has never asked. Some day she may, when she\nawakens to the fact that the very oldest and, at the same time, one of\nthe most intensely interesting monuments of her literary history is an\nalien in a strange country.\n\nApart from the book itself, the hero of the book, and its faithful\ncopyist, there is a fascination and much insight to be drawn from a\nstudy of the personality of its author. Adamnan, like Boswell, has\nachieved immortality through an enthusiastic and almost self-effacing\nhero-worship. His great object, as he tells us again and again, is to\nshow up the wonderful character of the saintly Columba, and any deed or\ntale that he thinks will enhance the prestige of this \u201cgreat father and\nfounder of monasteries\u201d goes down with unfailing devotion.\n\nBorn about the year 624 in Donegal, Adamnan, like Cummene, was a kinsman\nof St. Columba. Indeed, the three men were descended from three\nbrothers, all of royal lineage. His peculiar name is understood to be a\ndiminutive of Adam, and is frequently followed by the patronymic Ua\nTinne, meaning grandson of Tinne. Of his father Ronan, or his mother\nRonnat, we know absolutely nothing beyond their descent, which was of\nhigh degree. And of his own childhood and youth there remains only a\nsingle legend, supposed to be the creation of a later age, reporting his\nfirst meeting with Finnachta, afterwards monarch of Ireland, with whom\nAdamnan was on the most friendly terms. This Finnachta, as his\nbiographer relates, was riding along one day to his sister\u2019s house with\na numerous cavalcade, when he met a schoolboy with a jar of milk on his\nback. In his haste to get out of the way the stripling knocked his foot\nagainst a stone, and tripping, down went the jar with its contents upon\nthe ground. Whereupon the great prince spoke kindly to the boy and\nassured him of protection, bidding him not to sorrow over it. To whom\nthe latter replied, \u201cO good man, I have cause for grief, for there are\nthree goodly students in one house and three more of us are attendants\nupon them. And how we act is this: one attendant from among us goes out\nin turn to collect sustenance for the other five, and it was my turn\nto-day; but what I had gathered for them has been spilled upon the\nground, and what grieves me more, the borrowed jar is broken and I have\nnot wherewith to pay for it.\u201d\n\nThese are the boyish and dramatic circumstances in which Adamnan emerges\non the canvas of tradition. From his youth it would thus appear that he\nwas inured to hardship, and consequently qualified for the rigorous\ndiscipline of the monastic life. Plain living went with high thinking,\nand the quiet, thoughtful student soon acquired a reputation for\nscholarship. He was just the kind of man to obtain entrance into the\ndistinguished circle of Iona, and though we cannot trace his career as\nsubordinate there, with certainty, we know that in 679, when fifty-five\nyears of age, he became head of the institution. At that period the\nmonastery was already known far and near for its learning. And there\nseems little doubt that the new abbot was, taking him all in all, the\nablest and most accomplished of St. Columba\u2019s successors. A great\nlinguist, he knew not only Latin, but, it may be inferred from his\nwritings, Hebrew and Greek also.\n\nFour years prior to his own promotion, Finnachta had become king in his\nnative country. That monarch, it would appear, never lost sight of the\nboy with the jar, whose whole bearing indicated a youth of rare promise.\nThe latter was afterwards invited to his court, and ultimately\nconstituted the king\u2019s spiritual adviser (anamchara). This we have on\nthe authority of an ancient bardic composition in a vellum MS., formerly\nin the possession of W. Monck Mason, Esq.\n\nBesides his interesting relations with Finnachta, Adamnan was fortunate\nin possessing the friendship of King Aldfrid of Northumbria. This\nintimacy probably dates from the time when the latter as prince had\noccasion to seek refuge in Ireland from his intriguing foes. At that\ntime he may have even been, as Duald Mac Firbis\u2019s annals affirm, a pupil\nof Adamnan.\n\nAt any rate, with two such royal friends, the influence of the Ionan\nabbot was very great. And on important occasions he served as ambassador\nor \u201cgo-between\u201d in matters of State betwixt the two kings. For example,\nafter a raiding expedition by the North Saxons on Meath, Finnachta got\nhim to undertake a mission to his friend Aldfrid to negotiate for the\nreturn of the captives, and the abbot had the satisfaction of personally\nconducting sixty of them back to Erin in 686.\n\nTwo years later he paid another visit to the Court in Northumbria. On\nboth occasions a dreadful plague was raging in that country, and\nthroughout a great part of Europe. In his usual ultra-rational manner\nAdamnan attributes his own immunity from the pestilence, and that of the\nPicts and Scots in general, to the intercession of his holy patron St.\nColumba.\n\nOn these tours he made the acquaintance of the leading clergy in the\nnorth of England. It is supposed he met Bede, then a young man, at the\nCourt also. This distinguished historian gives various facts regarding\nthe abbot and his movements. He appears to have read Adamnan\u2019s book on\nthe \u201cHoly Places,\u201d though it may be that he never saw the biography,\nwhich was a much later production. At least he makes no mention of it\nanywhere.\n\nThere were two great questions that then divided the Celtic churches\u2014the\ncelebration of Easter and the tonsure. Through his intercourse with the\nEnglish clergy in Northumbria, and more especially, it is affirmed,\nthrough a lively discussion he had with the learned Ceolfrid, Abbot of\nJarrow, Adamnan was persuaded to adopt the Catholic in preference to the\nCeltic usage in these matters. On his return to Hy the brethren\nstrenuously opposed the innovation, and there was a lasting difference\nof opinion thus originated by his change of views. For years the abbot,\nwho was pre-eminently a man of peace and unity\u2014and, like the great and\npious scholar he was, always open to conviction,\u2014earnestly strove to win\nthem over to what he deemed to be the better method, but did not succeed\nin his own lifetime, though in after years the change was ultimately\nadopted. In 692 he visited Ireland, and again in 697, between which\nyears he wrote the book that has made his name and memory immortal. A\nman of great energy and incessant diligence, he was much on the move\nconvening synods and negotiating affairs. Like his extraordinary patron,\nhe interested himself in politics as well as in religion and literature,\nof which he was a shining light.\n\nUnhappily the law which St. Columba had got enacted, exempting women\nfrom fighting in actual warfare, had soon fallen into abeyance, and\nAdamnan resolved to have it re-enacted. According to a legend in the\nLeabhar Breac and Book of Lecain, his attention was called to the\ninhuman custom in the following accidental way. One day he happened to\nbe travelling through the plain of Bregia, says the legend, with his\nmother on his back, when they saw two armies in deadly conflict. During\nthe heat of the combat his mother\u2019s eye caught sight of a woman dragging\nanother woman by means of an iron reaping-hook from the opposing\nbattalion. The hook was fastened in the unfortunate victim\u2019s breast.\nSitting down overcome by the sight, the distressed Ronnat said to her\nson, \u201cThou shalt not take me from this spot until thou exemptest women\nfor ever from being in this condition and from excursions and hostings.\u201d\nAdamnan promised it. And at the important Synod of Tara, convened in\n697, with the approval of King Finnachta, the point was carried,\ninvolving a mighty social revolution from henceforth in the life and\ncustoms of the Gael. For under the old regime, men and women went\nequally to battle.\n\nThe enactments of this synod were afterwards known in Latin as \u201cLex\nAdamnani,\u201d and in Gaelic \u201cCain Adhamhnain.\u201d In addition to a certain\nprivilege conceded to him and to his successors of levying contributions\nfor sacred purposes, Dr. Reeves thinks it was on this occasion that the\nquestions of Easter and the tonsure were publicly discussed, and\nAdamnan\u2019s views and usage adopted in Ireland.\n\nAfterwards he seems to have been some years in that country promoting\nhis reforms. He certainly was there in 701; and Bede mentions that he\ncrossed from Erin to Hy the summer of the year that he died, and\nindicates that he had been there a considerable time previously. His\ndeath occurred on September 23rd, 704. It is thus touchingly\ncommemorated by the great historian. \u201cFor it came to pass that before\nthe next year came round he departed this life; the Divine goodness so\nordering it that, as he was a man most earnest for peace and unity, he\nshould be taken away to everlasting life before the return of the season\nof Easter he should be obliged to differ still more seriously from those\nwho were unwilling to follow him in the way of truth.\u201d He had apparently\ncelebrated his last Easter in Ireland, and died at the mature age of\nseventy-seven.\n\nHis fame rests on his writings, chiefly the _Life of St. Columba_, and\nhis book on the \u201cHoly Places\u201d\u2014_De Locis Sanctis_. Adamnan himself saw\nnot these Holy Land localities, but a French bishop on his return from\nthe east was driven by a storm to spend the winter with Adamnan, who\ntook down on waxen tablets his interesting accounts of the chief places\nvisited, and afterwards wrote out, _brevi textu_, on parchment. It is\nbetter written and more fluent even than the biography, and when found\nmany years after, it was published as \u201cthe earliest account coming from\nmodern Christian Europe of the condition of Eastern lands and the cradle\nof Christianity.\u201d\n\nAdamnan presented the book to King Aldfrid of Northumbria. There are\nextant MSS. of it as old as the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries still\non the Continent\u2014at Rome, Corbey, Saltzburg, and other places.\n\nBesides these chief Latin works he is credited with a _Life of St.\nPatrick_; poems, quoted by Tighernach, the \u201cFour Masters,\u201d and the Book\nof Lecain; a _History of Ireland_ to his own times, and _An Epitome of\nIrish Laws in Metre_. These two latter are only mentioned by Ward[16]\n(on what authority is not known), and may be probably only compilations\nof more modern times.\n\nIn the _Liber Hymnorum_, however, there is a short hymn in Gaelic\nentitled Adamnan\u2019s Prayer. It may be read in Dr. Stokes\u2019 _Goidelica_.\nAnd in the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre there is a more lengthy production known\nas \u201cFis Adhamhnain.\u201d It is in the form of a sermon, and may have been\nwritten down some two hundred years after the abbot\u2019s time. In this\nremarkable vision Adamnan figures as \u201cthe high sage of the western\nworld,\u201d and like Aeneas or Dante, he is privileged on the festival of\nSt. John the Baptist to visit heaven and hell. The scenes he beheld are\ndepicted in the original Gaelic with a realism and power of vivid\nimaginary detail that puts even Thomas Boston in the shade. As Dante\nfound his Florentine enemies in not too comfortable circumstances in the\nInferno, so Adamnan is here represented as seeing the Aircinnich\u2014the lay\nadministrators of the church lands, who too often abused their trust, in\nsimilar dool. But this sentiment alone is sufficient to show that the\ncomposition is of later date than Adamnan\u2019s day, for such Aircinnich had\nyet to arise, and the broad acres they mismanaged.\n\nIt is said that at the time of the great Synod in 697 the public mind\nhad for long been kept in such a state of suspense and alarm by the\nprevailing pestilences and portents, that the report of the abbot having\nsome such vision made it so susceptible to his influence that he had far\nless difficulty in carrying into effect his revolutionary measures than\nhe would have had in ordinary circumstances.\n\nBut all these things\u2014writings and traditions alike\u2014tend to show how this\nquiet, intellectual, studious, pious, and\u2014from our point of\nview\u2014amazingly credulous, yet influential scholar, impressed his own and\nsucceeding ages.\n\nAdamnan\u2019s best known book is essentially a Life of St. Columba, written\nnot in any chronological order, but on a characteristic plan of his own.\nThere are two prefaces, and what would really be the gist and\nsubject-matter of a modern biography is condensed by him into one short\nparagraph at the end of the second of these. The work is then divided\ninto three parts or books. The first deals with prophetical revelations,\nthe second with miracles, the third with visions of angels; and under\nthese titles he groups all the most striking stories of the saint\u2019s\nlife. All the collateral information\u2014and it is not much\u2014regarding the\nhistory of the time, the social life, the manners, customs, language,\ntopography, etc., we get merely by the way in the telling of the tale.\nAdamnan apparently had no thought that his readers would wish to know\nsomething of these, or if he had he did not deem it any part of his task\nto enlighten them. He was writing for his own times, and he could not\nconceive that the eye of any monk or other reader could wander off from\nthe central luminary to mere details of the environment. It is at once\nthe limitation and strength of the enthusiast and the specialist. How\ncould he know that he was writing for the far-distant future?\u2014this\nunassuming monk in his cell, unconsciously addressing a people who have\nemerged from his theory of the universe, and who listen and wonder at\nhis stories, which to them have all the charm and interest of fairy\ntales.\n\n_Tempora mutantur, eheu!_ The little facts that incidentally dropped\nfrom his pen are those most sought and valued now, while the miracles,\nvisions, and prophecies which he took to be the soul and substance of\nthe book, wear a different aspect to modern eyes. It is these trifling\ndetails, sometimes mere names, that give us glimpses into the state of\nsociety in Ireland and Pictland, and into the civil and ecclesiastical\nhistory of the time.\n\nAdamnan\u2019s consuming desire at all times is to present \u201cthe evidences\nwhich the venerable man gave of his power.\u201d And when we reflect that he\nbelieved that \u201cby some divine intuition\u201d St. Columba, \u201cthrough a\nwonderful experience of his inner soul, beheld the whole universe drawn\ntogether and laid open to his sight, as in one ray of the sun,\u201d we need\nnot be surprised at the wonders unfolded. In the first chapter of Book\nI., and before entering upon illustrative examples, he gives a summary\nof his hero\u2019s supernatural qualities. For example, he healed diseases;\nexpelled from the island \u201cinnumerable hosts of malignant spirits, whom\nhe saw with his bodily eyes assailing himself and beginning to bring\ndeadly distemper on his monastic brotherhood.\u201d The surging waves quickly\nbecame quiet at his prayer, and contrary winds changed into fair. He\ntook a white stone from the river Ness and blessed it for healing\npurposes. This famous pebble floated like an apple when placed in water.\nIn the country of the Picts he raised a dead child to life, and while\nyet a young man in Hibernia turned water into wine. An immense blaze of\nheavenly light was occasionally seen to surround him in the light of\nday, and he was frequently favoured with the society of bright hosts of\ncelestial beings. He often saw just men carried by angels to the highest\nheavens, and reprobates hurried by demons to hell. The blessed man even\nforetold the destinies of individual men, pleasing or painful, according\nto their deserts. And \u201cin the dreadful crash of wars he obtained from\nGod by the virtue of prayer, that some kings should be conquered and\nothers come off victorious.\u201d\n\nAnd now, coming to the substance of the separate books in order, we need\nnot dwell on the prophetical revelations, numerous and curious though\nthey are, beyond giving one or two as typical examples. The credulity of\nthe author and his capacity for belief are passing strange, and even\nforeign to an age like our own. A peasant, he tells us, once asked the\nsaint by what death he would die. \u201cNot in the battlefield nor at sea,\u201d\ncame the ready response, \u201cbut the travelling companion of whom thou hast\nno suspicion shall cause thy death.\u201d And the man died through the\neffects of a wound accidentally caused by his own knife.\n\nOne wonderful experience may be quoted, as quite in line with Professor\nJames\u2019 argument in his Gifford Lectures at Edinburgh University (May,\n1901). In discussing \u201cThe reality of the Unseen,\u201d this brilliant\nexponent of the new Psychology instanced a number of curious cases of\nthe occurrence of a \u201cpresence\u201d to individuals, and he maintained that\nthe sentiment of reality could indeed attach itself to things of which\nthe representative faculty could frame only the dimmest sort of an idea.\nAnd abstractions other than the ideas of pure reason had the power of\nmaking us feel presences that we were impotent articulately to describe.\nNo more striking example of his contention could be desired than the\nfollowing. It is entitled, \u201cOf the consolation which the monks when they\nwere weary on their journey, received from the saint visiting them in\nspirit.\u201d\n\nBaithene and the brethren were returning in the evening to the monastery\nfrom the harvest work when something strange and unusual was felt by\nthem all. It is thus described by an elder brother. \u201cI perceive,\u201d he\nsaid to the others, \u201cthe fragrance of such a wonderful odour, just as if\nall the flowers on earth were gathered together into one place. I feel\nalso a glow of heat within me, not at all painful, but most pleasing,\nand a certain unusual and inexpressible joy poured into my heart, which\non a sudden so refreshes and gladdens me that I forget grief and\nweariness of every kind. Even the load, however heavy, which I carry on\nmy back, is in some mysterious way so lightened from this place all the\nway to the monastery that I do not seem to have any weight to bear.\u201d\n\nKing Brude and his Druids had rather a different sensation when, outside\ntheir fortifications near Inverness, some of the latter tried to prevent\nthe saint from chanting the evening hymns. Very much in the flesh this\ntime, St. Columba began to sing the 44th Psalm so wonderfully loud, like\nthe rattle of thunder, that king and people were terror-struck with the\nawful noise, and forthwith relented. Columba seems to have been more\nthan a match for these pagan opponents. For in the second book, where\nthe miracles are recorded, among other confusions to which he drove the\nresisting Picts, the following is recorded. When first he visited Brude,\nit happened that the king, elated by the pride of royalty, acted\nhaughtily and would not open his gates to his distinguished visitors.\nBut the man of God, observing this, approached the folding doors with\nhis companions and, having first formed upon them the sign of the cross,\nhe knocked and then laid his hand upon the gate, which instantly flew\nopen of its own accord, the bolts sliding back with great force. The\nsaint and his followers then passed through, and ever after, as long as\nhe lived, king Brude knew how to respect and reverence his imperious\nvisitor. It was to him that the latter gave the remarkable white pebble\nwhich effected cures. \u201cAnd what is very wonderful,\u201d says our author,\n\u201cwhen this same stone was sought for by those sick persons whose term of\nlife had arrived, it could not be found.\u201d Even King Brude himself was\nabandoned _in articulo mortis_ by the fateful pebble.\n\nAfter giving examples of miraculous punishments inflicted on those who\nwere opposed to St. Columba, Adamnan instances a few encounters with\nwild beasts, and as they relate to our own Scotland they are of ancient\nand exceptional interest.\n\n\u201cOn one occasion,\u201d to quote our author, \u201cwhen the blessed man was\nstaying some days in the Scian island (Skye), he left the brethren and\nwent alone a little farther than usual to pray; and having entered a\ndense forest he met a huge wild boar that happened to be pursued by\nhounds. As soon as the saint saw him at some distance he stood looking\nintently at him. Then raising his holy hand and invoking the name of God\nin fervent prayer, he said to the beast, \u2018Thou shalt proceed no farther\nin this direction; perish on the spot where thou hast now reached.\u2019 And\nno sooner were these fateful words uttered than it appears his\nformidable opponent collapsed, expiring on the spot.\u201d\n\nBut an experience on the mainland of the Picts seems to have been even\nmore exciting. One day he had to cross the river Ness. And when he\nreached the bank of the river he saw some of the inhabitants burying an\nunfortunate man, who, according to the accounts of those who were\nburying him, was a short time before seized as he was swimming, and\nbitten most severely by a monster that lived in the water; his wretched\nbody was, though too late, taken out with a hook by those who came to\nhis assistance in a boat. The blessed man, on hearing this, was so far\nfrom being dismayed that he directed one of his companions to swim over\nand row across the coble that was moored at the farther bank. And Lugne\nMocumin, hearing the command of the excellent man, obeyed without the\nleast delay, taking off all his clothes except his tunic and leaping\ninto the water. But the monster, which, so far from being satiated, was\nonly roused for more prey, was lying at the bottom of the stream, and\nwhen it felt the water disturbed by the man swimming, suddenly rushed\nout, and giving an awful roar darted after him with its mouth wide open,\nas the man swam in the middle of the stream. Then the blessed man,\nobserving this, raised his holy hand, while all the rest, brethren as\nwell as strangers, were stupefied with terror, and invoking the name of\nGod, formed the saving sign of the cross in the air, and commanded the\nferocious monster, saying, \u201cThou shalt go no farther, nor touch the man;\ngo back with all speed.\u201d Then at the voice of the saint the monster was\nterrified, and fled more quickly than if it had been pulled back with\nropes, though it had just got so near Lugne as he swam that there was\nnot more than the length of a spear staff between the man and the beast.\nThen the brethren, seeing that the monster had gone back, and that their\ncomrade Lugne had returned to them in the boat safe and sound, were\nstruck with admiration and gave glory to God in the blessed man. And\neven the barbarous heathens who were present were forced, by the\ngreatness of this miracle which they themselves had seen, to magnify the\nGod of the Christians.\n\nThe raising of the hand and forming the sign of the cross in the air\nseems to have been a frequent and effective expedient. In the case of a\nyouth who was returning from the milking of the cows with his pail on\nhis back, and who stopped at the door of the cell where the blessed man\nwas writing, it was the means of driving out a demon that lurked in the\nmilk pail. No sooner had he left than the saint made the sign. Instantly\nthe air was greatly agitated. The bar which fastened the lid of the pail\nbeing pulled back through the two openings which received it, was shot\naway to a great distance, while the lid fell to the earth and the\ngreater part of the milk was spilled upon the ground. The demon that\nlurked in the bottom of the pail could not endure the power of the sign,\nand fled thus violently in terror.\n\nSuch is the unvarying style of Adamnan. That he himself credited those\nversions of stories reported is beyond question. \u201cOur belief in the\nmiracles which we have recorded,\u201d he says, \u201cbut which we did not\nourselves see, is confirmed beyond doubt by the miracles of which we\nwere eye-witnesses.\u201d Three times in his own experience he saw\nunfavourable gales changed into propitious breezes.\n\nAs Book III., dealing with visions and angels, embodies Cummene\u2019s\ncontribution, it is of the highest interest to consider some of its\nchoice memories. \u201cOn a certain night,\u201d proceeds chap. ii., \u201cbetween the\nconception and birth of the venerable man, an angel of the Lord appeared\nto his mother in dreams, bringing to her as he stood by her a certain\nrobe of extraordinary beauty, in which the most beautiful colours, as it\nwere, of all the flowers seemed to be portrayed. After a short time he\nasked it back and took it out of her hands, and having raised it and\nspread it out he let it fly through the air. But she, being sad at the\nloss of it, said to that man of venerable aspect, \u2018Why dost thou take\nthis lovely cloak away from me so soon?\u2019 He immediately replied,\n\u2018Because this mantle is so exceedingly honourable that thou canst not\nretain it longer with thee.\u2019 When this was said, the woman saw that the\nforementioned robe was gradually receding from her in its flight, and\nthat then it expanded until its width exceeded the plains, and in all\nits measurements was larger than the mountains and forests. Then she\nheard the following words, \u2018Woman, do not grieve for the man to whom\nthou hast been bound by the marriage bond; thou shalt bring forth a son\nof so beautiful a character that he shall be reckoned among his own\npeople as one of the prophets of God, and he hath been predestined by\nGod to be the leader of innumerable souls to the heavenly country.\u2019 At\nthese words the woman awoke from her sleep.\u201d\n\nA priest, to whose care the sacred youth had been confided, upon\nreturning home from the church after mass found his house illuminated\nwith a bright light, and saw in fact a ball of fire standing over the\nface of the little boy as he lay asleep. And in after years a higher\npersonage, St. Brendan, reported that he observed a most brilliant\npillar wreathed with fiery tresses preceding the same wonderful\nindividual.\n\nIt was not to be supposed that such a distinguished ornament of the\nchurch militant could escape the attention and intrigues of its\narch-enemy. And so, on another day, while the holy man went to seek in\nthe woods of Iona for a place more remote from men and fitting for\nprayer, he suddenly beheld, as he afterwards told a few of the brethren,\na very black host of demons fighting against him with iron darts. These\nwicked demons, as the Holy Spirit revealed to the saint, wished to\nattack his monastery and kill with the same spears many of the brethren.\nBut he, single-handed, against innumerable foes of such a nature, fought\nwith the utmost bravery, having received the armour of the apostle Paul.\nAnd thus the contest was maintained on both sides during the greater\npart of the day, nor could the demons, countless though they were,\nvanquish him; nor was he able by himself to drive them from his island\nuntil the angels of God\u2014as the saint afterwards told certain persons\u2014and\nthey few in number came to his aid, when the demons in terror gave way.\n\nThe chapter, which is far and away the most thrilling and humanly\ninteresting, is the last of the volume, entitled, \u201cHow our patron Saint\nColumba passed to the Lord.\u201d It lingers with loving memory over the\nclosing scene of this remarkable life, giving a minute account of the\nsaint\u2019s last words and acts, his preparations for the impending change,\nand the manner and circumstances of his death. But as this is an\noft-repeated and well-known passage, it need not be quoted here.\n\nAdamnan\u2019s _Vita Columb\u00e6_ is not the only ancient _Life of St. Columba_\nafter Cummene\u2019s, but it is undoubtedly the standard classic one, from\nwhich most of the subsequent biographies draw their facts and\ninspirations, with the exception, perhaps, of the \u201cOld Irish Life,\u201d\nwhich furnishes particulars not mentioned in this one.\n\nNeither is the Schaffhausen document the sole existing MS. copy of the\ngreat biography. Dr. Reeves consulted as many as seven distinct MSS.,\nthree of which contained a longer and four a shorter text. Besides these\nhe had heard of five other extant copies, more or less complete.\n\nThe seven from which he obtained his own various readings are the\nfollowing:\u2014\n\nI. Codex A.\u2014The famous Schaffhausen one, the oldest of all, dating from\nthe early years of the eighth century.\n\nII. Codex B.\u2014A vellum of the middle of the fifteenth century, preserved\nin the British Museum.\n\nIII. Codex C.\u2014The Canisian text, which was published in 1604 from a MS.\nin the monastery of Windberg, Bavaria.\n\nIV. Codex D.\u2014The second tract in a large vellum of the thirteenth\ncentury, in Primate Marsh\u2019s library, Dublin.\n\nV. Codex F.\u2014A vellum consisting of fifty leaves, now in the Royal\nLibrary of Munich.\n\nVI. Codex G.\u2014A small quarto MS. on vellum of the early part of the ninth\ncentury, in the Library of St. Gall.\n\nVII. Codex Cottonianus in the British Museum, also a vellum of the\nlatter part of the twelfth century.\n\nThe others, which he had not seen, are variously distributed in Austria,\nBavaria, Switzerland, and Belgium.\n\nWith all its defects, Adamnan\u2019s masterpiece is the most valuable\nmonument of the early Celtic Church which has escaped the ravages of\ntime; imaginative, superstitious, magical, and steeped in hero-worship,\nit is characteristically Celtic and of surpassing interest to the\narch\u00e6ologist and philologist.\n\nIts value as such would have been vastly enhanced in these times had it\nbeen written in Gaelic, and doubtless, too, had the author condescended\nmore on social and historical details. But Adamnan apparently had no\nhigh opinion of his native language as a literary medium. In his first\npreface he almost apologises for using Gaelic names of men and tribes\nand obscure places in the \u201cbase Scotic tongue,\u201d which he thinks rude in\ncomparison with the languages of foreign nations, and begs his readers\nnot to despise a record of useful deeds on account of these native words\ninserted.\n\nDr. Reeves seems to regret that Adamnan did not follow the method of\nBede and give us an ecclesiastical history instead of a biography. We\ncannot all share his sentiment. Had it been other than it is\u2014had it even\nbeen in Gaelic\u2014the probability is that it might not have survived. In\nGaelic it certainly never could have attained the celebrity it enjoyed\non the continent of Europe during the Middle Ages, and which helped to\nperpetuate it. On the other hand, without the memoir as thus preserved,\nthe life of St. Columba, the greatest pioneer of Scottish history,\nreligion, and literature, would now be as vague and jumbled as that of\nany mythical hero, even as that of the historical St Patrick outside his\nown \u201cConfession\u201d unfortunately is; and we should be ignorant of many\npoints concerning which we have now first-hand information.\n\nAs it stands, the _Vita Columb\u00e6_ is still the most authentic voucher we\nhave for various important particulars in the civil and religious\nhistory of the Picts and Scots, and the severe Pinkerton himself was\nperhaps never nearer the truth on Celtic subjects than when he\npronounced it \u201cthe most complete piece of such biography that all Europe\ncan boast of, not only at so early a period, but even through the whole\nMiddle Ages.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER V\n                            THE BOOK OF DEER\n\n  An ancient curio\u2014Second oldest book of Scotland\u2014Where did it come\n      from?\u2014Its contents threefold\u2014Gaelic colophon from the ninth\n      century\u2014The work of a native scribe of Alba\u2014Peculiarities\u2014The\n      ecclesiastical art of the period\u2014The Gaelic entries\u2014\u201cLegend of\n      Deer\u201d\u2014Drostan\u2019s tears\u2014Some very quaint history\u2014The earliest source\n      for Scottish Gaelic\u2014Authentic glimpses into the Celtic condition\n      of Scotland\u2014Origin of shires, parishes, burghs, individual\n      freedom, and the use of the English language\u2014Three editions of the\n      Gaelic of the Book of Deer\u2014Now one of the very oldest MSS. of\n      native origin that Cambridge can boast of.\n\n\nIn the year 1860, Mr. Henry Bradshaw, Librarian of Cambridge University,\nwhile rummaging among old books, came upon a curious production which at\nonce usurped his attention. Here, thought he, is surely a survival from\nsome remote time. And examining the MS., he found it to consist of\neighty-six parchment leaves, six inches long, four and a half wide, and\nclosely written on both sides.\n\nThe language was Latin, written in the Irish character, \u201cnot very unlike\nthe Bodleian C\u00e6dmon.\u201d Each page showed marks of ruling with a sharp\ninstrument, and the letters hung from the ruled lines instead of resting\non them. The pages were surrounded by ornamented borders, most of them\nfilled in with interlaced work in panels, and with fretwork of a\npeculiar kind.\n\nOn a casual inspection of the subject-matter, the accomplished librarian\nhad no difficulty in ascertaining that it consisted of the first six\nchapters of St Matthew\u2019s Gospel, and part (verses 1\u201322) of the seventh;\nthe first four chapters of St. Mark, and part of the fifth (to middle of\nverse 35); the first three chapters of St. Luke, with the first verse of\nthe fourth; the whole of the Gospel of St. John; a fragment of an Office\nfor the Visitation of the Sick, in a later hand; and the Apostles\u2019\nCreed. The writing of the Gospels was all in one uniform hand, the ink\ndark-brown with age, and the initial letters of paragraphs designed in\nfanciful dragonesque forms and variously coloured. At the end of the\nbook, just after the Apostles\u2019 Creed, the writer had added a colophon in\nanother language, which looked like Gaelic, and on the margins and\nvacant spaces of the volume there was a number of entries in the same\nvernacular, but evidently inserted much later.\n\nWhat greatly enhanced the rarity and interest of this remarkable codex,\nin the finder\u2019s eyes, was that it also contained a collection of\ncoloured pictures and ornamental designs contemporary with the writing,\nexecuted in the same style, and apparently by the same hand that penned\nthe Gospels.\n\nWhere did this ancient curio come from? It was easy for him to trace its\nentrance into the Library, for he found it among the remainder of the\nbooks of John Moore, at one time Bishop of Norwich, and later of Ely.\nThese books had come into the possession of the University in a very\ninteresting way. After the prelate\u2019s death, which took place in 1714, it\nappears that King George the First, acting on the suggestion of Lord\nTownshend, bought the extensive library of the deceased for the sum of\n6000 guineas, and gifted it to the College Library.\n\nThe small octavo MS. of which we are speaking, and now known as the Book\nof Deer, had formed part of Bishop Moore\u2019s collection in 1697, and\nstrange to say, after its removal to Cambridge, it lay apparently\nneglected for a century and a half on the shelves of that University\nLibrary, until the discriminating eye of Mr. Bradshaw singled it out as\nof exceptional antiquity and value\u2014as, in fact, one of the very oldest\nMSS. of native origin that Cambridge can boast of.\n\nThus far the history of the quaint foundling. For the rest, it must tell\nits own tale.\n\nObviously one of the few relics of the Celtic Church now extant, it\nrequired an expert in the Gaelic language and antiquities to elicit the\ndesired information regarding its origin and long past. And when Whitley\nStokes sought a perusal, we can almost fancy the eager Bradshaw\naddressing his fellow-linguist in the language of Marcellus to Horatio\nwhen the ghost of Hamlet\u2019s father suddenly appeared, \u201cThou art a\nscholar; speak to it.\u201d Here was the worn and faded form of a book\nresurrected from the dust of oblivion, and, like the shade of the dead\nking, once more catching the eye of men, and making their hearts quiver\nwith eerie curiosity.\n\nA rising Celticist, Mr. Whitley Stokes soon applied himself to the\ninteresting inquisition, following the venerable scroll back for a\nthousand years to the ancient time when it first took shape. And in the\n_Saturday Review_ of December 1860 appeared an anonymous article from\nhis pen, in the form of an appreciative notice, giving translations of\nthe Gaelic, and otherwise making known to the public the importance of\nthis latest literary discovery.\n\nIn the contents of the volume he found sufficient internal evidence to\nbe able to trace its past, so far as many details of its early origin\nand environment are concerned.\n\nThese contents, as already hinted, are threefold. First, the original\nsubstance of the book; second, its ornamentations; and third, the notes\nand memoranda inserted at a later time on the margins and blank pages.\n\nAnd into what age and environment, we naturally ask, do these lead us?\n\nAs on receipt of an unknown letter, the receiver turns with eager eyes\nto scan the signature at the end, so here the expert first directs his\nattention to the colophon or postscript of the scribe.\n\nIn this particular instance it happens to be in Gaelic, and may be\nrendered thus: \u201cBe it on the conscience of every one in whom shall be\nfor grace the booklet with splendour, that he give a blessing on the\nsoul of the poor wretch (truagain) who wrote it\u201d (\u201cForchubus caichduini\nimbia arrath inlebran colli aratardda bendacht forainmain in truagain\nrodscribai\u201d).\n\nThis Gaelic, says Whitley Stokes, is identical with the oldest Irish\nglosses given by Zeuss in his _Grammatica Celtica_, and \u201ccertainly as\nold as the ninth century.\u201d Professor Westwood, from a study of the\nwritten characters, which are those at that time common to the Irish and\nAnglo-Saxon schools, came to the same conclusion as to the age of the\nbook.\n\nThe version of the Gospels which it contains is one of a class which has\nbeen called \u201cIrish,\u201d because, while mainly corresponding with Jerome\u2019s\nVulgate, it preserves occasional readings from versions of earlier\ndates. The text, in other words, agrees with the text of the various\nBooks of Gospel used in the Scoto-Irish monasteries of the period, such\nas the Books of Durrow, Kells, Dimna, Moling, Armagh, etc.\n\nIt would appear that Jerome\u2019s recension made its way early among Gaelic\nscholars, and during the isolation of the Celtic Church, there had been\na sort of revision which produced a native version exhibiting\ncharacteristics peculiar to itself and common to all the above-mentioned\ntexts. Hence the wonderful uniformity alike in the text and in the\npeculiarities of spelling found in all the surviving Gaelic MSS. of that\nearly period.\n\nIt is not known whether the book was produced in the place whose name it\nbears or in Iona, or whether it was written by a Pict or a Scot.\nScholars are content to affirm their opinion that it is the work of a\nnative scribe of Alba, without particularising too confidently.\n\nDr. Stuart, who edited it for the Spalding Club in 1869, observed that\nthough the handwriting is good and uniform, casual examination of the\nMS. will show that it is a careless transcript of a corrupt text. The\nspelling is frequently barbarous and capricious. There are many\nviolations of grammar, with omissions, transpositions, repetitions and\ninterpolations of various kinds, while the prepositions are almost\nalways joined to the word which they govern.\n\nGenerally speaking, this Book of Deer exhibits many of the peculiarities\nof spelling which Tischendorf noted in the Vulgate, for example:\u2014\n\n                      Magdalen_\u00e6_ for Magdalen_e_.\n                      Ba_b_tismum for ba_p_tismum.\n                      O_cc_ulus for o_c_ulus.\n                      Abra_ch_am for Abra_h_am.\n                      _Ch_anna for _C_ana.\n                      Pro_f_eta for pro_ph_eta.\n                      Dic_ie_ns for dic_e_ns.\n                      _Z_abulus for _d_iabolus.\n                      _H_oriens for _o_riens, etc.\n\nBut the copying is otherwise of such a kind that it appears very\ndoubtful if the scribe really knew Latin well. It certainly indicates a\ngreat falling away from the high scholarship of Adamnan and the verbal\naccuracy of Baithene. And this itself might confirm us in the idea that\nit may have been written in Deer or somewhere in Buchan rather than in\nIona. Very curious blunders might be quoted; but perhaps none more\ngrotesque than that in the genealogy in St. Luke, where Seth is set down\nas the first man and father of Adam, or again in John xviii. 22, \u201cSic\nrespondis Pontifici\u201d (Answerest thou the high priest so?) is written\n\u201cSicrespem dispontifici.\u201d In other cases words are introduced which\nentirely destroy the sense.\n\nThe second feature of this remarkable codex to arrest the attention, is\nthe decoration, which also is found to exhibit the character of the\necclesiastical art of the period at which it is presumed to have been\nwritten. The style of ornament of the illuminations is in fact entirely\nsimilar to that used in the well known Irish Books of Gospel prior to\nthe ninth century, and on its own account is exceedingly interesting.\nThe first folio has its page divided into four panels by a plain Latin\ncross, with a rosette in the centre. In these are four figures\nrepresenting, most likely, the four evangelists, though they might very\nwell stand for clerics. Fronting the beginning of the first Gospel is a\nfigure, full-page size, taken to represent St. Matthew, the author of\nthat Evangel. He appears with a beard, and clothed in ecclesiastical\nvestments, all but the feet, which are bare. In his right hand he holds\na sword of unusual form, turned downwards with the point of the scabbard\nresting between his feet; the handle is guarded before and behind, the\nguards being curved and reversed.\n\nOn either side of the evangelist there looks forth a smaller figure,\nwhich seems to be intended for an angel.\n\nAt the beginning of St. Mark\u2019s Gospel is another figure in the same\nstyle, with an object in front of his breast like a book in ornamental\nbinding. In his own place, St. Luke appears in the attitude of prayer,\nhis arms outspread. St. John is surrounded by six smaller figures,\nsimilar to those accompanying St. Matthew. The two last pages of the MS.\nhave also designs of which one repeats with variations that at the\nbeginning of the book; while the other is a combination of similar\nfigures with geometric ornament. Throughout the volume are found here\nand there small drawings\u2014quaint little flourishes representing fern\nleaves, birds, and animals, curiously wrought, and words as if in trial\nof the pen, some of which show very delicate and correct lines. The\ninitial letter of each Gospel is enlarged and ornamented with patches of\ndifferent colours, about two inches high, and the ends of the principal\nstrokes of the letters terminate in dogs\u2019 heads.\n\nYet it must be added that with all its similarity of style and\nattractive colouring, the art is poor in comparison with that of\ncontemporary Irish MSS.\n\nSuch are the original contents of the codex. There remain the later\nnotes and memoranda on the margins and blank spaces. And these are of\ntwo kinds\u2014those written in Latin and those in Gaelic. The Latin ones\nconsist of (1) the fragment of an Office for the Visitation of the Sick\ninserted between Mark and Luke, and with a single line of Gaelic rubric\nin the body of it, namely, \u201cHisund dubeir sacorfaic dau\u201d (\u201cHere give the\nsacrifice to him\u201d); (2) a Charter by King David confirming to the monks\nof Deer their lands and their privileges. As the Office for the Sick may\nhave been the first insertion, perhaps 200 or 250 years after the\noriginal book was written, so the King\u2019s Charter, granted some time\nbefore his death in 1154, was with a single exception apparently the\nlast, for in declaring that the clerics of Deer were free from all lay\ninterference and undue exaction, \u201cas it is written in their book,\u201d it is\nimplied that the rest of the entries had already been made.\n\nThese latter are the six Gaelic ones, and they contribute the chief\nvalue to the Book of Deer. They all relate to grants of land and other\nprivileges given from time to time to the Monastery of that name. At\nBanff and Aberdeen, in the early part of the twelfth century, the book\nwas produced in the King\u2019s Courts in evidence of the rights of the\nclerics to the land in question, and their claim was thereby\nsubstantiated. The entries were made at different times, from the end of\nthe tenth or the beginning of the eleventh century down to the middle of\nthe twelfth. They occur in the earlier part of the book, and though\ninferior in point of penmanship and even of ink to the original contents\nof the MS., they are well written and perfectly legible throughout.\nInscribed as they were in the Gaelic of the place and of the period,\nthese entries introduce us direct and at once into the community of\nmonks who owned the codex.\n\nThe first is of exceeding great interest. It is known as the \u201cLegend of\nDeer.\u201d Based upon a tradition of some 500 years, it cannot be regarded\nas strictly historical, which all the others are. The tradition was that\nthe monastery of Deer was founded by St. Columba. According to the\nlegend, the great Abbot came with his pupil Drostan from Hy (Iona) to\nAbbordoboir, the modern Aberdour in Aberdeenshire, but whether by land\nor sea is not stated. The record simply says, \u201cAs God had directed\nthem.\u201d Bede the Pict was, at the time, Mormaer or Grand Steward of\nBuchan, and gave them the town in freedom for ever from mormaer and\ntoisech (chieftain). They came after that to the other town of the\ndistrict, now known as Deer, and \u201cit was pleasing to Columcille because\nit was full of God\u2019s grace,\u201d and he asked Bede to give him that one too,\nbut the Pict refused.\n\nThen a son of this ruler took ill and was at the point of death, when\nhis father sent to the clerics\u2014Columba and his pupil\u2014to pray for the lad\nthat he might recover, and he gave them in offering the land from \u201cCloch\nin tiprat to Cloch pette meic Garnait\u201d (\u201cFrom the stone of the well to\nthe stone that marks the bounds of the son of Garnat\u2019s place\u201d). They\noffered a prayer and health came to the dying youth. After that,\nColumcille departed from the district, gifting the town to Drostan. But\nbefore he set out he blessed it, and left as his \u201cword,\u201d \u201cWhosoever\nshall come against it, let him not be many-yeared or victorious.\u201d\n\nDrostan\u2019s tears (deara), we are told, flowed freely on parting with his\nfamous Chief, whereupon the immortal Columba said, \u201cLet Dear be its name\nhenceforward.\u201d And thus the town and monastery derived their name, since\nvariously spelt as Dear, Der, Deir, Dere, and Deer.\n\nThe facts underlying the legend are not at all improbable. On the\ncontrary, they are quite in keeping with the character of St. Columba\nand the range of his mission. Arguing from the circumstance that no\nDrostan is mentioned in history in connection with the saint, an attempt\nhas been made by Dr. Macbain to show that the founder of the monastery\nmay have been another individual of that name who lived about 700 A.D.,\nbut there is no sufficient data. The word is a diminutive of the British\nname Drust. And whoever Drostan was, as a saint he has been held in\nhonour in the Buchan district from very early times. The church of\nAberdour was dedicated to him, and Drustie\u2019s fair used to be held\nannually at Deer on the 14th of December.\n\nIn connection with the \u201cword\u201d said to have been left by Columcille,\nthere is some very quaint history in after years. The Celtic Earls of\nBuchan, partly influenced by it, no doubt, showed a munificent spirit\ntowards the Church of Deer till the fall of their House with the Comyns,\nwhen Robert the Bruce came to the throne.\n\nThe Comyns had opposed the latter and were so utterly overthrown that,\naccording to a chronicle of the period, of a name which numbered at one\ntime the three Earls of Buchan, Mar, and Menteith, and more than thirty\nbelted knights, there remained no memorial in the land \u201csave the orisons\nof the monks of Deer.\u201d\n\nSir Robert de Keith, the influential Marischal of Scotland and staunch\nsupporter of the Bruce, got a grant of some pleasant lands in the\nneighbourhood of the monastery from the King as a reward for his\nservices. Thereafter, partly through intermarriage, the Marischals in\nsuccession became the leading family in the district, and at the time of\nthe Reformation were tenants of the abbey lands. By authority of a\nmember of the family who had become \u201cAbbot and Commendator of Deer,\u201d the\nproperty was by a certain process rather mendaciously made over to the\nEarl of the day. But the Earl\u2019s wife, \u201ca woman both of a high spirit and\nof tender conscience, forbade her husband to leave such a consuming moth\nin his house as was the sacrilegious meddling with the Abisie of Deir.\u201d\nUnfortunately, however, \u201cfourteen chalders of meill and beir was a sore\ntentatione, and he could not weel indure the randering back of such a\nmorsell.\u201d Her demand was met with \u201cabsolut refusall.\u201d So she had a\nvision of the impending ruin of the house. It is thus curiously recorded\nby Patrick Gordon, a writer of the eighteenth century, in his book\nentitled, _A Short Abridgement of Britanes Distemper from the year of\nGod 1739 to 1749_.\n\n  The night following, \u201cin her sleepe, she saw a great number of\n  religious men in their habit, cum forth of that Abbey to the stronge\n  Craige of Dunnoture which is the principall residence of that familie.\n  She saw them also sett themselves round about the rock, to gett it\n  down and demolishe it, having no instruments nor toilles wherewith to\n  perform this work, but only penknyves; wherewith they foolishly (as it\n  seemed to her), began to pyk at the Craige. She smyled to sie them\n  intend so frutles are interpryse; and went to call her husband to\n  scuffe and geyre them out of it. When she had fund him and brought him\n  to sie these sillie religious monckes at their foolishe work, behold!\n  the wholl Craige, with all his strong and statly buildings, was by\n  their penknyves undermynded and fallen in the sea, so as ther remained\n  nothing but the wrack of ther rich furniture and stufe flotting on the\n  waves of a raging and tempestuous sea. Som of the wiser sort, divining\n  upon this vission, attrebute to the penknyves the lenth of time befor\n  this should com to pass; and it hath bein observed, by sundrie, that\n  the Earles of that house before wer the richest in the kingdom, having\n  treasure in store besyd them; but ever since the addition of this so\n  great revenue, they have losed their stock by heavie burdeines of debt\n  and ingagment.\u201d\n\nThe writer who relates this wonderful vision did not live to see the\ndownfall of the House in the following century, or, it is surmised, he\nwould have regarded it in the light of a literal fulfilment.\n\nBut a much more distinguished author in recent times, the French Comte\nde Montalembert, has not hesitated to connect the ruin of the family\nfortunes with the sinister \u201cword\u201d of the famous Columcille: \u201cWhosoever\nshall come against it, let him not be many-yeared or victorious.\u201d The\nscribes who inserted the later entries had kept up the ominous\nprediction by concluding the fourth with the sentence, \u201cAnd the Lord\u2019s\nblessing on every mormaer and on every toisech who shall fulfil this,\nand to their seed after them;\u201d and the fifth, with the alternative, \u201cAnd\nhis blessing on every one who shall fulfil this after him, and his curse\non every one who shall go against it.\u201d\n\nIn Gaelic entry No. 2 we suddenly emerge from the traditionary elements\nof the first into the region of historical fact. We need not detail the\nvarious grants referred to in the entries 2 to 6 or the names of the\ndonors. Our chief interest in these vernacular addenda lies in the\ncircumstance that they throw an ancient and fresh light on the language\nand history of the period. Philologically, they are of great value as\nthe earliest specimens of Scottish Gaelic extant. In Adamnan\u2019s _Life of\nSt. Columba_ there are, of course, some Celtic words, but these are\nmerely names of persons or places and the book is the work of a scholar\nborn and educated in Ireland.\n\nHitherto, therefore, so far as the Gaelic literary monuments of Scotland\nhave survived, they may all be regarded as more or less of Irish origin,\ncharacter, and inspiration. But here at length and for the first time we\nhave one that is distinctly Scottish, both in language and the manner of\nwriting. As Windisch has expressed it in his _Celtic Speeches_, \u201cthe\noldest source for Scottish Gaelic is the Book of Deer.\u201d After it there\nis no other for 400 years, till the Dean of Lismore\u2019s book is produced\nbetween 1512 and 1526.\n\nBefore the sixteenth century you will look in vain for a scrap of any\nliterature or even record in Scottish Gaelic outside the Book of Deer.\nThe arguments that may be adduced to show that in the latter we have the\ngenuine native vernacular, as distinct from the Irish Gaelic in vogue in\ncontemporary MSS., are these.\n\nFirst, the book was evolved in a corner of Scotland as remote as could\nbe from Ireland. The district formed part of the country of the Picts,\nwho had asserted a kind of independence in ecclesiastical affairs.\n\nSecond, the Norsemen by their frequent incursions had inserted a wedge\nas it were between the two countries that hitherto had so much in\ncommon. They destroyed Iona and forced the Church to adopt Dunkeld as\nits chief abbatial centre. Since Malcolm Canmore\u2019s time, Scotland was\nthus becoming a separate kingdom, independent of English and Irish\ninfluences, and the establishment of bishoprics by the Kings Alexander\nand David freed even the Church from both England and Ireland. The\ntwelfth century was therefore a likely time for the birth of a native\nliterature.\n\nThird, the writing in the Book of Deer is of a thoroughly practical\nkind, relating to business transactions, and the Gaelic of the district\nmust have been used. The very purpose of the memoranda was to\nsubstantiate claims against future mormaers and toisechs who might be\ndisposed to dispute their legality.\n\nFourth, it is believed that even in the Western Highlands, not to speak\nof Buchan, the difference between Irish and Scottish Gaelic was then\nwider than the literature would lead us to infer. For this reason, that\nthe Gaelic MSS. of the period were produced by men who derived their\nculture from Ireland and naturally followed the Irish standard in their\nwritten compositions. The contents of the Book of Deer fully justify\nthat conclusion.\n\nThe Gaelic text is of the same age with that in the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre\nand Book of Hymns. Yet a comparison with these typical Irish monuments\nshows that the monks of Deer had developed peculiarities in writing\nGaelic which differed considerably from the standard of the Irish\nscholars. Windisch, commenting upon this circumstance, says, \u201cThe manner\nof expression, words, and forms are as in the Irish, but the manner of\nwriting shows already a stronger phonetic decay; whether it be that the\nScotch Gaelic has lived faster, or that only the manner of writing has\nremained less ancient, and has fitted itself more exactly to the\npronunciation of the time.\u201d\n\nIt is in this respect more like the Middle than the Ancient Irish.\n\nThose who are interested in the study of archaic words and grammatical\nforms will find the Book of Deer not a bad quarry; in fact our very\noldest bed-rock for Scottish idioms. There are few declensional\nspecimens, it is true, but these suffice to show, as Dr. Whitley Stokes\nobserved, that the Highlanders declined their nouns in the eleventh\ncentury as fully as the Irish, which is very far from being the case\nto-day. Some of the peculiarities of the newly-fledged Scottish Gaelic\nmay here be noticed. For example, that distinction of vowels so\nnoticeable in the Authorised Version of the Scriptures, where we have\nthe Irish _o_ in _focal_ instead of the Scottish _a_ as in _facal_, may\nbe observed in the colophon of the Book of Deer, where we have\n_truagain_, \u201cthe poor wretch,\u201d and not _trogan_ as in the Irish Priscian\nof St. Gall. Another feature is the confusion of vowels if ending words,\nas _i_ for _e_, the sinking of _c_ and _t_ to _g_ and _d_, and the\nassimilation of _ld_ and _ln_ to _ll_. The spelling has further local\ncharacteristics, perhaps due to Pictish influence, as, for example, _cc_\nfor _ch_; thus _imacc_ is for _imach_, modern _a mach_, \u201cout of,\u201d\n\u201chenceforth;\u201d _buadacc_ is for _buad(h)ach_, \u201cvictorious.\u201d\n\nThe aspirated _d_ or _g_ is dropped, as in _blienee_, just as from\nJocelyn of Furness (1180) we learn that the pronunciation of _tighearn_\nwas at that time _tyern_, though in Irish _tigerna_. Another Gaelic\nScotticism is the manner of treating _n_ in the preposition _in_. In\nearly Irish the _n_ disappears before _s_ and _p_; here it is retained,\nas _insaere_, _inpett_. We also find _ibbidbin_ for _im-bidbin_ and\n_ig-ginn_ for _in-cinn_. Thus the two peculiar features of Celtic\ngrammar known as aspiration and eclipsis, or vocalic infection and nasal\ninfection of tenues, are observed.\n\nThe great rule for spelling known as \u201cLeathan ri leathan is caol ri\ncaol,\u201d that is, \u201cbroad (vowel) to broad, and small (vowel) to small,\u201d\nforced on Scottish Gaelic from Ireland, is, with very rare exceptions,\nignored in the Book of Deer. The orthography of the latter has many\ncontractions, and is more phonetic than that of the Irish MSS. All of\nwhich peculiarities and circumstances point to the conclusion arrived at\nby Celtic scholars in general, that the Scottish Gaelic dialect of the\neleventh and the twelfth centuries, and especially the accent, differed\nmuch from the language of educated Irishmen.\n\nThe next two literary monuments of this vernacular, namely, those of the\nDean of Lismore and of Duncan Macrae of Inverinate, both of whom wrote\nphonetically, bring out this difference between the two dialects still\nmore clearly. It is an interesting fact, apparent from the Book of Deer,\nthat the present Aberdeenshire, now so Teutonic, was, when the entries\nwere made, a Gaelic-speaking district. The names of the kings, mormaers,\nand toisechs mentioned are all Celtic, indeed most of them are common\nenough names to-day in the Highlands,\u2014Cathal, Domnall, Muridach,\nMaelcolum, Cainnech, Donnchad, Gartnait, Aedh, Comgall, Maledoun,\nMatadin; Nectan was Bishop of Aberdeen, Leot Abbot of Brechin,\nDomangart, a ferlegin or \u201cman of learning,\u201d and Cormac Abbot of Turiff.\nA few are non-Celtic, such as Andrew, Samson, and David. Unhappily, in\nthese records the names of women do not figure much. Two very euphonious\nand beautiful ones, however, are given,\u2014Eua, the \u201cwedded wife\u201d of\nColban, and Ete, daughter of Gillemichel. It is a wonder that these\ndelightful names, especially Ete or Eite, have gone out of use in the\nHighlands.\n\nThe Celts seem to have had a genius for coining melodious appellations,\nsweet and endearing, as well as strong, rough, and uncouth.\n\nUnlike Adamnan\u2019s _Vita Columb\u00e6_ and Bede\u2019s _History_, there is no hint\nin this MS. of any language other than Latin and Gaelic. The latter was\nin evidence in the Courts of Banff and Aberdeen, and we would gather\nfrom the line of vernacular inserted in the Latin fragment of an Office\nfor the Visitation of the Sick that the monks of Deer were more familiar\nwith their Gaelic than their Latin; for in the Irish Book of Dimna the\ndirection is not the Gaelic \u201cHisund dubeir sacorfaic dau,\u201d but it is the\nLatin \u201cDas ei Eucharistan.\u201d\n\nBut apart from their philological value, the memoranda in the Book of\nDeer throw a welcome light on an early and obscure period of our\nnational history. Where the student of the social, political, and\necclesiastical machinery of the time would otherwise have to grope his\nway among dim and doubtful hints and analogies, he has here authentic\nglimpses into the Celtic condition of Scotland.\n\nAnd these notices are all the more valuable because they were made at\nthe time when a great social and ecclesiastical revolution was\nimpending. There was, on one side, the change from the primitive\npatriarchal polity to the feudal regime, and on the other, from the\nmonastic to the parochial system. The period covered by the entries is\ntowards the close of the Celtic epoch, before this momentous transition\nhad taken place. We see the old order ready to depart, and we get some\nlight on the origin of the new institutions which were about to\nsupersede it.\n\nQueen Margaret, wife of Malcolm Canmore, had much to do with the\nremoulding of the ancient structure of society in Scotland. This old\nsystem of inherited peculiarity was first confronted with one founded on\ndifferent principles, when the Celtic clergy of Scotland met in council,\nto listen during three days to the addresses of the Saxon princess,\nwhose speeches were translated into the language of the Gael by her\nhusband the King. Just as in the other great social movements of later\ntimes in the Highlands, the influences that undermined the old order\nwere not the result of natural progress in the Celtic polity, but of\nforeign ideas and principles introduced from without. It was these that\nled to the destruction of the civil and ecclesiastical institutions on\nwhich the old regime rested. In the train of Queen Margaret had come\ninto Scotland a race of Saxon, and afterwards of Norman settlers, whose\npresence in the country led to a quickening of the national life, and\nthe awakening of a feeling of unity such as could find no place among\nthe divided clans of a Celtic people.\n\nIn the Book of Deer we still have the old patriarchal system in full\nswing. There is the Ardrigh or High King. Under him and over the\nprovinces are the mormaers, and under the mormaers the tribal or\ndistrict chieftains known as toisechs. All these had their exactions out\nof the land, besides having their own fat manor lands. They had rights\nof personal service, civil and military; of entertainment when\ntravelling; and of exacting rent in kind or in money. There were neither\ndioceses nor parishes as yet. The patriarchal idea was carried out even\nin the monastic system. Each tribe or tuath had a monastery. Its abbot\nbelonged to a leading family of the tuath or of the founder, in which\nfamily the office was hereditary. The system gave rise to great abuses;\nfor as the monastery grew rich in lands the abbot took to do more with\nthe temporal than with the spiritual management, and often the lands\npassed out of the possession of the monastery altogether into the hands\nof the laymen.\n\n\u201cIt was not so in the case of Deer, the clerics of which down to the\nmiddle of the twelfth century were still receiving from the bounty of\nthe Gaelic chiefs of this district additions to their monastic\ninheritance, in the whole of which they were secured by King David I.,\nwith full immunity from all secular exactions.\u201d It is plain, however,\nfrom the terms of the royal charter, that attempts had been made to\nfleece them, and that they were able to maintain their rights in virtue\nof the grants recorded in their book.\n\nThe abuses of the lay abbacies, though not wholly removed, were fairly\nchecked by Queen Margaret and her sons, through the creation of\nbishoprics and the gradual supersession of the monastic by the parochial\nsystem. Soon, dioceses and parishes, which cannot be traced farther back\nthan the time of Alexander I., began to appear in the records. They had\nbeen established in England much earlier.\n\nOther new civil divisions and distinctions emerge. The old \u201ccountries\u201d\nand \u201cprovinces\u201d become shires. Towns spring up, and the number of\nindividuals and corporations holding personal property and corporate\nrights increased. A large part of the best land was given by charter\nfrom King David to men who held of the crown in feudal tenure.\n\nThe mormaer became merged in the Earl, and the toisech in the Thane. In\nshort, with the growth of feudal law, and the change to the parochial\nsystem, the old Celtic regime was fast becoming a thing of the past,\nthough many of the customs and traditions associated therewith lingered\non till the great overthrow of the Forty-five, and even in some\nlocalities almost to our own times.\n\nWe are thus able, through the medium of this venerable Book of Deer, to\nreach a hand over time to Columcille and his faithful Drostan, to Bede\nthe Pict, to the monks of Buchan, and that succession of the Ardrighs,\nmormaers, and toisechs who lived in the old and primitive conditions,\nbefore the new institutions and the regime under which we ourselves\nexist were evolved. We can hardly think of Scotland to-day apart from\nthe categories of parishes, burghs, individual freedom, English\nlanguage, and many others, and yet in these far-off times the monks of\nDeer and their contemporaries had to be doing without them. For all\nthis, these men were not lacking in culture or pious devotion. Their\nbook shows us that they revered the spiritual Columba as their Chief,\nand founder of their monastery, and besides being expert caligraphists,\nhaving some skill in painting and illumination, they were educated with\na sufficient knowledge of Latin to transcribe it intelligently and use\nit in the services of the church. \u201cThis is not much to say of them,\u201d\nsays Dr. Anderson in his Rhind Lectures, \u201cbut,\u201d he adds, \u201cit is a great\ndeal more than we have it in our power to say of any other community or\ninstitution from similar evidence, if we except the parent community of\nIona itself.\u201d\n\nOf the Gaelic of the Book of Deer there are three editions. The first\nwas prepared, Latin and Gaelic together, with valuable preface and\nfacsimile plates, by Dr. Stuart, and published by the Spalding Club in\n1869. It is one of the many excellent and beautifully printed volumes we\nowe to that distinguished Association. Mr. Stokes was responsible for\nthe English translation. The second publication he has given himself, in\nhis own _Goidelica_. There we find all the later entries of the codex\nwith translation, notes, and glossary. A similar service has since been\nrendered by Dr. Macbain of Inverness, who provides the text with\ntranslation, notes, and glossary of his own, founded on the work of the\nprevious editors, but throwing additional light on the vocabulary. This\ncontribution appears in the eleventh volume of the _Transactions of the\nGaelic Society of Inverness_ (1884\u201385), and is a welcome aid to the\nstudy of the text.\n\nAs in the case of the oldest book of Scotland, so in the case of this\nsecond oldest, it is to be regretted that the Book of Deer has strayed\noutwith our own land, yet no doubt, it is to this fact that we owe the\nexistence of both to-day; for no other book of so ancient a calibre has\nbeen able to survive the many stormy convulsions and turbulent ferments\nknown as Scottish history. Cast up like flotsam and jetsam in a late\nage, and treasured in the high places of learning, they both add a\nlustre and a glory now to our ancient language and literature which we\nwould otherwise in vain desiderate.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER VI\n                       THE MS. LEGACY OF THE PAST\n\n  A fresh start in the study of Celtic literature\u2014Advent of foremost\n      scholars\u2014The new basis found by Zeuss\u2014Resurrection of ancient\n      texts\u2014Unexpected light\u2014H. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville and his mission\n      to this country\u2014The numbers, dates, and localities of Gaelic MSS.:\n      (1) on the Continent; (2) in the British Isles\u2014Subject\n      matter\u2014Examples of the oldest written Gaelic poetry in Europe\u2014The\n      great books of saga\u2014Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre\u2014Books of Leinster,\n      Ballymote, and Lismore\u2014Quotations\u2014Account of the Ancient\n      Annals\u2014Tighernach\u2014The _Chronicon Scotorum_\u2014The \u201cFour\n      Masters\u201d\u2014Romance of the fugitive documents.\n\n\nIt is practically within the last fifty years that the great revival in\nthe study of Celtic literature has taken place. About the middle of last\ncentury the foremost scholars began to arrive, and since then there has\nbeen quite a galaxy of experts, both on the Continent and in the British\nIsles, who have approached the subject on scientific lines, and by\ncareful literary research have not only opened to us the treasures of\nthe past, but have also thrown a flood of light on them.\n\nPrior to their advent, Celtic studies had no solid basis, for the\nsufficient reason that the materials were not available. Old-time\nconvulsions had dispersed the documents to the four winds, and they\nremained where they lay, buried for ages from the public eye.\n\nSuch learned men as occupied themselves with these studies before the\nmiddle of last century confined their attention in great part to the\nlanguages and literatures of the Neo-Celtic races\u2014the Welsh and the\nBretons. They sought in these light to dissipate the obscurity that hung\nover the early history of the Celtic race\u2014the period anterior to the\nconquest of Gaul by the Romans. They consulted grammars and dictionaries\npublished in Brittany, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, during the last\nthree centuries. Of the texts themselves, the oldest they knew were\nWelsh, dating from about the thirteenth century; and some poems of Welsh\nbards preserved in MSS., of which the most ancient went no farther back\nthan the end of the twelfth century. These were literary treasures\nindeed, with the characteristic Celtic flavour, as may be seen from the\nbeautiful critiques of Renan and Matthew Arnold, both of whom were\ncharmed by the spirit and sentiment they breathe.\n\nBut in general it may be said that the early scholars had only mastered\nthe more modern forms of the language, and it was from texts\ncomparatively recent that they sought illumination of a past removed\nfrom them by more than nineteen centuries.\n\nSuch was the stage Celtic study had reached\u2014a kind of arrested\ndevelopment\u2014when suddenly a unique resuscitation took place.\n\nThe first of the new scholars to arrive were O\u2019Donovan and O\u2019Curry.\nEugene O\u2019Curry, Professor of the Catholic University of Ireland, went\nstraight to the necessities of the case by publishing in 1849 a\ncatalogue of the Gaelic MSS. in the British Museum, and then, of those\nin the Royal Academy of his native land. Afterwards, besides other\nvaluable contributions, he gave to the world his _Lectures on the MS.\nMaterials of Irish History_, enhancing the interest of the work by\nputting a very large and varied selection of facsimiles of the ancient\nwritings in the appendix. A very Tischendorf was this indefatigable MS.\nhunter and interpreter. Very aptly indeed did he speak of himself as an\nunderground worker. Much had been done by other labourers, but the\nfoundation was still to seek and still to lay. And it is significant of\nformer methods, that he knew not one man previous to his own time who\nhad qualified himself for the work in hand, either by mastering the\nancient Gaelic, or by making himself acquainted with the MSS. And yet\nthese are the genuine sources of historical and antiquarian knowledge in\nthis department.\n\nClose after O\u2019Curry came the great Continental savant Zeuss, who may be\nregarded as the real founder of the new and solid basis on which Celtic\nstudies now rest. His monumental work, the erudite _Grammatica Celtica_,\nappeared in Leipzig in 1853, giving a new impetus all over Europe to a\nstudy which hitherto had attracted but a languid, or at the best, a\nrestricted attention. And when, following up this great work, the German\ngrammarian published the glosses found in some of the oldest Gaelic MSS.\non the Continent, it was recognised that he had opened up a new and most\nfertile field for future explorers. These latter were immediately\nforthcoming\u2014learned authorities, like Nigra, Ascoli, Ebel, Stokes,\nWindisch, and Zimmer, who brought to light other important documents and\nexplained their significance. Thus was the new movement in Celtic study\nduly inaugurated, with what results we shall see.\n\nThe glosses published by Zeuss, though they furnish no fresh ideas,\noffer to the learned world a grammatical interest of the highest kind.\nThey belong, some to the eighth century, others to the ninth, and the\nvenerable Gaelic in which they are couched presents certain antique and\ncurious characteristics which are entirely lacking to the Welsh of the\nsame period, and still more to that of the twelfth and following\ncenturies\u2014the only forms known to the scholars before Zeuss.\n\nSince his time the new basis which he found for Celtic studies has been\nwonderfully enlarged, chiefly through the discovery of other Gaelic\ntexts contemporary with some of those that served for his own beautiful\nwork. And then the remarkable publications of erudite men in Dublin, and\nthe excellent work of Windisch, Professor of Sanskrit at Leipzig, have\ncalled the attention of experts on the continent to a great mass of\ndocumentary material in the British Isles. Under the transcription and\nretouching of many of these MSS. by later copyists, there are found\noriginal compositions, primarily in the ancient Gaelic of which Zeuss\nwas the first interpreter.\n\nUnlike the glosses, they furnish us with a vast storehouse of new ideas\nand traditions of every sort, comprising especially the mythological and\nlegendary, the legal also, and even the grammatical under various forms.\nTheir originality is unquestionable. These texts, in carrying us back to\npagan times, throw quite unexpected light on the incomplete though\nprecious accounts which ancient writers like C\u00e6sar, Diodorus of Sicily,\nand Strabo have given of the primitive civilisation of the Gauls. We\nshould expect to find in this mass of curious heroic literature some\nexpression of the traditions common to all the Celtic race before the\nsettlement of the different branches in the countries which now bear\ntheir name, and we are not disappointed. The MSS. preserved do give us a\ncrowd of fresh thoughts on the beliefs and customs of the Celts in the\nmost ancient epochs of their history.\n\nIn this respect they help to gratify the longing desire of living men to\nknow something of the actions, the range of thought, the character of\nmind, the habits, the tastes, the arts, the religion, and, in short, the\neveryday life of so old and venerable a race as our own, which has\nplayed such a wonderful part in the drama of history.\n\nThe French authorities have been fully alive to the value of these\nstudies, and on one occasion, at least, the Minister of Public\nInstruction showed his interest in a very practical and laudable way. In\nFebruary of 1881 Jules Ferry, who was in office at the time, appointed\nH. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville, Professor of Celtic in the College of\nFrance, as a special commissioner to visit the British Isles, and\ninvestigate and make a list of all the Gaelic MSS. he could find. This\nliterary mission De Jubainville carried out the same year, subsequently\nembodying his report in a book which gives not only his catalogue of\nMSS. inspected in England and Ireland, but also a list of those on the\nContinent. For some reason or other he omitted to include Scotland in\nthe area of his research, and so the large collection of valuable\ndocuments in the Advocates\u2019 Library, Edinburgh, is not chronicled in his\ninteresting r\u00e9sum\u00e9. Yet still, we have now for the first time a pretty\ngeneral estimate of all the more important material available.\n\nWe need not follow this enthusiastic MS. hunter in his peregrinations\nthrough the British Isles and on the Continent, entering, as he\nfrequently did, the precincts of ancient universities, cloisters, and\nmuseums, sitting in odd corners in libraries, poring over musty leaves,\ndeciphering antique characters, looking at some documents through glass\ncases which he would fain see opened, handling others with eager,\nhurried scrutiny, while a verger or a monk mounts sentry over the\ninquisitive foreigner, watching the precious relics with jealous care,\nand limiting the time for observation.\n\nWhat concerns us most are the tabulated results; and we might look in\nthe passing at some of the more striking facts which they exhibit.\n\nAnd first of all it is not a little surprising to learn that, while the\nlibraries of the Continent possess twenty MSS., or more correctly twenty\nportions of MSS., written in the Gaelic language before the eleventh\ncentury, in the libraries of England and Ireland there are only seven of\nthat remote age. But after that date the British libraries take the\nlead, since the number of their Gaelic MSS. before the seventeenth\ncentury amount to 133, whereas the total on the Continent down to the\nseventeenth century is only thirty-five. Of course this excludes the\nCeltic Latin MSS., of which there are upwards of 200 in European\nlibraries.\n\nAltogether there are just fifty-six Gaelic documents that are known to\nbe on the Continent of dates ranging from the eighth to the nineteenth\ncentury, and these are distributed as follows:\u2014\n\n 8th century           2 Milan, Cambray.\n 8th to 9th century    2 St. Paul in Carinthia, Vienna.\n 9th century          13 Berne, Carlsruhe (2), Dresden, Laon, Leyden,\n                           Nancy, Paris (2), Rome, St. Gall (2), Turin.\n 9th to 10th century   1 W\u00fcrzburg.\n 10th century          2 Paris.\n 11th century          6 Carlsruhe, Rome (2), St. Gall, Vienna (2).\n 11th to 12th century  1 Klosterneuburg.\n 12th century          1 Engelberg.\n 13th to 15th century  1 Rennes.\n 14th to 16th century  1 Paris.\n 16th century          1 Stockholm.\n 17th century         12 Brussels (11), Paris.\n 18th century          5 Paris (4), Rouen.\n 19th century          4 Paris (2), Rouen (2).\n Dates uncertain       4 Berne, Florence, Milan (2).\n\nBesides the number, antiquity, and wide distribution of these MSS., we\nare struck with two things. First, the fact that Milan and Cambray, two\nContinental cities, have the honour of possessing the two most ancient\nGaelic MSS. now extant. One of these relics is a Latin commentary on the\nPsalms, the other a Latin sermon, but in both there are glosses in Irish\nor Gaelic written in the eighth century. Earlier than that we cannot go\nfor actual writing still extant in the native tongue.\n\nThe other striking thing about the list is the entire absence of Gaelic\nMSS. in the northern countries of Europe, such as Norway, Sweden, and\nDenmark, where we should most expect to find them. There is one indeed\nat Stockholm, but it is merely a copy written in the sixteenth century.\nSurely this goes far to confirm the sinister reputation of the marauding\nDanes and Norsemen with regard to learning. Keating, writing 250 years\nago, asserts their destructiveness. \u201cIt was not allowed to give\ninstruction in letters.... No scholars, no clerics, no books, no holy\nrelics, were left in church or monastery through dread of them. Neither\nbard nor philosopher nor musician pursued his wonted profession in the\nland.\u201d\n\nApparently these northern pillagers, who laid waste so many monasteries,\ninstead of removing the rare and precious books to their own lands, were\nno better than the Vandals in their mad business of burning and\ndestroying on the spot what they evidently themselves could not value or\nappreciate.\n\nBut coming now to the British Isles, we might briefly consider the\nliterary legacy which the learned Frenchman found in those libraries of\nEngland and Ireland that he visited. In all, he mentions 953 as the\nnumber of MSS. to which he had access, and these were located as\nfollows:\u2014\n\n                     At Cambridge                 3\n                     \u201e  British Museum          166\n                     \u201e  Oxford                   15\n                     \u201e  Royal Irish Academy     560\n                     \u201e  Trinity College, Dublin  63\n                     \u201e  Franciscans, Dublin      22\n                     \u201e  Lord Ashburnham          63\n                     \u201e  Some special libraries   61\n                                                \u2014\u2014\u2014\n                        Total                   953\n                                                ===\n\nSo far from being exhaustive, our literary commissioner thinks these\nfigures very far below the actual number of Gaelic MSS. in the British\nIsles. Though he makes no reference in this respect to Wales or\nScotland, he is aware that there must be many in private libraries that\nhe has not indicated. And he admits that, according to O\u2019Curry, Trinity\nCollege has 140 instead of the 63 he mentions. And besides its 559\ncatalogued MSS., the Royal Academy of Ireland possesses about as many\nmore not catalogued, of which only one, the Book of Fermoy, was\ndescribed to him as worthy of his special attention.\n\nThough in point of antiquity there is none of all these British MSS. to\ncompare with the oldest glosses on the Continent, there are two which\ncome near it. They date from the ninth century, and are both located in\nTrinity College. These are the Book of Armagh and the Book of Dimna.\nNext in order, between the ninth and tenth centuries, come (1) the Irish\nCanons at Cambridge; (2) the Gospel of Maeielbrid Mac Durn\u00e2in, tenth\ncentury, at Lambeth Palace; (3) the Psalter of Southampton, end of the\ntenth century or beginning of the eleventh, at St. John\u2019s College,\nCambridge; (4) The Book of Deer, with its Latin, ninth to tenth, and\nGaelic entries tenth to twelfth, also at Cambridge in the University\nLibrary; and (5) the Gaelic portion of the Missal of Stowe, bought by\nthe British Government with the rest of Lord Ashburnham\u2019s collection for\ntheir Museum.\n\nThese seven MSS. are the most ancient, the only ones, in fact, in which\nyou find Gaelic written before the eleventh century within the British\nIsles. Yet they are not Gaelic MSS., strictly speaking, but Latin ones\nin which are found some words or phrases or paragraphs written in the\nnative tongue. The Gospel of Maeielbrid, for example, contains only a\nline and a half of Gaelic, the Book of Armagh four pages.\n\nTo find what we would strictly call Gaelic documents, we must come down\nas far as the closing years of the eleventh century, which yields us\nfour. Henceforth there is no lack of abundant and rich material. The\ntwelfth century is credited with seven, the thirteenth with eight, the\nfourteenth with eleven, the fifteenth and sixteenth with ninety-six, the\nseventeenth with sixty-six, the first half of the eighteenth with\nseventy-seven. Total down to the year 1750, 276 MSS. in the British\nIsles of the whole number 953 catalogued by De Jubainville. So that the\nremainder, the vast majority of the British MSS., are of comparatively\nrecent date, subsequent in fact even to the days of Macpherson of\nOssianic fame.\n\nMore important than the number, dates, and distribution is the\nsubject-matter of our literary legacy, and this now falls to be\nconsidered. It is very difficult to classify the MSS. according to their\ncontents, as so many of them are miscellaneous. Yet they do admit of\nbeing brought under certain categories. Leaving aside for the present\nall the later ones written after 1600, we have in all 168 Continental\nand British documents to deal with.\n\nOf these we must place in a section apart all the Latin ones that only\ncontain glosses or poems or notes in Gaelic which are additional or\nsecondary to the original text. This is the case with all the\nContinental MSS. concerned, except three, one at Rennes, one at Paris,\nand one at Stockholm. It is also the case with ten Britishers, viz. (1)\nthe Book of Deer, (2) the Irish Canons, (3) the Psalter at Cambridge,\n(4) the Gospel of Maelbrigte hua Mael\u00fbanaig, (5) the Book of Dimna, (6)\nthe Book of Armagh, (7) the Book of Kells, (8) the fragment of Psalter\nattributed to St. Camin, (9) the Missal of Stowe, and (10) the Gospel of\nMaeielbrid Mac Durn\u00e2in at Lambeth Palace.\n\nThat makes a total of forty-two in which the Gaelic is only added in\nnotes to a Latin original. Yet they comprise the most ancient of all we\nhave, and though their grammatical value is very considerable, their\nliterary interest is but meagre\u2014almost nil in fact\u2014with the exception of\nthe few poems at Milan, St. Gall, Dresden, St. Paul in Carinthia, and\nKlosterneuburg.\n\nAs these poems seem to lie like wayside flowers in our path, it is worth\nour while, before passing on, to turn aside for a little to cull some of\nthe verses.