An historical account of the Macdonnells of Antrim : including notices of some other septs, Irish and Scottish

Front matter

Go M. LJ

GENEALOGY

COLLECTION

Contents

Pages. [ — 20

I. Princes of the Isles,

II. The Lords of Isla and the Antrim Glynns, 21—45

Chapter I. Princes Of The Isles

|UR best genealogists, Mac Firbis and O'Flaherty, represent the Macdonnells (i) as descended from an Irish prince, named Colla, and surnamed Uaish, or the ' Noble,' the eldest of three distinguished brothers, who lived in the earlier part of the fourth century. These brothers were the sons of Eochaidh Doimhlein, brother of the king, and Aileach, daughter of Ubdaire, king of Alba. The coming of this Scottish princess to Ireland, and her subsequent residence in the palace of Aileach, so called after her name, are celebrated in a very ancient Irish poem. The poet describes the princess as " a mild, true woman, modest, blooming, till the love of the Gael disturbed her, and she passed with him from the midst of Chind-Tiri (Cantire) to the land of Uladh." Her palace of Aileach, in the present county of Donegal, became the residence of the Northern Ui Neill princes, and continued to be occupied as such almost to the time of the English invasion. (2) The names of her warlike and ambitious sons were Cairell, Muredhach, and Aedh, although they are more familiarly known in history as the three Collas. (3) Assisted by their kinsmen and allies on the opposite shores of the North Channel, (4) they were able to form a powerful political combination, which, in the year 327, placed the eldest brother, Colla Uaish, on the throne of Ireland. He only held this position, however, for the space of four years, when he was compelled to give way before the claims of a more powerful cousin. Being soon afterwards reconciled to the reigning monarch,

(I) Macdonnells. — Throughout the following pages, this surname will be written as above, except in extracts from books, or manuscripts, where the orthography of the writers themselves will be strictly preserved. The original form of the name is Domhnaill, pronounced exactly Donndl, and so written by our best Gaelic scholars. Sir James Macdonnell, the last in the male line of the lords of Isla and Cantire, spelled his surname Makdonall.

The old families of Keppoch and Glengarry have abandoned the use of the final d, and now adopt the more correct orthography. Scottish writers, however, continue the use of it, without attempting to account for its introduction. See Gregory's History of the Western Highlands and Isles of Scotland, pp. 85, 417.

(2) Invasion. — See the Ordnance Memoir of the Parish of Templeiiwn; pp. 224 — 228; Book of Rights, translated and edited by O'Donovan, p. 120 ; Cambrensis Eversus, translated and edited by Kelly, vol. i., p. 489.

(3) Three Collas.- Colla, surnamed Uaish,oi the 'Noble,' because he had worn the crown ; Colla, surnamed Meann, or the ' Stammerer;' and Colla. surnamed da Chrioch, a phrase sometimes written FSchri, and translated 'earthy,' or 'clay-like.' See Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History, p. 72.

(4) Channel. — The North Channel was anciently known as Sruth-na-Maoile, ' the Current of the Moyle, or Mull;' more correctly, Srulhar-na-MaiU Chinntiri, ' the Current of the Mull of Cantire.' This is probably the earliest recorded name of the strait referred to. See Book of Leinster, as quoted by O'Curry in the Atlantis, vol. iv., p. 122.

Colla Uaish and his brothers were commissioned to lead an expedition against the Ultomans, or men of Ulster, and were granted as much territory as they might be able to wrest from the enemy. In this expedition they were successful, having completely defeated the Ultonians at the great battle of Achaidh-Leith-Derg, in Fearnmhaigh, now Farney, a district in the present county of Monaghan. Fergus, the king of Ulster, was slain, and his shattered forces, pursued by " their victorious enemies, were driven over Glenrighe (the valley of the Newry Water) into the district which now forms the counties of Down and Antrim, from which they never after returned. The Collas destroyed Emania, and then took the whole of that part of Ulster now forming the modern counties of Armagh, Louth, Monaghan, and Fermanagh, into their own hands, as swordland ; and it was held by their descendants, the Maguires, Mac Mahons, O'Hanlons, and others, down to the confiscation of Ulster under the English King, James I." (5)

