Ossian Collection > Selections from the Gaelic bards

12
MACGREGOR'S LULLABY.
"On the sixteenth of June, 1552, says the curate of Fortingall,
Duncan Macgregor and his sons, Gregor and Malcohn Roy, were
beheaded by Colin Campbell of Glenurchy, Campbell of Glenlyon,
andMenziesof Rannoch." — "Sketches of early Scottish History,"
page 355, &c. The authoress of the following ballad was a
daughter of Colin Campbell of Glenurchy, and the wife of Gregor
Macgregor, whose death she so feelingly laments. The Black
Duncan mentioned was her brother. He was called " Donachadh
dubh a Churaichd," or Black Duncan of the Cowl, from some
peculiar head-dress he was in the habit of wearing, and in which
it is said he is represented in his picture still preserved at
Taymouth Castle. This chief, the seventh laird of Glenruchy, was
a man of some mark in his day. He played his part in the fierce
politics of the time, and managed his own estate, as is seen from
contemporary records, in a very businesslike and careful manner.
Like his unfortunate sister, however, he had also something of a
finer turn. " Black Duncan," says Professor Innes, " had a taste
for books — read history and romance — and is not quite free from
a suspicion of having dabbled in verse himself." Although his
sister does not spare him in her denunciation of her kindred, he
must have been quite scatheless of causing her sufferings, for he
appears to have been only seven years old when Gregor Macgregor
was executed. Duncan Laideus, alias Macgregor, father of this
Gregor, has had his name, some time or other, put at the head of
an interesting old Scottish Poem, from which Professor Innes gives
some very pleasing extracts. It is called " Duncan Laideus, alias
Macgregor's Testament," and is " found written on the blank
leaves at the end of one of the]copies of the romance of Alexander,"
a favourite book with " Black Duncan of the Cowl."