Blair Collection > Selections from the Gaelic bards

ALEXANDER MACDONALD. 7
loose in their wildest fury, and terror is heaped on terror round
the good ship of Clan-Ranald, as she courses on her perilous way
from Uist to Carrickfergus ; and not until all her sails are rent, and
every board and plank in her are strained, does the poet Hag or
stop to draw breath, or let " the rough wind bitter boaster" —
"ruffle round her fair."
But though possessing many such notable points as the preced-
ing, though altogether so remarkable a production, so very
vigorous, so very characteristically Highland, " The Manning of
the Birlinn" may not possibly abound in some other qualities,
which are perhaps more attractive to the general reader than the
lavish display of strength, the mere powerful exertion of energetic
and robust faculties, can ever be.
The " Manning of the Birlinn" is here translated, line for line,
with the original. It is the longest poem in Gaelic, except such
as are Ossianic.