\n\nOf the two poems in the Milan codex, Dr. Stokes declares they are\ndifficult to decipher and more difficult to translate. But of the four\nquatrains on the margin of the Priscian of St Gall, here are two\ncharming examples, very characteristic of the Gael\u2019s love of nature and\nlearning, as well as reminiscent of his wild environment. The first is\nnot unlike the lyric of Columcille himself, when he describes the peace\nof Durrow:\u2014\n\n                     A grove surrounds me:\n           The swift lay of the blackbird makes music to me\u2014\n                 I will not hide it;\n           Over my much-lined little book,\n             The song of the birds makes music to me.\n\nThe author of the second, as Professor Mackinnon has fancied, must often\nhave seen the storm burst upon a wild spot on the west of Ireland, or,\nmore likely still, on Iona, Tiree, Oronsay, or Skye.\n\n                   Is acher in gaith innocht:\n                   Tufuasna fairggae findfholt;\n                   Ni \u00e1gor reimm mora minn\n                   Dond laechraid lainn oa Lochlind.\n\n                   Wild blows the wind to-night:\n                   The white-haired billows rage;\n                   The bold warriors from Norway\n                   Fear not the path of a clear sea.\n\nIn the Codex Boernerianus of Dresden we have the following lines.\nTranslated literally, they run thus:\u2014\n\n  To go to Rome is much of trouble, little of profit. The King whom thou\n  seekest here, unless thou bring him with thee thou findest not.\n\n  Great folly, great madness, great loss of sense, great folly since\n  thou hast proposed (?) to go to death, to be under the unwill of\n  Mary\u2019s Son.\n\nIt was the late Herr Mone, Archivdirektor at Carlsruhe, who discovered\nthe Gaelic poems in the MS. belonging to St. Paul in Carinthia, and sent\nthe first verse of the first of these poems to Dr. Reeves. Thereafter\nDr. Whitley Stokes wrote him requesting to be favoured with the\nremainder, with which request he not only complied, but also sent two\nother extracts from the same codex, and a letter dated Carlsruhe,\nJanuary 24th, 1859. There are in all five short Gaelic poems or\nfragments in the MS.\n\nThe first, of eight stanzas, is in praise of Aedh, son of Diarmad, and\nhas been translated by Eugene O\u2019Curry.\n\nWe give here simply the first and last verses:\u2014\n\n             Aedh great to institute hilarity,\n             Aedh anxious (desirous) to dispense festivity,\n             The Straight Rod, the most beautiful,\n             Of the hills of cleared Ro-er-enn.\n\n             At ale-drinking, poems are sung\n             By companies among people\u2019s houses\n             Sweet-singing bards announce\n             In pools of ale the name of Aedh.\n\nThe next to be quoted is part of a longer poem found in the Books of\nLeinster, Ballymote, Glendaloch, Lismore, and a Bodleian MS. The copy\nfrom the Book of Leinster is given in full by Dr. Whitley Stokes in his\n_Goidelica_, but here are the two quatrains of it in the Carinthian\ncodex:\u2014\n\n             He is a bird round which a trap shuts,\n             He is a leaky bark in dangerous peril,\n             He is an empty vessel, he is a withered tree,\n             Who so doth not the will of the King above.\n\n             He is pure gold, he is a heaven round the sun,\n             He is a vessel of silver full of wine,\n             He is an angel, he is wisdom of saints,\n             Every one who doth the will of the King.\n\nThe third poem, Dr. Stokes says, is exceedingly obscure. It seems to\nmean\u2014\n\n  There remains a fort in Tuain Inbir ... with its stars last night,\n  with its sun, with its moon.\n\n  Gobhan made that: let its story be perceived by you: my heartlet, God\n  of heaven, he is the thatcher that thatched it.\n\n  A house wherein thou gettest not moisture; a place wherein thou\n  fearest not spear-points. More radiant it is than a garden, and it\n  without an _udnacht_ around it.\n\nAnother of the pieces in this Carinthian MS. is of a very different\norder. A monk in a humorous and facetious strain, according to Professor\nZimmer, contrasts his own serious studies with the very different\npursuits of another person whom he calls Pan Gurban (or Panqur ban,\nWindisch), a Slavonic name, meaning, as Zimmer thinks, \u201cMr. Hunchback.\u201d\n\nOmitting the forty-two Gaelic documents from the 168, we have 126\nremaining which have been written before the year 1600, and these deal\nwith a great variety of subjects: religion, law, medicine, astronomy,\ngrammar, history, and legendary history.\n\nThe texts that treat of theology, mysticism, lives of saints, and\nmartyrologies, are very numerous; those of law few. Medicine figures in\na class apart. Astronomy gets even a smaller place than medicine. Its\nmost ancient monument dates from the fourteenth century.\n\nOne of the most curious and least known of all the Gaelic relics is a\ntreatise on Gaelic grammar, written in Gaelic. It is divided into four\nbooks, and is preserved to us in ten MSS. of the fourteenth, fifteenth,\nand sixteenth centuries. The four books of which it is composed are\nattributed, the first to Cennfaelad, an historic personage who died in\n678; the other three to mythical, prehistoric authors, such as\nFercertn\u00e9, Amergin Gl\u00fbngel, and Fenius Farsaid. The antiquity and\nability of the latter grammarian for the work, may be inferred from the\nsomewhat startling statement that he is said to have composed the Gaelic\ntongue out of seventy-two languages, and afterwards his son Nial visited\nEgypt to teach the languages after the confusion of Babel. Verily the\nCelts were an enterprising race to have a grammarian first in the field,\nand the nebulous Fenius Farsaid deserves a grave as high as Browning\u2019s\nhero, for even before Moses \u201cground he at grammar.\u201d It is a pity that\nthis rare old treatise which Ireland possessed in the Middle Ages has\nnot been published. The MSS. are in the British Museum, Royal Academy of\nIreland, Trinity College, and with the Franciscans of Dublin.\n\nBut not in any of the above-named categories do we find the body and\nsoul of Celtic literature. The real breathing spirit of the past speaks\nto us rather in the great MSS. of the Middle Ages, those which deal with\nromance and history\u2014the earlier sagas and the later annals; and these\ndeserve more than a passing reference. The saga or heroic literature is\nfar and away the most curious and abundant. De Jubainville himself\nchronicles no less than 540 pieces of this class. But its greatest\nmonuments are the miscellaneous MSS. known as the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre,\nthe Book of Leinster, Book of Ballymote, Book of Lecain, and Book of\nLismore.\n\nNo more precious and important document in the whole range of ancient\nGaelic literature has reached us than the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre, or Book\nof the Dun Cow, said to be so called after an original text of that name\nnow lost, but of which it contains a copy. St. Ciaran, it appears, wrote\ndown from the dictation of the risen Fergus, the tale of the \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3\nChuailgn\u00e9,\u201d in a book which he had made from the hide of his pet cow.\nThis favourite from its colour was called the Odhar (or Dun), of which\nNa h\u2019Uidhre is the genitive. The existing Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre is a MS.\nof the end of the eleventh century, and, even more than the Book of\nHymns, its contemporary, it merits the distinction of being the earliest\nexclusively Gaelic document that we have. Besides preserving St.\nCiaran\u2019s version of the T\u00e1in, it contains a copy of Dallan Forgaill\u2019s\nfamous \u201cAmra\u201d in praise of Columcille, and quite a number of ancient\nsacred and secular pieces, some of which are of great interest. The\ncompiler of this venerable codex was Maelmuiri, son of the son of Conn\nnam-Bocht, a writer who met his death in 1106 in the middle of the great\nstone church of Clonmacnois, at the hands of a band of robbers. There is\na quaint inscription at the top of folio 45 in his own original\nhandwriting. The words run, \u201cThis is a trial of his pen here by\nMaelmuiri, son of the son of Conn.\u201d\n\nNext in importance to Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre comes the Book of Leinster,\nwritten fifty years later. Rich in saga, it contains the fullest account\nof the \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9.\u201d O\u2019Curry sets so high a value upon this codex\nthat he writes: \u201cI think I may say with sorrow that there is not in all\nEurope any nation but this of ours that would not long since have made a\nnational literary fortune out of such a volume, had any other country in\nEurope been fortunate enough to possess such an heirloom of history.\u201d\n\nThe Book of Ballymote belongs to the end of the fourteenth century\u2014that\nof Lismore to the fifteenth. The latter is the property of the Duke of\nDevonshire, having been discovered in his Castle of Lismore, county of\nWaterford, Ireland, so late as the year 1814. Besides containing Lives\nof saints, etc., it is considered specially important in point of view\nof the Ossianic cycle.\n\nOf all the heroic sagas the greatest and the longest is that for which\nwe are indebted to the Book of Leinster and Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre\u2014the\n\u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9.\u201d This is not the place to deal with such a lengthy\nstory; but by way of illustrating the quality and literary interest of\nthese old world MSS., preserving as they do the most characteristic\ntraits of Celtic genius in the age before writing, we give two\nquotations from this wonderful saga.\n\nAnd the first will show the keen perception, the wealth of pictorial\ndetail, and descriptive power of language so characteristic of the\nGaelic ursgeuls and poems. It is the personal account of the Ulster\nchiefs as given in the T\u00e1in.\n\n  \u201cThere came another company there,\u201d said Mac Roth; \u201cno champion could\n  be found more comely than he who leads them. His hair is of a deep-red\n  yellow, and bushy; his forehead broad and his face tapering; thin red\n  lips; pearly shining teeth; a white smooth body. A red and white cloak\n  flutters about him; a golden brooch in that cloak at his breast; a\n  shirt of white kingly linen with gold embroidery at his skin; a white\n  shield with gold fastenings at his shoulder; a gold-hilted long sword\n  at his left side; a long, sharp, dark-green spear with a rich band and\n  carved silver rivets in his hand.\u201d \u201cWho is he, O Fergus?\u201d said Ailill.\n  \u201cThe man who has come there is in himself half a battle; the fury of\n  the slaughter hound,\u201d etc.\n\nTruly a wonderful accoutred warrior was this, and gorgeous in his\napparel for his age. Like our Oriental Nabobs and savage chiefs he\nbelieved in colour and luxurious display.\n\nBut I fancy it would be hard to beat the second quotation as an\nillustration of the riotous luxuriance of the Celtic imagination in the\ndays when it was at its best, unsobered by science, unrestricted by\nreason. The quotation is from the description of the fight between the\ntwo rival bulls in Queen Meve\u2019s country. In the poetic language of the\ntale, \u201cthe province rang with the echoes of their roaring, the sky was\ndarkened by the sods of earth they threw up with their feet, and the\nfoam that flew from their mouths; faint-hearted men, women, and children\nhid themselves in caves, caverns, and clefts of the rocks, whilst even\nthe most veteran warriors but dared to view the combat from the\nneighbouring hills and eminences. The Finn-bheannach or White-horned at\nlength gave way, and retreated towards a certain pass which opened into\nthe plain in which the battle raged, and where sixteen warriors bolder\nthan the rest had planted themselves; but so rapid was the retreat and\nthe pursuit that not only were all these trampled to the ground, but\nthey were buried several feet in it. The Donn Chuailgne at last coming\nup with his opponent, raised him on his horns, ran off with him, passed\nthe gates of Meve\u2019s palace, tossing and shaking him as he went, until at\nlast he shattered him to pieces, dropping his disjointed members as he\nwent along. And wherever a part fell, that place retained the name of\nthat joint ever after.\u201d And thus it was that \u201cAth Luain, now Athlone,\nwhich was before called Ath Mor or the Great Ford, received its present\nname from the Finnbheannach\u2019s luan or loin having been dropped there.\u201d\n\nThis \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9\u201d opens a window upon the past, and were it only\nfor the rich and abundant historical details it so lavishly furnishes,\nmust be held a treasure. \u201cNotwithstanding the extreme wildness of the\nlegend,\u201d says O\u2019Curry, \u201cI am not acquainted with any tale in the whole\nrange of our literature in which the student will find more of valuable\ndetails concerning general and local history; more of description of the\nmanners and customs of the people; of the druidical and fairy influence\nsupposed to be exercised in the affairs of men; of the laws of Irish\nchivalry and honour; of the standards of beauty, morality, valour,\ntruth, and fidelity exercised by the people of old; of the regal power\nand dignity of the monarch and the provincial kings, as well as much\nconcerning the division of the country into its local dependencies;\nlists of its chieftains and chieftaincies; many valuable topographical\nnames; the names and kinds of articles of dress and ornament; of\nmilitary weapons; of horses, chariots, and trappings; of leechcraft as\nwell as instances of perhaps every occurrence that could be supposed to\nhappen in ancient Irish life. All of these details are of the utmost\nvalue to the student of history, even though mixed up with any amount of\nthe marvellous or incredible in poetical traditions.\u201d\n\nSo much for the sagas and monuments of heroic literature. There remain\nthe other great class of MSS. to which we have referred\u2014the Annals. They\nserve as a basis for Irish history, and only the more quaint and\nimportant need be mentioned here, such as the Annals of Tighernach, the\n_Chronicon Scotorum_, the Annals of Innisfallen, the Annals of Boyle,\nthe Annals of Ulster, the Annals of Loch C\u00e9, the Annals of Clonmacnois,\nand most important of all, the book called the \u201cFour Masters.\u201d\n\nOf all these the Annals of Tighernach is the most ancient and most\nreliable, having for author the abbot of that name who died in 1088. It\nis supposed that in compiling this work he had as basis a chronicle kept\nby the monks from the founding of the abbey in 544. The MS. of this\nhistory belongs to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. A considerable\npart of it is in Gaelic, interspersed with numerous quotations from\nLatin and Greek authors. Dr. O\u2019Conor, commenting on this, remarks that\nTighernach\u2019s balancing of these authorities against each other manifests\na degree of criticism uncommon in the early age in which he lived.\n\nThe precious historical composition known as the _Chronicon Scotorum_\nexists in a copy written towards 1650 by Duald Mac Firbis. The original\nbelonged to the twelfth century, the chronicle itself ending in 1135. It\nbegins with the following title and short preface by the compiler:\u2014\n\n  The chronicle of the Scots (or Irish) begins here\u2014\n\n  Understand, O Reader, that it is for a certain reason, and\n  particularly to avoid tediousness that our intention is to make only a\n  short abstract and compendium of the history of the Scots in this\n  book, omitting the lengthened details of the historical books;\n  wherefore it is that we beg of you not to criticise us on that account\n  as we know that it is an exceedingly great deficiency.\n\nHe then passes rapidly over the first three ages of the world,\u2014the\nearlier colonisation of Ireland, the death of the colonists at Tallaght\nin the county of Dublin, and the visit of Nial, the son of Fenius\nFarsaid, to Egypt to teach the languages. With winged speed the compiler\nreaches the year 375, when St. Patrick was born, and then the red letter\ndate 432 which witnessed his arrival in Ireland. Columcille\u2019s prayer at\nthe battle of Cooldrevna is given under the year 561, and numerous\nscraps of poems here and there quoted as authorities. A large deficiency\noccurs between 722 and 805 A.D., where the compiler has written, \u201cThe\nbreasts (or fronts) of two leaves of the old book out of which I write\nthis, are wanting here, and I leave what is before me of this page for\nthem, I am, Dubhaltach Firbisigh.\u201d A similar defect, it may be noted,\noccurs in the Annals of Tighernach from 756 to 973.\n\nThe other Annals above-mentioned carry the history down towards the end\nof the sixteenth century.\n\nAlmost contemporary with the _Chronicon Scotorum_ arose the greatest of\nall, _The Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters_,\ncommonly cited as the \u201cFour Masters,\u201d a name given to its authors by\nColgan. It was the work of Michael O\u2019Clery and other three great\nscholars, begun in 1632 and finished in 1636. All the best and most\ncopious Annals he could find throughout Ireland were collected by him\nfor this _magnum opus_. Like so many others of these historical\ncompilations, it begins far back, in the year of the world 2242, and\nfinishes in 1616 A.D. \u201cThere is no event of Irish history,\u201d says Dr.\nHyde, \u201cfrom the birth of Christ to the beginning of the seventeenth\ncentury, that the first inquiry of the student will not be, \u2018What do the\n\u201cFour Masters\u201d say about it?\u2019 for the great value of the work consists\nin this, that we have here in condensed form the pith and substance of\nthe old books of Ireland which were then in existence, but which, as the\nFour Masters anticipated, have long since perished.\u201d\n\nThe work has been published by O\u2019Donovan in 1851. His is regarded as the\nbest and most complete edition in translation and notes. It forms six\nvolumes, without counting the supplementary index. The autograph MS.\nstill exists, composed of two volumes, of which the first, stopping at\nthe year 1169, forms No. XXI. of the Stowe Collection. Of the second\nvolume there are two autograph copies: the one complete, in the library\nof the Royal Academy of Ireland; the other, comprising only the years\n1335 to 1605, is preserved at Trinity College, Dublin.\n\nAnd now looking back over this long legacy of vellum, is there not\nsomething eerie in the thought of these old-world musty MSS. creeping\nout once more into the light, after ages of gravelike oblivion?\n\nIf we could follow their actual history, from their slow genesis under\nthe pen of ancient amanuenses through their subsequent fortunes, when\nperhaps some of them under the cloak of a fleeing monk, or in a shaky\ncoracle at sea, barely escaped the fury of illiterate warriors or the\nwaves; some of them other perils on land in their wanderings through the\nBritish Isles and the Continent,\u2014what a revelation of life and destiny\nthat would be! They have slept a long sleep through turbulent ages since\nthen, apparently unappreciated, buried, neglected, and forgotten, but\nnow in this new age, as we have seen, there is a mighty hunt and\nscramble for the resurrected relics. Many of them have been already\npublished, and there is a movement afoot by the Irish Text Society to\nprint the more important of the rest. Libraries and individuals compete\nwith each other for possession of the originals. So that now, in the\neyes of the wise and the wealthy, the hitherto obsolete MSS., often cast\naside in odd chests and closets as mere brown rubbish, are more prized\nand coveted as rare treasure than even their rivals of to-day. And what\na legacy of vellum all-told we owe to the old scribes of cell and\ncloister; from the legended Fenius Farsaid all the way down to the \u201cFour\nMasters.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VII\n                 THE SCOTTISH COLLECTION OF CELTIC MSS.\n\n  Cabinet in Advocates\u2019 Library\u2014Curious assortment of vernacular\n      literature\u2014Number and character\u2014Origin of the collection\u2014Highland\n      Society and Kilbride MSS.\u2014Subsidiary additions\u2014Work for the\n      expert\u2014Fate of some luckless documents\u2014Value of MSS. XL., LIII.,\n      and LVI.\u2014Three literary monuments of the Western Highlands: (1)\n      The Book of the Dean of Lismore\u2014History, description, value,\n      contents, extracts, names of contributors; (2) The Fernaig\n      MS.\u2014Characteristics\u2014Interesting details of supposed author; (3)\n      The Book of Clanranald\u2014Quaint relic\u2014Two MSS., the Red and the\n      Black\u2014History and contents, with specimen prose-poem and elegy.\n\n\nIn a cabinet in the Advocates\u2019 Library, Edinburgh, may be seen what\nlooks like the decayed and mouldering remains of some obsolete\nliterature. Very rarely is the case opened, and only once in a while\ndoes the casual observer show any more than a passing interest in these\nfaded and tattered remnants. Why should he? In comparison with the vast\nvariety of neatly printed and handsomely bound volumes around, their\nappearance is uninviting. Handwritten, many of them with frayed edges,\nleaves missing, ink faded, words illegible, it is only too apparent they\nhave not escaped the marks of age, damp, soot, and moths.\n\nHere is No. IX., for example, a portion of a single leaf of dirty\npaper\u2014no more. And No. LII., loose leaves and scraps gathered together\nunder one cover; XXXVII., one of the best known of all, with several of\nits leaves torn, and in many places quite illegible. No. XL., five\nlayers of different origin stitched together in a vellum cover. And what\nshall we say of the curious little volume only two inches long and one\nand a half in breadth and thickness, bound together with thongs in quite\nprimitive fashion? On a page in the middle is written: \u201cIs e so leabhar\nNeil Oig\u201d (\u201cThis is Neil the Younger\u2019s book\u201d). And here and there on\nsome other musty records we find such entries as these: \u201cIs mise Eoin o\nAlbain\u201d (\u201cI am John from Scotland\u201d), or \u201cIs mise Domhnall a foghlumach\nMaigbeathadh\u201d (\u201cI am Donald Bethune the Scholar\u201d).\n\nAll are not equally tattered and faded. The handwriting in several is\nfresh and clear as on the day of production. It varies from the coarse\nand careless to the highly finished and artistic, from the merest daubs\nto the richly coloured and ornamental.\n\nYet to the superficial observer with no antiquarian tastes, there is\nlittle here to attract, the more because most of these torn and dirty\nfragments exhibit a language and orthography hard to decipher, and much\nharder to read and understand. It took the late Dr. Maclauchlan of\nEdinburgh five years to decipher and copy a single MS.\u2014No. XXXVII., and\nhe tells us pathetically that it was the hardest piece of work he was\never engaged in.\n\nThe interested spectator, on the other hand, if his eye happens to be\ndirected to the obscure and tattered miscellany, naturally inquires, and\nlearns to his surprise that this is the Scottish collection of Gaelic\nMSS., all that could be gathered into one place in this country of the\nvernacular MS. literature of the past. A swift inspection shows upwards\nof threescore documents, of which thirty-six at least are parchments,\nthe rest paper or paper and parchment combined. Alongside lie later\nvolumes\u2014transcripts of tales, ballads, and other lore. A few of the\nparchments hail from the fourteenth century, but the majority were\nwritten in the fifteenth and sixteenth. The paper MSS. were all produced\nwithin the last 350 years, mainly in the end of the seventeenth and the\nfirst half of the eighteenth centuries, while the adjacent accretions of\ntranscripts and books belonged to men who lived within the last 100\nyears.\n\nIt is easy to tell the tale of this assortment. Ireland, England, and\nthe Continent had their rich collections long ago. With Scotland such a\nthing seems to have been an afterthought. Only in 1861 were these\nliterary monuments of the past brought together and deposited as a kind\nof national treasury in the Advocates\u2019 Library, and this laudable result\nis due mainly to the energy and interest of Dr. Skene, author of _Celtic\nScotland_, and formerly Historiographer-Royal in Edinburgh.\n\nHe knew of two collections fairly large and representative that had been\nmade earlier, and exerted himself to have them united and housed where\nthey might be reasonably accessible. These belonged, one to the Highland\nSociety, the other to the Kilbride family.\n\nThe former was made in the opening years of the nineteenth century,\nwhile the battle still raged over the authenticity of Macpherson\u2019s\nOssian. With Mr. Henry Mackenzie, author of the _Man of Feeling_, as\ntheir chairman, the Society instituted an inquiry into the whole\nquestion, and scoured the country far and near for Ossianic MS.\nliterature. In this way they secured a good many documents, the greater\nnumber of which came from London through Macpherson\u2019s literary executor.\nIt was well known that in his lifetime Macpherson had carried away from\nthe North-West Highlands and Islands some very old literary MSS., which\nhe afterwards deposited with his London publishers for public\ninspection. But so few cared to see them that the originals thus\nexhibited cannot now be identified.\n\nIt is highly probable that some of those which the Highland Society\nreceived from the Metropolis were among the number. The rest came to\nthem from other quarters. Some were purchased, and the whole reported on\nin the Proceedings of 1805.\n\nThe history of the Kilbride[17] collection is even more fortuitous. A\nletter from Lord Bannatyne to the Chairman of the Society and Committee\ntells how it was first discovered. Acting on the suggestion of Lord\nHailes, Bannatyne when Sheriff of Bute, and accustomed to attend the\nCircuit at Inverary, made inquiries among the Highland gentlemen he met\nthere regarding any fugitive Gaelic MSS. they might happen to be\ncognisant of, and in this way there came into his hands one of the\nKilbride collection, belonging to Major Maclachlan. It appears that from\nthe time of the Reformation, the Kilbride family had cultivated a taste\nfor Celtic antiquities, as a result of which they possessed a very large\nnumber of Celtic documents, gleaned partly in the Highlands and partly\nin Ireland. Following up the clue thus incidentally found, the\nenthusiastic Sheriff obtained permission for a delegate \u201cto take\ninspection and bring an account of the MSS. in Major Maclachlan\u2019s\npossession.\u201d These were found to number twenty-two, exclusive of five\nthat were lent. They are catalogued V. to XXXI. in the Edinburgh\nCabinet.\n\nWe need not dwell upon the subsidiary additions to this original and\ndouble nucleus in the Advocates\u2019 Library. But it may be noted, there are\nbesides in the University Library of Edinburgh, a Gaelic medical MS.;\none collection of poetry made in the middle of the eighteenth century,\nby Jerome Stone; another in the beginning of the nineteenth, by Irvine,\nand a fragment of a Gaelic grammar. The Library of Scottish Antiquaries\nalso exhibits a Gaelic curio in the form of a translation of the \u201cLilium\nMedicin\u00e6\u201d of Bernardus Gordonus, a foreign physician. And counting the\nfew extra productions in private hands, these comprehend all the MS.\nliterature of the Gael now extant in Scotland, so far as known.\n\nNot a satisfying sum-total by any means. The harvest truly was plentiful\nbut the gleaners were few, and this forlorn remnant hardly does credit\nto our national prestige and veneration for the past. It cannot compare\neither in number, variety, antiquity, or content, with the rich\nassortments elsewhere, such as those in Ireland, England, and the\nContinent. Yet this collection, such as it is, has a value of its own,\nand in some important respects supplements the material of other more\nancient and valued documents.\n\nThe wonder is that so many of these manuscripts have survived to tell\ntheir tale of dool, considering the haphazard way in which they have\nbeen preserved. There is something to be said for the apparent apathy\nand neglect, when we remember the stormy past, the national vicissitudes\nand convulsions that continued down almost to last century.\n\nAnd how should our Scottish ancestors know that there was any purpose to\nbe served in preserving books which nobody could read? The peculiar\nidiom and orthography had long since become obsolete. Until fifty years\nago no scholar could interpret the scrolls, and the wiseacres of the\npast, no less than the multitude of illiterate clansmen, might well be\npardoned if it never occurred to them that the brain of a modern critic\nwould some day forge a key for these old-world hieroglyphics, and\nthrough the study of the derelict parchments, make a dead language\nspeak.\n\nInstances are on record of the fate of some luckless MSS., which serve\nto illustrate the doom of many more.\n\nBefore the Forty-five, for example, a valuable collection of old Gaelic\npoetry was made in Strathglass, which afterwards found its way to the\nCatholic College of Douay. The last heard of this vagrant volume was\nthat the Principal, while yet a student there, saw the leaves of the\nmutilated document torn out to kindle the fire in their stove.\n\nA similar vandalism overtook the library of the Macvurichs, seanachies\nof Clanranald, who had been accumulating material for seventeen\ngenerations, from the time of Muireach Albanach, about 1200. There were\nmany parchments, according to the testimony of a recent illiterate\ndescendant, and among them the Red Book made of paper, but none of these\nare now to be found, because, when deprived of their lands, his family\nlost their literary taste and zeal. He knew not what became of the\nparchments. Two or three he saw cut down by tailors to make measuring\ntapes, and although he himself fell heir to some after his father\u2019s\ndeath, being without education, he set no value upon them and they\ndisappeared.\n\nDr. Skene has prepared a general catalogue of the Scottish collection.\nBut half of the documents have never been read or described. No Zeuss or\nZimmer has yet arisen in Scotland with leisure or patience enough to\ndecipher them.\n\nStrange that the cry \u201cMade in Germany\u201d should apply even to the key to\nthe ancient Gaelic, that the Continent had to come to our aid to\ninterpret our own literature, and that now, the key having been handed\nover, these remaining relics should continue, hieroglyphically locked in\nthe land of their nativity. Yet it is so. With the exception of a few\nspecimens culled here and there, we have no English rendering of some of\nthe finest pieces of this MS. literature.\n\nThough poor in history and law, and destitute of dramatic writings, the\ncollection is fairly rich in the poetic, the heroic, the legendary, and\nmore wonderful still, the medical. The latter treatises have a quaint\ninterest of their own, and offer a basis of comparison for measuring the\nprogress in the medical department of science. What would our modern\nsavants, for example, think of the \u201cNotes according to Jacques de\nForli\u201d? Even the old-fashioned doctor himself might be puzzled to get at\ntheir meaning.\n\n  Jacques de Forli says that there are two ways of administering an\n  electuary; according as it is intended for the vitals or the\n  extremities. For the extremities there is tria sandaili for the side,\n  and diamargariton for the head, and pliris for the brain, and sweet\n  electuary to strengthen the parts of the bladder, and diacostum in the\n  folds of the diaphragm, and each of these is to be given before food,\n  that they may affect the part at a distance from the stomach; for the\n  food prevents the moving of the electuary towards the parts which it\n  is necessary to invigorate.\n\nDr. Kuno Meyer has described MS. XL. as one of the most important. Its\nprincipal claim on our attention lies in the fact that it contains a\nconsiderable number of old texts, of which no other versions or no other\nequally old and good versions are known to exist. The handwriting of the\noldest part is of the fourteenth century. Initial letters are coloured,\nand the contents are seven Aideda or Death-tales of the heroic cycle of\nearly Irish legend. It supplements the Book of Leinster by relating the\ndeath of Conchobar, who was hit in battle by a ball made of lime mixed\nwith the brains of a slain foeman known as Mesgedra, and though the\nbullet could not be removed from his head, the wound was stitched with\nthread of gold to match his auburn hair. Afterwards when debarred from\nphysical exertion, an awful trembling shook creation, and on inquiring,\nthe king learned from his Druids that Christ was pitilessly crucified\nthat day. Whereupon a great rage seized Conchobar for the iniquity\nthereof, and drawing his sword he rushed against a wood, attacking the\ntrees till the wood was level. And with the fury the brains of Mesgedra\nstarted out of his head, his own brains following after, so that he fell\ndead.\n\nFrom the versions in LIII, and LVI., much valued by scholars, Dr.\nWhitley Stokes has published the Tale of the Sons of Uisneach (_Irische\nTexte_: Stokes and Windisch, Leipzig, 1887).\n\nSpecially interesting, from the purely Scottish point of view, are the\nthree well-known literary monuments hailing from the Western Highlands,\nand they deserve more than a passing reference.\n\nThe first figures in the Advocates\u2019 Library as a MS. collection of\nGaelic poetry taken down from oral recitation as early as 1512 to 1526.\nIt is known as \u201cThe Book of the Dean of Lismore,\u201d the accepted belief\nbeing that Sir James Macgregor, at that time Dean of Lismore in\nArgyllshire, and his brother Duncan were the compilers.\n\nOriginally it was brought into notice by John Mackenzie, Esq., of the\nTemple, London, literary executor of Macpherson, who gave it among the\nother documents to the Highland Society. How it came into his hands or\nwhere it lay for the 300 years that elapsed between the Dean\u2019s time and\nthe beginning of last century is not known.\n\nThe book, as it stands, consists of 311 quarto pages. Several are\namissing at the beginning and at the end. Many of the leaves are stained\nand almost illegible from the effects of damp. Others are worn by use\nand exposure. But apart from these defects, which are common to other\ncodexes, the MS. differs from all the MSS. in the Scottish collection in\ntwo essential features. It is written in the current Roman hand of the\nperiod, and the spelling is phonetic.\n\nThere are two distinct handwritings, and thus apparently two compilers.\nOn the lower margin of the 27th page stands the inscription:\u2014\n\n             Liber Domini Jacobi Macgregor Decani Lismoren,\n\nthe handwriting of which has a striking resemblance to that of the major\npart of the volume. And this is really all there is to show that the\nDean was compiler.\n\nThe other Macgregor, whose name occurs on page 144, is for good reasons\nidentified as his brother:\u2014\n\n Duncha deyr aclyth Mac Dhowl vic Eone Reawych\n \u201cDuncan (the \u2018deyr aclyth\u2019 is untranslatable), son of Dugald, son of\n    John the Grizzled.\u201d\n\nThe book is of great interest on account of its age, orthography, and\ncontents. It has a double value, as Dr. Skene has pointed out\u2014linguistic\nand literary. Linguistic, because its peculiar orthography presents the\nlanguage at the time in its aspect and character as a spoken language,\nand enables us to ascertain whether many of the peculiarities which now\ndistinguish the Gaelic were in existence 400 years ago. Literary,\nbecause it contains poems attributed to Ossian, and to other poets prior\nto the sixteenth century which are not to be found elsewhere; and thus\npresents to us specimens of the traditionary poetry current in the\nHighlands prior to that period, which are above suspicion, having been\ncollected nearly 400 years ago, before any controversy on the subject\nhad arisen.\n\nIn other words, we have here the oldest written Scottish Gaelic, except\nthat in the Book of Deer, with numerous productions of the time\nantecedent to the Reformation, and some even of the fourteenth century,\nfor comparison with our modern Gaelic. And we have the complete\nrefutation of Dr. Johnson\u2019s bold assertion that the language had nothing\nwritten. \u201cThe Erse never was a written language,\u201d said that vigorous\ncritic; \u201cthere is not in the world an Erse (that is, a Gaelic) MS. a\nhundred years old.\u201d Into what strange neglect had our literature fallen\nwhen such an emphatic dictum could be made on the housetops.\n\nThis one was at that time over 200 years old, and could it have been\nresurrected from its nameless obscurity would surely have satisfied the\nunconvinced and sceptical Doctor.\n\nVoluminous and various are its contents, culled from about sixty-six\ndifferent authors, the whole extending to 11,000 lines of Gaelic poetry,\nwith 800 in the genuine Ossianic style. The pieces vary from\nhalf-a-dozen to a hundred lines. And a peculiarity of the Ossianic\nfragments in this MS. is the frequent introduction of St. Patrick, who\nis represented as holding dialogues with the bard. Seeing that in the\npoems of Macpherson the saint never emerges, it is surmised that he\nregarded all references to him as unauthentic, interpolations of later\ntimes, when the Church ideas and dogmas crept into vogue. The Dean\u2019s\ncollection is divided naturally into two parts, one more ancient and\nuntouched by Christian sentiment, the other more modern, and not free\nfrom ecclesiastical leaven. To the former category belong those poems\nsuperscribed \u201cThe author of this is Ossian,\u201d and of these the finest is\nthe bard\u2019s eulogy of his father Finn. \u201cThe ideal here set forth is\nperfectly Homeric,\u201d wrote Professor Blackie; \u201cAchilles in his best\nmoments and most favourable aspect might have stood for it.\u201d\n\nIn its English rendering, which is poetically inferior to the original,\nit runs thus:\u2014\n\n                        \u2019Twas yesterday week,\n                        I last saw Finn;\n                        Ne\u2019er did I see\n                        A braver man;\n                        Teige\u2019s daughter\u2019s son,\n                        A powerful King;\n                        My fortune, my light,\n                        My mind\u2019s whole might.\n                        Both poet and chief,\n                        Braver than kings,\n                        Firm chief of the Feinn\n                        Lord of all lands,\n                        Leviathan at sea,\n                        As great on land,\n                        Hawk of the air,\n                        Foremost always,\n                        Generous, just.\n                        Despised a lie,\n                        Of vigorous deeds,\n                        First in song,\n                        A righteous judge,\n                        Firm his rule,\n                        Polished his mien,\n                        Who knew but victory,\n                        Who is like him,\n                        In fight or song?\n                        Resists the foe\n                        In house or field.\n                        Marble his skin,\n                        The rose his cheeks,\n                        Blue was his eye,\n                        His hair like gold.\n                        All men\u2019s trust,\n                        Of noble mind,\n                        Of ready deeds,\n                        To women mild,\n                        A giant he,\n                        The field\u2019s delight.\n\n                        Ne\u2019er could I tell,\n                        Though always I lived,\n                        Ne\u2019er could I tell,\n                        The third of his praise,\n                        But sad am I now\n                        After Finn of the Feinn!\n\nand so on.\n\nAs it is quite impossible to produce in English the euphonious effect of\nthe peculiar rhythm of the original Gaelic, with its alliteration and\nvocalic concords, here is an example from the above description:\u2014\n\n                 DEAN TEXT              MODERN VERSION\n           Fa Filla fa flaa       Fa filidh, fa flath,\n           Fa ree er gire         Fa righ air gach righ,\n           Finn flah re no vane   Fionn flath righ nam Fiann,\n           Fa trea^t er gy^t teir Fa triath air gach tir,\n           Fa meille mor marre    Fa miol mor mar\u00e1\n           Fa lowor er lerg       Fa luthmhor air leirg,\n           Fa schawok glan gei    Fa seabhag glan gaoithe\n           Fa sei^t er gi carde   Fa saoi air gach ceird.\n           Fa hillani^t carda     Fa h\u2019 oileamhnach ceirde\n           Fa m\u2019ky^t nor verve    Fa marcach nar mheirbh,\n           Fa hollow er znei^t    Fa ullamh air gniomh,\n           Fa stei^t er gi scherm Fa steidh air gach seirm,\n           Fa fer chart a wrai    Fa fior cheart a bhreith,\n           Fa tawicht toye        Fa tabhach tuaith,\n           Fa Ly\u2019seich naige      Fa ionnsaigheach \u2019n aigh\n           Fa bra^ta er boye.     Fa breadha air buaidh.\n\nAt page 87 there is a curious fragment on Tabblisk, supposed by some to\nbe chess, by others backgammon:\u2014\n\n      Ruinous is Tabblisk, few men but know it,\n      Of what I know myself, I have a little tale to tell,\n      On a certain day I was travelling through Foytle. The land,\n      Variegated, beautiful, pleasing. I came there at noon,\n      When a maiden of red lips met me in the town,\n      And asked me to join in one of these games;\n      She produced a chess-board, etc.\n\nHere follows the description of this game.\n\nThey made much of blood in those days, even as we do of heredity now:\u2014\n\n   The blood of forty and three kings in the blood of the Great King,\n   The blood of many races is thy pure blood which we cannot name,\n   The blood of Arthur in thy gentle veins....\n   The blood of Conn of the two Conns beneath thy soft skin;\n   The blood of Grant, as also of the race of Neil, etc.\n\nIt is quite interesting to note the names of some of the contributors to\nthe Dean\u2019s book. They are so various in rank and character.\n\nOf these Duncan Mor O\u2019Daly was Abbot of Boyle in 1244. Some of his\npieces have reference to persons and events in Irish history. One of\nthem, beginning, \u201cMayst thou enjoy thy belt, O Cathal,\u201d gives a very\nfull description of that ornamented article of attire and its adjuncts.\nThere is another whose name has been preserved by tradition, namely,\nMuireach Albanach, and he has been claimed by Scottish Gaels as the\nfirst of the celebrated Macvurichs.\n\nFour of the poems in the MS. are by Campbell, the Knight of Glenorchy,\nwho fell in the battle of Flodden; three by the Earl of Argyll, and\nother three by the Countess Isabella.\n\nThe compositions generally are very difficult to read, yet the book is\nnot lacking in colour. Here are aphorisms from Phelim Macdougall,\nreflecting, no doubt, the fashionable virtues and vices and partialities\nof the age:\u2014\n\n              \u2019Tis not good to travel on Sunday,\n              Not good to be of ill-famed race;\n              Not good to write without learning,\n              Not good is an Earl without English.\n              Not good is a sailor if old,\n              Not good a priest with but one eye,\n              Not good a parson if a beggar.\n              Not good is a lord without a dwelling,\n              Not good is a woman without shame,\n              Not good is fighting without courage,\n              Not good is entering a port without a pilot;\n              Not good is a maiden who backbites,\n              Not good is neglecting the household dogs,\n              Not good is disrespect to a father,\n              Not good is the talk of the drunken,\n              Not good is a knife without an edge,\n              Not good is the friendship of devils;\n              And thy Son, oh Virgin most honoured,\n              Though he has saved the seed of Adam,\n              Not good for himself was the cross.\n\nThe Fernaig MS. is another Highland production that was not known in\nJohnson\u2019s day. In 1807 it was in the west of Ross-shire, at the place\nwhose name it bears, and afterwards came into the possession of Dr.\nSkene. This collection was made between the years 1688 and 1693, in the\ncountry of the Macraes, in far Kintail, and breathes the spirit of the\ntimes, politically and religiously, as then reflected in Highland\nJacobite circles.\n\nThe MS. consists of two paper volumes in brown pasteboard cover,\ncontaining 4200 lines of poetry. There are several leaves loose, and\nothers blank, a few half pages written upon, and one folded in. The\nsecond part was never finished. In one place six leaves closely written\non both sides have been neatly removed.\n\nLike the Dean of Lismore\u2019s, the handwriting is in the current Roman\ncharacter, and the spelling phonetic. The collection includes\ncompositions by different authors within the area extending from South\nArgyll to the north of Sutherland, Bishop Carsewell being among the\nnumber. Some of the pieces date back to the beginning of the sixteenth\ncentury. Strange to say for a Highland gleaning, there is no love or\ndrinking song. Wine and women have scant notice here. The Gaelic in\ngreat part is practically the dialect still spoken in Kintail and\ndistrict.\n\nLittle is indicated of the history of the book or of the author in the\ntext itself. But on the first page of volume I. occurs the significant\nand suggestive superscription:\u2014\n\n                         Doirligh Loijn Di\n                         Skrijvig Lea Donochig\n                         Mack rah 1688.\n\nProfessor Mackinnon, adopting this clue, made careful search, and is\nsatisfied that the writer was Duncan Macrae of Inverinate, chief of that\nname. In the course of his investigation, the professor alighted upon\nsome curious and interesting facts, full apparently of local colour.\n\nIt appears there were two Duncan Macraes of some note living on the\nshores of Loch Duich at that time. Big Duncan of Glenshiel, a warrior\nwho fell at Sheriffmuir, and whose mighty claymore, said[18] to be\npreserved in the Tower of London as \u201cthe great Highlander\u2019s sword,\u201d with\none terrible stroke cut through trooper and steed, ere he succumbed\nhimself in the onslaught. The other, Donnachadh nam Pi\u00f2s, or Duncan of\nthe silver plate, so called from the magnificence of his table service,\nwas our author. Born about 1640, in early life he studied in the\nUniversity of Edinburgh, and was known as a man of unique ingenuity and\nmechanical skill. As evidence thereof it is said he had something to do\nwith bringing the water into Edinburgh, and it is related how, on one\noccasion, a foreign vessel having got dismasted in passing through Kyle\nRhea, he made a new mast for the craft by splicing pieces of wood\ntogether. For this the captain, deeply grateful, gave him the famous\nsilver herring, which remained in the family for generations, and was\nreputed to attract the herring from far and near into Loch Duich.\n\nThe oak trees now at Inverinate he reared from French acorns.\n\nLike his brother John, who graduated at the University, King\u2019s College,\nAberdeen, on July 12th, 1660, Duncan possessed the bardic gift. Poems\nattributed in the MS. to \u201can certain harper\u201d and \u201cTinkler\u201d are, by good\nauthorities, set down to his own Muse, these being simply _noms de\nplume_.\n\nCultured, liberal, and deeply religious, he was ecclesiastically an\nardent Episcopalian, politically a vehement Jacobite. His wife, the\nheiress of Raasay, it appears, diddled him out of her property by\nconveying the title-deeds to a relative to keep the lands for her own\nclan. Blood was thicker than the marriage bond.\n\nBut in spite of this the Kintail chief prospered, and bought lands in\nGlen Affaric from the Chisholm. Like the passing of Arthur, his death\nwas rather dramatic. He had gone to Strathglass, attended by a single\nfollower, to settle about this new property, and was returning with the\npapers in his possession. On coming to Dorisduan he found the Connag\nRiver in high flood, but ventured to cross, only to be carried away in\nthe attempt. Unfortunately for him, his companion possessed the fatal\ngift of _or na h\u2019Aoine_, by which, according to local belief, he could\ncause the death, if he wished, of any one seen by him crossing the\nstream on a Friday. And at this juncture the unhappy man, seeing his\nmaster battling with the flood, and unable to keep from looking at him,\nmuch less to render assistance, in his distress exercised his sinister\ngift, thereby drowning the poetic Duncan, his own chief.\n\nThe Fernaig MS., apart from other considerations, is of great value as\nrepresenting the literary output of the seventeenth-century period in\nthe Highlands, and so helping to fill the gap between the Dean of\nLismore\u2019s time and the pregnant Forty-five.\n\nOne other very interesting relic of Highland MS. literature remains to\nbe noticed. It is the Book of Clanranald, found in two MSS. known as the\nRed and the Black. The latter, a thick little paper codex strongly bound\nin black leather boards, is of the size of a New Testament and of the\nnature of a commonplace book, containing accounts of the families of the\nMacdonalds, and the exploits of the great Montrose, together with some\nof the poems of Ossian.\n\nThe history of the book is obscure. Many years ago Dr. Skene picked it\nup among some old Irish MSS. at a bookstall in Dublin, and, buying it,\nsent the fugitive back to the family of Clanranald, in whose possession\nit now is.\n\nBut of the two MSS. the Red is far and away the more famous, as it\nfigured largely in the Ossianic controversy, and gives the Macdonald and\nMontrose histories fuller. On Macpherson\u2019s visit to the West he received\nthis MS., by consent of Clanranald, from Nial Macvurich, and it was only\nafter Macpherson\u2019s death that the present Red Book was restored.\nAuthorities are not certain that this is the real original, but\nClanranald believes that it is, and the editors of _Reliqui\u00e6 Celtic\u00e6_\nare of the same opinion.\n\nSince its return it has been much consulted by Ossianic inquirers, as\nwell as by the historians of the country. A transcript and translation,\nnot very accurate, were made of the historical parts early in last\ncentury. Sir Walter Scott made use of these in his notes, _Lord of the\nIsles_, and Mark Napier in his _Montrose_, to throw light upon the\nobscurer points of Highland conduct in that great chief\u2019s campaign. In\nlater times a better rendering has been given by the great Irish\nscholar, O\u2019Curry, who translated the history for Dr. Skene\u2019s _Celtic\nScotland_.\n\nBoth MSS., the Red and the Black, are closely allied and supplement each\nother. The only English in the former is a satire on Bishop Burnet,\nwhereas nearly the whole of the last half of the latter is in that\nlanguage. The writers were the Macvurichs, hereditary bards of the\nClanranald chiefs, who traced their descent from Muireach Albanach. The\nearly history of the Macdonalds, down to about 1600, was probably\ncomposed by successive members of this line, but the record of the\nMontrose wars and following events is evidently the work of Nial\nMacvurich, whose life extended from the reign of Charles the First\nbeyond Sheriffmuir. It may have been written prior to 1700. Its chief\npurpose is to vindicate the Gael in his marvellous exploits under\nMontrose. Here Alasdair Macdonald and not the brilliant Lowland leader\nis hero.\n\nNeedless to say, besides Ossianic fragments, old as the _Ages of the\nFeinn_ and _Cnoc an Air_, the MSS. contain genealogies, chronologies,\nhistory, poetry, geography, grammar, and various disconnected jottings.\n\nA most curious production is the genealogy of Clanranald as far back as\nAdam, often with name and date, and some of the names are portentously\nlong.\n\nThe Macdonald history begins with the superscription, \u201cThe age of the\nWorld at the time the sons of Mil\u00e9 came into Ireland 3500\u201d (that is,\n1700 B.C.), and in the opening sentence announces that Amergin Whiteknee\nwas poet and historian and judge to them, and the first Gaelic author.\n\nThere is a wonderful prose poem on page 210 of the Red Book, on the\n\u201cArmy and Arming of the Last Lord of the Isles,\u201d part of which is worth\nquoting for the way in which it hits off the characteristics of the\nclans, and the graphic description it gives of the armour of this\nsupreme King of the Gael.\n\n  And they were in well arranged battalions, namely, the proud, luminous\n  countenanced, finely-hued, bold, right-judging, goodly, gifting Clan\n  Donald; the ready, prosperous, routing, very bold, right judging\n  Clanranald; the attacking, gold shielded Clan Alister; the protecting,\n  firm, hardy, well-enduring Macphees; the fierce, strong men, the\n  Maclachlans; the lively, vigorous, liberally-bestowing, courageous,\n  austere, brown-shielded Macdougalls; the cheerful, chief-renowned,\n  battle-harnessed Camerons; the inimical, passionate, hardy Macneils;\n  the manly, sanguinary, truly noble Mackinnons; the fierce, undaunted,\n  great-feated Macquarries; the brave, defending, foraging, valiant,\n  heroic, ale-abounding Mackenzies; the active, spirited, courteous,\n  great-bestowing Clan Morgan (or Mackay) and the men of Sutherland came\n  as a guard to the Royal Prince; and the powerful, lively, active,\n  great-numbered, arrogant Mackintoshes in a very large powerful force\n  around the Chief of Clan Chattan in active, hardy battalions with\n  their champions. There came along with these warriors earls, princely\n  high chiefs, knights, chiefs, lords, barons and yeomen, at one\n  particular place, to the noble son of Alexander, and these numerous,\n  rejoicing, heroes, and powerful, active, fierce, sounding hosts\n  gathered together.\n\n  This is the manner in which they appointed the powerful, fierce,\n  active, mighty-deeded, white-armoured, supreme King of the Gael, viz.,\n  the terror-striking, leopard-like, awful, sanguinary, opposing,\n  sharp-armed, fierce, attacking, ready, dexterous, powerful, steady,\n  illustrious, full-subduing, furious, well-prepared, right-judging\n  Earl, as he received on him the armour of conflict and strife against\n  every tumult, that is, his fine tunic, beautifully embroidered, of\n  fine textured satin, ingeniously woven by ladies and their daughters;\n  and that good tunic was put upon him.\n\n  A silk jerkin which was handsome, well-fitting, rich,\n  highly-embroidered, beautiful, many-coloured, artfully-done, gusseted,\n  corded, ornamented with the figures of foreign birds, with branches of\n  burnished gold, with a multiplicity of all kinds of embroidery on the\n  sides of the costly jerkin. That jerkin was put upon him to guard him\n  against dangers.\n\n  A coat of mail which was wide, well-meshed, light, of substantial\n  steel, beautifully-wrought, gold-ornamented, with brilliant Danish\n  gems. Such a mail coat as that was possessed by the lithe Luga of Long\n  Arms.\n\nWe may conclude this brief account of the Book of Clanranald by a\nspecimen of its poetry\u2014an elegy for Sir Norman Macleod, which Nial\nMacvurich made. It illustrates how to the Gael, when in grief, all\nnature seems to suffer and reciprocate his feelings; and the mighty\nportents associated in the olden days with the birth or demise of a\nchief.\n\n         A death of the deepest anguish it is\n         To his friends and his followers;\n         Over his grave as they perform a _neachd_\n         They have their turn at the tomb which we cannot get.\n\n         The women of every country are in sadness,\n         Also their heroes and ecclesiastics;\n         Their faithful freemen are in grief,\n         The extremity of severe affliction is among them.\n\n         The hospitality, the pure generosity,\n         The joyous exclamation, the ready welcome,\n         They have all gone with him into the earth,\n         For an age after him there will be but lamentation.\n\n         We are in want of gold and cattle,\n         Since the Chief of Rushgarry died;\n         The learned men since the hour of his death,\n         Have forsaken their havens of watching.\n\n         Flaming troubles pervaded the stars of heaven,\n         They poured forth the showers of lightning;\n         The hills are not illumined by day,\n         Their grief for him mastered them.\n\n         The rivers are rising over the woods,\n         There is a scarcity of fish in the bays;\n         The fruitage is not found in the land,\n         The roaring of the sea is very coarse.\n\n         At the last hours of his death,\n         Dreadful tokens appeared to us;\n         Foreboding clouds which denoted grief,\n         Were of gold colour in the Northern region.\n\nSuch is our heritage of Celtic MSS. in this country, and, in view of the\npaucity of these existing relics, may we not reiterate the lines of\nHorace?\u2014\n\n                  Full many a chief and warrior lived\n                  Ere Agamemnon saw the day,\n                  Of whom no record hath survived\n                  The glories that have passed away.\n                  Unwept, unsung, unknown they lie,\n                  For want of hallowed Poesy.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VIII\n                         THE MYTHOLOGICAL CYCLE\n\n  A rich and abundant saga literature\u2014Three leading periods or\n      cycles\u2014The myths and folk-tales\u2014Problems to men of science\u2014The\n      philologists and anthropologists take opposite sides\u2014Their\n      theories\u2014Attitude of the annalists and romancists of Ireland\u2014Their\n      craze for genealogy\u2014Early settlers in Erin\u2014Advent of the Milesians\n      or Gaels\u2014The Three Sorrows of Gaelic Storydom: (1) \u201cThe Tragedy of\n      the Children of Tuireann\u201d; (2) The fascinating \u201cAided of the\n      Children of Lir\u201d; (3) Story of \u201cDeirdre and the Sons of\n      Uisneach\u201d\u2014Extraordinary interest evinced in this saga\u2014Marvellous\n      output of texts and translations.\n\n\nWith the arrival of Christianity and its literary promulgators, St.\nPatrick and St Columba, authentic history may be said to have begun,\nfirst in Ireland, and then in Scotland. Before the fifth century there\nexisted a rich and abundant saga literature transmitted by oral\ntradition. But even the very oldest of the tales we now have, could\nhardly have been written down in MS. form before the seventh or eighth\ncentury. Such is the general belief of scholars who have sifted and\nexamined the earliest records.\n\nThe mass of saga carried over from pagan times, goes back over ages\nuntold and immemorial. And yet it is found to sort out under great\nleading periods or cycles, three of which seem to stand out distinct and\npre-eminent. These are known as the Mythological, the Heroic, and the\nOssianic.\n\nRoughly speaking, the Mythological cycle, beginning away back in the\nvague and dim past, stretches to near the beginning of the Christian\nera. The other cycles follow, filling up the 400 odd years that elapse\nbefore the dawn of written history.\n\nThe mythological stories are fewer than the rest, and of course more\nabsurd and unintelligible. Most of them are found in O\u2019Clery\u2019s _Leabhar\nGabhala, or Book of Invasions_, 1630, of which the more important MSS.\nare the Books of Leinster and Ballymote. Their chief interest lies in\nthe light they throw upon the early religious ideas of the Celt.\n\nIn a practical age like our own, most people are impatient of ancient\nmyth and fairy tales. They seem so utterly unreal, absurd, and\nimpossible, that it is hard to conceive how any sane mortal could have\ngiven them credence for one moment. And yet so universal are such\nstories among every race of mankind, and so credible and far-reaching in\ntheir influence in early times, that they have survived when multitudes\nof recorded facts have perished. They show that men, and especially\nprimitive men, have the same kind of thoughts, desires, fancies, habits,\nand institutions all the world over.\n\nThe myths and folk-tales have a wonderful similarity, reappearing in\ndifferent guise but in substance the same, among the most varied races\nand peoples, so that savages to-day in different continents and islands\nhave beliefs and customs corresponding to those which stagger us in the\nsagas of our own Celtic ancestors, and quite as fantastic.\n\nIt is this which lends the fascination to students of comparative\nmythology and to the folk-lorist. What seems arrant nonsense and the\nheight of absurdity to ordinary intelligence, lures them on to seek in\nthese wild stories for the origins of belief, for the early conceptions\nwhich influenced men in their religion and in their life. Removed from\nprimitive man by centuries of progress, and ruled as we are by a\nscientific view of the world, it is hard for us to put ourselves at the\ncentre of vision and standpoint of our early ancestors, to whom the\nfacts of life were more confused than they appear to us, and in a manner\nmore uncanny and mysterious. Like the savage of to-day, judging from\ntheir myths, they conceived all things as animated and personal, capable\nof endless interchange of form. Men might become beasts, beasts might\nchange into men. Even the gods appeared in human or bestial forms.\nAnimals, plants, stones, earth, winds and waters, spoke and acted like\nhuman beings, changing their shapes accordingly.\n\nThis is the very essence of myth and fairy tale. Or as Professor Max\nM\u00fcller has expressed it, \u201cWhat makes mythology mythological in the true\nsense of the word is what is utterly unintelligible, absurd, strange, or\nmiraculous.\u201d\n\nWhat appears most incredible and repugnant, the ugly blots and scars of\nthese narratives are just the problems to men of science. How to account\nfor them? How to explain their origin? Over this, contending schools are\nconstantly engaged in a kind of guerilla warfare. Leaving the\narch\u00e6ologists to pursue their own studies among the material\n\u201csurvivals,\u201d the philologists and anthropologists take opposite sides\neach in defence of his own particular theory.\n\nBriefly stated, the difference between them is this: the philologists\nmaintain that language\u2014language as it were in a state of disease\u2014is the\ngreat source of the mythology of the world. Professor Max M\u00fcller held\nthis view and gave it a widely accepted vogue. The ugly scars he\nexplained as due to the old words and popular sayings lingering on in a\nlanguage after their original harmless and symbolic meanings had been\nlost. Thus what might have been originally a poetical remark about\nnature, might in process of time be interpreted colloquially and become\nan obscene, brutal, or vulgar myth. To go no further afield than the\nHebrew sacred writings, when we think of an impassioned apostrophe to\nthe sun, and the subsequent popular legend that the sun and the moon\nstood still, we see that the philologist argument is not without force\nand cogency.\n\nYet the anthropologists are more in the line of evolution, for they\nmaintain that mythology on the whole represents an old stage of thought,\nfrom which civilised men have slowly emancipated themselves. This is\nalso the view of Mr. Andrew Lang, who recently contributed a work on the\nsubject. The scars so-called are the remains of that kind of taste,\nfancy, customary law, and incoherent speculation that prevail in human\nnature in its primitive barbarian state. And indeed when we contemplate\nthe credulity, superstition, and readiness to accept the grotesque and\nfabulous, that dominate such inhabitants even of a civilised country as\nare kept ignorant and isolated, this theory seems to point to the main\nsource of myth and fairy tale.\n\nAs in the early literature of Greece the gods and heroes are mixed up,\nso in the records of the Gael. But the annalists and romancists of\nIreland, who had a passion for writing history, evidently had no inkling\nof this. The thought of mythology was far enough removed from their way\nof thinking, and such floating tales and personages and events as they\nfound wafted towards them on the stream of tradition they took for\nactual fact. At any rate, they wove them into the story of the past of\ntheir nation in such a way as to lead us to believe that the mythical\nbeings were as real to them as the kings and warriors of their own age.\nAnd these historians had quite a craze for genealogy; never satisfied\nunless they could trace their chiefs or heroes and ancestors up to Adam,\nwhich they invariably succeed in doing, bridging the gaps with very\nfertile ingenuity.\n\nThus the last great chasm to be spanned in the line of pedigree is the\nDeluge\u2014to surmount which was a work more intricate and needing more\nskill in a manner than the Forth Bridge; for if they could once connect\nwith Noah, the Bible record does the rest.\n\nThe feat is accomplished, set down by the annalists of the Middle Ages\nwith all the plausibility of sober fact. Forty days before the Flood,\nthe Lady C\u00e6sair, niece or granddaughter of Noah\u2014it is immaterial\nwhich\u2014with fifty girls and three men came to Ireland. This, we are to\nunderstand, was the first invasion or conquest of that country. All\nthese were drowned in the Deluge, except Finntan, the husband of the\nlady, who escaped by being cast into a deep sleep, in which he continued\nfor a year, and when he awoke he found himself in his own house at Dun\nTulcha. It is charming to note with what precision and _sangfroid_ names\nare quoted in this legended history. At Dun Tulcha he lived throughout\nmany dynasties down to the sixth century of our era, when he appears for\nthe last time with eighteen companies of his descendants engaged in\nsettling a boundary dispute. Being the oldest man in the world, he was\n_ipso facto_ the best informed regarding ancient landmarks.\n\nAfter the Flood various peoples in succession stepped on to the platform\nof Irish history. First the Partholans; then the Nemedians, Firbolgs,\nTuatha de Danann, and last of all the Milesians, thus carrying the\nchronology down to the time of Christ. From the arrival of the earliest\nof these settlers, the Fomorians or \u201cSea Rovers\u201d are represented as\nfighting and harassing the people. Sometimes in conjunction with the\nplague, at other times with the Firbolgs and Gaileoin and Fir-Domnann,\nthey laid waste the land. The Partholans and Nemedians were early\ndisposed of. And then appeared from the north of Europe, or from heaven,\nas one author says, the Tuatha de Danann, who at the great battle of\nMoytura South overcame the Firbolgs, scattering them to the islands of\nAran, Islay, Rathlin, and the Hebrides, and afterwards defeating the\nFomorians at Moytura North, thus gaining full possession of the land.\nMuch of this fabulous history is taken up with these early struggles\nbetween the Fomorians and the Tuatha de Danann, of whom Breas and Lugh\nof the Longhand, and Dagda are the great heroes.\n\nAt length from Spain and the East came the last invaders, known under\nvarious names, as the Milesians, the Scots, or Gaels. They are the\nancestors of our modern race, called Milesians from an ancestor Mil\u00e9,\nand Gaels or Gaidels from an ancestor Gadelus. When they arrived at\nTara, a vast army from over the seas, they met the three kings and\nqueens of the Tuatha. The latter complained that they were taken by\nsurprise, and entreated the Milesians to embark again on their ships\nthat they might have a fair chance of opposing them. This they did,\nretreating for \u201cnine waves\u201d on the sea. But on facing about, lo! Ireland\nwas not to be seen. The Tuatha de Danann by their enchantment had made\nthe island as small as a pig\u2019s back, and therefore invisible from the\nships. Besides, they raised a violent storm with clouds and darkness.\nMany Milesian ships were wrecked, and a crisis was only averted by their\nleader, Amergin, who was also a Druid, pronouncing a Druidic prayer or\noration, addressed it would seem to the Tuatha, when the storm\nimmediately ceased and they landed in peace. After some skirmishes, the\nTuatha eventually retire to the Land of Promise, the country of the\n_S\u00ecdh_\u2014fairy mounds, where in the popular lore they were till lately,\ntaking considerable interest in the affairs of their quondam conquerors.\n\nDruidism, it will be seen, enters largely into all these ancient\ncontests, the opposing parties using spells as well as blows.\n\nThe Milesians we are supposed to have some knowledge of\u2014with more or\nless of their blood in our veins. They are regarded as the main body of\nthe Gaelic people. But who were the Tuatha de Danann and the Fomorians?\nPersonifications of the forces of nature, or the Gaelic gods of the\nupper and lower worlds, argue writers on mythology. As Zeus, Poseidon,\nPluto, and the rest of the Greek deities rule over the heavens, the\nearth, the sea, and the shades, so do the Tuatha, the pagan gods of the\nGaelic people; while the Fomorians, vicious and troublesome as they\nwere, may in their origin be none other than the sea powers\u2014the rough\nchaotic tumult of the Atlantic Ocean, against which in the west of\nIreland the various settlers had to contend.\n\nBut the early introduction of Christianity, throwing the pagan gods and\ntraditions, as it did, into the limbo of perdition, renders it very\ndifficult for us now to arrive at any definite and certain conclusions\non these matters.\n\nThe literary interest of the mythological cycle centres largely in the\n\u201cThree Sorrows of Story-telling,\u201d two of which belong exclusively to it,\nthe third to the Cuchulinn cycle. Though connected with the period of\nthe Tuatha de Danann, it is well to remember that these two as well as\nthe third were actually written later than the earliest of the heroic\ntales.\n\nFirst comes the \u201cAided or Tragedy of the Children of Tuireann.\u201d It is\nmentioned by Cormac in his Glossary (ninth or tenth century), and by\nFlann of Monasterboice (ob. 1056). The story is partially told in the\nBook of Lecain (cir. 1416), and is found in several MSS., including No.\nLVI. of the Scottish collection. O\u2019Curry, O\u2019Duffy, and Joyce have each\nat various times edited and published it with translation; the first in\nthe _Atlantis_, vol. iv.; the second for the Society for the\nPreservation of the Irish Language in Dublin, 1888; and the third in his\n_Old Celtic Romances_, London, 1879.\n\nThe scene opens near the ramparts of Tara, in the reign of Nuada of the\nsilver arm. Two handsome, young, and well-formed men are seen\napproaching. Accosted by the doorkeeper, who had only one eye, they\nannounced themselves as physicians, and subsequently offered to put his\ncat\u2019s eye in the place of the one he had lost. This done, the substitute\nproved convenient and inconvenient, for when he desired to take sleep or\nrepose, then the eye would start at the squeaking of the mice, the\nflying of the birds, and the motion of the reeds; whereas, when he\nwished to watch a host or an assembly the same organ continued in deep\nsleep. Similarly, but to better effect, the king was fitted with a new\narm, namely, that of the swineherd, of equal length and thickness with\nhis own. The bones only were removed from its original owner and set by\nthe one leech, while the other sought herbs to put flesh and muscle upon\nit.\n\nThis introduction apparently has no bearing upon the story proper, which\nnow begins.\n\nThe Fomorians who dwelt in Lochlann laid Ireland under heavy tribute.\nWhoever paid not the tax had his nose cut off. One day, when the King of\nSire held a fair upon the hill of Balar, the Tuatha de Danann, who were\nthere assembled, saw a goodly host coming towards them. This was Lugh\nLamhfhada and the fairy cavalcade from the Land of Promise. Lugh was\nmounted on a steed which was as swift as the bleak, cold wind of spring,\nand sea and land were equal to her, and her rider was not killed off her\nback. When the troop came where the king was they presently saw a grim\nand ill-looking band advancing towards them\u2014eighty-one Fomorian\nambassadors come to lift the tax. Lugh arose and slaughtered them,\nleaving only nine to bring back the news. Incensed, the Fomorians, under\nBreas, the son of Balor of the mighty blows, resolved to invade Ireland\nand take revenge on Lugh. \u201cAnd after ye have overcome him and his\npeople,\u201d said Balor to the departing warriors, \u201cput your cables round\nthis island of Erin which gives us so much trouble, and tie it to the\nstems of your ships; then sail home, bringing the island with you, and\nplace it on the north side of Lochlann, whither none of the Tuatha will\never follow it.\u201d Thus the Irish difficulty is not of yesterday, and\nBalor proposed to settle it in a very drastic way.\n\nLugh heard of their arrival and sent to assemble the fairy cavalcade\nfrom every place where they were. Cian, his father, traversing the plain\nof Muirtheimhne on this quest suddenly encountered three warriors\u2014the\nsons of Tuireann, with whom, though relatives, he was at deadly feud.\nThe only ruse he could think of for defence in this awkward plight was\nto strike himself with a Druidical wand into the shape of a pig, and\njoin the herd of swine he saw feeding near him. But the brothers\ndetected the trick, and Brian the eldest, with one swift stroke of a\nmagic wand transformed the others into two slender fleet hounds, who\ngave tongue ravenously upon the trail of the Druidical pig. While the\nlatter made for a wooded grove Brian\u2019s spear transfixed her in the\nchest, and the pig screamed in human speech, imploring quarter. The only\nconcession granted the unhappy beast was that she might return into her\noriginal shape and therein get killed. In this Cian had his revenge,\nfor, instead of the _eric_ of a pig, he assured them they would now be\nliable for an _eric_ altogether oppressive, because of his rank.\n\nSix times they buried the body and the earth refused it, but the seventh\ntime they put it under the sod the earth took to it.\n\nMeanwhile Lugh had joined issue with the Fomorians and got the victory.\nAnd after the slaughter and triumph of the battle, missing his father,\nhe set out with the fairy cavalcade to find out what had befallen him.\nWhen lo! as he crossed the scene of his sire\u2019s sad fate, the earth spoke\nto him and said:\u2014\n\n\u201cGreat was the jeopardy in which your father was here, O Lugh, when he\nsaw the children of Tuireann, for he was obliged to go into the shape of\na pig; nevertheless they subsequently killed him in his own shape.\u201d\n\nThe body was thereupon dug up and examined. Lugh kissed it three times,\nuttering words of lamentation, and ending with a mournful lay.\n\n\u201cCian was again placed in the grave after that, his tombstone was\nerected over his tomb, his dirge was sung, and his name inscribed in\nOgam.\u201d\n\nAnd now it will be ill with the sons of Tuireann. Having reached Tara,\nand as he sat in honourable position next the King of Erin, Lugh looked\nround on the miscreants and ordered the Chain of Attention of the Court\nto be shaken, that all present might listen. Of the entire company the\nchildren of Tuireann were the best in agility and dexterity; they were\nthe handsomest as well as the most honoured. So Lugh approached the\nsubject of the death of his father and the vengeance due with\ncircumspection and inquiry. Brian denied: \u201cNevertheless,\u201d he said,\nspeaking for himself and his brothers, \u201cwe shall give _eric_ for him to\nthee, as though we had done the act.\u201d\n\nThereupon, in presence of all, Lugh announced the compensation required,\n\u201cnamely, three apples, the skin of a pig, a spear, two steeds, a\nchariot, seven pigs, a whelp, a cooking spit, and three shouts on a\nhill.\u201d A mere trifle this eric may seem, but it turned out afterwards,\nwhen the special items demanded were characterised, that there was as\nmuch hazard involved in getting any one of them as there was for the\nyouthful David in another Court, and for another king, to get one\nhundred foreskins of the Philistines. Brian suspected treachery, but he\naccepted the bill, and with his two brothers went forth to seek the\npayment. Daring feats of valour have to be faced to get those wonderful\napples from the Garden of Hesperides, and the skin of the pig of the\nKing of Greece, and the well-poisoned spear of the King of Persia, and\nall the rest. But they got a loan of Lugh\u2019s curach to ferry them over\nthe wave wherever they wished, and their sister Eithne, going down to\nthe harbour, uttered a lay over them as the warrior band put out from\nthe beautiful and clearly-defined borders of Eire.\n\nSuccess crowned their extraordinary adventures, much to the chagrin of\nLugh, who sent a spell of magic after them to bring them back. They\npresent him with their spoils, taken in strange and distant lands, only\nto be reminded that the full measure of the _eric_ has yet to be\ndischarged. On the morrow they went to their ship, and the maiden, with\nmoist eyes, sees them off once more. Again they are successful.\nThereafter, in attempting the last feat of all, namely, to give three\nshouts on the hill of Midkena in Lochlann, they got severely wounded by\nthe spears of its champion guardians. And on their return they\ndespatched their aged father, Tuireann, to Tara with all haste to seek\nfrom Lamhfhada the gifted skin to relieve them, but Lugh refused; and\nthe life went forth from the brothers three at the same time.\n\nTheir father sang their death song, and \u201cafter that lay, Tuireann fell\nupon his children and his soul left him;\u201d and they were interred, parent\nand sons, and, it is even alleged, sister too, all in one grave.\n\nThe \u201cTragedy of the Children of Lir\u201d is the second in order of the Three\nSorrows. Though set in the earliest cycle, it is not represented in any\nof the ancient MSS. The oldest as yet known to contain it is No.\nXXXVIII. of the Scottish collection, written at the latest in the early\nseventeenth century. There is a copy also in MS. LVI. All the other\ncopies, which are pretty numerous, belong to the eighteenth and\nnineteenth centuries, and are in the MSS. of Dublin and the British\nMuseum. Monsieur H. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville in his survey noted no less\nthan seventeen of these. The comparative lateness of the records has led\nMr. Alfred Nutt to surmise that this story may simply be the Gaelic\nversion of the \u201cSeven Swans\u201d _m\u00e4rchen_, once common in the country, and\nworked up by a monk of the sixteenth century\u2014a suggestion Professor\nMackinnon thinks not at all unlikely. O\u2019Curry published the tale with a\ntranslation in the _Atlantis_, and Dr. P. W. Joyce included it in his\n_Old Celtic Romances_.\n\nThe incidents of this once very popular tale are as follows: In a\nconflict with the Milesians the Tuatha de Danann were defeated, and\nfound it necessary to deliberate on the policy they must pursue and the\nking they should elect. Various candidates are eligible, but Bodhbha\nDearg is ultimately chosen. In high dudgeon, Lir, who sought the exalted\nposition for himself, left the assembly and returned to his own _S\u00ecdh_.\nSo far from retaliating, the new ruler, when Lir\u2019s wife died, sent for\nhim and offered him his choice of three of the most beautiful and\nbest-instructed maidens in all Erin. He took the eldest of these sisters\nand married her. But she died, leaving four handsome children, a\ndaughter and three sons. A second time Lir had his choice, and Eva,\nsister number two, came as spouse to his home at _S\u00ecdh_ Fionnachaidh. A\ndevoted stepmother she proved to the children, till by and by green-eyed\njealousy infected her. She saw that their father would often rise from\nhis bed in the dawn of the morning and go to theirs to fondle them. And\nfancying herself slighted, \u201cshe lay in bed a whole year filled with gall\nand brooding mischief.\u201d\n\nThe outcome of this passion was a plot to do away with the children,\nwhom for the purpose she enticed to a lonely spot and bribed her\nservants to slay. This they refused to do, and although she made the\nattempt herself she had not the nerve to execute it. \u201cHer woman\u2019s\nweakness prevented her.\u201d Yet she had her revenge in a curious way. She\ngot the children to bathe in Lake Dairbhreach, and once there, by\nDruidical enchantment she transformed them into four beautiful\nsnow-white swans. As such for 300 years they swim back and fore on the\nsmooth lake, then for 300 in the Sruth na Maoile (off Kintyre), and 300\nmore at Iorus Domnann and Innis Gluaire, in the Western Sea. And in no\nway could they escape their bird life \u201cuntil the union of Larguen, a\nprince from the north, with Becca, a princess from the south,\u201d or as the\nIrish version adds, \u201cuntil Talchend Adzehead (that is, St. Patrick)\nshall come to Erin, bringing the light of a pure faith, and until ye\nhear the voice of the Christian bell.\u201d\n\nThe vindictive Eva repented her evil deed, but could not undo the\nmischief. To ameliorate their lot, she granted her enchanted victims the\nuse of their Gaelic speech, of their human reason, and the power of\nsinging sweet, plaintive, fairy music, surpassing all known in the world\nin its harmony and soothing influence.\n\nSwift retribution ultimately overtook this once beautiful woman; for\nwhen the king heard of her cruel deed, he asked her \u201cwhat shape of all\nothers on the earth, or above the earth, or under the earth she most\nabhorred?\u201d To which she replied, \u201cA demon of the air.\u201d \u201cA demon of the\nair you shall then be to the end of time,\u201d said the angry Bodhbha Dearg.\n\nMeanwhile the centuries roll over the children of Lir on the peaceful\nLake Dairbhreach, not altogether without sunshine, since the\npeople\u2014Milesians and Tuatha de Danann alike\u2014were wont to crowd on its\nshore to hear their music and watch their graceful movements. But the\ntime came when they found themselves in \u201cthe current of Mull,\u201d tossed on\nthe stormy seas twixt Erin and Alba, and here they had to dree their\nweird with much suffering for another cycle; sometimes separated from\neach other in the storm and darkness; at other times almost frozen to\ndeath on Carraig-nanr\u00f2n. Hapless birds! the slow moving ages bring them\nto the third stage, which is pretty much a repetition of their\nexperiences in the second. For in the Western Ocean round Glora Isle\nthey are still tormented by the restless wave and the cold and vicious\nwinds of winter, till their three hundred years therein are\naccomplished.\n\nAnd then at last St Kemoc comes; they hear the sound of the Christian\nbell and their spell is broken. Thereafter the children of Lir, no\nlonger swans, receive Christian baptism and die. For rashly attempting\nto take the birds prematurely away from his protection one of the MSS.\nasserts that St. Kemoc cursed King Larguen with righteous energy. And\nafter their death, in the manner of the previous interments, he buried\nthese ill-starred children all in one grave, sang their death-song,\nperformed their funeral rites, raised their tomb, and wrote their names\nin Ogam. Thus ended their chequered career, which lasted well-nigh a\nmillennium.\n\nThe third Sorrow of Gaelic storydom, that of \u201cDeirdre and the Sons of\nUisneach,\u201d does not belong, strictly speaking, to the mythological\ncycle; yet it is prehistoric and mythical in every other respect, though\ndevoid of the absurd and fantastical elements so characteristic of the\nother two. Indeed it may have sprung, as Mr. J. F. Campbell maintains,\nfrom some Indo-European romance, the common heritage in one form or\nother of the Aryan family from India to Ireland. The tale is at once the\noldest and most famous of the three Aideds, and must have had a wide\nvogue in early times, for it is mentioned in so ancient an authority as\nthe Book of Leinster, that it was one of the _primscela_ that the bards\nwere bound to know. Many versions of the saga exist, but chiefly in\nballad form.\n\nThe oldest and shortest is that in the Book of Leinster, twelfth\ncentury, with which may be classed one in the Yellow Book of Lecain,\nfourteenth century, and in the Egerton MS., British Museum. The best and\nfullest version, now published, is generally held to be that obtained\nfrom MSS. LIII. and LVI. of the Scottish collection, the former a vellum\nof the fifteenth century. In addition to various other documents in the\nAdvocates\u2019 Library, such as Nos. V. and XLVIII., which contain\nfragments, Monsieur H. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville found seventeen copies of\nthe legend in later MSS. in London and Dublin.\n\nThe extraordinary interest evinced in this saga is not confined to\nancient or medieval times, but continues unabated down to our own day,\nif we may judge by the attention it has received at the hands of\nauthors, editors, and translators. Nearly every foremost scholar of the\nnineteenth century has dealt with it in text, or notes, and translation.\n\nOf many and various publications in modern times, the following will\nsuffice to show the place it holds in Celtic literature. The texts,\nprinted sometimes with notes and translation, are usually of different\nversions.\n\nO\u2019Flanagan, _Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Dublin_, 1808;\nO\u2019Curry, _Atlantis_, vol. iii. 1860, from Yellow Book of Lecain;\nCampbell, _Leabhar na Feinne_, 1872; Windisch, _Irische Texte_, vol. i.