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CARMICHAEL'S CARMINA
GADELICA.
FROM time to time we have
been reminded of the existence of a unique literature among the
Highlanders of Scotland. For those, however, not fortunate enough to be
able to read Gaelic, the accessible monuments of Highland life and lore
have been and are, unhappily, too few. The fame attained by Macpherson's
Ossian was European, that work has been the means of directing attention
to the oral traditions of the people. The most notable fruit of that
interest was the publication of the West Highland Tales by lain F.
Campbell of Islay in 1862. That work contains invaluable material for
the student of folk-lore and of Gaelic imagination and expression. In
this department the highest beauty and significance must be awarded to
the tale of Deirdire, collected in Barra by Campbell's life-long friend
and fellow-worker, Mr. Alexander Carmichael. That romance of the Gael,
otherwise known as the Fate of the Children of Usnach, which Macpherson
introduced into his work as Darthula, and which has for ages before been
known as one of the three sorrows of story-telling, Carmichael
contributed, along with an English rendering, to the Transactions of the
Gaelic Society of Inverness. It is the finest oral tale ever found in
Scotland. Otherwise Mr. Carmichael is well-known to students,
particularly from his finely written paper in the third volume of
Skene's History of Celtic Scotland, more recently, too, by his unique
and charming account of the "Grazing and Agrestic Customs of the
Hebrides," printed in the Report of the Crofter Commission under Lord
Napier and Etterick, not to dwell upon his great help in the way of
contributions to Nicolson's edition of the Gaelic Proverbs, and
numerous other articles in the proceedings of the Society of
Antiquaries, The Evergreen, and elsewhere. We must congratulate the
distinguished writer upon having at last issued in the most sumptuous
form an edition de luxe, in two magnificent volumes, of a portion of his
hitherto unpublished collection of Hymns and Incantations, with literal
English translation, interesting introductions, admirable notes on
natural history and curious myths and old world legends on terms dying
and obsolete. The glossary at the end has not at any rate even the fault
that a critic found with Johnson's Dictionary when he pronounced it an
admirable work were it not that it changed the subject too often. The
work is printed on the finest hand-made paper by T. & A. Constable,
printers to Her Majesty, and sold by Norman Macleod, George IV. Bridge,
Edinburgh. The portrait, prefixed to the first volume, is from the
accomplished hand of Mr. Skeoch Cumming, an eminent painter who has won
for himself great credit in the South African War, serving with the
Midlothian Yeomanry. Long may the years sit lightly on him. His work is
such as no other man in Scotland could have done. It is necessarily
unique and will increase in value and in interest as the years go by.
His years of self- sacrifice, it may be safely predicted, have
unconsciously won for him a literary immortality.
These fine poems, and equally fine introductions, with their beautiful
personality, show how the Highlander, while firmly holding by
Christianity, interweaved older rites and religious observances into the
order of his daily life. They are a supreme illustration of the success
of the policy which the venerable Bede (H. E. I., 30) tells us was
recommended by one of the Roman bishops to the missionaries of Britain
to disturb as little as possible existing pagan practices, when these
were not directly incompatible with the tenor of the Christian life. The
temples, cleansed with holy water, were to be hallowed for Christian
worship; heathen festivals, instead of being utterly abolished, were to
be devoted to the festivals of the saints. The result was that the ways
of his fathers were not too rudely cut off from the nature of the Gael.
These poems and charming introductions, while evidencing a high literary
faculty, bear the amplest testimony to the lasting character of the work
accomplished so many ages ago by Colum Cille, and to the hold upon life
exercised by the religion which he and his disciples taught and
exemplified in their own lives. The whole of life was seen to be sacred.
