T. It is true for you. There is not much between hands with you.
N. Tim has not a great estimate on my work.
T. If I had a hedge to make, I think I would put black thorn or white thorn into it. I should even prefer a bush of furze to that willow. But what is this William Buckley is doing with his team of horses? What is the matter with you now, William? Is your plough broken?
W. No, Tim, but my whippletree is broken, and I am trying to put a gad upon it.
T. Stop! stop! William, you are putting it on the wrong way. Twist the gad off the end (pole) of the whippletree, and it will have the best grip. There! put a knot on it now."
C. Look, Tim, does not the sea look beautiful to-day. I don't know whence came that ship yonder.
T. She was not there yesterday. See, aroo, Carroll, is not the boat far from the stern of the ship?
C. It is, Tim, and well it has become you, the dán is finished by you, and my quart of beer won by me.
T. Is it mad you are, Carroll—what dán?
C. Listen to me. There is not long since you said to young Ned: “A bad hedge is the green willow.”
T. I said so, and there is not much poetry in the willow.
C. Then you shouted at him: “Don't put the withered sapling in the hedge.”
T. And where is the poetry in that much.
C. Have patience. You then said to William Buckley, “Twist the gad over the end of the whippletree,” and just now you said to me, “How far the boat is from the stern of the ship.” I myself never made a better dán than it. Look (he quotes the lines again).
T. By the deer! Carroll, there are no bounds to you. And it was out of my own mouth every word of it come. You have won the bet clean. Come ye along and let the drink go round. Look here, Carroll, I should think that jump was rather big from the end of the whippletree of the stern of the ship.
C. It was you that gave that jump. It was necessary for me to follow you.
T. Ambossa! you have scored again. There is no use in being at you.
A NEW GAELIC BOOK.
Cóir Fáilte re Fer do sgéil—p. 240.
Reliqiæ Celtiæ, vol. ii.—The second and concluding volume of Dr. Cameron’s unpublished papers is a volume of absorbing interest for all students of Gaelic literature. Like the first, it is edited by Mr. MacBain and the Rev. Mr. Kennedy, and forms a large and beautifully printed volume of 650 pages. The price is not indicated. Even our own large MSS. collections in Dublin have not, to my mind, such an attraction as the few but precious fragments—for many of them are very small—which are preserved in the MS. department of the Advocates’ Library in Edinburgh. Dr. Cameron transcribed much of the Gaelic there preserved, and his transcriptions are here published in full. Thus, the Argyllshire Turner MS. xiv. is given in pages 310-420. (The contents are all poetical, and almost all purely Scottish, except the fine cumha nam brathar (page 333), and some good Cuchullin fragments, and some proverbial philosophy). Pages 420-474 contain a version from same library of the “Sons of Usna,” already published in the Irische Texte. But by far the most valuable part is that (pp. 138-309) containing the “Book of Clanranald.”[1] There are two books of the name, similar in the character of their contents. Both were transcribed by the hereditary historians of Clanranald, descendant of Muireaḋaċ Albannaċ, so famous in the whole Gaelic world of the 13th century. Successive members of the family have recorded clan history down to the beginning of the 18th century, and thus in pp. 148-208 we have a rich treat of what ought to be regarded as the best classical Highland Gaelic. This part of the work is of the highest historical as well as literary value. The poetic contents of the books of Clanranald are various, and far more attractive than such collections usually are. The Fernaig MS. occupies pp. 1-137; it is a faithful copy of a MS. written in a rude, phonetic fashion in 16S8. Towards the end of the volume, pp. 475-523 are devoted to a collection of proverbs made by Dr. Cameron as a supplement to Nicholson’s great work. Last, but by no means least, we are given a number of Cameron’s lectures—literary, historical. and philological—which show that Dr. Cameron had realized the truth—that it is impossible to obtain a sure grasp of Highland Gaelic without a close acquaintance with the older Gaelic of the sister isle. The present volume is, I believe, the most valuable that has ever been published in the interests of Scottish Gaelic; it throws light on the past history of many a glen and dismantled fortress; it gives to the world some gems of Gaelic thought, and affords ample material for future work.
THE ANCIENT IRISH DIVISION OF THE YEAR.
(Continued.)
Whilst the division of the year into two main seasons prevailed in Erin for a long time—how long we do not know—it is quite certain that the sub-division into four quarters is also of ancient date, and was known in pagan times. The fact that the Welsh have hâf and gauaf—our saṁ and gaṁ—certainly points to a time when the Celts were one people, all alike dividing their year into SAM and GAM or SAMAS and GAMAS; but the fact that they have not our words for autumn and spring but others, proves as certainly that the sub-division into four seasons came later, when the Gaedhil and Cymry had separated, and had become two nations.
The Irish name for autumn or harvest is foġṁar, and for spring earraċ. Of these names I have never met with any adequate explanation; and if anyone has rightly explained them, or anticipated what I am going to say about them, I am not aware of it. I think I can show that the words themselves bear traces of their late formation.
Of foġṁar different explanations have been hazarded. O’Donovan took credit for suggesting it was the same as the Greek ὀπώρα, fruit-time. Philologically, nothing could be wilder than this comparison; but he quotes O’Clery’s Glossary as giving another origin: “foġṁar .i. foṫa mís n-gaiṁ,” i.e., foundation of the months of winter. Now, whether O’Clery himself, or some older writer, is to be credited with this guess, whoever started it seems to have got nearer the truth than any one else I
- ↑ Clanranald (in Gaelic Claun Raghnaill, or children of Ragnall, a Scandinavian chief). In the same way is derived the family name MacRaghnaill, now anglicised Magrannel, Grannell, or Crangle, and often (especially in County Longford) changed into Reyolds.