\nLeipzig, 1880; Dr. Whitley Stokes, _Irische Texte_, vol. ii. Leipzig,\n1887, the former from Book of Leinster, the latter from MSS. LIII. and\nLVI., Advocates\u2019 Library. Dr. Cameron\u2019s _Reliqui\u00e6 Celtic\u00e6_, also from\nMS. LVI. Windisch, O\u2019Curry\u2019s and O\u2019Flanagan\u2019s texts, reprinted _Gaelic\nJournal_, Dublin, 1882\u201384. Carmichael, _Transactions of the Gaelic\nSociety of Inverness_, vol. xiii. 1887, an admirable folk-lore version\ntaken down in the Western Isles from oral recitation. Angus Smith, in\nhis _Loch Etive and Sons of Uisneach_, treats it fictionally in dialogue\nform, 1879.\n\nKeating tells the tale in his _History of Ireland_. It is found in part\nin the Welsh story of Peredur, taken apparently from a fifteenth century\nMS. Mr. Joseph Jacobs has given in English dress, in _Celtic Fairy\nTales_, an abridged account from Carmichael\u2019s version. Of French\ntranslators, H. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville, M. Georges Dottin, and M. Louis\nPonsinet may be mentioned. Of poetical English versions there is no\nlack. Macpherson treated it specially in Darthula, Sir James Ferguson\ndramatised it, Dr. Joyce published it in America (Deirdre: Boston and\nDublin), and Drs. Todhunter and Douglas Hyde have given other\nrenderings. Mr. T. W. Rolleston made it the subject of the Prize Cantata\nof the F\u00e8is Ceoil in Dublin in 1897.\n\nTruly a marvellous output of texts and translations, rivalling any in\nthe whole range of our Gaelic literature. And the above catalogue does\nnot by any means exhaust the list. The wonder is that the saga should be\nfound in remote and outlying corners of the Highlands floating by oral\ntradition down to our own time. Fletcher got a version about 1750,\nIrvine took down part of the verse about 1801 from a fox-hunter on\nTayside, Carmichael from an old Macneill in Barra in 1871. The story is\nof additional interest to us because it is laid partly in Ireland and\npartly in Scotland, among that beautiful scenery around Loch Etive so\nwell known to native and tourist.\n\nThe story opens at Emain Macha, or Emania, where, with the nobles of\nUlster, King Conchobar is feasting in the house of Feidhlim the bard.\nDuring the entertainment Feidhlim\u2019s wife gave birth to a daughter; and\nCathbad the Druid forthwith prophesied that the child would grow up \u201ca\nmaiden fair, tall, long-haired, for whom champions would contend.\u201d Her\nlips would be cherry-red over pearly teeth; her lovely form the envy of\nhigh queens. Deirdre, the Druid named her, and thrilled the company by\nannouncing that her queenly beauty would yet involve the province in\nheavy woes.\n\nAll the nobles present, instantly wished to circumvent such destiny by\nhaving the child put to death. Conchobar intervened: \u201cLet not that be\ndone,\u201d said he; \u201cI will take her with me and send her to be reared that\nshe may become my own wife.\u201d Deirdre was accordingly removed and kept\napart in a fortress, seeing no one but her tutor and nurse and\nLebarcham, the king\u2019s _banchainte_ or conversation woman. Shot up at\nlength into the fair maiden of Cathbad\u2019s prediction, she happened one\nsnowy day to be looking out, when she observed her _oide_ (tutor)\nkilling a calf, and a raven came to drink the blood. \u201cDear to me\u201d she\nexclaimed, \u201cwould be the man who would have the three colours yonder on\nhim, his hair like the raven, his cheek like the blood, and his body\nlike the snow.\u201d \u201cSuch an one is Naois, son of Uisneach,\u201d suggested the\n_banchainte_.\n\nThey met, Deirdre and he. A kinsman of the king and one of three gifted\nbrothers, this Naois stood head and neck taller than any man in Erin,\nand peerless in strength, courage, and manly beauty. When he or his\nbrothers sang, the cows gave two-thirds additional milk and people were\nenchanted. Their prowess was such that the three together could meet all\nUlster in arms.\n\nDeirdre adored Naois, and proposed that they twain should elope. At\nfirst he refused, but bewitched by her charms and entreaties he yielded.\nThe brothers went off, taking their followers, 150 men with their wives\nand greyhounds. For a time they were pursued round Erin to Ballyshannon,\nHowth, Rathlin, till they sought refuge in Alba and sailed for Loch\nEtive. From that beautiful centre they made many excursions inland,\nliving in hunting booths, chasing the deer on the mountains, assisting\nthe King of Alba, who needed their help, and living joyous and free; a\nmost romantic life, full of incident and full of happiness.\n\nAfter a time Conchobar hatched a plot to lure them back. First he\napproached Cuchulinn and Conall Cearnach to undertake a mission. But\nthese champions, suspecting treachery, gave blunt refusal. At length\nFergus Mac Roich was induced to go, not without misgivings. When he\narrived with his two sons and bargeman, Naois and Deirdre were sitting\ntogether in their hunting booth playing at chess. Fergus went into the\nglen and raised his sweet-voiced warning cry, after the manner of a\nhunter. Naois heard the sound and said, \u201cI hear the cry of a man of\nErin.\u201d Deirdre dissimulated at first, \u201cThat was not the cry of a man of\nErin but the cry of a man of Alba.\u201d Afterwards she explained it was\nbecause of a dream she had had, which she felt foreboded evil. The\nemissaries spend the night with them and win over Naois.\n\nNext morning they all sail away, returning to Erin, and as the land\nfades from her view, Deirdre with mingled regret and presentiment, sings\nor recites a beautiful lay, describing the shores of Loch Etive and the\ncharms of the life she led in the glens. The following rendering is from\nDr. Skene, the few verses here quoted indicating the feeling and passion\nof the old lyric:\u2014\n\n             Glen Etive! O Glen Etive!\n             There I raised my earliest house;\n             Beautiful its woods on rising\n             When the sun fell on Glen Etive.\n\n             Glen Orchy! O Glen Orchy!\n             The straight glen of smooth ridges;\n             No man of his age was so joyful\n             As Naois in Glen Orchy.\n\n             Glenlaidhe! O Glenlaidhe!\n             I used to sleep by its soothing murmurs;\n             Fish and flesh of wild boar and badger,\n             Was my repast in Glenlaidhe.\n\n             Glendaruadh! O Glendaruadh!\n             I love each man of its inheritance,\n             Sweet the noise of the cuckoo on bended bough,\n             On the hill above Glendaruadh.\n\n             Glenmasan! O Glenmasan!\n             High its herbs, fair its boughs;\n             Solitary was the place of our repose,\n             On grassy Invermasan.\n\nThe upshot of this fateful voyage was that Fergus, their guardian, was\nunwittingly decoyed to a feast through the King\u2019s strategy, his son\nBuinne Borb was bribed to act the traitor, and the sons of Uisneach were\nslain. But not before they had done mighty execution against the hosts\nof Conchobar, and kept them at bay till his Druid put a sea with high\nwaves across the plain before them, while their foes had the benefit of\ndry land on which to attack from behind.\n\nDeirdre was distracted at the loss of her lover. Taken to the King\u2019s\npalace, for the space of a whole year even the raising of her head or\nthe giving of a smile she did not concede, till Conchobar, chagrined\nwith such moping, resolved to send her away for a time with Eogan who\nslew Naois. On the way the evil man flung her a brutal taunt, suggestive\nof her defencelessness, which when Deirdre heard she gave a start, made\na wild leap from the chariot, and her brains were dashed in fragments\nagainst a pillar stone that stood opposite. But the manner of her death\nis otherwise told in the popular version, apparently with more romantic\neffect and less probability. All through, the narrative is interspersed\nwith touching lays, expressive of the heroine\u2019s feelings at various\ntimes. Thus after her loss:\u2014\n\n             Long is the day without Uisneach\u2019s children,\n             It was not mournful to be in their company,\n             Sons of a king by whom pilgrims were rewarded;\n             Three lions from the hill of the cave.\n\n             Thou that diggest the tomb,\n             And that puttest my darling from me,\n             Make not the grave too narrow;\n             I shall be beside the noble ones.\n\nCathbad, the Druid, in retaliation for Conchobar\u2019s dissimulation, curses\nEmain Macha; and Fergus Mac Roich, resenting the dastardly treachery\nthat brought the noble sons of Uisneach to an untimely grave, took\nservice under Queen Meve of Connaught and harassed Ulster for years. At\nlength Nemesis overtook the guilty Conchobar. Emania is levelled to the\nground, never again to be rebuilt. None of his race inherit the proud\nwalls of that ancient citadel.\n\nThus, like Helen of Troy, was Deirdre the unhappy cause of strife and\ncalamity to the land and its people, to the lover and friends she held\nso dear\u2014fateful Deirdre and hapless sons of Uisneach!\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IX\n                            THE HEROIC CYCLE\n\n  The golden age of Gaelic romance\u2014Number of the tales\u2014Cuchulinn\u2014His\n      early adventures\u2014The Wooing of Eimer\u2014Training in Skye\u2014The Bridge\n      of the Cliffs\u2014Tragedy of Conlaoch\u2014Elopement\u2014The \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3\n      Chuailgn\u00e9,\u201d and exploits of Cuchulinn\u2014Ferdia at the ford\u2014The two\n      champions of Western Europe\u2014Cuchulinn in the Deaf Valley\u2014Death\u2014The\n      Red Rout of Conall Cearnach\u2014Instruction of Cuchulinn to a\n      prince\u2014His \u201cPhantom Chariot\u201d\u2014Modern translations of these rare\n      sagas.\n\n\nThe Heroic, or, as it is sometimes called, the Cuchulinn, or Red-Branch\ncycle, corresponds with the period immediately before and after the\nopening of the Christian era.\n\nThis was really the golden age of Gaelic romance, at once the most\ncomplete, productive, and brilliant of the three traditional epochs. And\nhappily of it almost all the larger and more important tales have been\npreserved. What a world of human interest is conjured up even by the\nnames and titles of these old-world sagas. Among them we find the \u201cT\u00e1in\nB\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9\u201d; Deirdre and the Sons of Uisneach; Conchobar\u2019s Vision; The\nBattle of Rosnaree; Conchobar\u2019s Tragedy; The Conception of Cuchulinn;\nHis Training; The Wooing of Eimer; Death of Conlaoch; Cuchulinn\u2019s\nAdventure at the Boyne; Intoxication of the Ultonians; Bricriu\u2019s\nBanquet; Eimer\u2019s Jealousy; Cuchulinn\u2019s Pining; Conall\u2019s Red Rout and the\nLay of the Heads; The Capture of the S\u00ecdh; The Phantom Chariot of\nCuchulinn; and that hero\u2019s Death; The Recovery of the T\u00e1in through the\nResurrection of Fergus. These and many other episodes, quaint and\nsuggestive, give us curious glints into the past.\n\nIn her recent book on the Cuchulinn saga, Miss Eleanor Hull has\nclassified the tales of this cycle under eight heads, which may be\nbriefly summarised as follows:\u2014\n\n                I. Tales personal to Conchobar            5\n               II.     \u201e       \u201e     Cuchulinn           16\n              III.     \u201e       \u201e     Fergus Mac Roich     5\n               IV.     \u201e       \u201e     Conall               4\n                V.     \u201e       \u201e     Celtchar             2\n               VI.     \u201e       \u201e     Curigh               4\n              VII.  \u201e  prefatory to  \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9\u201d 24\n             VIII. Miscellaneous                         36\n                                                         \u2014\u2014\n                                            Total        96\n                                                         ==\n\nA goodly aggregate, indeed, to survive the dim forgetfulness of time!\nThese narratives now constitute the main body of early Celtic tradition.\nThey breathe the spirit of the race in the long distant past, and\nconsequently are of unique value and import.\n\nIt is evident they bear marks of pre-Christian origin, but we must\nremember they have reached us through the transcription of monks, and\nhence be prepared to find in them many interpolations, suppressions, and\nalterations. Indeed one very old legend represents the longest\u2014the\n\u201cT\u00e1in,\u201d as having been taken down by St. Ciaran at the grave of Fergus\nMac Roich, and to the dictation of that hero, who, it appears, was\nconjured up from the dead for the purpose. St. Columba and the other\nchief saints of Ireland are reported as witnesses of this proceeding,\nand on their departure with the coveted writing, after they had offered\nup thanksgiving, Fergus also retired to his lone tomb.\n\nThere are Scotch versions of some of the sagas, but the vast majority\nare Irish. The earliest written copies are those in the Leabhar Na\nh\u2019Uidhre and Book of Leinster\u2014the latter the fullest of all the saga\ndocuments.\n\nUlster was the chief theatre of the Heroic drama. In that province,\nunder the patronage of King Conchobar, arose the renowned order of\nknighthood which included such celebrities as Conall Cearnach,\nCuchulinn, and the sons of Uisneach. Yet of all the knights of the Royal\nBranch, the second, above-named, was _facile princeps_, the most\noutstanding and representative man; in fact, a kind of demigod, round\nwhom whole armies and many champions fatefully gyrated.\n\n_Fortissimus heros Scotorum_, says the Annals of Tighernach, \u201cvii years\nwas his age when he took arms, xvii when he was in pursuit of the \u2018T\u00e1in\nB\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9,\u2019 xxvii when he died.\u201d The Book of Ballymote, a later MS.,\ngives him a much longer career, asserting that the year of the \u201cT\u00e1in\u201d\nwas the fifty-ninth of Cuchulinn\u2019s age, from the night of his birth to\nthe night of his death.\n\nTo get at once a direct and luminous glimpse into the literature of his\ncycle, we have only to follow this champion in his varied fortunes and\nexploits. And so we turn to the story of his extraordinary career,\nrecognising that the Celtic imagination has here full play, untrammelled\nby the limitations of physical science or modern thought, and that in\nthese rich and varied creations of fancy we have fact and fiction so\nintricately commingled that it is vain to try to differentiate between\nthem.\n\nSome of the sagas tell us that Cuchulinn was supernaturally descended\nfrom the god Lugh. But later versions with more restraint affirm that\nhis father\u2019s name was Sualtam, his mother\u2019s Dechtine, and that she was a\nsister of King Conchobar. When a boy he was known as Setanta, till he\ngot the name Cuchulinn, which came to him in a manner quite\ncharacteristic and worthy of mention.\n\nCuland, a smith and Ulster retainer, it appears, had asked the king and\nhis retinue to spend a night and a day with him. In response to this\ninvitation \u201call the Ultonian nobles set out: a great train of\nprovincials, sons of kings and chiefs, young lords and men-at-arms, the\ncurled and rosy youth of the kingdom, and the maidens and fair-ringleted\nladies of Ulster. Handsome virgins, accomplished damsels, and splendid\nfully-developed women were there; satirists and scholars were there; and\nthe companies of singers and musicians, poets who composed songs and\nreproofs, and praising-poems for the men of Ulster. There came also with\nthem from Emania, historians, judges, horseriders, buffoons, tumblers,\nfools, and performers on horseback. They all went by the same way behind\nthe king.\u201d\n\nLate that evening Culand inquired if any more were expected, and on\nreceiving a reply in the negative, he closed the doors and let loose the\nhouse-dog. No sooner was the place thus shut up for the night than the\nboy Setanta arrived, and was set on by the dog. A fierce struggle\nfollowed, but the youth got the better of his canine assailant and laid\nhim lifeless. For this loss Culand demanded _eric_. Unable to pay,\nSetanta offered to watch the house himself until a pup of its slain\nguardian grew up. Hence the name Cu-Chulaind, that is, Culand\u2019s dog, by\nwhich he was subsequently known. So runs the myth.\n\nAfterwards, with the consent of his mother, he paid a visit to his uncle\nthe king. Happening to arrive at Emania when the boys were playing\nshinty, the mischievous frolics began to throw their balls and _camags_\nat him. Whereupon Cuchulinn\u2019s \u201cwar-rage seized him,\u201d and \u201che shut one\neye till it was not wider than the eye of a needle; he opened the other\ntill it was bigger than the mouth of a meal goblet.\u201d No wonder that the\nterrified youngsters fled in every direction.\n\nPresently King Conchobar recognised his nephew when he presented himself\nat the Court, and he introduced him to his youthful compeers. Suitable\narms, a suitable chariot and charioteer were given him, and he soon\nproved himself a unique warrior.\n\nThe women of Ulster admired him \u201cfor his splendour at the feat, for the\nnimbleness of his leap, for the excellence of his wisdom, for the melody\nof his language, for the beauty of his face, and for the loveliness of\nhis look.\u201d \u201cThere were seven pupils in his royal eyes, four in the one\nand three in the other; seven fingers on each of his two hands, and\nseven toes on each of his two feet.\u201d \u201cI should think,\u201d says the writer\nof one text, \u201cit was a shower of pearls that was flung into his head.\nBlacker than the side of a black cooking-spit, each of his two eyebrows,\nredder than ruby his lips.\u201d\n\nHe was too young, too daring, too beautiful, in the opinion of the\nchiefs, to be a gallant unwed; for their women and maidens loved him\ngreatly. So they took counsel with the king to have him married.\n\nEmissaries were sent to the courts and princes of all Erin in quest of a\npartner whom it might please Cuchulinn to woo, but they returned after a\nyear unsuccessful.\n\nLeft to fend for himself, the hero got ready his chariot and set out for\nthe house of Forgaill of Lusk, whose daughter Eimer was renowned for the\nsix victories she had upon her: the gift of beauty, the gift of voice,\nthe gift of music, the gift of embroidery and all needlework, and the\ngifts of wisdom and virtuous chastity. In the pleasure-ground of the\nmansion, surrounded by the fair daughters of the neighbouring chiefs and\nmen of wealth, the lady descried the famous chariot in the distance, and\none of her maidens describes the appearance of the horses, the chariot,\ncharioteer, and hero. The latter she reports thus:\u2014\n\n  Within the chariot a dark sad man, comeliest of the men of Erin.\n\n  Around him a beautiful crimson five-folded tunic, fastened at its\n  opening on his white breast with a brooch of inlaid gold, against\n  which it heaves beating in full strokes. A shirt with a white hood,\n  interwoven red with flaming gold. Seven red dragon gems on the ground\n  of either of his eyes. Two blue-white, blood-red cheeks, that breathe\n  forth sparks and flashes of fire. A ray of love burns in his look.\n  Methinks a shower of pearls has fallen into his mouth. As black as the\n  side of a black ruin each of his eyebrows. On his two thighs rests a\n  golden hilted sword, and fastened to the copper frame of the chariot\n  is a blood-red spear with a sharp mettlesome blade, on a shaft of wood\n  well-fitted to the hand. Over his shoulders a crimson shield with a\n  rim of silver, ornamented with figures of golden animals. He leaps the\n  hero\u2019s salmon-leap into the air and does many like swift feats.\n\nSuch was Cuchulinn in the damsel\u2019s eyes. Eimer declined his suit at\nfirst on the plea that she was a younger daughter, and advised him to\napproach her father for leave to pay court to her elder sister, whose\nbrilliant accomplishments she fully rehearsed. This suggestion the hero\nspurned and love sprang up between them.\n\nAfter he departed Forgaill heard of the visit of the remarkable unknown\nstranger, and quickly divined who he was. Not wishing to have this\nprofessional champion as son-in-law, the wily father disguised himself\nas a Gaulish or Scandinavian envoy and set out for Emania. There he was\nwell received by the king, and while witnessing the feats of the knights\nhe took occasion to recommend the king to send his nephew to Skye to\ncomplete his special training in arms, at the celebrated school of the\nlady Scathach. His sinister idea was that so many dangers and\ndifficulties would beset Cuchulinn on the way that he would never\nreturn. The latter vowed he would go. And on setting out he encountered\nmany perils. Among others he had to traverse \u201cthe plain of misfortune,\u201d\nwhich he did by the aid of a wheel and of an apple given him by a chance\nacquaintance. He took instruction from the Albannach Donall by the way,\nand declined the love of his ugly daughter. But departing from their\nhome he arrived in safety at Dun Scathach.\n\nThe Grianan or sunny house of his future instructress, \u201cbuilt upon a\nrock of appalling height,\u201d \u201chad seven great doors and seven great\nwindows between every two doors of them, and thrice fifty couches\nbetween every two windows of them, and thrice fifty handsome\nmarriageable girls in scarlet cloaks and in beautiful and blue attire,\nattending and waiting upon Scathach.\u201d\n\nHere he met his one match in arms, Ferdia Mac Daman, the Firbolg\nchampion. Naois, Ardan, and Ainnle, the three sons of Uisneach, were\nalso pupils. To pass the \u201cBridge of the Cliffs\u201d was the first great feat\nto be learned. \u201cWonderful was the sight that bridge afforded when any\none would leap upon it, for it narrowed until it became as narrow as the\nhair of one\u2019s head, and the second time it shortened until it became as\nshort as an inch, and the third time it grew slippery as an eel of the\nriver, and the fourth time it rose up on high against you until it was\nas tall as the mast of a ship.\u201d\n\nIt was while practising the feat of the bridge that Scathach\u2019s lovely\ndaughter Uathach fell in love with him as she spied the hero from one of\nthe windows of the Grianan. And then \u201cher face and colour constantly\nchanged, so that now she would be as white as a little white flowret,\nand again she would become scarlet.\u201d Cuchulinn and she were afterwards\nmarried. During his sojourn at the Dun, Scathach was carrying on war\nagainst other tribes over whom her rival the Princess Aoife (Eva) ruled.\nWhen the two hosts met, Aoife challenged Scathach to single combat, and\nCuchulinn went out instead to encounter the heroine. This was his chance\nintroduction to the lady who bore him his famous son Conlaoch. Before he\nwent back again to his native land, he left instructions with her that\nthe child to be born if a girl would be hers, if a boy she was to train\nhim In all hero feats, except the gaebolg or belly dart\u2014a mysterious\nweapon that could only be cast at fords on water. Then she was to send\nhim to Erin, bidding him tell no man who he was.\n\nConlaoch\u2019s amazing exploits in his father\u2019s country are related in a\nspecial tale, which tells how he killed the Ulster warriors sent against\nhim, and how Cuchulinn himself unwittingly opposed him in arms till,\nhard pressed by his skilful opponent, he called for his gaebolg and\ndespatched him.\n\nIt was then the unhappy father discovered that he had killed his own\nson.\n\nThis is apparently the Gaelic version of the well-known Persian tale of\nSohrab and Rustum\u2014a story of Aryan origin. Just as Cuchulinn recognised\nwhen too late his kinship with Conlaoch, and mourned over him, so did\nthe father of the young Tartar, for the brief moments the latter\nsurvived his mortal wound.\n\nOn his return from Skye, prior to the birth of his ill-fated son,\nCuchulinn had been joyously welcomed home by King Conchobar and his\nknights. Losing no time he proceeded to Lusk to claim Eimer. The young\nlady had in his absence become deeply enamoured of him, though her\nfather and brothers remained obdurate. Fortifying themselves against the\nintrusion of the champion for a whole year, they denied him entrance, or\neven a sight of his faithful lover, until Cuchulinn, getting desperate,\nscaled the walls, overcame his opponents and carried off Eimer, her\nmaid, and much treasure in his chariot. All the way north to Emania he\nhad frequent combats with the men who followed to frustrate this heroic\nelopement.\n\nCommenting on the story, O\u2019Curry makes the interesting remark that\n\u201cthere is scarcely a hill, valley, river, rock, mound, or cave in the\nline of country from Emania in the present county of Armagh to Lusk in\nthat of Dublin of which the ancient and often varying names and history\nare not to be found in this singularly curious tract,\u201d namely, the\nWooing of Eimer. \u201cSo that, if we look upon it even as a highly-coloured\nhistoric romance, it will be found one of the most valuable of our large\ncollection of ancient compositions on account of the light which it\nthrows not merely on ancient social manners, and on the military feats\nand terms of those days, but on the meaning of so vast a number of\ntopographical names. And it records, too, I may add, very many curious\ncustoms and superstitions, many of which to this day characterise the\nnative Irish people.\u201d\n\nOther exploits of the wonderful Cuchulinn are related in the \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3\nChuailgn\u00e9\u201d or \u201cCattle Raid of Cooley\u201d\u2014the greatest and longest of the\nheroic sagas. Here we encounter that remarkable Amazon, Queen Meve of\nConnaught, and her third husband, Ailill. When at Rath-Cruachan it seems\nthey had spread their royal couch, and between them there ensued a\npillow conversation, ending in a controversy as to which of the two was\nthe richer. In this debate comparison was made between their mugs and\nvats and iron vessels, their urns and brewers\u2019 troughs, and kieves.\nTheir jewels also were brought out, such as finger-rings, clasps,\nbracelets, thumb-rings, diadems, and gorgets of gold; their apparel of\ncrimson, blue, black and green, yellow and chequered and buff,\nwan-coloured, pied and striped. Comparison was made between their flocks\nof sheep and steeds and studs, and herds of swine and droves of cows.\nBut all were found to be exactly equal.\n\nThen Ailill recollected that he had a young bull named \u201cFinn-bheannach\u201d\nor \u201cWhite-horned,\u201d which had been calved by one of the Queen\u2019s cows, but\nwhich had left her herd and joined his own because the high-minded\nanimal did not \u201cdeem it honourable to be under a woman\u2019s control.\u201d\nMeve\u2019s disappointment was keen that no bull of hers was found to match\nthis one; so, when Fergus Mac Roth the herald assured her that Dar\u00e9, in\nCuailgne, Ulster, possessed a brown one, the best in all Erin, she\nimmediately sent him with nine subordinates to fetch it, offering its\nowner liberal terms for a year\u2019s loan. Dar\u00e9 treated the messengers with\nkindly hospitality, and agreed to the royal request. But, unhappily,\nwhile the men were imbibing too freely that night, his steward overheard\none of them boasting that if the bull had not been willingly sent they\nwould have taken it by compulsion.\n\nOn this coming to Dar\u00e9\u2019s ears, he swore by the gods that now they would\nnot have his Donn Chuailgne either by force or consent.\n\nMeve was not a woman to be thus lightly denied or insulted. _Nolens\nvolens_ she would have the bull, and summoned her native forces for\naction. She also invited the men of Leinster and Munster to join her in\navenging past indignities received at the hands of the men of Ulster.\nFifteen hundred men from the latter province, who happened to be at feud\nwith King Conchobar for his treachery to the sons of Uisneach, were\nprevailed upon to answer her summons, and a great army set out. At a\nplace near modern Louth, where they halted on the march, a feast was\nheld, at which the Queen contrived to promise to each of the leaders,\nwithout the knowledge of the rest, the hand of her beautiful daughter\nFinnamhair in marriage as a stimulus to valour and fidelity. \u201cOn one of\nthe nights the snow that fell reached to men\u2019s legs and to the wheels of\nthe chariots, so that it made one plain of the five provinces of Erin,\nand the men never suffered so much before in camp. None knew throughout\nthe whole night whether it was his friend or his foe who was next him\nuntil the clear shining sun rose early on the morrow.\u201d\n\nThough the Ulster men had sufficient warning of the approach of this\nhost, they were not in readiness. A childish helplessness, to which they\nwere subject for an unmanly crime, had overtaken them and left them at\nthe mercy of their foes.\n\nIt was Cuchulinn\u2019s country the enemy had invaded, and he kept them at\nbay. Hovering around them unseen all day, he killed as many as a hundred\neach night with his sling. In vain Meve tried to buy this boyish hero\noff, first by a mutual conference, with the glen between them, and\nsecond by sending an embassage with Mac Roth as messenger-in-chief. On\nthis occasion Cuchulinn discarded the twenty-seven cunningly prepared\nundershirts which with cords and ropes were secured about him. And this\nhe did to escape the difficulty that would arise in throwing them off,\nshould his paroxysm come to boiling point and he in them still. Anon for\nthirty feet all round the hero\u2019s body the snow melted with the intense\nheat generated in his system. His charioteer, we are told, durst not\ncome nigh him. From a safe distance he informed his master of Mac Roth\u2019s\napproach and described him.\n\nCuchulinn demands single combat, enjoining his opponents by the laws of\nIrish chivalry not to pass the ford till he was overcome. Queen Meve\nreluctantly consents, deeming it better to lose one warrior a day than a\nhundred each night. With her messenger came a youth anxious to see the\nrenowned hero, and he, deceived by the boyish appearance of Cuchulinn,\ndetermined to fight him. To warn the rash stripling of his danger, the\nlatter plays upon him two sword-feats. By the first, \u201cthe under-cut,\u201d he\nslices away the sod from under this Etarchomal\u2019s soles and lays him\nsupine, with the sod upon his upturned chest. By the second, \u201cthe\nvigorous edge-stroke,\u201d he takes off all his hair from poll to forehead\nand from ear to ear, as clean as though he had been shaven with a razor,\nbut without drawing blood. Finally, he despatches him with the \u201coblique\ntransverse stroke,\u201d whereby in three simultaneously fallen segments the\nyouth reaches the ground.\n\nChampion after champion falls in single combat, until Meve, getting\ndesperate, had at length to call in the aid of magic. So we read that\none warrior was helped by demons of the air in bird shape, but in vain;\nand the great magician Cailatin and his twenty-seven sons, despite their\nspells, also met their doom. Cuchulinn was further persecuted by the\nwar-goddess, the Morrigan, who appears in all shapes to plague him and\nto frighten the life of valour out of his soul. He himself is not behind\nin demoniac influence, for with the help of the Tuatha de\nDanann\u2014Manannan especially\u2014he does great havoc among Meve\u2019s troops,\ncircling round them in his chariot and dealing death with his sling.\n\nIt was during one of these exploits that he gave his chariot the heavy\nturn, so that its iron wheels sank into the earth and their track was in\nitself a sufficient fortification, for the stones and pillars and flags\nand sand rose back high on every side round the wheels.\n\nHis foes are baffled. Impatient Meve cannot forget that the Ulster men\nwill soon be rid of their childish feebleness, and then the game is up.\nSo she approaches Ferdia, the only warrior fit to match Cuchulinn, with\nthe view of arranging a combat whereby the latter may be laid low.\nFerdia at first refuses to fight his former comrade, with whom he had\nmade a compact of undying friendship while attending the lady Scathach\u2019s\nschool in Skye. The Queen then promises him Finnamhair for wife, with\nland and riches. It is probable that even this bait would not have\nfetched the unwilling warrior had she not further threatened that her\ndruids and ollamhs would \u201ccriticise, satirise, and blemish him,\u201d enough\nto \u201craise three blisters on his face,\u201d if he refused. Thereafter he\nconsented, thinking it better to fall by valour and championship than by\ndruids and reproach.\n\nFergus was accordingly sent forward to tell Cuchulinn that his friend\nFerdia was coming to fight him. \u201cI am here,\u201d retorted the champion,\n\u201cdetaining and delaying the four great provinces of Erin from Samhain\ntill Feill Brighde, and I have not yielded one foot in retreat before\nany one during that time, nor will I, I trust, before him.\u201d The\ncharioteer gets ready the chariot, and into it sprang \u201cthe\nbattle-fighting, dexterous, battle-winning, red-sworded hero, Cuchulinn,\nson of Sualtam, and there shouted around him Bocanachs and Bananachs and\nGen\u00eet\u00ee Glindi, and demons of the air. For the Tuatha de Danann were used\nto set up shouts around him, so that the hatred and the fear and the\nabhorrence and the great terror of him should be greater in every\nbattle, in every battlefield, in every combat, and in every fight into\nwhich he went.\u201d\n\nThe heroes met at the ford. After the first day\u2019s fight, \u201ceach of them\napproached the other forthwith and each put his hand round the other\u2019s\nneck and gave him three kisses. Their horses were in the same paddock\nthat night, and their charioteers at the same fire; and their\ncharioteers spread beds of green rushes for them with wounded men\u2019s\npillows to them. The professors of healing and curing came to heal and\ncure them, and they applied herbs and plants to the stabs and cuts and\ngashes and to all their wounds. Of every herb and of every healing and\ncuring plant that was put to the stabs and cuts and gashes and to all\nthe wounds of Cuchulinn, he would send an equal portion from him\nwestward over the ford to Ferdia, so that the men of Erin might not be\nable to say, should Ferdia fall by him, that it was by better means of\ncure that he was enabled to kill him.\u201d\n\nAs the days pass the fighting becomes more serious. Early on the fourth\nFerdia arose and went forward alone to the ford. He knew that that day\nwould decide the contest, and that either or both of them would fall.\nHaving put on his wonderful suit of battle, he displayed many\nextraordinary feats which he never learned from any other,\u2014not from\nScathach, or Uathach, or Aoife, but which were invented by himself.\n\nOn seeing these, Cuchulinn said to his charioteer, \u201cI perceive there, my\nfriend Laeg, the noble, varied, wonderful, numerous feats which Ferdia\ndisplays on high, and all these will be tried on me in succession.\nTherefore if it be I who shall begin to yield this day thou must excite,\nreproach, and speak evil to me, that the paroxysm of my rage and anger\nshall grow the more. If it be I who shall prevail then thou shalt laud\nand praise and speak good words to me, that my courage may be the\ngreater.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt shall be so done indeed, O Cuchulinn,\u201d replied the faithful Laeg.\n\nThe champions then arranged to try the ford feat. And the saga remarks:\n\u201cGreat was the deed, now, that was performed on that day at the ford\u2014the\ntwo heroes, the two warriors, the two champions of Western Europe, the\ntwo gifted and stipend-bestowing hands of the north-west of the world,\nthe two beloved pillars of the valour of the Gael, and the two keys of\nthe bravery of the Gael, to be brought to fight from afar through the\ninstigation and intermeddling of Ailill and Meve.\u201d\n\nFirst, they began to shoot with missive weapons, till, getting more\nfurious, Cuchulinn sprang at his opponent twice for the purpose of\nstriking his head over the rim of his shield, but each time Ferdia gave\nthe shield a stroke of his left knee or elbow, and cast Cuchulinn from\nhim like a little child on the brink of the ford.\n\nLaeg perceived that act, and, true to the instructions of his master,\nbegan taunting him. \u201cAlas! indeed,\u201d said he, \u201cthe warrior who is against\nthee casts thee away as a lewd woman would cast her child. He throws\nthee as a mill would grind fresh malt. He pierces thee as the felling\naxe would pierce the oak. He binds thee as the woodbine binds the tree.\nHe darts on thee as the hawk darts on small birds, so that henceforth\nthou hast not call, or right, or claim to valour or bravery to the end\nof time and life, thou little fairy phantom.\u201d\n\nAt that word up sprang the fallen hero with the rapidity of the wind,\nand with the readiness of the swallow, and with the fierceness of the\ndragon, and the strength of the lion, into the troubled clouds of the\nair the third time, and he alighted on the boss of the shield of Ferdia,\nbut with the same humiliating result.\n\n\u201cIt was then that Cuchulinn\u2019s first distortion came on, and he was\nfilled with swelling and great fulness, like breath in a bladder, until\nhe became a terrible, fearful, many-coloured Tuaig, and he became as big\nas a Fomor, or man of the sea, the great and valiant champion in perfect\nheight over Ferdia.\u201d\n\nSo close was the fight they made now that the Bocanachs and Bananachs,\nand wild people of the glens, and demons of the air screamed from the\nrims of their shields, and from the hilts of their swords, and from the\nhafts of their spears.\n\nAt length Ferdia found an unguarded moment upon his opponent and wounded\nhim sorely. Cuchulinn, unable to endure this, or Ferdia\u2019s stout quick\nstrokes and tremendous great blows at him, called for the gaebolg. It\nwas a weapon that used to be let down the stream and cast from between\nthe toes. It made the wound of one spear in entering the body, but it\nhad thirty barbs to open, and could not be drawn out of a person\u2019s body\nuntil it was cut out. So Laeg set the gaebolg down the stream, and\nCuchulinn caught it between the toes of his foot and threw an unerring\ncast of it at Ferdia.\n\n\u201cThat is enough now indeed,\u201d said the wounded man. \u201cI fall of that.\u201d\n\nThereafter a trance, a faint, and a weakness fell on Cuchulinn as he saw\nthe body of Ferdia. But Laeg roused him, and then he began to lament and\nmourn, and to utter a panegyric over his slain rival as David did over\nJonathan:\u2014\n\n           O Ferdia (he said) treachery hath defeated thee.\n           Unhappy was thy fate\u2014\n           Thou to die, I to remain,\u2014\n           Grievous for ever is our lasting separation.\n\n           When we were far away, yonder\n           With Scathath, the gifted Buanand,\n           We then resolved that till the end of time\n           We should not be hostile one to the other.\n\n           Dear to me was thy beautiful ruddiness,\n           Dear to me thy perfect form,\n           Dear to me thy clear grey-blue eye,\n           Dear to me thy wisdom and thine eloquence.\n\n           There hath not come to the body-cutting combat,\n           There hath not been angered by manly exertion,\n           There hath not borne shield on the field of spears\n           Thine equal, O ruddy son of Daman.\n\n           Never until now have I met,\n           Since I slew Aoife\u2019s only son,\n           Thy like in deeds of battle,\n           Never have I found, O Ferdia.\n\n           Finnamhair, daughter of Meve,\n           Notwithstanding her excellent beauty,\n           It is putting a _gad_ on the sand or sunbeam\n           For thee to expect her, O Ferdia.\n\nHe continued to gaze on his fallen friend, and when at length, tempted\nby his charioteer to come away and get healed of his grievous wounds, he\nsaid, \u201cWe will leave now, O my friend Laeg, but every other combat and\nfight that ever I have made was to me but as a game and a sport compared\nto the combat and the fight of Ferdia.\u201d\n\nThere is a most beautiful rendering of his further eulogy in Dr.\nSigerson\u2019s _Bards of the Gael and Gall_. Here it is. The repetition and\nrhythm have been adapted from the original:\u2014\n\n                  Play was each, pleasure each,\n                  Till Ferdia faced the beach;\n                  One had been our student-life,\n                  One in strife of school our place,\n                  One our gentle teacher\u2019s grace,\n                    Loved o\u2019er all and each.\n\n                  Play was each, pleasure each,\n                  Till Ferdia faced the beach,\n                  One had been our wonted ways,\n                  One the praise for feat of fields,\n                  Scathach gave two victor shields\u2014\n                    Equal prize to each.\n\n                  Play was each, pleasure each,\n                  Till Ferdia faced the beach;\n                  Dear that pillar of pure gold,\n                  Who fell cold beside the ford.\n                  Hosts of heroes felt his sword\n                    First in battle\u2019s breach.\n\n                  Play was each, pleasure each,\n                  Till Ferdia faced the beach;\n                  Lion, fiery, fierce, and bright,\n                  Wave whose might nothing withstands,\n                  Sweeping, with the shrinking sands,\n                    Horror o\u2019er the beach.\n\n                  Play was each, pleasure each,\n                  Till Ferdia faced the beach;\n                  Loved Ferdia, dear to me;\n                  I shall dree his death for aye,\n                  Yesterday a mountain he,\u2014\n                    But a shade to-day.\n\nQueen Meve with her army ravaged the province of Ulster and secured the\nDonn Chuailgne. Ultimately, through the recovery of the Ultonians from\ntheir temporary debility, she was thoroughly defeated. Yet,\nnotwithstanding the loss of so many warriors, the masterful woman\ncongratulates herself on having accomplished the two great objects of\nher expedition\u2014the securing of the brown bull and the chastisement of\nher former husband, King Conchobar.\n\nThe story of the T\u00e1in ends in an anti-climax, relating in the most\nludicrous and fantastic manner the tragic fate of the bulls,[19] the\nunwitting cause of all this frenzy.\n\nBut Queen Meve was determined to avenge herself on Cuchulinn, and in the\ncourse of time collected another large army. Among all his foes none was\nmore venomous than were the descendants of the wizard Cailatin, who,\nwith his twenty-seven sons, had been killed at the ford combat. The\nmalignant efforts of these sorcerers to get the warrior into their power\nare vividly described. For a time he was kept and entertained in the\nroyal palace by his wife Eimer and the ladies of Emania, and poets, and\nmusicians, and wise men. The wizards made noise as of battle, and when\nCuchulinn looked out he imagined he saw battalions drawn up upon the\nplains smiting each other unsparingly. It was with difficulty he was\nwithheld from going out.\n\nSo, by Conchobar\u2019s command he was taken at length by the druids and\nladies of the Court to a far away lonely glen, called the Deaf Valley.\nEven here the wizards found him, and in consequence the very dogs were\nterrified with the goblins, prodigies, and eldritch things with which\nthe place was haunted. A full account is given of the manner in which\nthey ultimately decoyed him from his retreat, and it is related how all\nthe omens were against him. For example, his brooch fell and pierced his\nfoot. His noble steed, the Liath Macha, refused to be yoked, and when\nfinally persuaded, let fall down his cheeks two large tears of dusky\nblood.\n\nBut Cuchulinn met his foes in battle array. And as many as there were of\ngrains of sand in the sea, of stars in heaven, of dewdrops in May, of\nsnowflakes in winter, of hailstones in a storm, of leaves in a forest,\nof ears of corn in Magh Breagh, of stalks of grass beneath the feet of\nthe herds on a summer\u2019s day, so many halves of heads and of shields, so\nmany halves of hands and of feet, so many red bones, were scattered by\nhim throughout the plain of Muirtheimhne. Grey was that field with the\nbrains of his enemies, so fierce and furious the hero\u2019s onslaught.\n\nWhen he fell, he fell pierced with his own spear, which Lewy, the son of\nCurigh, had hurled back upon him, but rising again, he went against a\npillar of stone that he might die standing up. And the Liath Macha\ndefended him with teeth and hoofs to the last, killing as many as thirty\nin the struggle. So died the mighty Cuchulinn.\n\nIn the Red Rout of Conall Cearnach we read how that famous knight, who\nhad been previously sent for, came back from Pictland to avenge the\ndeath of his friend, and how he brought the heads of the chief offenders\nto Eimer.\n\nSatisfied with this retribution, Eimer desired Conall to dig a grave for\nCuchulinn wide and deep; and she laid herself down in it with her mate,\nsaying, \u201cLove of my soul, O friend, O gentle sweetheart, many were the\nwomen who envied me thee until now, and I shall not live after thee.\u201d\nAfter she expired Conall performed the customary funeral obsequies,\nwrote their names in Ogam, and raised the stone over their tomb.\n\nIn the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre there is a detached episode entitled, \u201cThe\nInstruction of Cuchulinn to a Prince.\u201d It occurs in the romance known as\n\u201cThe Sickbed of Cuchulinn,\u201d and on the authority of the Brehon Law we\nknow that many of the precepts therein enjoined were rules legally\nincumbent on the chieftains in aftertimes.\n\nThe occasion was the election of a king to rule over Erin in Tara.\n\nLugaid, destined for this exalted office, was at the time the pupil of\nCuchulinn, sitting over his pillow as he lay ill. When news came,\nsuddenly the prostrate hero arose and began to instruct the young\nprince. Among other precepts he gave voice to these, which show not only\nthe traditional estimate of the hero\u2019s character, but also the high\nmoral qualities expected in the chief ruler of Erin and his satellites.\n\n\u201cSpeak not haughtily. Discourse not noisily. Mock not, insult not,\nderide not the old. Think not ill of any. Make no demands that cannot be\nmet. Receive submissively the instructions of the wise. Be mindful of\nthe admonitions of the old. Follow the decrees of your fathers. Be not\ncold-hearted to friends; but against your foes be vigorous. Avoid\ndishonourable disputes in your many contests. Be not a tattler and\nabuser. Waste not, hoard not, alienate not. Submit to reproof for\nunbecoming deeds. Do not sacrifice justice to the passions of men. Be\nnot lazy lest you become weakened, be not importunate lest you become\ncontemptible.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you consent to follow these counsels?\u201d the distinguished tutor\nasked.\n\nTo which the prince made answer, \u201cThese precepts without exception are\nworthy to be observed. All men will see that none of them shall be\nneglected. They shall be executed, if it be possible.\u201d\n\nLittle wonder that in later Christian times the old pagan hero was held\nin high esteem, and even exalted into a medium for the conversion of\nKing Laoghaire, whom the preaching of St. Patrick himself failed to\nconvince. In the \u201cPhantom Chariot of Cuchulinn\u201d it is related that\nPatrick went to Tara to enjoin belief upon the King of Erin, that is,\nupon Laoghaire, son of Nial, for he was King of Erin at the time, and\nwould not believe in the Lord, though he had preached unto him. \u201cBy no\nmeans will I believe in thee, nor yet in God,\u201d said the heathen monarch\nto the saint, \u201cuntil thou shalt call up Cuchulinn in all his dignity, as\nhe is recorded in the old stories, that I may see him, and that I may\naddress him in my presence here; after that I will believe in thee.\u201d\n\nUpon this St. Patrick conjured up the hero, so that he appeared to the\nKing in his chariot as of old. Laoghaire\u2019s description of Cuchulinn as\nthus seen in his phantom chariot is even more graphic than that of the\nmaid in the Wooing of Eimer.\n\nThe spectre proved a most earnest preacher, endeavouring to persuade his\nroyal hearer to believe in God and Patrick, and so escape the pains of\nhell, of which it appears he had had some experience.\n\n                  My little body was scarred\u2014\n                  With Lugaid the victory:\n                  Demons carried off my soul\n                  Into the red charcoal.\n\n                  I played the swordlet on them,\n                  I plied on them the gae-bolga;\n                  I was in my concert victory\n                  With the demon in pain.\n\n                  Great as was my heroism,\n                  Hard as was my sword,\n                  The devil crushed me with one finger\n                  Into the red charcoal.\n\nIt is somewhat ludicrous to read that he practised the gaebolg even on\nthe spiteful units of the under world, though apparently with less\nsuccess than on Ferdia and the rest.\n\nThe tale consistently enough concludes that \u201cgreat was the power of\nPatrick in awakening Cuchulinn, after being nine fifty years in the\ngrave.\u201d\n\nTo appreciate the vigour and spirit of these remarkable sagas as they\nfigure in the original, one requires to read them through. No\nquotations, however well chosen, can do full justice to their wealth of\nimagination and descriptive power, especially when depicting stirring\nincidents, curious customs, men, horses, chariots, arms, ornaments,\nvesture, and colours. Then they are profuse, fantastic, minute, and\nboldly original, tedious, sometimes through the very prodigality of\ntheir adjectival resources. In perusing them the reader feels that he is\nin a fresh field of literature and breathing an atmosphere entirely\ndifferent to anything modern.\n\nThough Homeric in form, there is always the Celtic tinge in the literary\nstyle as well as in the facts seized on and made prominent. Within the\nlast half century these early tales have been frequently translated into\nvarious languages, and excellent versions are now available from the\npens of such distinguished scholars as Eugene O\u2019Curry, Dr. Whitley\nStokes and O\u2019Flanagan, M. d\u2019Arbois de Jubainville and M. Louis Duvan,\nDr. Ernst Windisch, Dr. Kuno Meyer, Standish Hayes O\u2019Grady and O\u2019Beirne\nCrowe.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER X\n                           THE OSSIANIC CYCLE\n\n  The old order changes\u2014Who were the Feinn?\u2014Ossian, his name and\n      relation to the bardic literature\u2014The Ossianic tales and poems\n      very numerous\u2014Earliest references\u2014First remarkable\n      development\u2014Original home of the Ossianic romance\u2014The leading\n      heroes\u2014A famous tract\u2014Legends regarding Fionn, and curious details\n      of his warrior-band\u2014The literature divided into four classes\u2014Most\n      ancient poems of Ossian, and the Feinn\u2014Quotations\u2014\u201cThe Dialogue of\n      the Ancients\u201d\u2014Ossian and Patrick\u2014Story of Crede\u2014Miscellaneous\n      poems\u2014Prose tales\u2014\u201cPursuit of Diarmad and Grainne\u201d\u2014\u201cLay of\n      Diarmad\u201d\u2014Norse Ballads\u2014Dream figures, a remarkable Gaelic\n      tradition.\n\n\nThe Ossianic cycle brings us down to the middle of the third century\nA.D. It is clearly much later than the Heroic. For in the interval the\nold order peculiar to the days of Cuchulinn has passed away, and new\nmanners and customs are in vogue. No longer is our attention engrossed\nwith descriptions of chariots and war-horses and cow-spoils. The heroes\nare an organised body of men, who engage in the peaceful pastimes of\nhunting and feasting when not occupied with the more serious business of\nwarfare. They appear less mythical than the demi-gods and champions of\nearlier times; yet they move in that dim background of history where\nfigures are always seen in chiaroscuro, and we cannot even be remotely\nconfident of their historical reality.\n\nIndeed, it has long been a moot question who the Feinn[20] were, and we\nstill have the most conflicting opinions on the subject. For example,\nthe native Irish have always regarded them as an actual martial caste,\nmaintained during several reigns by the kings of Erin for national\ndefence. And there is documentary evidence to show that as early as the\nseventh century Fionn[21] was generally looked upon as a quondam popular\nhero. Eugene O\u2019Curry shared the belief of his countrymen, for he says:\n\u201cI may take occasion to assure you that it is quite a mistake to suppose\nFinn Mac Cumhaill to have been a merely imaginary or mythical character.\nMuch that has been narrated of his exploits is, no doubt, apocryphal\nenough, but Finn himself is an undoubtedly historical personage; and\nthat he existed about the time at which his appearance is recorded in\nthe Annals is as certain as that Julius C\u00e6sar lived and ruled at the\ntime stated on the authority of the Roman historians.\u201d And O\u2019Curry\nsupports this opinion with the statement that the hero\u2019s pedigree is\nfully detailed in the Book of Leinster, and his death is chronicled in\nthe _Annals of the Four Masters_, as having taken place in 283 A.D.\n\nYet more recent scholarship inclines to other and very different views.\nDr. Hyde fancies the school of Mr. Nutt and Professor Rhys would\nrecognise in the Feinn tribal deities euhemerised or regarded as men.\nDr. Skene and Mr. Macritchie believed they were a race distinct from the\nGaels, probably allied to, or even identical with, the Picts, the latter\nventuring the opinion that they might be the _s\u00ecdh_ or fairy folk of the\nmounds so frequently in evidence in Gaelic literature; while Dr.\nAlexander Macbain speaks of Fionn as probably the incarnation of the\nchief deity of the Gaels, and his band of heroes as a kind of\nterrestrial Olympus.\n\nFrom these latter the popular Ossian, son of Fionn, has been singled out\nas the representative bard of early times. The most ancient forms of the\nname were Ossin, Oisin, or Oisein, meaning \u201cthe little fawn.\u201d It is\nvariously spelt in the Book of the Dean of Lismore. And only in\nMacpherson\u2019s time and through his usage did the word acquire its modern\nfamiliar orthography.\n\nIn the same manner as the name of David is traditionally associated with\nthe Hebrew Psalter, or the name of Homer with the Homeric poetry, so is\nthat of Ossian the warrior bard with the classic poems of the Gael. His\nwill always be identified with the bardic literature that celebrates the\ndeeds of the Feinn, even though scholars cannot affirm with historic\ncertainty that he actually lived or was the real author of one of the\nballads attributed to him.[22]\n\nThe Ossianic tales and poems are very numerous. Indeed O\u2019Curry says that\nif printed at length in the same form as the text of O\u2019Donovan\u2019s edition\nof the _Four Masters_ they would occupy as many as 3000 pages of such\nvolumes. And that statement was made before the publication of\nCampbell\u2019s Scottish collection, known as _Leabhar na Feinne_. Apart from\nthe tales, it is believed that the poetry alone extends to upwards of\n80,000 lines.\n\nYet, compared with the wealth of ancient texts that represent the Heroic\nsaga, we have very few old vellum MSS. representing the Ossianic. Of\nmany of the pieces there are two redactions, one on vellum, the other on\nmodern paper\u2014the latter usually the longer and more profuse. It would\nseem as if the Ossianic tales took hold of the imagination of the Gael\nmuch more powerfully than did those of the Heroic cycle, with the result\nthat they have been in process of evolution down almost to the present\nday\u2014certainly to the end of the eighteenth century, which witnessed that\nwonderful recrudescence of production, associated in Scotland with the\nnames of Macpherson, Smith, Clark, Maccallum, and others.\n\nThe earliest references to Fionn occur in two Irish poets, one of the\ntenth and the other of the eleventh century; in the Annals of\nTighernach, who died in 1088; and in the venerable Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre\nand Book of Leinster. So that as early as the origin of these latter two\nMSS. we have written Ossianic or Fionn tales; and, seeing these literary\nmonuments were compiled from older documents it is at least possible, as\nscholars affirm that some of the tales may have been written down in MS.\nbefore the end of the seventh century.\n\nThe first remarkable development in the evolution of the saga took place\nbetween the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, the most characteristic\nfeature of the change being the prominence given to foreign invasion,\nespecially the invasion of Lochlanners. Fionn is no longer a tribal\nchief in one locality, but the acknowledged leader of all Gaeldom\nagainst the intruding aliens.\n\nThe stories of his own exploits and of those of his warrior band are\nGaelic variants of tales common to all Celtic, indeed to all Aryan\nraces. In his essay on the \u201cDevelopment of the Ossianic or Fenian Saga,\u201d\nprinted in vol. ii. of _Waifs and Strays of Celtic Tradition_, Mr.\nAlfred Nutt says that \u201cin the redactions which substantially reach back\nto the twelfth century, these tales are profoundly modified in two ways:\nfirstly, the euhemerising process begun in the ninth to tenth centuries\nhas fully developed, and the saga has been fitted into a framework of\ntribal and personal conditions, which necessarily determine the growth\nalong certain lines; secondly, mythic features and incidents have been\ntranslated, as it were, into historic terms, borrowed from the\ncomparatively recent history of the race, and the saga has in\nconsequence been enriched by a new series of personages, and by a wider\ngeographic horizon. At this stage it is taken up by the literary class\nof the day, the professional story-tellers, and metrically fixed. It is\nliterary in so far as the form is artificial, that is, due to a given\nman who did not hesitate to embellish and amplify out of his acquired\nstock of knowledge; popular in so far as it is kept in close touch with\ntradition. This semi-literary form continued to develop until the\neighteenth century in both divisions of Gael-land, but the guiding\nimpulse ever came from Ireland. During the last hundred years and more,\nlarge fragments of it have been preserved in Scotland orally, and offer\nthe most instructive object lesson with which I am acquainted to the\nstudent of traditional diffusion and transmission. Side by side with the\nsemi-literary development, the purely popular forms continued to exist\nand grow. With regard to Scotland, the chief Ossianic problem is, how\nfar these may be looked upon as independent of the semi-literary twelfth\ncentury forms, that is, as derived substantially from the earlier\ntraditions brought by the Gael to Scotland in the early centuries of the\nChristian era. There is much to be said for and against this view. There\nis practically nothing to be said in favour of the Fenian saga being\nolder on Scotch ground than the Dalriadic colonisation. Both Scotland\nand Ireland have an equal claim to the saga in this sense\u2014that both\ncountries were inhabited by Gaels, who told and localised it wherever\nthey went; but Ireland\u2019s claim is so far superior that these tales were\ntold in Ireland earlier than in Scotland; that whatever admixture of\nfact there is in them is Irish fact, and that the chief shapers of the\ncycle have been Irish, and not Scotch Gaels. On the other hand, the\nGaels seem both to have preserved the popular form in a more genuine\nstate, and the semi-literary form orally with greater tenacity.\u201d\n\nIreland we may therefore regard as the original home of the Ossianic\nromance, which in time diffused itself to the west of Scotland, to the\nHebrides, and even to the Isle of Man. And it is significant that while\nthe theatre of the Cuchulinn drama was mainly the north of that\ncountry\u2014Ulster and Connaught, that of the Feinn was the south\u2014Leinster\nand Munster.\n\nThe leading heroes of this cycle were:\u2014\n\n1. Fionn, son of Cumhail, son of Trenmor, who is represented as having\nbeen a druid.\n\n2. Gaul Mac Morna, leader of the clan Morna in Connaught. The first name\nof Gaul was Aedh Mac Morna, but in the battle of Cnucha he lost an eye\nand was henceforth known as Gaul, that is, the _Blind_ Mac Morna. In\nthis battle he slew Cumhail, Fionn\u2019s father, the leader of the Leinster\nband, and though he afterwards served under Fionn, they had no great\nlove for each other.\n\n3. Ossian, son of Fionn, who in later times became famous as the great\npoet of the Celtic people.\n\n4. Oscar, son of Ossian, and grandson of Fionn, who is represented as\nhandsome and kind-hearted, and generally one of the bravest of the\nFeinn.\n\n5. Diarmad O\u2019Duibhne, with the beauty spot\u2014\u201cball seirc\u201d\u2014which compelled\nany woman who saw it to fall in love with him.\n\n6. Caoilte Mac Ronan, a nephew (or cousin) of Fionn, the swiftest of all\nthe Fenian heroes.\n\n7. Fergus Finne-bheoil, \u201cthe eloquent,\u201d who figures as a wise counsellor\nas well as a great warrior.\n\n8. Conan Maol, the fool and coward of the party.\n\nThe greater number of the incidents of this cycle are represented as\nhaving taken place during the reign of Cormac Mac Art Mac Conn of the\nhundred battles, and that of his son, Cairbre of the Liffey. The former\nreigned from 227 to 268 A.D., but it was during the reign of the latter\nthat the battle of Gabhra was fought, in the year 283 A.D., which for\never put an end to the Fenian power.\n\nIn O\u2019Flaherty\u2019s \u201cOgygia\u201d it is said, \u201c_Cormac_ exceeded all his\npredecessors in magnificence, wisdom, and learning, as also in military\nachievements. His palace was most superbly adorned and richly furnished,\nand his numerous family proclaim his majesty and munificence; the books\nhe published and the schools he endowed at Temor bear unquestionable\ntestimony of his learning; there were three schools instituted, in the\nfirst the most eminent professors of the art of war were engaged, in the\nsecond history was taught, and in the third jurisprudence was\nprofessed.\u201d\n\nThere is a famous tract entitled, \u201cThe Instruction of a Prince,\u201d\nascribed to this king, which has evidently been redacted in Christian\ntimes. It is preserved in the Book of Ballymote, and takes the form of\nquestion and answer between the son Cairbre and his royal father.\n\n  \u201cO Grandson of Conn, O Cormac,\u201d said Cairbre, \u201cwhat is good for a\n  king?\u201d\n\n  \u201cThat is plain,\u201d said Cormac, \u201cit is good for him to have patience and\n  not to dispute, self-government without anger, affability without\n  haughtiness, diligent attention to history, strict observance of\n  covenants and agreements, strictness mitigated by mercy in the\n  execution of laws ... let him enforce fear, let him perfect peace.\u201d\n\n  \u201cO Grandson of Conn, O Cormac,\u201d said Cairbre, \u201cwhat is good for the\n  welfare of a country?\u201d\n\n  \u201cThat is plain,\u201d said Cormac, \u201cfrequent convocations of sapient and\n  good men to investigate the affairs, to abolish each evil and retain\n  each wholesome Institution, to attend to the precepts of the elders;\n  let the law be in the hand of the nobles, let the chieftains be\n  upright and unwilling to oppress the poor.\u201d\n\n  \u201cO Grandson of Conn, O Cormac,\u201d said Cairbre, \u201cwhat are the duties of\n  a prince at a banqueting house?\u201d\n\n  \u201cA Prince,\u201d said Cormac, \u201cshould light his lamps and welcome his\n  guests with clapping of hands, procure comfortable seats, the\n  cup-bearers should be respectable and active in the distribution of\n  meat and drink. Let there be moderation of music, short stories, a\n  welcoming countenance, a welcome for the learned, pleasant\n  conversations, and the like.\u201d\n\n  \u201cO Grandson of Conn, what is good for me?\u201d to which Cormac answers:\u2014\n\n  \u201cIf thou attend to my command, thou wilt not mock the old although\n  thou art young, nor the poor although thou art well-clad, nor the lame\n  although thou art strong, nor the ignorant although thou art learned.\n  Be not slothful, nor passionate, nor penurious, nor idle, nor\n  jealous....\u201d\n\nAgain Cairbre asks how he is to conduct himself among the wise and among\nthe foolish, among friends and among strangers, among the old and among\nthe young, to which Cormac, his father, replies:\u2014\n\n  Be not too knowing nor too simple; be not proud, be not inactive, be\n  not too humble nor yet haughty; be not talkative but be not too\n  silent; be not timid, neither be severe. For if thou shouldst appear\n  too knowing thou wouldst be satirised and abused; if too simple thou\n  wouldst be imposed upon; if too proud thou wouldst be shunned; if too\n  humble thy dignity would suffer; if talkative thou wouldst not be\n  deemed learned; if too severe thy character would be defamed; if too\n  timid thy rights would be encroached upon.\n\nThere are various versions of the story of Fionn\u2019s birth. In Leabhar Na\nh\u2019Uidhre it is told shortly as follows: Tadg, chief druid of Conn, had a\nbeautiful daughter called Muirne. Cumhail, son of Trenmor, who was head\nof the Militia in King Conn\u2019s time, asked Muirne in marriage, but her\nfather Tadg refused to give her, because he knew from his druidical\nknowledge that if Cumhail married her, he himself would lose his\nancestral seat at Almhain, now Allen, in Leinster. So Cumhail took\nMuirne by force and married her. Tadg appealed to King Conn, who sent\nhis forces after the delinquent, resulting in the battle of Cnucha being\nfought, in which Cumhail was killed by Aedh son of Morna, who in turn\nlost his eye. Muirne fled to Cumhail\u2019s sister, and gave birth to a son,\nwho was at first called Demni. When he grew up he demanded _eric_ of his\ngrandfather Tadg for the death of his father, and so, according to\ndruidical anticipation, he got possession of Almhain. He also made peace\nwith Gaul, who afterwards figured as one of his band of warriors.\n\nIn the Bodleian Library, Oxford, there is a MS. written about the\nfifteenth century, in which is preserved a treatise entitled \u201cBoyish\nexploits of Fionn.\u201d It is interesting to note here how he was reputed to\nhave come by the gift of seeing into the future. At that time on the\nbanks of the Boyne there lived a famous poet called Finn Eges, and young\nFionn was sent to him to complete his education. There was a prophecy\nthat if one of the name of Fionn ate a salmon caught in Fiacc\u2019s pool on\nthe Boyne he should no longer be in ignorance of anything he might wish\nto know. The poet had industriously fished the pool for seven years and\nnever landed a single fish. However, one was caught shortly after\nFionn\u2019s arrival, and Finn Eges sent the lad to cook it, with strict\ninjunctions not to taste it. While turning the salmon on the fire Fionn\nburnt his thumb, and instinctively thrust it into his mouth to cool. On\nreporting the incident to his master, the poet asked him his name.\n\u201cDemni,\u201d said the lad. \u201cYour name is Fionn,\u201d muttered the poet, \u201cand it\nis you who were destined to eat of the salmon of knowledge, you are the\nreal Fionn!\u201d\n\nThus it was that knowledge came to the young hero. Through the chance\nincident of suddenly inserting his thumb in his mouth, the hidden was\nrevealed to him.\n\nThe legend, as given in a vellum MS. in Trinity College, Dublin, is\nsomewhat different. It says that on a certain occasion Fionn was hunting\nnear _Sliabh nam Ban_, and while standing at a spring, presently a\nstrange woman came along, filled a silver tankard at the well, and\nwithout saying a word walked away with it. The hero\u2019s curiosity was\naroused. He followed, unperceived, until she reached the side of the\nhill, where a concealed door opened to admit her. In by this entrance\nshe walked, and Fionn attempting to do likewise got his thumb trapped\nbetween the door and doorpost as the former suddenly swung back. It was\nwith great difficulty he managed to extricate the _ordag_, but having\nsucceeded, he at once thrust it, bruised as it was, into his mouth to\nease the pain. And no sooner had he done this than he found himself\npossessed of the gift of foreseeing future events. Hence the expression,\n\u201cordag mhor an eolais\u201d (the great thumb of knowledge).\n\nIrish scholars invariably represent the Feinn as a band of Militia, or\nkind of standing army, that fought battles, and defended the kingdom\nfrom invasion. Before a soldier could be admitted into this select\ncorps, he had to promise, \u201cfirst, never to receive a portion with a\nwife, but to choose her for good manners and virtues; second, never to\noffer violence to any woman; third, never to refuse any one in the\nmatter of anything he might possess, that is, he ought to be charitable\nto the weak and the poor; and fourth, no single warrior should ever flee\nbefore nine champions.\u201d It was necessary that \u201cboth his father and\nmother, his tribe, and his relatives should first give guarantees that\nthey would never demand an _eric_ or revenge from any person for his\ndeath.\u201d\n\nIn a fifteenth century MS. in the British Museum it is stated that (1)\nNot a man was taken until he was a prime poet versed in the twelve books\nof poetry. (2) No man was taken till in the ground a large hole had been\nmade such as to reach the fold of his belt, and he put into it with his\nshield and a forearm\u2019s length of a hazel stick. Then must nine warriors\nhaving nine spears, with a ten-furrows\u2019 width between them and him,\nassail him, and in concert let fly at him. If he were then hurt past\nthat guard of his, he was not received into the Fian-ship. (3) Not a man\nof them was taken until his hair had been interwoven into braids on him,\nand he started at a run through Ireland\u2019s woods, while they seeking to\nwound him followed in his wake, there having been between him and them\nbut one forest bough by way of interval at first. Should he be overtaken\nhe was wounded, and not received into the Fian-ship after. (4) If his\nweapon had quivered in his hand he was not taken. (5) Should a branch in\nthe wood have disturbed anything of his hair out of its braiding he was\nnot taken. (6) If he had cracked a dry stick under his foot, as he ran,\nhe was not accepted. (7) Unless that, at full speed, he had both jumped\na stick level with his brow, and stooped to pass under one on a level\nwith his knee, he was not taken. (8) Unless also without slackening his\npace he could with his nail extract a thorn from his foot, he was not\ntaken into the Fian-ship. But if he performed all this he was of Fionn\u2019s\npeople.\n\nKeating, who wrote about 1630, and who had access to documents now no\nlonger extant, gives some curious details:\u2014\n\n  The members of the Fenian body (he says) lived in the following\n  manner. They were quartered on the people from November Day till May\n  Day, and their duty was to uphold justice and to put down injustice on\n  the part of the kings and lords of Ireland, and also to guard the\n  harbours of the country from the oppression of foreign invaders. After\n  that, from May till November, they lived by hunting and the chase, and\n  by performing the duties demanded of them by the kings of Ireland,\n  such as preventing robberies, exacting fines and tributes, putting\n  down public enemies, and every other kind of evil that might afflict\n  the country. In performing these duties they received a certain fixed\n  pay.... However, from May till November the Fenians had to content\n  themselves with game, the product of their own hunting, as this right\n  to hunt was their maintenance and pay from the kings of Ireland. That\n  is, the warriors had the flesh of the wild animals for their food, and\n  the skins for wages. During the whole day, from morning till night,\n  they used to eat but one meal, and of this it was their wont to\n  partake towards evening. About noon they used to send whatever game\n  they had killed in the morning by their attendants to some appointed\n  hill, where there were wood and moorland close by. There they used to\n  light immense fires, into which they put a large quantity of round\n  sandstones. They next dug two pits in the yellow clay of the moor, and\n  having set part of the venison upon spits to be roasted before the\n  fire, they bound up the remainder with _sugans_\u2014ropes of straw or\n  rushes\u2014in bundles of sedge, and then placed them to be cooked in one\n  of the pits they had previously dug. There they set the stones which\n  they had before this heated in the fire round about them, and kept\n  heaping them upon the bundles of meat until they had made them seethe\n  freely, and the meat had become throughly cooked. From the greatness\n  of these fires it has resulted that their sites are still to be\n  recognised in many parts of Ireland by their burnt blackness. It is\n  they that are commonly called _Fualachta nam Fiann_, or the Fenians\n  cooking spots.\n\n  As to the warriors of the Fenians, when they were assembled at the\n  place where their fires had been lighted ... there every man stripped\n  himself to his skin, tied his tunic round his waist, and then set to\n  dressing his hair and cleansing his limbs, thus ridding himself of the\n  sweat and soil of the day\u2019s hunt. Then they began to supple their\n  thews and muscles by gentle exercise, loosening them by friction,\n  until they had relieved themselves of all sense of stiffness and\n  fatigue. When they had finished doing this they sat down and ate their\n  meal. That being over, they set about constructing their\n  hunting-booths, and preparing their beds, and so put themselves in\n  train for sleep. Of the following three materials did each man\n  construct his bed\u2014of the brushwood of the forest, of moss, and of\n  fresh rushes. The brushwood was laid next the ground, over it was\n  placed the moss, and lastly rushes were spread over all. It is these\n  three materials that are designated in our old romances as the _Tri\n  Cuilcedha nam Fiann_ (the three beddings of the Fenians).\n\nThe literature of the Ossianic cycle is divided by O\u2019Curry into four\nclasses\u2014\n\n1. The first consists of poems in ancient MSS., ascribed to Fionn Mac\nCumhail, to his sons Ossian and Fergus Finnbheoil, and his nephew\nCaoilte. There are seven in Fionn\u2019s name, five in the Book of Leinster,\nand two in the Book of Lecain. Other two are attributed to Ossian in the\nBook of Leinster, of which one is a description of the battle of Gabhra,\nwhich took place in the year 283, and in which Oscar, the brave son of\nOssian, and Cairbre Lifeachair, the monarch of Erin, fell by each\nother\u2019s hands.\n\nThe original of this latter has both alliteration and assonance, which\nwe miss in the English version here given:\u2014\n\n              An Ogam on a stone, and a stone on a grave,\n              Where once men trod;\n              Erin\u2019s prince on a white horse\n              Was slain by a slender spear.\n\n              Cairbre made a cruel cast,\n              High on his horse good in the fray;\n              Shortly before they both were lamed\u2014\n              He struck Oscar\u2019s right arm off.\n\n              Oscar made a mighty cast,\n              Raging bold like a lion:\n              Killed Cairbre, grandson[23] of Conn,\n              Whom warriors bold obeyed.\n\n              Youths, mighty and daring,\n              They met their death in the strife;\n              Not long before their combat,\n              More heroes had fallen than lived.\n\n              I myself was in the fight,\n              Southward there of Gabor green;\n              Twice fifty men I slew\u2014\n              With my own hand I slew them.\n\n              The Ogam is here on the stone,\n              Round which many ill-fated fell;\n              Were Finn, in prowess great, alive\n              Long in mind would be the Ogam.\n\nThe facts of Cairbre fighting on horseback and the Ogam on the stone\nseem to point back to early times, though alternatively the ideas might\nbe used afterwards to give an air of antiquity to the piece.\n\nOssian\u2019s second describes the great fair and festival games of Liffey,\nand sketches a visit he paid with his father and accompanying warriors\nto the court of the King of Munster. These are the only poems of the\nbard that O\u2019Curry knew, that could positively be traced as far back as\nthe twelfth century. The earliest written pieces superscribed with his\nname that we have in Scotland are the nine in the Book of the Dean of\nLismore. Mr. J. F. Campbell was of opinion that the Dean regarded them\nas actual compositions of the warrior-bard, contemporary with Cormac Mac\nArt.\n\nOf one of these, well known as a lament of Ossian in his old age,\nProfessor Blackie has given an English rendering from the Dean\u2019s text,\nand Dr. Douglas Hyde another more recently from a similar text in the\nBelfast Museum. The latter runs thus:\u2014\n\n              Long was last night in cold Elphin,\n              More long is to-night on its weary way.\n              Though yesterday seemed to me long and ill,\n              Yet longer still was this dreary day.\n\n              And long for me is each hour new-born,\n              Stricken, forlorn, and smit with grief\n              For the hunting lands and the Fenian bands,\n              And the long-haired, generous, Fenian chief.\n\n              I hear no music, I find no feast,\n              I slay no beast from a bounding steed,\n              I bestow no gold, I am poor and old,\n              I am sick and cold, without wine or mead.\n\n              I court no more, and I hunt no more,\n              These were before my strong delight\n              I cannot slay, and I take no prey;\n              Weary the day and long the night.\n\n              No heroes come in their war array,\n              No game I play, there is nought to win;\n              I swim no stream with my men of might,\n              Long is the night in cold Elphin.\n\nAsk, O Patrick, thy God of grace, To tell me the place he will place me\nin, And save my soul from the Ill One\u2019s might, For long is to-night in\ncold Elphin.\n\nAs in the beautiful poem entitled \u201cFinn\u2019s Pastimes,\u201d so in the following\nverses from the Dean\u2019s Book, the bard shows that he is in intimate touch\nwith nature, revelling in her sights and sounds:\u2014\n\n                 Binn guth duine an tir an \u00f4ir,\n                 Binn a ghl\u00f2ir a chanaid na h\u2019eoin;\n                 Binn an nuallan a ni a chorr,\n                 Binn an tonn am Bun-da-treoir,\n                 Binn am fabhar a ni a ghaoth;\n                 Binn guth cuach os Cas-a\u2019choin,\n                 Aluinn an dealradh a ni grian,\n                 Binn a nithear feadail nan lon, etc.\n\n               Sweet is man\u2019s voice in the land of gold,\n               Sweet the sounds the birds produce;\n               Sweet is the murmur of the crane,\n               Sweet sound the waves at Bundatreor,\n               Sweet the soft murmuring of the wind;\n               Sweet sounds the cuckoo at Cas-a\u2019choin,\n               How soft and pleasing shines the sun,\n               Sweet the blackbird sings his song, etc.\n\nThere is one genuinely ancient poem ascribed to Fergus, the bard\u2019s\nbrother. It was copied from the lost \u201cDinnsenchus\u201d into the Book of\nLecain and Book of Ballymote. It tells of a remarkable adventure Ossian\nonce had. While out hunting with a few followers he was decoyed into a\nmountain cavern by some of its fairy inhabitants, and detained there\nwith his companions for a whole year. During all that time the bard was\nin the habit of cutting a small chip from the handle of his spear, and\ncasting it upon the stream that issued from his rocky prison. Fionn, who\nhad searched in vain for his missing men, happened one day to come to\nthis river, and observing a floating chip, picked it up, and knew at\nonce that it was from Ossian\u2019s spear, and intended for a sign. He\nthereupon followed the stream to its source, entered the cavern, and\nrescued the captive hunters.\n\nA poem by Caoilte Mac Ronan, found in the same two MSS. as the last, and\ncopied from the same source, is not a legend of the Feinn, but a love\nstory, in which Cliodhna, a fair-haired, foreign lady, figures as\nheroine.\n\n2. The second class of Ossianic literature consists of tracts made up of\narticles in prose and poetry, attributed to one or other of the bards\nalready mentioned, but related by some other person. The most important\nin this category, and perhaps the only genuine one now existing, is that\nknown as \u201cAgallamh na Sean\u00f3rach,\u201d or \u201cDialogue of the Ancients,\u201d the\nlatter being Ossian and Caoilte. Full of curious and really valuable\nhistorical information, it is the largest Fenian or Ossianic tale, and\nhas recently been edited by Dr. Whitley Stokes. The text preserved in\nthe Book of Lismore, and more or less fully in other collections,\nasserts that after the battle of Gabhra, the Feinn were so shattered and\ndiminished in numbers that they dispersed themselves over the country.\n\nOssian and Caoilte survived their brethren in arms, and after wandering\nfor a time among the new and strange generation that had grown up, they\nagreed to separate.\n\nThe former went to his mother in the enchanted mansion of Cleitech, as\nsome MSS. say, to \u201cTir nan Og.\u201d The latter passed over Magh Breagh\nsouthwards, and ultimately joined St. Patrick, who was delighted to add\nso remarkable a convert to his following.\n\nNearly 150 years passed since their early warrior days, when Ossian\nsuddenly returned from \u201cTir nan Og\u201d and the enchanted mansion to seek\nhis old friend and comrade Caoilte. On finding him, henceforth they both\nbecame St. Patrick\u2019s constant companions in his missionary journeys\nthrough Erin. They give him the history and topography of every place\nthey visit and of numberless other places, all of which is noted down by\nBrogan, the saint\u2019s faithful scribe, for the benefit of future\ngenerations. So says the wonderful \u201cColloquy of the Ancients.\u201d As an\ninstance of this service, Patrick and his company were one day sitting\non the hill Finntulach, now better known as Ard-Patrick, in the county\nof Limerick, when the saint inquired regarding the origin of the name.\nCaoilte explained how it used to be called Tulach na Feinne until Fionn\naltered it; and went on to relate how that great leader of men and his\nfollowing were once on this same hill when Cael O\u2019Neamhain came to him,\nand the conversation of the two heroes turned on Crede, the daughter of\nCairbre, King of Kerry.\n\n\u201cDo you know,\u201d said Fionn, \u201cthat she is the greatest flirt of all the\nwomen of Erin; that there is scarcely a precious gem in the land that\nshe has not obtained as a token of love; and that she has not yet\naccepted the hand of any of her admirers.\u201d \u201cI know it,\u201d said Cael, \u201cbut\nare you aware of the conditions on which she would accept a husband?\u201d\n\u201cYes,\u201d replied Fionn, \u201cwhoever is so gifted in the poetic art as to\nwrite a poem descriptive of her mansion and its rich furniture will\nreceive her hand.\u201d \u201cGood,\u201d said Cael, \u201cI have with the aid of my nurse\ncomposed such a poem, and if you will accompany me, I will now repair to\nher court and present it to her.\u201d\n\nFionn consented, and setting out on their journey they in due time\nreached the lady\u2019s mansion, which was situated at the foot of the\nwell-known Paps of Anann in Kerry. On their arrival, the lady asked\ntheir business. Fionn answered that Cael came to seek her hand in\nmarriage. \u201cHas he a poem for me?\u201d queried she. \u201cI have,\u201d said Cael. And\nhe then recited his poem, of which the following are a few\ncharacteristic verses:\u2014\n\n          Happy the house in which she is,\n          Between men and children and women,\n          Between Druids and musical performers,\n          Between cup-bearers and door-keepers.\n\n          Between equerries without fear,\n          And distributors who divide (the fare);\n          And over all these the command belongs\n          To fair Crede of the yellow hair.\n\n          It would be happy for me to be in her _d\u00f9n_,\n          Among her soft and downy couches,\n          Should Crede deign to hear my suit,\n          Happy for me would be my journey.\n\n          A bowl she has whence berry-juice flows,\n          By which she colours her eyebrows black,\n          She has clear vessels of fermenting ale;\n          Cups she has and beautiful goblets.\n\n          The colour (of her _dun_) is like the colour of lime\n          Within it are couches and green rushes,\n          Within it are silks and blue mantles,\n          Within it are red, gold, and crystal cups.\n\n          Of its grianan the corner stones\n          Are all of silver and of yellow gold,\n          Its thatch in stripes of faultless order,\n          Of wings of brown and crimson red.