The chronicles of the ancient British states con tain a store of curious information concerning the original constitution, functions, and privileges of this highly respected order. They seem to have been di vided into two classes: The first, comprehending the sacred or religious poets, whose office it was to com pose and sing hymns in honour of the gods ; and to celebrate their peculiar and mysterious religious rites. These were called by the Greeks Eubates, by the Ro mans Yates, and in their own language Fails. The second class comprehended the secular poets, who were more peculiarly called bards, and celebrated in song the battles of heroes, and the romantic atchievements preserved by tradition. The number of these ap pears to have been very great. In the poems of Os sian we read of 100 bards belonging to one prince, singing andplaying in concert for his entertainment. Every chief bard, who was called Allah Redan, or doctor in poetry, was allowed to have 30 bards of inferior note constantly about his person ; and every bard of the second rank was allowed a retinue of 15 poetical disciples.
It appears that in Wales there was an annual con gress of the bards, usually held at the royal resi dence, the sovereign himself presiding in the assem bly. Here each was assigned a precedence and emo lument suitable to his merit; but the bard most high ly distinguished for his talents was solemnly chaired, and honoured with the badge of a silver chain. The bards, properly so called, were distinguished front the Druids, and from the Eubates, or Ovates, by the colour of their dress : they were clad in sky-blue ,garments, whilst the Druids wore white, and the Ovates green. Their disciples were arrayed in varie gated garments, consisting of these three colours blended. There were four principal meetings of the bards held in the course of the year; viz. at the two solstices and two equinoxes. The first was at the winter solstice, which was the beginning of their year, and was called Alban Arthan ; the second at the vernal equinox; called Alban Eilir ; the summer solstice, or Alban Hevin ; and the autumnal equinox, or Alban Livid, following next in order. They as sembled in circles of unwrought stones, placed so as to be indexes of the seasons, in the open air, and al ways when the sun was above the horizon ; or, as they expressed it, in the face of the sun, and in the - eye of the light.
From these particulars it is plain, that the institu tion of bards among the Celtic nations; had some thing farther in view, than the celebration of heroic atchievements by music and song ; they were the positaries of the various kinds of knowledge then prevalent in their tribe, and of the authenticated re. cords of the nation. When writing was unknown, oral tradition was the only method of preserving the memory of what was important ; and the bards were an order of men trained on purpose to accomplish this end, and to deliver knowledge down to posterity in a form calculated at once to arrest the attention, and assist the recollection. In order that nothing
should become current without due consideration, whatever was intended to be thus permanently re corded, was always laid before the• grand meetings. It was there discussed with the most scrutinizing se verity ; if then admitted, it was reconsidered at a se cond meeting; and it was not, till it had received the approbation of three successive meetings, or of the triennial supreme convention, that its admission was finally confirmed. At this great assembly, all that had 'been confirmed at the provincial meetings was recited, for the use of the disciples who were to com mit it to memory ; and what was thus solemnly rati fied, was to be recited for ever afterwards ; once at least in every year, in addition to the former bardic traditions.
Such was the well-organised system for preserving traditionary knowledge, by the institution of the bards, an-important branch of the system of Druid ism, but which seems to have long survived that sys tem, on account of its extraordinary means and pre cautions for self-preservation. It has been advanced, and with some appearance of probability, that bard ism was the parent of free masonry ; a character which it assumed, in order that its members might assemble in secret, and•unsuspected. The term ovyz, or ovate, by Ncli kb the third class of bards was dis tinguished, has the meaning of artisan or mason ; and the free-masons preserve a traditionary memorial of their meeting anciently on the tops of the highest hills, and in the bottoms of the deepest values, and when the sun was in its due meridian.
It was the cruel policy of Edward I. to command a general massacre of the Welsh bards, persuaded that nothing was more likely to maintain among the peo ple a sentiment of military valorr, and a passion for national independence, than the traditionary legends of this class of men, who, like the ancient Tyrtmus, employed their animated strains, as a means of exci ting the courage of their countrymen against the common enemy. The system of bardism, however, recovered much of its ancient vigour in Wales, .du ring the short, but spirited, insurrection of Owen Glendower. But when that effort for restoring the independence of the country was-crushed, the bards were again proscribed and persecuted. They, how ever, again made their appearance, as the genealo gists and minstrels of the great Welsh chieftains ; a capacity in which they have enjoyed great honour and emolument, in every country where tradition was not entirely superseded by the general diffusion of letters. In Ireland, and in Scotland, every great fa mily was possessed of its bard, almost down to the present day. In the Highlands of Scothind, parti cularly, every regulus or chieftain had his family bard, who was regarded as filling a very important office, and who had lands assigned him, which de scended regularly to nib posterity.