No place was given to a mere decorous Sunday morality. Their piety
permeated all the details of work, sanctifying all innocent pleasures,
mingling with and softening the sorrows, while it elevated the joys of
life. This spirit is well illustrated by the opening poem in the book,
entitled "A Rune before Prayer":
I am bending my knee
In the eye of the Father who created me,
In the eye of the Son who purchased me,
In the eye of the Spirit who cleansed me
In friendship and affection;
Through Thine own Anointed One, O God,
Bestow upon us fulness in our need,
Love towards God,
The affection of God,
The smile of God,
The wisdom of God,
The grace of God,
The fear of God;
To do in the world of the Three
The will of God,
As angels and saints do in heaven
Each shade and light,
Each day and night;
Each time in kindness
Give Thou us Thy Spirit.
Take, again, the
Baptismal Blessing:
Thou Being who inhabitest
the heights
Imprint Thy blessing betines,
Remember Thou the child of my heart
In name of the Father of peace,
When the priest of the King
Puts the water of meaning upon him
Grant him the blessing of the Three
Who fill the heights.
Sprinkle down upon him Thy
grace,
Give Thou to him virtue and growth,
Give Thou to him strength and guidance,
Give Thou to him flocks and possessions,
Sense and reason void of guile,
Angel wisdom in his day
That he may stand without reproach
In Thy presence.
The English translation
is all that a literal rendering could be; often it is specially happy,
e.g., in a stanza of No. 82.
God kindle Thou in my
heart within
A flame of love to my neighbor,
To my foe, to my friend, to my kindred all,
To the brave, to the knave, to the thrall
O Son of the loveliest Mary,
From the lowliest thing that liveth
To the Name that is highest of all.
The preface to the work
is happy, beautiful, luminous and terse. Mr. Carmichael must be
congratulated upon it, as well as upon the long introductions to the
hymns on St. Bride, St. Michael, with their many curious pre- Christian
reminiscences. These will reveal to scholars many points of comparison
with the customs of Greece and Rome and India; the incantations are very
peculiar, some of them being common to Scotland and Ireland. The Rev.
Mr. Cockayne's work, Old English Leechdoms in the Rolls Series furn- ish
some stanzas which are very close to some of these Gaelic pieces. The
literal English translation given by Mr. Carmichael in the page facing
the original Gaelic shows his marvellous intuition into these often
partially obscure and difficult Gaelic words. For the student of
folklore, anthropology, theology, poetry, anecdote ; for the Gaelic
lexicographer I for the lover of mellow Christian devotion, these
volumes afford a treat. Not one of those seven hundred odd pages but
furnish material of value in different aspects. The work is enriched and
adorned with fine specimens of Gaelic ornamental letters which will
feast the eye of the student of Celtic art. They are copied entirely
from designs in old Gaelic manuscripts in the Advocates' Library.
As an instance of curious
folklore suffice it to quote a short piece from one of the
introductions. It tells of the reverence which is accorded in some
districts to the sacred beetle and which can be paralleled in West
Connaught. The student of aprocryphal sacred legend may be left to trace
out the source for himself. "When His enemies were in search of Christ
to put Him to death they met the sacred beetle (cearr-dubhan) and the
grave-digger beetle (daol) out on a foraging expedition in search of
food for their families. The Jews asked the beetles if they had seen.
Christ passing that way. Proud to be asked and anxious to conciliate the
great people, the grave-digger promptly and volubly replied: Yes, yes,
He passed here yesterday evening when I and the people of the town-land
were digging a grave and burying the body of a field-mouse that had come
to an untimely end. You lie, you lie, said the sacred beetle; it was a
year ago yesterday that Christ the Son passed here, when my children and
I were searching for food, after the king's horse had passed. The
grave-digger bet- lie is always killed when seen, for legend portrays
his ready officiousness against Christ. The sacred beetle is spared from
his desire to shield Christ from His enemies, but because he told a lie
he is always turned on his back."
If I were asked to point
to any work which might even approximately be called the Veda of the
Gael. I know no work to which I could more truthfully point than this
one. In spirit it is Vedic, so far as a work collected at this time of
day can be. It gives the heart-aspirations and innermost feelings of the
Gaelic race; it enters into the heart of nature and of the poor. These
people have the secret of life and it is good to be in their company
even for a short time. The fresh breeze blows through it----the ritual
of pastoral life, growth, reaping, storage, milling, baking, rising,
sleeping, birth, marriage, death; of sacred days and festivals. It is to
be treasured up on purpose for a life beyond life. The work is
unconsciously great. All libraries and all who can afford it should have
a copy of it.
