Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 1, 1890.djvu/384

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378
The Campbell of Islay MSS.

volumes also lettered thus. Of these, one lettered vol. i contains a working copy of the printed matter, which consists, as is well known, of the Gaelic texts, with brief critical introduction, and brief critical summaries and notes in English. The second volume of the work, which was to contain the general introduction and an English version, never appeared. It was, therefore, with great curiosity that I turned to “Vol. II. MS. Introduction”. This contains a fair scribe’s-copy, but revised, amended, and added to by Campbell himself, of his proposed Introduction to the second volume of the Leabhar na Feinne. His original autograph, from which this transcript was made, is also in the collection lettered L. na F., and marked in left-hand upper corner of cover-verso, A. N. 4.

The transcript originally consisted of 177 numbered pages, increased by some 40 or 50 pages of additions, chiefly towards the end, and evidently after Campbell had been to Ireland and became better acquainted with the Irish evidence. The MS. was then continued to p. 221 (“ended Jan. 15th, 1872; copied March 12th, 1872”), and further increased by four pages of Sect. 16 (“March 22nd, 1877”) and an unpaged Chronological Appendix of five pages. There is a MS. List of Contents for the first twelve sections, which I transcribe, adding remaining contents:—

Sect. I. Introduction.—Nature and Art.—Gaelic Folk-lore.—Table of Dates.—Foundation of Macpherson’s Ossian.

Sect. II. Scotch Folk-lore.

Sect. III. Collecting Traditions: Method of Collection.—Macpherson’s Fingal.—Folk-lore of Old.—Morison, Fort William, Mac Cisaig, South Uist, Mull, etc.

Sect. IV. Irish Phonology.—Letters.—Reading MSS.—Grammar.—Result.—Book of Leinster.—Ossian Language.

Sect. V. Old Gaelic MSS. and their Contents.—Irish MS. List of Stories, 1100 A.D.—O’Donovan’s Catalogue—H 3, 17. Book of Leacan—H 2, 16.—Conclusion.—Fenian Poetry.

Sect. VI. Later Irish MSS. (1) Fionn’s Colloquy: Language,