brary in
Edinburgh contains a number of MSS. probably written in Scotland between
1400 and 1600, but with one exception the language is Irish.

"Book of the Dean of Lismore."

The solitary exception just mentioned is the famous codex known as the
_Book of the Dean of Lismore_. The pieces contained in this volume are
written in the crabbed current Roman hand of the period, and the
orthography is phonetic, both of which facts render the deciphering of
this valuable MS. a task of supreme difficulty. The contents of this
quarto volume of 311 pages are almost entirely verse compositions
collected and written down by Sir James Macgregor, dean of Lismore in
Argyllshire, and his brother Duncan, between the years 1512 and 1526. A
disproportionate amount of space is allotted to the compositions of
well-known Irish bards such as Donnchadh Mor O'Daly (d. 1244),
Muiredhach Albanach (c. 1224), Tadhg Og O'Higgin (d. 1448), Diarmaid
O'Hiffernan, Torna O'Mulconry (d. 1468). But native bards are also
represented. We can mention Allan Mac Rorie, Gillie Calum Mac an Ollav,
John of Knoydart, who celebrates the murder of the young lord of the
isles by his Irish harper in 1490, Finlay MacNab, and Duncan Macgregor,
the transcriber of the greater part of the volume. The poems of the
last-mentioned writer are in praise of the Macgregors. A few other poems
are by Scottish authors such as Campbell, Knight of Glenorchy (d. 1513),
the earl of Argyll and Countess Isabella. A number consist of satires on
women. These Scottish writers are still under the influence of Irish
metric, and regularly employ the four-lined stanza. They do not appear
to adhere to the stricter Irish measures, but delight rather in the
freer forms going by the name of _oglachas_. The Irish rules for
alliteration and rhyme are not rigidly observed.

The linguistic peculiarities of the Dean's Book await investigation, but
among the pieces which represent the Scottish vernacular of the day are
the _Ossianic Ballads_. These, twenty-eight in number, extend to upwards
of 2500 lines, and form by far the most important part of the
collection. Thus the Dean's Book was compiled a full hundred years
before the earliest similar collection of heroic ballads was made in
Ireland. In Scotland the term Ossianic is used loosely of both the
Ulster and the Fenian cycles, and it may be as well to state that three
of the pieces in the volume deal with Fraoch, Conlaoch and the Bloody
Rout of Co