THE CLAN DONALD.
The appearance of the
second volume of the history of the Clan Donald marks an epoch in clan
history. Not only is it a sumptuous work typographically and
pictorially, but the text is worthy of the great subject of the book.
Clan Donald towers above all the other clans. The influence which, at
the dawn of the historic period, broke up the great tribes of
Albion—those comprising the provinces of Moray, Athole, etc., were not
felt in the isles or in the mainland possessions of the Macdonalds at as
early a period; consequently, while most of the Highland clans were
forming, and gradually rising to power, the Macdonalds already held a
commanding position as rulers, virtual sovereigns of vast territories,
and no other clan ever attained to equal greatness. An adequate history
of the Macdonald, it will be understood, therefore, is a herculean
undertaking. To say that the two volumes now before the public do
justice to the subject, is to bestow the highest possible praise, yet
one feels that it would be truly difficult to overstate the excellence
of this great work. A memorial has been raised more enduring than brass,
and of such workmanship as will command acknowledgment.
The first volume extended
to 570 pages, the second is within four pages of 800 royal folios, a
bulky volume set in Roxburgh binding. The facsimile reproductions of
important deeds and documents, the half-tone and the tinted
illustrations are particularly well done, and are a credit to the
handicraft of bookmaking. No clansman can help feeling gratified that
the history of the Clan Donald has been thus handsomely decorated, and
sent forth arrayed in a garb most befitting its important and valuable
message.
The second volume opens
with that romantic chapter of Clan Donald history, that pertaining to
the Macruaries of Garmoran and the North Isles. The relationship of
Christina Macruarie to King Robert Bruce brings to notice an interesting
historical alliance. Christina married the Earl of Mar; Bruce married
their daughter, who thus became a connecting link between the line of
the mighty Somerled and the Stewart Kings. Amy Macruarie is lightly
passed, the pathos and romance woven by tradition around her person
giving place to Chartulary prose. The MacDonald connection of the Clan
MacAllister, to whom the Alexanders in various parts of the Lowlands, in
Forfar- shire and in Aberdeenshire belonged, and of whom were the
Alexanders of Menstrie who rose to the dignity of Earls of Stirling, is
shown and the fortunes of these septs are broadly touched. Of special
interest to MacDonalds in Canada is the chapter devoted to the house of
Stirling, for at one time Sir William Alexander, afterwards Earl of
Stirling, held the Canadian lands of New Scotland or Nova Scotia and he
it was that created the order of Knight- baronets of Nova Scotia, in the
British Baronetage. The Clan ramifications in Ireland—the clan Donald of
Ulster, of Connaught and Leinster, find treatment in two chapters, and
those of the Macdonalds of Antrim, descended from Sorley Buy Macdonald,
whose prowess kept the English Government long at bay are described in
one of the most interesting chapters in the volume. To the Highland
reader, however, the fortunes of the home branches, of the Macdonalds,
of Ardnamurchan, of Glencoe, of Clanranald, of Glengarry, or Dunnyveg
and the Glens, will appeal with fascinating interest, for the historians
tread on more familiar ground and with greater firmness.
This history was
undertaken at the request of the Clan Donald Society, by two reverend
clansmen, Rev. A. Macdonald, Kiltarlity, Inverness-shire, and Rev. A.
Macdonald, Killearnan, Rosshire, whose tastes run with their
opportunities. If the Clan Society had done nothing more than induced
the production of this great work, its existence would be more than
justified; and the recently formed Clan Donald Society in Canada could
do no better than follow the example thus set, in collecting clan
history in Canada and perpetuating the story on the printed page.
A book which has made
steady headway during the past year is Rev. Duncan Anderson's Scottish
Folklore, a Canadian publication issued by the enterprising house of
George N. Morang & Company.
