polis he prepared for the press and published by subscription a volume of Gaelic poems, containing nearly all his best productions. Returning to his native district he attempted farming, but his efforts, as in the case of a greater Scottish bard-Robert Burns-were not attended with success, and for several years before his death at Santaig, about 1780, he was chiefly dependent for support on the liberality of his more prosperous relations. Some Gaelic scholars esteem Macdonald's for the bar. Like many a wayward son of the Muse he disappointed both his chief and his father. While at college he inconsiderately married Mary Macdonald, on whom he had composed several songs; and without completing his course, he, to support himself and his young wife, became a teacher. It is said that he was first employed as such by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge; afterwards as parochial schoolmaster at Ardnamurchan, residing in a romantic situation on the Sound of Mull, directly oppo-"Blessing of the Biorlinn" as equal to Ossian's site to Tobermory. While in this agreeable position he prepared a vocabulary for the use of Gaelic schools, the first work of the kind in the language. It was published at Edinburgh in 1741. When Prince Charles landed he laid down the ferule and took up the sword. He was the Tyrtæus of the Highland army, and his warlike strains aroused the greatest enthusiasm among the followers of the ill-fated Stuart. poems of the same length, and pronounce the force of thought and energy of poetical ardour with which he "Hurls the Biorlinn through the cold glens," unsurpassed, if indeed it has been equalled, by any modern Highland poet. His poem in praise of Mòrag contains many lofty and impassioned lines, and his Odes to Spring and Winter are indicative of high poetic power. At the close of the rebellion, in which he Collections of his poems were published in bore an officer's commission, Macdonald and 1751 and 1764, and a third volume of his his elder brother Angus escaped pursuit, and for poetry appeared in 1802. It is asserted by a time sought shelter in the woods and caves Mackenzie that but a small portion of this of Borradale, in the district of Arasaig. After bard's poems have been preserved in print. His a time Jacobite friends invited the poet to son Ronald, having published a volume, and Edinburgh to take charge of the education of not meeting with encouragement for a second, their children. While residing in the metro- | destroyed all his father's manuscripts. THE LION OF MACDONALD. Awake, thou first of creatures! indignant in their | O'er crested chieftaincy thy state, O thou of frown, Let the flag unfold the features that the heather1 blossoms crown; right assuming? I see thee, on thy silken flag, in rampant3 glory streaming, Arise, and lightly mount thy crest, while flap thy As life inspired their firmness thy planted hind flanks in air, And I will follow thee the best that I may dow or dare. feet seeming. The standard-tree is proud of thee, its lofty sides embracing, Yes, I will sing the Lion King, o'er all the tribes Anon unfolding to give forth thy grandeur any victorious; space in. To living thing may not concede thy meed and A following of the trustiest are cluster'd bythy side, And woe, their flaming visages of crimson, who shall bide? actions glorious; How oft thy noble head has woke thy valiant men to battle, As panic o'er their spirit broke, and rued the foe their mettle. Is there thy praise to underrate, in very thought presuming 1 The Macdonald badge is a tuft of heather. The heather and the blossom are pledges of their faith, And the foe that shall assail them is destined to the death. 2 The clan claimed the right wing of the battle. 3 A lion rampant is the Macdonald cognizance. Was not a dearth of mettle among thy native kind, They were foremost in the battle, nor in the chase behind. Their arms of fire wreak'd out their ire, their shields emboss'd with gold And the thrusting of their venom'd points upon the foeman told; O deep and large was every gash that marked their manly vigour, And irresistible the flash that lighten'd round their trigger; And woe, when play'd the dark blue blade, the thick-back'd, sharp Ferrara, Though plied its might by stripling hand, it cut into the marrow. Clan Colla,1 let them have their due, thy true and gallant following, Strength, kindness, grace, and clannishness their lofty spirit hallowing. Hot is their ire as flames aspire, the whirling March winds fanning them; Yet search their hearts, no blemish'd parts are found, all eyes though scanning them. They rush elate to stern debate, the battle call has never What limbs were wrenched, what furrows drench'd, in that cloud-burst of steel, That atoned the provocation, and smok'd from head to heel; While cry and shriek of terror break the field of strife along, And stranger notes are wailing the slaughter'd heaps among. When, from the kingdom's breadth and length, might other muster gather, So flush in spirit, firm in strength, the stress of arms to weather? Steel to the core, that evermore to expectation true, Like gallant deer-hounds from the slip, or like an arrow flew, Where deathful strife was calling, and sworded files were closed, Was sapping breach the wall in of the ranks that stood oppos'd, And thirsty brands were hot for blood, and quivering to be on, And with the whistle of the blade was sounding many a groan. Found tardy cheer or craven fear, or grudge the O, from the sides of Albyn, full thousands would prey to sever. Ah, fell their wrath! The dance of death2 sends legs and arms a flying, And thick the life-blood's reek ascends of the downfallen and the dying. Clandonuil, still my darling theme, is the prime of every clan; How oft the heady war in has it chased where thousands ran. O ready, bold, and venomful, these native warriors brave, Like adders coiling on the hill, they dart with stinging glaive; Nor wants their course the speed, the force-nor wants their gallant stature This of the rock, that of the flock that skim along the water. Like whistle-shriek the blows they strike, as the torrent of the fell; So fierce they gush, the moor-flames' rush their ardour symbols well. Clandonuil's root,3 when crowd each shoot of sapling, branch, and stem, What forest fair shall e'er compare in stately pride with them? Their gathering might what legion wight in rivalry has dar'd, Or to ravish from their Lion's face a bristle of his beard? 