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ANCIENT BARDS. |
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mder Elizabeth all the Irish bards who were :aptured, were hanged.
The last Irish bard existed as late as the eighteenth century.
Turlogh O'Carolan was born 1670, and died 1737; worthily closing the long reign of the fiery ninstrel guild of Ireland.
Scotland's bardism, was similar to that of Wales and Ireland, but the ranks and privileges are less known. The bag-pipe was played • as much as the harp, and there was much analogy in the ancient music of Ireland and Scotland. The scale on which the Scotch pieces were founded, bears much resemblance to the Chinese, and to some of the Hindoo modes.
In England there were also bards, but there was not an order, as in the preceding countries, and at a time when these heraldic singers were so highly honored in "Wales, the singers and musicians of England were held in very slight social estimation. The irruptions of the Danes, and Norsemen generally, upon England in the ninth, tenth and eleventh centuries, brought a taste of the forcible Northern sagas along with them, and when King Canute held the throne, bards and " gleemen," were protected and favored, for King Canute was very fond of song. He, himself, wrote a song which was for a long time the favorite ballad of England.
The circumstances which prompted it were as follows: —
He was being rowed near the Monastery of |
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