Mr. Anderson has for
sponsors the Earl of Aberdeen and Professor Clark of Trinity University,
two Aberdonians who ought to know the genuine from the spurious in all
that pertains to Scottish life and character. Mr. Anderson has produced
a readable, amusing, and interesting book which is fated undoubtedly to
rank high among the leading books of the year. To while away a winter
evening no better collection of good things has been issued these many
years by the Canadian press.
Crockett's latest volume
"The Sticket Minister's Wooing" and other short stories bears the imprint
of Morang & Co. The collection is most excellent. The leading
sketches—which give the title to the well bound and bulky volume—are
among Crockett's very best writing. He has a strong subject in Robert
Fraser, and he handles it with all the power of concentration and rapid
touch for which Crockett is noted. No one can sip here without tasting
the nectar of genius. "Gibby the Eel,"
"The Hempie's Love
Story," "The Little Fair Man," etc., etc., all contribute to make this
one of Crockett's most readable collection of sketches. (See page 81.)
Entering the spacious
parlors of the Publishers' Syndicate (Toronto), the most attractive
volume beyond doubt, is the sumptuous edition of Andrew Lang's History
of the Jacobite Episode. Scotsmen will differ, and reasonably differ
from the versatile author, on many points in this history, but on one
thing every lover of the artistic in book-craft will unite, and that is
in doing homage to the superb execution of the mechanical and artistic
sides of this wonderful volume. Seldom has the skilled artisan put such
exquisite finish on the engraver's art. The plates are magnificent. To
say nothing of the rarity of some of the portraits here given to the
world, the reproductions in many colors, or in mezzotints, or in black
and white tone, are as near perfection as may be. The letter-press is a
dream of beauty, a luxury to the fastidious eye, an aesthetic reverie.
The binding, and designs are, of course, in keeping with the rest. I say
not one word of the contents. Andrew Lang must draw the critics. He
cannot help it. Let that pass. The story as he writes it is of course
extremely well told. Whether you agree with him or not you must read on
to the end. He writes to be read and you must buy him to keep abreast of
the times. For the rest you have a book which, for other reasons,
although to some this may seem subordinate, is worth its weight in gold.
Then you are shown
Stevenson's Letters and his volumes in various styles of binding; so
with Sir Walter Scott, everything that can be desired in the matter of
careful editing, annotation and lovely page you can choose from; and
then you come to Burns. The lover of Burns can be satisfied. From the
popular edition of Alexander Smith to the critical volumes of Henley and
Henderson he can select, and it is pleasing to be informed that Henley's
Burns has had a successful run in Canada. The four volumes form a Burns
library unequalled within the same select compass; and erudition,
criticism and discrimination can surely do no more for Burns than the
collaborateurs have done in these volumes. Needless to say the
illustrations have a distinct artistic value.
A book which I pored over
with quickened interest was Butler's "Ruined Abbeys of Scotland." What a
charm those monuments of piety and patriotism have for the student of
Scottish history. If the crumbled down walls could speak what a story
would be theirs? Yet "Stone walls have ears"; they have tongues, too;
nor are these ruins dumb. Mr. Butler is a master of his art, and he
succeeds in his purpose, which is to tell the story of the old churches
in the language of the people.
A number of Edinburgh
books bearing the imprint of T. & T. Clark, for whom the Publishers'
Syndicate are the Canadian agents, are also to be seen. They carry the
credentials of the solid Scottish house, but not finding among them any
distinctly Scotch, I forbear to refer to such admirable titles as
"William Herschel," "Crànmer," "Luther," "Buddha," and others among the
"World's Epoch Makers." (See page 86.)
While not a Scottish
book, the sum and substance of Professor Bryce's History of the Hudson's
Bay Company is so Scottish that it cannot be excluded from this article.
Hudson's Bay Company was long under the domination of Scotsmen, much of
its greatest work was accomplished by the hardy mountaineer of Scotland
that its history reads like a history of the achievements of famous
Scots abroad. Dr. Bryce has given us a great book; he tells a wonderful
story, and the Scotsman must, indeed, be dead to national impulse who
can read the book without cherishing a pardonable pride in his country
and its people. William Briggs (Toronto), the public-spirited publisher
has done much to encourage the study and research of early Canadian
history, and to his patriotic policy Canada owes this and other
admirable historical works.
