LACHLAN MOR MACVURICH.—This senachie and bard to the Clanranald is the author of one of the most extraordinary poems in Gaelic or in any language. He was of the family of the famous Muireadhach Albannach. He accompanied Donald, Lord of the Isles, at the battle of Harlaw, in 1411, and rehearsed his poem to animate the followers of the Islay chief. This war-song or battle-incitement (Stewart’s Collection) consists of three hundred and thirty-eight lines. The theme of the production is “O, children of Conn of the Hundred Fights! remember hardihood in the time of battle.” Round this subject Lachlan Mòr has gathered some six hundred and fifty adverbial adjectives, arranged alphabetically, and every one of them bearing specially and martially on the great theme of the song. There is nothing in the poem but these adjectives, which certainly in themselves are not very poetical; but rehearsed unhesitatingly from a good memory “in all their astonishing alliterative array by a ready speaker gifted with a strong and sensitive voice, they could not but have offered a rare opportunity for impetuous, vehement, and effective declamation.” It may be remarked here, _en passant_, that there is no decisive evidence for the assertions of historians that Donald of Islay lost that battle. He claimed the victory; but even although it were more decided it would be equally barren of important results. It is also a misconception of the character of the forces engaged when it is said that one side was Celtic and the other Saxon, and that it was a struggle for race supremacy. There were many Gaels on the other side also, just as there were in the last battle fought on British ground—that of Culloden. THE FOUR WISE MEN.—One of the most interesting poems in the _Book of the Dean of Lismore_ is a dialogue between four men who are supposed to stand at the grave of Alexander the Great. It appears to be somewhat older than the fifteenth or sixteenth century. It illustrates the strong masculine character of those earlier ballads, where sense is not buried under a heap of verbiage. Whoever the author was, he was evidently a man of sound judgment and cultured common sense. Being of more than average merit in the original, the poem bears translation better than other inferior productions in the Dean’s Book. It has been excellently done by the late Mr Thomas Pattison, and I avail myself of his version. It is very interesting to read the moralisings of Highlanders some five hundred years ago. Four wise men met beside the grave Where the Prince of Greece was laid— The mightiest Alexander; And these true words they said:— “But yesterday, to serve his need, The world’s great host would rise; And there, alas!” the first man said, “To-day he lonely lies.” “Proudly rode he on the earth Not many days bygone; And now the earth,” the second cried, “It rests on his breast bone.”