Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/186

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. XL FKB. -20, im.

EWEN MACLACHLAN. (10 S. xi. 90.)

MR. J. M. GRANT is right in describing the account of Maclachlan in the ' D.N.B.' as unsatisfactory : its bibliography is meagre and inaccurate. Much of the contemporary praise bestowed on him may be discounted as due to the Celtic fervour of his pane- gyrists, and it must be admitted that most of his English verse is poor stuff ; but, for his period, his Gaelic scholarship was re- markable. Some of his work still remains in MS., and his publications are sparingly represented in the great libraries. Thus the British Museum printed Catalogue has but five entries under his name ; the Advocates' Library Catalogue only two. He was Librarian of University and King's College, Aberdeen, from 1800 (when, having just taken his M.A., he was appointed at a salary of 300 merks Scots) to 1819, when he appears to have resigned on receiving the full charge of the parish school of Old Aber- deen. He died in 1822.

I feel it incumbent on me to put at least the bibliography of my most distinguished predecessor in a satisfactory form. The books noted in the appended list are all in the library of the University of Aberdeen, with the exception of the first, a copy of which has been kindly lent to me by Prof. Mackinnon, Edinbiirgh.

' O

, i,i Orain Ghaidh ealacha : | le | Ailein Dughal- lach, 1^ fear ciuil arm an lonbhar Lochaidh. I Maille ri | co' chruinneachadh | oran is dhan, I le I ugh- dairibh eile. | Dun-eidean :, clodhbhuailt air-son an ughdair le Eoin Moir, I ann an cuirt a Phaiters- nich. | 1798.

6 Jin. by 4 in. Pp. 6 + 5-222. Pp. 109 to 175 are devoted to " Bain le E. McL[ach- lan]," viz., ' An Samhradh,' ' Am Fogh'ar ' ' An Geamhradh,' ' An t'Earrach,' ' Smeo- rach Mhic-Lachainn,' ' Oran do'n Nolluig ' Duan do dh'oidhche na Bliadhnn' uire/ 'Rann do'n Leisg,' 'An ode to the river Pean' (English and Gaelic), 'Dan mu chonaltradh ' ; ' Earran do cheathramh leabhar an Iliad aig Homer' ('Iliad,' iv 11. 419-544, in 228 lines of Gaelic verse) ; ' Toiseach an ochdaimh leabhair do'n Iliad aig Homer ' (' Iliad,' viii. 11. 1-77, in 140 lines of Gaelic) ; ' Am Messiah aig Mr. Pope.'

Maclachlan's renderings from Homer are described by Reid ('Bibl. Scoto-Celtica,' p. 84) as a " translation of the first two books of the ' Iliad '" ! His contributions

are not reproduced in the Inverness (1829) edition of Allan MacDougall's ' Orain ' (un- known to Reid). That edition, however, contains on pp. 131-6 ' Cumha do dh' Eoghan MacLachuinn, a dh'eug ann an Obar- readhain, agus, ghiulaineadh a' chorp dhachaidh, do'n Chill an Aird-ghabhar,' in eighteen stanzas. Another Gaelic Lament for Maclachlan, from the pen of the Rev. Angus Macintyre, appears in Cuairtear nan Oleann for September, 1840.

1805. 'liST/ | Trepi rov ecr(o <<s sve Carmen 'grsecum. | de verbis | Fiat Lux. | Auctore Evano McLachlan, | Abriensi, | Regii Collegii Aber- donensis alumno. | [Motto from Jones.] Edinburgi :


 * excudebat Jacobus Ballantyne. | 1805.

9in. by Sin. Pp. 10. To this effort of Maclachlan's had been awarded a prize of 25Z. offered in 1804 by Dr. Claudius Buchanan Vice-Provost of the College of Fort William, Calcutta, for a Greek ode on the subject Tevf(r6 ws. The Ode was reprinted in the ' Attempts ' of 1807, and in the ' Effu- sions ' of 1816. The copy of the original edition in Aberdeen University Library bears on the back of the title-page the inscription in the author's handwriting :

" Has ingenii sui primitias qualescunque, summa cum reverentia, in Almae Matris gremio deponit alumnus, Evanus McLachlan, 17mo. Cal. Maias 1806."

1806. Homeri | Odyssea, | Grace et Latine : | juxta edit. | Sam. Clarke, | Glasg. 1799. | Editio quarta. [Motto from Aristotle.] | Tom. I. (II.)

miae typographi, \ inpensis [sic] Longman, Hurst, Bees, et Orme, Londini ; -et | A. Brown, Aberdoniae.
 * Aberdoniae. \ Excud. J. et D. Chalmers, Acade-


 * 1806.

6| in. by 4 in. Pp. [4] + 331 + [1] ; ([4] + 329 + [!]). The Greek and Latin on alternate pages. Edited, like the ' Iliad ' of 1813 (infra), by Ewen Maclachlan. See Mr. George Walker's ' Aberdeen Awa',' p. 79. " A new fount of Greek type was ordered," writes Mr. Walker, " but that was easier to procure than compositors to set it up. At last, one man made himself competent to put the letters together mechanically without any knowledge of the language ; and it is said that as the result of the years spent by him on this dry and uncongenial task, he ended his days in the Lunatic Asylum."

1807. Attempts | in | verse. | [Motto from Ovid.]
 * By Ewen Maclachlan. | Aberdeen : | printed for

the author, | by | J. Chalmers and Co. | 1807.

5|in. by 3J in. Pp. 61 + [1]. Dedicated " To the students of University and King's College." The first Attempt is an ' Elegy on the death of a student at King's College.'

1808. Collegium Bengalense. I Nobilissimo et ornatissimo | viro | Marchioni de Welleslcy. j Indiae Orientals Praefecto, | carmen. | Auctore | Evano