\n\nCrede seems to have been very well pleased with this song, for she\nmarried Cael. But, sad to tell, on being called away soon after to the\nbattle of Finntraigh, he was there killed. His widowed partner gave vent\nto her grief in an elegy replete with interest, because it exhibits the\nCeltic characteristic of imputing to all nature\u2014birds, deer, waves, and\nrocks, one\u2019s own mournful feelings; and because it contains allusions to\nancient customs. Her wail sounds like a Highland coronach of other days:\n\u201cA woeful note, and O a woeful note is that which the thrush in\nDrumqueen emits, but not more cheerful is the wail which the blackbird\nmakes in Letterlee. A woeful sound, and O a woeful sound is that the\ndeer utters in Drumdaleish. Dead lies the doe of Drumsheelin, the mighty\nstag bells after her sore suffering, and O suffering sore is the hero\u2019s\ndeath, his death, who used to lie by me. Sore suffering to me is Cael,\nand O Cael is a suffering sore, that by my side he is in dead man\u2019s\nform; that the wave should have swept over his white body, that is what\nhath distracted me, so great was his delightfulness. A dismal roar, and\nO a dismal roar is that the shore\u2019s surf makes upon the strand.... A\nwoeful booming, and O a boom of woe is that which the wave makes upon\nthe northward beach, butting as it does against the polished rock,\nlamenting for Cael, now that he is gone.\u201d\n\n3. The third class of this literature consists of miscellaneous poems\nattributed chiefly to Ossian, with a few also to his brother poets, and\na large number without any ascription of authorship. They are found\nmostly in paper MSS. of the last 250 years, and are generally\ntranscripts from older books. In whole or in part they often take the\nform of dialogues between Patrick and Ossian. Apparently following the\nidea suggested by the \u201cColloquy of the Ancients,\u201d the Gaelic dreamers\nhave instituted talks and debates between these representatives of\nPaganism and Christianity. Such dialogues are to be found in earlier\nMSS., like those of the Book of Lismore and the Book of the Dean of\nLismore, but more frequently in later ones. Besides dealing with the\nexploits of the Feinn, they somewhat humorously accentuate the\nantagonism between the pagan and ecclesiastical ideals. Specimens of the\nmore famous of these may be seen in the chapter dealing with the\ninfluence of the Church on Celtic literature. Of the other poems of this\nclass, the best known is perhaps that entitled \u201cCath-Chnuic-an-Air,\u201d or,\nmore shortly, \u201cCnoc-an-Air.\u201d In addition to giving an account of the\nbattle, it describes the treasures of the Feinn hidden under Loch Len\u00e8\n(Killarney).\n\nThe delightful \u201cOssian and Evir-Alin\u201d may also be noted here. Pattison\nthought it possibly one of the oldest of all the Ossianic fragments, but\nhe was well aware that it is not easy to determine its age. These verses\nfrom his English rendering suggest its peculiar charm:\u2014\n\n             We came to the dark Lake of Lego;\n             There a noble chief came to meet\n             And conduct us with honour to Branno\u2014\n             With honour and welcomings sweet.\n\n                    \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n             Branno inquired, \u201cWhat is your purpose?\n             What would you have of me?\u201d\n             And Cailta said, \u201cWe seek thy daughter,\n             Her would we have of thee.\u201d\n\n                    \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n             \u201cSo high the place, O Ossian,\n             Do men\u2019s tongues to thee assign,\n             If I twelve daughters had,\u201d said Branno,\n             \u201cThe best of them should be thine.\u201d\n\n             Then they opened the choice and spare chamber,\n             That was shielded with down from the cold;\n             The posts of the door were of polished bone,\n             And the leaves were of good yellow gold.\n\n             Soon as generous Evir-Alin\n             Saw Ossian Fingal\u2019s son,\n             The love of her youth, by the hero\n             By me, young maid, was won.\n\n             Then we left the dark Lake of Lego\n             And homeward took our way;\n             But Cormac, fierce Cormac, waylaid us\n             Intent on the furious fray.\n\nOssian and Cormac fight for the lady. The personal combat is described,\nand the victorious Ossian continues\u2014\n\n               I swept the head from his shoulders\n               And held it up in my hand;\n               His troops they fled, and we came with joy\n               To Fingal\u2019s mountain land.\n\n4. The fourth class consists of prose tales, describing in a romantic\nstyle the exploits and daring deeds of Fionn and of individuals of his\nband. The two best known are the \u201cPursuit of Diarmad and Grainne,\u201d and\nthe \u201cBattle[24] of Ventry Harbour.\u201d Of the former the leading details\nare these:\u2014\n\nFionn in his old age asked the monarch Cormac Mac Art for the hand of\nhis celebrated daughter Grainne in marriage. The king agreed to the\nhero\u2019s proposal, and invited him to Tara to obtain the princess\u2019s own\nconsent, necessary in those days as in these to their union. Accepting\nthe invitation, he proceeded thither, attended by a chosen body of his\nwarriors, among whom were his son Ossian, his grandson Oscar, and a\nchief officer Diarmad O\u2019Duibhne. A grand feast was provided, over which\nthe monarch presided, and the Feinn were entertained with every mark of\nfavour and distinction.\n\nIt appears to have been a custom on such occasions in ancient Erin, says\nO\u2019Curry, for the mistress of the mansion or some other distinguished\nlady to fill her own rich drinking cup with choice liquor, and send it\nround by her maid-in-waiting to the leading gentlemen at the banquet,\nwho in turn passed it on to certain others next them, in order that\nevery guest might enjoy the distinction of participating in the special\nfavour. The lady Grainne in this instance did the honours of the\noccasion, and all, with the exception of Ossian and Diarmad, had drunk\nfrom her cup. But while the imbibing company were yet proclaiming their\npraises of the liquor and their profound acknowledgments to the hostess,\nthey fell one by one into a heavy sleep.\n\nThe slim hostess had caused the drink to be drugged, and, as soon as she\nrecognised the effect, went and sat beside Ossian and Diarmad,\naddressing the former, and complaining to him of the folly of his father\nFionn in expecting that a maiden of her youth and beauty should ever\nconsent to become the wife of so old and war-worn a veteran. Had it been\nOssian himself, gladly would she accept him; but since that could not be\nin the circumstances, she saw no chance of escaping the evil her\nfather\u2019s rash promise threatened to bring upon her than by flight.\nOssian could not dishonour his own sire by being partner to such a\ncourse, so she conjured Diarmad, by his manliness and chivalry, to take\nher away, make her his wife, and thus save her from a fate more tragic\nin her eyes than death itself.\n\nAfter much persuasion, for the step was serious in view of his leader\u2019s\nire, Diarmad consented, and they both eloped, gaining the open country\nbefore the somnolent company awoke.\n\nBut no sooner had Cormac and Fionn rallied than they perceived how they\nwere duped, and, raging desperately, they vowed vengeance against the\nabsent pair. Organising a party for pursuit, the jilted lover\nimmediately set out to scour the country. In this search he sent forward\nadvance parties of his swiftest and best men in every direction.\nApparently to little purpose at first, for Diarmad was a favourite with\nhis brethren-in-arms, and the peculiar circumstances of the elopement\ninvested it with such an element of romance, and of sympathy on the part\nof the young heroes, that those in pursuit never could discover the\nretreat of the lovers. Even if Fionn himself did happen to get on their\ntrack, he was thwarted by means of some wonderful stratagem on the part\nof Diarmad.\n\nSuch is the outline of \u201cThe Pursuit of Diarmad and Grainne,\u201d a pursuit\nwhich extended all over Erin. In the course of its narration in the\noriginal a large amount of curious information on social manners,\nancient tales, superstitions, topography, and the natural products of\ndifferent parts, is introduced. The absconding pair were caught at last,\nbut the Fenian heroes would not permit Fionn to punish Diarmad.\n\nUltimately, the chief had his own peculiar revenge. When at the hunt of\nthe magic boar Diarmad killed that formidable quarry, and escaped\nscatheless, with sinister intention Fionn asked him to measure its\nlength against the bristles. In doing so Diarmad\u2019s foot, his only\nvulnerable part, was pierced by one of the poisonous points. And\nalthough Fionn could have restored him by a draught from his life-giving\nshell, he would not. Thus died the hapless Diarmad O\u2019Duibhne, an officer\nof fine person and most fascinating manners. Famous in family annals\ntoo, for from him the Campbells trace their descent. Not only does he\nfigure in their genealogical tree,[25] but the Dukes of Argyll still\nhave the boar\u2019s head on their coat-of-arms.\n\nThe \u201cLay of Diarmad\u201d has for generations been very popular. There are\nvarious versions of it. Pattison\u2019s English rendering is mainly from the\ntext in Maccallum\u2019s collection. Fionn afterwards repenting that he did\nnot save his young rival, lamented thus:\u2014\n\n               Alas, that, said Fionn, for a woman\n               I\u2019ve slain my own sister\u2019s son\u2014\n               For an ill woman slain him! too noble\n               To be slain for the loveliest one.\n\n               Sad stood the heroes beside thee,\n               O youth of the noble race;\n               And dim grew the eyes of each maiden\n               When the mould went over thy face.\n\n               And now like the tree, I stand lonely\u2014\n               Wither\u2019d and wasted and sear;\n               With the rude howling tempest to tear me,\n               Where the shade of no green bough is near.\n\nQuite a large collection of ancient Ossianic ballads are concerned with\nthe wars between the Feinn and the Norse invaders from Lochlann. They\nare quite manifestly of dates posterior to the Viking age, and might\nconstitute a class by themselves. In \u201cThe Banners of the Feinn,\u201d the\nheroes are marshalled before us one by one. And here also Diarmad\nO\u2019Duibhne takes the lead. The ballad, in rollicking modern verse, has\nbeen thus rendered by Dr. Macneill:\u2014\n\n               The Norland king stood on the height\n               And scanned the rolling sea;\n               He proudly eyed his gallant ships\n               That rode triumphantly.\n\n               And then he looked where lay his camp\n               Along the rocky coast,\n               And where were seen the heroes brave\n               Of Lochlann\u2019s famous host.\n\n               Then to the land he turn\u2019d, and there\n               A fierce-like hero came;\n               Above him was a flag of gold,\n               That waved and shone like flame.\n\n               \u201cSweet Bard,\u201d thus spoke the Norland king,\n               \u201cWhat banner comes in sight?\n               The valiant chief that leads the host,\n               Who is that man of might?\u201d\n\n               \u201cThat,\u201d said the bard, \u201cis young MacDoon,\n               His is that banner bright;\n               When forth the Feinn to battle go,\n               He\u2019s foremost in the fight,\u201d etc., etc.\n\nDream-figures of the dim and distant past, Fionn and his warriors have\nnot quite lost their sway over the Celtic imagination. Indeed, Gaelic\npopular tradition has it that they are not dead, but sleeping under\ngreat green knolls somewhere in the Highlands, and that one day they\nwill awake to restore the Gael to his ancient power, just as the Cymri\nlook for the return of Arthur. It is even related that once a wight\nobtained entrance to their place of rest, and was asked to blow three\ntimes on the _dudach_ or horn. This he did, and, after the first blast,\nbehold! the sleeping forms of men and dogs moved to life; after the\nsecond, the Feinn warriors got up on their elbows and stared at him. The\nsight so unnerved the rash intruder that, throwing down the instrument,\nhe fled in terror from the ghostly place; while after him came the awful\nimprecation, \u201cMil\u00e8 mollachd, is miosa dh\u2019fhag na fhuair\u201d (\u201cA thousand\ncurses on you; you left us worse than you found us\u201d). These were the\nlast words he heard as he made good his escape\u2014the last account of the\nFeinn borne to the upper world.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XI\n       THE INFLUENCE OF THE NORSE INVASIONS ON GAELIC LITERATURE\n\n  The dreaded Vikings\u2014In English waters\u2014Descents on Iona\u2014Monasteries\n      favourite objects of attack\u2014Destruction of books\u2014Their own eddas\n      and sagas\u2014Modern discovery of the wonderful Icelandic\n      literature\u2014The Northmen in a new light\u2014Literary effects of their\n      invasions\u2014Arrested development\u2014Lamentable dispersion of the\n      literary classes\u2014Pilgrim Scots\u2014The rise of Scottish\n      Gaelic\u2014Present-day differences between it and Irish\u2014Introduction\n      of Norse words\u2014Decay of inflection\u2014Gaelic examples of Viking\n      beliefs and superstitions\u2014The Norseman still with us.\n\n\nBritain owes her proud pre-eminence among the nations as much to the sea\nas to any other external factor. Her empire seems to sit stable upon the\nwaves. So far from disconnecting the broadcast parts, it is the ocean\nthat links them well together into one mighty whole which keeps \u201cthe\nfretful realms in awe.\u201d Thus as citizens of the British Empire we are\nwont to regard the sea as our most powerful ally and friend. We connect\nwith it the idea of national defence. It is our bulwark. With it we\nassociate also the spirit of freedom, and pleasure in summer time, when\nmultitudes frequent the coast and drink in new life and energy there.\nAnd in reflective moments it wafts our thoughts to larger issues, and we\nrecognise that the sea helps towards the realisation of the brotherhood\nof man, for it brings the nations into close touch with one another, and\nthrough the quiet channels of trade and commerce, tends to exorcise old\nand distant race antagonisms. And so in this country we are born to view\nthe ocean with kindly eyes, and to rely upon it almost as our national\nfoster-parent.\n\nYet it was not ever thus. We go back to a time in these western lands\nwhen the briny wave was a terror to men, for out there, in storm and\nshine, lurked their chief danger. Any morning they awoke, or any evening\nthey retired to rest, they might see the dragon-prowed galleys of the\nwild Norsemen bearing down upon them. And in the night, when the winds\nhowled or there came a moaning from the deep, they could not be sure but\nthe dreaded Vikings were upon them. No part of the coast of these\nislands or of north or west France was safe from their incursions. The\nblue waves and the distant horizon of the watery main were then scanned\nwith different feelings from ours. A secret fear haunted the imagination\nas it saw or fancied it perceived a distant sail on the seascape. The\nvery children inherited the awe inspired by these ruffians of the deep;\nfor ruffians they were, many of them, who massacred and laid waste,\nsparing not even the peaceful abodes of piety and learning.\n\nSometimes they bore down upon a reach of coast when the unsuspecting\ninhabitants had not the faintest presentiment of peril from the waves. A\nmedieval writer (Monachi Sangale, Gesta Caroli, II. 14) tells how\nCharlemagne himself and his courtiers were thus surprised. They were\nseated at a banquet one day in the town of Narbonne, when all of a\nsudden some swift barks were seen putting into the harbour. The company\nstarted up, wondering who the strangers might be. Were they Jews, or\nAfricans, or simply British traders? None could tell. The keen eye of\nthe king alone hastily divined the situation. \u201cNo bales of merchandise,\u201d\nsaid he, \u201care borne hither by yonder galleys. They are manned by\nterrible foes.\u201d And then advancing to the window, he stood for a long\ntime reflecting, his eyes moist with tears and bent on vacancy. No one\ndurst ask him the cause of his foreboding, till at length he broached it\nhimself. \u201cIt is not for myself,\u201d muttered he, \u201cthat I am weeping, nor\nfor any harm that yonder barks can do to me; but it grieves me sore to\nthink that during my lifetime they have made bold to approach these\nshores, and greater still is my dejection when I reflect on the evils\nthey will yet inflict on those who come after me.\u201d And he was right. The\ncrews that he saw in the offing were plundering Northmen, who were soon\nto be followed by kindred sea-rovers bent on conquest. Of little avail\nin his own time were his strong forts and garrison towns built to\nwithstand the foe, and after his death his less imperious successors\nhardly dared lift a dagger to stem the tide of invasion that laid waste\ntheir fairest lands and cities. \u201cTake the map,\u201d wrote Sir Francis\nPalgrave in his history of _Normandy and England_, \u201cand colour with\nvermilion the provinces, districts, and shores which the Northmen\nvisited, as the record of each invasion. The colouring will have to be\nrepeated more than ninety times successively before you can arrive at\nthe conclusion of the Carlovingian dynasty. Furthermore, mark by the\nusual symbol of war\u2014the two crossed swords\u2014the localities where the\nbattles were fought by or against pirates,\u2014where they were defeated or\ntriumphant, or where they pillaged, burned, or destroyed; and the\nvalleys and banks of the Elbe, Rhine and Moselle, Scheldt, Meuse, Somme\nand Seine, Loire, Garonne and Adour, the inland Allier, and all the\ncoasts and coastlands between estuary and estuary, and the countries\nbetween the river streams will appear bristling as with _chevaux de\nfrise_.\n\n\u201cThe strongly-fenced Roman cities, the venerated abbeys and their\ndependent bourgades, often more flourishing and extensive than the\nancient seats of government, the opulent seaports and trading towns were\nall equally exposed to the Danish attacks, stunned by the Northmen\u2019s\napproach, subjugated by their fury.\u201d\n\nAccording to Paul B. du Chaillu, one of the more recent and exhaustive\nwriters on the subject, the Viking age extended from the second to the\nmiddle of the twelfth century A.D. For a long time\u2014centuries no\ndoubt\u2014individuals were wont to come as traders, and in that capacity may\nhave been welcomed. But towards the end of the eighth century an\nalarming development took place. Issuing from the viks or bays of Norway\nand Denmark, the notorious Vikings appeared as depredators and\nconquerors. 787 is given as the date when first their hostile vessels\nwere seen in English waters. And henceforward concerted attempts were\nmade to land on our shores and annex our territory. In 793 the work of\nplunder was effectively inaugurated by an attack on Lindisfarne and\nother points in Northumbria. The monastery on that island was laid\nwaste, and the Northumbrian kingdom itself so crippled that it lost the\ncommanding influence it wielded in the days of Adamnan and Bede and\ntheir friend King Aldfrid.\n\nNext year the marauding Norsemen emerged in the Western Isles, which\nfrom this time till the middle of the thirteenth century were destined\nto be favourite haunts and special theatres of their operations.\n\nThey quickly found and sacked defenceless Iona, and for years took\nspoils of the sea between that Island and Erin. The Hebrides and the\nIsle of Man were at their mercy in 798, and still insatiate with former\nbooty, in 802 they revisited Iona and burned its sacred buildings to the\nground. Returning four years later, they put the whole community to the\nsword, numbering no fewer than sixty-eight persons.\n\nIona truly had cause to dread the unceasing attentions of these terrible\nstrangers, for each visit seemed more appalling than the other. Baulked\nin their efforts to get the silver shrines and relics of the departed\nColumba, the freebooters made another swift and dire descent upon the\nisland in 825. Trained by sad experience, the monks on this occasion had\ntaken the precaution to bury their treasure-trove in a hole in the\nearth, covering the surface with sods. And when their fierce assailants\nburst upon the unprotected sanctuary, they found the holy St. Blathmac,\nwho was probably acting-abbot at the time, standing before the altar. Of\nhim they impetuously demanded the way to the hidden objects of their\npursuit\u2014the precious silver shrines\u2014and when he calmly refused,\ninsisting that he did not know the place of concealment which his\nbrethren had selected, they savagely murdered him on the spot. The\nAnnals of Ulster record the martyrdom, and Walafridus Strabo, a\ncontemporary on the Continent, gives an interesting metrical account of\nthe event in Latin, gathered no doubt from one or other of the monks who\nhad fled to him from these islands through terror of the Norse.\n\nOnce more, on Christmas eve in 986, the famous monastery of Hy, ever\nrising on its own ashes, was attacked and destroyed by the successors of\nthese old Danes, and this time the abbot and fifteen monks were put to a\nviolent death. From Orkney and Shetland, and the coasts of Caithness and\nthe Hebrides the hardy Norsemen swooped down upon Eastern Scotland as\nwell as upon the English and Irish seaboards, until at length they made\nthemselves for a time masters of a great part of the country.\n\nHow they went to work may be gathered from their own records. For\nexample: Harold Fairhair\u2019s saga, c. 22, says, \u201cThey ravaged in Scotland\nand took possession of Katanes (Caithness) and Sudrland (Sutherland) as\nfar as Ekkjalsbakki. Sigurd slew the Scotch Jarl, Melbrigdi, and tied\nhis head to his saddle-straps; the tooth which protruded from the Jarl\u2019s\nhead wounded the calf of Sigurd\u2019s leg, which swelled and he died\ntherefrom; he is mounded at Ekkjalsbakki.\u201d\n\nFrom these details it will be seen that they had much of the Vandal and\nthe rough buccaneer in their composition. Monasteries were favourite\nobjects of attack. They contained the richest plunder, and from their\nnature, as religious centres, offered the least resistance. And not\ncontent with merely carrying off the loot, the rovers mingled blood with\ntheir depredations. Hence the peculiar fitness of the introduction into\nthe Litany of the significant petition: \u201cFrom the fury of the Northmen,\ngood Lord, deliver us.\u201d And this coarse grain in their character\naccounts for their reckless conduct in other directions. They seem to\nhave had a special aversion to monks and clerics and learning. They made\nshort work of the books and bells of monasteries. We have contemporary\nevidence of their vandalism towards literature in a remarkable book of\nthe period entitled, _Wars of the Gael with the Gaill_ (Northmen). It is\nin Gaelic, and appears in the Book of Leinster, copied about 1150. The\nauthor may have been an eye-witness of many of the scenes, and\nparticularly of the battle of Clontarf, which he so realistically\ndescribes. His accuracy on matters of fact has been fully attested. We\ncan, therefore, credit his statement when he affirms regarding the few\nmen of learning who had survived the Viking ordeal that \u201ctheir writings\nand their books in every church and in every sanctuary where they were,\nwere burnt and thrown into water by the plunderers from beginning to\nend\u201d (of the Norse invasion).\n\nCountless numbers of the illuminated books of the men of Erin and Alba\nthus perished. It was a mania with these illiterate rovers to destroy\nall learning. Eloquent testimony to this is borne by the historian\nKeating also. \u201cIt was not allowed,\u201d he says, \u201cto give instruction in\nletters.... No scholars, no clerics, no books, no holy relics were left\nin church or monastery through dread of them. Neither bard nor\nphilosopher nor musician pursued his wonted profession in the land.\u201d\n\nAnd if modern evidence were necessary it might be found in the fact that\nwhile Gaelic MSS. of the Viking age are to be found in almost every\nother country of Europe, there is not one to be gleaned in the lands\nwhence the Norsemen came. From which circumstance it may be inferred\nthat they set so little value upon these literary acquisitions that they\ntook no care to preserve them, or even to carry them away to their own\nterritory. When the tide of invasion had well nigh spent itself,\nIreland, once so rich in native literature, was found to be so depleted\nthat King Brian Boru had to send delegates abroad, \u201cto buy books beyond\nthe sea and the great ocean,\u201d as the records affirm, so scarce had they\nultimately become.\n\nYet even in their roving days the strenuous Norsemen had rare _eddas_\nand _sagas_ of their own, to which they were passionately devoted. These\nwere not then written down, but recited orally, like the Celtic tales,\ntill they found a literary embodiment in MS. books.\n\nIt was only towards the middle of the last century that their wonderful\nnational sagas burst upon Europe, and thrilled and surprised the learned\nquite as much as if they had felt a whiff of the old Viking breath upon\nthem. Prior to that time historians were largely dependent upon the\nEnglish, Irish, and Frankish chronicles for their knowledge of this\nnorthern race and their deeds of spoliation, but since the discovery in\nIceland of the literary remains of their immediate descendants, quite a\nfresh light has been cast upon their disposition and habits. And we\nrecognise that they were not quite the demons and fiends the monkish\nscribes believed them to be. It is clear that, having suffered so much\nfrom the hardy invader the latter had the tendency to exaggerate his\nferocity. For example, the author of the _Wars of the Gael with the\nGaill_: \u201cIn a word, although there were an hundred sharp, ready, cool,\nnever-resting brazen tongues in each head, and a hundred garrulous,\nloud, unceasing voices for each tongue, they could not recount nor\nnarrate nor enumerate nor tell what all the Gael suffered in common,\nboth men and women, laity and clergy, old and young, noble and ignoble,\nof hardship and of injury and of oppression in every house from these\nvaliant, wrathful, foreign, purely pagan people.\u201d\n\nIn every war and conquest there are dreadful happenings, and the Viking\nwas not troubled with sentiment or too much conscience in his\nproceedings. He was rough and ready\u2014like his trade, as we should say\u2014as\nhe needed to be in that age if he meant to be master or even to get a\nliving.\n\nGreat upheavals, we must remember, were taking place in his mother\ncountry and driving him from his home.\n\nTo take one example, Harold Fairhair, in bringing the whole of Norway\nunder his sway effected quite a revolution, changing the old \u00f6dal tenure\nby which the land was held into a feudal one. Rather than submit to the\nnew order many nobles and people simultaneously sought freedom\nelsewhere. They settled in Shetland, Orkney, and the Hebrides,\noccasionally raiding back to harass the king. But by the year 872 the\nlatter had so far established his rule at home that he was free to\ntackle these islands with their Norwegian rebels and annex the territory\nto Norway. Whereupon the more daring and independent spirits who had\nsettled there and in Ireland, and had contracted alliances in marriage\nwith leading native families, once more hived off, this time sailing\naway for Iceland to join friends and relations who had migrated thither\nfrom the mother country. And these were the nucleus of the colony whose\ndescendants produced the wonderful Icelandic literature which is now\nreckoned among the most valuable assets of medieval Europe. Among the\nsettlers were men who bore Gaelic names and left their impress upon this\nNorse heritage. From the parchments lately discovered upon which the\nhistory of the Vikings is written, and which are begrimed by the smoke\nof the Icelandic cabin and worn by the centuries that have passed over\nthem, we learn many things that tend to show the Northmen in a new\nlight. These men, who held undisputed sway of the seas for more than\nnine centuries, were not by any means barbarians. They had a\ncivilisation rivalling that of the Gael, though of a different warp and\nwoof, and they were not even without a script or mode of writing. The\ncharacters they used are known as runes, and may have been in use as\nearly as the second or third century.\n\nIn the sagas we are often told that drawings on shields and embroidery\non cloth were made by them to preserve the memory of heroic deeds and\nimportant events. And though the set who invaded our shores, in the\nstress of war and sailing were not likely to trouble much with learning\nor letters, their nation had doubtless retired _literati_ just like our\nown.\n\nTo trace the effect of these Norse invasions on Celtic literature will\nnow be our main endeavour.\n\nI. The first and immediate influence was doubtless to arrest its\nprogress. After ages of apparent barrenness, the genius of the\nGaelic-speaking peoples had at length produced the germ of a literature\nwhich in the days of St Patrick and St. Columba took root and began to\ngrow. For well-nigh four centuries it had gone on developing in a most\npromising way. The quiet and leisure of the monasteries furnished the\natmosphere most suitable for its inception and subsequent growth. These\nreligious retreats were then the centres of learning and nurseries of\nthought, and many men were arising within their sacred walls who had a\ngenuine love and taste for writing\u2014a love so great that they were not\nmerely content with copying books, composing poems, or writing history,\nbut they embellished them in a way which has excited the admiration of\nmodern times.\n\nGaelic literature both in Ireland and Scotland was thus bidding fair to\nyield a rich and abundant harvest when the blight of the Norse invasion\nfell suddenly upon it, and effectually hindered its farther advance for\nseveral centuries. The history of literary work in every age and country\nshows that it is mostly in times of peace that this delicate plant\nflourishes. In the stormier periods, when wars are waged, changes\nfrequent, and a spirit of unrest abroad, production of books is rare or\neven non-existent.\n\nWhen the Celts themselves were a warrior race, living for the most part\nby the sword, and migrating from land to land, they had no literature\nthat we know of. The conditions of life were not such that men could\nquietly cultivate the art and practice of writing. Life was too full of\nchange, too turbulent, and too uncertain.\n\nSimilarly the Norsemen during the Viking age, till they gained a\npeaceful retreat in Iceland, were no litterateurs. Sailing and fighting\nwere more exciting, and with these the habits of the scribe or of the\nauthor were not entirely compatible. And so when the tide of invasion\nburst upon the monasteries of Ireland and Scotland, when rest from\nstrife and security from change could no longer be had, authorship, if\nit did not entirely cease, became more rare and spasmodic. This is\nparticularly true of Scotland, for with the exception of the Book of\nDeer, with its Latin contents of the ninth century, and its Gaelic\nentries written towards the end of the Viking period, we have nothing to\nshow, of known Scottish origin, from the beginning to the end of these\nincursions. Ireland was more fortunate in that in spite of invasion her\nliterary output was more continuous, especially in the department of\npoetry.\n\nII. Contemporary with this arrested development, the sinister influence\nof the Norse depredations may be traced in another result, and one which\nhas left a deep and permanent mark in the history of Celtic literature.\nIt is the lamentable dispersion of the literary classes\u2014monks and\nmissionaries\u2014to the Continent with such books and MSS. as they were able\nto save from the violence of the invaders. Long before the inroads of\nthese Norsemen became a terror to the Gael, we know that Irish\nmissionaries had spread themselves over England, France, Germany,\nSwitzerland, and Italy. And in addition to their peripatetic preaching,\nthey had established monasteries and colleges for the diffusion of\nChristianity and learning. From MSS. preserved in St. Gall, Switzerland,\nwe gather that these pilgrim Scots usually travelled in companies,\nprovided with long walking-sticks, leathern wallets, and water-bottles.\nThey wore long flowing hair, and were clad in rough garments. Though\nthus rude and uncouth in appearance, they were accomplished scholars,\nmany of them, and easily acquired the languages of the countries through\nwhich they passed, or in which they settled and preached with all the\nperfervid eloquence so natural to the Celt. To show the extent of their\nwanderings, and the distinguished calibre of the missionaries\nthemselves, a few names may be given which still live in books and\ntradition. St. Columbanus, perhaps the best known of all, died in 615.\nHis name is perpetuated in the town of San Columbano. It was he who\nfounded the monasteries of Luxueil in France, and Bobbio among the\nApennines. Almost equally prominent as an evangelist was St. Gall, his\ncompanion, who gave his name not only to the town which subsequently\ngrew up beside his monastery, but also to a whole canton of Switzerland.\nThen there were St. Catald, from the school of Lismore in Ireland; St.\nDonnatt his brother, Bishop of Lupice in Naples; St Kilian the apostle\nand martyr of Franconia, still annually commemorated at W\u00fcrzburg. At a\nmonastery near Strasburg, also founded by an Irish bishop, there is a\ncharter of date 810, which specifies grants made to that house, to the\npoor, and to the pilgrim Scots\u2014the nine of whom therein mentioned are\nall bishops except the abbot. In the ninth century there was a convent\nof Scots at Mont St. Victor near Feldkirk. Dungall, of the same Scotic\nnationality, figures as the author of the famous letter to Charlemagne\non the eclipses of 810, and he held the office of preceptor at the\ncathedral school at Pavia. Besides the numerous other places in which\nthey laboured, from the middle of the seventh to the twelfth century,\nScotic monasteries were founded at Ratisbon, Vienna, Eichstadt,\nW\u00fcrzburg, Erfurt, Kelheim, and Constance.\n\nThese earlier retreats served as so many houses of refuge for the poor\nmonks and scholars flying from the fury of the Norsemen, when life and\nproperty became insecure at home, in Iona, and elsewhere. It is known\nthat a fresh tide of Gaelic pilgrims set out for the Continent from the\ntime that the new peril appeared, seeking safe custody for themselves\nand their books among their countrymen abroad.\n\nAnd thus it has come to pass that there are to-day hundreds of Celtic\nMSS. in Latin and Gaelic widely scattered throughout Europe, in places\nas far apart as Paris, Brussels, Dresden, Berne, Vienna, Rome, Florence,\nMilan, Schaffhausen, St. Gall, etc. And while in the British Isles we\nhave only seven of these with Gaelic writing prior to the eleventh\ncentury, on the Continent there are as many as twenty.\n\nIt is surmised that it was in this manner in 825, after the attack on\nIona and murder of St. Blathmac, that the famous _Vita Columb\u00e6_ of\nAdamnan found its way to Reichenau on the Rhine, where it remained for\nnearly a millennium, till it was ultimately transferred to Schaffhausen.\n\nThese are two far-reaching and long-lasting effects of the Viking\ntroubles\u2014the arrest of the literary development and the dispersion of\nthe documents, but they by no means exhaust the category.\n\nIII. We have now to take into account the severance of Ireland from\nScotland. Anterior to the Norse invasions the language and literature of\nboth were one. There is no distinction to be made, for they were common\nto both countries from the time of St. Columba, and there was constant\ncoming and going between Scotland and Ireland. But when the Norsemen\ncame they effectually put a stop to this. For two centuries they kept\nthe kindred realms apart, and never again was the original unity\nrestored.\n\nDuring the period of disjunction the separated parts began to travel on\ndifferent lines, and when the Viking sway ceased to sever them, the\nlanguage and literature of each had already taken on a character of its\nown sufficiently divergent to keep them for ever asunder. The Book of\nDeer is the first monument of this departure in Scotland, even as the\nLeabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre and _Liber Hymnorum_ are the earliest in Ireland.\n\nThe Norse invasions were thus directly responsible for the rise of the\nScottish Gaelic and our native vernacular literature as distinct from\nthe Irish. Had it not been for their interception there is no knowing\nhow long the two dialects might have continued as one.\n\nAs it was, notwithstanding the growing divergence, the written, though\nnot the spoken language of both countries might be regarded as still,\nfor the most part, the same in form till the fourteenth century. After\nthat they ceased to be even apparently identical, and to-day the chief\ndifferences between the two tongues are these four:\u2014\n\n1. The Irish has a future in the verb, whereas Gaelic uses the present\ntense to indicate futurity.\n\n2. Inflection is fuller in written Irish than in written Gaelic.\n\n3. In Irish (south especially) the accent remains on the end syllable,\nwhereas in Gaelic it is nearly always on the first.\n\n4. In Gaelic every noun outside the _o_ declension forms the plural in\n_n_, whereas in Irish _n_ is shown very rarely.\n\nIV. Instead of the parent Irish, there was from henceforth a Norse\nlinguistic influence upon the language of Scotland. There can be no\ndoubt that the new element thus imported into the Gaelic is very\nconsiderable. Yet this is a department of philology which has never been\nadequately worked. It offers an interesting field for further research\nand inquiry, and it is gratifying to know that the study of Irish-Norse\nrelations, in its various aspects, claims the attention of such eminent\nwriters as Professor Zimmer, Professor Sophus Bugge, Dr. Alexander\nBugge, Dr. Craigie of Oxford, and Miss Faraday.\n\nWe have to reckon with the fact that the Norsemen came in large numbers,\nand freely intermarried with the native races, so that to-day the\ninhabitants of Orkney, North-east Caithness, North and West Sutherland,\nand North Lewis, differ very little in physique and general appearance\nfrom the people of Norway and Iceland. And in Skye, Islay, and Kintyre\nthere is a large admixture of Viking blood, as well as in the other\nHebridean Islands, though not so marked in Mull and Jura.\n\nAs we should expect, the Norse element in the Gaelic is most in evidence\nin maritime terms and place names.\n\nAs examples of the former, we have _vata_, a boat; _sgoth_, a skiff;\n_birlinn_, a yacht; _sgioba_, a crew; _stiuir_, a rudder; _ailm_, a\nhelm; _sgod_, the sheet of the sail; _rac_, the masthoop; _stagh_, the\nstay; _reang_, the rib; _tobhta_, the thwart; _tearr_, tar; _spor_, a\nflint.\n\nThen we have _eilean_ for island; _haf_, the open sea; _ob_, a\nland-locked bay, as in Oban; _uig_, a creek; _aoi_, an isthmus;\n_geodha_, a gully; _sgeir_, a reef; _bodha_ and _roc_, sunken rocks;\n_cleit_, a cliff; _grunnd_, the bottom; _bruic_, sea-weed.\n\nOf place names there is no lack. It has been calculated that in Lewis,\nNorse are still to Gaelic names as three or four to one; in Skye as\nthree to two; in Islay as one to two; in Kintyre as one to four; in\nArran and the Isle of Man as one to eight.\n\nThe Minch they called Skottlandsfjord. The smaller isles were nearly all\nrenamed, Eriskay, Eric\u2019s isle; Jura, deer\u2019s isle; Pladda, flat isle;\nStaffa, stave isle; Sanda, sand isle. To the larger islands the invaders\nleft their original names, though these were occasionally sounded in\nNorse fashion, as, for example, Sgith (Skye) as Ski\u014d with long vowel.\n\nPersonal names were also imported; Rognvald as Raonall or Rao\u2019all,\nRagnhilda as Raonailt, Torcull, Goraidh, etc. The Latin Magnus, which\nwas common as a personal name in Norway, we borrowed in the Gaelic form\nManus; and such surnames as Macleod, Nicolson, Macaulay, and Macaskill\nwith the Celtic Mac prefixed.\n\nOther common words of Norse derivation are _traill_, a slave; _nabuidh_,\na neighbour; _sgillinn_, a penny; _m\u00f2d_, a court of justice, meeting;\n_gadhar_, a greyhound; _toraisgean_, a peat knife, half Norse, half\nGaelic; _suith_, soot; _shearradair_, towel; _mal_, rent; _gleadhraich_,\nnoise.\n\nThe Vikings were called _sumarlidi_, \u201csummer wanderers,\u201d because they\nwere most abroad at that season, and from this came the name once famous\nin the West\u2014\u201cSomerled\u201d of the Isles. To the Norse is also attributed the\ninsertion of _t_ in words like _struth_ for _sruth_, _stron_ for _sron_.\n\nV. But more important even than the introduction of new words was the\ninfluence upon the structure of the language. And competent authorities\nhold that to it we must assign the main share in accelerating the decay\nof inflection noticeable in the Scottish Gaelic and Manx as compared\nwith the Irish. The latter was not so much exposed to Norse influence as\nthe former. And it is very apparent that the change referred to began to\nassert itself soon after the Norse had ostracised the Irish, and taken\nits place as a rival language in the West, destined to influence the\nlocal Gaelic.\n\nIt is not contended that the Gaelic writers derived any help from the\nNorsemen. They were themselves the more advanced of the two. On the\nother hand, the Icelandic scholar Viglisson has traced Gaelic rhymes and\nmeasures as well as Gaelic ideas in the old Norse literature, and\nProfessor Zimmer even suggests that the Icelander owes to the Gael his\nprose style. In the Islendinga Book, c. 1., we read that when Iceland\nwas first settled from Norway in the days of Harold Fairhair there were\nChristian men, whom the Norsemen called Papa, but who afterwards went\naway because they would not remain with the heathen, and left behind\nthem Irish books and croziers and bells, from which it could be seen\nthat they were Irishmen.[26]\n\nVI. How far the Norse ideas have entered into the warp and woof of\nGaelic literature is perhaps the most interesting aspect of the whole\nsubject, and one that offers a wide field for research. It cannot yet be\nsaid that we have sufficiently differentiated between the two sets of\nlegends, beliefs, and customs to be able to affirm with certainty that\nsuch and such belong to the one race, and such and such belong to the\nother. The mythologies of peoples have so much in common, so much that\nseems characteristic of the thinking of the whole human race at certain\nstages of its development, that many ideas and legends have no exclusive\nvalue, and cannot be claimed as the original heritage of one people more\nthan another.\n\nYet conceptions pass from land to land and folk to folk, like an\nepidemic, and become assimilated by each new race that breathes or\nimbibes them, and as the Gaels have contributed to the thought of the\nNorsemen, so have the Vikings in turn impressed their ideas, especially\ntheir legends and beliefs, upon the imaginative race with whom they\nmingled, and by whom they ultimately became absorbed.\n\nWhen we remember that, in the opinion of the best authorities, even the\nvery oldest of the Gaelic sagas could hardly have been written down\nbefore the seventh or eighth century, and that many of them are of much\nlater date, we can well conceive how a Norse element might enter largely\ninto them.\n\nIt is well known that the Lochlanners or Norsemen figure largely in the\nOssianic poems, and \u201cit is quite evident,\u201d says Dr. Hyde, \u201cthat most of\nthem, at least in the modern form in which we now have them, are\npost-Norse productions.\u201d\n\nIn the Mythological, which is really the latest in point of writing,\nwhile the Fomorians who dwelt in Lochlann, vicious and troublesome\ninvaders as they were, may in their origin be conceived as none other\nthan the sea-powers personified\u2014the rough chaotic tumult of the Atlantic\nOcean, against which in the west of Ireland the various settlers had to\ncontend, they might more literally represent the Viking rovers which\nlater ages had to encounter, and by whom they were so often harassed and\novercome.\n\nIn such stories as The Children of Lir, and more particularly The\nChildren of Tuireann, we have Gaelic examples of Norse beliefs and\nsuperstitions. Take, for instance, shape-changing, of which there are\nmany illustrations in the Viking sagas. We are reminded at once of the\nunhappy fate of the children of Lir, when we read in the Hrolf Kraki,\ncc. 25, 26, that \u201cKing Hring of Uppdalir in Norway had a son Bj\u00f6rn, and\nwhen his wife died, he married a woman from Tuinm\u00f4rk. She changed her\nstepson into a bear in this way. She struck him with a wolf-skin glove,\nand said that he should become a fierce and cruel lair-bear, and use no\nother food than the cattle of his father.\u201d She went on to say, \u201cThou\nshalt kill it for thy food, so much of it that it will be unexampled,\nand never shalt thou get out of this spell, and this revenge shall harm\nthee.\u201d\n\nThen it is told that the king\u2019s cattle were killed in large numbers, as\na big and fierce grey bear began to attack them. One evening the Bondi\u2019s\ndaughter (Bj\u00f6rn\u2019s sweetheart) happened to see this fierce bear, which\ncame and fondled her much. She thought she recognised in the animal the\neyes of her lover, and followed him to his den, where, strange to\nrelate, she saw, not the bear, but a man. And Bj\u00f6rn, for he was no\nother, told her he was a beast by day and a man by night.\n\nAs in this Norse saga we have the marriage, the stepmother, the revenge,\nthe striking with the wolf-skin glove, the spell, all corresponding to\nthe similar details in the Gaelic tale, with the exception that in the\nlatter the objects are usually struck by a magic wand instead of by a\nwolf-skin glove. And comparing it with the story of the children of\nTuireann, Cian went into the shape of a pig, while Bj\u00f6rn figured as a\nbear.\n\nThe two Gaelic stories above referred to, though they profess to belong\nto the Mythological age, centuries before Christ, were actually written\ndown much later than the Heroic tales. The Norse story, on the other\nhand, is supposed to be laid in the sixth century A.D., and it would be\nhard to say, we daresay, which originated first or found the earliest\nexpression in writing.\n\nAnother Viking idea which has found its way into Gaelic literature is\nthe belief in a Valhalla, or hall of the slain. It was held that to fall\ngloriously on the field of battle secured undisputed entrance into this\nheaven. In the \u201cAged Bard\u2019s Wish,\u201d an attractive poem of the Macpherson\nperiod, we find the bard desirous of obtaining entry at death into the\nhall where dwell Ossian and Daol. This conception of the future was\nevidently adopted from Norse traditions, for the Gael, so far as is\nknown, had not originally the idea of a Valhalla. Transmigration was\nmore in his line. And curious was the occupation of the warriors in the\nhall of the slain.\n\n\u201cEvery day after having dressed, they put on their war clothes, and go\nout into the enclosure and fight and slay each other. This is their\ngame; near day meal they ride home to Valhalla and sit down to drink\u201d\n(later edda, c. 40).\n\nThe unworthy and fushionless had not this bliss. Their portion was a\nregion cold, foggy, and cheerless. And it is thought that the author of\nAdamnan\u2019s vision may have got his cold and wet imagery of the place of\nwoe from the pagan invaders. St. Brendan, in his _Navigatio Brendani_, a\nbook well known in medieval Europe, gives a legend which is one of the\nmost singular products of Celtic imagination. He found Judas upon a rock\nin the midst of the Polar seas. Once a week he passes a day there to\nrefresh himself from the fires of Hell. A cloak that he had given to a\nbeggar is hung before him and tempers his sufferings. As St. Brendan\nlived in the middle of the sixth century the subject of the legend is\npre-Norse, and it is the heat that is represented as infernal. Dante, it\nwill be remembered, reserves the ice and cold for the last degree of\ntorment in the Inferno. And of Highland bards, Duncan Macrae, David\nMackellar, and others, down to the eighteenth century, have introduced\nthe same idea. Indeed, it has even been hinted that the tendency of the\nHighland preacher to dwell upon the sterner aspects of our faith may\nwell be due to the lingering influence of the northern paganism. But\nthis we think rather far-fetched and unlikely, for other less ancient\ninfluences, local and potent, have been at work to depress the outlook\nof the Gael.\n\nThe Norseman, however, is still with us in hidden and often unknown\ncorners of our life, our literature, and our history. Perhaps to him we\nowe our continuance as a race to this day. He has carried with him over\nthe wave the breath of freedom and strenuous endeavour, and infused them\ninto the life of this great nation, helping Britain to build up and\nmaintain a world-wide empire and supremacy upon the seas.\n\nBut judging his influence upon Gaelic literature solely, we cannot say\nthat, so far as it is known, it was of a helpful or even far-reaching\nkind. In the first shock of invasion it would rather seem to have been\nruinous and deleterious in its effects, arresting development and\ndispersing the rising literary activity.\n\nBut what if it could be proved by further research that while distinctly\nhostile to the ecclesiastical order in all its manifestations and\nproductions, and therefore its books, the appearance of the Norsemen in\nthese islands revived the interest in the native sagas, so that the\nscribes were encouraged to write them down and preserve them for future\nages. Then verily it might with strictest veracity be said that to the\nVikings we owe the cream of our literature, for it is a recognised fact\nthat \u201cthe sagas and historic tales, and the poetry that is mingled with\nthem, are of far greater importance from a purely literary point of\nview\u201d than all the ecclesiastical transcriptions and contributions of\nthe period. But this is a suggestion we offer as not at all improbable,\nand, like the whole subject of Norse influence, is worthy of a fuller\ninvestigation than any it has yet received.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XII\n                    THE FOUR ANCIENT BOOKS OF WALES\n\n  The _Myvyrian Archaiology_\u2014Oldest texts\u2014The Black Book of\n      Caermarthen\u2014The Book of Aneurin\u2014The Book of Taliessin\u2014The Red Book\n      of Hergest\u2014Gildas and Nennius\u2014The ancient Laws and Institutes\u2014A\n      great dialectic battle\u2014The princes of song\u2014\u201cI Yscolan\u201d\u2014A Welsh\n      Ossianic poem\u2014Characteristics of the early poetry\u2014The medieval\n      romances\u2014Their history\u2014Modern translations of the Mabinogion\u2014Two\n      classes of tales\u2014The legend of Taliessin\u2014His curious odes\u2014Kilhwch\n      and Olwen\u2014The Lady of the Fountain\u2014Three striking features of the\n      Arthurian romances\u2014Their influence on Western Europe.\n\n\nThe arrival of James Macpherson marks a great moment in the history of\nCeltic literature. It was the signal for a general resurrection. It\nwould seem as if he sounded the trumpet, and the graves of ancient MSS.\nwere opened, the books were read, and the dead were judged out of the\nthings that were written in them.\n\nThis is true not only of the Highland and Irish barderie, but also of\nthe poetry of Wales. The sudden popularity of the Ossianic publications\nled to a desire on the part of the Welsh to show that they also were in\npossession of a body of native poems not less interesting, and with far\nbetter claims, as they thought, to authenticity. It is significant to\nnote that though Edward Lhuyd gave an account of the Welsh MSS. in the\n_Arch\u00e6ologica Britannica_ as early as 1707, none of the poems were\nprinted till the era of Macpherson. His famous _Fragments of Ancient\nPoetry Collected in the Highlands of Scotland_, 1760, was soon followed\nby a succession of rival publications from the sister country, such as\n_Specimens of the Poetry of the Ancient Welsh Bards_, 1764; _Musical and\nPoetical Relics of the Welsh Bards_, 1784; \u201cPoems of Taliessin,\u201d in the\n_Gentleman\u2019s Magazine_, 1789\u201390; _The Heroic Elegies and other Pieces of\nLlywarch H\u00ean_, 1792, and in the year 1801 the text of the whole of the\npoems. This latter figures as the now oft-quoted _Myvyrian Archaiology\nof Wales_, containing all the chief productions of Welsh literature, and\nwas published in 1801\u20131807 by Owen Jones, a wealthy furrier in Thames\nStreet, London. Interested scholars, among them Aneurin Owen, Thomas\nPrice, William Rees, and John Jones set themselves to finish the work of\nthe Myvyrian peasant.\n\nThere was no lack of venerable MSS. from which to draw, for many\ntranscripts had been made from time to time in the past. But the sources\nto which we must go for the oldest texts are mainly four, known as _The\nFour Ancient Books of Wales_, namely:\u2014\n\n                     The Black Book of Caermarthen.\n                     The Book of Aneurin.\n                     The Book of Taliessin.\n                     The Red Book of Hergest.\n\nThe Black Book of Caermarthen is the oldest. It is a MS. of the twelfth\ncentury in the Hengwrt collection, and contains only poems. It consists\nof fifty-four folios of parchment in small quarto, with illuminated\ncapitals. There are four different handwritings, apparently of the same\nperiod, with the exception of a few insertions made by a subsequent\nwriter. The MS. belonged originally to the six black Canons of the\npriory of Caermarthen. Hence the name. After the dissolution of that\nreligious house at the Reformation, it passed into the hands of Sir John\nPrice, a native of Brecnockshire, and before the year 1658 was in the\nHengwrt collection. Last century it changed hands again, when the whole\nof the latter most valuable collection was bequeathed to W. W. E. Wynne,\nEsq., of Peniarth.\n\nThe Book of Aneurin, second in point of antiquity, belongs to the\nthirteenth century. It also is a small quarto, consisting of nineteen\nfolios of parchment. Here we have, perhaps, the most ancient copy now\nextant of that truly venerable and illustrious relic of Welsh poetry\ncalled the \u201cGododin,\u201d as well as the four Gorchanau, not quite so old.\nThe capitals which mark the beginning of the stanzas are coloured\nalternately red and green. This literary monument belonged formerly to\nthe Hengwrt collection, but in more recent times was bought from Mrs.\nPowell of Abergavenny by Sir Thomas Phillipps, Bart., of Middle Hill.\n\nThe Book of Taliessin, third in order, is still in the same collection.\nA small quarto MS. written on vellum, in one hand throughout, of the\nearly fourteenth century, it consists now of thirty-eight leaves, and\nwants the outer page both at the beginning and at the end. Hence it\nbegins in the middle of one poem and ends in that of another.\n\nThe last, but certainly not the least of this wonderful series, is the\nRed Book of Hergest in Jesus College, Oxford. It is a thick folio\ncontaining 360 leaves of vellum, and has been written at different times\nfrom the early part of the fourteenth century till the middle of the\nfifteenth. From this valuable codex Lady Charlotte Guest got eleven of\nher far-famed stories.\n\nThe book takes its name from Hergest Court, a seat of the Vaughans, near\nKnighton, Radnorshire, and before it was finally gifted to Jesus College\nin 1701, it passed through several hands.\n\nIt is written in double columns, in three different handwritings. There\nis reason to infer that it was begun in 1318 at the very latest, a date\ngiven in one of the columns, and that it was finished in 1454. The book\nis an enormous compilation of Welsh compositions in prose and verse, of\nall the periods from the sixth century till the middle of the fifteenth.\n\nEmbellished lately in a magnificent binding of red morocco with steel\nclasps, and preciously preserved in a case, it is now shown as one of\nthe curiosities of Oxford.\n\nIf we except this codex and others in Jesus College, and those in the\nBritish Museum, most of the Welsh MSS. are in private hands. They used\nto belong to the religious institutions, but when these were done away\nwith in the reign of Henry VIII., the ancient documents were dispersed.\nVarious leading families of Wales afterwards made collections, thus\nhelping to preserve the MSS. from destruction, but more than one of\nthese collections have since been destroyed by fire.\n\nIt must be understood that though the four great books of poetry and\nromance here considered have been called _The Four Ancient Books of\nWales_, they are not the only compositions of a remote origin. For there\nare three other notable works represented in very old MSS. These are,\nfirst, the history and epistle of Gildas, forming one Latin treatise on\nthe early history of the country, and written by him in the year 560. Of\nthis work there have been three MSS. The oldest perished, but not before\na printed copy had been taken of it in 1568. The other two, one of the\nthirteenth and the other of the fourteenth century, are still extant in\nthe public library of Cambridge.\n\nNext to this very ancient history of Gildas is that of Nennius\u2014an\nedition of the _History of the Britons_ made by him in 858. There are\nthree MSS. extant of this venerable book dating as early as the tenth\ncentury\u2014one in the Vatican, one in Paris, and one in the British Museum.\n\nNot less celebrated is the great native compilation entitled _The\nAncient Laws and Institutes of Wales_. The oldest of them, namely, The\nLaws of Howeldda, belong to the tenth century.\n\nWales thus possesses a literature which for antiquity carries us back as\nfar as the age of St. Columba. In the sixth century, when the Abbot of\nIona was opening the page of poetic history in Scotland, the little land\nin the west had many distinguished bards, such as Aneurin, Taliessin,\nLlywarch H\u00ean, Myrddin, Kian, Talhaiarn. For the preservation of their\npieces we are mainly indebted to _The Four Ancient Books_.\n\nAs in the case of the Ossianic compositions, a great dialectic battle\nwas fought over the origin of these Cymric poems, some, such as Malcolm\nLaing and John Pinkerton, denying, and others affirming their antiquity,\nbut the outcome of the controversy has been to establish their genuine\nauthenticity. While it is freely admitted by the best critics that many\nof the pieces traditionally attributed to Taliessin are not older than\nthe twelfth century, no one now disputes that Aneurin, Taliessin,\nLlywarch H\u00ean, and Myrddin were famous bards who lived and composed in\nthe sixth century, and that we have some of their poems preserved in the\nabove-mentioned books with the exception, perhaps, of Myrddin\u2019s. The\nhonour of the title \u201cKing of the bards\u201d lies between the first two, both\nof whom have been so designated. Stephens, in his _Literature of the\nCymry_, gives the palm to Aneurin. His great poem, the \u201cGododin,\u201d has\nattracted much attention on account of its peculiar character and\nrecognised historic value. It is practically divided into two parts by\nstanza forty-five, where the author speaks in his own name. The first\npart is consistent throughout, and Dr. Skene regards it as the original,\nas distinguished from the second, which may be a later continuation made\nup of other incidents. The poem is found in the Book of Aneurin, and\nvarious theories have been advanced as to the locality and date of the\nbattle it treats of. One of these assumed that the subject was a\nstruggle between the tribe Ottadeni and the Saxons in the sixth century.\nAnother, that it referred, on the contrary, to the traditional slaughter\nof the British chiefs at Stonehenge by Hengest in \u201cThe Plot of the Long\nKnives.\u201d A third would find in it the battle mentioned by Bede as having\nbeen fought between Aidan, King of the Scots of Dalriada, and Ethelfrid,\nKing of Northumbria, in 603. A fourth theory suggests _that_ between\nOswy and Penda. But the name of the Scottish Donald Brec emerges in the\nstory, \u201cA phen dyvynwal vrych brein ae cnoyn,\u201d which in English means,\n\u201cAnd the head of Donald Brec the ravens gnawed it.\u201d The scene of the\nstruggle appears to have been Catraeth and Gododin. And it is\ninteresting to note that one of the editors of the _Myvyrian\nArchaiology_ (Mr. Edward Williams) locates it in Roxburghshire, as the\nbattle fought between the Cymry and Saxons in 570. Villemarqu\u00e9, on the\nother hand, in his, _Poems des Bardes Bretons_, places the contest on\nthe banks of the Calder in Lanarkshire in 578. While Dr. Skene is\nequally sure that the requirements of the case are met \u201cin that part of\nScotland where Lothian meets Stirlingshire in the two districts of\nGododin and Catraeth, both washed by the sea of the Firth of Forth, and\nwhere the great Roman wall terminates at Caredin, or the Fort of\nEidinn.\u201d\n\nThe style of the poem may be gleaned from the following rendering:\u2014\n\n A grievous descent was made on his native place,\n The price of mead in the hall, and the feast of wine;\n His blades were scattered about between two armies;\n Illustrious was the Knight in front of Gododin,\n Eithinyn the renowned, an ardent spirit the bull of conflict.\n A grievous descent was made in front of the extended riches,\n The army dispersed with trailing shields\u2014\n A shivered shield before the herd of the roaring Beli,\n A dwarf from the bloody field hastened to the fence;\n On our part there came a hoary-headed man to take counsel\n On a prancing steed bearing a message from the golden-torqued leader.\n Twrch proposed a compact in front of the destructive course,\n Worthy was the shout of refusal.\n We cried, Let Heaven be our protection;\n Let his compact be that he should be prostrated by the spear in battle.\n The warriors of the far-famed Alclud\n Would not contend without prostrating his host to the ground.\n\nLike Ossian, Aneurin appears to have been a warrior-bard. Where he\nspeaks of himself he says:\u2014\n\n             I am not headstrong and petulant.\n             I will not avenge myself on him who drives me.\n             I will not laugh in derision.\n             Under foot for a while,\n             My knee is stretched,\n             My hands are bound\n             In the earthen house,\n             With an iron chain\n             Around my two knees.\n             Yet of the mead from the horn,\n             And of the men of Catraeth,\n             I, Aneurin, will compose,\n             As Taliessin knows,\n             An elaborate song\n             Or a strain to Gododin\n             Before the dawn of the brightest day.\n\nTaliessin, on the other hand, was no warrior, simply a bard. Several of\nhis pieces possess more real poetry than any part of the \u201cGododin.\u201d As\nStephens has remarked, they show more skill in composition, finer ideas,\nbolder images, and more intense passion than any poet of the same age.\nThere are seventy-seven pieces attributed to him, twelve of which, this\ncritic thinks, may be genuine, and as old as the sixth century; among\nthese the \u201cBattle of Gwenystrad,\u201d the \u201cBattle of Argoed Llwyvain,\u201d the\n\u201cBattle of Dyffryn Gwarant,\u201d and some of the Gorchanau. In after life\nTaliessin became the bard of Urien Rheged, to whom and to his son Owain\nhis chief poems are addressed. These contain some passages of exquisite\nbeauty.\n\nLlywarch H\u00ean does not rival the other two as a prince of song, yet his\npoems are not lacking in poetic excellence. They are undoubtedly old,\nand valuable from his descriptions of manners, and the incidental\nallusions he makes that are strikingly illustrative of the age, and all\nthe more interesting because we have so few other authorities to\nenlighten us as to its manners. His forte lay not so much in heroic\npoetry as in elegies and pathetic lamentations. Of the poems attributed\nto him in the Red Book of Hergest the following is a specimen:\u2014\n\n        Sitting high upon a hill, battle inclined is\n        My mind, and it does not impel me onward.\n        Short is my journey, my tenement is laid waste.\n\n        Sharp is the gale, it is bare punishment to live,\n        When the trees array themselves in gay colours\n        Of summer, violently ill I am this day.\n\n        I am no hunter, I keep no animal of the chase,\n        I cannot move about;\n        As long as it pleases the cuckoo, let her sing.\n\n        The loud-voiced cuckoo sings with the dawn,\n        Her melodious notes in the dales of Cuawg;\n        Better is the lavisher than the miser.\n\n        At Aber Cuawg the cuckoos sing\n        On the blossom covered branches;\n        The loud-voiced cuckoo, let her sing awhile.\n\n        At Aber Cuawg the cuckoos sing,\n        On the blossom covered branches;\n        Woe to the sick that hears their contented notes.\n\n        At Aber Cuawg the cuckoos sing,\n        The recollection in my mind;\n        There are that hear them that will not hear them again.\n\n        Have I not listened to the cuckoo on the ivied tree?\n        Did not my shield hang down?\n        What I loved is but vexation; what I loved is no more.\n\nIn such doleful strains the bard continues his parable. The sad note of\nthe Gael is not lacking in him.\n\nMyrddin is the fourth great poet of the sixth century. Various poems are\nreputed his in the _Myvyrian Archaiology_, but they are all probably of\na much later date, as Stephens and others think. One of the most\ninteresting to us of these traditional Myrddin pieces is the \u201cI\nYscolan.\u201d It appears in the Black Book of Caermarthen. Yscolan is\nrepresented as having held a dialogue with Myrddin. To have done so he\nmust have lived in the sixth century. Welsh writers, like Davies and\nStephens, identify the name as St. Colan or Columba. \u201cInstead of being\nunknown to the Cymry of the Middle Ages, no person was better known than\nYscolan,\u201d says Stephens. From their view Dr. Skene dissents, and\nProfessor Rhys also holds it utterly impossible that Yscolan was St.\nColumba, as the two names cannot be connected, _Columba_ being in Welsh\n_Cwlum_. It is not maintained by any of these critics that the poem, as\nit stands, is anything like so old as the period of Myrddin. But older\nit evidently is than the time of Edward I., and this shows, as the Welsh\nwriters affirm, the existence among the bards, from an early date, of a\ntradition that St. Columba had, in his zeal for Christianity, destroyed\nsome druidic books. This tradition got mixed up with a later one about\nthe books of Cambria, which had been sent to the White Tower of London\nfor security, having been destroyed there by some Vandal of an Yscolan,\nwho must have lived after the twelfth century.\n\nBut whoever the Yscolan of the dialogue was, Myrddin assails him thus\n(Stephens\u2019 version):\u2014\n\n                 Black is thy horse, and black thy cap,\n                 Black thy head, and black thyself,\n                 Black-headed man, art thou Yscolan?\n\nAnd Yscolan answers:\u2014\n\n  I am Yscolan the Scholar,\n  Light is my Scottish knowledge.\n  My grief is incurable for making the ruler take offence[27] at thee.\n\n  For having burnt a church,[28] destroyed the cattle of a school,\n  And caused a book to be drowned,\n  I feel my penance to be heavy.\n\n  Creator of all creations,\n  And greatest of all supporters,\n  Forgive me my fault.\n\n  A full year I have been\n  At Bangor on the pole of a weir.\n  Consider thou my sufferings from sea-worms.\n\n  If I had known as well as I now do\n  How clearly the wind blows upon the sprigs of the waving wood,\n  I should not have done what I did.\n\nHad he known of certain proofs of druidic excellence he would have\nrefrained. Though the tradition of St. Columba having destroyed some\npagan books may have actually been current among the Welsh bards, it is\nvery unlikely that he ever met Myrddin. As Dr. Skene suggests, the black\nYscolan may well have been one of the black Canons of Caermarthen\nconnected with some book-episode in the Tower. For we know from Adamnan\nthat the dress of Columba was white, and the above sketch hardly fits in\nwith his history. It is interesting to note that in the book called\nTaliessin, there is \u201cThe Death-song of Corroi, son of Dayry,\u201d curiously\nenough the only specimen of a Welsh Ossianic poem which has come down to\nus. It tells the story of Curigh of Munster; and Cuchulinn, the famous\nhero of Ulster:\u2014\n\n              Tales will be known to me from sky to earth\n              Of the contention of Corroi and Cocholyn,\n              Numerous their tumults about their borders.\n\nThis poem is fully noticed by Dr. Skene in his edition of the _Book of\nthe Dean of Lismore_, p. 141.\n\nTaking the Welsh poems as a whole, the difficulty has always been to\ndifferentiate between the historical and the mythological. They are\nusually so obscure in themselves, especially the so-called mythological\nones, that some think there lurks in them a system of mystical and\nsemi-pagan philosophy handed down from the Druids, and which our age\ncannot fathom.\n\nOthers think that they are nothing but the wild and extravagant\nvapourings of bards of the twelfth and subsequent centuries. Referring\nto this, Dr. Skene wrote in his edition of the poems, and translations\nof the poems, in _The Four Ancient Books of Wales_, vol. i. pp. 15, 16:\u2014\n\n  I consider that the true value of these poems is a problem which has\n  still to be solved. Whether they are genuine works of the bards whose\n  names they bear, or whether they are the production of a later age, I\n  do not believe that they contain any such system of Druidism or\n  Neo-Druidism as Davies, Herbert, and others attempt to find in them,\n  nor do I think that their authors wrote, and the compilers of these\n  ancient MSS. took the pains to transcribe, century after century, what\n  was a mere farago of nonsense and of no historical or literary value.\n  I think that these poems have a meaning, and that, both in connection\n  with the history and literature of Wales, that meaning is worth\n  finding out; and I think further, that if they were subjected to a\n  just and candid criticism, we ought to be able to ascertain their true\n  place and value in the literature of Wales.\n\nRenan, on the other hand, held that bardism lasted into the heart of the\nMiddle Ages under the form of a secret doctrine, with a conventional\nlanguage and symbols almost wholly derived from the solar divinity of\nArthur. \u201cThis,\u201d he says, \u201cmay be termed Neo-Druidism, a kind of Druidism\nsubtilised and reformed on the model of Christianity, which may be seen\ngrowing more and more obscure and mysterious until the moment of its\ntotal disappearance.\u201d\n\nOne remarkable fact in connection with these early poems is how few of\nthem contain any notice of Arthur. Out of the whole number there are\nonly five which mention him at all, and then it is the historical\nArthur, the Guledig, to whom the defence of the wall was entrusted, and\nwho fought the twelve battles in the north, perishing at Camlan.\n\nFor accounts of the ideal Arthur we need to turn to the medieval\nromances, and this is the part of Welsh literature which has most\nfascinated the world and influenced the literatures of Europe. It is\nwell known how there arose on the Continent in the twelfth and\nthirteenth centuries a body of Romance, popular in England, France,\nGermany, Norway, Sweden, and even Iceland, down to the Reformation, and\nit is equally well known that the origin of these tales may be traced to\nWales through the north-west of France\u2014the modern Brittany.\n\nFirst appeared the _Historia Britonum_ of Gruffydd ap Arthur, commonly\nknown as Geoffrey of Monmouth, who was a Welsh priest, born in 1128. In\nthis book he professed to have translated into Latin from an ancient\nWelsh MS. the history of Britain from the days when the fabulous Brut,\nthe great-grandson of Aeneas, landed on its shores, down through the\nwhole period of King Arthur and his Round Table to Cadwaladr, a Cymric\nking who died in 689. From the Latin the stories were put into French\nverse by Gaimar, and getting to France they fell into the hands of\nRobert Wace, a native of Jersey (and Norman trouv\u00e8re), who, with the\nhelp of other independent sources of information, made them into a poem\nin 1155, which he called the \u201cBrut.\u201d\n\nIn this form the Romance found its way back to England, and about 1205\nwas told for the first time in English verse by Layamon, an English\npriest who dwelt on the banks of the upper Severn, and who was thus,\nbesides being indebted to Wace, near enough the original source to have\naccess to the great body of Welsh literature then current on the\nsubject.\n\nThrough these, and French authors, the Cymric tales soon passed to other\nContinental lands, and since then have been retouched, paraphrased, and\namplified in all the languages of Europe. They belong to the age, and\nbreathe the spirit of chivalry.\n\nIn modern times these romances have again attracted attention, and\nbecome famous through the publication of Lady Charlotte Guest\u2019s English\ntranslations of the Mabinogion, 1st edition, 1837\u201349, and reprint, 1877;\nVicomte de la Villemarqu\u00e9\u2019s French translations of the Welsh poems and\nRound Table romances in 1841 and subsequently; and later still,\nProfessor Loth of Rennes\u2019 translation of the Mabinogion.\n\nAs in the case of the Gaelic sagas, traditions had been floating among\nthe Welsh people for hundreds of years, and when the general awakening\nof the twelfth century took place, a natural desire sprung up to have\nthese collected, arranged, and written down. The Mabinogion were thus\noriginally tales penned to be repeated at the fireside, to while away\nthe time of young chieftains and their following, but ultimately they\nreacted very powerfully upon the national literature and character. The\nname Mabinogion was not at first so generally applied to all the tales\nas it is to-day. Only four were so designated.\n\nIn point of antiquity these tales sort out into two distinct\nclasses,\u2014one older, the other less ancient. The latter celebrate heroes\nof the Arthurian cycle, and are full of ecclesiastical terms and of\nallusions to Norman customs, manners, arts, arms, and luxuries. The\nformer refer to persons and events of an earlier period, are more\nmythological, and contain very few of these later allusions. As\nProfessor Rhys[29] thinks, they are essentially Goidelic stories, and\ntheir machinery is magic, not the laws of chivalry.\n\nTo the older class belong\u2014\n\n                The Tale of Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed.\n                The Tale of Branwen, daughter of Llyr.\n                The Tale of Manawyddan, the son of Llyr.\n                The Tale of Math, son of Mathonwy.\n\nThese only are the Mabinogion.\n\n                  The Contention of Llud and Llevelys.\n                  The Story of Kilhwch and Olwen.\n                  The Dream of Rhonabwy.\n\nThis last Professor Rhys regards as a hash or after-composition, in\nspite of the respectability of the MS.\n\nTo the later class\u2014\n\n                 The Tale of the Lady of the Fountain.\n                 The Story of Peredur, son of Evrawc.\n                 The Story of Geraint, son of Erbin.\n                 The Dream of Macsen Gudelig.\n\nAnd to these eleven, in her third volume published in 1849, Lady\nCharlotte Guest added the Hanes Taliessin, compiled in the fourteenth\ncentury, but, according to Ernest Renan, belonging to the more ancient\nof the two classes above mentioned. The great beauty, originality, and\nantique flavour of these stories may here be exhibited by means of a few\ncharacteristic extracts.\n\nAnd the first to be given is from the legend of Taliessin.\n\n\u201cIn times past (it begins) there lived in Penllyn a man of gentle\nlineage, named Tegid Voel, and his dwelling was in the midst of the lake\nTegid, and his wife was called Caridwen. And there was born to him of\nhis wife a son named Morvran at Tegid, and also a daughter named\nCreirwy, the fairest maiden in the world was she; and they had a\nbrother, the most ill-favoured man in the world, Avagddu. Now Caridwen\nhis mother thought that he was not likely to be admitted among men of\nnoble birth by reason of his ugliness, unless he had some exalted merits\nor knowledge. For it was in the beginning of Arthur\u2019s time and of the\nRound Table.\n\n\u201cSo she resolved, according to the arts of the books of Fferyllt, to\nboil a cauldron of Inspiration and Science for her son, that his\nreception might be honourable, because of his knowledge of the mysteries\nof the future state of the world.\n\n\u201cThen she began to boil the cauldron, which, from the beginning of its\nboiling, might not cease to boil for a year and a day, until three\nblessed drops were obtained of the Grace of Inspiration.\n\n\u201cAnd she put Gwion Bach, the son of Gwreang of Llanfair in Caereinion in\nPowys, to stir the cauldron, and a blind man named Morda to kindle the\nfire beneath it, and she charged them that they should not suffer it to\ncease boiling for the space of a year and a day. And she herself,\naccording to the books of the astronomers, and in planetary hours,\ngathered every day of all charm-bearing herbs. And one day towards the\nend of the year, as Caridwen was culling plants and making incantations,\nit chanced that three drops of the charmed liquor flew out of the\ncauldron and fell upon the finger of Gwion Bach. And by reason of their\ngreat heat he put his finger to his mouth, and the instant he put these\nmarvel-working drops into his mouth he foresaw everything that was to\ncome, and perceived that his chief care must be to guard against the\nwiles of Caridwen, for vast was her skill.\n\n\u201cAnd in very great fear he fled towards his own land, and the cauldron\nburst in two, because all the liquor within it, except the three\ncharm-bearing drops, was poisonous, so that the horses of Gwyddno\nGaranhir were poisoned by the water of the stream into which the liquor\nof the cauldron ran, and the confluence of that stream was called the\nPoison of the Horses of Gwyddno from that time forth.\n\n\u201cThereupon came in Caridwen, and saw all the toil of the whole year\nlost. And she seized a billet of wood and struck the blind Morda on the\nhead until one of his eyes fell out upon his cheek. And he said,\n\u2018Wrongfully hast thou disfigured me, for I am innocent. Thy loss was not\nbecause of me.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Thou speakest truth,\u2019 said Caridwen; \u2018it was Gwion Bach who robbed\nme.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd she went forth after him running. And he saw her and changed\nhimself into a hare and fled.\n\n\u201cBut she changed herself into a greyhound, and turned him. And he ran\ntowards a river and became a fish. And she in the form of an otter-bitch\nchased him under the water until he was fain to turn himself into a bird\nof the air. She as a hawk followed him, and gave him no rest in the sky,\nand just as she was about to stoop upon him, and he was in fear of\ndeath, he espied a heap of winnowed wheat on the floor of a barn, and he\ndropped among the wheat and turned himself into one of the grains. Then\nshe transferred herself into a high-crested black hen, and went to the\nwheat and scratched it with her feet, and found him out and swallowed\nhim, and, as the story says, she bore him nine months, and when she was\ndelivered of him she could not find it in her heart to kill him, by\nreason of his beauty. So she wrapped him in a leathern bag, and cast him\ninto the sea, to the mercy of God, on the 29th day of April.\u201d\n\nAnd, Moses-like, was Taliessin afterwards found in the Weir of Gwyddno\nby that prince\u2019s only son Elphin, who took him to the house of his\nfather. Some of the extraordinary tales which this prodigy of a boy told\nin verse are given, and it is related how he bewitched the bards of King\nM\u00e6lgron by pouting out his lips after them, and playing \u201cBlerwm, blerwm\u201d\nwith his finger upon his lips as they went to court. His own answers to\nthe king are always in song. Among the curious odes that he sang are\nthose known as\u2014\n\n                    The Excellence of the Bards.\n                    The Reproof of the Bards.\n                    The Spite of the Bards.\n                    One of the Four Pillars of Song.\n\nThis latter begins:\u2014\n\n                       The Almighty made\n                       Down the Hebron Vale,\n                       With his plastic hands\n                           Adam\u2019s fair form.\n\n                       And five hundred years,\n                       Void of any help,\n                       There he remained and lay\n                           Without a soul.\n\n                       He again did form,\n                       In calm paradise,\n                       From a left side rib,\n                           Bliss-throbbing Eve.\n\n                       Seven hours they were\n                       The Orchard keeping,\n                       Till Satan brought strife\n                           With wiles from Hell.\n\n                       Thence were they driven,\n                       Cold and shivering,\n                       To gain their living\n                           Into this world, etc.\n\nOf the story of Kilhwch and Olwen, which has a particularly antique\ncharacter, Renan felicitously says that by its entirely primitive\naspect, by the part played in it by the wild boar in conformity to the\nspirit of Celtic mythology, by the wholly supernatural and magical\ncharacter of the narration, by innumerable allusions, the sense of which\nescapes us, it forms a cycle by itself. Passing by the unique adventures\nof Kilhwch, he quotes as a typical sample the remarkable passage on the\nfinding of Mabon, where his followers said unto Arthur, \u201cLord, go thou\nhome; thou canst not proceed with thy host in quest of such small\nadventures as these,\u201d and Arthur commissions Gwrhyr, because he knew all\nlanguages, and was familiar with those of the birds and the beasts, to\naccompany others, whom he named, in search of the lost cousin. They went\nforward first to the ousel of Cilgwi, and got its weird and quaint\nanswer, then to the stag of Redynvre. From him to the owl of Cwm\nCawlwyd, to the eagle of Gwern Abwy, and, lastly, to the salmon of Llyn\nLlyw. Each tells its tale, and passes them on to the next. The speeches\nof these ancient denizens of the land are very old-fashioned and\ncurious, typical of all the primitive extravagance of the Celtic\nimagination.\n\nBut it is in tales like the \u201cLady of the Fountain\u201d and \u201cPeredur\u201d that we\ntap the later, full-blown, and most characteristic Arthurian romance.\nThe former begins: \u201cKing Arthur was at Caerlleon upon Usk; and one day\nhe sat in his chamber, and with him were Owain, the son of Urien, and\nKynon, the son of Clydno, and Kai, the son of Kyner, and Gwenhwyvar and\nher handmaidens at needlework by the window. And if it should be said\nthat there was a porter at Arthur\u2019s palace, there was none. Glewlwyd\nGavaelvawr was there, acting as porter to welcome guests and strangers,\nand to receive them with honour, and to inform them of the manners and\ncustoms of the court; and to direct those who came to the hall or to the\npresence chamber, and those who came to take up their lodgings.\n\n\u201cIn the centre of the chamber King Arthur sat upon a seat of green\nrushes, over which was spread a covering of flame-coloured satin, and a\ncushion of red satin was under his elbow. Then Arthur spoke, \u2018If I\nthought you would not disparage me,\u2019 said he, \u2018I would sleep while I\nwait for my repast; and you can entertain one another with relating\ntales, and can obtain a flagon of mead and some meat from Kai.\u2019 And the\nking went to sleep.\u201d\n\nKynon tells a tale: \u201cI was the only son of my mother and father, and I\nwas exceedingly aspiring, and my daring was very great. I thought there\nwas no enterprise in the world too mighty for me, and after I had\nachieved all the adventures in my own country, I equipped myself and set\nforth to journey through deserts and distant regions. And at length it\nchanced that I came to the fairest valley in the world, wherein were\ntrees of equal growth, and a river ran through the valley, and a path by\nthe side of the river. And I followed the path until midday, and\ncontinued my journey along the remainder of the valley until the\nevening, and at the extremity of the plain I came to a large and\nlustrous castle, at the foot of which was a torrent. And I approached\nthe castle, and there I beheld two youths.