Of the descendants of Colla Uaish, perhaps the most distinguished were his great-grandsons, Loam, Angus, and Fergus, who, about the year 506, permanently laid the foundation of the Dalriadic kingdom in Scotland. (6) These leaders were the sons of Eire, " and partly possessors of Dalriada," an ancient principality on the Antrim coast, which extended from the Bush-foot to the village of Glynn, near Lame, and from which the Irish colonists went forth. (7) It is not to be supposed that all these emigrants, or indeed many of them, originally belonged to this territory, but they assembled here, and sailed from the most convenient ports along its shore, — one of which rl. — See Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish ' ely changed the

(5) >

History, pp. 72, 73. This invasion

aspect of affairs in the North. "Until the year 332," says Dr. Reeves, " Uladh or Ulster denoted a province nearly as large as the name now imports, and the palace of its rulers was at n-Eamhain, or Emania, now the Navan, near Armagh." Tighernach states that "the three Collas afterwards destroyed Eanihain Macha, and the Ultonians did not dwell in it from that out; and they took from them their kingdom (rom Lough Neagh out [westward]." (Reeves, Ecdes. Antiquities, p. 253.)— Speaking of the ruins of Emania, M. C. Ferguson states that the Fort, although greatly diminished, still covers about eleven acres. " From its elevated position an extensive prospect of the line country around Armagh stretching away to the Fews mountain, may be obtained.

Here we stand on a fortress of the Celt, which has had a history of upwards of two thousand years. The adioining townland of Creeve Roe yet preserves the name, and designates the site of the House ot the Red Branch, a species of military college in which the Ulster warriors were wont to assemble." See Story of the Irish before the Conquest, pp. 25, 26.

(6) In Scotland. — " Some consider the colony of 506 as the first, and that which was intended by Bede ; as Ussher, Works, vol. vi., p. 147; O' Flaherty, Ogygia, p. 464; Vardeus, RumbolJ. p. 366; Chalmers, Caledonia, vol. i., p. 269. Others, again, assert that Cairbre Riada led over a colony about the middle of the third century; as O'Conor, Dissertations, pp. 297, 307 (Dublin, 18 12) ; Ogvgia Vindicated, p. 162 ; Pinkerton, Enquiry, vol. ii., pp. 61, 87. See Giraldus Cambrensis, Topographia Hibern., iii. 16 (p. 742, ed. Camden); Stillingfleet, Orig. Britann., p. 287 (London, 1840) ; Reeves, Eccles.

Antiquities, p. 319." Adamnan's Life of St. Columba, edited, with Notes and Dissertations, by the Rev. Dr.

Reeves, p. 433, note.

(7) Went forth.— "That tract of the county Antrim," says Ussher, "which we call Route was known to the Irish by its true name of Dalrieda. It extends (as the late most noble Randolph Earl of Antrim informed me by letter) from the river Bush to the cross of Glenfinneaght, of which I find mention made in those ancient Irish verses bearing the title of ' Patrick's Testament,' a distance of thirty miles : the following old Irish verse being brought forward in support." [Of this verse the late Dr. O'Donovan has furnished the following translation, in Dublin Penny Journal, vol. i., 362 : —

" From the Buaish which flocks fly over, Unto the cross of Glenfinneaght, Extends Dalriada of subdivisions.

As all who know the land can tell."]

"Now the whole of Dalrefh or Dalrede," continues Ussher, "with the island of Rachlyn or Rachrin lying opposite to it, was in old times granted to Alan de Galway, by John King of the English and Lord of Ireland, as we know from the royal archives preserved in the Tower of London : both being possessed at present in hereditary right by Randolph Earl of Antrim, son of the Randolph mentioned above ; to whom, by the way, on his return from England, with his illustrious lady, the widow of the celebrated George Duke of Buckingham, I have, on the very day on which I wrote this, paid my respects at the house of Viscount Moore of Mellifont."

See Ussher's Works, edited by Dr. Ellington, vol. vi., pp. 146, 147 ; see also Reeves's Eccles. Antiquities, p. 329, note.

was undoubtedly Port Brittas, (8) at the head of Ballycastle Bay. The colonists, on reaching Alba appear to have formed three distinct settlements, which co-operated with, but remained for a time independent of each other. Those led by Angus occupied a few islands, the principal of which were Isla, Jura, and Iona. Loam's followers took possession of that territory which, to this day, bears his name. Fergus, surnamed Mor, (9) probably mustered a larger number of colonists than either of his brothers, as he was able at first to plant the three districts now known as Cantire, Cowal, and Argyle Proper. Loarn, the eldest, enjoyed the chief position in the growing kingdom during his life. Fergus, the youngest, survived the others, and being able to unite and consolidate the three principal settlements, in due time was proclaimed king. The new kingdom soon absorbed the adjoining districts lying between Lome and Ardnamurchan Point, and now known as Mull, Morven, Ardgowan, and Lochaber. Thus, the original Dalriadic kingdom in Scotland was bounded on the south by the Frith of Clyde, and was separated from the Pictish kingdom on the east by the mountain range anciently known as Drumalban, which extends from the shore of Lochlomond in Dumbartonshire to Loch Broom in Sutherland. (10)