A Scottish book of the
year that claims special attention is the poetical works of Alexander
MacLachlan, prepared first by his daughter as a labor of love, and
carried on by a small committee of friends after her death. The book is
a well edited, well printed, and handsomely made volume, which will be a
decided addition to the library of any lover of poetry whether English
or Scotch. MacLachlan's fame will be still further proclaimed by this
posthumous collection of his verse.
A new volume of verse
from Mr. J. Stuart Thomson, a brilliant young Canadian who is now one of
the managers of the famous Plant System, and with whom the writing of
verse is one of the enthusiasms of the hours of leisure from business,
is announced by William Briggs. In "A Day's Song," this new book, Mr.
Thomson exhibits the fulfilment of the promise of his earlier volume "Estabelle."
It is a valuable addition to Canadian literature. Mr. Thomson was born
and educated in Montreal. He is of Scotch parentage on his father's
side, and on his mother's comes of old U. E. Loyalist stock.
Rev. Alexander Miller,
Presbyterian minister of Kintail, Ont. (Old Country friends will
remember him as Free Church minister of Renton), has written a vigorous
pamphlet of a polemical character, entitled "Plymouthism and the Modern
Churches." Whatever the adherents of this sect may think of Mr. Miller's
arguments, its opponents will undoubtedly regard them as entirely
logical and unanswerable. He handles the tenets of the brethren without
gloves.
Rev. Dr. Maclean, a
Methodist clergyman, at present stationed at Neepawa, Man., has written
a number of valuable works, but his latest, "The Making of a Christian"
(William Briggs), is in some respects his best. A reviewer writes of it:
"The charm of the style is its rugged Anglo-Saxon, the language of the
Bible and Pilgrim's Progress. It fairly bristles with monosyllabic
sword-points. There is not a dull line in the book. Open it where you
will and diamonds may be had for the picking up."
A work of great interest
to Bible students, and one for which there has been a felt demand, has
been supplied by Rev. Donald McKenzie, a Presbyterian clergyman, living
in Toronto, in his "Exposition of the Old Testament Sacrifices," just
published by William Briggs. Mr. McKenzie's object has been to prepare a
popular work translating the symbolism of those ancient institutions
into the life and thought of the present day. In the closing chapter the
sacrifice of Christ is expounded in the light of the preceding
discussion.
Rev. Dr. MacKay, of
Woodstock, whose "Pioneer Life in Zorra" has found readers far beyond
the bounds of Canada, has followed this with another Zorra book. In
this, under the title, "Zorra Boys at Home and Abroad; or, How to
Succeed" (William Briggs), Dr. MacKay traces the career of a score or so
of men who were born or brought up in Zorra, that remarkable Highland
settlement—and have won distinction in various walks of life—as cabinet
ministers, senators, millionaires, presidents and professors of
colleges, missionaries, authors, etc. Two of these Zorra boys of whom
their native place has special reason to be proud are Mackay of Formosa
and "Ralph Connor," the well known author. Dr. MacKay has so sketched
these lives as to make them not only deeply interesting reading, but
most inspiring in their stimulus toward the cultivation of those
qualities and virtues which ensure success. No better book for the young
was ever written in Canada.
A new Canadian historical
romance that has sprung into quick popularity, is "Lords of the North"
(Toronto: William Briggs), the author of which is a young Canadian girl,
Agnes C. Lant, of Ottawa. It is a story of the great struggle between
the Hudson's Bay Company and its formidable rival the North-West Company
for the possession of the fur trade in the North-West. We learn with
pleasure that the book within a week of issue ran into a second edition.
It is perhaps without exception the most fascinating Canadian work yet
written. Miss Lant is of Scottish ancestry on her father's side.