\u201d\n\nHe describes the wonderful dress of these, and of a man in the prime of\nlife clad in a robe and a mantle of yellow satin with band of gold lace,\nshoes of variegated leather fastened by two bosses of gold. This man\nwent with him towards the castle. \u201cAnd there I saw four-and-twenty\ndamsels,\u201d he says, \u201cembroidering satin at a window. And this I tell\nthee, Kai, that the least fair of them was fairer than the fairest maid\nthou hast ever beheld in the island of Britain, and the least lovely of\nthem was more lovely than Gwenhwyvar, the wife of Arthur, when she has\nappeared loveliest at the offering on the day of the Nativity or at the\nfeast of Easter. They rose up at my coming, and six of them took my\nhorse and divested me of my armour; and six others took my arms and\nwashed them in a vessel until they were perfectly bright. And the third\nsix spread cloths upon the table and prepared meat. And the fourth six\ntook off my soiled garments, and placed others upon me, namely, an under\nvest and a doublet of fine linen, and a robe and a surcoat, and a mantle\nof yellow satin with a broad gold band upon the mantle, and they placed\ncushions both beneath and around me, with coverings of red linen, and I\nsat down. Now, the six maidens who had taken my horse unharnessed him as\nwell as if they had been the best squires in the Island of Britain.\nThen, behold, they brought bowls of silver wherein was water to wash,\nand towels of linen, some green and some white; and I washed, and in a\nlittle while the man sat down to the table, and I sat down next to him,\nand below me sat all the maidens except those who waited on me.\u201d\n\nAfter he divulged the object of his journey, the host directed him to a\nblack man of great stature on the top of a mound, ill favoured, with but\none foot, one eye in the middle of his forehead, a club of iron, and a\nthousand wild animals grazing around him.\n\nNext day Kynon set out and found this giant. And when I told him, he\nsays, \u201cwho I was and what I sought, he directed me. \u2018Take,\u2019 said he,\n\u2018that path that leads towards the head of the glade, and ascend the\nwooden steep until thou comest to the summit; and there thou wilt find\nan open space like to a large valley, and in the midst of it a tall\ntree, whose branches are greener than the greenest pinetrees. Under this\ntree is a fountain, and by the side of the fountain a marble slab, and\nin the marble slab a silver bowl attached by a chain of silver, so that\nit may not be carried away. Take the bowl and throw a bowlful of water\nupon the slab, and thou wilt hear a mighty peal of thunder, so that thou\nwilt think that heaven and earth are trembling with fury. With the\nthunder there will come a shower so severe that it will be scarce\npossible for thee to endure it and live. And the shower will be of\nhailstones. And after the shower the weather will become fair, but every\nleaf that was upon the tree will have been carried away by the shower.\nThen a flight of birds will come and alight upon the tree, and in thine\nown country thou didst never hear a strain so sweet as that which they\nwill sing. And at the moment thou art most delighted with the song of\nthe birds thou wilt hear a murmuring and complaining coming towards thee\nalong the valley. And thou wilt see a knight upon a coalblack horse,\nclothed in black velvet, and with a pennon of black linen upon his\nlance; and he will ride unto thee to encounter thee with the utmost\nspeed. If thou fleest from him he will overtake thee, and if thou\nabidest there, as sure as thou art a mounted knight he will leave thee\non foot, and if thou dost not find trouble in that adventure thou\nneedest not seek it during the rest of thy life.\u2019\u201d\n\nIn these tales the principal part belongs to the women, and here it is\nthe Lady of the Fountain. In reading the romances we instantly find\nourselves on the top wave of chivalry. Three things strike the modern\nreader.\n\nFirst, the ideal here presented of King Arthur and his Queen Gwenhwyvar,\nthe pure and homely atmosphere of their Court in that wild and barbarian\nage, and the sterling qualities and integrity of the Knights of the\nRound Table. Each fights not for any national cause, but to show his\npersonal excellence and satisfy his taste for adventure. It is an epic\ncreation representing the dream of medieval times.\n\nSecond, not less surprising to us is the _sangfroid_ with which the\nwarriors carry out their adventures, the supreme indifference to danger,\nor to the pain and death they inflict when they set to, to try each\nother\u2019s mettle. Knight attacks knight for no other reason than that he\nis superior in prowess to himself, and he will risk his life any day to\nget the mastery over a rival in arms. They reck nothing of sword cuts.\nEnough for them that it is in accordance with the laws of chivalry.\n\nThird, and perhaps most wonderful of all, is the delicacy of the\nfeminine feeling breathed in these romances. There is nothing sensual in\nthe love here portrayed. It is angelic. Never an impropriety or gross\nword is to be met with in all these pages, never a prurient suggestion\nfor all the roughness of that rude age. Women figure as divine, the most\ncharming creatures in the world, to protect whose honour and win whose\nlove and esteem, danger and even death are freely braved. This was a new\nelement introduced into European literature\u2014the creation of woman\u2019s\ncharacter and the place given her in chivalry. \u201cNearly all the types of\nwomankind known to the Middle Ages,\u2014Guinevere, Iseult, Enid,\u201d\u2014says\nRenan, \u201care derived from Arthur\u2019s court.\u201d\n\nThe influence of these tales upon the literature, the taste, the social\nlife of the whole of Western Europe has been immense, and they are still\nas fresh and enchanting to the intelligent reader as any Arabian Nights\u2019\nEntertainment.\n\nLady Charlotte Guest\u2019s literary monument is for English readers the\nstandard classic. There we find a charming translation with luminous\nnotes of these famous Mabinogion, a collection which Renan has called\n\u201cthe pearl of Gaelic literature, the completest expression of the Cymric\ngenius,\u201d and for the early Welsh poetry, both in the original and in\ntranslation, we have the sumptuous edition of Dr. Skene, culled from\n_The Four Ancient Books of Wales_, to delight us. The poetry and romance\nof the Cymry are really two literatures essentially distinct from each\nother. Springing from the same soil, each reflects in its own way the\nsame national character which had so much in common with that of our own\nancient Gaelic ancestry, so that we feel to-day with regard to that long\npast, that \u201cdistance only lends enchantment to the view.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XIII\n                        CELTIC LITERARY REVIVALS\n\n  Sixth century awakening throughout Celtdom\u2014Illustrious\n      names\u2014Brittany\u2019s wonderful cycle of song\u2014Charming examples\u2014Dearth\n      of tenth century\u2014A strange trait of Celtic life\u2014The brilliant\n      medieval renaissance\u2014Output of Ireland, Wales, and Brittany\u2014The\n      Cornish dramas\u2014Last speaker of that dialect\u2014Period of inactivity\n      and decline\u2014Recrudescence\u20141745\u20131800 the high-water mark of\n      Highland production\u2014A galaxy of poets\u2014Splendid lyrical\n      outburst\u2014New Ossianic cycle\u2014Seana Dana\u2014Caledonian bards\u2014The Welsh\n      Eisteddfod\u2014Latest Celtic renaissance\u2014Some characteristic features,\n      results, manifestations\u2014Antiquity, thou wondrous charm!\n\n\nThere comes a time in the history of races when, passing from simplicity\nto reflection, their deepest nature finds expression in some form of\nliterature. That time for the Celtic people has been the late fifth, but\nmore especially the sixth century of our era. And the remarkable fact\nconfronts us then of a simultaneous poetic awakening in all the chief\ngroups into which the Celtic remnant had been divided. Ireland,\nScotland, Wales, and Brittany were all involved in this primal literary\nactivity.\n\nA most curious phenomenon to contemplate is this racial renaissance.\nWhen the great Celtic empire had crumbled, and its defeated fragments\nwere driven to their last resorts on the outmost confines of Europe,\nvanquished by the alien who kept them at bay, suddenly the sundered\nremnants burst into song. Plaintive and sad for the most part has been\nthis utterance, but full of the wealth of sentiment, fancy, and old-time\npeculiarities of conception so characteristic of this ancient people.\n\nSt. Patrick, St. Sechnall, Dubthach, Fiacc, Dallan Forgaill, and others,\ninaugurated the new time in Ireland; St. Columba and his following\naccomplished a similar transition for Scotland, opening the pages of\nliterary history with beautiful hymns and lyrics, which have continued\nto this day. In Wales the pregnant sixth century which gave us\nColumcille was _the_ great age of bardic literature\u2014the age of such\nprinces of poetry as Aneurin, Taliessin, Llywarch H\u00ean, and Myrddin.\n\nThese are among the most illustrious names of the Celtic past. And in\nBrittany the same period is believed to have produced that wonderful\ncycle of song, some of which has been taken down from oral recitation so\nlate as last century by the learned and enthusiastic M. de\nVillemarqu\u00e9,[30] the Macpherson of Brittany, and published in his\ndelightful _Barzaz-Breiz, Chants populaires de la Bretagne_, a number of\nwhich Mr. Tom Taylor has rendered into English. Those entitled\u2014\n\n                     The Wine of the Gauls,\n                     The Prediction of Gwenc\u2019hlan,\n                     The Lord Nann and the Fairy,\n                     The March of Arthur,\n                     The Plague of Elliant,\n                     The Drowning of Kaer-Is\u2014\n\nare held to belong to the period with which we are dealing, and to have\nbeen in existence prior at least to the close of the sixth century. They\nare all distinguished by the presence of alliteration as well as rhyme,\nby a more or less complete division into triplets, like the ancient\nWelsh triads, as well as by a distinctly archaic impress in the manners\ndescribed, and the feelings of the singer.\n\nThe names of the authors have not come down to us, as in the other three\ncountries, but, having already quoted specimens of the fifth and sixth\ncentury poetry of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, it might not be\nuninteresting now to give characteristic examples of the early\ncompositions of Brittany.\n\nThe Wine of the Gauls is undoubtedly ancient, so ancient indeed, that\nPart II. is regarded as a fragment of the song that accompanied the old\nCeltic sword-dance in honour of the sun. It runs thus:\u2014\n\n                 Blood wine and glee\n                     Sun to thee\u2014\n                 Blood wine and glee.\n                         Fire! Fire! steel, oh! steel!\n                         Fire! fire! steel and fire.\n                         Oak! Oak! earth and waves,\n                         Waves, oak, earth and oak.\n\n                 Glee of dance and song\n                     And battle throng.\n                 Battle, dance and song.\n                         Fire! fire, etc.\n\n                 Let the sword blades swing\n                     In a ring,\n                 Let the sword blades swing.\n                         Fire! fire, etc.\n\n                 Song of the blue steel\n                     Death to feel,\n                 Song of the blue steel.\n                         Fire! fire, etc.\n\n                 Fight, whereof the sword\n                     Is the Lord,\n                 Fight of the fell sword!\n                         Fire! fire, etc.\n\n                 Sword, thou mighty King\n                     Of battle ring,\n                 Sword, thou mighty King!\n                         Fire! fire, etc.\n\n                 With the rainbow\u2019s light\n                     Be thou bright,\n                 With the rainbow\u2019s light.\n                         Fire! fire, etc.\n\nFar more charming is the episode of Lord Nann and the Fairy, and\ngenuinely typical of the powerful fancy and natural magic of the Celt.\n\n                The good Lord Nann and his fair bride,\n                Were young when wedlock\u2019s knot was tied\u2014\n                Were young when death did them divide.\n\n                But yesterday that lady fair\n                Two babes as white as snow did bear:\n                A man-child and a girl they were.\n\nFor making him a manchild\u2019s sire, Lord Nann offered to get his bride any\ndainty food she liked, \u201cmeat of the woodcock from the lake or of the\nwild deer from the brake.\u201d She chose the latter, while she grudged\nsending him to the wood.\n\n          The Lord of Nann when this he heard\n          Hath gripp\u2019d his oak spear with never a word,\n\n          His bonny black horse he hath leap\u2019d upon;\n          And forth to the greenwood he hath gone.\n\n          By the skirts of the wood as he did go,\n          He was \u2019ware of a hind as white as snow;\n\n          Oh fast she ran and fast he rode,\n          That the earth it shook where his horse-hoofs trode.\n\n          Oh fast he rode, and fast she ran,\n          That the sweat to drop from his brow began,\n\n          That the sweat on his horse\u2019s flanks stood white\n          So he rode and rode till the fall o\u2019 the night.\n\n          When he came to a stream that fed a lawn\n          Hard by the grot of a Corrigaun.\n\n          The grass grew thick by the streamlet brink,\n          And he lighted down off his horse to drink.\n\n          The Corrigaun sat by the fountain fair,\n          A-combing her long and yellow hair;\n\n          A-combing her hair with a comb of gold\u2014\n          (Not poor, I trow, are those maidens cold)\u2014\n\n          Now who\u2019s the bold wight that dares come here\n          To trouble my fairy fountain clear?\n\n          Either thou straight shalt wed with me\n          Or pine for four long years and three,\n          Or dead in three days\u2019 space shalt be.\n\nThis proposal he spurned, asserting that he was already married, and\nwould die on the spot ere he would take a Corrigaun to wife. Her spell\nshe cast, and instantly he feels sick. On return he bids his mother make\nhis bed, for in three days she would hear his passing-bell, but adjures\nher never to tell the tale to his bride. The three days expire, and the\nlatter inquires of her mother-in-law why the Church bells toll and the\npriests chant in the street below, all clad in their white vestments? \u201cA\nstrange poor man had died,\u201d was the evasive answer. Then she asks\nwhither her husband had gone, and on being assured he would soon be\nback, the unsuspecting lady concerns herself with the kind of gown she\nwould wear for her churching. Said her mother-in-law:\u2014\n\n              \u201cThe fashion of late, my child, hath grown,\n              That women for churching black should don.\u201d\n\nAnd then:\u2014\n\n               As through the churchyard porch she stept\n               She saw the grave where her husband slept.\n\nAnd the dialogue proceeds:\u2014\n\n              \u201cWho of our blood is lately dead\n              That our ground is new raked and spread?\u201d\n\n              \u201cThe truth I may no more forbear,\n              My son\u2014your own poor lord\u2014lies there.\u201d\n\n              She threw herself on her knees amain,\n              And from her knees ne\u2019er rose again.\n\n              That night they laid her, dead and cold\n              Beside her lord beneath the mould;\n              When lo!\u2014a marvel to behold!\u2014\n\n              Next morn from the grave two oak trees fair\n              Shot lusty boughs into the air;\n\n              And in their boughs\u2014oh wondrous sight\u2014\n              Two happy doves all snowy white\u2014\n\n              That sang as ever the morn did rise\n              And then flew up\u2014into the skies.\n\nIn addition to the songs, Villemarqu\u00e9 published _The Breton Bards of the\nSixth Century_, but Renan preferred the songs as by far the better.\n\nThe impulse given by the first literary awakening continued in Ireland,\nScotland, and Wales for two or three centuries, until the confusion and\ndisintegration of the Norse invasions put an end to it. During this\nearly and brilliant period the Celt poured forth the richest treasures\nof his nature. Before the foe triumphed, many valuable pieces of\nliterature, including the heroic sagas, had been committed to writing,\nand thus preserved for posterity, though it is known that much was\ndestroyed by the reckless invader. It was a bright morning\u2014this dawn of\nletters\u2014too suddenly clouded and overcast.\n\nFor a century or two after, the Celtic field in its various parts\nremained singularly barren and unproductive. Ireland was not altogether\nwithout poets and scholars, though greatly fallen from her pristine\nglory, but in Wales, from the middle of the seventh century till the\nyear 1080, hardly any poetry of merit was produced, and the same might\nbe said of Scotland, and, it would appear, of Brittany also.\n\nNo illustrious bards or outstanding writers redeemed the general dearth\nof the tenth century. That was the darkest hour before another brilliant\ndawn.\n\nOssian, St. Patrick, and Columcille; Dubthach and King Laoghaire; Prince\nArthur and his knights; Taliessin and the Royal Urien, Aneurin, Llywarch\nH\u00ean; what were these but memories? vanished heroes and bards of the\npast. Already the walls of Balclutha were desolate, the harp hung mute\nin Tara\u2019s hall; nay, Tara itself was now a simulacrum,\u2014a ruin, deserted\nfor ever. And even from Caerleon and Dun-Reged had not the glory\ndeparted? Too soon the sun, late-risen, had sunk upon the unhappy Celts,\ndefeated in war and now dumb and helplessly inarticulate in literature.\nIt seemed as if, swan-like, the pathetic remnants of this old race had\nat length sung their dying song, and sunk into silent and finished\noblivion.\n\nTo such a pass to all appearance, through Carlyle\u2019s \u201cstar-fire and\nimmortal tears,\u201d had Destiny led these hapless peoples by the advent of\nthe tenth century, that he would be a visionary indeed who should\nprophesy any renaissance, and a true seer, for the time being, who\nshould say\u2014\n\n                                   ... Look\n               Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there.\n\nYet, ph\u0153nix-like, is it not ever the fate of the hidden and precarious\nCeltic genius to rearise from its ashes and reassert its vitality? And\nso in the eleventh and twelfth centuries there was such a wonderful\nliterary awakening throughout Celtdom, that it was as when:\u2014\n\n                                    ... A sable cloud\n              Turns forth her silver lining on the night.\n\nAnd this new activity, be it noted, was not confined to the Gaels of\nIreland and Scotland, but, as in the sixth century, comprehended the\nCymri of Wales and Brittany also.\n\nHerein lies a strange trait of Celtic life, that the great literary\nrevivals should be thus simultaneous, and common to all the sundered\ngroups, though these latter are isolated so much linguistically and\nlocally. Not once or twice in their history has this curious affinity of\ngenius and sentiment been evinced.\n\nIn the case of the Gael, no sooner was the grip of the Vikings relaxed\nthan the bards and schools began to flourish again. The new Irish king,\nthe semi-usurper Brian Boru, helped much towards this happy\nconsummation, as he was a real patron of letters and worked hard to\nrestore the fallen fortunes of Gaelic literature. Early in the eleventh\ncentury he was on the throne, and that and the following century\nwitnessed the new and copious revival of art and learning. To this\nperiod belong the great monuments, such as the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre, the\nBook of Hymns, the Book of Leinster, as well as the Scottish Book of\nDeer.\n\nDuring these two centuries a host of poets and some annalists lived, the\nchief of whom were Flann of Monasterboice and Tighernach. Quite a number\nof the names of prominent bards who wrote then are given by Dr. Hyde in\nhis _Literary History of Ireland_. And we know that from this time the\ninterest taken in the past gave rise to that rich and abundant medieval\nsuccession of books of saga common to Ireland and Scotland. But though\nthese latter were compiled, some of them after the twelfth century, the\nactual revival did not last beyond the Norman Conquest of Ireland, which\nculminated at the close of that same twelfth century, arresting Irish\ndevelopment and disintegrating Irish life. So that for 300 years after,\nErin produced nothing comparable to her former achievements.\n\nTurning to the Cymri, on the other hand, we find the remarkable\nintellectual awakening of the eleventh and twelfth centuries ushered in\nin a similar way as in Ireland, by the advent of new rulers. Rhys ap\nTewdwr, who had taken refuge in Brittany, returned in 1077 and ascended\nthe throne of South Wales, to which he laid claim as true heir. And\nGruffyd ap Kynan, similarly exiled in Ireland, came back to reign in\nNorth Wales in 1080. Uniting their forces in one first great attempt,\nthese two hereditary princes overthrew the reigning monarch, and were\nconfirmed on the thrones of their ancestors.\n\nLike Brian in Ireland, they also in their own fatherland were\ninstrumental in introducing a new era of literature. In North Wales it\nshowed itself in a revival of poetry, while in South Wales it took the\nform of prose. Thomas Stephens mentions no less than seventy-nine bards\nwho lived between 1080 and 1400, many of whose pieces are still extant\nin MSS.\n\nTo this period belong the greatest monuments of Welsh genius\u2014_The Four\nAncient Books of Wales_, and the wonderful cycle of romance treasured\nfor us in the Mabinogion, besides those numerous compositions\ntraditionally attributed to Taliessin, Myrddinn, and others. Chronicles,\nromances, poems, mabinogion, and a large collection of moral and\nhistorical triads\u2014these constitute the result of that extraordinary\noutburst of creative energy which dates from the days of Gruffyd ap\nKynan.\n\nNor was Brittany asleep during this literary activity, for she too had\nher share in common with Wales in the origin and dissemination of the\nArthurian romance.\n\nIt is one of the problems of criticism to-day, rightly to apportion the\ncredit between the two countries.\n\nRobert Wace undoubtedly drew from independent Breton sources as well as\nfrom Geoffrey of Monmouth. And from the eleventh century onwards date\nthe historic and narrative ballads so characteristic of Brittany. A\nselection of these have been translated into English by Mr. Taylor, and\nall of those he gives came into existence, he assures us, before the end\nof the fourteenth century. So we have such medieval titles as, \u201cThe Evil\nTribute of Nomen\u00f6e,\u201d \u201cBran,\u201d \u201cThe Return from Saxon-land,\u201d \u201cThe\nCrusader\u2019s Wife,\u201d \u201cThe Clerk of Rohan,\u201d \u201cBaron Jau\u00efoz,\u201d \u201cThe Battle of\nthe Thirty,\u201d \u201cJean of the Flame,\u201d \u201cDu Guesclin\u2019s Vassal,\u201d and \u201cThe\nWedding Girdle\u201d\u2014titles not unlike Chaucer\u2019s own.\n\nBran, the hero of the second ballad, is believed to have been taken\nprisoner in the great battle recorded in history as having been fought\nin the tenth century near Kerlo\u00e4n, between the Norsemen and the Bretons,\nunder Ewen the Great.\n\n                 Sore wounded lies the good knight Bran\n                 On the foughten field of Kerlo\u00e4n.\n\n                 On Kerlo\u00e4n\u2019s field, hard by the shore,\n                 Lieth the grandson of Bran-Vor.\n\n                 Maugre our Bretons won the day,\n                 He\u2019s bound and o\u2019er sea borne away.\n\n                 Borne over sea, shut up, alone,\n                 In Donjon tower he made his moan.\n\nBran dies in captivity.\n\n       On the battlefield of Kerlo\u00e4n\n       There grows a tree looks o\u2019er the lan\u2019;\n\n       There grows an oak in the place of stour, (_i.e._ battle)\n       Where the Saxon fled from Ewen-Vor.\n\n       Upon this oak, when the moon shines bright,\n       The birds they gather from the night.\n\n       Sea-mews, pied-black and white are there\n       On every forehead a bloodspeck clear.\n\n       With them a corbie, ashgrey for eld\n       And a young crow[31] aye at her side beheld.\n\n       Wayworn seem the twain, with wings that dreep,\n       As birds that flight o\u2019er sea must keep.\n\n       So sweetly sing these birds, and clear,\n       The great sea stills its waves to hear.\n\n       And aye their songs one burden hold\n       All save the young crow\u2019s and the corbie\u2019s old.\n\n       And this is ever the crow\u2019s sore cry,\n       \u201cSing, little birds, sing merrily.\u201d\n\n       \u201cSing, birds o\u2019 the land, in merry strain,\n       You died not far from your own Bretayne.\u201d\n\nBesides these narrative ballads, Brittany produced at various periods\nidyllic songs and religious canticles.\n\nAs for Cornwall, whose dialect is now extinct, she never produced much\nof a Celtic literature. What there is still extant is preserved in MSS.\nof the fifteenth century, representing possibly all the ancient\nliterature she ever had, and dates from that or the preceding fourteenth\ncentury. These pieces consist of one poem, entitled \u201cMount Calvary,\u201d and\nthree dramas, or miracle plays, with nothing distinctly Celtic about\nthem save the language. With the exception of these and another drama of\nthe seventeenth century (1611), and the Lord\u2019s Prayer translated, the\nobsolete and defunct Cornish dialect has no literature to show, and\ntherefore is not concerned in the special Celtic revivals characteristic\nof the literature in the other dialects. A translation of the ancient\ndramas from the original Cornish has been made and published thirty\nyears ago by Edwin Norris. Their value now is almost solely linguistic.\n\u201cThe last survivor of those who spoke in their youth pure Cornish is\nsaid to have been Dolly Pentreath of Mousehole near Penzance, who died\nin 1778, aged 102. And even she would not have talked Cornish in her\nyouth if she had not lived in one of the few parishes along the coasts\nof Mount\u2019s Bay and St Ive\u2019s Bay, and a few districts to the west of\nthose bays, where alone at the beginning of the last century\n(eighteenth) the ancient dialect existed.\u201d (Morley\u2019s _English Writers_,\nvol. i. p. 750.)\n\nAfter the brilliant medieval renaissance came another period of\ninactivity and decline. From the sixteenth century it is true that a new\nseries of poets and prose writers began to arrive in the different\nCeltic nationalities. In Ireland, during the first half of the\nseventeenth century, there was quite a distinguished recrudescence of\nnational scholarship, associated with the names of Geoffrey Keating, the\nFour Masters, and Duald Mac Firbis, all of whom were prose writers of\neminence; and in the Highlands of Scotland flourished Mary Macleod and\nher contemporaries.\n\nBut we must come down to the period immediately following the Forty-five\nto encounter a more general and splendid resuscitation.\n\nAnd this time the Highlands especially were prominently to the front.\nHitherto, though possessing bards of mark, not since the days of\nColumcille did the Scottish Gael burst so richly and abundantly and\ntunefully into song. It seemed as if the accumulated and pent-up\nsentiments of generations, at last overflowing, had found outlet and\nexpression. The great Jacobite risings furnished the incentive.\nInvolving, as they did, the profoundest issues for the individual, the\nfamily life, and the whole structure of society in the Highlands, these\nfar-reaching events stirred the deepest emotions in the Gaelic breast,\nwhich found utterance on tongues which otherwise might for ever have\nremained silent.\n\nSurpassing the story even of Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table,\nbecause more near, more real and historical, the romance of Prince\nCharlie and the Highland chiefs has taken a lasting hold of the popular\nimagination. It has woven itself into deathless song and story. The\npoetry and music it has elicited in the Highlands alone are among the\nsweetest creations of Celtic genius. They convey a pathos of sound,\nrichness of rhythm, and perfection of harmony that is captivating even\nto foreign ears.\n\nThe period between 1745 and 1800 may be regarded as the high-water mark\nof Highland poetry. For quality and quantity combined, it has never been\nreached in the past, and is not likely now ever to be rivalled in the\nfuture. Never before in Gaelic Scotland had there been such a quick and\nsplendid succession of bards. In fact, within those fifty years after\nCulloden we have nearly all the great names of Highland poetry\u2014certainly\nthose best known and which rank highest in the national esteem. A mere\nlist of the more important is sufficient to attest this.\n\nThere were living then Alexander Macdonald, better known as Alasdair\nMacmhaighstir Alasdair; John Maccodrum, the North Uist bard; Hector\nMacleod of South Uist; Dugald Buchanan; David Mackellar; Rob Donn;\nDuncan Macintyre, popularly called Donnachadh B\u00e0n; Lauchlan Macpherson,\nJohn Roy Stuart, Kenneth Mackenzie, James Macpherson, Dr. John Smith,\nJohn Clark, Mrs. Grant of Laggan, William Ross, Allan Macdougall, James\nShaw, James Macgregor, Ewan Maclachlan, Alexander MacKinnon, Donald\nMacdonald, and Donald Macleod\u2014a goodly number and highly representative\nto appear in that single half century.\n\nIt is somewhat remarkable that Ireland, too, shared in the Jacobite\npoetic reawakening, though she had so partial and distant a hand in the\nactual warfare. Without doubt, her people thoroughly sympathised with\nthe gallant attempt of Prince Charlie. And this is abundantly evidenced\nby the popularity and amount of the national poetry. Not only might a\nlist of names be given, similar to the above, though fewer in number,\nbut Dr. Hyde assures us that the Jacobite poems of Ireland would, if\ncollected, fill a large-sized volume. Hardiman printed about fifteen in\nthe second volume of his _Irish Minstrelsy_, and O\u2019Daly about\ntwenty-five more in his _Irish Jacobite Poetry_, second edition.\n\nComparing this splendid lyrical outburst of that period in the two\ncountries, Dr. Hyde expresses his own opinion in the following\ninteresting criticism: \u201cThere seems to me,\u201d he says, \u201cto be perhaps,\nmore substance and more simplicity and straightforward diction in the\npoems of the Scottish Gaels, and more melody and word-play, purchased at\nthe expense of a good deal of nebulousness and unmeaning sound in those\nof the Irish Gaels; both, though they utterly fail in the ballad, have\nbrought the lyric to a very high pitch of perfection.\u201d\n\nBut the literary revival of the eighteenth century was not by any means\nconfined to the work of the lyrical poets either in Scotland, Wales, or\nIreland. It was this period, the latter half of the century, that\nwitnessed the new Ossianic cycle, associated with the name of\nMacpherson. Though popularly supposed to be, the latter was not the\nearliest pioneer of this movement. In 1756, four years before\nMacpherson\u2019s _Fragments_ appeared, Jerome Stone, who was in youth a\npackman, and afterwards a teacher at Dunkeld, gave to the public the\nfirst translation of old Gaelic poems ever published. On his death, that\nsame year at the age of thirty, he left a collection, gleaned by\nhimself, of ancient Ossianic ballads, which has recently passed into the\npossession of Edinburgh University.\n\nStone undoubtedly had the bardic gift; his rendering of the original is\nquite as free as Macpherson\u2019s own. The following may be quoted as an\nexample of his style. It is taken from \u201cFraoch\u2019s Death,\u201d published in\nthe _Scots Magazine_, 1756, shortly before he died:\u2014\n\n           But now he\u2019s gone and nought remains but woe\n             For wretched me; with him my joys are fled;\n           Around his tomb my tears shall ever flow,\n             The rock my dwelling, and the clay my bed;\n           Ye maids and matrons from your hills descend,\n             To join my moan and answer tear for tear;\n           With me the hero to the grave attend,\n             And sing the songs of mourning round his bier,\n           Through his own grove his praise we will proclaim,\n           And bid the place for ever bear his name.\n\nStone did not catch on, like his more brilliant successor.\n\nBefore then, except for the fragments that survived, mainly on the lips\nof oral tradition throughout the Highlands, the old-time volume of saga\nand heroic poetry had well nigh sunk into oblivion. The MSS. lay\nneglected in odd and distant corners of the land, hidden and\ninaccessible, so that the new generations of Gaels as they appeared were\nwholly ignorant of their existence. The stirring events of the times\nthemselves were not conducive towards the more peaceful study and\npursuit of literature. Hence, with the better known publication of\nMacpherson\u2019s contributions there came to the view of modern times, with\nstartling suddenness, an old deposit of literary wealth, which quite\nastonished the age. It was as if by some convulsion, ancient strata of\nunderlying rock had suddenly upheaved and found access to the surface,\nmuch to the wonder and curiosity of all.\n\nThe heather was immediately ablaze. A new enthusiasm was awakened in the\npast. Gaelic scholarship was taxed to the uttermost to substantiate the\ncredit of this new fame. Libraries were scrutinised, ancient houses\nsearched, memories ransacked, and every remote township and glen scoured\nto find material. And when material was not forthcoming in sufficient\namount, the Muses were invoked to supply the deficiency.\n\nIt is now well understood that the period was one of abnormal activity\nin the production of Ossianic poetry. This might be inferred from the\nexisting British collections of Gaelic MSS., most of which are posterior\nto the age of Macpherson. Many imitators sought to emulate the ancient\nbards, and even to palm their modern productions upon the public as part\nof the original deposit. So late as the day of Mackenzie of \u201cThe\nBeauties\u201d such pieces as \u201cMordubh,\u201d \u201cCollath,\u201d and \u201cThe Aged Bard\u2019s\nWish\u201d were regarded as ancient and authentic, though there are few\npeople now, and certainly no recognised authority on the subject,\nprepared to maintain that.\n\nCertain of these eighteenth century creations are of great merit. Though\nthey lack the antiquity they profess, they are worthy to rank alongside\nthe poetry of the period. Dr. Smith\u2019s _Seana Dana_ or _Old Lays_, for\nexample, are reckoned fully as interesting and poetical in the original\nGaelic as Macpherson\u2019s _Ossian_; yet, unlike the latter, his English\ntranslation is a poor substitute for the really fresh and idiomatic\nvernacular which he published. One of his finest poems, \u201cDan an Deirg,\u201d\nhas been rendered into English, edited, and annotated by an accomplished\nEnglishman, Mr. C. S. Jerram, a scholar and graduate of Cambridge.\n\nIn Mr. Pattison\u2019s _Gaelic Bards_ we have a translation in dainty verses\nof another of his poems, entitled \u201cFinan and Lorma.\u201d Here the young\npeople around the ancient Ossian are represented as addressing the bard\nin these lines:\u2014\n\n         While on the plains shines the moon, O Bard!\n         And the shadow of Cona holds;\n         Like a ghost breathes the wind from the mountain,\n         With its spirit voice in its folds.\n\n         There are two cloudy forms before us,\n         Where its host the dim night shows;\n         The sigh of the moon curls their tresses,\n         As they tread over Alva of roes.\n\n         Dusky his dogs came with one,\n         And he bends his dark bow of yew;\n         There\u2019s a stream from the side of the sad-faced maid,\n         Dyes her robe with a blood-red hue.\n\n         Hold thou back, O thou wind! from the mountain,\n         Let their image a moment stay;\n         Nor sweep with thy skirts from our eyesight,\n         Nor scatter their beauty away.\n\n         O\u2019er the glen of the rushes, the hill of the hinds,\n         With the vague wandering vapours they go;\n         O! Bard of the times that have left us,\n         Aught of their life can\u2019st thou show?\n\nTo which Ossian replies:\u2014\n\n          The years that have been they come back as ye speak,\n            To my soul in their music they glide;\n          Like the murmur of waves in the far inland calm,\n            Is their soft and smooth step by my side.\n\nSmith\u2019s translation appeared in 1780, and the originals, nominally from\nthe Gaelic of Ossian, Ullin, and Orran, etc., in 1787. The poems were\nfourteen in number, with titles as follow: \u201cThe Lay of the Red,\u201d \u201cThe\nDeath of Gaul,\u201d \u201cThe Lay of Duhona,\u201d \u201cDiarmad,\u201d \u201cClan Morni,\u201d or \u201cFinan\nand Lorma,\u201d \u201cThe War of Linne,\u201d \u201cCathula,\u201d \u201cThe War of Manus,\u201d including\n\u201cThe Lay of the Great Fool,\u201d \u201cTrahul,\u201d \u201cDargo,\u201d \u201cConn,\u201d \u201cThe Burning of\nTaura,\u201d \u201cCalava,\u201d and \u201cThe Death of Art.\u201d\n\nIn the lay of Taura there occurs the much admired word-portrait\nentitled, \u201cAisling air dhreach Mna,\u201d or \u201cThe Vision of a Fair Woman.\u201d\nThis is how she looked in the eye of her Gaelic admirer, and one can\njudge if her charms match those of Aspasia or of Cleopatra:\u2014\n\n                  Innseam p\u00e0irt do dreach nan reul;\n                  Bu gheal a deud gu h-\u00f9r dl\u00f9;\n                  Mar channach an t-sl\u00e9ibh\n                  Bha cneas fa h-eideadh \u00f9r.\n\n                    Bha a br\u00e0ighe cearclach b\u00e0n\n                  Mar shneachda tl\u00e0 nam beann;\n                  Bha a d\u00e0 chich ag eiridh l\u00e0n;\n                  B\u2019e\u2019n dreach sud miann nan sonn.\n\n                    Bu shoitheamh binn a gloir;\n                  S\u2019 bu deirge na\u2019n r\u00f2s a beul;\n                  Mar chobhar a sios n\u2019a taobh\n                  Sinte gu caol bha gach meur.\n\n                    Bha a d\u00e0 chaol mhala mhine\n                  D\u00fbdhonn air liomh an loin.\n                  A da ghruaidh dhreachd nan caoran;\n                  \u2019Si gu iomlan saor o chron.\n\n                    Bha a gnuis mar bharra-gheuga\n                  Anns a cheud-fh\u00e1s \u00fbr;\n                  A falt buidhe mar \u00f3radh shleibhtean;\n                  \u2019S mar dhearsadh gr\u00e9ine bha s\u00fbil.\n\nThe Gaelic is not easily translated into felicitous English, but it has\nbeen given by Dr. Macneill, somewhat literally thus:\u2014\n\n           Tell us some of the charms of the stars;\n           Close and well-set were her ivory teeth;\n           White as the cannach upon the moor\n           Was her bosom the tartan bright beneath.\n\n             Her well-rounded forehead shone\n           Soft and fair as the mountain snow;\n           Her two breasts were heaving full;\n           To them did the hearts of the heroes flow.\n\n             Her lips were ruddier than the rose,\n           Tender and tunefully sweet her tongue;\n           White as the foam adown her side\n           Her delicate fingers extended hung.\n\n             Smooth as the dusky down of the elk\n           Appeared her two narrow brows to me;\n           Lovely her cheeks were like berries red;\n           From every guile she was wholly free.\n\n             Her countenance looked like the gentle buds\n           Unfolding their beauties in early spring;\n           Her yellow locks like the gold-browed hills,\n           And her eyes like the radiance the sunbeams bring.\n\nIn the same year, 1780, in which Dr. Smith issued his renderings,\nanother small volume of translations of so-called ancient Gaelic poetry\nappeared under the title _Caledonian Bards_. It was by John Clark,\napparently a very much poorer imitator of Macpherson, and hailing from\nthe latter\u2019s own native district, Badenoch. Among the poems submitted,\nappears the \u201cMordubh,\u201d already referred to, and which in its vernacular\ngarb has misled more than one Celtic enthusiast. Of the latter, besides\nMackenzie, Mrs. Grant of Laggan, 1755\u20131838, was so far deceived that,\ntaking Clark\u2019s eighteenth century contribution for genuine ancient\npoetic material, she set herself to render some of it into more\nbeautiful verse of her own. A contemporary and friend of Sir Walter\nScott, this lady takes a high place in the Highland English literature\nof the period. A third who lived in her time, and who had no mean poetic\ngift, was the Rev. Duncan Maccallum of Arisaig, the author of \u201cCollath,\u201d\nthat other composition which passed for a time as a specimen of ancient\npoetry. But enough has been said to show the range of this derived and\nimitative activity.\n\nIt will be seen that while on the one hand the Jacobite romance gave\nrise to a new poetic revival, the Ossianic compositions, on the other\nhand, proved also a source of general Celtic inspiration during the\nlatter half of the eighteenth century, and for two decades, at least, of\nthe nineteenth. Though the impulse of the Prince Charlie episode did not\ncarry to Wales as it did to Ireland, that of the Ossianic cycle did, and\nissued in a similar enthusiasm in the production and publication of\nbooks of Welsh poetry. This interest became so widespread that in 1819\nthe national Eisteddfod was revived once more at Caermarthen, and\nregained its old place in the hearts of the people. Without discussing\nthe tradition that ascribes its origin to the sixth century, it is now\nfairly well ascertained that it is, at least, as old as the twelfth or\nthirteenth century. History shows that Prince Griffith of South Wales\nheld a great Eisteddfod at Caermarthen in 1451, at which the twenty-four\nmetres of Welsh poetry were settled for all time. Since then it has had\na chequered career; officially patronised by the Tudors, it seems to\nhave declined under the Stuarts, and nearly perished under the first\nthree Hanoverians. But now, since its revival in 1819, nearly every\nhamlet in Wales holds its annual Eisteddfod, and the national one has\ngrown to such a magnitude that it tends not only to keep alive the\nCeltic spirit, but also to foster the love of music and poetry in the\nPrincipality.\n\nLike much of our own Highland barderie, the Welsh poetry is the product\nof workmen who have never been taught to read or write their own\nlanguage in the schools. Yet such is their natural taste and sense of\nstyle that some of their best modern lyrics need not fear comparison\nwith those of Tannahill or even of Burns. Undoubtedly such poetry has\nserious limitations, but it has a charm and beauty of its own, and is as\nfresh and limpid as the mountain streams. The fragrance of the heather\nis upon it quite as much as it is upon the lyrics of our own bards in\nthe Highlands. And as these latter felt the charm of the towering\nmountain, the gloomy glen, the forest solitude, the lonely mysterious\nsea, the bubbling stream, the wildflower, and the changing seasons, and\ngave felicitous and sympathetic expression to the emotions these\nawakened in their breasts, so did the peasant poets of Wild Wales. All\nthrough last century, both in the Highlands and in that country, there\nhave been a succession of minor bards who have maintained the native\ntongue sweet and warm and tuneful by their lyrics, though in Ireland the\nsame cannot be said, as the language there until quite recently had not\nbeen fostered so much as in the sister countries.\n\nBut to-day we constantly read of ourselves as passing through another\nCeltic renaissance, and this is the last which falls to be noticed. It\ntook its rise half a century ago in the work of the scholars, and\ndoubtless was the natural sequence of the widespread interest aroused at\nhome and abroad by the Ossianic compositions. It was recognised that\nthere was material to work upon, which could be dealt with from a\nscientific as well as a literary point of view. And so the renaissance\nin the first instance was a revival of interest in the language itself,\nand the ancient MS. monuments that contained its oldest forms.\n\nTwo sets of scholars interested themselves in this new line of research.\nOn the one hand, distinguished Irishmen like John O\u2019Donovan and Eugene\nO\u2019Curry devoted themselves to the task of bringing to light the\nneglected and hidden MS. remains, which had hitherto for centuries lain\nin the obscurity of religious or public libraries unread and\nuncatalogued. And through these treasures they sought to interpret the\nGaelic past. On the other hand, Continental savants such as Bopp, Zeuss,\nand Ebel, deeply absorbed in philological studies, were already at work\non the linguistic problem, which has rescued the Celtic dialects from an\nunnatural isolation and equally unmerited contempt.\n\nZeuss\u2019s book in particular, published in 1853\u2014the Gaelic part of it\nfounded on the study of Gaelic Continental MSS., illuminated the whole\nfield, just as much as if the searchlight had been turned on a dark and\nhidden landscape. From that day a Celtic renaissance was assured. His\nphilological results, and the fact that the ancient dialects had now\nbeen proved beyond question to belong to the great Aryan group, and\nclosely akin to the classic languages of Europe, gave the Celtic a new\nimportance and fired the enthusiasm of that subsequent galaxy of\nscholars, who have made Celtic studies famous.\n\nSurprised and charmed with the prestige their own language and\nliterature had thus suddenly acquired in the eyes of Europe, and\nespecially of learned philologists, many of the Celts themselves now\nbegan to look with kindlier interest upon their own literary legacy and\nto recognise its value. The attention thus drawn to the past gradually\naroused enthusiasm for every surviving relic of tradition, of\nliterature, of history, of social custom, and of music. It has led to\nthe foundation of Celtic chairs for the study of the language and\nliterature, notably at Oxford, Edinburgh, and Berlin. It has given rise\nto the Gaelic M\u00f2d, Irish Text Society, and numerous other Highland,\nIrish, and Welsh Associations, and kindred periodicals, British,\nAmerican, and Continental. Never before has such a mass of Celtic\ntradition and lore been brought to view, and published in book or\nmagazine, as there has been within the last few decades.\n\nIt cannot indeed be said that this renaissance has added any new\nmasterpieces to the native literatures, either in prose or poetry. A\nwonderful outburst of literary activity there has been, and\ndistinguished authors have arrived; but the remarkable thing is, and it\nis worthy of note, that the so-called Celtic renaissance, if we regard\nit solely from its literary side and apart from the work of scholars,\nhas found its fullest expression in English, and addresses itself not so\nmuch to the native Gaels or Cymri as to the English-speaking world in\ngeneral. Highland, Welsh, and Irish litterateurs have taken to placing\ntheir wealth of dream, of poetic sentiment and imagination, as well as\ntheir marvellous gift of story-telling, at the service of English\nliterature, which is accordingly enriched, while the old river dries up\nin proportion as the number of readers and writers of the original\ntongue declines.\n\nThere are some things that we cannot hope to resuscitate. They pass in\nthe nature of things. Some that we would not wish to recall even if we\nmight. They have served their day. And if the current Celtic renaissance\nhas not contributed as much to the vernacular literature as might be\ndesired, it has certainly immensely enhanced the glories of the past,\nand it has otherwise exhibited a revival of Celtic _esprit de corps_\nwhich shows that\u2014\n\n               The ancient spirit is not dead\u2014\n               Old times, methinks, are breathing there.\n\nThat this race-feeling survives, this kinship of blood, and is ever and\nanon reasserting itself, may be inferred from the recent Pan-Celtic\nCongress in Dublin, where representatives of Wales, of Brittany, of the\nHighlands, of Ireland, and even of Celtdom beyond the seas, assembled in\nall their ancient _tailoring_ to do homage to the past, to reckon with\nthe present, and formulate afresh their aspirations\u2014to ask, in fact,\nwhat does this latest renaissance mean? and whither tends it?\n\nA truly heterogeneous gathering, and eminently characteristic of the\nrace, who still look wistfully for the return of Arthur or of the Feinn,\nand some new age of magic and romance, and whose forte it is unceasingly\nto pursue the unknown, the undefinable, the ideal.\n\nWe can picture the bewildered surprise and irrepressible mirth of the\naverage, unimaginative, unbelieving Sassenach, as he suddenly encounters\nthe extraordinary Pan-Celtic pageant on the living streets of Dublin.\nWhence this resurrection of phantoms\u2014these apparitions of long dead\nancestors? \u201cNay, good citizen, \u2019tis no phantasy,\u201d sober reason replies,\n\u201cbut one of various manifestations, perhaps the most evanescent of the\npresent Celtic renaissance, which finds little in our modern,\nmaterialistic civilisation answering to its deepest aspirations.\u201d And,\nfalling into reverie over the unwonted spectacle, we ourselves in our\nwonderment musingly repeat the words of Charles Lamb:\u2014\n\n  Antiquity! thou wondrous charm, what art thou? that being nothing, art\n  everything! When thou wert, thou wert not antiquity\u2014then thou wert\n  nothing, but hadst a remoter _antiquity_, as thou calledst it, to look\n  back to with blind veneration; thou thyself being to thyself, flat,\n  jejune, _modern_! What mystery lurks in this retroversion? or what\n  half Januses are we, that we cannot look forward with the same\n  idolatry with which we for ever revert? The mighty future is as\n  nothing, being everything; the past is everything, being nothing.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XIV\n                  HIGHLAND BARDS BEFORE THE FORTY-FIVE\n\n  \u201cThe Owlet\u201d\u2014Three Macgregor songs\u2014The old bardic system superseded\u2014Era\n      of modern Gaelic poetry\u2014Mary Macleod\u2014Details of her life\u2014Famous\n      songs\u2014Iain Lom\u2014Ardent poet and politician\u2014His \u201cVow\u201d\u2014Eventful\n      career\u2014Poems\u2014Created Gaelic Poet-Laureate\u2014Influence on Highland\n      history\u2014Other minor bards and bardesses\u2014Imitations by Sir Walter\n      Scott\u2014The blind harper, and the blind piper\u2014A comic poet\u2014Two major\n      bards\u2014Maccodrum\u2019s Muse\u2014Characteristics of the group before the\n      Forty-five.\n\n\nThe Book of the Dean of Lismore may be regarded as having gathered up\nthe best of the available, medieval, Gaelic poetry, and as having closed\nthe old bardic period. After it there came a break of nearly a hundred\nyears. It is true that there are some pieces which hail from this\ninterval, but they are isolated and few, with no certain dates.\n\nOf these, the most remarkable is that styled \u201cThe Owlet,\u201d and it is\nworthy of notice here as being the only composition of the kind in the\nlanguage. The poem is attributed to Donald Macdonald, a native of\nLochaber, and perhaps the most expert archer of his day. Withal a famous\nwolf-hunter, he appears to have lived in the days before firearms, and\nto have composed the verses when old. Their occasion is briefly\nsummarised by Mackenzie of \u201cThe Beauties,\u201d in a footnote. In his\ndeclining years the poet had married a young woman who proved a very\nunmeet helpmate. For when he and his dog were worn down with the toils\nof the chase, and infirmities rendered them stiff and decrepit, this\n\u201ccrooked rib\u201d took a pleasure in teasing them. Finding an old feeble owl\none day, she installed it in the house as a more fitting companion than\nherself for the aged bard and his dog. The poem is an ingenious\nperformance in the form of a dialogue between the outraged husband and\nthe bird.\n\nThree Macgregor songs of that period have likewise a wonderful charm and\npathos. They are entitled \u201cMacgregor\u2019s Lullaby,\u201d \u201cMacgregor\u2019s O\u2019Ruara,\u201d\nand \u201cThe Braes of the Ceathach.\u201d The authoress of the first laments the\ndeath of her husband, who, with his father and brother, were beheaded at\nthe instigation of Colin Campbell of Glenorchy; her own sire, Campbell\nof Glenlyon; and Menzies of Rannoch. The following verses are from\nPattison\u2019s rendering:\u2014\n\n              Early on a Lammas morning,\n              With my husband was I gay;\n              But my heart got sorely wounded\n              Ere the middle of the day.\n\n              (chorus)  Ochan, Ochan, Ochan uiri,\n                        Though I cry, my child, with thee\u2014\n                        Ochan, Ochan, Ochan uiri,\n                        Now he hears not thee nor me.\n\n              Malison on judge and kindred\u2014\n              They have wrought me mickle woe;\n              With deceit they came about us,\n              Through deceit they laid him low.\n\n              Had they met but twelve Macgregors,\n              With my Gregor at their head;\n              Now my child had not been orphaned,\n              Nor these bitter tears been shed.\n\n              On an oaken block they laid him,\n              And they spilt his blood around;\n              I\u2019d have drunk it in a goblet\n              Largely, ere it reached the ground.\n\n                     \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n              When the rest have all got lovers\n              Now a lover have I none;\n              My fair blossom, fresh and fragrant,\n              Withers on the ground alone.\n\n              While all other wives the night-time\n              Pass in slumber\u2019s balmy bands;\n              I, beside my bedside weary,\n              Never cease to wring my hands.\n\n              Far, far better be with Gregor\n              Where the heather\u2019s in its prime,\n              Than with mean and Lowland barons\n              In a house of stone and lime.\n\n                     \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n              Bahu, bahu, little nursling\u2014\n              Oh! so tender now and weak;\n              I fear the day will never brighten\n              When revenge for him you\u2019ll seek.\n\n                  Ochan, Ochan, Ochan uiri,\n                  Though I cry, my child, with thee\u2014\n                  Ochan, Ochan, Ochan uiri\n                  Yet he hears not thee nor me.\n\nWe pass by the few existing lines of Bishop Carsewell and Sir John\nStewart of Appin, who both lived in the sixteenth century, and forthwith\nemerge upon the new time, the era of modern Gaelic poetry. Almost\nsimultaneously in Scotland and Ireland, a great change took place in the\nform and complexion of this vernacular poetic literature. From the early\npart of the seventeenth century, the intricate metres and technicalities\nof the old bardic system, which had been in vogue for a thousand years,\nbegan to be discarded and superseded, and more freedom in versifying\nintroduced. Dr. Douglas Hyde sums up the principles of this new\ndeparture in two sentences: first, the adoption of vowel rhyme in place\nof consonantal rhyme; second, the adoption of a certain number of\naccents in each line in place of a certain number of syllables. And in\nconsequence of these changes, he holds that the Gaelic poetry of the\nlast two centuries is probably the most sensuous attempt to convey music\nin words ever made by man. He who has once heard it and remains deaf to\nits charm can have little heart for song or soul for music. It is\nabsolutely impossible, he says, to convey the lusciousness of sound,\nrichness of rhythm, and perfection of harmony in another language. The\nsweetest creation of all Gaelic literature, this new outburst of lyric\nmelody was a wonderful arrangement of vowel sounds, so placed that in\nevery accented syllable, first one vowel and then another fell upon the\near in all possible kinds of harmonious modifications. Some verses are\nmade wholly on the \u00e0 sound, others on the \u00f2, \u00f9, \u00e8, or \u00ec sounds, but the\nmajority on a unique and fascinating intermixture of two, three, or\nmore; as, for example, in Mary Macleod\u2019s vowel-rhyming over the drowning\nof Mac-Ille Chalum in the angry Minch between Stornoway and Raasay:\u2014\n\n                   Mo bh\u00e8ud, \u2019s mo bhr\u00f2n,\n                   Mar dh\u2019eirich dh\u00f2\n                   Muir beucach, m\u00f2r,\n                   Ag leum mu d\u2019bh\u00f2rd,\n                   Thu f\u00e9in, \u2019s do sh\u00e8oid\n                   \u2019Nuair reub \u2019ur se\u00f2il,\n                   Nach d\u2019fhaod sibh tre\u00f2ir\n                     A chaitheadh orr.\n\n                   \u2019S e an sgeul\u2019 craiteach\n                   Do\u2019n mhnaoi a d\u2019fhag thu,\n                   \u2019S do t-aon bhrathair,\n                   A shuidh na t\u2019aite,\n                   Diluain C\u00e0isge,\n                   Chaidh tonn b\u00e0it ort,\n                     Craobh a b\u2019aird\u2019 de\u2019n ubhal thu.\n\nTo give the effect in English the original has been somewhat freely,\nthough not quite accurately, rendered thus:\u2014\n\n                         My grief, my pain,\n                         Relief was vain\n                         The seething wave\n                         Did leap and rave\n                         And reeve in twain,\n                         Both sheet and sail,\n                         And leave us bare\n                           And foundering.\n\n                         Alas! indeed,\n                         For her you leave.\n                         Your brother\u2019s grief\n                         To them will cleave.\n                         It was on Easter\n                         Monday\u2019s feast\n                         The branch of peace\n                           Went down with you.\n\nIt has been acknowledged even by Dr. Hyde, one of our greatest Irish\nauthorities of the present, that the Scottish Gaels led the way in this\ngreat change that transformed the Celtic poetry of both Islands, and to\nMary Macleod, popularly known as \u201cMairi nighean Alasdair Ruaidh,\u201d has\nbeen assigned the honour of being the first of the modern Highland bards\nto inaugurate the new system.\n\nBefore her day most of the Gaelic poetry was Ossianic, or of uncertain\nauthorship; fugitive, and generally in the ancient style. The poets were\nbound by the rules of their order, and to excel within the very narrow\nlimits of the old-world prosody, hedged about as it was with so many\ntechnicalities, required years of severe bardic study and preparation.\nMary, apparently without any tuition, without even the power to read or\nwrite, suddenly burst these unnatural bonds asunder, and gave to the\nspirit of her poetry the freedom of the elements, unhampered and\nunfettered by the intricate metres of the Schools. She invented rhythms\nof her own, often making the music of sound an echo of the sense. And\nfrom her time scores of new and brilliant metres have made their\nappearance.\n\nOnly a few biographical details of this remarkable woman are known, but\nthey are characteristic, and extremely interesting, revealing a\npersonality outside the common order of Highland intellect. Born in\nRoudal, Harris, in the year 1569, she was the daughter of Alexander\nMacleod, son of Alasdair Ruadh, a descendant of the chief of that\ndistinguished clan; and at an early age, apparently, she became a nurse\nin the family of the Macleods at Dunvegan Castle. Though otherwise\nilliterate, the poetic Mary must have derived some culture,\nindependently of book learning, from her association with the chiefs and\ntheir following in the ancestral home where, nearly 200 years\nafterwards, Dr. Johnson and his friend were so hospitably entertained.\nIn the course of her long career, for she lived to be 105 years old, she\nnursed no less than five lairds of the Macleods,[32] and two of the\nlairds of Applecross.\n\nThere is no evidence that she was much addicted to the making of poetry\nuntil somewhat advanced in life. It was then at least that she composed\nthose pieces that have survived and made her name illustrious in\nHighland literature. Most of them have reference to events that happened\nin the Macleod family.\n\nThus the song, \u201cAn Talla \u2019m bu ghna le Mac Leoid,\u201d was produced\nextempore during the last illness of one of the lairds. Happening to ask\nMary facetiously what kind of a lament she would make for him after he\nwas gone, she declared in response that it would be a very mournful one.\n\u201cCome nearer me,\u201d said the aged chief, \u201cand let me hear part of it,\u201d\nwhereupon the clever bardess sang this pathetic dirge. The power of\nextemporising poetical compositions still lingers in the Highlands.\n\nAgain, \u201cHithill, uthill agus h\u00f2,\u201d owes its existence to the gift of a\nsnuff-mull bestowed on Mary by a son of Sir Norman.\n\nAll her barderie, however, did not suit the proud chief of Dunvegan, who\nobjected to the scope of the publicity he and his menage received at the\nhands of the family nurse, exercising, as she freely did, the privileges\nof the poet. And therefore he banished her to the island of Mull, under\nthe care of a relative.\n\nBut if one song sent her away, another brought her back. It was hard to\nbe exiled from Eilean-a-Cheo, and the castled seat of the clan, and so\nseizing the opportunity which the advent of the young laird\u2019s birthday\noffered, she composed the now well-known \u201cLuinneag Mhic Leoid,\u201d or \u201cOde\nto Macleod,\u201d in which she presented a portrait so flattering that the\nstubborn chief relented and sent a boat to bring her back, on condition\nthat henceforth she should no more exercise her gift of song. The\ndelighted poetess readily assented.\n\nYet even on the way from Mull to Skye she could not restrain the poetic\nafflatus, and though for a time after her return she kept her word, as\nBlackie says, \u201ca bird is a bird and will sing\u201d; and Mary Macleod, this\nirrepressible daughter of the red-haired clansman, once more incurred\nthe displeasure of her chief by composing a new poem on the recovery of\nhis son from some illness; and in extenuation of the charge laid against\nher, she naively maintained, \u201cIt is not a song; it is only a cr\u00f2nan,\u201d\nthat is, a crooning.\n\nThe ode she produced in Mull in the days of dreary exile is one of the\nfinest of her poems; wild and beautiful, with a very peculiar charm. It\ngenerally appears in all the best collections of Gaelic songs, and has\nbeen translated into English verse both by Pattison and Blackie. The\nrendering of the latter is, perhaps, the more euphonious, and brings out\nbetter the repetition at the beginning of each stanza, as:\u2014\n\n                    I sit on a knoll,\n                    All sorrowful and sad,\n                    And I look on the grey sea\n                    In mistiness clad,\n                    And I brood on strange chances\n                    That drifted me here,\n                    Where Scarba and Jura\n                    And Islay are near.\n\n                    Where Scarba and Jura\n                    And Islay are near;\n                    Grand land of rough mountains,\n                    I wish thee good cheer,\n                    I wish young Sir Norman\n                    On mainland and islands\n                    To be named with proud honour,\n                    First chief of the Highlands!\n\n                    To be praised with proud honour\n                    First chief of the Highlands,\n                    For wisdom and valour,\n                    In far and nigh lands;\n                    For mettle and manhood\n                    There\u2019s none may compare\n                    With the handsome Macleod\n                    Of the princeliest air.\n\n                    And the blood through his veins,\n                    That so proudly doth fare,\n                    From the old Kings of Lochlann\n                    Flows richly and rare.\n                    Each proud earl in Alba\n                    Is knit with his line,\n                    And Erin shakes hands with him\n                    Over the brine.\n\n                    And Erin shakes hands with him\n                    Over the brine;\n                    Brave son of brave father,\n                    The pride of his line,\n                    In camp and in council\n                    Whose virtue was seen,\n                    And his purse was as free\n                    As his claymore was keen.\n\n                           \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n                    With my heart I thee worship\n                    Thou shapeliest Knight,\n                    Wellgirt in the grace\n                    Of the red and the white;\n                    With an eye like the blaeberry\n                    Blue on the brae,\n                    And cheeks like the haws\n                    On the hedge by the way.\n\n                    With a cheek like the haws\n                    On the hedge by the way,\n                    \u2019Neath the rarest of locks\n                    In rich curly display;\n                    And the guest in thy hall\n                    With glad cheer shall behold\n                    Rich choice of rare armour\n                    In brass and in gold, etc.\n\nIt needs some of Mary\u2019s own imagination to picture her going about in\nafter days wearing a tartan _tonnag_, fastened in front with a large\nsilver brooch, and carrying a silver-headed cane. Hardy to a degree in\nmind and constitution, the venerable nurse and poetess, when long past\nthe natural span of years, was much given, we are told, to gossip,\nsnuff, and whisky. After her death, which took place at Dunvegan in\n1674, she was buried in her native isle of Harris.\n\nMackenzie of \u201cThe Beauties\u201d appraised this quaint personage as the most\noriginal of all our poets, who borrowed nothing. Her thoughts, her\nverse, and rhymes were all equally her own; her language simple and\nelegant; her diction easy, natural, and unaffected. There is no\nstraining to produce effect; no search after unintelligible words to\nconceal the poverty of ideas. Her thoughts flow freely, and her\nversification runs like a mountain stream over a smooth bed of polished\ngranite. She often repeats her rhymes, as in the above instance, yet we\nnever feel them tiresome or disagreeable, for, more than most of her\nGaelic compeers, Mary was mistress of the poetic lyre.\n\nAfter her came another striking figure in the history of Highland bardic\nliterature. This was John Macdonald, the Lochaber poet, popularly known\nas Iain Lom, probably from lack of hair either on his head or face, and\nsometimes styled Iain Manntach, from an impediment in his speech.\nSingular in these physical respects, he was no less remarkable for his\nmental characteristics. A man of great force of character, he combined\nin his personality the ardent poet and the keen politician, the\nintuitive dreamer and the restless man of action.\n\nMacdonald belonged to the Keppoch family, lived through the stirring\ntimes of Charles I., Charles II., James II., the Revolution, and\nsubsequent reign of William and Mary, dying at an advanced age in 1710,\nwhen Anne was on the throne.\n\nThis is the wonderful schemer whom some regard as the real genius of the\nMontrose Campaign during the Civil War. Were it not for him, it is\ncertain, events could not have developed so favourably and so\nbrilliantly for the victorious Marquis as they did. Keen Jacobite as he\nalways was, he accompanied the latter on most of his marches, and it is\nmarvellous that the great Border minstrel, Sir Walter Scott, especially\nin his account of the battle of Inverlochy in the _Legend of Montrose_,\nmakes no reference to him.\n\nThe Keppoch bard first came into prominence as a man to be reckoned\nwith, in connection with the murder of his chief, which, it is said he\nforesaw, but was unable to avert. Sent abroad as a minor to be educated,\nthe heir of Keppoch was supplanted in his absence by his own faithless\nand intriguing cousins, who murdered both him and his brother on their\nreturn home. The dastardly crime rankled in the bosom of the fiery bard.\nAmong the faithless clansmen he alone remained fearlessly true to the\nstricken family, and he determined to have revenge. \u201cThe Vow of Iain\nLom,\u201d published in Mrs. D. Ogilvy\u2019s _Highland Minstrelsy_, graphically\ndepicts his state of mind at the time. He went from house to house, and\ncastle to castle, calling for vengeance on the assassins, and having at\nlast obtained a commission from Government to take them dead or alive,\nhe first addressed himself to Glengarry, who declined the dangerous\ntask, and then to Sir Alexander Macdonald, who put a company of chosen\nmen at his disposal, the \u201cCiaran Mabach,\u201d poet and soldier, at their\nhead.\n\nUnder the Keppoch bard\u2019s directions the murderers were summarily\nattacked and beheaded in their own barricaded house. A gruesome monument\nof seven heads, representing those of the father and six sons, now marks\nthe well on Loch Oich side, known as _Tobar-nan-ceann_, where these\nbleeding trophies are said to have been washed on their way to Glengarry\nCastle, whence they were carried to Skye as a tribute to the Knight of\nSleat.\n\nThe bard has a poem on \u201cMort na Ceapach,\u201d the murder of Keppoch; and\nanother entitled \u201cA Bhean Leasaich,\u201d in which he begins by praising Sir\nAlexander Macdonald of Sleat and his son Sir James, evidently with the\nintention of provoking Glengarry for his remissness in the matter of\nretribution upon the usurpers. His own persecution by the traitors\nfurnished the poet with another theme. From this time he became a man of\nmark in the Highlands, feared and respected. Though not a soldier\nhimself, when the Civil War broke out he identified himself with the\ncause of the Stuarts, and was the means of bringing the armies of Argyll\nand Montrose into deadly conflict at Inverlochy on February 2nd, 1645.\nThe wily John, a willing spectator, evaded taking a personal hand in the\nencounter by the following ruse. When asked to make ready to march to\nthe fight, by the Macdonald commanding the Irish contingent, he slyly\nreplied, \u201cIf I go along with thee to-day, and fall in battle, who will\nsing thy praises to-morrow? Go thou, Alasdair, and exert thyself as\nusual, and I shall sing thy feats, and celebrate thy prowess in martial\nstrains.\u201d\n\nThe result was that the bard feasted his eyes from a safe distance on\nthe disaster of the Campbells, with whom he was ever at feud, and moved\nby all the passion and prejudice of the event composed the heroic\nstanzas entitled, \u201cThe Battle of Inverlochy.\u201d So realistic and graphic\nis the description given in the original Gaelic that it seems to\nphotograph many of the details just as they happened. \u201cThe spirit of\npoetry, the language, and boldness of expression,\u201d says Mackenzie, with\nperhaps the Celtic leaning to hyperbole, \u201chave never been equalled.\u201d Yet\nto-day we read these vindictive strains with different feelings from\nthose that animated the bard.\n\nA few verses may be quoted from the rendering of Professor Blackie,\nwhich, though they lack the fire and intensity of the original, give a\ngood idea of the gist of the poem:\u2014[33]\n\n              Did you hear from Cille Cummin\n              How the tide of war came pouring?\n              Far and wide the summons travelled,\n              How they drave the Whigs before them!\n\n              From the Castle tower I viewed it\n              High on Sunday morning early,\n              Looked and saw the ordered battle\n              Where Clan Donald triumphed rarely.\n\n              Up the green slope of Cuil Eachaidh\n              Came Clan Donald marching stoutly;\n              Churls who laid my home in ashes,\n              Now shall pay the fine devoutly!\n\n                     \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n              Many a bravely mounted rider,\n              With his back turned to the slaughter,\n              Where his boots won\u2019t keep him dry now,\n              Learns to swim in Nevis water.\n\n              On the wings of eager rumour\n              Far and wide the tale is flying,\n              How the slippery knaves, the Campbells,\n              With their cloven skulls are lying!\n\n              O\u2019er the frosted moor they travelled,\n              Stoutly with no thought of dying;\n              Where now many a whey-faced lubber,\n              To manure the fields is lying!\n\n              From the height of Tom-na-harry\n              See them crudely heaped together,\n              In their eyes no hint of seeing,\n              Stretched to rot upon the heather!\n\n              Warm your welcome was at Lochy,\n              With blows and buffets thickening round you,\n              And Clan Donald\u2019s groov\u00e8d claymore,\n              Flashing terror to confound you!\n\n              Hot and hotter grew the struggle\n              Where the trenchant blade assailed them;\n              Sprawled with nails on ground Clan Duin\u00e9,\n              When the parted sinew failed them.\n\n              Many a corpse upon the heather,\n              Naked lay, once big with daring,\n              From the battle\u2019s hurly-burly,\n              Drifting blindly to Blarchaorainn.\n\n                     \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7       \u00b7\n\n              If I could, I would be weeping\n              For your shame and for your sorrow,\n              Orphans\u2019 cry and widows\u2019 wailing,\n              Through the long Argyll to-morrow.\n\nAll this to the weird and exulting chorus:\u2014\n\n                    H-i rim h-\u014f-r\u00f2, h-\u00f2-r\u00f2 leatha,\n                    H-i rim h-\u014f-r\u00f2, h-\u00f2-r\u00f2 leatha,\n                    H-i rim h-\u014f-r\u00f2, h-\u00f2-r\u00f2 leatha,\n                    Chaidh an la le Clann-D\u00f2mhnuill.\n\nHis dangerous strategy and stinging sarcasm at length roused the Marquis\nof Argyll to offer a reward for his head, and it is characteristic of\nthe impetuous John that he appeared in person in the audience-hall of\nthis mighty chief to claim it, relying for safety, no doubt, on the\nsacred regard in which Highlanders always held the professional bard.\nThe Marquis received him courteously, and as they passed through a room\nhung round with heads of moor-fowl, he asked him, \u201cHave you ever seen,\nJohn, so many black-cocks together?\u201d \u201cYes,\u201d he replied. \u201cWhere?\u201d \u201cAt\nInverlochy.\u201d \u201cAh! John,\u201d muttered Argyll, \u201cwill you never cease gnawing\nat the Campbells?\u201d \u201cI am only sorry,\u201d added the implacable bard, \u201cthat I\ncannot swallow them.\u201d\n\nFor his services in the Stuart cause he was created Gaelic\npoet-laureate, and received from Charles II. a yearly pension. Iain Lom\nthus holds the unique distinction of having been the first and only\nGaelic poet-laureate. Altogether his poems would occupy a considerable\nvolume, though they have never been so issued.[34] Pattison has not\ntranslated any, but Iain Lom has nevertheless obtained a well-merited\nniche in Messrs. Blackie, the publishers, _Poets and Poetry of\nScotland_, 1876, compiled by James G. Wilson; and the romantic side of\nhis character is charmingly represented incidentally in Neil Munro\u2019s\nnovel, entitled _John Splendid_.\n\nLong after his death his Jacobite effusions still exercised a powerful\ninfluence over his countrymen, counteracting in no small degree the\nefforts of the Government to suppress the Stuart factions. \u201cChildren\nwere taught to lisp them,\u201d says the _New Statistical Account of\nScotland_. \u201cThey were sung in the family circle on winter nights, and at\nweddings, lykewakes, fairs, and in every company. They attributed to the\nStuarts and their adherents the most exalted virtues, and represented\ntheir opponents as incarnate fiends. In 1745, Moidart and Kilmonivaig\nwere called \u2018The Cradle of the Rebellion,\u2019 and they were the very\ndistricts where the songs of Iain Lom leavened the whole mass of society\nwith Jacobite sentiments.\u201d\n\n                   Mightier was the verse of Iain\n                   Hearts to nerve, to kindle eyes,\n                   Than the claymore of the valiant,\n                   Than the counsel of the wise.\n\nContemporary with Iain Lom, and his confederate in bringing retribution\nupon the Keppoch traitors, was a minor bard, known as Archibald\nMacdonald, or \u201cAn Ciaran Mabach,\u201d an illegitimate son of Sir Alexander\nMacdonald, sixteenth baron of Sleat. In after life he lived in easy\ncircumstances, well adapted for the cultivation of his poetic tastes, on\nan estate granted him in North Uist by his influential father, in return\nfor numerous services rendered as a sagacious and practical man of\naffairs. Otherwise his life was uneventful and his poetry limited in\namount.\n\nBut the field held various other less prominent bards, for to this\nperiod belonged several of those whose productions appear in the Fernaig\nMS. of Duncan Macrae. Nor was the Highlands then lacking in poetesses.\nTwo at least figure in the record of the remembered.\n\nDorothy Brown, a native of Luing Island, Argyllshire, composed many\npoems, of which perhaps that to Alasdair Maccolla is the only one now\nextant, yet as a poetess she alone of women in that age approached the\nstandard of Mary Macleod.\n\nCicely Macdonald, her contemporary, was daughter of Ronald of Keppoch,\nin youth a frolicsome maiden and clever at epigrams. Marrying a\ngentleman of the Lovat family, she lived with him farther north, and\ncame to be known for her bardic gifts. Songs and laments were her chief\nproductions, but after her husband died at Inverness in a fit of\ninebriety, she took to hymn-making. The names of her earlier pieces are\nsuggestive, such as: \u201cMor\u00e0ghach Mhic Shimidh,\u201d \u201cSlan gu br\u00e0th le ce\u00f2l na\nclarsaich,\u201d and \u201cAlasdair a Glinne-Garaidh.\u201d The latter beautiful one,\nMackenzie assures us, has served as a model for many Gaelic songs.\n\nThe next name in the succession is that of Nial Macvurich, family bard\nand historian of Clanranald, distinguished also as a descendant, through\na long line of bardic ancestors, from the ancient and historic Muireach\nAlbannach, whose poetry figures in the Book of the Dean of Lismore. To\nNial we are indebted for the history of his illustrious clan, written in\nGaelic and preserved in the Red Book of Clanranald. But it is to be\nregretted that of his own poems none is now extant, except two pieces\ntreasured in \u201cThe Beauties.\u201d Solicitous to perpetuate the history and\nancient poetry of others, it appears that Nial took no thought for his\nown to have them written down, and so they have mostly disappeared. He\nlived to a great age, like the majority of these early Highland bards,\nand was an old man living on his farm in South Uist at the time of the\nfirst Jacobite rising in 1715.\n\nStill another poet of Clanranald fame, John Macdonald, or Iain Dubh Mac\nIain \u2019Ic-Ailein, born about 1665, and resident in Eigg; and then we\nreach the Aosdan Matheson, who was bard to the Earl of Seaforth in the\nseventeenth century. Appurtenant to this post he held free lands in\nLochalsh, Ross-shire, and composed as many poems as would fill a large\nvolume, but most of these, like Nial Macvurich\u2019s, and for the same\nreason, have long been forgotten. One of those preserved has been very\nfreely rendered or imitated in English by Sir Walter Scott, under the\ntitle \u201cFarewell to Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail,\u201d 1815.\n\nThe original verses are arranged to a beautiful Gaelic air, of which the\nchorus is adapted to the double pull upon the oars of a galley, and\nwhich is therefore distinct from the ordinary boat-songs. They were\ncomposed on the occasion of the embarking at Dornie, Kintail, of the\nEarl of Seaforth, who was obliged to take refuge in Spain, after an\nunsuccessful effort in favour of the old Chevalier in 1718. Sir Walter\u2019s\nversion runs thus:\u2014\n\n      Farewell to Mackenneth, great Earl of the North,\n      The Lord of Lochcarron, Glenshiel, and Seaforth;\n      To the Chieftain this morning his course who began,\n      Launching forth on the billow his bark like a swan.\n      For a foreign land he has hoisted his sail,\n      Farewell to Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail!\n\n      O swift be the galley, and hardy her crew,\n      May her captain be skilful, her mariners true,\n      In danger undaunted, unwearied by toil,\n      Though the whirlwind should rise, and the ocean should boil;\n      On the brave vessel\u2019s gunnel, I drank his bonail,\n      And farewell to Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail!\n\n      Awake in thy chamber, thou sweet southland gale!\n      Like the sighs of his people, breathe soft on his sail;\n      Be prolong\u2019d as regret, that his vassals must know,\n      Be fair as their faith, and sincere as their woe;\n      Be so soft, and so fair, and so faithful, sweet gale,\n      Wafting onward Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail!\n\n      Be his pilot experienced, and trusty, and wise,\n      To measure the seas and to study the skies;\n      May he hoist all his canvas from streamer to deck,\n      But oh! crowd it higher when wafting him back\u2014\n      Till the cliffs of Skooroora, and Conan\u2019s glad vale,\n      Shall welcome Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail!\n\nHector Maclean, of the same period, was bard to Sir Lachlan Maclean of\nDuart, from whom he had a small annuity. Two poems of his, the \u201cChief\u2019s\nElegy\u201d and \u201cSong,\u201d are reckoned among the beauties of Gaelic poetry, and\nhave also attracted the attention of Sir Walter Scott, who translated or\nimitated in the abrupt style of the original a fragment of the latter,\nentitled \u201cWar-Song of Lachlan, High-Chief of Maclean.\u201d This song, like\nmany of the early Gaelic productions, makes a rapid transition from one\nsubject to another. From the situation of a forlorn maiden of the clan,\nwho opens with an address to her absent lover, it passes finally to an\neulogium over the martial glories of the chieftain. Thus:\u2014\n\n               A weary month has wandered o\u2019er\n               Since last we parted on the shore;\n               Heaven! that I saw thee, Love, once more,\n               Safe on that shore again!\n               \u2019Twas valiant Lachlan gave the word;\n               Lachlan, of many a galley lord;\n               He call\u2019d his kindred bands on board,\n               And launched them on the main.\n\n               Clan Gillian is to ocean gone,\n               Clan Gillian, fierce in foray known;\n               Rejoicing in the glory won\n               In many a bloody broil;\n               For wide is heard the thundering fray,\n               The rout, the ruin, the dismay,\n               When from the twilight glens away\n               Clan Gillian drives the spoil.\n\n               Woe to the hills that shall rebound\n               Our banner\u2019d bagpipes\u2019 maddening sound;\n               Clan Gillian\u2019s onset echoing round,\n               Shall shake their inmost cell.\n               Woe to the bark whose crew shall gaze\n               Where Lachlan\u2019s silken streamer plays!\n               The fools might face the lightning\u2019s blaze\n               As wisely and as well!\n\nLachlan Mackinnon of Strath, Isle of Skye, is the next to figure in this\nsuccession. Unlike so many of the others, he was not unlettered, nor\nignorant of such knowledge of the language as may be gleaned from a\ncritical study of its structure. Hence his Gaelic is wonderfully pure\nand correct. In early life he filled the r\u00f4le of a strolling musician,\ncarrying his violin about with him from place to place, till certain\npersonal considerations obliged him to desist.\n\nAfter him came a blind harper and a blind piper, both famous in Highland\nminstrelsy. The harper was Roderick Morrison, son of an Episcopal\nclergyman in the island of Lewis. He was born in the year 1646, and in\nhis boyhood had been sent along with his two brothers to be educated at\nInverness, all three having been destined by their father for the\nministry of the Church. But, unhappily, while there the youthful\nislanders were seized with smallpox, which was then epidemic in the\ntown. His two brothers recovered from the effects of the dread scourge,\nand afterwards became ministers, one at Contin, the other at Poolewe in\nRoss-shire. Roderick himself was the chief sufferer, for not only was\nhis face disfigured and contracted, but he also lost the use of his\neyes. Incapacitated thus for a profession, he turned his attention to\nmusic, and in addition to the skill he acquired in playing other\ninstruments, became an adept at the harp. Hence the name \u201cAn Clarsair\nDall,\u201d by which he was generally known throughout the Highlands.