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

INTRODUCTION. xlv
The family possessed the penny lands of Baleshear and the
son of the hero of this elegy was. called '■'■ Tighearn natn
peighinnean." Hugh, of Baleshear, and Captain Donald
Roy, his brother, were largely instrumental in assisting the
escape of Prince Charles from the Long Island after the
disastrous battle of CuUoden. A grandson of Hugh Mac-
Donald was Professor of Natural History in St. Andrews
and representatives of the famil)- still survive.
\\'e have concluded our review of the poems of John
INIacCodrum and think we are justified in placing a high
estimate on his genius. Critics have with good reason
considered that the absence of the tender passion — that
\\armth of sentiment which glows in the pages of Mac
Donald, Macintyre and Ross detracts from the fulness of
his poetic gifts. In all other respects he stands high in the
front rank of the poets of the last two centuries. If he
must needs come after the three just mentioned he does so
Certainly not lottgo mtervallo. If his flight be not as sustained
as MacDonald's or Macintyre's and if he be inferior in
emotional power to William Ross he is superior to the first
in sincerity, to the second in patriotic fervour, to the third
in ethical soundness, and to all in humour. If MacDonald's
is the more powerful imagination, if Macintyre's is a richer
descriptive art, and if Ross's is a wider and more cultured
sympathy with nature, MacCodrum has a keener eye for the
realities of life and he is more imbued than any of them
with that mental shrewdness which inspires the poetry of
common sense. Several of his poems entitle him to an
undoubted place among the greatest masters of Gaelic verse.