Storm-bound on Mingulay

Ruairidh an Rùma / Roderick MacNeil

A topic and a name mentioned previously in this blog is that of Carmichael’s visit to  Mingulay and also that of the tradition bearer Roderick MacNeil, styled Ruairidh an Rùma (c. 1790–1875), so-called ‘from a hogshead of rum he found on the shore and from the contents of which he nearly died’. Alexander Carmichael visited the remote island of Mingulay on more than one occasion and in September 1871 he found himself there in company of his folklore mentor, John Francis Campbell. Whilst storm-bound for a three whole days, Campbell took the opportunity to sketch MacNeil and Carmichael wrote down some traditions from this excellent tradition bearer. An account written by Campbell says ‘Rory Rum the story man about 85 the best climber in Minglay till he got past work…He never wore shoes or stockings, never had a bonnet on his head till some years ago and how is crippled by the Rheumatism and stoops over a longs stick.’ MacNeil’s knowledge of birds, their habitats and behaviour must have been phenomenal given his many years of actively taking part in bird-fowling. Here is but one example that Carmichael noted down from MacNeil’s recitation about the langaid or guillemot:

Incident in Langai[d] – bird life. A Lang[aid] came
with a siolag and herring and left these with its
peite and left. Another came with the same
to its own peite which was young. The big
pet did not con[sume] what was given it and the
parent bird of the little pet with [went] over
and took the siol[ag] and the her[ring] over to its own pet
and left. The par[ent] bird of the big pet re[turned] and
foun[d] that its pet had nothing. The pet and
bird chattered for a moment after
which the pa[rent] bird went over to the small pet
took it up in its bill gave it a fierce shake
and threw it with the pre[cipice]! An old wom[an]
in Miulay has a pet gull 7 ye[ars] It goes am[ong]
all the house[s] in the place can un[derstand]
all said to it – and do what is said to it.

Reference:

CW114/41, f. 67v.

Image: Ruairidh an Rùma as sketched by John Francis Campbell. Courtesy of the Trustees of the National Library of Scotland (NLS Adv.MS.50.4.6, f. 119v).

The Old Woman of the Mill-Dust

Cailleach

A 6/8 jig still popular amongst musicians, especially pipers, is Cailleach an Dùdain (‘The Old Woman of the Mill-Dust’). Alexander Carmichael notes down three versions of a port-à-beul (mouth music) that accompany this tune but they all appear to be unfortunately rather fragmentary. The most complete version is given at the very end of one of his longest fieldwork notebooks (CW120):

An toir thu do nighean domh
Chailleach an dudain?
An toir thu do nighean domh
Chailleach an Dudain?
An toir thu do nighean domh
Dheanainns mire rithe
Ghleusainn fiodha[l] dhi
S dhannsainn cridheil rithe
Chailleach an dudain!
&c &c

Elsewhere in Carmina Gadelica, Carmichael has a long note about the curious ‘resurrection’ dance which accompanied the playing of this jig:

One dance is called, ‘Cailleach an Dudain,’ carlin of the mill-dust. This is a curious character-dance. The writer got it performed for him several times.

It is danced by a man and a woman. The man has a rod in his right hand, variously called ‘slachdan druidheachd,’ druidic wand, ‘slachdan geasachd,’ magic wand. The man and the woman gesticulate and attitudinise before one another, dancing round and round, in and out, crossing and recrossing, changing and exchanging places. The man flourishes the wand over his own head and over the head of the woman, whom lie touches with the wand, and who fills down, as if dead, at his feet. He bemoans his dead ‘carlin,’ dancing and gesticulating round her body. He then lifts up her left hand, and looking into the palm, breathes upon it, and touches it with the wand. Immediately the limp hand becomes alive and moves from side to side and up and down. The man rejoices, and dances round the figure on the floor. And having done the same to the right hand, and to the left and right foot in succession, they also become alive and move. But although the limbs are living, the body is still inert. The man kneels over the woman and breathes into her mouth and touches her heart with the wand. The woman comes to life and springs up, confronting the man. Then the two dance vigorously and joyously as in the first part. The tune varies with the varying phases of the dance.