\n\nVisiting Ireland, it is thought he profited by tuition from his\nfellow-harpers there, who had achieved fame in that form of minstrelsy;\nand on his return to Scotland he took occasion to call at every baronial\nresidence on the way to exhibit his art. It so happened at the time that\nmany of the Scotch nobility and gentry were at the Court of King James\nin Holyrood, Edinburgh, and thither the blind musician wended his way,\nwhere he found an excellent friend in the person of the Highland\nchieftain, John Breac Macleod of Harris, who readily engaged him as his\nfamily harper.\n\nWhile holding this office Morrison composed several beautiful tunes and\nsongs, living the life of a farmer at Totam\u00f2r in Glenelg, on a piece of\nland which his patron granted him rent-free. On the death of the latter\nhe returned to his native island, and died there in a good old age, and\nwas buried in a country churchyard near Stornoway.\n\nMorrison was a poet of power and culture. His elegy, \u201cCreach nan\nCiadan,\u201d on the chieftain who befriended him, is reckoned one of the\nmost pathetic, plaintive, and heart-touching of Highland laments.\n\nThe blind piper, John Mackay of Gairloch, was a contemporary, though\ntwenty years his junior. Like his father before him, who hailed from the\nReay country, this Mackay was born blind. Taught music first of all\nunder the paternal roof, he was sent later on to the Isle of Skye to\nperfect his studies under the direction of the celebrated Mac Crimmon.\nThere he excelled all other pupils, and soon learned to compose\npipe-music himself. In fact, it is recorded that one of the Mac\nCrimmons, jealous of his powers as a pipe-music composer, bribed some of\nthe youths to throw him over a precipice, which they did one day, the\nblind stripling falling a distance of twenty-four feet, but without\nphysical hurt. The rock is still known as \u201cLeum an Doill,\u201d or \u201cThe Blind\nMan\u2019s Leap,\u201d since he had the good fortune to land on his soles.\n\nAfter seven years\u2019 tuition in Skye he returned to his native parish,\nsucceeding his father as family piper to the Laird of Gairloch, and\nsubsequently marrying. Numerous pibrochs, strathspeys, reels, and jigs\nare placed to his credit. When at length he was superannuated on a small\nbut competent annuity, the old man used to pass his time visiting\ngentlemen\u2019s houses in the Reay country and the island of Skye. On one of\nthese peregrinations in Sutherlandshire he composed the beautiful\npastoral \u201cCoire an Easain,\u201d lamenting Lord Reay. Of this poem Mackenzie\nsays, \u201cIt is not surpassed by anything of the kind in the Celtic\nlanguage\u2014bold, majestic, and intrepid, it commands admiration at first\nglance, and seems on a nearer survey of the entire magnificent fabric as\nthe work of some supernatural agent.\u201d Could Highland admiration go\nfarther?\n\nThe \u201cPiobaire Dall\u201d lived till he was about ninety-eight years of age,\nand sleeps with his father Ruairidh Dall within the clachan of his\nnative parish in the west.\n\nOther minor bards of the period were, John Whyte, William Mackenzie,\nJohn Maclean, Malcolm Maclean, the poet Macdonald of Muck, who composed\nthe \u201cMassacre of Glencoe,\u201d Angus Macdonald, Hector Macleod, Archibald\nMacdonald, and Zachary Macaulay.\n\nArchibald Macdonald excelled as a comic bard\u2014one of the few that\nHighland Gaeldom has produced. His \u201cElegy\u201d on Roy while living\u2014a piper\nand favourite companion of his own\u2014and his \u201cResurrection\u201d of the same\nindividual, are counted very clever. He it was who composed the famous\nsatire, \u201cTha biodag air Mac Thom\u00e0is,\u201d which, when played at a wedding\nmemorable in Highland history, ended so tragically for the player, and,\nindeed, for Mac Thom\u00e0is himself, the alleged heir to the Lovat estates,\nwho had to fly from the country, and whose descendants have on more than\none occasion in recent times contested the right of the present Lovat\nfamily to the ancient inheritance.\n\nTradition still pathetically relates how on that occasion, enraged at\nthe playing of the piece which so cleverly satirised himself, this young\nMaster of Lovat stabbed the bag of the piper, to silence it, with his\nbiodag, but the weapon entered the player\u2019s heart also, and bag and\npiper both collapsed with a mournful groan.\n\nZachary Macaulay is worthy of note on another account. From his family\nwas descended the brilliant Lord Macaulay, so famous in letters, and it\nmay very well have been from this source that the gifted essayist and\nhistorian derived his vivid pictorial style. Zachary was born in the\nisland of Lewis early in the eighteenth century, and was the son of an\naccomplished Episcopalian clergyman there. His productions as a poet\nexhibit true bardic power, though he is believed in his youth to have\nbeen given to writing wanton songs. The air of one of his popular pieces\nwas in after days a great favourite with Burns.\n\nTwo major bards remain to be noticed, who lived partly before and partly\nafter the Forty-five\u2014John Maccodrum and Alexander Macdonald. The latter,\nthe more distinguished of the two, claims fuller mention hereafter.\nMeanwhile, no more fitting subject might be found wherewith to conclude\nthis chapter than an account of the original and witty Maccodrum, with\nexamples of his poems.\n\nBorn in North Uist, he became in manhood bard to Sir James Macdonald of\nSleat, who died at Rome in 1766. It was a curious circumstance that\nfirst commended him to the notice of this nobleman. The poet happened to\nmake a satire on the tailors of the Long Island, who were so exasperated\nthat they refused one and all to make him any clothing. Consequently he\nwent about for a time in tatters, and meeting Sir James one day, the\nlatter naturally inquired the reason why his trousers were so ragged.\nMaccodrum explained, and was asked to repeat the offending verses. On\ncomplying he was there and then promoted to be bard to the family, and\nobtained, as was usual in such circumstances, free lands on the estate\nfor his maintenance.\n\nA lively wit and biting sarcasm seem to have been characteristics of\nMaccodrum\u2019s Muse. Yet he could be very tender, as on the occasion when\nhe laments the untimely death of his patron, at the early age of\ntwenty-five. Then was the bard unusually serious and even pious:\u2014\n\n              As I awake it is not sleep\n              That strives with me in troubles deep;\n              My bed beneath the tears I weep\n                  Is in disquiet;\n                  My bed beneath, etc.\n\n              Of him, my patron bright, bereft,\n              I have no fair possession left;\n              While pain of loss my soul has cleft\n                  In sight and hearing;\n                  While pain of loss, etc.\n\n              Sore tears are ours; joy is no more,\n              No hope of smiles; no cheer in store;\n              We seem like the brave Fianns of yore\n                  And Finn forsaken;\n                  We seem like the brave Fianns, etc.\n\n              Ah! true it seems the tale to tell;\n              Our cup is filled with doings fell;\n              Provoking in a rage of hell\n                  Bless\u2019d God the Highest;\n                  Provoking in a rage, etc.\n\n              Blest One, from Thee let us not swerve;\n              Above with Thee he goes to serve;\n              O Christ! do Thou for us preserve\n                  Our loving brothers;\n                  O Christ! do thou for us preserve, etc.\n\nMaccodrum was deemed a witness of no mean weight in the Ossianic\ncontroversy, on the strength of the following statement by Sir James\nMacdonald, in a letter dated from Skye, October 10th, 1763. Addressing\nDr. Blair, on that occasion he writes: \u201cThe few bards that are left\namong us repeat only detached pieces of the Ossianic poems. I have often\nheard them and understood them, particularly from one man, called John\nMaccodrum, who lives on my estate in North Uist. I have heard him repeat\nfor hours together poems which seemed to me to be the same with\nMacpherson\u2019s translations.\u201d\n\nThe bard once met the hero of Ossianic fame when the latter had gone to\nthe Outer Hebrides to collect fragments of ancient poetry. From\nLochmaddy, Macpherson happened to be travelling across the moor towards\nthe seat of the younger Clanranald of Benbencula, and falling in with a\nnative, he took occasion to ask him if he had anything on the Feinn.\nThis man, who was none other than the quick-witted and sarcastic\nMaccodrum, taking advantage of Macpherson\u2019s badly expressed and\nambiguous Gaelic, retorted literally to the effect that the Feinn did\nnot owe him anything, and even if they did, it were vain to ask for\npayment now. Unaware of the personality of the bard, and direly offended\nat the character of the reply, which reflected on his own knowledge of\nthe language, the proud collector passed on his way without more ado.\nBoth men thus met and parted as ignorant of each other as ships that\npass in the night.\n\nMaccodrum\u2019s poems have never been published separately. A few appeared\nin Alexander Macdonald\u2019s collection. Many of the rest, entrusted to\nmemory, are now merged in oblivion. He had not the versatility either of\nMary Macleod or of Alexander Macdonald, for he sometimes imitates the\npoems of bards more original than himself, yet in purity and elegance of\nlanguage he frequently approaches Macdonald. His satire on \u201cDonald\nBain\u2019s Bagpipe,\u201d and his poems on \u201cOld Age\u201d and \u201cWhisky,\u201d are considered\nexcellent, witty, ingenious, and original. And \u201cSmeorach\nChlann-Domhnuill,\u201d or \u201cThe Mavis of Clan Donald,\u201d which has been\nrendered into English verse by Professor Blackie, is a delightful p\u00e6an\nin praise of his own native Uist.\n\n         The Mavis of Pabal am I; in my nest\n         I lay long time with my head on my breast,\n         Dozing away the dreary hour,\n         In the day that was dark, and the time that was sour.\n\n         But now I soar to the mountain\u2019s crest,\n         For the chief is returned whom I love best;\n         In the face of the sun, on the fringe of the wood,\n         Feeding myself with wealth of good.\n\n         On the tip of the twigs I sit and sing,\n         And greet the morn on dewy wing,\n         And fling to the breeze my dewy note,\n         With no ban to my breath, and no dust in my throat.\n\n         Every bird will praise its own nest,\n         And why shall not I think mine the best?\n         Land of strong men and healthy food,\n         And kindly cheer, and manners good.\n\n         A land that faces the ocean wild,\n         But with summer sweetness, mellow and mild,\n         Calves, lambs, and kids, full many a score,\n         Bread, milk, and honey piled in the store.\n\n         A dappled land full sunny and warm,\n         Secure and sheltered from the storm,\n         With ducks and geese and ponds not scanted,\n         And food for all that live to want it, etc.\n\nThe poet, apparently, made the most of his own rugged island, and now\nlies buried in an old churchyard not far from the village of Houghary,\nwhere a rough boulder of gneiss, of uneven, battered surface, spotted\nwith nodules, but without any inscription, marks his grave. He himself,\nwhile living, had picked it out from the beach and destined it for this\npurpose.\n\nThe Highland bards before the Forty-five were thus a goodly company, and\nthey had this in common, that they were independent for the most part of\nwriting, in some cases even of education; yet they had a wonderful\ncommand of their native Gaelic, and an extraordinary ear for the\nbeauties of sound that may be expressed through the medium of language.\nThey were all more or less attached to chiefs, whose praises they sang,\nand almost without exception these early bards lived into an extreme old\nage, and died in the land they had never left, and among the friends\nthey had never forsaken.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER XV\n            THE INFLUENCE OF THE CHURCH ON GAELIC LITERATURE\n\n  The origins of Celtic literature\u2014Two streams\u2014The Pagan\u2014The\n      Christian\u2014Influence of the early Celtic Church as patron of\n      letters\u2014Originates a written literature\u2014Attitude towards the\n      ancient sagas\u2014Medieval obscurantism\u2014The Dialogues between Ossian\n      and Patrick quoted and discussed\u2014Their significance\u2014Bishop\n      Carsewell and the Reformation\u2014The rival influences of Naturalism\n      and the Church\u2014Decline of Gaelic oral literature\u2014The Nineteenth, a\n      century of gleaning rather than of great creative\n      work\u2014Reasons\u2014Present-day return to nature\u2014Splendid services of\n      individual Churchmen.\n\n\nAs we work our way back through history towards the origins of Celtic\nliterature, we recognise two streams issuing from two very different\nsources. One has its rise in pre-Christian times, welling up from the\npagan heart of the race from a remote antiquity. It is represented by\nthe sagas and the poetry that is mingled with them. These sagas breathe\nthe spirit of the Celtic people in the long past, and are the most\ncharacteristic of all their literary products. So old are they, that\nvery few of them deal with events posterior to the eighth century, and\nthose that do are the less meritorious.\n\nIn this respect it may be said that the Celts produced their best\nliterature first. This literature was long in coming to the birth. It\ntook centuries to evolve. But when it did appear it proved a new\ncreation. The mind of a people lived in it, spoke through its tales.\nGenerations of ancestors, lost and speechless in the slumber of the\nages, found in it life and utterance.\n\nSo far as this stream has gained in volume through its course down the\ncenturies, it has done so by expansion. Each succeeding age harks back\nto the past and draws from the original, imitating and transcribing,\nuntil now in the great books of sagas and modern literature thereon, we\nhave a mighty river of Gaelic lore.\n\nYet nothing so original, nothing so characteristic in this line has ever\nbeen added to the early contribution. The Celtic genius seems to have\nfound its fullest and most distinctive expression then, in the days\nbefore writing, and before Christianity was introduced, and ever since\nit has been drawing inspiration from its oldest creations.\n\nTake away this stream, and the peculiar interest of Celtic literature is\ngone. How many centuries the sagas were in the making before they took\nfinal shape as we read them, can never be known. They passed from\ngeneration to generation by oral delivery, and it was only in the\nseventh or eighth century of our era that they ultimately found\nembodiment in writing. This much can be inferred, though we have no\ncopies earlier than the end of the eleventh century and middle of the\ntwelfth, those from which these latter drew their texts having perished\nlong ago.\n\nBut as this stream flowed on from a past as remote and mysterious as the\nsources of the Nile were in the days of Herodotus, suddenly a new and\nindependent one takes its rise. And this latter stream can be traced to\nits source in the fifth century of our era. It emanated not, as in the\nother case, from the pagan heart of the race in its more primitive\nphase, but in that heart overtaken and surprised by the new doctrines of\nChristianity.\n\nThis was really a new departure\u2014a new beginning. The two streams had\nlittle in common. In essence and colour they seemed as if they belonged\nto two different worlds, which indeed was the case, in point of outlook\nand underlying thought.\n\nAs literature the old was better. It represented the real quintessence\nof the Celtic genius before it was diverted into new channels. And this\nis what makes critics like M. Darmesteter, while fully admitting the\nglorious significance of the new stream as a literary renaissance, yet\nconsider it a decadence in contrast with the earlier.\n\nFor all this, the far-reaching significance of the new creation must not\nbe lost sight of. It is probable that even then the ancient stream had\nreached its full flood, and but for the advent of the latter, which came\nwith the new thought, it may have gradually subsided with the old order\nand never have found a way to posterity.\n\nHistorically, then, it is with the introduction of Christianity that\nCeltic literature first finds its embodiment, and when we consider the\ncondition of continental Europe at the time, this early beginning in the\nwriting of books is quite marvellous. It is to the Church, therefore, in\nthe person of its missionary pioneers, that we owe the initial force\nthat resulted in a written Gaelic literature.\n\nIn bringing Christianity to bear on the old pagan life and thought of\nthe race, the missionaries effected a reanimation, which brought latent\npowers into action in a new direction. They furnished the people with\nfresh ideas, new material for thought, and an entirely changed outlook.\nThe movement, indeed, might be described as the passage from Celtic\nnaturalism to Christian spiritualism. And when we consider what the old\npaganism really was in many of its features, this emancipation cannot be\nregarded in any other light than that in which history uniformly regards\nit, as a salvation of the country, preparing the way for the realisation\nof all those grand possibilities that lay in the future.\n\nWith the coming of St. Patrick Ireland entered upon a new epoch, and\nwith the advent of St. Columba the political and literary history of\nScotland may be said to have begun. Every credit is due to the Church,\ntherefore, as the importer and originator of a written literature, as\nwell as of a true religion. To it we owe the remarkable arrival of\nletters which not only tapped a new fountain head, causing a new stream\nof literary composition to flow, but which also secured for us the\npreservation and continuance of the old to this day.\n\n\u201cFew forms of Christianity,\u201d wrote Renan, \u201chave offered an ideal of\nChristian perfection so pure as the Celtic Church of the sixth, seventh,\nand eighth centuries. Nowhere, perhaps, has God been better worshipped\nin spirit than in those great monastic communities of Hy or Iona, of\nBangor, of Clonard, or of Lindisfarne.\u201d\n\nAnd it is this purity of motive and sincerity of purpose that led the\nearly missionaries, in contrast to the obscurantists of later ages, to\nrecognise the high value of literature and use it in the service of\nreligion. In the primitive Celtic Church we find no conflict between the\ntwo, such as the sickly piety of some more modern periods has instituted\nand maintained. Learning and culture were then never regarded as enemies\nto religion. On the contrary, they were deemed not only helpful, but\neven indispensable to the progress of Christianity in the land. And they\nwere encouraged as such. They were the most powerful agents for the\nremoval of racial ignorance, superstition, and prejudice.\n\nAll honour, therefore, to the Church that first kindled the lamp of\nliterature and the love of knowledge in these once dark islands.\n\nThe attitude of this early Celtic Church towards the original oral\ntraditions and compositions of the people was perfectly consistent, and\ncan be easily understood. It simply ignored them as far as that was\npossible, offering in their stead a substitute infinitely better fitted,\nas it thought, to elevate the life and character of these pagan peoples.\n\nWith a zeal that is entirely praiseworthy, it set itself to the\nmultiplication of copies of the Psalter, of the Gospels, and other parts\nof Scripture. It is really marvellous, when we consider that these had\nto be patiently and laboriously and beautifully handwritten, how much\nwas accomplished in this way by the early missionaries. St. Columba\nalone was credited with having written \u201cthree hundred gifted, lasting,\nilluminated, noble books,\u201d all of them transcriptions of some portions\nof the Bible, no doubt.\n\nIt is this which accounts for the fact that almost all the existing\nliterary monuments of the early Celtic Church are copies of the Gospels\nor of the Psalter, with or without Gaelic or Latin glosses.\n\nThus the \u201cDomhnach Airgid,\u201d the \u201cCathrach,\u201d the Books of Durrow, Dimna,\nKells, Molling, Armagh, Deer, the \u201cGospel of Maeielbrid Macdurnain,\u201d the\n\u201cPsalter of Southampton,\u201d with correlative books like the \u201cIrish Canons\u201d\nand \u201cMissal of Stowe,\u201d in the British Islands, besides those on the\nContinent.\n\nIt is significant that the missionaries used the Latin versions of the\nScriptures rather than Greek or Hebrew ones, with the reading and\nwriting of which latter they seemed to have been less familiar. They did\nnot attempt, so far as we know, to make a Gaelic translation of the\noriginal, but contented themselves, no doubt, with rendering from Latin\ninto the Gaelic in course of their preachings and expositions.\n\nOne thing is evident, that these scholarly men had no aversion to\ntextual criticism or any fear of it, like so many of their Highland and\nIrish successors to-day, for they freely indulged in it for their own\nand the popular benefit. Thus the Celtic Church of Scotland and Ireland\nhad Jerome\u2019s recension of the Vulgate almost as soon as it was issued,\nand, to judge from the youthful Columba and his master St. Finnian\u2019s\navidity for it, welcomed it with great enthusiasm. And more than that,\nthe Celtic Church appears to have collated Jerome\u2019s text with older\nnative texts of their own, to make if possible even a better version,\nsuch as they might use in all their monasteries, and such as we find to\nthis day in most of their great books of Gospel, as quoted above.\n\nBut in the same way that Knox unfortunately found it expedient to\ndestroy many beautiful buildings, books, and customs of the Roman\nCatholic Church at the time of the Reformation, so the early Celtic\nChurch in conflict with an ancient and debasing paganism felt it\nnecessary, while tolerating many ancient customs and superstitions, to\nresist the leaven of heathenism in every shade and form, and thus even\nto ignore the compositions which breathed so freely its spirit and\natmosphere.\n\nThere is a high probability that the best minds felt the hardship of\nhaving to turn their backs upon the most beautiful of these literary\nproducts of their race. For example, in the \u201cDialogue of the Sages,\u201d\nfound in the Book of Lismore, it is recorded that St. Patrick himself\nfelt rather uneasy at the delight with which he listened to the stories\nof the ancient Feinn, and feared it might be wrong in him to enjoy or\nshow his appreciation of those pagan narratives, yet when he consulted\nhis guardian angels, they not only assured him that there was no harm in\nlistening to the tales, but even counselled him to have them written\ndown in the words of ollamhs, \u201cfor,\u201d said they, \u201cit will be a rejoicing\nto numbers and to the good people to the end of time to listen to these\nstories.\u201d\n\nThe missionaries appear to have been too earnest and consistent in their\nstruggle with the gnarled roots of paganism to indulge their taste in\nwriting what they could not help admiring as tales of great literary\nbeauty, and very fascinating. And so for two or three centuries, though\nthe cultivation of writing and bardic compositions went steadily on,\nnone of the ancient pagan products found patrons sufficiently literary\nto commit them to MSS.\n\nThe new school followed a style and trend of its own, and in addition to\nendless transcribing, produced Latin prose works of its own, prominent\namong which may be mentioned St. Patrick\u2019s _Confession_, and \u201cEpistle to\nCoroticus,\u201d Cummene\u2019s and Adamnan\u2019s _Lives of St. Columba_, Brendan\u2019s\n_Navigatio_ or _Voyaging_, each of which have had a wide vogue\nthroughout the Middle Ages, and since.\n\nAmong its Gaelic contributions are many beautiful poems, some of ancient\nrenown, on account of their theme or author, such as Dallan Forgaill\u2019s\n_Amra Choluimcille_, St. Columba\u2019s own numerous lyrics\u2014that on Derry, on\nCormac\u2019s visit, his \u201cFarewell to Ara,\u201d all breathing love of nature and\naffection for home.\n\nThen we have the verses of Cennfaelad, who died in 678; Aengus the\nCuldee\u2019s \u201cFeilire,\u201d or Calendar, about 800; the poems in the Monastery\nof St. Paul, Carinthia; and the verses in the Codex Boernerianus; the\n\u201cSaltair na Rann,\u201d about the year 1000, a collection of 162 poems in\nearly middle Irish.\n\nOf hymns and prayers, both in Gaelic and Latin\u2014compositions of the early\nCeltic Church\u2014there is no lack. The most famous of the Latin ones are\nthose of Sechnall (on St. Patrick) and of Columcille (\u201cThe Altus,\u201d \u201cIn\nte Christo,\u201d and \u201cNoli Pater\u201d); and of the Gaelic ones, St. Patrick\u2019s\n\u201cDeer\u2019s Cry,\u201d Colman\u2019s and Fiacc\u2019s hymns, \u201cNinine\u2019s Prayer,\u201d Ultan\u2019s and\nBroccan\u2019s hymns, both in praise of Brigit, \u201cAdamnan\u2019s Prayer,\u201d and the\nhymns of Sanctain and Mael-isu.\n\nWhen to these we add specimens of homiletic literature and \u201cCormac\u2019s\nGlossary\u201d (Cormac, King-Bishop of Cashel, 837\u2013903), which is reckoned by\nfar the oldest attempt at a comparative vernacular dictionary made in\nany language of modern Europe, and the same author\u2019s \u201cSaltair of\nCashel,\u201d we have a very fair representation of what the new literature\ninitiated by the monks and missionaries contained.\n\nIt is mainly a religious literature, as contrasted with the purely pagan\nwar-stories and romances of the heroes. This ethical movement for a time\ntended to supplant the natural spontaneous poetical output of the race,\nyet it could not crush out these older creations, which were independent\nof books and MSS., and as intense in feeling and true to nature as\nanything which the classical literatures contain.\n\nAnd so in course of time there came a reaction. The votaries of\nnaturalism so far triumphed in their zeal for the ancient sagas and\nromances, that they began to have them written down. Zimmer thinks that\nthe earliest redaction of the \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9\u201d dates from the seventh\ncentury. But it is difficult to ascertain when the sagas first found\nembodiment in ink. The interest in them appears to have been revived\nimmediately before or at the time when the Norsemen arrived and were\ndevastating the country. The devotion of the latter to the\ncharacteristic sagas of their own race and nation may have quickened the\nenthusiasm of the Gael for his own. And the new atmosphere which this\nrough pagan element introduced to the land, breaking for a time the\ninfluence and sway of the Church and of the men of learning in the\nmonasteries, may have conduced further to bring into popular favour the\nold heroic war-poetry, nerving the heart of the people to withstand the\nonslaught of the invader in the spirit of the dead heroes.\n\nChristianity suffered eclipse for a while, and with it the interests of\nlearning and the religious literature, cultivated so assiduously in the\nmonasteries.\n\nBy the time that the sagas had come to be written down, the old feeling\nwhich had prompted the early missionaries to ignore them was apparently\ngiving way, since there were scribes within the Church eager to commit\nthem to MS. This was a natural and inevitable reaction.\n\nBut monastic Christianity, ever on its guard against nature, was\nconstantly seeking after the strange and paradoxical. For it, abstinence\nwas worth more than enjoyment, happiness must be sought in its opposite.\nAnd so there sprung up afresh, this time a more blind and uncompromising\northodox antagonism to the early paganism and all its creations.\n\nThe Dialogues between Ossian and Patrick are our witness. These, while\nprofessing to bring the spirit of paganism and of early Christianity\ntogether in the person of the last great representative of the one and\nthe first of the other, were evidently the work of monkish scribes in\nthe twelfth century or earlier, and they throw a significant sidelight\non the situation. In reality they reflect the posture of affairs, not as\nit was in the early days when Christianity was first introduced, but as\nit existed later, when ecclesiastical doctrines had taken on their more\nlurid, medieval colour.\n\nIn form and setting the Dialogues are the nearest approach to a drama\nthat the Gael has ever produced. And Miss Hull thinks that they were\ndesigned simply to popularise the ancient tales. But such a view seems\nto us to miss the whole aim and point of these compositions, which are\nclearly the undisguised result of a reaction,\u2014nay, even revolt in the\nminds of thoughtful and patriotic men, monks or clerics or laymen,\nagainst the narrow and captious spirit that can see no good in any form\nof natural life and religion other than the contracted faith in which it\nwas itself reared.\n\nEvidently the Church had descended from the high level of faith and\npolicy it had maintained in the days of St. Patrick and St. Columba, and\nmeasures which the latter had found necessary as temporary expedients\ntill the need for them had vanished, smaller minds had elevated into\nprinciples; and even the simple tenets of Christianity they had\ndistorted by casting them into an ecclesiastical mould, and opposing\nthem to the most natural instincts and enthusiasms of the human heart.\n\nThe writers of the Dialogues, we can see, are thoroughly in earnest, and\nnot sparing in their irony and banter of the grim theology which found\nno place for the natural virtues of the Celts, or for the story of the\ndreams and ideals of a thousand years. A mocking, derisive humour runs\nthrough these pieces, but the humour is all on one side. There can be no\nmistaking the sympathies of the writers, who themselves are\nintellectually emancipated from the narrow tenets and intolerant spirit\nthat would consign the heroes without reflection and without scruple to\nendless pain.\n\nIn these Dialogues paganism at its best is brought face to face with\necclesiastical Christianity, and is made to appear more just, more\nhumane, and desirable in every way.\n\nTo the spirit of these conversations, or to the form in which they are\ncast, no exception can reasonably be taken. In one respect only might\nstudents of history dissent, and that is, to the selection of St.\nPatrick as spokesman for the bigotry that is here pilloried.\n\nThose who are familiar with the authentic records of his life and the\nspirit of his teaching will feel that an injustice is done the apostle\nof Ireland, by associating his name with such counterfeit sentiment. Had\na typical medieval monk or cleric been selected as advocate of the\nrepulsive theology represented here, the r\u00f4le would have been more true\nto life and historical fact. As it is, one feels that a noble character\nis traduced and put in a false setting. These Dialogues are profoundly\ninteresting, not only because of the struggle between nature and dogma,\nbetween the cosmic process and the ethical, here brought into\nirreconcilable antagonism, but also because the two original and\nindependent streams of Gaelic literature seem here to meet, and, like\nthe rushing together of contrary tides or of two confluent currents, to\nmingle their waters together in a wild tumult of angry waves, which only\nsubsides as each again gradually finds its own channel.\n\nOne of the most interesting of the Dialogues is that which is known as\n\u201cOssian\u2019s Prayer,\u201d and is about 150 lines in length. The bard begins by\nasking the saint if the Feinn of Erin are in heaven. When he is informed\nthat his father, Gaul, and Oscar cannot be there, he not unnaturally\nretorts, \u201cIf Erin\u2019s Feinn are not in heaven, why should I Christian be?\u201d\nThereupon the saint taunts him with irreverent fierceness of language,\nadding \u201cWhat are all the Feinn of Erin to one hour with God alone?\u201d But\nOssian declares he would prefer to see one battle waged by the valiant\nFeinn than to see the Lord of Heaven and his cleric (Patrick) chanting\nsin.\n\nThe saint tries to impress him with God\u2019s omniscience by telling him in\neffect that it would be impossible for the smallest midge to enter\nheaven without God\u2019s knowledge. \u201cHow different from Finn,\u201d exclaims the\nbard, \u201cthousands might enter, partake of his cheer, and depart without\nnotice.\u201d\n\nThe argument throughout shows complete divergence in their thought.\n\n\u201cFinn is in hell in bonds,\u201d says Patrick. \u201cHe is now in the house of\npain and sorrow, because of the amusement he had with the hounds and for\nattending the (bardic) schools each day, and because he took no heed of\nGod.\u201d And to an interpolation of Ossian, \u201cMisery attend thee, old man,\u201d\nhe continues, \u201cwho speakest words of madness; God is better for one hour\nthan all the Fenians of Erin.\u201d\n\nTo which the bard retorts, \u201cO Patrick, who makest me that impertinent\nanswer, thy crozier would be in atoms were Oscar present. Were my son\nOscar and God hand in hand on Knock-na-veen, if I saw my son down, it is\nthen I would say that God was a strong man.\n\n\u201cHow could it be that God and his clerics could be better men than Finn,\nthe chief king of the Fenians, the generous one, who was without\nblemish? All the qualities that you and your clerics say are according\nto the rule of the King of the Stars, Finn\u2019s Fenians had them all, and\nthey must be now stoutly seated in God\u2019s heaven. Were there a place\nabove or below better than heaven, \u2019tis there Finn would go and all the\nFenians he had.\u201d\n\nBaffled in his attempt to initiate the pagan into his new doctrines, and\ncurious to hear, Patrick relents and calls for a tale. The following is\nan example of the usual metre of the original mellifluous Gaelic:\u2014\n\n               Ossian, sweet to me thy voice,\n               Now blessings choice on the soul of Finn,\n               But tell to me how many deer\n               Were slain at Slieve-na-man-finn.\n\nAnd warming to the task, the bard recites the glorious character and\ndeeds of the vanished heroes. \u201cThe Fenians never used to tell untruth.\nThere never sat cleric in church, though melodiously ye may think they\nchant psalms, more true to his word than the Fenians, the men who shrank\nnever from fierce conflicts.\u201d And then when he adds, \u201cI never heard that\nany feat was performed by the King of the saints, or that _He_ reddened\nhis hand,\u201d the exasperated and dogmatic Patrick stops him short with the\nassertion, \u201cLet us cease disputing on both sides, thou withered old man,\nwho art devoid of sense; understand that God dwells in heaven of the\norders, and Finn and his hosts are all in pain.\u201d Ossian, pathetically,\n\u201cGreat then would be the shame for God not to release Finn from the\nshackles of pain; for if God himself were in bonds, my chief would fight\non his behalf. Finn never suffered in his day any one to be in pain or\ndifficulty without redeeming him by silver or gold, or by battle and\nfight, until he was victorious.\n\n\u201cIt is a good claim I have against your God, I to be among these clerics\nas I am, without food, without clothing or music, without bestowing gold\non bards, without battling, without hunting, etc.\u201d The idea of his\nwell-meaning instructors was to starve the bard into submission, in the\nintolerant spirit of the Inquisition of later times, or of boycotting in\nmore modern days.\n\nElsewhere the bewildered Ossian laments as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cAlas, O Patrick, I did think that God would not be angered thereat; I\nthink long, and it is a great woe to me, not to speak of the way of Finn\nof the Deeds.\u201d To which Patrick: \u201cSpeak not of Finn nor of the Fenians,\nfor the Son of God will be angry with thee for it. He would never let\nthee into his court, and He would not send thee the bread of each day.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will, O Patrick, do his will. Of Finn or of the Fenians I will not\ntalk, for fear of bringing anger upon them, O cleric, if it is God\u2019s\nwont to be angry.\u201d\n\nMingled with these arguments are passages which quiver with the Gaelic\nenthusiastic love of nature. In _Finn\u2019s Pastimes_, for example, we have\na lyric of extraordinary beauty. After a couple of verses addressed to\nhis opponent, ending, \u201cCan his doom be in hell, in _the house of cold_?\u201d\nOssian goes on to tell of his father\u2019s delight in nature. The passage is\nheld to be in the very best style, rhyme, rhythm, and assonance, all\ncombined with a most rich vocabulary of words expressive of sounds,\nnearly impossible to translate into English. But we quote from Dr.\nSigerson\u2019s beautiful rendering of the original:\u2014\n\n                The tuneful tumult of that bird,\n                The belling deer on ferny steep;\n                This welcome in the dawn he heard,\n                These soothed at eve his sleep.\n\n                Dear to him the wind-loved heath,\n                The whirr of wings, the rustling brake;\n                Dear the murmuring glens beneath,\n                And sob of Droma\u2019s lake.\n\n                The cry of hounds at early morn,\n                The pattering deer, the pebbly creek,\n                The cuckoo\u2019s call, the sounding horn,\n                The swooping eagle\u2019s shriek.\n\nThese Dialogues are quoted at some length, because they bring into clear\noutline permanent tendencies\u2014the rival influences of naturalism and the\nChurch\u2014Celtic literature struggling to be free, and the Church seeking\nto saturate it with its own sentiment, and use it solely for its own\npropaganda. That is the history down to this day. Nature, love, and war\non the one side, and religious themes on the other. The one timid of the\nother, and each on its guard against the undue ascendency of its rival.\n\nThus it is assumed that James Macpherson ignored these ancient\ncompositions, namely, the Dialogues, as modern and counterfeit, because\nof the intrusion of the ecclesiastical element into the purely pagan\ndomain. Into none of his own so-called translations did he admit any\nflavour of Christianity, regarding that only as the genuine and original\nOssianic residuum which breathed the spirit of pre-Christian times.\n\nBut he lived in the days before textual criticism. We cannot credit the\nChurch as a whole with disinterested love of literature and its\nencouragement. But in every age there have been men within its fold who\nwere passionately devoting themselves to authorship on their own\naccount, and to the preservation of books and MSS., and literary lore of\nthe past. Every monastery in the Middle Ages was thus more or less a\nplace in which reading and writing were cultivated, and some were active\ncentres of literary work. So that indirectly, and especially in\ntroublous times, we owe to the Church the splendid heritage of a Gaelic\nliterature continuous from the days of St. Patrick and St Columba to our\nown. Down to very recent times, in fact, the men connected with\nreligious institutions have been the real custodiers, if not always\nthemselves the authors, of Gaelic productions. Thus it was Maelmuiri in\nClonmacnois that enriched posterity with the wonderful Leabhar Na\nh\u2019Uidhre, while his contemporary did for the hymns in the _Liber\nHymnorum_ what he so bravely and intelligently did for the sagas. From\ntheir time the fatuous hostility to the sagas had evidently broken down.\nPerhaps the Dialogues between Ossian and Patrick had been as effective\nin their own way in pouring ridicule and contempt upon the opposing\nfaction as the poems of Burns in withering the hyper-orthodox tyranny of\nlater times. At any rate, from the monasteries of Ireland in these\nMiddle Ages came the great books of sagas and romance, such as the Books\nof Leinster, Ballymote, Lecain, Lismore, etc.; and in Scotland in the\ncorresponding period we have the Glenmasan MS. of the thirteenth\ncentury; MS. XL. of the fourteenth; and, besides others, the great Book\nof the Dean of Lismore, which covers the period down almost to the\nReformation in Scotland.\n\nBut with the Reformation the old spirit of mistaken evangelical zeal\nagainst the ancient heroic literature seems to have revived in an\naggressive form, for we find no less a man than Bishop Carswell, the\nmost representative Churchman in the Highlands of that age, inveighing\nagainst the popularity of the sagas. In the epistle to the reader, which\nhe prefixed to Knox\u2019s Liturgy, the first book printed in Gaelic, he\nsays:\u2014\n\n  And great is the blindness and sinful darkness and ignorance and\n  perverseness of those who teach and write and compose in Gaelic, that\n  with the view of obtaining for themselves the vain rewards of this\n  world, they are more desirous, and more accustomed to preserve the\n  vain, extravagant, false, and worldly histories concerning the Tuath\n  de Dananns and Milesians, Fionn, the son of Cumhail, and his heroes\n  the Feinn, and many others, which I shall not here mention, nor\n  attempt to examine, than they are to write, and to teach, and to\n  compose the sincere words of God and the perfect way of truth. For the\n  world loves falsehood more than the truth, and as a proof of it,\n  worldly sinful men will pay for falsehood, and will not listen to the\n  truth though they have it for nothing.\n\n  A great portion of the darkness and ignorance of such persons arises,\n  too, from the aforesaid truths not being taught in good books,\n  understood by all who speak the general language or habitual Gaelic\n  tongue.\n\nThis was a volte-face from the sympathetic attitude of the Dean of\nLismore, and no doubt included him in its sweeping indictment. Yet we\nmay take it as representing the attitude of the leaders of the\nReformation towards the literature as well as the beliefs and cults\ntolerated by the Latin Church. For a time the great evangelical\nmovement, which had spread from Germany over England and Scotland, had\nlittle effect in the Highlands. The people remained widely indifferent\nto religious influences of every kind, except such lingering influence\nas the Roman Catholic Church continued to exert upon them; but when at\nlength they came once more under the influence of evangelical preachers,\nlike Robert Bruce and others, the precedent set by Carsewell and the\nreformers seems to have been less or more uniformly followed; and with\nevery revival of clerical authority there appeared an unmistakable\ntendency towards a revival of clerical intolerance, painfully\ndetrimental to wholesome literature, as well as to music, athletic\nsports, and amusements of every kind.\n\nConsequently since the Reformation Gaelic oral literature has been\ngradually disappearing, until, in the words of Mr. Alexander Carmichael,\n\u201cit is now becoming meagre in quantity, inferior in quality, and greatly\nisolated.\u201d\n\nIn his own collection, which represents the latest gleaning in this\nfield of Gaelic lore, we see the influence of the Church and the old\npagan traditions strangely intermingled. The very title, \u201cHymns and\nIncantations,\u201d suggests the double influence, the two streams which have\nbeen running parallel, approaching each other, mingling and separating\nall through Celtic literature.\n\nHowever much the Church may have gained the ascendency over rival\ninfluences, it has never been able to stifle the heroic poetry of the\nrace. At periods when the latter seemed most to have gone under, and\ndisappeared beneath the ban of religion, it came to life again with\namazing vitality, as, for example, in the days of Maelmuiri and after,\nwhen the ecclesiastical seemed to have conquered the pagan; and again in\nthe days of Macpherson, when the Reformation appeared to have made a\nclean sweep of the heroic saga in the land, leaving neither name nor\nmemorial. And the MSS. had so completely disappeared that they were not\nknown to exist.\n\nBut forth they came to testify once more to the hidden and precarious\ngenius of the Celtic people, which produced such diverse characters as\nFergus and Ossian, Patrick and Columcille.\n\nWhile the nineteenth century has been exceptionally brilliant in the\ndepartment of English literature, the same cannot be said of Gaelic\nliterature. In the former great works of creative genius have appeared,\nwhich have added immense lustre to the language in which they were\nconceived. In the latter the output by comparison has been very poor and\nmeagre, no lengthy sustained production of any originality having seen\nthe light either in prose or poetry. It would seem as if the genius of\nthe Gaelic language had found more congenial expression in English, for\nnot a few of those who have enriched the younger literature, from Sir\nWalter Scott onwards to William Black and Robert Buchanan, have derived\ntheir inspiration, and sometimes their themes, from Celtic sources. Of\nnative compositions we have nothing to show beyond elegies, songs, and\nlyrics, some of them of great beauty, and as spontaneous and true to\nnature as the beating of men\u2019s hearts. But no epic, no heroic poetry, no\ndrama, no great prose work worthy to be classed with the masterpieces of\nEnglish literature, or even with the minor works, has appeared within\nthe last century. Instead of being a century of creative work, as in\nEnglish, it has rather been a century of gleaning. All the best works in\nGaelic are collections\u2014gleanings from the past.\n\nIt would be difficult to assign the real reason for the barrenness of\nproduction in recent times. Many causes seem to combine. The derelict\ncondition of the Highland and Irish populations in the beginning of last\ncentury may have had something to do with it; the decline and limited\nuse of the language; the invasion of English and English literature, of\nLowland people and Lowland ways.\n\nGleaners and native lovers of Celtic literature generally ascribe a\nlarge share of the decadence to the influence and attitude of the Church\nin its local testimony. During the greater part of last century,\nespecially in the Highlands, that influence has been such that, had the\nDialogues been produced any time within that period, they would have hit\nthe mark quite as surely as in the age in which they were written, if we\nconceived St Patrick as orthodox cleric and Ossian as the native genius\nof the Celtic people.\n\nBut times have changed. The lights and shadows on the canvas have again\nshifted. Our modern habits of thought are different. Like Ossian, men\nlook askance on morbid teaching, and have no great enthusiasm for\nunnatural asceticism. The prevailing theory of life, impatient of\nethical dualism, objects to the identification of nature with evil quite\nas much as the bard did. If nature is not evil, it asks, where, then, is\nthe necessity or the benefit of a renunciation which is incompatible\nwith the conditions under which men have to exist? And so, concurrent\nwith the decadence of ecclesiastical ideas and ecclesiastical authority,\nthere is a return to nature; and in many quarters a fresh interest is\nbeing taken in the language, literature, and lore of the Gael. And new\nwriters have arisen who breathe the spirit of the race, and voice its\nlongings, yearnings, strivings, free from theological bias.\n\nTheir medium is no longer the Gaelic, but the English, into which they\nhave carried many quaint idioms, sentiments, and expressions. Indeed it\nis doubtful if ever the Gaelic will again adapt itself to any great\nliterary work, since the gifted have adopted English as the more\ncomprehensive vehicle.\n\nYet now, looking dispassionately over the vicissitudes of Gaelic\nliterature from the time it was first cradled in the rough bosom of the\nrace, and nurtured by Christianity, we cannot forget the splendid\nservices rendered by monks and Churchmen in the early days and during\nthe Middle Ages down to the Reformation. Adverse periods of obscurantism\nthere have been, blighting enough and painfully retrograde. But for ages\nthe Church figured as the patron of letters, and even in later times\nthere have been enthusiastic literary workers within its pale. In\nScotland men like Sage, Macnicol, Smith, Maccallum, Drs. Norman Macleod,\nMacdonald, Clerk, Maclauchlan, Cameron, Dowden, Henderson, and Macneill;\nin Ireland Drs. Reeves, Todd, Wright, Stokes, and many others.\n\nAnd taking the influence of the Church at its best, we may surely apply\nto it, in its relation to literature, the remark of Dean Church in a\nwider connection: \u201cHistory teaches us this, that in tracing back the\ncourse of human improvement, we come in one case after another upon\nChristianity as the source from which improvement derived its principle\nand its motive. We find no other source adequate to account for the new\nspring of amendment, and without it no other source of good could have\nbeen relied on.\u201d\n\nSo here Christianity, through its medium, the Church, besides saving the\nsoul of a departing oral literature, has been the fruitful spring and\ninspiration of much that is beautiful, pure, and enduring in our Gaelic\nheritage.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XVI\n             THE INFLUENCE OF CELTIC, ON ENGLISH LITERATURE\n\n  Earliest contact\u2014Loan-words\u2014Three periods of marked literary\n      influence\u2014Layamon\u2019s \u201cBrut\u201d\u2014A fascinating study for critics\u2014The\n      development of the Arthurian Romance\u2014Sir Thomas Malory\u2014Question as\n      to origin of rhyme\u2014A Celtic claim\u2014Elements in Scottish poetry\u2014in\n      English literature\u2014Gray\u2019s \u201cBard\u201d\u2014Macpherson\u2019s \u201cOssian\u201d\u2014Influence\n      on Wordsworth and his contemporaries\u2014Moore\u2019s \u201cIrish Melodies\u201d\u2014Sir\n      Walter Scott\u2014Tennyson\u2014Interesting comparison\u2014Arnold, Shairp,\n      Blackie\u2014Novelists after Scott\u2014Living writers.\n\n\nAnglo-Saxon or Old English came into contact with Celtic from the year\n449 onwards. By the end of that century the latter had the beginnings of\na literature, the former had not. C\u00e6dmon\u2019s poem dates from nearly 200\nyears later.\n\nEnglish literature could not, therefore, have been influenced by Celtic\nfor centuries after the first Saxon invasion, as it had not then come\ninto existence. But the English language was so influenced. From the\nearliest contact it doubtless bore traces of the Celtic in the form of\nloan-words.\n\nYet, strange to say, very few such native vernacular words passed over\ninto Old English till the Norman invasion. The reason may have been, as\nsuggested by Sweet, that the Britons were themselves to a large extent\nRomanised, especially those of the cities, who were for the most part\ndescendants of Roman soldiers.\n\nAfter the Conquest many more Celtic words found their way into English\nthrough the Norman-French, and, as might be expected, it is very\ndifficult to discriminate between the contributions of the earlier and\nthe later period. Names of persons and places, on the other hand, are\neasily distinguished, because they were generally taken over without\nchange.\n\nNot till the fateful Forty-five had finally broken down the ancient\nbarriers of racial seclusion was there any further great accession of\nthis Celtic element. But owing to the interest awakened then in the\nHighlands, the freer intercourse established with England and the\nLowlands of Scotland, and especially through the writings of historians\nand travellers, and of great authors like James Macpherson and Sir\nWalter Scott, a number of new words passed from this time direct from\nthe Highland Gaelic as well as from the Irish into the English language.\nFrom the former came the well-known clan, claymore, ghillie, plaid,\npibroch, sporran, slogan, whisky, reel; and from the latter, brogue,\nkern, Tory, shamrock, shillelagh, usquebaugh, bother, and a few others.\nWords had been dribbling from the Welsh also, as we might expect, from\ntime to time.\n\nThe influence on the literature began later, but it has been very marked\nand continuous down to the present day. Three periods stand out as\nparticularly potent. The first begins from the end of the twelfth\ncentury and extends to the Reformation. The second, taking its impetus\nfrom the Forty-five and the Ossianic revival, carries us forward to the\ntime of Tennyson. And the third, coeval with the modern Celtic\nrenaissance, reaches from Tennyson to the present time.\n\nThough the different branches of the Celtic people had been producing a\nliterature from the sixth century, that literature does not seem to have\naffected English authorship, until in the Middle Ages it created the\ncaptivating Arthurian romances. Then, like the other Continental\nliteratures, the English for the first time fell under the sway of the\nCeltic imagination.\n\nThe earliest great poem written in the English language after the Norman\nConquest owes its inspiration and theme entirely to that source. In the\nopening passage the author introduces himself thus: \u201cThere was a priest\nin the land, whose name was Layamon; he was son of Lovenath; may the\nLord be gracious unto him! He dwelt at Ernley at a noble church on\nSevern\u2019s bank, good it seemed to him, near Radstone, where he read\nbooks. It came in mind to him and in his chiefest thought that he would\nof England tell the noble deeds, what the men were named, and whence\nthey came, who first had English land.\u201d\n\nThis Layamon, travelling widely over the land in search of information,\nfound three valuable books on which he based his tale\u2014an English\ntranslation of Bede, a Latin book made by St. Albin and the fair Austin,\nand the French one by Wace.\n\nHis own poem he called the \u201cBrut,\u201d after the fabulous Brutus, the\ngreat-grandson of Aeneas, who, according to Welsh writers, became the\nancestor of the Kings of Briton. It deals chiefly with the materials of\nWace, but it gives the story of Uther Pendragon and his famous son\nArthur in much fuller detail. For example, while Wace\u2019s \u201cBrut\u201d contains\n15,300 lines, Layamon\u2019s has 32,250, more than double, and the\ncomposition is characterised by a somewhat rude attempt at alliteration\nand rhyme.\n\nThere are two MSS. still extant of this interesting work, both of them\nin the British Museum. The oldest is held to have been written not later\nthan 1205, and the language is so purely English, notwithstanding its\nsource, that less than fifty words of French origin have been found in\nit by Sir Frederick Madden, who in 1847 first edited these texts.\n\nAlmost a hundred years pass after Layamon wrote before another English\nbook of the kind appears. And this time it is the rhyming chronicle of\nRobert of Gloucester, who goes over some of the ground of Geoffrey of\nMonmouth, and brings the history down to 1272.\n\nA fascinating study for critics is the wonderful way in which the\nArthurian romance seems to have developed from a small beginning. This\ngradual evolution can in the main be traced.\n\nSo far as our modern knowledge goes, the Arthur of real life was a\nCornish chief with a following in Wales, who met Cedric of Wessex in the\nstricken field, but who himself at length fell fighting the Picts, most\nprobably in our own native Scotland. Gildas chronicles a great victory\nwon over the Saxons, but omits to record who was the victorious chief.\nIt is Nennius who first mentions Arthur by name, in the ninth century.\nHis story is vastly amplified by Geoffrey of Monmouth, who wrote about\n1154, and by the time it comes from the pen of Robert Wace, some ten\nyears later, there is the splendid addition of the Round Table. Layamon\nis able to go into details, not hitherto mentioned, of the construction\nof this famous Board, which obviated quarrels over uppermost seats,\nsince no one could have precedence owing to its shape. Up to this point\nthe legend bore no Christian character. It is saturated with the magic,\nand slaughter, and revenge of the old Pagan North, rich in stories of\ngiants, dwarfs, serpents, and heathen enchantments, far enough removed\nfrom the spirit of medieval Christianity. But by the beginning of the\nthirteenth century it suddenly underwent a great development, and new\nincidents were added with which the earlier writers could not have been\nacquainted.\n\nThomas Arnold thinks that this transformation is due to the genius of\nWalter Map (_circa_ 1210), who introduced the religious element with the\nview of converting the Arthurian legends, and employing them in the\nservice of Christianity.\n\nFrom this time we have in French the Story of the Holy Grail, the\nHistory of Merlin, Sir Launcelot of the Lake, the Quest of the Holy\nGrail, and the Death of Arthur. The first two have been attributed to\nRobert Borron, the latter three to Walter Map himself. But the whole\nsubject appears to be wrapped in singular obscurity, and offers a field\nfor considerable divergence of opinion. The latest dissertation on the\nquestion is that by Jessie L. Weston in her recent publications. (Nutt:\nLondon, 1901.) After the above, five more stories followed, such as\nTristram and the history of King Pellinore by other writers. These later\nseries of romances seem to have caught on better in France than in\nEngland. For only a few metrical compositions of this class are found in\nEnglish MSS. prior to the days of Sir Thomas Malory, and these in\ndocuments of the fifteenth century. One alliterative tale, indeed, that\nof _Sir Gawayne and the Green Knight_, first printed by Sir F. Madden in\n1839, and re-edited by Dr. Morris, is held by the latter to have been\nwritten about 1320. Sir Gawayne was Arthur\u2019s nephew, and figures in the\nearly stories as one of the purest models of knighthood, though very\ndifferently represented by the author of Tristram and subsequent\nwriters, including even Malory, who drew from French sources. About the\nmiddle of the fifteenth century Henry Lonelich translated into English\nverse the prose narrative of the sacred Grail, and possibly this may\nhave led Malory, the author of the more famous _Morte d\u2019Arthur_, to\nproduce, as he did about the year 1470, the remainder of the romances\nconnected with the Holy Grail in English prose. It was one of the\nearliest books printed by William Caxton (1485), and certainly one of\nthe finest examples of the prose of the pre-Elizabethan period.\n\nSir Thomas Malory compiled it out of the French versions of \u201cMerlin,\u201d\n\u201cLauncelot,\u201d \u201cTristram,\u201d the \u201cQueste du Saint Graal,\u201d and the \u201cMort\nArtur.\u201d His own postscript at the end of the book fitly describes its\nscope in very quaint terms. It runs as follows:\u2014\n\n  Heere is the end of the whole booke of King Arthur and of his noble\n  Knights of the round table, that when they were whole together there\n  was ever an hundred and fortie. Also heere is the end of the death of\n  King Arthur. I pray you all, gentlemen and gentlewomen, that read this\n  book of King Arthur and his Knights from the beginning to the ending,\n  pray for me while I am alive, that God send mee good deliverance.\n\n  And when I am dead, I pray you all pray for my soule. For this booke\n  was finished the ninth yeare of the raigne of King Edward the Fourth,\n  by Sir Thomas Maleor, Knight, as Jesu help me for his great might, as\n  hee is the servant of Jesu both day and night.\n\n  Thus endeth this noble and joyous booke entitled _La Mort Darthur_,\n  notwithstanding it treateth of the birth, life, and acts of the said\n  King Arthur and of his noble Knights of the round table, and their\n  mervailous enquests and adventures, the achieving of the holy\n  sancgreall, and in the end the dolorous death and departing out of\n  this world of them all.\n\nAs literature, this work of Malory is very interesting, and has been\nfrequently edited within the last hundred years.\n\nBeyond the powerful influences exerted by the Celtic romances, there\nfalls to be noticed another way in which the Gaelic genius is believed\nto have affected and even moulded English poetry in the later Middle\nAges. It is well known that down to Chaucer\u2019s time English poetry was\ncharacterised chiefly by alliteration. Scarcely any authors attempted\nrhyme. And those, like Layamon, who tried to combine both, often seem to\nachieve neither the one nor the other. They failed to produce the real\neffect of metre. But after Chaucer, rhyme gradually supplanted\nalliteration. And it is held by various learned authorities that this is\ndue to Celtic influence. The Celts first invented rhyme, they say, and\nin proof of this it is shown that they used it centuries before the\nEnglish or any other western nation. \u201cOutside of Wales and Ireland,\u201d\nsays Dr. Hyde, \u201cthere probably exists no example in a European\nvernacular language of rhymed poetry older than the ninth century.\u201d\n\nAnd Matthew Arnold, in a footnote to his _Study of Celtic Literature_,\nasserts that \u201crhyme,\u2014the most striking characteristic of our modern\npoetry as distinguished from that of the ancients, and a main source, to\nour poetry, of its magic and charm, of what we call its _romantic\nelement_,\u2014rhyme itself, all the weight of evidence tends to show, comes\ninto our poetry from the Celts.\u201d And in this opinion these litterateurs\nare supported by the earlier testimony of great philologists like Zeuss\nand Count Nigra.\n\nFrom the time of John Barbour, too, it is recognised that the bards of\nScotland who wrote English poetry have been influenced in various ways\nnot peculiar to their own contemporaries in England, by their connection\nwith and descent from the Celt. Stopford Brooke mentions three elements\nof Scottish poetry that he regards as distinctly Celtic contributions.\nThese are, first, the love of wild nature for its own sake\u2014the\npassionate, close, and poetical observation and description of natural\nscenery, which is not found in the poetry of England till near the end\nof the eighteenth century; second, the love of colour so characteristic\nof Gaelic and Cymric authorship; and, third, the wittier, more\nrollicking humour, which contrasts with the Teutonic humour, which has\nits root in sadness. The humour of Dunbar is thus as widely different\nfrom that of Chaucer as the humour of Burns is from that of Cowper, or\nof a modern Irishman is from that of a modern Englishman.\n\nBut if there is really humour in the ancient Celtic literature it is\nentirely unconscious. Many passages tickle our risible faculties now,\nand we smile as we read some of the narratives, such as the fight\nbetween Queen Meve\u2019s bull and his opponent in the old saga, but this is\nbecause of the very wealth of the Gaelic imagination and the mendacity\nof its exaggerations. It is questionable if the original Gael, the slave\nof such a powerful fancy, saw anything in his own extravagant\ndescriptions to laugh at. More likely he perpetrated these fictions\nquite as unconsciously as his Irish descendant of to-day perpetrates his\nbulls.\n\nAll the same it is quite conceivable that from this early tendency to be\ncarried off the ground by flights of fancy, the Scottish sense of\nhumour, conspicuous in the poets from pre-Reformation times, may have\ndeveloped.\n\nThat Celtic literature revelled from a remote antiquity in nature and\nlove of colour is very manifest from the earliest Gaelic, Welsh, and\nBreton tales. Take, for instance, the following description of Olwen\nfrom the Welsh:\u2014\n\n  The maiden was clothed in a robe of flame-coloured silk, and about her\n  neck was a collar of ruddy gold, on which were precious emeralds and\n  rubies. More yellow was her head than the flower of the broom, and her\n  skin was whiter than the foam of the wave, and fairer were her hands\n  and her fingers than the blossoms of the wood anemone amidst the spray\n  of the meadow fountain. The eye of the trained hawk, the glance of the\n  three-mewed falcon, was not brighter than hers. Her bosom was more\n  snowy than the breast of the white swan, her cheek was redder than the\n  reddest roses. Whoso beheld her was filled with her love. Four white\n  trefoils sprang up wherever she trod.\n\nThe old sagas and romances are full of this sort of vision. It was\nimpossible that such Celtic compositions could exist without imparting\nsome of their charm, their brilliant colouring, their observation, and\ndelight in nature and the unknown, to English literature. Naturally,\nScottish poetry first felt this influence. But the wonder is that\nEnglish literature as a whole was so late in being permeated therewith.\nWhen it did enter, it effected a mighty change both in the style and\nsubject matter.\n\nBeyond rhyme, love of nature, love of colour, and a certain type of\nhumour, which we have just glanced at, Matthew Arnold recognised three\nelements which are in a manner distinct from these. \u201cIf I were asked,\u201d\nhe says, \u201cwhere English poetry got these three things\u2014its turn for\nstyle, its turn for melancholy, and its turn for natural magic, for\ncatching and rendering the charm of nature in a wonderfully near and\nvivid way\u2014I should answer, with some doubt, that it got much of its turn\nfor style from a Celtic source; with less doubt, that it got much of its\nmelancholy from a Celtic source; with no doubt at all, that from a\nCeltic source it got nearly all its natural magic.\u201d...\n\n\u201cThe Celt\u2019s quick feeling for what is noble and distinguished gave his\npoetry style; his indomitable personality gave it pride and passion; his\nsensibility and nervous exaltation gave it a better gift still, the gift\nof rendering with wonderful felicity the magical charm of nature. The\nforest solitude, the bubbling spring, the wildflowers are everywhere in\nromance. They have a mysterious life and grace there; they are nature\u2019s\nown children, and utter her secret in a way which makes them something\nquite different from the woods, waters, and plants of Greek and Latin\npoetry. Now, of this delicate magic Celtic romance is so pre-eminent a\nmistress, that it seems impossible to believe the power did not come\ninto romance from the Celts. Magic is just the word for it\u2014the magic of\nnature; not merely the beauty of nature,\u2014_that_ the Greeks and Latins\nhad; not merely an honest smack of the soil, a faithful realism,\u2014_that_\nthe Germans had; but the intimate life of nature\u2014her weird power and her\nfairy charm.\u201d What better example of this distinction between the magic\nand beauty of nature might be wished for than the following beautiful\nconception? \u201cWell,\u201d says Math to Gwydion, \u201cwe will seek, I and thou, to\nform a wife for him out of flowers. So they took the blossoms of the\noak, and the blossoms of the broom, and the blossoms of the\nmeadow-sweet, and produced from them a maiden, the fairest and most\ngraceful that man ever saw. And they baptized her, and gave her the name\nof Flower-Aspect.\u201d\n\nShakespeare, in handling nature, while he had the Greek touch, is also\ncredited with sometimes striking the more exquisite and inimitable\nCeltic note. Thus:\u2014\n\n            The moon shines bright. In such a night as this,\n            When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees,\n            And they did make no noise, in such a night\n            Troilus, methinks, mounted the Trojan walls\u2014\n                             ... In such a night\n            Did Thisbe fearfully o\u2019er-trip the dew\u2014\n                             ... In such a night\n            Stood Dido with a willow in her hand,\n            Upon the wild seabanks, and waved her love\n            To come again to Carthage.\n\nBut we must pass on to the second period, the period after the\nForty-five, to see a more abundant entrance of the Celtic elements into\nEnglish literature as a whole. It might be detected in isolated\ninstances, but during the latter half of the eighteenth century both\nprose and poetry were influenced by Celtic in a very marked degree.\n\nCollin\u2019s ode on the \u201cPopular Superstitions of the Highlands\u201d was perhaps\nthe first contribution after the memorable Rising to herald the new\ntime. If we except Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cMacbeth,\u201d it is almost the earliest\ninroad by an English poet into the wild and romantic regions beyond the\nGrampians.\n\nAfter him came Gray, with a similar interest in Celtic lore. His\nwell-known poem \u201cThe Bard\u201d appeared in 1755. This ode is founded on a\ntradition current in Wales that Edward I., when he completed the\nconquest of that country, decreed the death of all the bards who should\nfall into his power. The original argument of this fine production is\nset down in the author\u2019s commonplace book as follows:\u2014\n\n  The army of Edward I., as they march through a deep valley, are\n  suddenly stopped by the appearance of a venerable figure seated on the\n  summit of an inaccessible rock, who, with a voice more than human,\n  reproaches the king with all the misery and desolation which he had\n  brought on his country; foretells the misfortunes of the Norman race,\n  and, with prophetic spirit, declares that all his cruelty shall never\n  extinguish the noble ardour of poetic genius in this island; and that\n  men shall never be wanting to celebrate true virtue and valour in\n  immortal strains, to expose vice and infamous pleasure, and boldly\n  censure tyranny and oppression. His song ended, he precipitates\n  himself from the mountain, and is swallowed up by the river that rolls\n  at its foot.\n\nGray deviated a little from this original sketch, but the above is, in\nthe main, the gist of the poem.\n\n      \u201cRuin seize thee, ruthless King!\n      Confusion on thy banners wait!\n      Though fanned by conquest\u2019s crimson wing,\n      They mock the air with idle state.\n      Helm nor hauberk\u2019s twisted mail,\n      Nor e\u2019en thy virtues, Tyrant, shall avail\n      To save thy secret soul from nightly fears,\n      From Cambria\u2019s curse, from Cambria\u2019s tears!\u201d\n      Such were the sounds that o\u2019er the crested pride\n      Of the first Edward scatter\u2019d wild dismay,\n      As down the steep of Snowdon\u2019s shaggy side\n      He wound with toilsome march his long array.\n      Stout Glo\u2019ster stood aghast in speechless trance:\n      \u201cTo arms!\u201d cried Mortimer, and couched his quivering lance.\n\n      On a rock, whose haughty brow\n      Frowns o\u2019er old Conway\u2019s foaming flood,\n      Robed in the sable garb of woe,\n      With haggard eyes the poet stood;\n      (Loose his beard, and hoary hair\n      Stream\u2019d like a meteor, to the troubled air;)\n      And, with a master\u2019s hand and prophet\u2019s fire,\n      Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre.\n      \u201cHark! how each giant oak, and desert cave,\n      Sighs to the torrent\u2019s awful voice beneath:\n      O\u2019er thee, oh King! their hundred arms they wave,\n      Revenge on thee in hoarser murmurs breathe;\n      Vocal no more, since Cambria\u2019s fatal day,\n      To high-born Ho\u00ebl\u2019s harp, or soft Llewellyn\u2019s lay,\u201d etc.\n\nIn addition to \u201cThe Bard,\u201d Gray translated into English verse fragments\nof the \u201cGododin\u201d and \u201cThe Triumphs of Owen\u201d from Mr. Evans\u2019s _Specimens\nof the Welsh Poetry_, published in London in 1764.\n\nAfter Gray came the renowned Macpherson, representing the very soul of\nthe Celtic genius, and Europe listened surprised as it felt the thrill\nof the new notes which he struck from the old instrument\u2014the passionate,\npenetrating regret, the deep melancholy, the sensitiveness to the powers\nof nature. In his _Ossian_ we are made to feel \u201cthe desolation of dusky\nmoors, the solemn brooding of the mists on the mountains, the occasional\nlooking through them of sun by day, of moon and stars by night, the\ngloom of dark cloudy Bens or cairns, with flashing cataracts, the ocean\nwith its storms.\u201d And when the wind shrieks and the elements do\nfrightful battle, there is the eerie sensation of ghostly presences\nhovering around the warriors on the hillside or out on the ocean.\n\nAnd through all the sadness of sorrow and the clang of conflict there\nbreak gleams of tender light and soothing reflection, as, for example:\u2014\n\n  Come, thou beam that art lonely, from watching in the night! The\n  squally winds are around thee, from all their echoing hills. Red, over\n  my hundred streams, are the light-covered paths of the dead. They\n  rejoice on the eddying winds, in the season of the night. Dwells there\n  no joy in song, white hand of the harps of Lutha? Awake the voice of\n  the string; roll my soul to me. It is a stream that has failed.\n  Malvina, pour the song.\n\n  I hear thee from thy darkness in Selma, thou that watchest lonely by\n  night! Why didst thou withhold the song from Ossian\u2019s failing soul? As\n  the falling brook to the ear of the hunter, descending from his\n  storm-covered hill, in a sunbeam rolls the echoing stream, he hears\n  and shakes his dewy locks: such is the voice of Lutha to the friend of\n  the spirits of heroes. My swelling bosom beats high. I look back on\n  the days that are past. Come, thou beam that art lonely, from watching\n  in the night!\n\nNo wonder these plaintive notes struck the heart of modern times with\noverpowering emotion, awakening a sympathy with the past, and opening a\nnew avenue of vision into the life of nature. Englishmen especially, who\nhad hitherto beheld the bleak mountains, the moors, and the naked rocks\nwith feeling almost akin to aversion, began to see a hidden beauty and\nmajesty in these sublime and lonely objects. And a passion for nature\ngradually crept into English poetry. Thomson had made a beginning in\nthis direction with his _Seasons_ as early as 1726\u201330, but it cannot be\nsaid that he quite struck the notes which afterwards so moved and\nenchanted the readers of Macpherson, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, and\nTennyson.\n\nThe new Ossian had a wonderful mastery of style, rhythmical flow,\npathos, and sometimes even sublimity of language, though it can scarcely\nbe said that he represented the realistic force and vivid exactness of\nthe Gaelic he sought to imitate in his English style. Of his\n_Fragments_, when they appeared, the poet Gray wrote: \u201cI was so struck,\nso extasi\u00e9 with their infinite beauty, that I writ into Scotland to make\na thousand enquiries.\u201d And he adds, \u201cIn short, this man is the very\ndemon of poetry, or he has lighted on a treasure hid for ages.\u201d\n\nEnglish poets and litterateurs from this time found a new well-spring of\ninspiration in the ancient Celtic fountain thus wondrously and\nunexpectedly tapped. And so we find men like Pennant, Dr. Johnson,\nBoswell, and numerous other interested travellers and historians, making\npilgrimages through the Highlands, with the view of observing for\nthemselves the old life surviving there, and of gathering up materials\nfor literary work. Each of the above-named, well known in the pages of\nEnglish literature, have contributed books which are now classic\nauthorities on the social customs and conditions of the Highlands at the\ntime of their visit, and thus helped to carry a stream of Celtic thought\nand feeling into the prose of the period, which was afterwards more\nfully developed by the great magician, Sir Walter Scott.\n\nMeanwhile the new elements had entered into the warp and woof of English\npoetry, and may be traced in all the great masters of the period\u2014Cowper,\nBurns, Wordsworth, Crabbe, Byron, and their numerous contemporaries.\nBlake was so enthusiastic that he is generally regarded as an imitator\nof Macpherson, and Southey, going even farther back, edited, with\nintroduction, in 1817, the _Morte d\u2019Arthur_ of Sir Thomas Malory before\nmentioned.\n\nYet more characteristically Celtic as a poet than all these, because\nhimself an Irishman, was Thomas Moore, author of _Lalla Rookh_, an\nIndian tale; and _Irish Melodies_. It is with these latter lyrics that\nwe are here most concerned, because they exhibit so much the quality of\nthe Gaelic muse in English verse. Take, for example, the following\ndelightful pieces\u2014euphonious, melancholy, and touching\u2014so full of the\nOssianic sadness and Celtic sentiment for the past, and for the dead\nheroes:\u2014\n\n               The harp that once through Tara\u2019s halls\n                 The soul of music shed,\n               Now hangs as mute on Tara\u2019s walls\n                 As if that soul were fled.\n               So sleeps the pride of former days,\n                 So glory\u2019s thrill is o\u2019er;\n               And hearts that once beat high for praise\n                 Now feel that pulse no more!\n\n               No more to chiefs and ladies bright\n                 The harp of Tara swells;\n               The chord alone, that breaks at night,\n                 Its tale of ruin tells.\n               Thus freedom now so seldom wakes,\n                 The only throb she gives,\n               Is when some heart indignant breaks\n                 To show that still she lives.\n\nThis one, too, sounds a similar note. It is entitled \u201cAfter the\nBattle\u201d:\u2014\n\n              Night closed around the conqueror\u2019s way,\n                And lightnings show\u2019d the distant hill,\n              Where those who lost that dreadful day\n                Stood few and faint, but fearless still!\n              The soldier\u2019s hope, the patriot\u2019s zeal,\n                For ever dimm\u2019d, for ever crost\u2014\n              Oh! who shall say what heroes feel\n                When all but life and honour\u2019s lost?\n\n              The last sad hour of freedom\u2019s dream\n                And valour\u2019s task mov\u2019d slowly by,\n              While mute they watch\u2019d, till morning\u2019s beam\n                Should rise and give them light to die.\n              There\u2019s yet a world where souls are free,\n                Where tyrants taint not nature\u2019s bliss;\n              If death that world\u2019s bright opening be,\n                Oh! who would live a slave in this?\n\nFrom Moore it is but a step to the great master-hand of Celtic romance,\nthe heroic Sir Walter Scott, who has done more than any modern writer to\npopularise the literature of the Gael, and to make the Gael and his\ncountry interesting to Englishmen. With his magic power he threw a halo\nover the land and the people, and made their past live again in his\nenchanting pages. What a world of forgotten romance he brought to light\nalike in his prose and his poetry! In the _Lady of the Lake_, _Tales of\na Grandfather_, _Waverley_, and _Rob Roy_, we have Celtic life and\ntradition depicted in a way which has vastly influenced and enriched our\nEnglish literature, besides showing the gate to subsequent authors into\na field near at hand, into which English imagination, much less English\nsympathy and literary art, had hardly as yet found its way. What\nWordsworth in England did for the Lake District, Scott in Scotland did\nfor the Highlands, fostering the love for scenery which the English\npoets had already begun to awaken.\n\nYet, more than any of his predecessors who cultivated the poetry of\nnatural description, Scott carried into English literature the Celtic\nimagination and sentiment, the Celtic magic and wistful veneration for\nthe past, which made him the wizard of modern literary romance.\n\nThe enthusiasm aroused by Macpherson, and even more by himself, had not\ndied down before another great period of Celtic influence arrived\u2014the\nlast, and, in certain respects, the most potent and extensive of all. As\nearly as 1842, the _Morte d\u2019Arthur_ and some other pieces of Tennyson\nappeared, but it was in 1859, contemporary with the Celtic renaissance\nat home and abroad, that he published _The Idylls of the King_. Founding\non the old Arthurian romances, as told in English by Sir Thomas Malory,\nTennyson depicts anew the more picturesque characters and incidents,\nidealising them in his own inimitable poetic style. So we have, in\ntwelve books,\u2014\n\n                        The Coming of Arthur,\n                        Gareth and Lynette,\n                        The Marriage of Geraint,\n                        Geraint and Enid,\n                        Balin and Balan,\n                        Merlin and Vivien,\n                        Lancelot and Elaine,\n                        The Holy Grail,\n                        Pelleas and Ettarre,\n                        The Last Tournament,\n                        Guinevere, and\n                        The Passing of Arthur.\n\nThe charm of these Idylls, which rank among the Poet-Laureate\u2019s best\nwork, may be gathered from the opening passage, describing the coming of\nArthur:\u2014\n\n           Leodogran, the King of Cameliard,\n           Had one fair daughter, and none other child;\n           And she was fairest of all flesh on earth,\n           Guinevere, and in her his one delight.\n\n             For many a petty king ere Arthur came\n           Ruled in this isle, and ever waging war\n           Each upon other, wasted all the land;\n           And still from time to time the heathen host\n           Swarm\u2019d overseas, and harried what was left.\n           And so there grew great tracts of wilderness,\n           Wherein the beast was ever more and more,\n           But man was less and less, till Arthur came.\n           For first Aurelius lived and fought and died,\n           And after him King Uther fought and died,\n           But either fail\u2019d to make the kingdom one.\n           And after these King Arthur for a space,\n           And thro\u2019 the puissance of his Table Round,\n           Drew all their petty princedoms under him,\n           Their King and head, and made a realm and reign\u2019d.\n\n             And thus the land of Cameliard was waste,\n           Thick with wet woods, and many a beast therein,\n           And none or few to scare or chase the beast;\n           So that wild dog, and wolf and boar and bear\n           Came night and day, and rooted in the fields,\n           And wallow\u2019d in the gardens of the King.\n           And ever and anon the wolf would steal\n           The children and devour, but now and then,\n           Her own brood lost or dead, lent her fierce teat\n           To human sucklings; and the children, housed\n           In her foul den, there at their meat would growl,\n           And mock their foster-mother on four feet,\n           Till, straighten\u2019d, they grew up to wolf-like men,\n           Worse than the wolves.\n\nThis, surely, puts us back into the old days. But \u201cArthur heard the call\nand came; and Guinevere stood by the castle walls to watch him pass.\u201d\nThe Celtic ideal of woman and the Celtic pursuit of the unknown and\nmysterious, and the delicacy and passion that characterise the early\nromances, pervade these nineteenth century Idylls throughout.\n\nIt is interesting to compare the Passing of Arthur, for example, as\nrecorded by Layamon, with Tennyson\u2019s more elaborate and developed\nidealisation. According to the former, these were the words of the\nking\u2019s dying speech to Constantine:\u2014\n\n  I will fare to Avalun to the fairest of all maidens, to Argant\u00e9 the\n  Queen, an elf most fair, and she shall make my wounds all sound; make\n  me all whole with healing draughts. And afterwards I will come again\n  to my kingdom and dwell with the Britons with mickle joy! Even with\n  the words there approached from the sea a little short boat floating\n  with the waves; and two women therein wondrously formed; and they took\n  Arthur anon and bare him quickly and laid him softly down, and forth\n  they gan depart. Then was it accomplished that Merlin whilom said,\n  that mickle care should come of Arthur\u2019s departure. The Britons\n  believe yet that he is alive, and dwelleth in Avalun with the fairest\n  of all elves, and the Britons even yet expect when Arthur shall\n  return.\n\nCompare with this the appearance from the wave of Tennyson\u2019s wondrous\nbarge with its fair occupants, and the famous farewell speech Arthur\nmade before setting out. After the well-known passage beginning, \u201cThe\nold order changeth, yielding place to new,\u201d he goes on:\u2014\n\n           But now farewell. I am going a long way\n           With these thou se\u00e9st\u2014if indeed I go\n           (For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)\u2014\n           To the island-valley of Avilion;\n           Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow,\n           Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies\n           Deep-meadow\u2019d, happy, fair with orchard lawns\n           And bowery hollows crown\u2019d with summer sea,\n           Where I will heal me of my grievous wound.\n\n             So said he, and the barge with oar and sail\n           Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted swan\n           That, fluting a wild carol ere her death,\n           Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood\n           With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere\n           Revolving many memories, till the hull\n           Look\u2019d one black dot against the verge of dawn,\n           And on the mere the wailing died away.