MAIRI NI’N ALASTAIR RUAIDH, who has been regarded by some as the first in point of time of the modern Gaelic bards, was born in Harris, in the Long Island, in 1569, and died at Dunvegan, Isle of Skye, in 1674, at the extraordinary age of 105 years. She received no education, yet her poetry is characterised by boldness, freshness, and originality. The metres she uses are often complicated and unusual; but the native melody of her song and the pathetic character of her conceptions render her poetry very enjoyable reading. She was a well-known visitor among her neighbours, who generally rallied her by references to a beverage stronger than water. Pattison translates a song she composed on her being banished from Dunvegan by the young chief of the MacLeods; who, on hearing her laudatory verses, sent a boat to bring back the affectionate poetess. Alone on the hill-top, sadly and silently Downward on Islay and over the sea I look, and I wonder how time hath deceived me— A stranger in Scarba, who ne’er thought to be. Ne’er thought it, my island, where rest the deep dark shade The grand mossy mountains for ages have made; God bless thee! and prosper thy chief of the sharp blade All over these islands his fame never fade! Never fade it, Sir Norman! for well ’tis the right Of thy name to win credit in counsel or fight— By wisdom, by shrewdness, by spirit, by might, By manliness, courage, by daring, by sleight. In counsel or fight, thy kindred know these should be thine— Branch of Lochlin’s wide-ruling and king-bearing line! And in Erin they know it, far over the brine; No Earl would in Albin thy friendship decline. The name of _Mairi ni’n Alastair Ruaidh_ has been affectionately remembered by many generations of Highlanders. JOHN MACDONALD.—This well-known Lochaber bard, called _Iain Lom_, or _bare_ John, was of the Keppoch family; lived in the reigns of Charles I. and II.; was a very old man about 1710.