It is played by a piper or a fiddler, or sung as a ‘port-a-bial,’ mouth tune, by a looker-on, or by the performers themselves. The air is quaint and irregular, and the words are curious and archaic. In his West Highland Tales Iain F. Campbell of Islay mentions that he saw ‘cailleach an dudain’ danced in the house of Lord Stanley of Alderley. He does not say by whom it was danced, but probably it was by the gifted narrator himself. In October 1871, Mr. Campbell spent some time with the writer and his wife in Uist. When driving him to Lochmaddy, at the conclusion of his stay, I mentioned that there were two famous dancers of ‘cailleach an dudain’ at Clachan-a-ghluip. We went to their bothy, but they were away. The neighbours told us that they were in the direction of Lochmaddy. When we reached there we went in search of them, but were unsuccessful. Some hours afterwards, as I was coming up from the shore after seeing Mr. Campbell on board the packet for Dunvegan, I saw the two women racing down the hill, their long hair and short dresses flying wildly in tlie wind. They had heard that we had been inquiring for them. But it was too late. The packet, with Mr. Campbell on board, was already hoisting her sails and heaving her anchor.

With regard to the name of the jig itself the cailleach may well refer to the Corn Dolly or Maiden, the last sheaf to be taken in from the harvest which in some regions of the Highlands and Islands was referred to as the cailleach. And if this is the case then the dust even on the mill floor could still retain the spirit of grain. Perhaps the ‘resurrection’ dance associated with the tune can be interpreted as mimicking the life, death and rebirth of the cailleach while she is meant to represent the spirit of the grain.

References:

Carmina Gadelica, pp. 206–07.

CW120/344, f. 100v.

Image:

Cailleach.

An Tuairisgeul Mòr – An Epic Tale

One of the stories that was prized above all by reciters was an epic one known as An Tuairisgeul Mòr, sometimes translated as ‘The Chief Story’. Unsurprisingly, this tale has been much sought after by collectors of Gaelic folklore and has been recorded and published on numerous occasions. In a marginal note, dated 11 November 1883, by John Francis Campbell in his copy of The Scottish Celtic Review he writes: ‘This story is considered to be one of the first class by story tellers all over the far west. This version is rather shortened [Gregorson Campbell’s Tiree version] and made reasonable by my friend the Minister but so far as it goes it is good and genuine.’ John Francis Campbell was in a position to know for the had printed versions of this tale in his Popular Tales of the West Highlands some two decades previously.

Here, John Ewen (Iain Eòghann) MacRury, from Torlum, Benbecula, provides a social context (and perhaps even a rather romanticised one) for the telling of this particular tale. The man name-checked as being ‘a famous old piper’ was Donald MacDougall, styled Dòmhnall Bàn Dùghallach (c. 1813–1893), a joiner by trade and a resident of Creagorry in Benbecula. The old man passed the tale on to his son, John, who settled at Crinan Canal and plied his trade as a steamer skipper on the Clyde. Perhaps in order to pass the time he might have even regaled his crew with this very story. It looks as if neither of these two men were actually recorded telling this particular tale but, fortunately, many others were such as those collected in South Uist, Eigg, Tiree, and Islay during the nineteenth century. The story was still evidently in circulation for it was collected by Calum Iain Maclean and John Lorne Campbell from Duncan MacDonald of South Uist in 1947 and 1950 respectively as well as also being recorded from Alick Stewart then residing at the Muir of Ord in 1953.

Tuaireasgeul Mor.
How he was put to death or how
he went to death, was a wonder-
ful tale. I heard old men well
versed in folk-lore say that it wo[u]ld
take a good reciter seven winter long
nights from beul na hoi[dh]che dusk
to Gairm-chailleach cock-crowing
to repeat it in full. In olden times
they used to meet, heads of families
in an appointed place to hear it re-
cited. It was divide[d] into chapters
and each chapter would take a whole
night. Domhnull Ban Dughallach
Donald Macdougall a famous old
piper of the MacCrimmon school
was considered the best reciter
of his day. His son John who
left Benbecula about thirty
years ago and settled down at Crinan
Canal could recite it word for
word, but not with the same
emphasis as his father.
John is still living and one
of his sons is Skipper of one of
the Clutha steamer up & down
on the Clyde. 1895

References:
CW1, fos. 109r–110v
Campbell, John Gregorson, ‘West Highland Tale: How the Tuairsigeul Mor was put to Death’, The Scottish Celtic Review, no. 1 (1881), pp. 61–77.
Macperson, Donald C., [=Abrach], ‘An Tuairisgeal’, An Gàidheal (1875), pp. 303–10.
MacKay, John, ‘An Tuairisgeal’, The Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness, vol. XXXIV (1927–28), pp. 1–112.
Duncan MacDonald’s recitation of An Tuairisgeul Mòr recorded by John Lorne Campbell:
http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/en/fullrecord/24966/1

Image: Illustration from Campbell’s Popular Tales of the West Highlands (though not of the Tuairisgeul Mòr!)

