itation of the boat-song has been rendered
familiar to the English reader by Sir Walter Scott, in the "Roderigh
Vich Alpine Dhu, ho! ieroe," of the "Lady of the Lake." The _Luineag_,
or favourite carol of the Highland milkmaid, is a class of songs
entirely lyrical, and which seldom fails to please the taste of the
Lowlander. Burns[22] and other song-writers have adopted the strain of
the _Luineag_ to adorn their verses. The _Cumha_, or lament, is the
vehicle of the most pathetic and meritorious effusions of Gaelic poetry;
it is abundantly interspersed with the poetry of Ossian.

Among the Gael, blank verse is unknown, and for rhyme they entertain a
passion.[23] They rhyme to the same set of sounds or accents for a space
of which the recitation is altogether tedious. Not satisfied with the
final rhyme, their favourite measures are those in which the middle
syllable corresponds with the last, and the same syllable in the second
line with both; and occasionally the final sound of the second line is
expected to return in every alternate verse through the whole poem. The
Gael appear to have been early in possession of these coincidences of
termination which were unknown to the classical poets, or were regarded
by them as defects.[24] All writers on Celtic versification, including
the Irish, Welsh, Manx, and Cornish varieties, are united in their
testimony as to the early use of rhyme by the Celtic poets, and agree in
assigning the primary model to the incantations of the Druids.[25] The
lyrical measures of the Gael are various, but the scansion is regular,
and there is no description of verse familiar to English usage, from the
Iambic of four syllables, to the slow-paced Anapaestic, or the prolonged
Alexandrine, which is not exactly measured by these sons and daughters
of song.[26] Every poetical composition in the language, however
lengthy, is intended to be sung or chanted. Gaelic music is regulated by
no positive rules; it varies from the wild chant of the battle-song to
the simple melody of the milkmaid. In Johnson's "Musical Museum,"
Campbell's "Albyn's Anthology," Thomson's "Collection," and Macdonald's
"Airs," the music of the mountains has long been familiar to the curious
in song, and lover of the national minstrelsy.[27]

[1] We are indebted for these observations on the Highland Muse to the
learned friend who has supplied the greater number of the translations
from the Gaelic poets, which appear in the present w