J. F. Campbell Collection > Transactions of the Ossianic Society > Volume 5

at table, were always at his service. Thus he lived to a
good old age, feared for his satirical powers, but respected
for his virtues. He has left behind some songs and sar-
castic verses, but none of them above mediocrity."
We are informed by Keating and Walker, that the conduct
of the Bards as a congregated body had, at various times,
become so intolerable to the people, that they demanded of
the state the banishment of the whole order. The first
instance recorded of their oppression occurred in the reign
of Achy the Third, who resolved on their expulsion ; but
Conor Mac Neasa, King of Ulster about the beginning
of the Christian era, a friend to the learned in general,
but to the bards in particular, interposed his mediation
and moderated the rage of the people.
The conduct of the Bards (says Keating) continued
irreprehensible from the death of Conor Mac Neasa till
Fiachaidh mounted the throne of Ulster. Then, and once
again in the reign of Maolcoba, who governed the same
province, the hand of the monarch was raised to chastise
them, but they were shielded from the impending stroke
by those generous princes, who invited and kindly received
them into their dominions.
Invested (says Walker,) with honours, wealth and power ;
endowed with extraordinary privileges, which no other sub-
jects presumed to claim ; possessed of an art, which, by
soothing the mind, acquires an ascendency over it ; respected
by the great for their learning, and reverenced, almost to
adoration, by the vulgar, for their knowledge of the secret
composition, and hidden harmony of the universe, — the
Bards became, in the reign of Hugh, intolerably insolent
and corrupted, and their order a national grievance.
They arrogantly demanded the golden buckle and pin,
which fastened the royal robes on the Monarch's breast,
and had been for many generations the associate of the