Mr. W. A. Fraser is to be
congratulated on the signal success of his "Mooswa." The book has
achieved instant and wonderful popularity. The Canadian publisher,
William Briggs, considers it the most popular Canadian book he has yet
published. An interesting feature in connection with the publication of
the book is the flood of letters it has brought the author from all
quarters, warmly praising the book, and urging him to further work along
the same line. It is no small credit to Canada to have produced two of
the three great writers of animal stories today, Fraser and
Seton-Thomson the third in the trio being the world famous Kipling,
whose "Jungle Tales " merit little, if any, more praise than the stories
of his Canadian confreres. (See page 83.)
Among the smaller books
deserving more than passing notice is a new Guide Book to Islay, by the
Rev. John George MacNeill, United Free Church Manse, Cawdor, Scotland.
To natives of the "Green, Grassy, Isle," it will come as a cherished
memory, with its wealth of beautiful description and illustrations of
noted places, but by a wider circle it will be kindly greeted because of
its value as a contribution to typographical literature. The reverend
author has not merely compiled a tourists' guide book, but has written a
short history of his native island which is of more than ordinary
interest to the student of such works. That it will meet with liberal
patronage is to be sincerely hoped. (Glasgow: Archibald Sinclair,
"Celtic Press," 47 Waterloo street.)
Among the important books
of the year, "Life in Scotland a Hundred Years Ago," by James Murray,
M.A., claims a conspicuous place. The material is furnished by Sir John
Sinclair's Old Statistical Account of Scotland, 1791-1799, an
exhaustless mine of information. Mr. Murray has made excellent use of
the old parish accounts, originally written by the parish ministers. He
classifies his material into agricultural, domestic and social,
marriages, births, funerals, popular superstitions, ecclesiastical and
theological, schools and schoolmasters, tales and legends, and
etymological, and has gleaned to such advantage that a comprehensive and
apparently complete picture appears to the mind. The book ought to be
widely read. To Canadians it has this especial interest that it gives an
authentic account of the life their Scottish forefathers pursued just
prior to their leaving to settle in Canada. The work can be strongly
recommended.
In the Upper Canada Tract
Society's rooms at 102 Yonge street, Toronto, there are many choice
volumes of Scottish authorship, chiefly of the religious class.
Oliphant, Anderson & Ferrier's "Famous Scots" series are on the counters
and Stodder & Houghton's publications. Dr. George Matheson's charming
volumes, "Studies of the Portrait of Christ," has had a deservedly
liberal sale, and what can be more suitable at this season as a gift to
a friend than this "banquet of pure, concentrated thought" as the
British Weekly describes the book. The British Monthly handled by this
house for Canada has had a most cordial reception. It is much sought
for, and will very soon be familiar to the Canadian public. Needless to
say it is a thoroughly good production, and it seems to have made a hit
from the start.
WHEN Prince Charlie
resided at Edinburgh, after the battle of Prestonpans, some of the
Presbyterian clergy continued to pray for King George at public service.
Rev. Mr. Macvicar being asked by some Highlanders to pray for the
Prince, promised to comply, and fulfilled his promise thus:- "And as for
this young Prince, who is come hither in quest of an earthly crown,
grant, O Lord, that he may speedily receive a crown of glory."
THE Scottish term "Wadset,"
meant that the mortgagee took into possession so much land as would
secure the principal and interest of the money lent, for which lie had
to give no account though there might be a surplus, but only to return
the lands to the former owner when the principal sum was paid off.
IN the Scots' Magazine
for July, 1802, there is a copy of a very curious crown grant, dated
11th July, 1487, by which James III confirms to Malice Doire (Malise
Dewar), an inhabitant of Strathfillan, in Perthshire, the peaceable
exercise and enjoyment of a relic of St. Fillan, called the Quegrich (Crozier)
which he and his predecessors are said to have possessed since the days
of Bruce. As the Quegrich was used to cure diseases, this document is,
probably, the most ancient Scottish patent ever granted for a quack
medicine.
THE relics of St. Andrew
which, tradition says, were brought into Scotland by Regulus, consisted
of: "One joint of the Saint's arm; item, three fingers of his right
hand; item, one tooth; item, one knee-pan." |
