human
This effusion, although in its original form it is only a kind of wild chant,--almost indeed half prose,--yet is the germ of the ballad. It occurs in many of the tales contained in that collection,--the repository of old Gaelic lore,--the 'Popular Tales of the West Highlands,' sometimes more and sometimes less perfect. The original will be found in the second volume of the Tales.... The vigorous and elastic spirit that pervades these verses must have strung the heart of many a hardy mariner, who loved to feel the fresh and briny breeze drive his snoring birlinn bounding like a living creature over the tumbling billows of the inland loch, or the huge swell of the majestic main.