Previously to the departure of Fergus from the Irish coast, he appears to have owned the territory or district surrounding the present village of Armoy, where he granted lands to St. Patrick, in the year 474, to build and endow the first christian church there. The saint is said to have specially blessed Fergus for this act of liberality, and at the same time predicted the future superiority of his family over those of his brothers, (ti) As Fergus is believed to have first landed in Alba, on the cost of Cantire, he most probably sailed from Port-Brittas, which, if not in his own territory, must have immediately adjoined it. Machrihanish Bay, in Cantire, lies exactly opposite, and although a formidable place for large vessels, the Irish galleys could glide safely into it with a favouring tide in two or three hours. A stream, flowing from the rugged hills of Cantire, (12) approaches the sea at this point through a beautiful valley, which still retains its

(8) Port Brittas. — In old Rentals of the Antrim estate, Bretain, latinised Britannia; Dorsum. " The vernacular Port Brittas, ' British-Port,' or ' Port of the Britons,' name Drum-Bretain at an early date passed into the was a denominational name applied to fifteen acres form Drum-Albin, which was in use until the thirteenth around or adjoining this little inlet. The name is now century, and was applied to the great mountain-chain obsolete. dividing Perthshire and Aigyle, and terminating in the

(9) Surnamed Mor. — This sobriquet, denoting 'large- Grampian Hills. This range forms the back-bone of bodied,' is often used to characterise members of the Scotland, and from its sides the eastern and western Clan-Colla. The following is an old chronicler's ac- waters respectively flow." Adamnan's Life of St. count of the impression made by the personal appearance Columia, edited by Reeves, p. 64, note.

of Fergus Mor, on his landing in Alba, preliminary to (n) His brothers. — See Reeve's Eccles. Antiquities, pp.

his inauguration as king :— 80, 244.

„ _, . . _ . _, . (12 Hills of Cantire. — Ceann-tirc, ' the Land's Head,' a

&SZ*£to£%£fiK£?£ MW : Pl-se frequently used as a proper name to designate the

Blyth and benyng. and manlie als thairwith, whole territory of Cantire, although it may have been

originally applied only to the Mull. "The vernacular

name Cenn-tire, or Cend-lire," says Dr. Reeves, "appears

occasionally in the Iri^h Annals, as Tighernach, 574, 681 ;

Stewart's Metrical Version of Hector Boece's Buik of Ulster, 575,680, 720; dnisfallen, 495 ; Four Masters, 620,

the Chronicles of Scotland, edited by W. B. Turnbull, 679, 1154. The Northmen called it Satiri (Johnstone's

vol. i., p. 40. Olave, pp. 14, 18, 20, 22, 27; Haco's Expedition, p.

(10) Sutherland. See Chronicles of the Picts and Scots, 48). The earliest Scotch charters have it Keniir (C. " ed by W. F. Skene, Preface, p. 113. The mountain Innes, Orig. Paroch., vol. ii., p. 1)." See Adamnan's range known as Drumalban was previously named Drum- Life of St. Columia, p. 57.

ancient name of Tir-Fergus, 'the territory of Fergus.' One of this prince's places of abode, after his election to the Dalriadic throne, is believed to have been the strong and extensive fortress now known as Dunstaffnage castle, which was certainly occupied by the early Scottish kings down to the time of Kenneth II , and was only abandoned as a royal residence about the middle of the ninth century. It is remarkable that, during several centuries afterwards, this castle disappears altogether from Scottish annals, and the impression now is that if any notices of it really exist between the years 850 and 1300, they must be looked for in Norse chronicles, as, during that interval, it was undoubtedly held by the Norwegians. (O/ig. Paroch. Scot., vol. ii., p. 117.) The ruins of Dunstaffnage stand on a low peninsular point, running out from the northern shore of the parish of Kilbride, and at the entrance to the beautiful Loch Etive. These ruins indicate various dates in masonry, some portions pointing to the castle-building style of the thirteenth century, whilst others, — such as fragments of the walls ten feet in thickness, — carry us back to a much more remote period. (13)

