Books and other items printed in Gaelic from 1871 to 1900 > Neniae

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evangelical effusions of MacRitohie ought to
receive some respect if not some consideration
on account of the purpose which they were
intended to serve by their publication. Their
religious intensity should be in their favour
which causes us to wonder at how little, com¬
paratively speaking, they have been relished. I
suspect the reason of their non-success is mostly
traceable to the fact, that they are laboured,
profuse, and generally dragging their slow lengths
along. There are many points of resemblance
between him and Farquharson, of whom
presently.
The poesy of the voluminous Mr. Farquharson
savours much of that “class which neither gods
nor men are said to permitI shrewdly think
his muse would pour forth her heart with far
greater lyric energy in honest prose than through
the restraining medium of measured syllables.
He possesses much of that emotional feeling
which is necessary for highly-coloured historic
composition; but his poetry is so utterly defici¬
ent in both subtilty of thought and subtilty
of expression that we are forced to the conclusion
that to him the sad “mechanic exercise of verse”
must be either unnatural or uncongenial. But
all Christion men must approve of the general
spirit and aim characteristic of Mr Farquhar-
sou’s poems, however strange his religious