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—
52 Gaelic Society of Inverness.
Again in his *' Allt-an-t-Siucair " the same bard says —
" An dreathan-donn gu surdail,
'Sa rifeid chiuil 'n bheul."
And the wren there sings so briskly
With his musical reed in tune.
Now let me draw attention to the curious fact that, in those four
quotations from the masterpieces of our two best modern Gaelic
bards, the song of the wren is always likened to pipe music or the
sound of the chanter reed, and certainly there is nothing to which
I can compare the rapid wai-bling song of this bird so much as to
the quick running notes in the crunluath of a piobaireachd
when played on the small chanter. Alexander M 'Donald,
in his " Failte na Morthir," also mentions the wren by its other
name
" Chiteadh Robin 'seinn a's sog air,
Agus frog air dreollan."
Though so much admired as a songster, and sj often mentioned in
our poetry, yet when we turn to our proverbs, we find that they,
in a good humoured, bantering sort of way, generally make fun oi
the consequential little wren. For instance, we have— " Is bigid
e sid, is bigid e sid, mar thuirt an dreathan, an uair a thug e Ian
a ghuib as a mhuir" — 'Tis the less for that, the less for that, as the
wren said when it sipped a bill-full out of the sea. Seemingly, the
wren repented of the damage done to the sea, and hastened to
repair it. As another proverb says— "Is moid i sid, is moid i sid,
mu'n dubhairt an dreathan-donn, 'n uair a rinn e dhileag 's a mhuir
mhoir"— It's the bigger of that, the bigger of that, as the wren
said when it added a drop to the sea. Small things and smallminded
men are generally compared to the wren, as when one
receives a paltry gift he says—Oha d' thainig ubli mor riamh bho
'n dreathan-donn— Large egg never came from the wren. And
when a small man tries to make himself very big, the saying is
applied— Is farsuinn a sgaoileas an dreathan a chasan 'n a thigh
fh6in—The wren spreads his feet wide in his own house. Sherifl"
Nicolson says— "There is something felicitous in the idea of a
wren spreading his legs like a potentate at his own hearth."
Another old saying has it—Is farsuinn tigh an dreathainn—Wide
is the wren's house. Alluding to the great number of the wren's
young, we have—(led 's beag an dreatlian, 's mor a theaghlach -
Though little is tlie wren, yet big is the family.