Scottish chroniclers are proud to tell that Fergus brought with him, when about to be inaugurated, the celebrated Lia Fail, or Stone of Fate, on which Irish monarchs were crowned at Tara, and, that after his coronation thereon, the precious article was deposited at Dunstaffnage. There it lay until removed thence to Scone by Kenneth Mac Alpine. Even George Buchanan, who was intolerant of all Irish and Highland glories, does not neglect to tell us that " the marble block which Simon Brek is said to have imported from Spain into Ireland, and Fergus, the son of Ferchard (Erck), carried thence to Argyle, he (Kenneth) caused to be removed from Argyle to Scone, on the river Tay, and set it there, enclosed in a chair of wood." {Historia, Lib. vi., chap. 3.) In the year 1296, Edward I. carried off the stone with its enclosing wooden chair, and had it placed under the throne in "Westminster Abbey, where it has since quietly reposed. The Scotch, strange to say, cherish something like a national sentiment on this matter, and have not yet forgiven the removal of the Lia Fail from Scone ! It was formerly spoken of as the "Scottish Palladium," and all traditions relating to it are preserved with much care and respect. Scotchmen, generally, know much more on the subject than their Irish kinsmen, and can rehearse with greater fluency, not only the extraordinary story as to when and how the stone was brought to Ireland, and thence to Scotland, but also various details relating to its shape, substance, and size. The Lia Fail, it appears, bears an ancient Gaelic inscription, which is translated thus : —

" Should Fate not fail, wher'er this Stone is found, The Scots shall monarchs of that realm be found."

(13) Remote period. — The following notice of Dunstaff- being also rounded; but on the inner area of one of the

nage castle describes the ruins as they exist at the present towers, a square structure of three storeys has been

time: — " Our first sight of these venerable ruins reminded erected, seemingly at no very distant period. Of this

us very much of our own Dunluce. They occupy the last the roof remains entire, and the flooring is not much

summit ot a perpendicular conglomerate mass, varying decayed. The smallest of the round towers is only

from ten to thirty feet in height, near the extremity of nine paces in diameter. The circumference of the

low peninsular flat projecting Irom the southern shore. whole building is about 400 feet. ... A ladder

The entrance is leached by a narrow outer staircase. leads from the court to the battlements over which The castle is an irregular four-sided structure, with a sweeps the strong sea-breeze from the Sound of Mull, round tower at each of three angles, the remaining angle and from which a wondrous panorama of sea and island

This prophecy, it is also gravely affirmed, has been literally fulfilled — James VI. of Scotland, the veritable representative of king Fergus, having succeeded to the English throne, and being grandfather to the princess Sophia, who was grandmother to George II., who was great-great-grandfather to Queen Victoria. (See Scottish Journal of Antiquities, vol. ii., p. 205.) Our Irish antiquaries, however, although they have lost all special veneration for the Lia Fail, are taking some trouble to undeceive their Scottish brethren on the subject. They maintain that the Stone was not brought here by Simon Brek at all, but by Tuatha De Danann colonists, that Erin still retains it, and that a certain Pillar yet standing at 'Tara of the Kings' is the veritable relic itself. (14)

When king Fergus had governed bravely and wisely on his Dalriadic throne for the space of twenty-five years, he determined, unfortunately, to revisit his native shore. Some chroniclers affirm that his object in coming was to arbitrate certain disputes that had arisen among several princes in Ulster ; whilst others represent that he was afflicted with a skin-disease, and came to use the waters of a medicinal well that existed then (and for many centuries afterwards) in the rock on which now stands the castle of Carrickfergus. The galley which bore him across the channel was wrecked at or near this rock, where the king was drowned, and where the name Car rig- Fergus, the ' Rock of Fergus,' perpetuates the memory of that tragical event. Fergus had sailed from some and mountain meets the gaze. Landward rise the mighty shoulders and soaring peak of Ben Cruachan, with vast outworks of lesser peaks, while seaward are the Sound of Mull, Loch Linnhe, Loch Etive, the hills of Morven and Ardgour, and the sea-beaten reef of Connell."— Coleraine Chronicle, Dec. 21, 1872.