Ruairidh an Rùma enjoys a good old cup of tea

Hector Maclean (1818–1893), the Islay schoolteacher then collecting in the Outer Hebrides for his friend and youthful companion, the Victorian polymath that was John Francis Campbell of Islay (1821–1885), wrote him a letter from Castlebay, Barra, on the 30 September 1860. In this fascinating account Maclean describes his recent expedition that had taken him to Mingulay and, most importantly, his meeting with Roderick MacNeil (c. 1790–1875), Ruairidh mac Dhòmhnaill, better known perhaps under his moniker Ruairidh an Rùma ‘from his having found at some time 3 hogsheads of rum on the shore’:

I was over at Minglay last week and saw Roderick McNeill who is so celebrated among the people here as a story teller. I have written several of his tales which appear to me to be remarkable for vivid and pointed dialogue. He is an animated and spirited old man and though crippled to a certain extent by rheumatism his vivacity is not the least damped and the vigorous activity of his mind is not the least impaired 74 and not a trace of dotage. He hobbles about bareheaded and barefooted and is said not to have worn shoes for the last fifty years. He tells his tales with extraordinary effect being a capital natural elocutionist using pause emphasis gesture and inflection of the voice to express passion sentiment and character fully as well as though he had been trained by some of the best actors of the day. His Gaelic is excellent but his style is of the plain simple kind. He has obviously an aversion to anything obscure or mystical and gives a clearness and reality to the greatest extravagance […] He has many tales borrowed from other sources than Highland but he gives them all a Highland form.

Some seven years later on 8 August 1867, Alexander Carmichael also met this famed tradition bearer – although he seems to have aged considerably during the intervening years – and notes down an amusing anecdote about him:

Ruary an Ruma. Strange. The school
servant gave him a cup of tea. He de
clared that once and but once only
did he ever taste tea before. Is there
another man of 88 in Britain who can
say the same? I asked him how did
he like the tea. M anamsa Dhia gu
bheil gle mhath. Ach bu cho mhath
liom an siucar eir uisge teth ris
a so! Nach bu mhath luidh mhic
Righ B[h]reitean seach an seo? Amen.

Although tea was perhaps not so much of a luxury item as it had once been in the Highlands and Islands it appears that it was still relatively scarce in Mingulay. On the other hand perhaps Ruairidh an Rùma may have preferred a tipple of the drink from which he earned his nickname rather than a good old cup of tea.

References:
NLS Adv. MS 50.2.1. fo. 226
CW MS 114, fo. 77r
Image: Cup of tea

A perfume of fragrant peat emanating from every page

One of the most exciting developments for scholars and academics in recent years is the ever-increasing number of out of copyright books being digitised and put online. This allows people worldwide not just to access often obscure texts, but to examine and compare individual copies. Staff at the National Library of Scotland have done a magnificent job making available much of their Gaelic material online at archive.org, including the collection of one of Carmichael’s most influential mentors John Francis Campbell (1821–1885). Campbell was an inveterate – and in the privacy of his own library often somewhat irascible – annotator of books, and his marginalia offer precious, and occasionally amusing, insights into the life and opinions of one of the key figures in the history of Gaelic folklore collecting.

Among Campbell’s volumes is a rather tatty copy of the Gaelic poetry anthology Sean Dàin agus Òrain Ghàidhealach (Perth, 1786), known as the Gillies Collection after its publisher John Gillies. This is clearly the copy Campbell refers to in the fourth volume of the Popular Tales of the West Highlands, where he uses it to estimate how popular the heroic Fenian ballads contained in it had been with its many readers:

On procuring a very dirty, torn, thumbed copy from Glasgow, with many names scribbled over it, and a perfume of fragrant peat emanating from every page, I set myself to consider whether dirt might not be an index to the modern reader’s taste; and by sight and smell it soon appeared that the heroic age had passed from the Firth of Clyde, where I had found none of the old poems.

Contemporary popular songs in the book, Campbell finds, are ‘nearly worn out’, ‘fairly torn to shreds’ with reading and re-reading; the heroic pieces, on the other hand, languish ‘nearly clean’, ‘nearly white’.

The copy is also of interest to us because of the young man to whom Campbell lent it. A note on the flyleaf explains the tale:

This copy was got from me by Archibald Sinclair an Islay man, Printer in Glasgow. It was so battered that I got it mended by a binder in Kensington. I lent it to Alexander Carmichael one of the Collectors of Popular Tales of the West Highlands, who took it with him to Uist; where I had asked him to collect stories. He lent it to Mr Clerk of Kilmallie who in 1870 published a new edition of Ossian at the expense of Lord Bute. Hearing of my book I wrote for it, and got it back this day, after no end of correspondence with Carmichael, Clerk, Murdoch &c, in Uist, Inverness, Kilmallie &c.

