Blair Collection > Selections from the Gaelic bards

ALEXANDER MACD0NAL1X 1 3
With a mighty grasp and manful ;
Stretch your bones and stretch your sinews ;
Leave her track in light behind you,
Stepping proudly.
Leave her track, &c.
Give a gleesome bout and lively ;
Stoutly rousing one another,
With this dainty boat-song chanted
By your fore-oar.
With this dainty boat-song, &c.
Raise the foam-bells round the tholepins,
Till your hands are bare and blister'd,
And the oars themselves are twisted
In the strong waves.
And the oars themselves, &c.
Let your brows be hotly lighted;
Heed not should your palms get skinless,
And the huge drops from your forehead
Fast be falling.
And the huge drops, &c.
Bend, and stretch, and draw, young gallants,
Your shafts of fir, in hue light grey;
And pass with heed the wild rough currents
Whirling briny.
And pass with heed, &c
Let your set of oars, full sweeping,
Mash the great sea with their vigour,
Going splashing in the wild face
Of the billows.
Going splashing, &c.
Row together, clean and steady,
Cleaving the great swelling water.