(14) Relic itself. — We have given above the substance of a very early Scottish tradition on this subject, which tradition was first embodied, it is supposed in the Chronicon Rhythmicam, a compilation of the thirteenth century, and afterwards adopted from it by the Scottish historians, Fordun, Winton, Boece or Boetius, Buchanan, and others. "It is a remarkable fact," says Petrie, "that this Scottish account has been adopted by the Irish themselves, since the succession of the house of Stuart to the British throne seemed to verify the ancient prediction connected with it, yet no Irish account has been found to support it earlier than that of Keating, who evidently adopted the statement of Boetius' well-known verse (see this verse translated above), which he quotes with the palpable view of sustaining the right of the first Charles to his throne. It may also be observed that between the Irish and Scottish accounts of the history of this stone, there is a total want of agreement, which shows that the Scottish writers, when they recorded this tradition, were not acquainted with, or disregarded the accounts of it preserved by the Irish. The Irish uniformly state that the Lia Fail was brought into Ireland from the north of Germany by the Tuatha De Danann colony ; the Scottish that it was brought from Spain, by the Milesian chief, Simon Breac, who, according to Irish histories, was not a Milesian, but a Fir- Bolg, or Belgian. . . . It is in the highest degree improbable that to gratify the desire of a colony, the Irish would have voluntarily parted with a monument so venerable from its antiquity, and considered essential to the legitimate succession of their own kings. However this may be, it is an interesting fact that a large obeliscal pillar-stone, in a prostrate position, occupied, till a recent period, the very situation on the hill of Tara pointed out as the Lia Fail by the Irish writers of the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries; and that this was a monument of pagan antiquity, an idol-stone, as the Irish writers call it, seems evident from its form and character." Sir George Petrie's Antiquities of Tara Hill, in Transactions of Royal Irish Academy, vol. xviii., pp. 160, 161.

Eugene A. Conwell, Esq., has the following account of a visit to this curious and rude monument with which so many national associations are connected : — " On the 18th of May, 1S66, I paid a visit to Tara, and made an examination of this stone. It stands five feet over ground ; and from subsequent examination, I found that it was sunk a foot and a half in the earth, the entire height or length of the stone being 6l/2 feet, and its girth four feet ten inches. I was struck by finding two lines cut into the south-east face of the stone, which overlooks the Croppies' Grave (as it is familiarly called) each line being \)i inch long, about an inch asunder, and cut or furrowed out in V-shaped fashion, to the depth of about three eights of an inch. On the top of the pillar, which is rounded off, can still be traced the remains of four cup-like hollows, in their present appearance rudely dug into the stone. Other portions of the pillar also afford evidences of similar cup-like hollows. The stone itself, which is a pillar of very fine-grained granite — a rock not belonging to the locality, and which, consequently, must have been imported here— appears to me not to have been originally a round pillar, as its present aspect might suggest, but a quadrilateral stone, whose edges have been worn off by attrition and the action of the weather."— Proceedings of the Royal Lrish Academy, vol. ix.,pp. 539, 540.

port further north than Cantire, and had no doubt encountered one of the frequently recurring storms that sweep the North Channel. The following is Boece's account of the shipwreck : —

" To schip tha went, and syne set fra the schoir, The wind blew up, the langer aye the moir; Bayth tow and takill festnit wer all fast, Within schort quhi'.e yet wer tha all aghast.

For Eolus so loud he blew his home On thame all nycht long or tother morne, — In Yrland cost rycht drafflie dyd thame dryve, In at a craig he made thame till arryve.

In all that schip eschapt nor aid nor young But perreist all with guid Fergus their King; Efter his name, my storie tellis thus, That place sensyne is, callit Craigfergus."

— See Stewart's Metrical Version of Boece's Chronicle, vol. i., p. 41.

The body of King Fergus was found, and buried at Ballymanach, now Monkstown, near Carrickfergus, where his bones were exhibited in after times, by the monks of that religious house, to the many Irish and Scottish votaries who made pilgrimages to his grave. This fact is referred to by the author of the Montgomery Manuscripts, who, when the duke of Ormonde visited Carrickfergus in 1666, mentioned the matter, as follows, in reply to an enquiry from that nobleman : — " His Grace stood a good while talking publickly of severall matters, and enquired if Fergus his body was found, and where buried : And there being none that answered, I told his Grace that Scotts history spoke of its being found, and that a place called Monks town (about three miles from thence) claimed the honour of preserving his Remains, but I believe that those Fryars, who built the very smal chapel in that town land (and were not in being till long after St. Patricks, days), could not show any of Fergus his bones, but some bodys els instead of them ; and so cheated their credulous Irish converts, and the Highland Scottish votarys, who came over to see Ireland, and those suppositious relicts of so greate and revered a man : for Real they could not be, because the Graves hungry stomack would not have taken time from 330 years before ye birth of Christ till the later centurys after it, to digest that morcell : and I was of opinion that Fergus his body was not embalmed after the Egyptian manner, used when the Pyramides were made, or practised in Alexander the Greates time, contemporary to Fergus." (15) Montgomery Manuscripts, new edition, pp. 427, 428.

