ghteenth
centuries. The new school, which abandoned the old rules and whose
inspiration is now personal, now patriotic, is represented by
_caoine_ (keens or laments), _abran_ (hymns), or _aislingi_
(visions), composed, among others, by Geoffrey Keating (d. c. 1650),
David O'Bruadair (c. 1625-1698), Egan O'Rahilly (c. 1670-c. 1734),
John MacDonnell (1691-1754), William O'Heffernan (fl. 1750), John
O'Tuomy (1706-1775), and Andrew MacGrath (d. c. 1790). The greatest
of the eighteenth century Irish poets was Owen Roe O'Sullivan (c.
1748-1784), whose songs were sung everywhere, and who, in the opinion
of his editor, Father Dinneen, is the literary glory of his country
and deserves to be ranked among the few supreme lyric poets of all
time.

If, in order to study the subjects treated by the poets, we lay aside
didactic poetry and confine ourselves to the ancient poems from the
seventh to the eleventh century, we shall find in the latter a
singular variety. They were at first dialogues or monologues, now
found incorporated with the sagas, of which they may have formed the
original nucleus. Thus, in the _Voyage of Bran_, we have the account
of the Isles of the Blessed and the discourse of the King of the Sea;
in the _Expedition of Loegaire MacCrimthainn_, the brilliant
description of the fairy hosts; in _The Death of the Sons of Usnech_,
the touching farewell of Deirdre to the land of Scotland and her
lamentation over the dead bodies of the three warriors; and in the
_Lay of Fothard Canann_, the strange and thrilling speech of the dead
lover, returning after the battle to the tryst appointed by his
sweetheart. Other poems seem never to have figured in a saga, like
the Song of Crede, daughter of Guaire, in which she extols the memory
of her friend Dinertach, and the affecting love-scenes between Liadin
and Curithir; or like the bardic songs designed to distribute praise
or blame: the funeral panegyric on King Niall, in alternate verses,
the song of the sword of Carroll, and the satire of MacConglinne
against the monks of Cork.

Religious poetry comprised lyric fragments, which were introduced
into the lives of the saints and there formed a kind of Christian
saga, or else were based on Holy Writ, like the _Lamentation of Eve_;
hymns in honor of the saints, like _The Hymn to St. Michael_, by Mael
Isu; pieces such as the famous Hymn of St. Patrick; and philosophic
poems like that keen analysis of the flight of thought which date