1 Coll, or Colla, is a common name in the clan. 2 The "mire chatta," or battle dance, 3 The clan consisted of several septs, as Clanranald Glengarry, Keppoch, &c. be proud, The natives of her mountains gray, around the tree to crowd; Where stream the colours flying, and frown the features grim Of yonder emblem Lion, with his staunch and crimson limb. Up, up, be bold, quick be unroll'd the gathering of your levy, Let every step bound forth a leap, and every hand be heavy; The furnace of the mêlée, where burn your swords the best, Eschew not; to the rally, where blaze your streamers, haste! That silken sheet, by death-strokes fleet and strong defenders mann'd, Dismays the flutter of its leaves the chosen of the land. ADDRESS TO THE MORNING. Son of the young Morn! that glancest O'er the hills of the east with thy gold-yellow hair, How gay on the wild thou advancest Where the streams laugh as onward they fare, And the trees, yet bedewed by the shower, Elastic their light branches raise, While the melodists sweet they embower, Hail thee at once with their lays. 4 The Macdonald armorial bearings are gules. 5 Prince Charles Edward was then expected. his residence at Lyons, France, where he continued to reside until a lingering consumption ended his career, March 25, 1754, in the fiftieth year of his age. His body was brought back to Scotland, and interred in that once great Walhalla, the Abbey Church of Holyrood. The poet was twice married into families of distinction; and by his first wife, a daughter of Sir James Hall of Dunglass, he left a son, who succeeded to his estate. WILLIAM HAMILTON of Bangour, one of the | He proceeded to the Continent, and took up first lyric poets who sought to communicate a classic grace and courtly decorum to Scottish song, was born of an ancient Ayrshire family in the year 1704. He received a liberal education, and early in life cultivated a taste for poetry, having before he was twenty assisted Allan Ramsay in his Tea-table Miscellany. His first and best strains were dedicated to lyrical poetry, and he soon became distinguished for his poetical talents. He was the delight of the fashionable circles of his native county, possessing, as he did, rank, education, and various accomplishments, and was known as "the elegant and amiable Hamilton." In 1745 he took the side which most young men of generous temperament were apt to take in those days he joined the standard of Prince Charles Edward, and became the poet-laureate of the Jacobite army by celebrating their first success at Prestonpans, in the ode of "Gladsmuir." When the cause of the Stuarts was lost by the battle of Culloden, Hamilton, after many hardships and perils among the mountains and glens of the Highlands, succeeded in effecting his escape to France. His exile, however, was short. He had many friends and admirers among the royalists at home, who soon obtained a pardon for the rebellious poet, and he was restored to his native country and his paternal estate. His health was always delicate, and a pulmonary complaint soon compelled him to seek a more genial climate. A volume of his poems was, without his consent or name, published at Glasgow in 1748; another edition of his works was issued at Edinburgh in 1760; but the latest and most complete edition, including several poems previously unpublished, and edited by James Paterson, appeared in 1850. "Mr. Hamilton's mind," says Lord Woodhouselee in his Life of Lord Kaimes, "is pictured in his verses. They are the easy and careless effusions of an elegant and a chastened taste; and the sentiments they convey are the genuine feelings of a tender and susceptible heart, which perpetually owned the dominion of some favourite mistress, but whose passion generally evaporated in song, and made no serious or permanent impression." Of Hamilton's poems not devoted to love, the most deserving of notice is "The Episode of the Thistle," which is an ingenious attempt, in blank verse, by a welldevised fable, to account for the national emblem of Scotland: "How oft beneath Its martial influence have Scotia's sons, Companion to the silver star, blest type There is another fragmentary poem by Hamilton, an extract from which appears among our selections. It is called "The Maid of Gallowshiels," and is an epic of the heroiccomic kind, intended to celebrate a contest between a piper and a fiddler for the fair maid | of Gallowshiels. The only poem which he wrote in his native dialect is "The Braes of Yarrow," which has been almost universally acknowledged to be one of the finest ballads ever written. Wordsworth was signally impressed with it, as appears from his trio of beautiful poems of Yarrow Unvisited," "Yarrow Visited," and "Yarrow Revisited." Mr. Hamilton of Bangour, who made the first translation from Homer in blank verse, is sometimes mistaken for and identified with another poet of the same name— -William Hamilton of Gilbertfield, in Lanarkshire, who was a friend and correspondent of Allan Ramsay, and the author of a modern version of Harry the Minstrel's poem on Sir William Wallace. Much I rejoiced that waeful, waeful day; I sang, my voice the woods returning, But lang ere night the spear was flown That slew my love, and left me mourning. What can my barbarous, barbarous father do, But with his cruel rage pursue me? My lover's blood is on thy spear, How canst thou, barbarous man, then woo me? My happy sisters may be, may be proud; My brother Douglas may upbraid, upbraid, And strive with threatening words to move me; My lover's blood is on thy spear, How canst thou ever bid me love thee? Yes, yes, prepare the bed, the bed of love, With bridal sheets my body cover; Unbar, ye bridal maids, the door, Let in the expected husband lover. But who the expected husband, husband is? And crown my careful head with willow. Pale though thou art, yet best, yet best beloved, Pale, pale, indeed, O lovely, lovely youth, Forgive, forgive, so foul a slaughter, And lie all night between my breasts, No youth shall ever lie there after." "Return, return, O mournful, mournful bride, Return and dry thy useless sorrow: Thy lover heeds nought of thy sighs, TO THE COUNTESS OF EGLINTON.1 Instructed from these scenes, what glowing fires 1 This poem, so landatory of the celebrated Ayrshire beauty, was appended to "The Gentle Shepherd."-ED. |