\n\n             But when that moan had past for evermore,\n           The stillness of the dead world\u2019s winter dawn\n           Amazed him, and he groan\u2019d, \u201cThe King is gone.\u201d\n           And therewithal came on him the weird rhyme,\n           \u201cFrom the great deep to the great deep he goes.\u201d\n\nSir Bedivere was thus the sole survivor of the Knights of the Round\nTable. In the final battle all that remained of them perished except the\nking himself and two knights, who escaped wounded. But first one and\nthen the other passed, dying from his hurt. With what a halo of colour\nand real Celtic enchantment poets and romancers have covered up the last\ngrim tragedy of the wounded knight watching his master, the royal Arthur\ndie, after all the rest were fallen and gone, and the Round Table was\nfrom henceforth to be but a memory.\n\nMacaulay must have inherited the Celtic power of pictorial detail and\nvivid colouring, though he might not willingly acknowledge it. Where did\nhe get that brilliant turn for style and those suggestive tricks of\nlively fancy if not from his Celtic ancestry?\n\nAfter him came three Celtic enthusiasts of great literary standing, who\nput Macaulay\u2019s apathy towards the Gaelic and Cymric tradition to the\nblush. These were Matthew Arnold; John Campbell Shairp, Professor of\nPoetry at Oxford, and Principal of the United College, St. Andrews; and\nProfessor Blackie of Edinburgh.\n\nOver the first, the apostle of culture, and otherwise dispassionate\ncritic, the Celtic past undoubtedly cast a spell. The finding of its\nliterature seemed to have influenced him in a similar manner as the\nhoving of a new planet into his ken thrills the eager astronomer. And we\nhave his personal contribution in his well-known _Study of Celtic\nLiterature_ (1867), a book which, like Renan\u2019s French essay, has done\nmuch to enhance the reputation and influence of our ancient heritage in\nmodern times. It was through his strenuous advocacy that the Celtic\nchair which Professor Rhys now occupies in Oxford was established.\n\nPrincipal Shairp published _Kilmahoe: a Highland Pastoral, with other\nPoems_, in 1864; his _Poetic Interpretation of Nature_ in 1877; and\n_Aspects of Poetry_ in 1881. These books revel in the Celtic sentiment,\nits melancholy, and love of nature. Their author exhibited the same\nspirit of admiration for the Gaelic muse that Matthew Arnold did for the\nCymric.\n\nIn one of his Highland lyrics, entitled, \u201cA Dream of Glen Sallach,\u201d\nShairp showed that he could be overpowered by the gloom pervading the\nland of the heather as much as any Gael:\u2014\n\n              In deep of noon, mysterious dread\n              Fell on me in that glimmering glen,\n              Till as from haunted ground I fled\n              Back to the kindly homes of men.\n\n              Thanks to that glen! its scenery blends\n              With childhood\u2019s most ideal hour,\n              When Highland hills I made my friends,\n              First owned their beauty, felt their power.\n\nAnd in \u201cThe Forest of Sli\u2019-Gaoil\u201d he muses thus of other days:\u2014\n\n              And doth not this bleak forest ground\n              Live in old epic song renowned?\n              Of him the chief who came of yore\n              To hunting of the mighty boar,\n              And left the deed, to float along\n              The dateless stream of Highland song,\n              A maid\u2019s lorn love, a chief\u2019s death toil.\n              Still speaking in thy name Sli\u2019-Gaoil!\n              Well now may harp of Ossian moan\n              Through long bent grass and worn grey stone:\n              But how could song so long ago,\n              Come loaded with some elder wo?\n              Were then, as now, these hills o\u2019er-cast\n              With shadows of some long-gone past!\n              Did winds, that wandered o\u2019er them, chime\n              Melodies of a lorn foretime?\n              As now, the very mountain burns\n              For something sigh that not returns!\n\nProfessor Blackie in later life had a similar passionate regard for\nCeltic literature, and not only did much by poetic renderings into\nEnglish from the Gaelic, and in other ways, to introduce English readers\nto the best treasures of the Gaelic past, but also, like Matthew Arnold,\nwas instrumental in founding a Celtic chair, namely, that in Edinburgh\nUniversity.\n\nOf novelists who, like Sir Walter Scott, have drawn their themes and\ninspiration from Celtic sources, there has been a splendid succession\nfrom the days of Tennyson till now. Among others, besides the veteran\nDr. George Macdonald, we may mention William Black, Robert Buchanan, and\nRobert Louis Stevenson, all three now dead, but recognised in their time\nas men of considerable literary genius. Black\u2019s descriptions, his scenes\nand incidents and characters in those graphic stories laid in the West\nHighlands, are well known, and are as full of nature as Stevenson\u2019s\nthrilling tales of _Kidnapped_ and _Catriona_ are of Celtic passion and\nadventure. Buchanan\u2019s _Child of Nature_ is now perhaps not so well known\nas these others, but the plot is laid in the extreme north-west corner\nof Sutherlandshire, and interprets Gaelic life and character with\nwonderful verve and insight. All the three writers seem to have caught\nthe magic glamour of the North, and to have been influenced in their\nstyle by the Celtic elements.\n\nOf living novelists to carry on the succession we have still a\ndistinguished contingent. Besides names, less familiar, the following\nhave achieved a wide reputation, namely, Dr. John Watson (Ian Maclaren),\nNeil Munro, Fiona Macleod, Katherine Tynan, and W. B. Yeats. These\nwriters are distinctly Celtic in style, idiom, and sentiment. They have\nall the passion, yearning, imagination, and emotion of the Gael,\ncombined with his wonderful gift of story-telling and of local colour.\n\nThere are other writers of distinction, such as Andrew Lang, Dr. Douglas\nHyde, Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, Dr. Sigerson, Dr. Todhunter, Stopford A.\nBrooke, Edmund Jones, T. W. Rolleston, Miss Eleanor Hull, Miss Jessie L.\nWeston, Miss Goodrich Frere, and Miss Emily Lawless, who have done much\nof later years to popularise the Celtic lore and literature, and to\nextend its sway over English letters.\n\nThrough books of history and philology which have been issuing from the\npress in a steady flow for decades past, the tide of Celtic influence\nstill continues to rise and permeate every department of English\nliterature. So that from that little spring we saw welling up in the\nfifth century, and which at first yielded but a few words of Celtic\nimport to incipient English, we have been able to trace a continuous\nstream, gaining in volume and momentum through the centuries, until now\nit is like a mighty Missouri which mingles its waters with the broader\nand more potent Mississippi, to be carried to the great ocean of human\nintercourse, and lose itself in the common good.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XVII\n              THE PRINTED LITERATURE OF THE SCOTTISH GAEL\n\n  Two interesting bibliographies\u2014Surprising revelations\u2014First Gaelic\n      printed book\u2014Meagre output prior to the Forty-five\u2014Earliest\n      original works issued\u2014No complete Bible in type before\n      1801\u2014Nineteenth century activity\u2014The Highlander\u2019s favourite\n      books\u2014A revelation of character\u2014His printed literature mainly\n      religious\u2014Translations\u2014The two books in greatest demand\u2014Dearth\n      of the masterpieces of other languages\u2014The most popular of\n      English religious writers\u2014of native bards\u2014Gaelic poetry\u2014The\n      printed succession\u2014Notable books\u2014Account of the Gaelic\n      grammars\u2014Dictionaries\u2014Periodicals\u2014Value of the literature.\n\n\nA close study of the printed literature of the Scottish Gael leads to\nsome surprising and even wholly unexpected revelations. Happily, we have\nthe materials for such a scrutiny within moderate compass, a fact which\ncannot be predicated of the more comprehensive and ubiquitous English.\n\nIt is an amazing circumstance\u2014indeed the _Spectator_, some seventy years\nago, dubbed it \u201ca piece of Highland dilettanteism\u201d\u2014that one should be\nfound enthusiastic enough to attempt to make an exhaustive bibliography\nof the printed Gaelic output of Scotland. Yet such a devotee has emerged\nnot once, but twice within the last century.\n\nFirst, in the person of John Reid, a Glasgow bookseller of Lowland\nbirth, who published in 1832 his _Bibliotheca Scoto-Celtica_, or \u201can\naccount of all the books which have been printed in the Gaelic\nlanguage,\u201d down to that date.\n\nSecond, in the person of the Rev. Donald Maclean, minister of Duirinish,\nSkye, who brought the catalogue forward to 1900, arranging the authors\u2019\nnames alphabetically, and giving the various editions, with their dates\nand places of publication. This MS., which has not yet been printed,\ncontains in addition a complete transcript of the title of each work, an\naccount of the author or translator so far as known, the number of\ncopies printed, size of paper, and published price, and in the case of\nthe very rare books, an account of the copies known to exist, and the\nprice they fetched on transfer.\n\nHad it not been for the earlier researches of Reid, it is not likely so\nelaborate an effort would have ever been attempted. Even Reid seems to\nhave been lured on gradually, all unconscious at first of the magnitude\nof the task, for he says that his book was not written with the view of\nbeing published. On the contrary, its _raison d\u2019\u00eatre_ is thus explained\nby him in the preface:\u2014\n\n  While studying the Gaelic language in 1825 a friend wished me to make\n  up a catalogue of his Gaelic books. It appeared, after the list was\n  made up, scarcely probable that many more should exist, and under the\n  idea of having almost already completed the list, the present work was\n  undertaken. All the Gaelic books in the neighbourhood were examined,\n  but I found the work increase so rapidly on my hands that it became\n  necessary to class them and re-write the whole; and the longer I\n  searched the more I was convinced that the literature of the Gael was\n  richer than even its friends imagined. The number of translations,\n  song-books, etc., which I now met with, many of them works which I had\n  never previously heard of, obliged me four times to extend the plan\n  originally adopted, and to re-write the MS.\n\nReid ransacked the principal libraries in this country and on the\nContinent in search of Gaelic books, yet he admits the list must\nnecessarily be imperfect. When finished, the work was awarded a premium\nby the Highland Society of London in 1831, and printed the following\nyear. It has been the aim of his bibliographic successor to supplement\nand complete the list by a new classification up to date.\n\nBoth men deserve credit for having patiently and persistently pursued\nwhat was undoubtedly an interesting but eminently thankless task, so far\nat least as financial remuneration was concerned.\n\nWhen we hark back to the period when MS. writing first began to pass\ninto modern type, we discover that no book of any kind was printed in\nthis country before 1477. In that year Caxton issued in London the\nearliest publication from an English printing press. Other books quickly\nfollowed, but nearly a century elapsed before any Gaelic writing passed\nthrough the inky mill.\n\nThe first printed work in that language is the translation of John\nKnox\u2019s _Liturgy_ by Bishop Carsewell, published in Edinburgh in 1567.\nCarsewell, or Carsuel, as the name is sometimes spelt, a native of\nKilmartin, was superintendent of the diocese of Argyll, and well versed\nin the Highland vernacular. It was he who, in the preface to his work,\ndenounced the ancient _ursgeuls_ or Gaelic prose tales as lying fables,\nand inaugurated a clerical campaign against the popular ballads. Yet he\nmerits our approbation for getting into print so early a book which\nmodern philologists regard as uncommonly valuable.\n\nOnly three copies exist of the original issue,\u2014one, complete, in the\npossession of the Duke of Argyll, and two others imperfect. Of the\ntwain, one is now in Edinburgh University Library, the other in the\nBritish Museum.\n\nThe Duke\u2019s was lost for a time, but recovered in 1842, and doubtless\nrestored to its ancient place in Inverary Castle.\n\nThis rare book is five inches long and three and a half broad,\ncontaining 247 pages, on the 246th of which occurs the couplet:\u2014\n\n                       Gras D\u00e9 is na th\u00f3s at\u00e1imid\n                       Ni r\u00e1nuic s\u00e9 f\u00f3s finid.\n\nAnd on the last page the following:\u2014\n\n                               DO BVAILE\n\n                             adh so agclo an\n                           Dvn Edin Le Ro\n                           ibeart Lekprevik\n                           24 Aprilis 1567.\n\nIn 1872 the Rev. Dr. Maclauchlan transcribed it entire for a new edition\nwhich was published the following year, 1873.\n\nNearly another century glides slowly by after the printing press\ndisgorged Carsewell\u2019s translation before any further Gaelic\nprinting\u2014that we know of\u2014took place, if we except the translation of\nCalvin\u2019s Catechism issued at Edinburgh in 1631. In fact, three\npsalm-books complete the list for the whole of that seventeenth century,\nnamely, the first fifty Psalms of David with the Shorter Catechism,\npublished by the Synod of Argyll in 1659, exactly ninety-two years after\nthe Liturgy; another Psalter by John Kirke in 1684, and the Synod of\nArgyll\u2019s finished in 1694. Thus in the sixteenth century we have just\none Gaelic printed book; in the seventeenth, three and a catechism; and\nall these merely translations from other languages.\n\nNot till 1741 do we encounter any original work, and even then it is\nsimply a Gaelic Vocabulary by Alexander Macdonald, the gifted bard of\nArdnamurchan. So that till after the Forty-five, Gaelic Scotland had no\nprinted literature of its own\u2014neither poetry nor prose of any kind.\n\nIndeed, with the exception of a few reprints between 1702 and 1725 of\nthe Synod of Argyll\u2019s Psalter and Catechism, and Kirke\u2019s Irish version\nof the Bible and Vocabulary in 1690, Lhuyd\u2019s Vocabulary in Nicholson\u2019s\n_Historical Library_, 1702, and Macdonald\u2019s, 1741, there were no\nadditions to the printed list of the Highlands till Baxter\u2019s _Call to\nthe Unconverted_ was issued in Gaelic in 1750, Macdonald\u2019s _Songs_ in\n1751, and David Mackellar\u2019s _Hymns_ in 1752. These two latter volumes\nwere the early precursors in type of that considerable output of song\nand hymn and story with which we have been familiar in later years.\n\nAfter them came, in 1752, a small book entitled _Hymn of Praise_\n(English and Gaelic), Willison\u2019s _Mother\u2019s Catechism_, and next year\nMacfarlane\u2019s _Translation of the Psalms, with forty-five of the\nParaphrases_.\n\nBetween 1753 and 1767, Reid could not find that any Gaelic work was\nprinted, with the exception of reprints of the Mother\u2019s and Shorter\nCatechisms and Macdonald\u2019s songs.\n\nLike some slow-moving stream, the output was at first very feeble and\nirregular, and drawn for the most part from imported sources.\n\nIn 1767, however, an event occurred in the Gaelic printing world worthy\nof special notice. This was the issue of the New Testament for the first\ntime in the language of the Highland people. It was translated by\nStewart of Killin, with the assistance of Dugald Buchanan and other\neminent Gaelic scholars, and was published by the Society for\nPropagating Christian Knowledge. Strange to say, the language of this\ntranslation was looked upon at that period as perfectly free from Irish\nidiom, and yet in Reid\u2019s day, half a century later, it was regarded as\nsavouring more of Irish than of Gaelic.\n\nThe same year in which the New Testament saw the light in the ancient\ndialect there appeared also the celebrated hymns of Dugald Buchanan, and\nthe year after the no less famous songs of Duncan Ban Macintyre.\n\nAs yet no Bible existed in the language of the Highlands, and attention\nhaving been drawn to this fact, the Society for Propagating Christian\nKnowledge set themselves to supply the defect. It was arranged to have\nthe Old Testament translated and issued in four parts, which were\nultimately published in Edinburgh as follows:\u2014\n\n                           Part I. in 1783.\n                           Part IV. in 1786.\n                           Part II. in 1787.\n                           Part III. in 1801.\n\nThe first part contained the Pentateuch, to which was prefixed a\nvocabulary of five pages and general rules for reading the Gaelic\nlanguage. The second comprised from Joshua to the end of 1 Chronicles.\nThe third, published last, contained 2 Chronicles and on to the end of\nthe Song of Solomon. The fourth was made up of the Prophets, and to it\nwas prefixed an advertisement, stating the use that had been made of\nvarious English translations.\n\nThe Rev. Dr. John Stuart of Luss was responsible for the rendering from\nHebrew into Gaelic of the first three parts, and the Rev. Dr. John Smith\nof Campbeltown for the fourth, which appeared second in point of\npublication.\n\nTheir MS. translations were, before being sent to press, submitted for\nrevision to a Committee of Highland clergymen specially selected; and by\norder of the General Assembly of 1782 a collection was made in all the\nparishes to defray the expense. This appointment was renewed in 1783 and\n1784, as the funds of the S.P.C.K. were reduced, and the outlay on\npublication amounted to \u00a32300 for some 5000 copies, with an additional\nnumber of Part I. containing the Pentateuch. The whole work was printed\non fine and common paper; and until the early decades of last century\nwas looked upon as the standard of Gaelic orthography.\n\nConsidering that the Bible has since come to be regarded as a kind of\nfetich in the Highlands, it is somewhat surprising to learn that there\nwas no complete rendering of it in the language earlier than 1801, just\na century ago. And apparently not till 1807 were the Gaelic Old and New\nTestaments finally printed together in one volume. In that year they\nwere thus issued in England for the first time on behalf of the British\nand Foreign Bible Society, who chose two different colours of paper for\nthe purpose\u2014the one blue for the Old Testament, and the other yellow for\nthe New, which gave the book rather a polychrome appearance. The\nimpression amounted to 20,000 copies, each of which cost the Society 6s.\n6d., though they issued them to subscribers at half that price.\n\nOf the Gaelic Scriptures there have been fourteen different recensions.\n\nFrom the time of the publication of Dugald Buchanan\u2019s and Duncan Ban\nMacintyre\u2019s compositions in 1767\u201368, may be reckoned the real beginning\nof the new era of printing, so far as the production of original Gaelic\nliterature was concerned, and that mainly poetry, for of prose the land\nwas singularly barren, except in translations. And it will hardly be\ncredited that from the introduction of printing down to the end of the\neighteenth century, just about a hundred years ago, if we exclude the\ntranslations from other languages, and extra editions of books already\npublished, there were not in all three dozen printed original\nScottish-Gaelic works to be found. The day of copious issue had not yet\narrived for the sweet and tuneful Gaelic.\n\nEven the collected MSS. of Macpherson did not appear in type till 1807,\nalmost half a century after his so-called translations electrified the\nliterary world.\n\nThus it will be seen that the nineteenth century was really the golden\nage of Gaelic printing, for, with the exception of the straggling\nvolumes indicated above, the literature we now have passed into printed\nbook form within the last hundred years. From the beginning of the\ncentury there was a marked increase in the rate of publication\u2014an\nactivity which has been growing in volume and momentum to the present\nday.\n\nAnd now it will be found highly informing and even entertaining to\nreview the printed literature of the Gael, to consider its character,\nits general features, and specially to note what the Highlander deemed\nworthy of putting into type\u2014his favourite books. Such a survey, in fact,\namounts to a revelation of character, and throws a wonderful light on\nhis recent past, his outlook on life, and peculiar habits of thought.\nIndeed, the glimpse we get here of the mental composition and literary\nlimitations of the purely Gaelic-speaking or Gaelic-reading section of\nour countrymen is really amazing, and if we did not know that they now\nrely so much for their knowledge and information on the English\nlanguage, would simply be incredible.\n\nIt surprised Reid beyond measure that there were so many Gaelic printed\nbooks to catalogue seventy years ago, and probably he thought the work\nwas well-nigh complete for all time, but had he lived to-day to scan the\namended and supplemented list, it would almost take his breath away, for\nhe expected the Gaelic long before now to be as extinct as the\nWaldensian or the Cornish. He just gave it fifty years in which to \u201cdie\ndown and drone and cease.\u201d People in general, even Highlanders, are\nscarcely aware of the very considerable number of printed books that\nexist in the native tongue.\n\nBut a cursory glance at the catalogue shows the derived nature of the\nmaterial. A large proportion of the volumes consists of translations,\nand these translations, if we except the Scriptures, are almost, if not\nentirely from the English. And here we are face to face with a most\nstriking fact. The literature represented, both in the original and in\ntranslations, is mainly religious.\n\nYou will search in vain for the masterpieces of other languages and\nother nations. The Hebrew Bible and Greek New Testament, _The Arabian\nNights\u2019 Entertainments_, parts of Homer\u2019s _Iliad_, and Thomas \u00e0 Kempis\u2019\n_Imitatio Christi_, are perhaps the solitary exceptions. All the best\nliterature of the world has been given a silent go-by.\n\nAnd this is true even of the greatest English and Scottish works of\ngenius. You will not find Chaucer, or Shakespeare, or Bacon, or Gibbon,\nScott or Dickens, Thackeray, Carlyle, or Tennyson here. Two poems alone\nof Burns are translated, \u201cTam o\u2019 Shanter\u201d and \u201cAuld Langsyne,\u201d but the\ngreat masters are to Gaelic print as if they had never existed. Science\nis unknown, and art and philosophy; history, too, we may say, and the\ndrama. Whole departments of human thought remain practically\nunrepresented, as if they were alien to the Gaelic mind.\n\nOn the other hand, works of religion, pious devotion, theology, and\necclesiastical polemics abound, showing the peculiar cast of the modern\nCeltic temperament.\n\nAnd of all the books, that which has been most in demand, if we may\njudge by the extraordinary frequency with which it has been printed, has\nbeen the Shorter Catechism. We are confronted with the curious fact that\nbetween the year 1651 and the Disruption in 1843 no less than seventy\neditions or reprints of this document were issued, and this\nnotwithstanding the circumstance that it was also usually published with\nthe oft-printed Psalter. The version far and away the most in evidence\nseems to have been the Synod of Argyll\u2019s, though other versions, such as\nDr. Ross\u2019s, Dr. Macdonald\u2019s, Dr. Smith\u2019s, and Morrison\u2019s were in\ncirculation, besides various other Catechisms, of which Willison\u2019s and\nWatt\u2019s were prominent examples. The Gael seems to have had a perfect\nmania for Catechisms. And next to these in his estimation comes the\nPsalter, with nearly eighty editions or reprints between the year 1659\nand the Disruption.\n\nThese editions represent six important versions, without taking into\naccount other four unauthorised ones. The select six may be given in\nchronological order, as follows:\u2014\n\n   1. The Synod of Argyll\u2019s translation of the first fifty Psalms,\n        entitled, \u201cAn Ceud Chaogad do Shalmaibh,\u201d 1659; and the whole,\n        1694.\n\n   2. Kirke\u2019s Psalter\u2014a translation by the Rev. Robert Kirke,\n        Balquidder, 1684. This was the first complete version issued,\n        ante-dating the former when finished by ten years.\n\n   3. Macfarlane\u2019s translation, which is just the Synod of Argyll\u2019s\n        amended and altered by the Rev. Alex. Macfarlane, M.A., of\n        Kilninver and Kilmelford, who excluded many of the Irishisms and\n        added forty-five of the paraphrases, 1753.\n\n   4. Smith\u2019s revised version, including all the Paraphrases, by the\n        Rev. Dr. Smith, Campbeltown, 1787.\n\n   5. Ross\u2019s Psalter, also an amendment, by the Rev. Thomas Ross, LL.D.,\n        Lochbroom, 1807.\n\n   6. The General Assembly\u2019s authorised translation, 1826.\n\nOf these the most extensively used seems to have been Dr. Smith\u2019s, which\nran through no less than thirty or thirty-five editions in half a\ncentury. Next to his, in popular esteem, came Macfarlane\u2019s, represented\nby twenty. Ross\u2019s and the General Assembly\u2019s have also had a wide vogue,\nespecially in more recent times.\n\nBesides the Shorter Catechism and Psalter, the _Confession of Faith_ has\nbeen printed in Gaelic eleven times, and _The Book of Common Prayer_\neight times, and Prayers from it once.\n\nOf English religious writers who have captivated the Highland emotions,\nBunyan takes first place with his _Pilgrim\u2019s Progress_, eleven editions;\n_Death of Mr. Badman_, one edition; _The Barren Fig-tree_, one; _The\nWorld to Come_, seven; _Visions of Heaven and Hell_, four; _Heavenly\nFootman_, three; _Water of Life_, five; _Holy War_, two; _Come and\nWelcome_, four; _Grace Abounding_, three.\n\nThen Baxter\u2019s _Call to the Unconverted_ went through nine editions, and\nhis _Saints\u2019 Rest_, seven. Alleine, Boston, Doddridge, Dyer, Jonathan\nEdwards were also prime favourites, whose works were represented by many\neditions, especially _The Sinner\u2019s Alarm_, _The Fourfold State_, _The\nRise and Progress of Religion in the Soul_, _Christ\u2019s Famous Titles_,\nand _Doomed Sinners_.\n\nThough the Gaelic-reading Highlanders had apparently little appetite for\ngeneral English literature in their own tongue outside works of\nreligion, they had a surprising avidity for hymns, elegies, and sermons,\nfor books on the Church, Christian doctrine, Baptism and the Sacraments.\nAnd we meet with such varied titles as _Voluntaryism Indefensible_,\n_Christ is All_, _Apples of Gold_, _Village Sermons_, _Letters to\nSinners_, _The Unspeakable Gift_, _Fame of the Branch_, _The Rose of\nSharon_, _Call to Awaken_, _Salvation by Grace_, _Sacramental\nExercises_, _The Believer\u2019s Hope_, _A Parting Exhortation_, _Blair\u2019s\nSermons_, _Token for Mourners_, _On the Guidance of the Holy Spirit_,\n_Short History of the Baptists_, _Lessons on the Sabbath_, _The\nDeclaratory Act_, _A Word of Warning to the People_, _Assurance of\nSalvation_.\n\nTopics of this kind abound. They formed the favourite pabulum of the\nmore pious of our countrymen, and to this day some of these or similar\ntheological productions may be found in almost every Gaelic household of\nthe North and West Highlands.\n\nWhile English printing concerned itself first with such works as _The\nGame and Playe of the Chesse_, _The Dictes and Sayings of Philosophers_,\n_The \u00c6neid of Virgil_, _The Poems of Chaucer_, _Lydgate and Gower_, _The\nGolden Legend_, and the _Morte d\u2019Arthur_, Gaelic printing took to do\nwith religion. Knox\u2019s Liturgy, Catechisms, Psalters, and Vocabularies\nwere its main concern; and only after the lapse of nearly two hundred\nyears did it give any attention to poetry or native literature of any\nkind. The original bards, like all other English and foreign writers,\nhad to wait in the outer court of the Gentiles. But after Baxter\u2019s _Call\nto the Unconverted_ was issued in 1750 they began to come straggling in,\nMackellar with his hymns and Macdonald with his songs. And in addition\nto Dugald Buchanan\u2019s and Macintyre\u2019s we have, during the following half\ncentury, these books:\u2014\n\nA volume of Hymns published in 1770 by Macfadyen, a Glasgow University\nstudent; and about the same time an Elegy and one or two other Gaelic\npoems by another Glasgow student. Ronald Macdonald, son of Alexander,\npublished the first issue of old Gaelic poems, including some of his own\nand his father\u2019s, in 1776. Then followed in 1777 an anonymous collection\nof Mirthful Songs, and in 1780 another of Curious ones; and a volume\nentitled _Loudin\u2019s Songs_.\n\nJohn Brown\u2019s, Margaret Cameron\u2019s, and A. Campbell\u2019s appeared in 1785;\nand next year the better known collections of John Gillies, bookseller,\nPerth, and Duncan Kennedy, schoolmaster, Kilmelford.\n\nIn 1787 Dr. Smith published his alleged poems of Ossian, Orran, Ullin,\netc., and those entitled _Dargo and Gaul_. And before the century closed\nKenneth Mackenzie\u2019s, Alexander Macpherson\u2019s, Duncan Campbell\u2019s, and\nAllan Macdougall\u2019s compositions were all in type, issued separately.\n\nThe subsequent years, from 1800 to 1831, were most prolific in the\noutput of poetical publications. It seemed as if the Highland bards had\nmade a rival rush for the printing presses, and kept the busy machines\nclicking. Among the names of those whose poems were then issued occur\nthe following: Dr. Dewar, Rob. Donn, William Gordon, George Ross Gordon,\nPeter Grant, Angus Kennedy, A. and J. Maccallum, J. Macdonald, John\nMacgregor, Dr. James Macgregor, P. Macfarlane, D. Macintosh, A. Mackay,\nJ. Maclachlan, J. Maclean, D. Macleod, D. Matheson, J. Morrison, James\nMunro, A. and D. Stewart, R. Stewart, P. Stuart, P. Turner. And in\naddition to theirs, and some other ten volumes of anonymous poetry,\npartly original and partly collected, there were published within that\nperiod the Highland Society\u2019s edition of Ossian\u2019s poems, and its\nreprint, the one in London, 3 volumes, 1807, the other in Edinburgh,\n1818.\n\nIf the Gaelic muse was at first slow in committing its productions to\nmodern printing, it appears to have cast off all reserve after 1800, and\nevery type of bardic effusion went to the press.\n\nBut of all the bards whose poems were appearing then, undoubtedly the\nmost popular was Dugald Buchanan. No other book in Gaelic, if we except\nthe Shorter Catechism and Psalter, has gone through so many editions as\nhis Hymns. In the comparatively short period of 110 years from their\nfirst appearance they have been issued from the press forty times\u2014so\ngreat has been the demand for these vivid and impressive products of\nGaelic genius.\n\nNext in general vogue to Buchanan\u2019s comes Peter Grant\u2019s _Spiritual\nHymns_, a book which has been printed at least nineteen times.\n\nThese three instances alone\u2014the Psalter, Dugald Buchanan\u2019s and Peter\nGrant\u2019s Hymns\u2014would indicate that this is the type of literature that\nhas gone highest with the Gael, even if we did not observe how\nfrequently volumes of spiritual hymns occur in the list of printed\nbooks.\n\nBy comparison such a classic as Alexander Macdonald\u2019s _Gaelic Songs_ has\nonly reached eight editions, Duncan Ban Macintyre\u2019s ten, and Rob Donn\u2019s\nthree.\n\nAnd this bias, so unmistakably exhibited by the Gaelic printed\nliterature, is not confined to poetry, but may be traced even in the few\noriginal prose works that the language possesses.\n\nOnly ten such books appeared during the early decades of the nineteenth\ncentury, and they are all religious ones of quite indifferent merit.\nWhile of forty-five prose translations which were printed, either\nthrough the munificence of private individuals, or as booksellers\u2019\nventures, forty-two were of a religious and three of a moral kind.\n\nThere can be no doubt that this extraordinary preponderance of the\nreligious over every other type of printed literature in the Gaelic\nlist, has exercised its own baneful influence on the Highland character\nof last century, leaving it lop-sided in some obvious directions and\nrendering the Gael blind to the wider issues of life, and therefore more\nor less impervious to new ideas. We can well understand his limitations,\nif, ignorant of English or other modern languages, he were confined to\nthe books of his native tongue, as many Highlanders of the past\ngenerations were. These books absolutely give him no knowledge of\nscience, philosophy, art, or even of the great literatures of the world.\nAnd his own poets occupied, as we have seen, a somewhat subordinate\nplace in his list. Taught to look through one particular medium, and\ndeprived of most other means of vision, the unsuspecting Gael grew up\nalmost entirely oblivious of the march of mind, and for the most part\nignorant of the thoughts that shake mankind.\n\nIt is through the introduction of English, therefore, that he has been\ngetting emancipated of late years from the narrow outlook which his own\nill-chosen and limited printed literature affords. And it is the sudden\nintrusion of this higher knowledge, rendering many of his theories\nobsolete, which has so painfully convulsed the older generation of\nGaelic-speaking Highlanders in recent times, and left them so ill at\nease.\n\nThough printing made its first inroad on the Gaelic language as early as\n1567, it is characteristic of the race that the cream of the literature\nonly found type within the nineteenth century. After the early editions\nof Ossian, Peter Grant, and Rob Donn, the following may be quoted as the\nmost noteworthy literary books that have appeared in the last hundred\nyears from the Highlands, namely: Dr. Norman Macleod\u2019s _Caraid nan\nGaidheal_; Mackenzie\u2019s _Beauties of Gaelic Poetry_, 1841; Campbell\u2019s\n_West Highland Tales_, 1860\u201362; Dr. Clerk\u2019s _Ossian_, 1870; Campbell\u2019s\n_Leabhar na Feinne_, 1872; Sinclair\u2019s _Oranaiche_, 1876\u201379; Nicolson\u2019s\n_Gaelic Proverbs_, 1882; Henry Whyte\u2019s _Celtic Garland_, 1880\u201381;\n_Celtic Lyre_, 1883\u201395; Mary Mackellar\u2019s _Poems and Songs_, 1881; Neil\nMacleod\u2019s _Clarsach an Doire_, 1883; Dr. Cameron\u2019s _Reliqui\u00e6 Celtic\u00e6_,\n1892\u201394; Dr. Nigel Macneill\u2019s _The Literature of the Highlanders_, 1892;\nand Alexander Carmichael\u2019s _Carmina Gadelica_, 1900.\n\nIn addition to the purely literary works, there are three other classes\nof Gaelic books, intimately associated with the history of the language,\nwhich have received considerable attention from the printer, and which\nare worthy of our notice here. These are School-books, Grammars, and\nDictionaries.\n\nOf school-books there were three series that ran through many editions\nduring the first half of last century, namely, the Gaelic Society\u2019s\nSchool series, the Society for Propagating Christian Knowledge series,\nand the General Assembly\u2019s series. Besides ordinary class books,\nportions of Scripture, especially from Proverbs, Psalms, Job, and the\nGospels were printed for use as reading books in schools. The first of\nthe above series dates from 1811, the second from 1815, and the third\nfrom 1826.\n\nJohn Reid apparently never heard of Fenius Farsaid or the \u201cUraicept na\nn-\u00c9igeas,\u201d[35] or of the other MS. fragments, for he has the following\ninteresting modern account of Gaelic Grammars.\n\n\u201cThe first attempt that we have on record of a Celtic Grammar was one\nwritten by Florence Gray, a monk who was born in Humond about the end of\nthe sixteenth or the beginning of the seventeenth century; but we have\nnever been able to find a copy of it, or ascertain if it was printed. It\nis probable that if it was printed it appeared about 1620, as we know\nthat he was living in Dublin in 1630.\n\n\u201cIn 1639 Tobias Stapleton, an Irish priest, published at Louvain a small\nquarto Catechism for the use of the Irish students on the Continent, in\nparallel columns, Latin and English. To the end of the Catechism is\nadded a small tract in Latin and Irish, entitled, \u2018Modus perutilis\nlegendi linguam Hibernicam.\u2019\n\n\u201cAfter this there appeared various little imperfect compends of Irish\nGrammar, but nothing of any real value until 1677, when there appeared\nat Rome Molloy\u2019s _Grammatica Latino-Hibernica Compendiata_, which,\nalthough deficient in syntax and other important requisites, was\ndecidedly the most important work on the subject until 1728, when Hugh\nM\u2018Cuirtin published his _Elements of the Irish Language_,[36] which\nagain appeared enlarged in his Dictionary, published in 1732.\n\n\u201cIn 1742, Donlevy published at Paris a Catechism in Irish and English,\nto which he appended \u2018The Elements of the Irish Language.\u2019 This has been\nfollowed by the Irish Grammars of General Vallancy, Dr. William Neilson,\nDr. Paul O\u2019Bryan, William Halliday, and one or two anonymous\nauthors.[37] It is said by Lhuyd, in the year 1707, that a Scottish\ngentleman had then some thoughts of publishing a Scottish Gaelic\nGrammar; but the earliest attempt known to us is by Malcolm, who, about\nthe year 1736, published _Some Elements of the Ancient Scottish, or\nCaledonian Celtick, with some Observations_. In the year 1778 Shaw\u2019s\nwork appeared, with the following title: _An Analysis of the Gaelic\nLanguage, by William Shaw, A.M., Forsan et haec olim meminisse juvabit.\nVirg., Edin._, 1778.\u201d\n\nA second edition followed the same year, the published price of the book\nbeing 4s. sewed. It is now very rare, but not of much account.\n\nThe next work of the kind to appear was Stewart\u2019s, announced as follows:\n\u201cElements of Gaelic Grammar, in four parts. I. Of Pronunciation and\nOrthography. II. Of the Parts of Speech. III. Of Syntax. IV. Of\nDerivation and Composition. By Alexander Stewart, Minister of the Gospel\nat Dingwall, Honorary Member of The Highland Society of Scotland,\nEdinburgh. Printed by C. Stewart & Coy.; for Peter Hill, Edinburgh; and\nVernon and Hood, London, 1801.\u201d\n\nA second edition, corrected and enlarged, was issued in 1812, a third in\n1876, and a fourth in 1879. It is very much superior to that by Shaw,\nand is still the best and the one in common use.\n\nA smaller volume appeared in 1828, entitled, _The Principles of Gaelic\nGrammar, designed to facilitate the study of that language to youth_, by\nArchibald Currie, formerly Master of the Grammar School, Rothesay, but\nat the time of publication Tutor at Prospect, Duntroon, Argyllshire. It\nhas never been reprinted. After him Neil Macalpine, of Dictionary fame,\nproduced one which went through four editions. The other grammarians\nhave been Munro, 1835\u201343; Forbes, 1843\u201348; Dr. Macgillivray, 1858; L.\nMacbean; D. C. Macpherson, 1891; Malcolm Macfarlane, for the Highland\nAssociation, 1893; Reid, 1895; and Gillies, 1896, the latter based on\nStewart\u2019s.\n\nA good Grammar of the Gaelic language is still a desideratum. Students\nfeel that those already in existence follow too slavishly the model of\ngrammars of other tongues, from which the Gaelic diverges, and thus\nexceptions to the rules abound. Only a man of the Zeuss type, well\nversed in philology and the original structure and peculiar idioms of\nthis ancient speech, would be likely to bring order out of the existing\nchaos, and produce a book which would be a real help to the study of the\nlanguage. Meanwhile the student has to fall back upon Stewart, whose\noutlines were put together when philological research was yet in its\ninfancy. Though Zeuss and Windisch have Gaelic Grammars, they are in\nLatin and German.\n\nThe history of the Dictionaries is even more interesting. Michael\nO\u2019Clery is credited with the first attempts to produce a Gaelic one.[38]\nHis _Seanasan Nuadh_, or glossary of old words, was published at Louvain\nin 1643. Other Irish lexicographers followed, as many as six\nDictionaries appearing before the year 1817 was ended, among them that\nof the learned Lhuyd of Wales and Oxford in 1706.\n\nThe earliest in the Scottish Gaelic, was Kirke\u2019s Vocabulary, printed at\nthe end of the Irish Bible in 1690, and consisting of five and a half\npages, on which the words were arranged alphabetically. Later, in 1702,\nanother Vocabulary of thirteen pages by him, including additions by\nLhuyd, was published in _Nicholson\u2019s Scottish Historical Library_. This\none is not arranged alphabetically, but under twelve heads or divisions.\nNeither of Kirke\u2019s was issued by itself, apart from other\nsubject-matter.\n\nAfterwards, about the year 1732, the Rev. Dr. Malcolm or M\u2018Colm of\nDuddingston made an attempt to compile a lexicon, the material for which\nwas said to have been prepared by Lhuyd. He published a prospectus and a\nspecimen of the work, entitled \u201cFocloir Gaoidheilge-Shagsonach,\u201d but\nalthough he was encouraged by the General Assembly and received a grant\nof \u00a320, the work never appeared.\n\nThus the first Gaelic Dictionary published in separate form was\nMacdonald\u2019s Vocabulary, 1741, written for the use of the Charity Schools\nfounded and endowed in the Highlands by the Society for Propagating\nChristian Knowledge. Like its predecessor, it is not arranged\nalphabetically but divided into subjects or chapters, like the\nsyllabaries used by the ancient Assyrians.\n\nA more ambitious work was \u201cA Galic and English Dictionary, containing\nall the words in the Scottish and Irish dialects of the Celtic that\ncould be collated from the voice, and old books, and MSS., by the Rev.\nWilliam Shaw, A.M., followed by an English and Galic Dictionary,\ncontaining the most useful and necessary words in the English language,\nexplained by the correspondent words in the Galic,\u201d by the same author,\n1780. The published price was two guineas, though it was frequently sold\nfor three and a half. Shaw\u2019s knowledge of the language was defective. A\nmost furious Highland storm burst over his head on account of his open\nchampionship of the Johnsonian side in the Ossianic controversy.\nConsequently some of the subscribers returned their copies, but on the\nplea that there were a good many Irish words in the book. Others, who\ndid not return them within a reasonable time, were found liable to pay.\nThe case had gone to the Court of Session, and the author won, the\njudges finding that though he did not fulfil the terms of his prospectus\nhe was not guilty of fraud or deceit in the preparation of the book, and\nwhen a definition of a Gaelic Dictionary was given they held that his\nlegally answered the description. From Shaw himself the curious fact was\nelicited that, when picking up words among the Highlanders, he found the\ntask nearly impossible, as he had to pay them all except the most\neducated, the natives being impressed with the idea that he was going to\nmake a fortune out of the language, and of course they should have a\nshare. In consequence he turned to the Irish peasantry, who received him\nmore graciously; and he had access to Colonel Vallancy\u2019s MSS. But the\nupshot was that the Dictionary did ultimately contain more Irish words\nthan Gaelic. And this, combined with his own unpopularity, gave his\ncontroversial foes the opportunity to thwart him, which he resisted, as\nwe have indicated, by litigation. Ultimately he had to seek refuge in\nthe Church of England, where through the influence, it is supposed, of\nDr. Johnson, he got a living worth \u00a3200 a year.\n\n\u201cA new Alphabetical Vocabulary, Gaelic and English, with some directions\n_for writing and reading_ the Gaelic,\u201d by Robert Macfarlane, Edinburgh,\nappeared in 1795; and in 1815 another, in two parts, by Peter\nMacfarlane, the Gaelic translator of Bunyan\u2019s _Pilgrim\u2019s Progress_,\nDoddridge\u2019s _Rise and Progress_, and Blair\u2019s _Sermons_. The two parts\nwere also published separately in the same year. This was the only\nreally practical Gaelic Dictionary up to date, but on account of its\nlimited size was still very deficient\n\nA prospectus for a more comprehensive lexicon was issued in 1803 by\nAlexander Robertson, schoolmaster, Kirkmichael, and a few parts\nappeared. Thereafter the Highland Society bought his MS., as an aid to\nthe Dictionary contemplated by themselves.\n\nSince then there have been issued as many as five good ones, all more or\nless well known and serviceable at the present time. The first of these\nwas by Rev. A. Armstrong, A.M., \u201cin which the words in their different\nacceptations are illustrated by quotations from the best Gaelic writers;\nand their affinities traced in most of the languages of ancient and\nmodern times, with a short historical appendix of ancient names deduced\nfrom the authority of Ossian and other poets; to which is prefixed a new\nGaelic Grammar, 1825.\u201d The work was published at three guineas.\n\nOn the other hand, the rival, issued by the Highland Society of\nScotland, three years later, on somewhat similar lines, cost seven\nguineas in demy quarto, and ten in royal. To an advertisement from the\npublisher the following is attached: \u201cThis great work has occupied the\nattention of the Society since 1814, and presents not only a fully\nillustrated view of the Gaelic of Scotland, but surpasses in extent any\nlexicon of the Celtic Language ever offered to the public in this or any\nother country.\u201d Armstrong\u2019s and this one are by far the largest and the\nbest.\n\nNext in order comes that projected by the Rev. Dr. Norman Macleod,\nMinister of Campsie, and the Rev. Dr. Daniel Dewar of Glasgow, 1831. It\nwas superintended through the press and indeed mainly compiled by the\nPeter Macfarlane already mentioned and his son Donald\u2014both accredited\nGaelic scholars; and sold for a guinea. It is now known as Macleod and\nDewar\u2019s.\n\nContemporary with it we may say, there appeared, in 1832, the first\nattempt at a Gaelic pronouncing Dictionary, sold in parts by all the\nteachers in the Highlands. It was originally issued as \u201cA Pocket\nPronouncing Gaelic Dictionary for Schools in the Highlands and Islands\u201d;\ncontaining a far greater number of pure Gaelic words than any other\nDictionary, and three times, in some instances ten times, the number of\nillustrations and examples in the large Gaelic Dictionaries, from the\nBible and other sources; also all words that are exclusively Irish\npointed out, and reasons given for rejecting them by N. Macalpine,\nstudent in Divinity and Parochial Schoolmaster in Islay.\n\nWhile Armstrong\u2019s and the Highland Society\u2019s Dictionary have only had\none edition, and Macleod and Dewar\u2019s five, Macalpine\u2019s has reached as\nmany as twelve, and was last printed in 1890. A small volume of\nrecognised merit by the Rev. Ewen Maceachen bears the date 1842. It has\nnow been re-edited by Dr. Macbain and Mr. John Whyte.\n\nLately Dr. Macbain\u2019s own _Etymological Dictionary_, the most scholarly\nwork of the kind, has been published at Inverness in 1896, of which\ninteresting book a new edition may shortly be expected, so that Highland\nVernacular Dictionaries have had a goodly record.\n\nOne other department of this study remains to be noted, namely the\nperiodicals, a mere list of which suffices to show their character and\nhistory. But indirectly this list throws a pathetic sidelight on the\nwaning fortunes, or may we not say, the expiring struggles of our\nancient tongue, as well as upon the number and variety of efforts that\nhave been put forth to resuscitate it.\n\n                               PERIODICALS\n \u250c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2510\n \u2502            Name.             \u2502       Place.        \u2502 Date. \u2502  Nos.  \u2502\n \u251c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2524\n \u2502Ros-Roine (The Rose of the    \u2502Glasgow              \u25021803   \u2502       4\u2502\n \u2502  Field)                      \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502An Teachdaire Gaidhealach     \u2502          \u201e          \u25021829\u201331\u2502      24\u2502\n \u2502  (Highland Messenger)        \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502An Teachdaire Ur Gaidhealach  \u2502          \u201e          \u25021835\u201336\u2502       9\u2502\n \u2502  (New Messenger)             \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Cuairtear nan Gleann          \u2502          \u201e          \u25021840\u201343\u2502      40\u2502\n \u2502An Cuairtear Og Gaidhealach   \u2502Antigonish           \u25021851   \u2502      13\u2502\n \u2502Cuairtear nan Coillte         \u2502Ontario              \u25021840   \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Teachdaire Gaidhealach        \u2502Antigonish           \u25021837   \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502  Thasmania                   \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502An Fhianuis (The Witness)     \u2502Glasgow              \u25021845\u201350\u2502      36\u2502\n \u2502Eaglais Shaor na h\u2019Alba       \u2502          \u201e          \u25021875\u201393\u2502      74\u2502\n \u2502  (Quarterly)                 \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502An Fhianuis (Continuation of  \u2502          \u201e          \u25021893\u2013  \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502  above)                      \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502A Bheithir Bheuma (The        \u2502          \u201e          \u25021845   \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502  Satirist, No. 1)            \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Teachdaire nan Gaidheal       \u2502          \u201e          \u25021844   \u2502       8\u2502\n \u2502Caraid nan Gael               \u2502          \u201e          \u25021844   \u2502       5\u2502\n \u2502Caraid nan Gaidheal (No. 1)   \u2502Inverness            \u25021853   \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Fear Tathaich (The Mountain   \u2502Glasgow              \u25021848\u201350\u2502      25\u2502\n \u2502  Visitor)                    \u2502                     \u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502An T-Aoidh Miosail            \u2502Edinburgh            \u25021847\u201348\u2502      17\u2502\n \u2502An Gaidheal (The Gael)        \u2502Toronto              \u25021871\u201377\u2502 6 vols.\u2502\n \u2502  Issued afresh               \u2502Glasgow and Edinburgh\u2502       \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Monthly Visitor               \u2502          \u201e          \u25021858\u2013  \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502The Celtic Magazine           \u2502Inverness            \u25021876\u201388\u250213 vols.\u2502\n \u2502The Highland Magazine         \u2502Oban                 \u25021885   \u2502       8\u2502\n \u2502The Banner of Truth           \u2502Glasgow              \u25021872\u201374\u2502 2 vols.\u2502\n \u2502The Highland Monthly          \u2502Inverness            \u25021889   \u2502      51\u2502\n \u2502Cuairtear na Coille           \u2502          \u201e          \u25021881   \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502MacTalla                      \u2502Sydney, Cape Breton  \u25021892   \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Supplement to _Life and Work_ \u2502Glasgow              \u25021879\u2013  \u2502        \u2502\n \u2502Scottish Celtic Review        \u2502          \u201e          \u25021881\u201385\u2502       4\u2502\n \u2502The Celtic Monthly            \u2502          \u201e          \u25021892\u2013  \u2502        \u2502\n \u2514\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2518\n\nOf these it will be seen the most died in their infancy. The only\nsurvivors in Scotland to-day are the Church Quarterly _An Fhianuis_, the\nMonthly Supplement to _Life and Work_, and the _Celtic Monthly_. There\nhave been about twenty monthly periodicals tried since the beginning of\nlast century. Of the _Gaelic Messenger_, to take a single example, Dr.\nNigel Macneill says that the late Mr. W. R. Macphun, the publisher,\ninformed him in 1873 that the parcels of _Messengers_ sent to the\nHighlands and Islands came back at the end of the year, _after they had\nbeen read_, without any accompanying payment. Dr. Macleod, the editor,\nand his enterprising publisher saw then that it was time to give up the\nbusiness. \u201cSome who have lost time and money in recent times over Gaelic\naffairs,\u201d adds Dr. Macneill sententiously, \u201cmay find some cold comfort\nin this incident in the experience of our greatest of prose writers.\u201d\n\nFurther comment on that score is surely unnecessary. Yet is it not\nsuggestive of much that the only paper at present wholly written in\nScottish Gaelic is one published in Cape Breton, 3000 miles without and\nbeyond the Celtic fringe of the Old World?\n\nTaken as a whole, we may see from this survey that the printed Gaelic\nbooks extant belong to the past. They represent a type of thought which\nhas been largely superseded. And no modern outside the world of Gaelic\ndream could live and thrive on them exclusively. Nevertheless they\nrepresent the literature of a people, ancient and venerable, and as such\nthey will have a value and interest for the future historian,\nlitterateur, philologist, and ethnologist far exceeding what they have\nto-day; and in translations the best of the bards will be read when the\nlanguage in which they breathed their poetry is no longer heard on the\nlips of men.\n\n\n\n\n                             CHAPTER XVIII\n                  THE MASTER GLEANERS OF GAELIC POETRY\n\n  The work of the gleaner\u2014Authors of the three most precious relics of\n      Celtic literature, Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre, Book of Hymns, and Book of\n      Leinster\u2014of the three Highland treasures, Book of the Dean of\n      Lismore, Fernaig MS., and Book of Clanranald\u2014Advent of\n      Macpherson\u2014Collections and collectors between 1750 and 1820\u2014First\n      printed gleaning\u2014Four nineteenth-century monuments, Campbell\u2019s\n      Leabhar na Feinne, Mackenzie\u2019s Beauties of Gaelic Poetry,\n      Sinclair\u2019s Songster, and Carmichael\u2019s Carmina Gadelica\u2014Other\n      recent gleaners and their books.\n\n\nTo the gleaners of the poetic heritage of the past we are indebted\nalmost as much as to the poets themselves; for what mattered it to us\nthat some Homer or Ossian had sung, if none of their contributions ever\nreached us? An unappreciative age may allow its masterpieces to be lost,\nbut the gleaners will not suffer that. They treasure the best, many a\ntime snatching the fugitive poems from the verge of oblivion.\n\nSometimes they glean for the pure pleasure of possessing, as the miser\namasses his gold. Often they do it to share with others. In any case,\nlike the middlemen of commerce, they are the true distributers, for\nsooner or later their wares reach the market.\n\nUnlike that of the poet, the work of the gleaner demands no originality;\nonly a certain devotion and enthusiasm for the compositions admired, and\na certain critical judgment, the latter not always in evidence, and not\nnecessarily indispensable. Posterity does the winnowing.\n\nTo the gleaners we owe the original compiling of the three most precious\nrelics of Celtic literature now in the world\u2014the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre,\nthe Book of Hymns, and the Book of Leinster.\n\nIt is away back in the latter end of the eleventh century and early part\nof the twelfth that we encounter the authors of these. When the gloom of\nthe Middle Ages was settling down upon Europe, and weird apparitions\nhovered round the camp fires and the cloisters; when the feudal lords\nwere building their strong castles and the men of peace their churches\nand monastic retreats, to escape from war and disorder and general\nwickedness, one might enter the precincts of the great monastery of\nClonmacnois in Ireland and find Maelmuiri, the son of the son of Conn\nnam Bocht, busy with his pen compiling the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre. Many\ntimes already had the sacred edifice been attacked and pillaged by the\nmarauding Norsemen, and even then it was surrounded by people rendered\nviolent and half savage by the disorders of the time, so that the\nstudious Maelmuiri with his literary tastes was not secure in his quiet\nretreat, but in the midst of his peaceful avocations was set upon one\nnight in the church and murdered by a band of robbers, to whom\nliterature, most likely, had no meaning.\n\nBut Maelmuiri had already reared his monument, more lasting than brass,\nin the book which happily escaped the hands of the ruffians.\n\nIt is the oldest miscellaneous gleaning we have, and contains, among\nmany valuable productions in prose and poetry, such ancient poems as\nDallan Forgaill\u2019s \u201cAmra\u201d or \u201cPraise of Columcille,\u201d and a pretty large\ntranscript of the \u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9.\u201d The Gaelic of the former in the\nFenian dialect was so ancient even in Maelmuiri\u2019s time that it had to be\nheavily glossed and commented upon.\n\nOf his contemporary, the compiler of the Book of Hymns, nothing seems to\nbe known. His monument too has survived the ravages and vicissitudes of\ntime, but without his name. A wonderful anthology it is, carrying us\nback, as in the case of the other, to the days of St Columba, and even\nfurther, to the period of St. Patrick. For here, in the _Liber\nHymnorum_, we have the Gaelic hymns of Patrick, Colm\u00e1n, Fiacc, Ult\u00e1n,\nBrocc\u00e1n, Sanct\u00e1in, Dallan Forgaill, M\u00e1el-\u00edsu, the prayers of N\u00edn\u00edne and\nAdamnan; a Quatrain on the Apostles; besides a variety of beautiful\nLatin hymns with Gaelic glosses and prefaces. Among the more famous of\nthe latter may be mentioned the \u201cTe Deum,\u201d the \u201cMagnificat,\u201d the \u201cGloria\nin Excelsis Deo,\u201d and the \u201cBenedictus Dominus Deus Israel,\u201d so well\nknown to worshippers throughout the ages since then; and the three Latin\nhymns of St. Columba\u2014the \u201cAltus,\u201d \u201cIn te Christo,\u201d and \u201cNoli Pater.\u201d\n\nMany of these occur only in the Book of Hymns, except when copied from\nit elsewhere, and may have been lost to posterity, but for the industry\nof the unknown gleaner now no more remembered.\n\nMaelmuiri and he, in all probability had made their collection before\nthe close of the eleventh century; and fifty years later appeared the\ncompiler,[39] who produced the Book of Leinster, containing no less than\n187 romances in prose and poetry. After the Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre this is\nreckoned the most important monument of Gaelic literature.\n\nThe stories recorded relate to events which for the most part happened\nbefore the year 650, and their interest and variety may be inferred from\nthe following category of subjects, into which they have been\nclassified, namely: destructions of fortified places, cow-spoils,\ncourtships, battles, cave-stories, voyagings, tragic deaths, feasts,\nsieges, adventures, elopements, slaughters, water-eruptions,\nexpeditions, progresses, and visions. A book of old-time and abundant\nhuman incident is this middle-age document.\n\nIn succession to these three master-gleaners there arose numerous other\nless famous ones in Ireland.\n\nBut our special quest carries us over from this time to the land famed\nin later song and story as the home of the Gaelic tongue. And coming to\nScotland three other monuments of Celtic industry and literary taste\narise to view, covering the period extending from the fourteenth century\nto the Forty-five. They are the Book of the Dean of Lismore, the Fernaig\nMS., and the Book of Clanranald. These having been described in detail\nin Chapter VII., demand no more than a passing reference here. Happily,\nmore is known of their authors than of the compilers of their famous\nprecursors.\n\nIt was in that wild and turbulent period of clan feuds in the Northern\nand Western Highlands, and family quarrels between the Douglases and\ntheir rivals in the Lowlands, almost half a century before the Scottish\nReformation, that the Dean of Lismore in his island home near Oban, set\nabout collecting his fund of Gaelic poetry. In 1512, just the year\nbefore Flodden, he began to write down what he gleaned from oral\nrecitation throughout the Highlands and Ireland, and continued with the\nhelp of his brother down to the year 1526, thus conserving not only the\npoetry of his own generation and of two previous centuries, but also\nmost beautiful and characteristic fragments of Ossianic poems, some of\nwhich, but for him, would have been irretrievably lost.\n\nA hundred and sixty years pass stormfully by before we meet the next\ngleaner in this field of poetic literature. And then arose among the\nwild Macraes of Kintail the chief of that name, Donnachadh nam Pi\u00f2s,\nfull of piety and song. Amid the tumults of the Revolution of 1688,\nwhile Claverhouse was leading the clans on to fateful Killiecrankie, and\nCannon and Buchan were ravaging the Northern Highlands, this friend of\nthe Muses, and learned chieftain, found a pastime in making of verse and\ncommitting to manuscript, thousands of lines of poetry current in his\nown district, from Carsewell\u2019s day down to his own, and in point of\nplace from Southern Argyllshire north to the borders of Caithness.\n\nThis representative gleaning carries the bardic succession over the long\ninterval since the Dean\u2019s time, and it is a pity that though the Fernaig\nmanuscript has been transcribed and annotated by Professor Mackinnon,\nand again transcribed by Dr. Cameron and Dr. Macbain, and partly\ntransliterated by Dr. Henderson, no English rendering has yet been\npublished.\n\nThe poems in the Book of Clanranald are not of the same high order as\nthe earlier survivals, with the exception of the two or three Ossianic\nfragments, which are likewise to be found elsewhere. But they supplement\nthe Fernaig collection, and help to bring down the poetic tradition\nnearer the Forty-five. It is to the Macvurichs\u2014the descendants of\nMuireach Albanach, and the hereditary bards of Clanranald\u2014that we owe\nthis contribution to the gleanings of poetising in by-gone days. They\ncollected throughout their successive generations chiefly elegies and\neulogies, from the time of Charles the First to George the Second.\n\nA new era of enthusiasm for bardic compositions opened with the advent\nof Macpherson and his publication in June 1760 of \u201cFragments of Ancient\nPoetry collected in the Highlands of Scotland.\u201d The rich field of Celtic\nlore in the past was by this time almost unknown. Few interested\nthemselves in the Celtic literature of their country. The Book of the\nDean of Lismore lay in obscurity, nobody now knows where. For centuries\nit had never been heard of. The Fernaig MS. and the Book of Clanranald\nwere equally buried, perhaps in old clan chests or lumber-rooms. No\nbetter evidence of the great dearth in the land of master-gleaners could\nbe adduced than the challenge of Dr. Johnson, that there were not in the\nwhole world Gaelic MSS. one hundred years old, and the feeble way in\nwhich it was met.\n\nInterest in these days had reached a very low ebb indeed, when the\ncontroversy over Macpherson\u2019s _Ossian_ set the Celts a-searching.\n\nMacpherson himself, first in the field of these newly awakened\nenthusiasts, is believed, in the course of his journey through the\nNorth-West Highlands, to have gleaned the best of what remained of the\ntreasure. But for him it is highly probable there would be no Scottish\ncollection of Gaelic MSS. in the Advocates\u2019 Library to-day. Many of them\nwere already on their way to decay, as their tattered appearance shows.\n\nBesides the work of the Highland Society and the stock in hand of the\nKilbride family, it is quite remarkable the number of minor collections\nthat were made between the years 1750 and 1820. This period was, in\nfact, a resurrected Ossianic cycle. It would be tedious, and quite\nunnecessary here to catalogue all the names, but we may mention the\nTurner, the Jerome Stone, the Macnicol, the Fletcher, the Campbell, the\nGillies, the Irvine, the Macpherson, the Kennedy, the Sir George\nMackenzie, the Sinclair, the Sage, the Macfarlane, the Grant, and the\nMaccallum collections. And among these gleaners, the baronet, the\nclergy, the teacher, the farmer, the printer, the soldier, the advocate,\nthe traveller, are all represented.\n\nIt is curious now, looking back on the great Macpherson Ossianic\ncontroversy, which called forth all this industry, this laborious\nwriting and research, to reflect on its rise and progress. Doubtless it\nwas felt then, as it is recognised now, that the only real way to solve\nthe riddle was to glean in the fields of poetry and history\u2014a task prior\nto that period too much neglected. They wanted data. Had they the\nrecords we now possess, and had they been able to read the ancient\nscrolls, there would have been no literary wrangle. How quietly and\nnaturally the question, then a problem, has with the advent of\nscientific scholarship solved itself. As a controversy the Macpherson\nsquabble is now as extinct as the dodo. And the Celtic champions who\nheralded the dawn of last century, as we did of this, would perhaps be\nalmost as much taken aback with the issue could they know, as with the\nwonders of steam or electricity and the camera.\n\nIt is an interesting fact that the earliest to achieve a printed\ncollection of ancient Gaelic poetry was Ronald Macdonald, son of the\nArdnamurchan bard, who published a volume in 1776, presumably from\nmaterials treasured by his father.\n\nBut if through the past centuries the master gleaners appeared only at\nrare intervals, the nineteenth has not been thus barren. For almost\nsimultaneously with the Celtic renaissance abroad, enthusiastic\nharvesters entered the field at home. Four works especially, all\nproduced within the last sixty years, call for particular attention.\nFollowing the modern method, their authors have each taken up a special\nline, ransacking the past and the present for their own peculiar pearls.\nAnd thus for the first time the whole Scottish field of Gaelic poetry\nhas been well-nigh gone over, and representative poems of every age and\nclass have been gleaned and printed.\n\nFirst in the order of the antiquity of its contents, though not first in\nthe field, comes Campbell\u2019s _Leabhar na Feinne_. It appeared in 1872,\nits title page announcement sufficiently indicating its aim and scope.\nAs a sub-title, the latter runs as follows:\u2014\n\n                       \u201cHeroic Gaelic Ballads\n                           Collected in Scotland\n                       Chiefly from 1512 to 1871\n\ncopied from old manuscripts preserved at Edinburgh and elsewhere, and\nfrom rare books; and orally collected since 1859; with lists of\ncollections and of their contents; and with a short account of the\ndocuments quoted.\n\n             Arranged by\n                   J. F. Campbell,\n                     Niddry Lodge, Kensington, London, W.\u201d\n\nThe author, who was a barrister, and of an ancient and illustrious\nHighland family in Islay, spent twelve years from 1859 collecting\nfolk-lore and poetry as opportunity offered throughout the Highlands, a\nwork in which he was assisted by various contributors and coadjutors.\nHis first book, entitled _Popular Tales of the West Highlands_, orally\ncollected, was published in Edinburgh in 1862. There are four volumes,\nand they contain mainly prose stories, such as were wont to be repeated\nround the firesides in the Highland Ceilidh in days of yore. Yet,\ncommingled with the Sgeulachdan, are to be found Ossianic fragments\nwhich had filtered down by oral tradition.\n\nThis publication, however, was but a stepping-stone to the author\u2019s real\n_magnum opus_, the _Leabhar na Feinne_.\n\nFor it, he collected about 54,000 lines of heroic poetry, and these it\nwill be observed are independent of the Irish MSS., and almost of the\nScottish MSS. written in the Irish character before the year 1512. With\nregard to the latter he says, \u201cTo publish them is more than I am able to\ndo. Where extracts have been made I have quoted a few passages to show\nwhat the language is like, and how these ancient writings correspond to\nlater writings.\u201d\n\nSince in many cases he had two or more versions of the same ballad, and\nin some cases five or six, it was his original intention to collate and\nmake one perfect copy. This idea he had ultimately to abandon, and\nwisely followed the plan of printing the oldest, with selections from\nlater versions. Of the first Ossianic fragment he attempted to collate\nfrom two versions, namely, Garbh Mac Stairn, he says, \u201cnot a line of\nMacpherson\u2019s Gaelic was in either version, but the story seemed to be\nthe foundation of the first book of Fingal, and therefore a literary\ncuriosity.\u201d It is significant that when Campbell issued his first book\nhe favoured the authenticity of Macpherson\u2019s _Ossian_, but by the time\n_Leabhar na Feinne_ appeared he was strong the other way. His early\nattitude he attributed to \u201cunformed opinions affected by old beliefs.\u201d\n\nThe ballads of _Leabhar na Feinne_ are arranged under nine heads,\naccording to their chronological sequence, as follows:\u2014\n\n    I. The Story of Cuchulinn.\n\n   II. The Story of Deirdre.\n\n  III. The Story of Fraoch.\n\n   IV. The Story of Fionn and the Feinn, including the Norse Ballads.\n\n    V. Parodies.\n\n   VI. Later Heroic Ballads.\n\n  VII. Mythical Ballads.\n\n VIII. Poems like Macpherson\u2019s _Ossian_.\n\n   IX. Pope\u2019s collection of ten Ballads.\n\nThese heroic tales read like the _Arabian Nights_, often with the\nexaggerated fancy of _Don Quixote_. The extraordinary variety and human\ninterest of the ballads may be gleaned even from their names. For\nexample: The Story of Cuchulinn and Eimer, his wife; his sword; his\nchariots; Garbh Mac Stairn; and Conlaoch; and Connal\u2019s revenge. The\nStory of Fionn and his Feinn; his pedigree; stories about his birth;\nOssian and Padruig; Ossian\u2019s last hunt; how he got his sight; the loss\nof the Fenian history; Ossian\u2019s controversy with Padruig; his lament for\nhis comrades; their names; their favourite music; how nine went forth to\nseek a whelp. Caoilte; how he slew a magic boar and a giant.\n\nThe following would pass as the titles of chapters in the great classic\nof Cervantes: The adventure with the timbrel player; With Silhalan; The\nadventure of the hag; The stealing of Fionn\u2019s cup; The adventure with\nthe enchanter\u2019s family; Roc, the King\u2019s one-legged runner; The smithy\nsong, how they got swords; The one-eyed giantess and her ships; The\nbattle with Manus; Fionn\u2019s expedition to Lochlan; His puzzle; His\nenchantment in the rowan booth; The adventure of the nine with a\nhorseman; The adventure in the house of the king of the fair strangers;\nThe Black Dog slain by Bran; The adventure of the six at the golden\ncastle; The tightest fight of the Feinn; The expedition of eight or of\nthe six to foreign lands; The distressed maiden; The battle of Fair\nStrand, in which the Feinn defeated the whole world in arms; The maid of\nthe fair white garment; Ossian\u2019s courting; How Bran was killed and\nGaul\u2019s dog; Fionn\u2019s encounter of wits with Ailbhe, Cormac\u2019s daughter;\nThe elopement of Grainne, Fionn\u2019s wife, with Diarmad, Fionn\u2019s nephew;\nDiarmad\u2019s lament for his comrades; The story of Gaul Macmorna; his\nadventure with Lamh-fhad; Gaul\u2019s last words to his wife.\n\nThe parodies have these headings: The black wrapper; A dream; The tailor\nand the Feinn; The truiseal stone; Diarmad\u2019s speech.\n\nAmong later heroical ballads occur subjects like these: The lay of the\ngreat fool; Oscar and the giant; Muirchadh Mac Brian and the heiress of\nDublin; Muirchadh Mac Brian\u2019s riding dress; Hugh O\u2019Neil\u2019s horse.\n\nSuch sumptuous narrative, spiced with no lack of imaginative detail,\nmight satisfy even Chaucer\u2019s merry group as they foregathered to listen\nto the story-telling at the Tabard Inn centuries ago.\n\nIn 1841, some thirty years before _Leabhar na Feinne_, Mackenzie\u2019s\n_Beauties of Gaelic Poetry_ appeared. It is a work of more general\ninterest than the other, in so far that it gives gems of every type of\npoem. Here are to be found in concise compass the best productions of\nthe best bards during the last 300 years, with brief biographical\nsketches, critical and explanatory notes, and other elucidations.\n\nJohn Mackenzie, the compiler, was born in 1806 of humble parentage in\nGairloch, Ross-shire. Educated in the parish school there, and\nafterwards at Tain Academy, he developed a taste for reading and music,\nand became very proficient in the making of musical instruments. His\nfather had him started in life as an apprentice joiner in Dingwall. This\noccupation he soon left, however, for more congenial literary work, such\nas the collecting of poetical material for publication. On leaving his\nnative strath to push his way in the great cities of the South, he acted\nfor a time as book-keeper in the Glasgow University printing office, and\nin addition to compiling \u201cThe Beauties,\u201d wrote much in prose. Afterwards\nthe late Gaelic publishers, Maclachlan and Stewart, Edinburgh, employed\nhim on various undertakings for several years. Besides \u201cThe Beauties\u201d he\nwrote a \u201cHistory of Prince Charlie,\u201d the English-Gaelic Dictionary,\nusually bound with Macalpine\u2019s, the \u201cGaelic Melodist,\u201d and compiled,\nwrote, translated, or edited under surprising difficulties, about thirty\nother works.\n\nA man of talent and industry, Mackenzie has produced a book which not\nonly enhances the prestige of our native literature, but also places\nhimself in the front rank of Gaelic gleaners.\n\nLike the Dean of Lismore, however, he has inserted certain matters which\ncritics feel might, with advantage, be omitted, as they detract from the\ndignity of the work as a whole.\n\nOn the other hand, the author of _Leabhar na Feinne_ feels aggrieved\nthat Mackenzie has not included among \u201cThe Beauties\u201d some of the ancient\nheroic ballads of Ossianic origin. As well might objection be taken to\nMr. Campbell himself for omitting the heroic poetry in the Irish MSS.\nand the Scottish MSS. written in the old Gaelic script. As a matter of\nfact, Mackenzie does give as samples three very beautiful pieces, the\n\u201cMordubh,\u201d \u201cCollath,\u201d and \u201cThe Aged Bard\u2019s Wish,\u201d which he took to be\nancient, but which are now held to belong to the Macpherson period.\n\nBoth compilers did well to follow each his own plan and work out his own\nideal. The field has thus been all the better harvested.\n\nMackenzie\u2019s undertaking seems to have early undermined his health, and\nthough usually resident in the South, he died at Inverewe on the 19th\nday of August 1848, among his own people, and was buried with his\nfathers in the old chapel in the churchyard of Gairloch, near which, at\nthe roadside, a monument now stands to his memory.\n\nA few specimen extracts from \u201cThe Beauties\u201d may here be quoted to\nillustrate their quality. Of the three earlier poems \u201cThe Aged Bard\u2019s\nWish\u201d is the best known, and of it our author gives both the text and a\nliteral translation. It was Mrs. Grant of Laggan who first brought it\nunder public notice, and then it was considered ancient because there is\nno flavour of Christianity in its composition. On the contrary, the bard\ndesires entrance at death into the hall where dwell Ossian and Daol, and\nexpresses the wish that there be laid by his side at the last a harp, a\nshell full of liquor, and his ancestor\u2019s shield. In other respects both\nthe language and sentiment are modern.\n\n           O c\u00e0iraibh mi ri taobh nan allt\n             A shiubhlas mall le ceumaibh ciuin\n           Fo sg\u00e2il a bharraich leag mo cheann\n             \u2019S bi th\u00f9s\u2019 a ghrian ro-ch\u00e0irdeil rium.\n\n           O place me by the purling brook,\n             That wimples gently down the lea,\n           Under the old tree\u2019s branchy shade,\n             And thou, bright sun, be kind to me!\n\n           Where I may hear the waterfall,\n             And the hum of its falling wave,\n           And give me the harp and the shell and the shield\n             Of my sires in the strife of the brave.\n\nOf Macintyre\u2019s \u201cBen Dorain,\u201d which is also included, Professor Blackie\nsays, \u201cI shall be surprised to learn that there exists in any language,\nancient or modern, a more original poem of the genus which we may call\nvenatorial. What Landseer, in a sister art, has done for animals in\ngeneral, that Macintyre, in this singular work, has done for the deer\nand the roe.\u201d And then Blackie himself gives a characteristic rendering\ninto English of the poem, very free, but catching the spirit of its\nGaelic author. For example:\u2014\n\n                  My delight it was to rise\n                  With the early morning skies\n                            All aglow,\n                  And to brush the dewy height\n                  Where the deer in airy state\n                            Wont to go;\n                  At least a hundred brace\n                  Of the lofty antlered race,\n                  When they left their sleeping place\n                            Light and gay;\n                  When they stood in trim array,\n                  And with low deep-breasted cry,\n                  Flung their breath into the sky,\n                            From the brae;\n                  When the hind, the pretty fool,\n                  Would be rolling in the pool\n                            At her will;\n                  Or the stag in gallant pride,\n                  Would be strutting at the side\n                  Of his haughty-headed bride\n                            On the hill.\n                  And sweeter to my ear\n                  Is the concert of the deer\n                            In their roaring,\n                  Than when Erin from her lyre\n                  Warmest strains of Celtic fire\n                            May be pouring;\n                  And no organ sends a roll\n                  So delightsome to my soul,\n                  As the branchy-crested race,\n                  When they quicken their proud pace,\n                  And bellow in the face\n                            Of Ben Dorain.\n                  O what joy to view the stag\n                  When he rises \u2019neath the crag,\n                  And from depth of hollow chest,\n                  Sends his bell across the waste,\n                  While he tosses high his crest,\n                            Proudly scorning.\n                  And from milder throat the hind,\n                  Lows an answer to his mind\n                  With the younglings of her kind\n                            In the morning;\n                  With her vivid swelling eye,\n                  While her antlered lord is nigh,\n                  She sweeps both earth and sky,\n                            Far away;\n                  And beneath her eye-brow grey,\n                  Lifts her lid to greet the day,\n                  And to guide her turfy way\n                            O\u2019er the brae.\n                  O how lightsome is her tread,\n                  When she gaily goes ahead,\n                  O\u2019er the green and mossy bed\n                            Of the rills;\n                  When she leaps with such a grace\n                  You will own her pretty pace\n                  Ne\u2019er was hindmost in the race,\n                            When she wills;\n                  Or when with sudden start,\n                  She defies the hunter\u2019s art.\n                  And is vanished like a dart\n                            O\u2019er the hills.\n\nAt the end of the book Mackenzie gives a select number of \u201cBeauties\u201d by\nindividuals who invoked the muse only on rare occasions, or whose\nhistory is little known to the world. Among these we find the anonymous\nyet exquisitely beautiful and pathetic \u201cMali Bheag \u00d2g.\u201d Our author\nclaims to be the first to give the whole of it correctly in print.[40]\nThere is much uncertainty as to the history, circumstance, and locality,\nbut the occasion of the poem was the elopement of two lovers, who were\npursued. The gallant, a young officer, stood to the defence of his\nbeautiful fianc\u00e9e, who stole behind him in the mel\u00e9e. Unhappily his\nsword accidentally in the swing struck her so violent a blow that she\nexpired at his feet. It was in jail awaiting execution that he composed\nthis heart-melting song:\u2014\n\n               Nach truagh leat mi\u2019s mi\u2019m priosan,\n               Mo Mh\u00e0li bheag \u00f2g\n               Do chairdean a\u2019 cuir binn\u2019 orm,\n               Mo chuid de\u2019n t-saoghal th\u00f9.\n               A bhean na mala m\u00ecne,\n               \u2019S na\u2019m pogan mar na fi\u00f2guis,\n               \u2019S tu nach fagadh shios mi\n               Le mi-r\u00f9in do bheoil.\n\n               \u2019S mise bh\u2019air mo bhuaireadh\n               Mo Mh\u00e0li bheag \u00f2g,\n               \u2019Nuair \u2019thain an \u2019sluagh mu\u2019n cuairt duinn\n               Mo ribhinn ghlan \u00f9r;\n               \u2019S truagh nach ann san uair ud,\n               A thuit mo lamh o m\u2019 ghualainn,\n               Mu\u2019n dh\u2019amais mi do bhualadh,\n               Mo Mh\u00e0li bheag \u00f2g.\n\nAs another independent gleaning, and valuable supplement to Mackenzie\u2019s\nwork, there falls to be mentioned Archibald Sinclair\u2019s _An T\u2019\nOranaiche_, or the _Gaelic Songster_, published in 1879. \u201cIf a man were\npermitted to make all the ballads, he need not care who should make the\nlaws of a nation,\u201d said a wise man. And certainly the songs occupy no\nmean place in Celtic life and poetry. Of these there is no collection in\nGaelic like Sinclair\u2019s\u2014humorous, patriotic, satiric, and sentimental. He\ngleaned, as he tells us, in many a field, saving some from oblivion.\nOthers he snatched from fugitive pieces of paper, ere these latter\nbecame food for the moth. In all there are 290 songs in the volume, and\nupwards of fifty names of composers, some of whom are still living. The\nsongs are mainly of last century, and were compiled in Glasgow by their\neditor, who was a publisher in that city.\n\nBy the well-known gleaners above mentioned, the heroic ballads, the\nlyric poems, and the songs have been securely garnered. But there still\nremained one large section of the field from which hitherto there had\nbeen no great ingathering, necessary to complete the harvest up to our\ntime. And happily, ere the century closed, the crowning work appeared.\nIt is a remarkable book and sumptuous, published in two volumes, in\n1900, by Alexander Carmichael, who was for many years a member of Her\nMajesty\u2019s Inland Revenue staff, and an enthusiastic admirer of Gaelic\nlore. The work is styled \u201c_Carmina Gadelica_,\u2014hymns and incantations,\nwith illustrative notes on words, rites, and customs, dying and\nobsolete; orally collected in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, and\ntranslated into English,\u201d by the author. Undoubtedly it places the\ncompiler in the very front rank of Celtic gleaners, and will carry its\ntestimony forward to posterity, as a monument of a phase of thought and\nlife now passing away. Even already its weird and old-world \u201cortha,\nurnan agus ubagan,\u201d sound like the echoes of a far-off time, from which\nthe race has long since emerged.\n\nYet its cultured author tells us that this work consists of old lore\ncollected during the last forty-four years, forming but a small part of\na large mass of oral literature written down from the recital of men and\nwomen throughout the land of the Gael, from Arran to Caithness, and from\nPerth to St. Kilda. The greater portion, however, was made in the\nWestern Isles, the last refuge of the distinctive Celtic life \u201cexpiring\non the horizon before the growing tumult of uniform civilisation.\u201d\n\nFor three centuries Gaelic oral literature has been disappearing, and,\nas our author tells us, it is now becoming meagre in quantity, inferior\nin quality, and greatly isolated.\n\n\u201cSeveral causes have contributed towards this decadence,\u201d he says,\n\u201cprincipally the Reformation, the rebellions, the evictions, the\nDisruption, the schools, and the spirit of the age. Converts in\nreligion, in politics, or in aught else are apt to be intemperate in\nspeech and rash in action. The Reformation movement condemned the\nbeliefs and cults tolerated and assimilated by the Celtic Church and the\nLatin Church. Nor did sculpture and architecture escape their\nintemperate zeal. The rebellions harried and harassed the people, while\nthe evictions impoverished, dispirited, and scattered them over the\nworld. Ignorant school teaching and clerical narrowness have been\npainfully detrimental to the expressive language, wholesome literature,\nmanly sports, and interesting amusements of the Highland people.\u201d\n\nMr. Carmichael has classified the contents of his extensive gleaning\nunder the following five sub-titles: Invocations, Seasons, Labour,\nIncantations, Miscellaneous, and in the general introduction explains\nhis mode of gathering the materials.