The family of Fergus Mor continued to maintain a leading position in Scotland, supplying, with few exceptions, the line of Dalriadic kings, and many of the more powerful of its thanes, or territorial lords. Of the latter, the most historical, and, it may truly be added, the most patriotic, was a great thane of Argyle, who appeared in the twelth century, called Somhairle among his

(15) Fergus. — William Montgomery, although an ac- land at the head of his colonists in A.D. 502, or 800

curate chronicler of events passing in his own day, was years later than William Montgomery supposed. See

misled by the Scottish annalists, who supposed that the Reeves's. Eccles. Antiquities, p. 319; Adamnan's Life of

reign of Fergus was so early as 330 years before Christ. St. Columba, edited by Reeves, p. 433, Ossianic Soc,

By far the best authority on this point is the Irish an- vol.. v., p. 177. nalist Tighernach, who states that Fergus went to Scot-

Celtic kinsmen, but better known as Somerled, which was the Norwegian form of his name. (16)

During the tenth and eleventh centuries, frequent settlements were made by Norwegian colonists

among the Celtic population of the Highlands and Isles of Scotland. Although, however, the evils

of northern rapacity and oppression were keenly felt, the Celtic element continued to predominate,

even during the most disastrous periods. At length a deliverer arose in Somerled, who was the

son of a Celtic father, and a fair-haired, blue-eyed Norwegian mother. Few, if any military leaders,

have left their marks more broadly or distinctly in Scottish history than he. This fact stands

clearly out, not only from the records of his career preserved in authentic chronicles, but, perhaps

even more strikingly in the circumstantial traditions respecting him, which still exist in Argyleshire

and the Isles. These traditions, when compared with the well-authenticated records of his life,

appear like the fragments of some history that had been written of him but is now lost, and hence

they serve to supplement attractively the curt and dry details of the old chronicles. Many of these

traditions refer to the youthful days of Somerled, who appears to have grown up an indolent and

handsome giant. His father, Gillabride, regarded with contempt the seemingly unwarlike nature

of his youngest son, who occupied himself in hunting and fishing, whilst his brothers trained

themselves to engage, as opportunities offered, in deadly conflict with their Norwegian oppressors.

Somerled's indolent and pleasant time, however, was soon destined to end. His father, being driven

from the hills and glens of Argyle, was compelled to conceal himself in a cave of Morven, and from

that moment Somerled began to take serious counsel respecting the position of affairs, with his youthful

companions of the chase. He found them ready, and equally prepared to hunt the wild-boar or

assault the dreaded Norsemen. Somerled's very nature thenceforward was entirely changed j he

became a new man ; the indolent dreamer was suddenly absorbed in the delights of stratagem and

battle. He spoiled like the eagle, and had no joy so great as when in the act of rending the prey.

His little band gathered strength as he went, and under his eye dealt blow after blow on the

bewildered enemy, until the Norsemen, whether soldiers or settlers, quickly abandoned their

garrisons and settlements in Argyle. They crowded into the Hebridean islands, whither Somerled

(16) Of his name. — This name is composed of two Norse remarks about two popular Scottish historians: — "This words, sumar and lidi, denoting ' summer-soldier.' The is the report of twenty writers in Icollumkill before Hector designation was often, at an early period, applied to sea- Boetius and Buchanan were born. These partial pickers rovers or ' vikings,' who lay in port -during the winter of Scottish chronology and history never spoke a favourmonths, and followed their marauding operations in the able word of the Highlanders, much less of the Islanders seasons of Summer and Autumn. " It seems very likely and Macdonalds, whose great power and fortune the rest also, that sumarlidi originally has been used in the same of the nobility envied, because they judged best to comply manner to designate the bear, roving about in the sum- with the humours of those who ruled the helm of the mer, and that the scalds or poets have since applied it as state, and men who knew nothing of their own descent, a proper designation for the vikings, either wandering and careless to know that of other!

about for prey in the summer, or taking to their snug Boetius knew very well, and so did Buchanan, that

hearths in the winter ; but that, as it happened so often Somerled was thane of Argyle, which was one of