Hew Morrison Collection > Poems and songs of John MacCodrum, Archibald MacDonald, and some of the minor Uist bards

XXVI INI KOnUCTION.
crann.'' " S e tha mi faighneachd co 's fear riaghlaidh ? "'
" 'I'ha "n stiùir."
It is told of Mac Codrum that he once went on a visit to
Kingsburgh, in Skye, and not being known to the domestics,
and, not having introduced himself, he was allowed for
some time to sit unnoticed in the kitchen. John may have
been a little out of humour at the non-recognition ; at any-
rate, on one of the servants, knowing that he had come
from Uist, and it being re])orted that the Clanranald of the
day was dead, asking him, " Nach do chaochail Mac-'Ic-
Ailein ?" John replied, " Mar do chaochail rinn iad an eucoir,
thiodhlaic iad e." After a while the same servant asked
him, "Ciod e cho fad "s a bha e os cionn talmhainn?"
" Bha tri fhichead bliadhna "s a deich." The girl felt insulted
- and no wonder — at these answers, and reported to her
mistress that the most impertinent man she ever saw was in
tlie kitchen. It was soon discovered that the stranger was
MacCodrum and the master and mistress, who were none
othL-r than Captain Allan MacDonald and the illustrious Flora,
was at once hospitably entertained. John was once enjoying
a neighbour's hospitality in the form of the simple but
wholesome diet of bread and milk. It seems, however, that
the ([uantity was meagre, and on seeing a fly alight on the
milk and getting drowned, the bard, who could not resist a
joke even in these circumstances, addressed the ill-fated fly
thus: — "A chreutair lei])idich a dhol'ga 'd' bhathadh fein
far a feudadh tu grunnachadh." "Ciive the man more milk,"
said his host, " Tha diol an arain a dh' annlan ann,"
;mswered U'hn.