\n\nThe glimpses of Highland life he gives in connection with his visits and\ncolloquies with the people are highly interesting.\n\n\u201cWhatever be the value of this work,\u201d he says, \u201cit is genuine folk-lore,\ntaken down from the lips of men and women, no part being copied from\nbooks. It is the product of far-away thinking, come down on the long\nstream of time. Who the thinkers and whence the stream, who can tell?\nSome of the hymns may have been composed within the cloistered cells of\nDeny and Iona, and some of the incantations among the cromlechs of\nStonehenge and the standing stones of Callarnis. These poems were\ncomposed by the learned, but they have not come down through the\nlearned, but through the unlearned\u2014not through the lettered few, but\nthrough the unlettered many, through the crofters and cottars, the\nherdsmen and shepherds of the Highlands and Islands.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe poems were generally intoned in a low, recitative manner, rising\nand falling in slow modulated cadences, charming to hear but difficult\nto follow. The music of the hymns had a distinct individuality, in some\nrespects resembling and in many respects differing from the old\nGregorian chants of the Church. I greatly regret that I was not able to\nrecord this peculiar and beautiful music, probably the music of the old\nCeltic Church.\u201d\n\nFollowing the advice and example of his acquaintance, J. F. Campbell of\nIslay, whom he knew for a quarter of a century, Mr. Carmichael gives the\nwords and names of the reciters. But, unlike Campbell and Mackenzie and\nSinclair, he gives an English rendering of the original in every\ninstance. Thus, while to the vast majority of this nation _their_\nfelicitous poems are locked up in the Gaelic, _his_ are available to\nall, in chaste and beautiful language, with charming letterpress,\nembellished by old Celtic letters, artistically copied by his wife from\nthe ancient MSS. in Edinburgh and elsewhere.\n\nSpeaking of the original, he maintains that, although in decay, the\npoems are in verse of a high order, with metre, rhythm, assonance,\nalliteration, and every quality to please the ear and to instruct the\nmind. Simple dignity, charming grace, passionate devotion, characterise\nmost of these pieces. Again and again he laid down his self-imposed\ntask, feeling unable to render the intense power and supreme beauty of\nthe original Gaelic into adequate English; but he persevered, thus\nplacing a stone as it were upon the cairn of those who composed and of\nthose who transmitted the work.\n\nAnd now, a few characteristic specimens from the book may fitly close\nthis study. The first is an incantation beginning:\u2014\n\n                   The wicked who would do me harm,\n                   May he take the (throat) disease\n                   Globularly, spirally, circularly,\n                   Fluxy, pellety, horny-grim, etc.\n\nBut scarcely any English can convey the vengeance of the vernacular.\nEven the sounds are terrifying:\u2014\n\n                 Ulc a dhean mo lochd,\n                 Gu\u2019n gabh e\u2019n galar gluc gloc,\n                 Guirneanach, goirneanach, guairneach,\n                 Gaornanach, garnanach, gruam.\n\nNext, we quote two verses from \u201cThe Invocation of the Graces,\u201d\ninteresting as containing beautiful names from the ancient sagas:\u2014\n\n                    A shade art thou in the heat,\n                    A shelter art thou in the cold,\n                    Eyes art thou to the blind,\n                    A staff art thou to the pilgrim,\n                    An island art thou at sea,\n                    A fortress art thou on land,\n                    A well art thou in the desert,\n                    Health art thou to the ailing.\n\n            Thine is the skill of the Fairy Woman,\n            Thine is the virtue of Bride the calm,\n            Thine is the faith of Mary the mild,\n            Thine is the tact of the woman of Greece,\n            Thine is the beauty of Eimer the lovely,\n            Thine is the tenderness of Darthula delightful,\n            Thine is the courage of Meve the strong,\n                  Thine is the charm of Buine-bheul.\n\nNow follows an example of a charm for sprain:\u2014\n\n                Christ went out\n                In the morning early,\n                He found the legs of the horses\n                In fragments soft;\n                He put marrow to marrow,\n                He put pith to pith,\n                He put bone to bone,\n                He put membrane to membrane,\n                He put tendon to tendon,\n                He put blood to blood,\n                He put tallow to tallow,\n                He put flesh to flesh,\n                He put fat to fat,\n                He put skin to skin,\n                He put hair to hair,\n                He put warm to warm,\n                He put cool to cool.\n                As the King of power healed that\n                It is in his nature to heal this,\n                If it be in his own will to do it.\n                  Through the bosom of the Being of life\n                  And of the Three of the Trinity.\n\nAnd, finally, we may take this as a good specimen of an invocation:\u2014\n\n              Bless, O Chief of generous Chiefs,\n              Myself and everything anear me,\n              Bless me in all my actions,\n              Make Thou me safe for ever.\n                  Make Thou me safe for ever.\n\n              From every brownie and ban-shee,\n              From every evil wish and sorrow,\n              From every nymph and water-wraith,\n              From every fairy mouse and grass-mouse,\n                  From every fairy mouse and grass-mouse.\n\n              From every troll among the hills,\n              From every siren hard pressing me,\n              From every ghoul within the glens,\n              Oh! save me till the end of my day.\n                  Oh! save me till the end of my day.\n\nIn recent years, Dr. George Henderson has done useful work in\ntransliterating several poems from the Fernaig MS., which, along with\nmany songs collected in the West Highlands, he has published in his\n_Leabhar nan Gleann_. And to Henry Whyte and Malcolm Macfarlane the Gael\nis indebted for an extensive gleaning in the field of vocal music. In\naddition to numerous Gaelic melodies, they have rescued a variety of\nexcellent songs from impending oblivion and enhanced their value,\nespecially to those who are unacquainted with the original, by giving\nliteral renderings in English, which serve to exhibit their simple\nbeauty.\n\nNor have the three sister nationalities been behind in work of this\nkind. The first important Irish gleaning has been Miss Brooke\u2019s\n_Reliques of Irish Poetry_, consisting of heroic poems, odes, elegies,\nand songs, which she published in the original with English translations\nand notes, Dublin, 1789. In more recent times we have the interesting\ncollections in English of Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, Dr. Hyde, Dr.\nSigerson, Yeats, and others, besides the _Treasury of Irish Poetry_\nlately edited by Stopford A. Brooke, and T. W. Rolleston. The latter\ndeals simply with the nineteenth century, but Dr. Sigerson\u2019s _Bards of\nthe Gael and Gall_ is an Anthology of nearly a hundred and fifty poems\nmetrically translated, \u201ccovering the ground from the earliest unrhymed\nchant ascribed to the first invading Milesian down to the peasant days\nof the eighteenth century.\u201d\n\nWales is well represented by the extensive Myvyrian Archaiology of Owen\nJones, 1801\u20131807, which capable Welshmen, such as Aneurin Owen, Thomas\nPrice, William Rees, John Jones and others, set themselves to finish;\nwhile M. de la Villemarqu\u00e9 has done for Brittany, in his now famous\nbooks, perhaps all the ancient gleaning it was possible to do at a\nperiod so late as the middle of last century.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER XIX\n                THE MASTER SCHOLARS OF CELTIC LITERATURE\n\n  The bards and seanachies\u2014Six men of outstanding literary\n      eminence\u2014The earliest pioneer of the modern philological\n      movement\u2014Representatives of the older scholarship\u2014Those\n      of the new\u2014The brilliant Zeuss\u2014Foreign periodicals\n      dealing with Celtic\u2014Foremost scholars of the various\n      nations\u2014Italian\u2014German\u2014French\u2014Danish\u2014Scandinavian\u2014American\u2014British,\n      including English, Irish, Welsh, Manx, and Scottish\u2014Many literary\n      problems solved\u2014The promise of future harvests.\n\n\nIn the company of the scholars we still breathe the atmosphere of the\npast. It is they who have resurrected the MSS. These monuments of\nby-gone days are the quarries among which they work. As Burns \u201ceyed with\njoy the general mirth,\u201d so do they scrutinise with eager glance the\nmuch-prized vellum.\n\nOnly a scholar can know the pleasure it gives to hap upon a long-lost\nrelic of literature, to turn over its leaves, steeping the book in\nwater, if need be, to make its pages come asunder, and even using acid\nto help the time-worn ancient one to deliver up its secret.\n\n\u201cWhy bother with such defunct lore?\u201d asks the man in the crowd, \u201cthe\npast is over and gone. It is long since superseded.\u201d Therein lies the\ndifference between him and the scholar. The scholar thinks it worth\nwhile. Nay, he will sacrifice much\u2014we shall repeatedly see\u2014to search out\nthe contribution of the past, and determine its meaning. As Plato,\nAristotle, and the master-minds of ancient Greece wrote their books and\ncarried on their studies, knowing full well that these would be read and\nassimilated by very few in their own day, there being no\nprinting-presses as now, and only a limited education; so many of the\nCeltic scholars of our own time labour on in solitude, conscious also\nthat even with the printing-press the circle of their readers must be\nsmall, yet knowing they are doing a work which in its own way is ever\nwidening the horizons of knowledge and enriching the common heritage of\nmankind.\n\nIn the bards and seanachies, there have not been lacking from remote\ntimes men who have interested themselves in the lore and learning of\ntheir race; but we need to come down to more recent times to encounter\nthe class of writers we have specially in view in this study.\n\nHappily, they are not confined to any one age or any one country. Yet\nIreland, as we might expect from its place in the Celtic group, figures\nearly and largely in the domain of Gaelic scholarship.\n\nDuring the first half of the seventeenth century\u2014to go no farther\nback\u2014it produced six men of outstanding literary eminence, who\nrepresented a national scholarship in that country, the lustre of which\nhas never since been surpassed. These were Geoffrey Keating, Duald Mac\nFirbis, and the Four Masters.\n\nKeating, though born in Ireland, was of Norman extraction, and educated\nabroad for the office of priest. On his return from Spain, a\nfull-fledged Doctor of Divinity, he was appointed to a church and\nattracted great crowds as a preacher, till an incident, the most trivial\nand fortuitous in its origin, drove him from the pulpit into literature.\nThe incident is worth recording as a determining factor in his\nillustrious career. It seems that in his audience one day a young lady,\nwho was reputed to have questionable relations with a high dignitary of\nthe Province, happened to appear, curious, like all the rest, to hear\nthe great preacher. Keating, as fate would have it, was discoursing on\nthis occasion on a theme not likely to commend itself to the dissolute\ngirl; still less, since all eyes pointed the moral in her direction.\n\nShe had her revenge, for forthwith soldiers were dispatched by her\nlordly patron to arrest the offending priest and make him prisoner. But\nthe latter hearing of this in time, made good his escape to the famous\nglen of Aberlow, where he lived for years a hidden life. It was while\nthus cashiered and ostracised that he conceived the idea of writing the\nhistory of Ireland, from the earliest times to the Norman conquest,\nafterwards travelling through the country in disguise, with Aberlow as\nbase, to consult the ancient MSS., which were then in the families of\nthe hereditary brehons and in the proximity of the old monasteries. Many\ndocuments which existed in 1630, and which he perused, have since\ndisappeared. And his work is thus of great value, as he rewrote and\nredacted their contents in his own words, like another Herodotus.\n\nDuald Mac Firbis, his contemporary, was equally indefatigable in\nransacking the past for the benefit of the future. His _magnum opus_ is\n_The Book of Genealogies_. O\u2019Curry thinks it perhaps the greatest\nnational genealogical compilation in the world. In addition, he compiled\nthe _Chronicon Scotorum_, various glossaries, and, according to himself,\na dictionary of the Brehon laws.\n\nAlmost at the same time that Keating was writing his history in the\nsouth of Ireland, the Four Masters were busy with theirs in the north.\nMichael O\u2019Clery, born at Donegal about 1580, was author of the Leabhar\nGabhala, or Book of Invasions, and other important works, but in\ncompiling the famous Annals, the greatest of all, he had the assistance\nof other three eminent scholars, known as Farfasa O\u2019Mulchonry, Peregrine\nO\u2019Clery, and Peregrine O\u2019Duigenan. Hence the name \u201cFour Masters,\u201d given\nby John Colgan of Louvain, himself worthy to rank after them as the\nauthor of the _Trias Thaumaturga_, a book which owes its origin to the\nvast collection of material amassed by Michael O\u2019Clery throughout his\nbusy life. The latter work consists of two enormous Latin quartos, the\nfirst containing the lives of Patrick, Brigit, and Columba; the second,\nthose of a number of other distinguished Irish saints.\n\nFrom the middle of the seventeenth century we are carried forward to the\nbeginning of the eighteenth. And the next great name that illuminates\nthe pages of Celtic scholarship is that of a Welshman, Edward Lhuyd. A\npeculiar interest and distinction attach to the work of this man,\ninasmuch as he was the earliest pioneer of the modern philological\nmovement, and almost stumbled on the discoveries of Grimm and Rask,\nwhich were only reached upwards of a century after his time.\n\nAn Oxford don, of Jesus College, he clearly saw the necessity of laying\na solid foundation for the scientific study of his own and kindred\nlanguages, and, following up his ideal, he set about publishing\nspecimens of the literature and preparing vocabularies of the various\ndialects. In pursuit of this laudable object he visited Ireland and\nScotland, and when his great work, the _Arch\u00e6ologica Britannica_, began\nto appear about 1703, enthusiastic Celts from far and near sent him\ncongratulatory odes, some of which he afterwards printed. These poems\nwere either in Latin or in the mother tongue of their contributors.\nAmong the specimens sent from the Scottish Highlands, one, composed by\nthe Rev. John Maclean of Kilninian, Mull, has been justly described by\nProfessor Mackinnon as a \u201creally admirable composition.\u201d\n\n           Great praise and thanks, O noble Lhuyd, be thine,\n           True learned patriot of the Cambrian line!\n           Thou hast awaked the Celtic from the tomb,\n           That our past life her records might illume.\n           Engraved in every heart in lettered gold\n           Thy name remains; thy silent words unfold\n           To future ages what our sires had seen,\n           While others say, \u201cA Gaelic race hath been.\u201d\n\nSuch is one verse of the ode, as rendered in English by Dr. Nigel\nMacneill.\n\nCompleted and printed at Oxford in 1707, the _Arch\u00e6ologica Britannica_\nwas, according to the title page, \u201cdelivered to the subscribers at 9s.\n6d., being the remainder of their payment, and to others at 16s.\u201d\n\nAs a scientific linguist, the reputation of its brilliant author was at\nonce established. His calibre may be inferred from the following\npregnant note, which he appended to an edition of Kirke\u2019s Gaelic\nVocabulary in 1702. The note is in Latin to this effect:\u2014\n\n  Of these 360 Gaelic words, 160 agree, in sound and sense, with the\n  British (Welsh) language. The letter _p_ in Welsh equates with the\n  letter _c_ in Gaelic, _e.g._, pren, crann (tree); plant, clann; pen,\n  ceann; pedwar, ceithir; pymp, cuig; pwy, cia; pasc, casg. _Gw_ of\n  Welsh equates with Gaelic _f_, _e.g._, gwyn, fionn; gwin, fion; gwr,\n  fear; gwair, feur; gwirion, firinneach. The Welsh _h_ corresponds with\n  the Gaelic _s_, _e.g._, hen, sean; helig, seileach; heboc, seabhag;\n  hil, siol; halen, salann; hyn, sin.\n\nWhat was to prevent a man of such critical insight travelling towards\nthe interesting discovery of the position of the Celtic in the Aryan\ngroup, or even the generalisation formulated in Grimm\u2019s Law? Already he\nwas on the track, observing sound changes. He began with the Celtic\ndialects, but had he lived, in all likelihood he would have carried his\nequations to other languages of the Aryan group, and anticipated some at\nleast of the modern results. As it was, his early death occurred before\nhe had time to work out the idea on the wider platform; and the honour\nof having laid a sure foundation for the new sciences of philology,\nethnology, and literary criticism passed a century and a half later to\nthe great German masters.\n\nAfter Lhuyd\u2019s time, unhappily in this country, his studies were not\nfollowed up. On the contrary, the investigation of Celtic questions was\ndetermined more by sentiment than by scholarship. Wrangling and\npartisanship took the place of learning and scientific veracity. And so\nfar were the methods and results of later criticism from being\nanticipated, that biassed men like Pinkerton and the Ossianic\ncontroversialists had a loud voice in the land.\n\nGradually a better type of scholarship began to emerge both in Scotland\nand Ireland. Not at first the representatives of the new order, but\nrepresentatives of the traditional seanachies, scholars of the long\npast, who interested themselves afresh in the literature, history, and\nantiquities of the race; and who began with unwearied zest to unearth\nand bring to light the long lost and forgotten monuments of the past. Of\nthese, in Scotland, the brothers Donald and John Smith, Ewen Maclachlan,\nDr. Thomas Maclauchlan, and Dr. Archibald Clerk, were perhaps the most\nprominent. As scholars they were rather uncritical, and do not rank in\nthe same category with the great names of later times; but they had\nstrong Gaelic sympathies and a large assortment of traditional\nknowledge.\n\nIn Ireland, on the other hand, there were far more who occupied\nthemselves with the earlier periods. Of these it would be hard to rival\nin patient, conscientious, and solid learning such men as O\u2019Reilly,\nPetrie, O\u2019Donovan, O\u2019Curry, Todd, Reeves, Hennessy, and Healy.\n\nThe first three were associated with the Ordnance Survey of Ireland, and\nin that sphere found excellent scope for their Celtic studies, in\nconnection with the place-names of the country.\n\nJohn O\u2019Donovan was born in 1809. His father, though a small farmer, had\nbeen descended from the celebrated O\u2019Donovans of County Cork, and when\nhe died in 1817 his son John, then eight years of age and one of a\nfamily of nine, was sent to Dublin to be educated. From the age of\nseventeen he began to devote himself systematically to Celtic study, and\nthree years later was brought under the notice of the Survey Commission\nas a youth singularly well qualified to conduct the arch\u00e6ological\ndepartment of their enterprise. Accordingly he entered the service in\n1829, and forthwith instituted a careful investigation of the printed\nbooks, MSS., and inscriptions bearing on topography; in due course\ncontributing articles to the _Dublin Penny Journal_, and laying the\nfirst instalment of his research before the British Association in 1835.\nSubsequently, Petrie and he published the full report.\n\nIn 1836 he set about preparing an Analytical Catalogue of the Irish MSS.\nin Trinity College, and from 1841 was editor of the works published by\nthe Irish Arch\u00e6ological Society. Ever since he undertook the work of the\nOrdnance Survey, he had in view the idea of writing a _Grammar of the\nIrish Language_, and after seventeen years\u2019 study the book appeared in\n1847, and was received with enthusiasm both at home and abroad. It is\ncharacteristic of the way in which British scholarship followed in the\nrear of that on the Continent, that so well informed and interested an\nexponent as O\u2019Donovan did not know when he published his valuable\nGrammar that aspiration and ellipsis had been explained in Germany eight\nyears before then. Thus he arrived too early to benefit much by the\nstudy of comparative philology, though deeply interested in the science.\n\nHis masterpiece is really the edition he issued of the _Annals of the\nFour Masters_ (1848\u201351). Of this vast effort Dr. Hyde affirms that it is\nthe greatest that any modern Irish scholar ever accomplished. \u201cSo long\nas Irish history exists, the _Annals of the Four Masters_ will be read\nin O\u2019Donovan\u2019s translation.\u201d\n\nIn 1847 he was called to the Bar, but sacrificed his prospects in that\nline for his Celtic studies. Later, he received the degree of LL.D. from\nTrinity College, Dublin, and a Government pension of \u00a350 a year, and was\nappointed Professor of the Irish Language in Queen\u2019s College, Belfast.\nBut having a large family to support on a small income, he contemplated\nemigrating to America or Australia, when in 1852, most opportunely, the\nGovernment resolved to appoint a Royal Commission to publish the ancient\nLaws and Institutions of Ireland, and he and O\u2019Curry, the two greatest\nsavants on that subject, were chosen for the office. Eight years\u2019 more\narduous work undermined his constitution, and he succumbed to an attack\nof rheumatic fever about the middle of November 1861.\n\nEugene O\u2019Curry did not long survive him. Neither of them lived to\ncomplete the vast undertaking, though they both wrote and translated\nvolumes of text, which have since been published.\n\nThe immense labours and success of O\u2019Curry in the difficult fields of\nGaelic research are even more astonishing than those of his coadjutor,\nas he had never received an academical education, and was mainly\nself-taught, and had to forge his way in new and unexplored directions.\nIn view of this his surprise was great when offered the Professorship in\nthe Catholic University of Ireland, and so diffident was he that it was\nwith difficulty he was persuaded to accept it. His catalogues, editions\nof texts and translations, and, above all, his famous books, the\n_Lectures on the Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History_ (Dublin,\n1861), and _On the Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish_ (London,\n1873), have rendered him a kind of quarry for subsequent scholars,\nBritish and Continental.\n\nTo Dr. Todd is mainly due the inception, in 1841, of the Irish\nArch\u00e6ological Society for publishing original documents. He figures also\nas the first editor of the _Liber Hymnorum_, Dublin, 1855, and as the\nbiographer of St. Patrick, while Dr. Reeves has done masterly service as\neditor and biographer of Adamnan.\n\nOf the line of scholars we have just passed in review, William Maunsell\nHennessy is probably the last great representative. The better part of\nforty years he spent in close familiarity with the great tomes in\nDublin, publishing, translating, and annotating, till the list of his\nworks have become too numerous to mention here. Among the chief of these\nare his edition of the _Chronicon Scotorum_, in the Master of the Rolls\u2019\nSeries, 1858; and his translation of the _Tripartite Life of St.\nPatrick_, printed by Mary Frances Cusack, 1871, and by O\u2019Leary, New\nYork, 1874.\n\n\u201cHennessy,\u201d says Standish O\u2019Grady, \u201cwas born at Castle Gregory, some\ntwelve miles west of Tralee, and in early life visited the United\nStates. Upon his return to Ireland he became a journalist, and was\nappointed to the Public Record Office, Dublin, in 1868. He enjoyed the\nfriendship of the Cavaliere Nigra, himself an accomplished Celticist,\nand was his guest at the Italian Embassy in Paris. In 1885 he was\nvisited by a family bereavement, almost tragic in sadness, and this\nagain was before long followed by a second blow, the effect upon his\nsensitive and affectionate nature being such that he never fairly\nrallied, but died at the age of sixty.\u201d\n\nHaving thus glanced briefly at the representatives of the older\nscholarship and their work, we shall now have occasion to retrace our\nsteps to consider the representatives of the new critical and\nphilological movement. After Edward Lhuyd\u2019s demise no further progress\nseems to have been registered in the elucidation of Celtic philology\ntill the time of Franz Bopp. Even as late as the first quarter of the\nnineteenth century, Gaelic was regarded by scholars as a peculiar\nlanguage, unconnected with the other European tongues. It is true that\nSir William Jones, from his study of Sanskrit, had thrown out the hint\nas early as 1786, that Celtic was of the same original stock with the\nother languages of Europe and South-Western Asia; but when Bopp first\npublished his _Comparative Grammar_ Celtic was omitted. It was Dr.\nPritchard, an English ethnologist, who, in 1832, really demonstrated on\nthe lines laid down by Grimm and Bopp, that the Celtic language is a\nmember of the Indo-European group.\n\nHis book, entitled _The Eastern Origin of the Celtic Nations_, from this\ntime drew the attention of continental scholars to the excluded and\nhitherto neglected language, with the result that three important works\nsoon after appeared, namely, first, one _On the Affinity of the Celtic\nLanguages with the Sanskrit_, by Adolph Pictet (Paris, 1837); second,\nthe _Die Celtischen Sprachen_, or _Celtic Philology_, by Bopp (Berlin,\n1839); and the _Celtica_ of Dr. Diefenbach (Stuttgart, 1839\u201340).\n\nBy this time Bopp had studied the Celtic dialects, and published the\nabove work as a supplement to his great _Comparative Grammar of the\nSanskrit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Gothic, German, and Sclavonic\nLanguages_. Some features of Gaelic phonetics, such as initial\naspiration and ellipsis, taking the place of declension, seems hitherto\nto have baffled scholars, but Bopp\u2019s sagacity enabled him to perceive\nthat these are nothing else than the relics and results of the\nafter-action of the old case-endings, and that the rational explanation\nis to be found in the final sound of the previous word, or, as we now\nsay, vocalic and nasal auslaut. This discovery has since been fully\nconfirmed by Zeuss, Ebel, and Windisch.\n\nIt was with the publication of the _Grammatica Celtica_, however, that\nthe great moment in the evolution of Celtic scholarship arrived. Its\ngifted author, J. Caspard Zeuss, stands supreme as the real founder of\nCeltic philology. He did for it what Grimm did for the Teutonic, and\nDiez for the Romance. Since the appearance of his monumental work it has\nbeen definitely settled that the Celtic languages are pure Indo-European\ntongues, without any admixture of foreign elements, and thus that they\nare members of the family in the same sense that Latin or Gothic is. In\naddition, it has furnished the means of interpreting the most ancient\nforms of the Gaelic language found in the very old MSS., which before\nthen had defied the efforts of translators.\n\nZeuss was born in Bavaria in July 1806, and after a brilliant school\ncareer, he went to the University of Munich, as his friends intended\nthat he should be a clergyman. But the youth preferred linguistic\nstudies, for which it soon transpired that he had a unique genius; and,\ncollege life over, he taught for seven years (from 1832\u201339) in the\nGymnasium of Munich. Meantime he pursued his own favourite science,\npublishing in 1837 a work which is still authoritative. It dealt with\nthe German chiefly, but from the first his studies included the oriental\nlanguages.\n\nTo settle in Berlin and support himself by teaching there had now become\nthe objective of his desire, as the Metropolis would furnish him with\nexceptional opportunities, but being a Catholic, he found this\nimpossible. In 1839, however, he succeeded in getting a professorship in\nthe Lyceum in Spires, and went there from Munich. It was then he began\nto study Celtic. How enormous the difficulties were for a man in his\nposition one can readily imagine, when it is remembered how widely\ndispersed, unknown, and unintelligible the materials for the most part\nwere at that time. His income was small, but in order to economise his\nresources, and have the wherewithal to pursue his researches, it is said\nthat he decided to remain a bachelor. It was his custom annually during\nthe vacation to visit the great libraries of London, Oxford, W\u00fcrzburg,\nSt. Gall, and Milan for the perusal of the Gaelic documents. In the\npreface to his great work, he even apologises for not having made full\nuse of the Milan glosses. This we know was not altogether his fault, for\nhe went twice there to study the MS. On the first occasion there\nhappened to be a convention of savants in the city, and the library was\nclosed, much to his disappointment. An epidemic of fever prevailed when\nhe returned the second time, and feeling certain sensations, he imagined\nhe had caught the infection, and left the place without accomplishing\nthe object of his visit. No doubt the overwrought student was nervous on\nthat occasion, and his fears may have got the better of him.\n\nIn 1847 he was appointed Professor of History in Munich. But his health\nnot being very robust, though he accepted the chair, he was obliged a\nfew months afterwards to resign. Fortunately, however, he received a\nsimilar appointment in the Lyceum of Bamberg, which he was able to\nmaintain. This was his last. The _Grammatica Celtica_, which was to take\nthe learned world by surprise and revolutionise Celtic studies, appeared\nin 1853, after thirteen years\u2019 close and laborious work. It is written\nin Latin, and is so profoundly erudite that it has the reputation, like\nsome other great German books, of being very difficult to grasp. The\nnumerous sources consulted in the production of this masterpiece of\nscientific scholarship are all carefully given in the preface. Its\npublication at once established his fame, but the work killed him. In\n1855 he was compelled to resign his chair through broken health. That\nsame year Professor Siegfried of Dublin saw him, and afterward wrote the\nfollowing interesting impression which the appearance of the devoted\nscholar made upon him. \u201cI paid a visit,\u201d he says, \u201cto this remarkable\nman in the vacation of 1855, when his health was fast sinking. He was a\ntall, well-made, rather spare man, with black hair and moustache, giving\non the whole more the impression of a Sclavonian or a Greek than a\nGerman.\u201d He did not long survive his retirement, for in November 1856,\nless than three years after the completion of his Grammar, this\nillustrious linguist but modest and retiring man died in his native\nvillage in Bavaria. To him, mindful of his outstanding influence, Dr\nWhitley Stokes has not inaptly applied the Greek line\u2014\n\n            \u0396\u03b5\u1f7a\u03c2 \u1f00\u03c1\u03c7\u03ae, \u0396\u03b5\u1f7a\u03c2 \u03bc\u03ad\u03c3\u03c3\u03b1, \u0394\u03b9\u1f78\u03c2 \u03b4\u2019 \u1f10\u03ba \u03c0\u03ac\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1 \u03c4\u03ad\u03c4\u03c5\u03ba\u03b1\u03b9.\n\nAfter the publication of the _Grammatica Celtica_, Celtic studies\nreceived a mighty impetus and took great strides forward. Now that the\nCeltic dialects were proved to be Aryan, their further study became a\nnecessity in connection with the comparative grammar of the whole\nfamily. Already in Germany there was the well-known _Zeitschrift f\u00fcr\nvergleichende Sprachkunde_ (Journal of Comparative Philology), a journal\nspecially devoted to the Germanic, Greek and Latin languages; but now in\n1856, the _Beitr\u00e4ge zur vergleichenden Sprachforschung_ (Contribution to\nComparative Etymology) was started in Berlin to deal with the Aryan,\nCeltic, and Sclavonic tongues, and giving particular attention to the\nCeltic. The periodical went through eight volumes, one appearing in four\nparts every two years; and when it came to an end the _Zeitschrift_,\nedited by Dr. Kuhn, began to receive articles on Celtic subjects, and\ncontinues to do so still.\n\nAmong the contributors to the _Beitr\u00e4ge_ Dr. Hermann Ebel was the most\nnotable. His Celtic studies in the journal were afterwards translated\nand issued in book form by the late Professor Sullivan of Dublin (1863).\nOf these the most important are _On Declension_, and _The Position of\nthe Celtic_. Ebel taught for thirteen years in Schniedmuhl, and when the\nChair of Comparative Philology, once occupied by Bopp, in Berlin, fell\nvacant, he was appointed thereto, but he did not live long to fulfil its\nduties, for he died in 1875, only two years later. He left, it is said,\nin MS. a dictionary of Old Gaelic. His greatest Celtic work, however, is\nthe second edition of Zeuss\u2019s Grammar published in 1871, which embodies\nthe results of Celtic scholarship down to that year.\n\nIn 1870 another important periodical, wholly devoted to Celtic studies,\nbegan to be published in Paris, namely the _Revue Celtique_. It was the\nappearance of this quarterly that ultimately led to the appointment of\nD\u2019Arbois de Jubainville as Commissioner to the British Isles, to report\non the Gaelic MSS. found there. This paper, which still flourishes, has\nfor over thirty years done good service in the interests of scholarship,\nthere being among its contributors such eminent writers as Ebel,\nWindisch, Max M\u00fcller, Count Nigra, Pictet, Jubainville, Stokes, Rhys,\nMacbain, and others.\n\nOccasional articles continue to appear in several German papers, but it\nmay be of moment in passing to note that a few years ago a new\nperiodical, entitled _Zeitschrift f\u00fcr Celtische Philologie_, was\nfloated, as well as an _Archiv f\u00fcr Celtische Lexicographie_, which shows\nthe interest that is still taken by the German philologists in this\ndepartment of study.\n\nAs the great succession of Celtic scholars after Zeuss and Ebel are more\nor less contemporary, it will be most convenient to deal with them in\nthe order of nationality. Among foreigners of the first rank are two\nItalians, Count Nigra and Ascoli of Milan. Nigra was for a time his\ncountry\u2019s ambassador in London and Paris. It will be remembered that\nHennessy, who enjoyed his friendship, was entertained by him at the\nItalian Embassy in the latter city. His most important contribution,\nfounded on his own researches in Italy, is the _Reliquie Celtiche_,\npublished in that land in 1872. Ascoli did similar good work in\nconnection with the Gaelic glosses in the ancient MSS. of Milan and St.\nGall, supplementing the labours in that field of Zeuss, Ebel, and Nigra.\n\nIn Germany, on the other hand, there are four still actively engaged who\nrank among the masters. First comes the brilliant Professor Windisch of\nLeipzig. He is best known for his _Irische Texte_ (vol. i.), published\nin Leipzig, 1880; and again a second series of the same, in\ncollaboration with Dr. Stokes, in 1884. It is a learned work with a\nvocabulary arranged alphabetically, which goes most minutely into the\nstructure of the words. Such pieces as Cuchulinn\u2019s Sickbed, the Vision\nof Adamnan, the Tale of the Sons of Uisneach, Hymns from the _Liber\nHymnorum_, and Irish glosses from the MSS. in the monastery of St Paul\nin Carinthia are among its varied contents. Windisch is Professor of\nSanskrit in Leipzig, and besides an Irish Grammar has published other\nbooks bearing on Celtic philology. In some instances he has corrected\nZeuss, and in various directions developed and extended his principles.\nAt present he is engaged on a second edition of the above-mentioned\ngrammar, and on an elaborate edition with translation of the T\u00e1in B\u00f3\nChuailgn\u00e9.\n\nNext to him comes Professor Zimmer, formerly of Greifswalde, now\nProfessor of Celtic in Berlin University. Two books stand to his credit\nin 1881, _Irish Glosses_ and _Celtic Studies_. As a writer he expresses\nfresh and interesting opinions on a great variety of subjects, such as\nthe pagan character of Irish literature, the ancient Celtic Church, the\n\u201cT\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9,\u201d Old Middle Irish MSS., the Irish scholars upon the\nContinent, Fiacc\u2019s _Life of St. Patrick_, and the scansion of the\nclassical Irish metres.\n\nProfessor Thurneysen of Jena (now of Freiburg) distinguished himself by\npreparing, along with B. G\u00fctterbock, an elaborate index to the\n_Grammatica Celtica_, which renders that work more complete and\naccessible. It was published in 1881.\n\nHe, along with Dr. Christian Stern, Librarian of Berlin, complete the\nquartette of famous German Celticists who have been for some time in the\nfield, though not the list of able scholars engaged in like studies in\nthat country. Other significant names are Drs. Holder, Finck, Zupitza,\nFoy, and Sommer.\n\nNor has France in recent years been lacking in eminent men of similar\nresearch. M. de la Borderie, Gaidos, De Jubainville, Lotti, Ernault,\nDottin, and Professor Loth of Rennes have all greatly advanced the\ninterests of Celtic philology and literature. Of these, D\u2019Arbois de\nJubainville is perhaps the best known, on account of his literary\nmission to the British Isles on behalf of the French Minister of Public\nInstruction in 1881, and his subsequent catalogue of the MSS. As\nProfessor at the College of France and editor of the _Revue Celtique_,\nhe made numerous interesting contributions in journal and book form to\nthe modern literature of the subject, such as _Grammatical Studies on\nthe Celtic Languages_ and _Epop\u00e9e Celtique en Irlande_.\n\nErnault occupied himself more with the Breton dialect and folk-lore,\nProfessor Loth with the Mabinogion and Welsh metrics.\n\nOther Continental savants of great promise remain to be mentioned. They\nbelong to the northern nations, which have recently begun to develop a\nlively enthusiasm for Celtic studies. Denmark is well to the front with\nProfessor Holger Pedersen, a pupil of Zimmer\u2019s, and Dr. Sarauw of\nCopenhagen, while Scandinavia is represented by Dr. Liden of Gothenburg.\nMuch is expected of these men on the lines on which scholarship now\ntravels. Hitherto America, so much engrossed with the problems of the\npresent, has been slow to enter upon a research which burrows so deeply\nin the past, yet within the last few years two names have emerged which\nare intimately associated with this subject, namely, those of the Rev.\nProfessor Henebry and Professor Robinson of Harvard. The one is\nconcerned with the translation of O\u2019Donnell\u2019s _Life of St. Columcille_,\nthe other with the collection of certain early Irish poems and sagas.\n\nAnd now, returning to our own shores after contemplating the masters\nabroad, it is pleasing to find so many who have distinguished themselves\nin one way or another in this field. England, Ireland, Wales, the Isle\nof Man, and Scotland have each furnished enthusiastic and capable men.\n\nForemost of these British scholars, and apparently now of all living\nCelticists, stands Dr. Whitley Stokes. Next to Zeuss he has done more\nthan any other single man in this particular department of study and\nresearch. His publications are a library in themselves, and deal with\nCornish, Breton, Old Welsh, as well as Irish and Gaelic. He has made\nhimself master of the field in a very thorough and scientific manner.\nPerhaps his best known books are the _Irische Texte_, vol. i., 2nd\nseries, 1884; vol. ii., published at Leipzig, 1887; _The Tripartite Life\nof St. Patrick_, 1887, and his _Goidelica_ (old and early-middle-Irish\nglosses, prose and verse) which appeared twenty years before the others,\nand reached a second edition in 1872. In it are given accurate\ntranslations of the Gaelic prefaces and hymns of the _Liber\nHymnorum_\u2014that ancient anthology which dates from the eleventh century.\n\nDr. Stokes, who is a son of Professor William Stokes, Dublin, studied\nIrish with O\u2019Donovan, and Sanskrit and Comparative Philology with\nProfessor Siegfried in Dublin. After a distinguished career in the\nIndian Civil Service he retired and took up residence in London. It was\nin Calcutta that the foundation of his great reputation as a Celtic\nscholar was laid, and it was from that city that he first issued his\n_Goidelica_. The preface is striking in its brevity and simplicity:\u2014\n\n  I have three objects in printing this book\u2014one, to save the contents\n  of my transcripts of the glosses at Turin, Milan, and Berne from the\n  destruction which in this country anything solely entrusted to paper\n  MSS. must sooner or later meet with; another, to give those excellent\n  German philologists who, like Schleicher and Ebel, have expressed a\n  desire for trustworthy copies of Old Irish compositions, material on\n  which they may look with confidence; and, thirdly, to lay the first\n  stone of the cairn which I hope to raise to the memory of my beloved\n  friend and teacher, Siegfried.\n\nThe cairn has since been raised, and it is indeed a notable one. Besides\nhis books, contributions from Dr. Stokes may be found in Continental\njournals, such as the _Beitr\u00e4ge zur vergleichenden Sprachforschung_ of\nBerlin, and the _Revue Celtique_ of Paris. He is still busy in his\nisland home at Cowes, editing and translating texts, of which the\n_Annals of Tighernach_, the _Amra Choluimcille_, _Agallamh na\nSeanorach_, and the _Bruiden Da Derga_ have lately been published.\n\nOther great names in this country are those of Professor Rhys of Oxford,\na Welshman; Professor Atkinson of Dublin, a Yorkshireman; Dr. Kuno Meyer\nof Liverpool, a German; Dr. Strachan of Manchester, Professor of Greek\nand Comparative Philology, a native of Keith, Banffshire; Dr. Douglas\nHyde, whose interesting book on the _Literary History of Ireland_ has\njust recently appeared; Dr. Norman Moore, the poetical Dr. Sigerson, and\nthe Professors Gwynne, father and son. Of these Principal Rhys has\nhitherto perhaps been the most prolific in dealing with the early\nhistory and problems of Celtic Britain, while the others have interested\nthemselves more in the language and literature.\n\nThere are two other outstanding names very familiar to the student of\nCeltic, the erudite Standish Hayes O\u2019Grady, author of _Silva Gadelica_,\nand friend of Windisch for many years, and Mr. Alfred Nutt, an authority\non folk-lore and literary antiquities. Besides Rhys, Wales has produced\nsuch indefatigable workers as Gwenogfryn Evans and Canon Silvan Evans,\nthe veteran of Welsh philology; Professors Morris Jones and Lewis Jones,\nof Bangor; the late Charles Ashton; Professor Anwyl of Aberystwyth, and\nMr. Brynmor Jones; while the Isle of Man has Mr. A. W. Moore and Mr.\nKermode.\n\nIn Scotland during the middle of last century Dr. Skene did much to\nrevive interest in the history and monuments of the past, by collecting\nMS. materials, editing the _Four Ancient Books of Wales_, and publishing\nhis own voluminous _Celtic Scotland_.\n\nThe first scholar north of the Tweed to assimilate the results of\nZeuss\u2019s labours and follow his lead was the late Dr. Cameron of Brodick;\nvery industrious, as may be seen from his contributions to the\nmagazines, and his posthumous work, the _Reliqui\u00e6 Celtic\u00e6_, but sadly\nlacking in system and method. After him come Dr. Macbain of Inverness, a\ndistinguished philologist, whose Gaelic Dictionary is a valuable\ncontribution to Celtic etymology, and the Rev. John Kennedy; the late\nSheriff Nicholson; Professor Mackinnon, occupant of the Edinburgh Chair\nof Celtic Literature, and Dr. Henderson, a former student of his, who\nhas since studied abroad and written various papers and books, and\nedited poems or tales collected in the Highlands.\n\nThese all represent the forces of scholarship in the highways and\nby-ways of Celtic literature. They are not all masters, in the technical\nsense of the word; not a few of them are, as we have already seen, and\nthe marvel is, looking back for fifty years, the number of men of the\nfirst rank who have appeared, in great part on the Continent but also in\nour own land. It is truly a recrudescence or re-arising of the Celt.\nSpent forces seem suddenly to have re-emerged and overflowed the\nforemost files of time, taking science captive and using it as their\ninstrument. And yet people wonder and inquire and continue to ask for\nevidence of a Celtic renaissance.\n\nMany literary problems have within the last half-century been solved,\nbut many more remain to be unravelled\u2014questions too, of history,\nethnology, and sociology. But so much has already been done\u2014so much that\na century ago seemed visionary and impossible, and had not even appeared\non the horizon of dreamers, that there is the promise of future\nharvests, and still unlimited scope for the masters.\n\nThus the progress. First the available materials had to be ascertained,\ncatalogued, sifted, and examined in every land. Then followed the work\nof publishing and interpreting the texts which have already yielded such\ninteresting philological and ethnical results, and now we look for a\nfurther synthesis in other directions from the hints and suggestions\nscattered all over these published records, which will throw light on\nthe fascinating problems which confront the students of history,\nethnology, arch\u00e6ology, and of the beliefs and customs of the race in its\nearlier stages\u2014a study in keeping with the human experience, that to go\non we must often go back.\n\n\n\n\n                             INDEX OF NAMES\n\n\n Achilles, 133\n\n Adam, 63, 83, 126, 130, 232\n\n Adamnan, 5, 16, 42, 45, 46, 47, 50, 58\u201377, 83, 88, 92, 201, 209, 215,\n    226, 291, 292, 349, 374, 380\n\n Aedh, 54, 105\n\n Aedh, 91\n\n Aedh Mac Morna, 178, 181\n\n Aeneas, 68, 228, 306\n\n Aengus, 48, 292\n\n Aidan, 221\n\n Ailbhe, 355\n\n Ailill, 109, 160, 161, 165\n\n Ainnle, 158\n\n Albin, St. 306\n\n Aldfrid, 65, 68, 201\n\n Alexander I., 89, 94\n\n Alexander the Great, 6, 7\n\n Alleine, 334\n\n Amergin, 131, 139\n\n Amphitrionis, 8\n\n Anderson, Dr., 95\n\n Andlis, 8\n\n Andrew, 91\n\n Aneurin, 218\u2013223, 240, 244\n\n Anne, Queen, 270\n\n Antestis, 8\n\n Anwyl, Prof., 383\n\n Aoife, 159, 165, 167\n\n Ardan, 158\n\n Argant\u00e9, 320\n\n Argyll, Earl of, 126, 272, 274, 327\n\n Aristotle, 12, 367\n\n Armstrong, Rev. A., 343, 344\n\n Arnold, Matthew, 2, 97, 309, 311, 321\u2013323\n\n Arnold, Thomas, 307\n\n Art, 179, 186, 193, 254\n\n Arthur, 125, 128, 227\u2013240, 344, 250, 260, 306\u2013308, 318\u2013321\n\n Ascoli, 98, 379, 380\n\n Ashburnham, 103\n\n Ashton, Charles, 383\n\n Aspasia, 254\n\n Athol, 8\n\n Atkinson, Prof., 383\n\n Attila, 2\n\n Aurelius, 319\n\n Austin, 306\n\n Avagddu, 230\n\n\n Bach, Gwion, 331\n\n Bacon, Francis, 332\n\n Baithene, 48, 61, 71, 83\n\n Balan, 318\n\n Balin, 318\n\n Balor, 141\n\n Bannatyne, Lord, 117, 118\n\n Barbour, John, 309\n\n Baxter, Richard, 328, 334, 335\n\n Becca, 145\n\n Bede, 5, 22, 56, 65, 77, 93, 201, 221, 306\n\n Bede, the Pict, 85, 86, 94\n\n Bedivere, 321\n\n Beli, 222\n\n Benen, 34\n\n Benignus, St., 34\n\n Bernard, St., 39\n\n Bethune, Donald, 116\n\n Bj\u00f6rn, 213, 214\n\n Black, William, 301, 323\n\n Blackie, Prof., 123, 186, 268, 272, 284, 322, 323, 358\n\n Blair, Dr., 283, 343\n\n Blake, William, 316\n\n Blathmac, St., 62, 201, 208\n\n Bodhbha, Dearg, 144, 145\n\n Bollandist Fathers, 31, 62\n\n Bondi, 214\n\n Bopp, Franz, 258, 375, 376, 379\n\n Borderie, M. de la, 381\n\n Borron, Robert, 307\n\n Boston, Thomas, 68, 334\n\n Boswell, 63, 316\n\n Brachet, A., 9\n\n Bradshaw, Henry, 79\u201381\n\n Bran, 247, 248, 355\n\n Branno, 192\n\n Branwen, 229\n\n Brash, 14\n\n Breas, 138, 141\n\n Brec, Donald, 222\n\n Brendan, St., 75, 215, 291\n\n Brian, 141\u2013143\n\n Brian Boru, 203, 246\n\n Bricriu, 153\n\n Bride, 365\n\n Brigit, 292, 369\n\n Brocc\u00e1n, 292, 349\n\n Brogan, 189\n\n Brooke, Miss, 366\n\n Brooke, Stopford, 310, 324, 366\n\n Brown, Dorothy, 276\n\n Brown, John, 335\n\n Browning, Robert, 107\n\n Bruce, Robert the, 86, 87\n\n Bruce, Robert, 300\n\n Brude, 46, 72\n\n Brutus, 306\n\n Buchan, Earls of, 87\n\n Buchanan, Dugald, 250, 329, 330, 335, 336\n\n Buchanan, Robert, 301, 323\n\n Bugge, Dr. Alex., 210\n\n Bugge, Prof. Sophus, 210\n\n Buinne Borb, 151\n\n Bunyan, 334, 343\n\n Burnet, Bishop, 130\n\n Burns, Robert, 257, 282, 299, 310, 367\n\n\n Cadwaladr, 228\n\n C\u00e6dmon, 15, 41, 57, 79, 304\n\n Cael, 189\u2013191\n\n C\u00e6sair, Lady, 137\n\n C\u00e6sar, 3, 5, 6, 9, 12, 13, 99\n\n Cailatin, 163, 169\n\n Cailta, 192\n\n Cainnech, 51, 91\n\n Cairbre, 179, 180, 185, 189\n\n Calpornius, 25\n\n Calvin, John, 328\n\n Cameron, Dr., 147, 303, 338, 351, 384\n\n Cameron, Margaret, 335\n\n Camin, St., 104\n\n Campbell, A., 335\n\n Campbell, Alex., 352\n\n Campbell, Colin, 263\n\n Campbell, D., 274\n\n Campbell, Duncan, 335\n\n Campbell, J. F., 146, 147, 176, 186, 338, 353, 354, 357, 363\n\n Campbell, Knight of Glenorchy, 126\n\n Campbell of Glenlyon, 335\n\n Canmore, Malcolm, 89, 92\n\n Caoilte, 179, 185, 188, 189, 355\n\n Caredig, 32\n\n Caridwen, 230, 231\n\n Carlyle, Thomas, 245, 332\n\n Carmichael, A., 147, 148, 300, 338, 361, 362, 363\n\n Carsewell, Bishop, 127, 264, 299, 300, 327, 328, 350\n\n Cassius, Dion, 12\n\n Catald, St., 208\n\n Cathal, 91, 126\n\n Cathbad, 148\u2013151\n\n Cathula, 254\n\n Caxton, William, 308, 327\n\n Cedric, 307\n\n Celtchar, 154\n\n Cennfaelad, 107, 291\n\n Ceolfrid, 66\n\n Ceretic, 32\n\n Chaillu, Paul B. du, 200\n\n Charlemagne, 59, 199, 208\n\n Charles I., 130, 270, 351\n\n Charles II., 270, 274\n\n Charlie, Prince, 250, 251, 256\n\n Chaucer, 309, 310, 332, 335\n\n Church, Dean, 303\n\n Cian, 141, 142, 214\n\n Ciaran, St., 108, 154\n\n Cicero, 12\n\n Clanranald, 129, 130, 276, 283\n\n Clark, John, 176, 250, 256\n\n Cleopatra, 254\n\n Clerk, Dr. A., 303, 338, 372\n\n Cliodhna, 188\n\n Clydno, 234\n\n Cocholyn, 226\n\n Colan, St., 225\n\n Colban, 92\n\n Colgan, 23, 50, 62, 112, 369\n\n Collin, 313\n\n Colm\u00e1n, 292, 349\n\n Columba St. (Columcille), 15\u201317, 28, 39\u201372, 76, 77, 85\u201388, 94, 95, 104,\n    112, 134, 154, 201, 206, 209, 220, 225, 226, 240, 244, 250, 288\u2013294,\n    299, 301 349, 369, 381\n\n Columbanus, St., 41, 207\n\n Comgall, 91\n\n Comyns, 86, 87\n\n Conaill, Cinal, 49\n\n Conall, 42\n\n Conall Cearnach, 149, 153\u2013155, 170, 355\n\n Conan Maol, 179\n\n Conchobar, 121, 148\u2013156, 160, 161, 169\n\n Conlaoch, 153, 159, 355\n\n Conn, 108, 125, 179, 180, 254, 348\n\n Cormac, Abbot of Turiff, 91\n\n Cormac, 51, 140, 291, 292, 341\n\n Cormac Mac Art, 179\u2013181, 186, 192\u2013194, 355\n\n Coroticus, 15, 30, 32, 33\n\n Corroi, 226\n\n Cowper, 310, 316\n\n Crabbe, 316\n\n Craigie, Dr., 210\n\n Crede, 189, 190\n\n Creirwy, 230\n\n Cuchulinn, 149, 153\u2013174, 178, 226, 354, 355, 380\n\n Culand, 155, 156\n\n Cumhail, 178, 179, 181, 185\n\n Cummene, 61, 63, 74, 76, 291\n\n Curigh, 154, 170, 226\n\n Currie, Archibald, 340\n\n Cwlum, 225\n\n Cyclops, 12\n\n\n Dagda, 138\n\n Daire, 28\n\n Dante, 68, 215\n\n Daol, 214, 357\n\n Dar\u00e9, 161\n\n Dargo, 254\n\n Darmesteter, 53, 288\n\n Darwin, Charles, 2\n\n David I., 84, 89, 94\n\n David, 91, 143, 167, 176, 328\n\n Davies, 225, 227\n\n Dayry, 226\n\n Dechtine, 155\n\n Deirdre, 146, 148\u2013153, 354\n\n Demni, 181, 182\n\n Devonshire, Duke of, 109\n\n Dewar, Dr., 336, 344\n\n Diarmad, King, 44, 45, 50, 105, 106\n\n Diarmad O\u2019Duibhne, 179, 193\u2013196, 254, 355, 356\n\n Dickens, Charles, 332\n\n Dido, 312\n\n Diefenbach, Dr., 375\n\n Diez, 376\n\n Dima, 51\n\n Diodorus, 12, 99\n\n Dionysius, 12\n\n Doddridge, 334, 343\n\n Domangart, 91\n\n Domnall, 91\n\n Donall, Albanach, 158\n\n Donlevy, 339\n\n Donn, Rob., 250, 336\u2013338\n\n Donnatt, St., 208\n\n Dorbene, 60, 61\n\n Dottin, Georges, 148, 381\n\n Dowden, Dr., 34, 52, 303\n\n Drostan, 85, 86, 94\n\n Drust, 86\n\n Dubthach, 37, 240, 244\n\n Duffy, Sir Charles Gavan, 324, 366\n\n Duhona, 254\n\n Dunbar, 310\n\n Dungall, 208\n\n Duvan, Louis, 173\n\n Dyer, 334\n\n\n Ebel, Dr. Herdmann, 98, 258, 376\u2013382\n\n Edward I., 225, 313\n\n Edward IV., 309\n\n Edwards, J., 334\n\n Eimer, 153, 157, 160, 169\u2013172, 355, 365\n\n Eite, 92\n\n Eithinyn, 222\n\n Eithne, 143\n\n Elaine, 319\n\n Elphin, 232\n\n Emerson, 1\n\n Enda, St., 29\n\n Enid, 237, 318\n\n Eogan, 151\n\n Eoin o Albain, 116\n\n Ephorus, 12\n\n Erbin, 230\n\n Ercoill, 8\n\n Ernault, 381\n\n Etarre, 319\n\n Ete, 92\n\n Ethelfrid, 221\n\n Ethne, 29\n\n Eua, 92\n\n Eva, 144, 145\n\n Evans, 314, 383\n\n Eve, 233\n\n Evir-Alin, 192\n\n Evrawc, 230\n\n Ewen, 247, 248\n\n\n Fairhair, Harold, 202, 204, 212\n\n Faraday, Miss, 210\n\n Farsaid, Fenius, 107, 112, 114, 338\n\n Fedelm, 29\n\n Feidhlim, 148\n\n Fercertn\u00e9 107\n\n Ferdomnach, 23\n\n Fergus Finne-bheoil, 179, 185, 188\n\n Ferguson, Sir James, 148\n\n Ferry, Jules, 99\n\n Festime, 8\n\n Fferyllt, 230\n\n Fiacc, 23, 25, 26, 37\u201339, 240, 292, 349\n\n Finan, 253, 254\n\n Finck, Dr., 381\n\n Finn Eges, 181, 182\n\n Finnachta, 64, 65, 67\n\n Finnamhair, 162, 163, 167\n\n Finnian, St., 44, 48, 290\n\n Finntan, 137\n\n Fionn (Finn), 123, 124, 174\u2013196, 283, 295, 296, 299, 354, 355\n\n Flann, 140, 246\n\n Fletcher, 148, 352\n\n Forbes, 340\n\n Forgaill, Dallan, 16, 55, 57, 61, 108, 240, 291, 348, 349\n\n Forgaill of Lusk, 157, 158\n\n Forli, Jacques de, 120\n\n Foy, Dr., 381\n\n Francis, St., 31, 39\n\n Fraoch, 354\n\n\n Gadelus, 138\n\n Gaidos, 381\n\n Gaimar, 228\n\n Gairloch, Laird of, 280\n\n Galates, 8, 12\n\n Galgacus, 6\n\n Gall, St., 41, 208\n\n Garbh, 354, 355\n\n Garnat, 86\n\n Gartnait, 91\n\n Gaul, 178, 181, 254, 295, 355\n\n Gavaelvawr, 234\n\n Gawaine, Sir, 308\n\n Geoffrey of Monmouth, 228, 247, 306, 307\n\n George I., 80\n\n George II., 351\n\n Geraint, 230, 318\n\n Germanus, 24, 27\n\n Geryon, 8\n\n Gibbon, 382\n\n Gildas, 220, 307\n\n Gillemichel, 92\n\n Gillies, H. C., 340\n\n Gillies, John, 335, 352\n\n Glengarry, 271, 272\n\n Glewlwyd, 234\n\n Gloucester, Robert of, 306\n\n Gl\u00fbngel, 107\n\n Gobhan, 106\n\n Goldsmith, 7\n\n Gomer, 8\n\n Goraidh, 211\n\n Gordon, George Ross, 336\n\n Gordon, Patrick, 87\n\n Gordon, William, 336\n\n Gordonus, 118\n\n Grainne, 193, 355\n\n Grant, 352\n\n Grant, Mrs., 250, 256, 357\n\n Grant, Peter, 336, 338\n\n Graves, Dr., 14\n\n Gray, 313\u2013315\n\n Gray, Florence, 339\n\n Gregais, 8\n\n Griffith, Prince, 257\n\n Grimm, 370, 371, 375, 376\n\n Gruffydd ap Arthur, 228\n\n Gruffydd ap Kynan, 246, 247\n\n Gudelig, 230\n\n Guesclin du, 247\n\n Guest, Lady Charlotte, 219, 229, 230, 237\n\n Guinevere, 237, 319, 320\n\n Guledig, 227\n\n Gurban, 106\n\n Gwenc\u2019hlan, 240\n\n Gwenhwyvar, 234\u2013236\n\n Gwreang, 231\n\n Gwrhyr, 233\n\n Gwyddno Garanhir, 231, 232\n\n Gwydion, 312\n\n Gwynne, Prof., 383\n\n\n Hael, Rhydderch, 225\n\n Hailes, Lord, 118\n\n Halliday, William, 339\n\n Hamlet, 81\n\n Hardiman, 251\n\n Healy, Dr., 50, 372\n\n Hecat\u00e6us, 2, 11\n\n Helen of Troy, 152\n\n H\u00ean Llywarch, 218, 221, 223, 240, 244\n\n Henderson, Dr. George, 303, 351, 366, 384\n\n Henebry, Prof., 381\n\n Hengest, 221\n\n Hennessy, W. M., 372, 374, 379\n\n Henry VIII., 220\n\n Herbert, 227\n\n Hercules, 8\n\n Herodotus, 2, 11, 19, 287\n\n Hoel, 314\n\n Holder, Dr., 381\n\n Homer, 176, 332, 347\n\n Horace, 133\n\n Horatio, 81\n\n Howeldda, 220\n\n Hring, 213\n\n Hull, Eleanor, 154, 293, 324\n\n Huxley, 2, 6\n\n Hyde, Dr. Douglas, 32, 46, 50, 57, 113, 148, 175, 186, 213, 246, 251,\n    264, 266, 309, 324, 339, 366, 373, 383\n\n\n Irvine, 118, 148, 352\n\n Isabella, Countess of Argyll, 126\n\n Iseult, 237\n\n\n Jacobs, Joseph, 147\n\n Jafed, 8\n\n James II., 49, 270, 279\n\n James, Prof., 71\n\n Jau\u00efoz, 247\n\n Jerome, St., 44, 49, 82, 290\n\n Jerram, C. S., 253\n\n Jocelin, 23\n\n John, St., 68, 80, 83, 84\n\n Johnson, Dr. Samuel, 123, 127, 267, 316, 343, 351\n\n Jonathan, 167\n\n Jones, Brynmor, 383\n\n Jones, Edmund, 324\n\n Jones, John, 218, 366\n\n Jones, Prof. Lewis, 383\n\n Jones, Prof. Morris, 383\n\n Jones, Owen, 218, 366\n\n Jones, Sir William, 18, 375\n\n Joyce, Dr., 140, 144, 148\n\n Jubainville, H. d\u2019Arbois de, 99, 103, 108, 144, 147, 148, 173, 379, 381\n\n Judas, 215\n\n\n Kaer-Is, 240\n\n Kai, 234, 255\n\n Keating, Geoffrey, 101, 147, 183, 203, 249, 368, 369\n\n Keats, 315\n\n Keith, Sir Robert de, 87\n\n Keller, Dr., 59, 62, 63\n\n Kemoc, St., 146\n\n Kempis, Thomas \u00e0, 332\n\n Kennedy, 352\n\n Kennedy, Angus, 336\n\n Kennedy, Duncan, 335\n\n Kennedy, Rev. John, 384\n\n Kermode, 383\n\n Kian, 221\n\n Kilhwch, 230, 233\n\n Kilian, St., 208\n\n Kirke, John, 328, 341, 371\n\n Kirke, Rev. Robert, 333\n\n Knox, John, 56, 290, 299, 327, 335\n\n Kuhn, Dr., 378\n\n Kynan, 246, 247\n\n Kyner, 234, 235\n\n Kynon, 234\n\n\n Laeg, 165\u2013167\n\n Laing, Malcolm, 221\n\n Lamb, Charles, 260\n\n Lamh-fhad, 355\n\n Landseer, 358\n\n Lang, Andrew, 137, 324\n\n Laoghaire, King, 28, 29, 34, 171, 244\n\n Larguen, 145, 146\n\n Launcelot, Sir, 307, 319\n\n Lawless, Emily, 324\n\n Layamon, 228, 306\u2013308, 320\n\n Lebarchan, 149\n\n Lekprevik, Roibeart, 327\n\n Leodogran, 319\n\n Leot, 91\n\n Lewy, 170\n\n Lhuyd, Edward, 4, 217, 328, 370, 371, 375\n\n Liden, Dr., 381\n\n Lir, 144\u2013146, 213\n\n Lismore, Dean of, 89, 91, 121\u2013123, 127, 129, 175, 186, 187, 191, 262,\n    299, 300, 357\n\n Livy, 12\n\n Llevelys, 230\n\n Llewellyn, 314\n\n Llud, 230\n\n Llyr, 229\n\n Lonelich, Henry, 308\n\n Longarad, 48\n\n Lorma, 254\n\n Loth, Prof., 229, 381\n\n Lotti, 381\n\n Lovat, 281\n\n Lovenath, 306\n\n Lugaid, 170, 172\n\n Lugh, 138, 141\u2013143, 155\n\n Luke, St., 80, 83, 84\n\n Lynette, 318\n\n\n Mabon, 233\n\n Macalpine, Neil, 340, 344, 356\n\n Macaulay, Lord, 281, 321\n\n Macaulay, Zachary, 281\n\n Macbain, Dr. Alex., 4, 86, 95, 175, 344, 351, 379, 384\n\n Macbean, L., 340\n\n Macbeth, 313\n\n Macbrian, 356\n\n Maccallum, 352\n\n Maccallum, A., 336\n\n Maccallum, Rev. Duncan, 176, 195, 256, 303\n\n Maccallum, J., 336\n\n Maccarthenn, 36\n\n Maccodrum, John, 250, 282\u2013284\n\n Maccolla, Alasdair, 276\n\n Mac Crimmon, 280\n\n M\u2018Cuirtin, Hugh, 339\n\n Mac Cumachteni, 23\n\n Mac Daman, Ferdia, 158, 163\u2013168, 172\n\n Macdonald, Alasdair, 130, 272\n\n Macdonald, Alexander, 250, 282, 284, 328, 329, 335, 336, 341\n\n Macdonald, Sir Alexander, 271, 272, 275\n\n Macdonald, Angus, 281\n\n Macdonald, Archibald, 281\n\n Macdonald, Archibald (An Ciaran Mabach), 271, 275\n\n Macdonald, Cicely, 276\n\n Macdonald, Donald, 251, 262\n\n Macdonald, Dr., 303, 338\n\n Macdonald, Dr. George, 323\n\n Macdonald, Sir James, 272, 282, 283\n\n Macdonald, John (Iain Dubh), 276, 336\n\n Macdonald, John (Iain Lom), 270, 275\n\n Macdonald of Muck, 281\n\n Macdonald, Ronald, 335, 352\n\n Macdougall, Allan, 250, 335\n\n Macdougall, Phelim, 126\n\n Macdurnain, 103, 104, 290\n\n Maceachan, Rev. Ewen, 344\n\n Macfadyen, 335\n\n Macfarlane, Rev. Alex., 328, 333, 334\n\n Macfarlane, Donald, 344\n\n Macfarlane, Malcolm, 340, 366\n\n Macfarlane, P., 336, 343, 344\n\n Macfarlane, Robert, 343\n\n Mac Firbis, Duald, 65, 112, 249, 368, 369\n\n Macgillivray, Dr., 340\n\n Mac Gormann, Finn, 349\n\n Macgregor, Duncan, 121, 122\n\n Macgregor, Gregor, 263, 264\n\n Macgregor, James, 251, 336\n\n Macgregor, Sir James, 121, 122\n\n Macgregor, John, 336\n\n Mac-Ille Chalum, 265\n\n Macintosh, D., 336\n\n Macintyre, Duncan Ban, 250, 329, 330, 335, 337, 358\n\n Mackay, A., 336\n\n Mackay, John, 280, 281\n\n Mackellar, David, 215, 250, 328, 335\n\n Mackellar, Mary, 338\n\n Mackenzie, Alexander, 267\n\n Mackenzie, Sir George, 352\n\n Mackenzie, Henry, 117\n\n Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail, 277\n\n Mackenzie, John, 121\n\n Mackenzie, John, 250, 282, 284, 328, 329, 335, 336, 338, 356, 357, 360,\n    361, 363\n\n Mackenzie, Kenneth, 250, 335\n\n Mackenzie, William, 281\n\n Mackinnon, Alexander, 251\n\n Mackinnon, Prof. D., 56, 105, 127, 144, 351, 384\n\n Mackinnon, Lachlan, 279\n\n Maclachlan, Ewen, 251, 372\n\n Maclachlan, I., 336\n\n Maclachlan, Major, 118\n\n Maclaren, Ian, 324\n\n Maclauchlan, Dr. T., 116, 303, 328, 372\n\n Maclean, Rev. Donald, 325\n\n Maclean, Hector, 278\n\n Maclean, John, 281, 336\n\n Maclean, Rev. John, 370\n\n Maclean, Sir Lachlan, 278\n\n Maclean, Malcolm, 281\n\n Macleod, Alexander, 267\n\n Macleod, Donald, 251, 336\n\n Macleod, Fiona, 324\n\n Macleod, Hector, 250, 281\n\n Macleod, John Breac, 279\n\n Macleod, Mary, 249, 265\u2013270, 276, 284\n\n Macleod, Neil, 338\n\n Macleod, Dr. Norman, 303, 338, 344, 346\n\n Macleod, Sir Norman, 132, 267, 269\n\n Macneill, Dr. Nigel, 196, 255, 303, 338, 345, 346, 370\n\n Macnicol, 303, 352\n\n Macpherson, Alex., 335\n\n Macpherson, D. C., 340\n\n Macpherson, James, 103, 117, 121, 123, 129, 148, 176, 214, 217, 240,\n    250\u2013256, 283, 298, 301, 305, 314\u2013316, 318, 331, 351\u2013355\n\n Macpherson, Lachlan, 250\n\n Macphun, W. R., 345\n\n Macrae, Duncan, 91, 127\u2013129, 215, 275, 350\n\n Macrae, John, 128\n\n Macritchie, 175\n\n Mac Roich, Fergus, 108, 149\u2013154, 301\n\n Mac Roth, Fergus, 109, 161\u2013164\n\n Macsen Gudelig, 230\n\n Macvurich, Nial, 129\u2013132, 276, 277\n\n Macvurichs, 119, 126, 130, 351\n\n Madden, Sir Frederick, 306, 308\n\n Maelbrigte, 104\n\n Maelcolum, 91\n\n M\u00e6lgron, 232\n\n Mael-isu, 292, 349\n\n Maelmuiri, 108, 299, 301, 348, 349\n\n Magnus, 211\n\n Malcolm, 339\n\n Malcolm, Dr., 341\n\n Maledoun, 91\n\n Malory, Sir Thomas, 308, 309, 316, 318\n\n Malvina, 315\n\n Manawyddan, 229\n\n Manus, 211, 254, 355\n\n Map, Walter, 307\n\n Mar, Earl of, 87\n\n Marcellinus, 12\n\n Marcellus, 81\n\n Margaret, Queen, 92\u201394\n\n Mark, St., 80, 84\n\n Mary, Queen, 270\n\n Mason, W. Monck, 65\n\n Matadin, 91\n\n Math, 229, 312\n\n Matheson, Aosdan, 276\n\n Matheson, D., 336\n\n Mathonwy, 229\n\n Matthew, St., 79, 84\n\n Menteith, Earl of, 87\n\n Menzies of Rannoch, 263\n\n Merlin, 307, 319, 320\n\n Mesgedra, 121\n\n Meve, Queen, 110, 151, 160\u2013169, 310, 365\n\n Meyer, Dr. Kuno, 120, 173, 383\n\n Mil\u00e9, 130, 138\n\n Mitchell, Anthony, 52\n\n Mitonis, 8\n\n Mocumin Lugne, 73, 74\n\n Molaise, St., 45\n\n Molloy, 339\n\n Mone, 105\n\n Montalembert, 88\n\n Montrose, 129, 130, 271, 272\n\n Moore, A. W., 383\n\n Moore, Bishop, 80\n\n Moore, Dr. Norman, 383\n\n Moore, Thomas, 316\n\n Morda, 231\n\n Morley, 249\n\n Morna, 178\u2013181\n\n Morni, 254\n\n Morrigan, 163\n\n Morris, Dr., 308\n\n Morrison, 333\n\n Morrison, J., 336\n\n Morrison, Roderick, 279, 280\n\n Mortimer, 314\n\n Morvran, 230\n\n Moses, 107, 232\n\n Muireach, Albanach, 119, 126, 130, 276, 351\n\n Muirne, 181\n\n Munro, James, 274, 336, 340\n\n Munro, Neil, 275, 324\n\n M\u00fcller, Max, 136, 379\n\n Mura, St., 61\n\n Muridach, 91\n\n Myrddin, 221, 224\u2013226, 240, 247\n\n\n Naitan, 56\n\n Nann, Lord, 240, 242\n\n Naois, 149, 150, 158\n\n Napier, Mark, 130, 272\n\n Nectan, 91\n\n Neil, Oig, 116\n\n Neilson, Dr. William, 339\n\n Nennius, 220, 307\n\n Nial, 34, 107, 112, 171\n\n Nicholson, 328\n\n Nicolson, 338, 384\n\n Nigra, Count, 56, 57, 98, 309, 374, 379, 380\n\n Ninine, 38, 292, 349\n\n Noah, 8, 137\n\n Noe, 8\n\n Nomen\u00f6e, 247\n\n Norris, Edwin, 249\n\n Nuada, 140\n\n Nutt, Alfred, 144, 175, 177, 383\n\n\n O\u2019Beirne, Crowe, 173\n\n O\u2019Bryan, Dr. Paul, 339\n\n O\u2019Clery, Michael, 50, 112, 135, 341, 369\n\n O\u2019Clery, Peregrine, 369\n\n O\u2019Connor, 111\n\n O\u2019Curry, 97, 98, 102, 108, 110, 130, 140, 144, 147, 160, 173, 175, 176,\n    185, 186, 193, 258, 369, 372, 373\n\n O\u2019Daly, 126, 251\n\n O\u2019Donnell\u2019s, 381\n\n O\u2019Donnells, 49\n\n O\u2019Donovan, 97, 113, 176, 258, 339, 372, 373, 374, 382\n\n O\u2019Duffy, 140\n\n O\u2019Duigenan, 369\n\n O\u2019Flaherty, 179\n\n O\u2019Flanagan, 147, 173\n\n Ogilvy, Mrs. D., 271\n\n O\u2019Grady, S. H., 173, 374, 383\n\n Olwen, 230, 233, 310\n\n O\u2019Mulchonry, 369\n\n O\u2019Reilly, 4, 372\n\n Orran, 254\n\n Oscar, 179, 185, 193, 295, 296, 356\n\n Ossian, 29, 122, 123, 129, 175\u2013194, 214, 222, 244, 253, 254, 293\u2013302,\n    314, 315, 323, 336, 343, 347, 355, 357\n\n Oswy, 221\n\n Owain, 223, 234\n\n Owen, Aneurin, 218, 366\n\n\n Palgrave, Sir Francis, 200\n\n Palladius, 22, 24\n\n Patrick, St., 15\u201317, 22\u201343, 53, 57, 68, 78, 112, 123, 134, 145, 171,\n    172, 187, 189, 191, 240, 244, 288, 291\u2013302, 349, 355, 369, 374, 382\n\n Pattison, 195, 253, 263, 268, 274\n\n Paul, St., 8, 31, 76\n\n Pedersen, Prof., 381\n\n Pelleas, 319\n\n Pellinore, King, 308\n\n Penda, 222\n\n Pendragon, Uther, 306\n\n Pennant, 316\n\n Pentreath, Dolly, 249\n\n Peredur, 147, 230, 234\n\n Petrie, 372\n\n Phillips, Sir Thomas, 219\n\n Pictet, Adolph, 375, 379\n\n Pinkerton, 78, 221\n\n Plato, 12, 367\n\n Pliny, 12\n\n Polybius, 12\n\n Ponsinet, Louis, 148\n\n Posidonius, 12\n\n Potitus, 25\n\n Powell, Mrs., 219\n\n Price, Sir John, 218\n\n Price, Thomas, 218, 366\n\n Pritchard, Dr., 375\n\n Prosper, 22\n\n Ptolemy, 7, 12\n\n Pwyll, 229\n\n Pytheas, 12\n\n\n Quixote, Don, 355\n\n\n Ragnhilda, 211\n\n Rao\u2019all, 211\n\n Raonailt, 211\n\n Raonall, 211\n\n Rask, 370\n\n Reay, Lord, 280\n\n Rees, William, 218, 366\n\n Reeves, Dr., 50, 60, 63, 67, 76, 77, 105, 303, 372, 374\n\n Reid, D., 340\n\n Reid, John, 325\u2013331, 338\n\n Renan, 97, 227, 230, 233, 237, 244, 289, 322\n\n Rheged, Urien, 223\n\n Rhys, Principal, 4, 175, 225, 229, 230, 322, 379, 383\n\n Rhys ap Tewdwr, 246\n\n Rhonabwy, 230\n\n Ripley, Dr. W. Z., 11\n\n Robertson, Alex., 343\n\n Robinson, Prof., 381\n\n Roc, 355\n\n Rognwald, 211\n\n Rolleston, T. W., 148, 324, 366\n\n Ronald of Keppoch, 276\n\n Ronan, 63\n\n Ronan, 179, 188\n\n Ronnat, 63, 67\n\n Ross, Rev. Thomas, 333, 334\n\n Ross, William, 250\n\n Ruadh, Alasdair, 267\n\n Rustum, 159\n\n\n Sage, 303, 352\n\n Samson, 91\n\n Sanctain, 292, 349\n\n Sangale, Monachi, 199\n\n Sarauw, Dr., 381\n\n Scathach, Lady, 158, 159, 163, 165, 167\n\n Schaafhausen, 2\n\n Schleicher, 382\n\n Scott, Sir Walter, 130, 256, 271, 277, 278, 301, 305, 316\u2013318, 323, 332\n\n Scylax, 12\n\n Seaforth, Earl of, 276, 277\n\n Sechnall, 36, 37, 240, 292\n\n Secundius, 36\n\n Setanta, 155, 156\n\n Seth, 83\n\n Shairp, Principal, 321, 322\n\n Shakespeare, 312, 313, 332\n\n Shaw, James, 250\n\n Shaw, Rev. William, 340, 342\n\n Shelley, 315\n\n Siegfried, Prof., 378, 382, 383\n\n Sigerson, Dr., 167, 297, 324, 366, 383\n\n Sigurd, 202\n\n Sinclair, Archibald, 338, 361, 363\n\n Sinclair, Sir John, 352\n\n Skene, Dr., 32, 55, 117, 120, 127, 129, 130, 150, 175, 195, 221\u2013227,\n    238, 383\n\n Smith, Angus, 147\n\n Smith, Dr., 176, 250, 253\u2013256, 303, 330, 333, 335, 372\n\n Smith, Donald, 372\n\n Sohrab, 159\n\n Somerled, 211\n\n Sommer, Dr., 381\n\n Southey, 316\n\n Stairn, 354, 355\n\n Stapleton, Tobias, 339\n\n Stephens, Thomas, 221\u2013225, 247\n\n Stern, Dr. Ludwig Christian, 174, 176, 380\n\n Stevenson, R. L., 323\n\n Stewart, A., 336, 340, 341\n\n Stewart, D., 336\n\n Stewart, Sir John, 264\n\n Stewart, R., 336\n\n Stokes, Prof. G. T., 36, 303\n\n Stokes, Dr. Whitley, 25, 26, 32, 34, 68, 81, 82, 90, 95, 98, 104\u2013106,\n    121, 147, 173, 188, 378\u2013383\n\n Stokes, Prof. William, 382\n\n Stone, Jerome, 118, 251, 252, 352\n\n Strabo, 7, 12, 99\n\n Strabo, Walafridus, 202\n\n Strabus, 62\n\n Strachan, Dr., 55, 383\n\n Stuart, Dr., 82, 95, 330\n\n Stuart, John Roy, 250\n\n Stuart, P., 336\n\n Sualtam, 155, 156\n\n Sweet, 304\n\n\n Tacitus, 5, 12\n\n Tadg, 181\n\n Talchend, 145\n\n Talhaiarn, 221\n\n Taliessin, 218\u2013223, 226, 230, 232, 240, 244, 247\n\n Tannahill, 257\n\n Taylor, Tom, 240, 247\n\n Teige, 124\n\n Tennyson, 305, 315, 318, 320, 323, 332\n\n Tewdwr, 246\n\n Thackeray, 332\n\n Thisbe, 312\n\n Thomson, 315\n\n Thurneysen, Prof., 57, 380\n\n Tighernach, 63, 111, 112, 155, 176, 246\n\n Tim\u00e6us, 12\n\n Tinne, 63\n\n Tirechan, 23, 24, 29\n\n Tischendorf, 83, 97\n\n Todd, Dr., 25, 33, 38, 303, 372, 374\n\n Todhunter, Dr., 148, 324\n\n Torcull, 211\n\n Townshend, Lord, 80\n\n Trahul, 254\n\n Trenmor, 178, 181\n\n Tuireann, 140\u2013143, 213, 214\n\n Turner, P., 336, 352\n\n Tynan, Katherine, 324\n\n\n Uathach, 159, 165\n\n Uisneach, 146, 149\u2013155, 158, 161, 380\n\n Ullin, 254\n\n Ult\u00e1n, 292, 349\n\n Urien, 234, 244\n\n Ussher, 62\n\n Uther, 319\n\n\n Vallancy, 339, 342\n\n Victoricus, 27\n\n Viglisson, 212\n\n Villemarqu\u00e9, 222, 229, 240, 244, 366\n\n Virgil, 12, 335\n\n Vivien, 319\n\n Voel Tegid, 230\n\n\n Wace, Robert, 228, 247, 306, 307\n\n Ward, 68\n\n Watson, Dr. John, 324\n\n Watt, 333\n\n Weston, Jessie L., 307, 324\n\n Westwood, Prof., 82\n\n White, Stephen, 62\n\n Whyte, Henry, 338, 366\n\n Whyte, John, 281, 344\n\n William King, 270\n\n Williams, Edward, 222\n\n Willison, 328, 333\n\n Wilson, James G., 275\n\n Windisch, Dr. Ernest, 57, 89, 90, 98, 121, 147, 173, 341, 376, 379, 380\n\n Wordsworth, 19, 315\u2013318\n\n Wright, Dr., 36, 303\n\n Wynne, W. W. E., 218\n\n\n Xenophon, 12\n\n\n Yeats, W. B., 324, 366\n\n Yscolan, 224\u2013226\n\n\n Zeuss, J. Caspard, 56, 82, 98, 99, 120, 258, 309, 341, 376\u2013379, 380,\n    382, 384\n\n Zimmer, Prof., 22, 98, 106, 120, 210, 211, 292, 380, 381\n\n Zupitza, Dr., 381\n\n\n\n\n                           INDEX OF SUBJECTS\n\n\n Adamnan, 58\u201379;\n   his biography, 61\u201368;\n   writings, 67\u201379;\n   his Life of Columba, 16, 58, 69\u201379;\n   Adamnan\u2019s Prayer, 68;\n   his Vision, 68\n\n Aged Bard\u2019s Wish, 253, 357, 358\n\n Alexander the Great and Celts, 7\n\n American scholars, 381\n\n _Amra Choluimcille_, 55, 108\n\n Ancestors of the Gael, 138, 139\n\n Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales, 220\n\n Aneurin, the Book of, 218, 219\n\n Annals, Irish, 111\u2013113\n\n _Arch\u00e6ologica Britannica_, 217, 370, 371\n\n Armagh, the Book of, 17, 22, 23, 82\n\n Arnold\u2019s _Study of Celtic Literature_, 309\u2013312, 321\u2013323\n\n Arthurian Romances, 227\u2013238, 306\u2013309\n\n Aryan group of languages, 19\n\n\n Ballymote, the Book of, 109\n\n Bards, the Irish, 54\n\n _Bards of the Gael and Gall_, 167, 168, 297, 298, 366\n\n _Barzaz-Breiz, Chants populaires de la Bretagne_, 240\u2013244, 366\n\n _Beauties of Gaelic Poetry, the_, 356\u2013360\n\n _Ben Dorain_, 358\u2013360\n\n Bible, Gaelic, 328\u2013330\n\n Bibliographies, Gaelic, 325\u2013327\n\n Bopp\u2019s discovery, 375, 376\n\n _Breton Bards of the Sixth Century, the_, 244, 366\n\n British scholars, 382\u2013385\n\n Brittany, early ballads of, 240\u2013244;\n   medieval ballads of, 247, 248\n\n Buchanan, Dugald, his hymns, 329, 336\n\n\n Caermarthen, the Black Book of, 218\n\n _Caledonian Bards_, 256\n\n _Carmina Gadelica_, 361\u2013366\n\n Cathrach, the, 16, 48, 49\n\n Celtic elements in English literature, 309\u2013312\n\n Celtic literary revivals, 239\u2013261\n\n Celtic renaissance, latest, 259, 353\n\n Celts, early history of the, 1\u20139;\n   arrival in British Isles, 3;\n   Continental empire, 5\u20139\n\n Christianity, introduction of, 27, 28, 47, 287\u2013290\n\n _Chronicon Scotorum_, the, 112, 369, 374\n\n Church, the, its influence on Gaelic literature, 286\u2013303\n\n Churchmen, splendid services of, 303\n\n Clanranald, the Book of, 129\u2013133\n\n Classical authors on early Celts, 11\u201313\n\n Columba, St., 16;\n   his biography, 41\u201378, 226;\n   writings, 47\u201358;\n   his poems, 49\u201353\n\n Confession of St. Patrick, 15, 25, 30\n\n Cornish dialect, last speaker of, 249\n\n Cornish literature, 248, 249\n\n Coroticus, Epistle to, 15, 30\n\n Cuchulinn, 155\u2013173\n\n\n Danish scholars, 381\n\n Decay of inflection in Scottish Gaelic and Manx, 211\n\n Decline of Gaelic Oral literature, 300\n\n Deer, the Book of, 16, 17, 79\u201395, 209, 246\n\n Deer\u2019s Cry, the, 15, 31, 33\n\n Deirdre and the sons of Uisneach, 146\u2013152\n\n _Dialogue of the Ancients_, 53, 188, 189\n\n Dialogues between Ossian and Patrick, 29, 292\u2013299\n\n Dictionaries, Gaelic, 341\u2013344\n\n Differences between Irish and Gaelic, 209, 210\n\n _Domhnach Airgid_, the, 36\n\n Durrow, the Book of, 16, 48, 82\n\n\n Early Celtic Church and oral traditions, 289\n\n Early missionaries and the Scriptures, 289, 290\n\n Edinburgh libraries in which are Celtic MSS.:\n   Advocates\u2019, 115\u2013118;\n   University, 118;\n   Scottish Antiquaries\u2019, 118\n\n Eisteddfod, Welsh, history of, 237\n\n English literature, 305\u2013324\n\n English loan-words from Celtic, 304, 305\n\n\n Fate of MSS., 119, 120\n\n Feinn, the, 174\u2013197\n\n Fernaig MS., the, 127\u2013129, 350, 351\n\n Fiacc\u2019s Hymn, 37, 38\n\n Fionn, 175\u2013197\n\n Foundation of Celtic Chairs, 259\n\n Four Ancient Books of Wales, 217\u2013238, 247\n\n Four Masters, the Annals of, 112, 113, 373;\n   authors, 369\n\n French scholars, 381\n\n\n Gadelic and Brittonic, linguistic difference, 3, 371\n\n Gaelic, earliest written, 17;\n   earliest distinctly Scottish, 89;\n   first printed book, 327\n\n _Gaelic Bards_, Pattison\u2019s, 253\n\n Galatian colony, 8\n\n _Genealogies, the Book of_, 369\n\n Genealogy, Irish, 137\n\n German scholars, 379\u2013381\n\n Gildas, works of, 220\n\n Gleaners, Gaelic, 347\u2013366\n\n Gododin, the, 221, 222\n\n Grammars, Gaelic, 107, 338\u2013341, 373\n\n _Grammatica Celtica_, 98, 376\u2013378\n\n Gray\u2019s _Bard_, 313, 314\n\n\n Hergest, the Red Book of, 218\u2013220, 224\n\n Heroic Cycle, the, 153\u2013173\n\n Highland bards before the Forty-five, 263\u2013285\n\n Highland bards after the Forty-five, 249\u2013251\n\n Highland Society Collection of Gaelic MSS., 117\n\n _Historia Britonum_, 228\n\n Hymns, the Book of, 17, 36, 209, 246, 348, 349, 374, 382\n\n\n Icelandic literature, 205\n\n Influence of Celtic on English literature, 305\u2013324\n\n Iona, 46;\n   ravages of Norsemen, 201\n\n Irish Annals, 111\u2013113\n\n Irish missionaries on the Continent, 207\n\n _Irische Texte_, 380, 382\n\n Italian scholars, 379, 380\n\n\n Jacobite poems of Ireland, 251\n\n Jones, Sir William;\n   his suggestion, 375\n\n Jubainville, M. d\u2019Arbois de; his mission to the British Isles, 99\u2013104\n\n\n Keating\u2019s work, 368, 369\n\n Kells, the Book of, 16, 48, 82\n\n Kilbride collection of MSS., 117, 118\n\n Knox\u2019s _Liturgy_, 327, 328\n\n\n Layamon\u2019s \u201cBrut,\u201d 305, 320\n\n _Leabhar Gabhala_, 135, 369\n\n _Leabhar na Feinne_, 353\u2013356\n\n _Leabhar nan Gleann_, 366\n\n _Leabhar Na h\u2019Uidhre_, 17, 108, 209, 246, 348\n\n Learning and culture, 289\n\n Leinster, the Book of, 108, 109\n\n _Liber Hymnorum_, 17, 36, 209, 246, 348, 349, 374, 382\n\n Lir, Tragedy of the Children of, 144\u2013146\n\n Lismore, the Book of, 109\n\n Lismore, the Book of the Dean of, 121\u2013126, 226, 350, 351\n\n _Literary History of Ireland_, Dr. Hyde\u2019s, 246\n\n Literature, Gaelic, printed, 325\u2013346\n\n Literature of the Early Celtic Church, 288\u2013292\n\n Llywarch H\u00ean\u2019s poetry, 223\u2013224\n\n\n Mabinogion, 229\u2013238\n\n Maccodrum\u2019s Muse, 282\u2013285\n\n Macdonald, Alexander, his work, 328, 336, 337\n\n Macdonald, John, life and poetry, 270\u2013275\n\n Macgregor songs, 263\n\n Macleod, Mary, life and poetry, 264\u2013270\n\n Macpherson\u2019s Ossian and other poems, 117, 217, 252, 314\u2013316, 331, 351,\n    352\n\n Malory, Sir Thomas, his _Morte d\u2019 Arthur_, 308, 309, 316\n\n Manuscripts, Celtic, 17, 40;\n   on the Continent, 96, 100, 101;\n   in England and Ireland, 97, 102;\n   in Scotland, 115\u2013134;\n   antiquity of MSS., 102\u2013104;\n   MSS. of the Middle Ages, 107;\n   MSS., XL., LIII., LVI., 120, 121;\n   Welsh, 217\u2013238\n\n Milesians, 138, 139\n\n Minor collections of Ossianic poetry, 352\n\n Minor Highland bards, 275\u2013282\n\n M\u00f2d, Gaelic, 259\n\n Modern novelists, 323\u2013324\n\n Moore\u2019s _Irish Melodies_, 316, 317\n\n Myrddin\u2019s poetry, 224\u2013226\n\n Mythological Cycle, the, 135\u2013152\n\n Myth and folk-tale theories, 135\u2013137\n\n Mythical races in Ireland, 137\n\n _Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales_, 218, 224, 366\n\n\n _Navigatio Brendani_, 215\n\n Nennius\u2019 _History of the Britons_, 220\n\n Nineteenth century output of Gaelic literature, 301, 302\n\n Ninine\u2019s Prayer, 38\n\n Norris, Edwin, translation of Cornish dramas, 249\n\n Norse eddas and sagas, 204, 205\n\n Norse ideas in Gaelic literature, 212\u2013215;\n   Norse words, 210, 211\n\n Norse invasions, 198;\n   influence on Celtic literature, 205\u2013217;\n   and upon the structure of the Gaelic language, 211, 212\n\n\n O\u2019Curry\u2019s research, 97, 373, 374\n\n O\u2019Donovan\u2019s life and work, 97, 372, 373\n\n Ogam writing, 14, 15\n\n Origin of shires, burghs, and parishes in Scotland, 84\u201395\n\n Ossian, 175;\n   poetry, 185\u2013188\n\n Ossianic cycle, 174\u2013197;\n   heroes of, 178;\n   literature, 185\u2013197;\n   poetry, 123, 185\u2013188;\n   tales, 176, 188\u2013197\n\n\n _P_, rarely used in Irish or Gaelic, 4;\n   group, 5\n\n Patrick, St., 15;\n   Lives of, 23;\n   biography, 23\u201339;\n   writings, 15, 30\u201339\n\n Patrick and Ossian, 29, 293\u2013298\n\n Periodicals, foreign, 378, 379;\n   Gaelic, 345, 346\n\n Picts, the, 45, 56\n\n Poetesses, Gaelic, 275, 276\n\n Poet-laureate, Gaelic, 274\n\n Poetry, Gaelic, in Continental MSS., 104\u2013106\n\n Psalters, Gaelic, 328, 333\n\n\n _Q._, the Aryan guttural changed into _p_, 4;\n   group, 5\n\n\n Reid\u2019s _Bibliotheca Scoto-Celtica_, 325\u2013327\n\n _Reliqui\u00e6 Celtic\u00e6_, 384\n\n _Reliques of Irish Poetry_, 366\n\n Renan, Ernest, on Welsh literature, 227, 230\n\n Rhyme, Celtic claim, 56, 57, 309\n\n Rise of the Scottish Gaelic, 89, 209\n\n\n Scandinavian scholars, 381\n\n Scholars, modern Celtic, 367\u2013385\n\n School-books, Gaelic, 338\n\n Scott, Sir Walter, renderings from Gaelic, 277, 278, 323;\n   influence, 317, 318\n\n Scottish collection of Celtic MSS., 115\u2013133\n\n _Seana Dana_, 253\u2013256\n\n Severance of Scotland from Ireland, 209\n\n Shairp, Principal, writings, 322, 323\n\n Skene, Dr., Collection of MSS., 117;\n   on Welsh poems, 227, 237\n\n _Songster, Gaelic_ (_An T Oranaiche_), 361\n\n Sorrows of Gaelic Storydom, the Three, 140\u2013152\n\n Statistics of Celtic-speaking peoples, 10, 20, 21\n\n Stephens\u2019 _Literature of the Cymry_, 221\n\n Stone, Jerome, a pioneer, 251\n\n\n T\u00e1in B\u00f3 Chuailgn\u00e9, 108\u2013111, 160\n\n Tales of Heroic Cycle, 153\u2013173\n\n Taliessin, the Book of, 218, 219;\n   the bard, 223;\n   legend of, 230\u2013232;\n   odes, 232, 233\n\n Taylor\u2019s translations of Breton ballads, 240\u2013244, 247, 248\n\n Tennyson\u2019s _Idylls of the King_, 318\u2013321\n\n Tighernach, the Annals of, 111\n\n _Treasury of Irish Poetry_, 366\n\n _Trias Thaumaturga_, 369\n\n Tuireann, Tragedy of the Children of, 140\u2013143\n\n\n Uisneach, Tale of the Sons of, 121, 146\u2013152\n\n\n Valhalla, 214, 215\n\n Vikings, 198\u2013216\n\n Villemarqu\u00e9, M. de, Breton ballads and folk-lore songs, 240\u2013248\n\n _Vita Columb\u00e6_, Adamnan\u2019s, 58\u201379, 92;\n   criteria of age, 59;\n   copyist, 60, 61;\n   history of MS., 62;\n   contents, 69;\n   other MSS. of, 76, 77\n\n\n _Wars of the Gael with the Gaill_, 203, 204\n\n Welsh bards of the sixth century, 221\n\n Welsh intellectual awakening of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, 246\n\n Welsh MSS., 220\n\n Welsh poetry, 217, 218, 257\n\n Wordsworth and his contemporaries, 316\n\n Whyte, Henry, his gleanings, 366\n\n\n Yscolan, 225, 226\n\n\n Zeuss\u2019 life and work, 98, 99, 376\u2013378\n\n Zimmer\u2019s books, 380\n\n\n                                THE END\n\n-----\n\nFootnote 1:\n\n  \u201cIn Europe the ancient races were all, according to Schaafhausen,\n  \u2018lower in the scale than the rudest living savages,\u2019 they must\n  therefore have differed to a certain extent from any existing\n  race.\u201d\u2014Darwin\u2019s _Descent of Man_, chap. vii. p. 281.\n\nFootnote 2:\n\n  \u201cThere is no proof of any migration of Asiatics into Europe west of\n  the basin of the Dnieper down to the time of Attila.\u201d\u2014Huxley.\n\nFootnote 3:\n\n  Adamnan refers to the same four peoples.\n\nFootnote 4:\n\n  \u201cThe first great movements of the European population of which there\n  is any conclusive evidence are that series of Gaulish invasions of the\n  east and south which ultimately extended from North Italy to Galatia\n  in Asia Minor.\u201d\u2014Huxley.\n\nFootnote 5:\n\n  \u201cTwo centuries after C\u00e6sar\u2019s conquest the Celtic tongue had all but\n  disappeared from Gaul, still that language did not perish without\n  leaving behind it slight but yet distinct traces.\u201d\u2014A. Brachet.\n\nFootnote 6:\n\n  Census, 1891.\n\nFootnote 7:\n\n  The number in Scotland who could speak Gaelic in 1901 was 230,806, and\n  who could speak Gaelic only, 28,106. The census of 1891 gave 43,738\n  speaking Gaelic only, and 38,192 speaking Irish only.\n\nFootnote 8:\n\n  _Races of Europe._\n\nFootnote 9:\n\n  Sir William Jones.\n\nFootnote 10:\n\n  Professor Zimmer, among others, believes that they were one and the\n  same person.\n\nFootnote 11:\n\n  Dr. Whitley Stokes thinks this sojourn took place between his first\n  missionary advent to Ireland in 397 and his second in 432.\n\nFootnote 12:\n\n  For examples, see Chap. XV.\n\nFootnote 13:\n\n  Benen, name of Saint\u2019s follower, St. Benignus.\n\nFootnote 14:\n\n  Version by Whitley Stokes in his Goidelica.\n\nFootnote 15:\n\n  The Book of Kells is held by the more competent authorities to belong\n  to the end of the seventh century.\n\nFootnote 16:\n\n  Ward or Vardaus, author of _Acta Sancti Rumoldi_.\n\nFootnote 17:\n\n  There are various Kilbrides in Scotland, several even in Lorn, but\n  this one is in the island of Seil, near Easdale.\n\nFootnote 18:\n\n  Professor Mackinnon, in _Transactions of the Gaelic Society of\n  Inverness_, vol. xi.\n\nFootnote 19:\n\n  See p. 110.\n\nFootnote 20:\n\n  Fiann, gen. Feinne, means the band, troop; the plural Fianna, the\n  troops or the soldiers.\u2014Dr. Ludwig Stern.\n\nFootnote 21:\n\n  Said to be so named from his white head.\u2014Dr. Macbain. Finn, ancient\n  form.\n\nFootnote 22:\n\n  The age of the oldest existing Ossianic poems, according to Dr. Ludwig\n  Stern, is the eleventh and twelfth centuries, though a few of them may\n  be more venerable.\n\nFootnote 23:\n\n  Really great-grandson.\n\nFootnote 24:\n\n  Finntraigh.\n\nFootnote 25:\n\n  Dr. Skene has shown, _Celtic Scotland_, vol. iii. p. 459, that another\n  O\u2019Duibhne is in question.\n\nFootnote 26:\n\n  Iceland, first settled by the Irish in 795, perhaps sixty-five years\n  earlier than the Norse. According to M. Letronne, 860 is the date of\n  the arrival of the latter.\n\nFootnote 27:\n\n  The belief was that Myrddin was persecuted by Rhydderch Hael at the\n  instance of Yscolan.\n\nFootnote 28:\n\n  Stephens has here, \u201cFor having hindered school instruction,\u201d wrongly\n  translated, we believe.\n\nFootnote 29:\n\n  \u201cI don\u2019t believe that Goidelic was extinct in Wales till the seventh\n  century; the bulk of the people of the north and the south of Wales\n  are in point of race to this day probably more Goidelic than\n  Brythonic. The Ordovices of Mid Wales were the Brythons of the west,\n  and hardly any others in Wales.\u201d\u2014Prof. Rhys.\n\nFootnote 30:\n\n  He collected Breton ballads and folk-lore songs, added to them,\n  revised and altered, and published the collection as authentic.\n\nFootnote 31:\n\n  Bran means crow in Breton dialect.\n\nFootnote 32:\n\n  The late Mr. Alexander Mackenzie has offered other suggestions. See\n  _Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness_, Vol. XXII. pp.\n  43\u201349.\n\nFootnote 33:\n\n  There is a spirited translation also by Mark Napier, Esq., in his\n  _Life of Montrose_.\n\nFootnote 34:\n\n  D. Campbell, in his _Language, Poetry, and Music of the Highland\n  Clans_, says that Mr. James Munro was preparing his poems for\n  publication with a memoir. This projected book has never appeared.\n\nFootnote 35:\n\n  Preserved in the Books of Ballymote and Lecain and MS. I. of the\n  Scottish collection.\n\nFootnote 36:\n\n  \u201cThis was no work to commend him to the powers that were, and he\n  appears to have been cast into prison, for, in a touching note at page\n  64 of the last edition of his Grammar, he asks his readers\u2019 pardon for\n  confounding an example of the imperative with the potential mood,\n  which he was caused to do \u2018by the great bother of the brawling company\n  that is round about me in this prison.\u2019 What became of him ultimately\n  I do not know.\u201d\u2014Dr. Douglas Hyde, _Literary History of Ireland_, pp.\n  599, 600.\n\nFootnote 37:\n\n  O\u2019Donovan\u2019s, 1847, published since Reid wrote, is the best Irish\n  Grammar.\n\nFootnote 38:\n\n  Of course Cormac\u2019s Glossary is the earliest, but does not count among\n  printed ones, because only in MS.\n\nFootnote 39:\n\n  Finn Mac Gormann, Bishop of Kildare, most probably.\n\nFootnote 40:\n\n  Second stanza he printed for first time.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n                          TRANSCRIBER\u2019S NOTES\n\n\n \u25cf Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.\n \u25cf Used numbers for footnotes, placing them all at the end of the last\n     chapter.\n \u25cf Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.\n \u25cf The caret (^) serves as a superscript indicator, applicable to\n     individual characters (like 2^d) and even entire phrases (like\n     1^{st}).","title":"The literature of the Celts","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":131730}