J.F. Campbell. January 23d 1871.

It is tempting to surmise that it is to the Gillies Collection that Carmichael is referring in an artless admission he makes in a letter written on 6 January 1869 to Clerk concerning a transcription of the poem Laoidh Chlann Uisne taken down from Donald MacPhee, the smith in Breubhaig, Barra, on 15 March 1867:

In transcribing this poem I did so as much as I could from memory without looking at my Sgialac book more than I could avoid being in a hurry at the time. It is therefore possible I may in some instances have inserted the words of the printed book.

Laoidh Chlann Uisne appears on pp. 260–7 of the Gillies Collection.

Image: Rev. Archibald Clerk of Kilmallie (1813–1887), who frequently referred to Campbell’s copy of the Gillies Collection in his edition of The Poems of Ossian (2 vols, Edinburgh: Blackwood & Sons, 1870).

References: Campbell’s copy of the Gillies collection is referenced as NLS Campbell 2.e.21, online at www.archive.org/details/seandainagusorai03gill

CW MS 103 fo.17v.
John Francis Campbell, Popular Tales of the West Highlands iv (Edinburgh: Edmonston & Douglas, 1862), 118–19.

Memorial to John Francis Campbell (2 June 1887)

Leaving Edinburgh on 31 May 1887, Carmichael made his way to Greenock to catch the ferry over to Islay. On the steamer he met Lord Lorne (Lord Archibald Campbell) and found him to be ‘pleasant & friendly’. Carmichael had been invited to the unveiling of a memorial to commemorate John Francis Campbell of Islay, or Iain Òg Ìle, who had passed away in Cannes some two years previously at the age of sixty-four. With characteristic modesty Carmichael wrote: ‘The inauguration of the monument to Iain Og Ile went off yesterday most splendidly. Great concourses of people. Fine dinner handsomely done and good speaking afterwards except by myself. Mine – Celtic Literature – was a bungled affair.’ The other speakers at this event were Lord Lorne, Hector Maclean and a Captain Campbell.
Since volunteering to work on a project that would later see the light of day as Popular Tales of the West Highlands (1860–62), Carmichael had known the late John Francis Campbell for over twenty years.
A subscription by the Islay association raised £300 (worth around £158500 in 2009) and a D. Haggart, a Glasgow sculptor, was commissioned to design the memorial in the form of an obelisk.
On that day the monument was inaugurated on the summit of Cnoc na Dàl, near to Islay House, in Bridgend. Two inscriptions, one in English and the other in Gaelic read:

John Francis Campbell
of Islay
an Eminent Celtic Scholar, Linguist, Scientist and Traveller.
A true and patriotic Highlander.
Loved alike by Peer and Peasant.
By his “Popular Tales of the West Highlands,”
“Leabhar na Feinne,”
and other literary works,
he preserved and rendered classic the
Folk-lore of the Scottish Highlands
He lies buried at Cannes, in France:
his memory lives in the hearts of his countrymen
Born 1821 Died 1885

Iain Og Ile, fìor Ghàidheal, sàr-dhuin’-uasal, agus àrd sgoileir, a choisinn urram agus cliù anns gach cearn. Ged nach do shealbhaich e oighreachd aithrichean, shealbhaich e gràdh nan Ileach, agus bithidh a chuimhne buan-mhaireann am measg Chlanna nan Gàidheal.

“An sòlas togar suas an càrn
Gun deòir gu làr mu chloich nan treun,
Sona an t-òg treun a thriall,
Mu’n cluinnear cliù fo chiar a’ Bhàis.”—Ossian.

A translation of which may be rendered:

Young John of Islay, a true Gael, a real gentleman, and a gifted scholar, who won honour and fame in very clime. Although he did not inherit the estate of his forefathers, he inherited the love of Islaymen, and his memory will be long-lasting among the Gaels.

“With gladness let the cairn be raised,
No tears upon its stone will fall
For happy is the brave now gone,
Whose virtues shine through Death’s dark pall.”

A fitting memorial and dedication for a man who loomed so large not only in Carmichael’s career but also in those of many others.

References: 

CW 89, fos. 1r –2r.
The Scotsman (02/06/1887), p. 7.
Image: John Francis Campbell’s Memorial, Islay.