From Marjory Kennedy Fraser's "Songs of the Hebrides"
Traditional verses collected and literally translated by Kenneth Macleod.

It is me that is under sorrow
In the early morn and me arising_

'Tis not the death of the kine in May-month
But the wetness of thy winding-sheet.

Thought mine were a fold of cattle
Sure little my care for them to-day.

Ailein Duinn, calf of my heart,
Art thou adrift on Erin's shore?

That not my choice of a stranger-land,
But a place where my cry would reach thee.

Ailein Duinn, my spell and my laughter,
Would, O King, that I were near thee,

On whatso bank or creek thou ar't stranded,
On whatso beach the tide has left thee.

I would drink a drink, gainsay it who might,
But not of the glowing wine of Spain__

*The blood of thy body , O Love, I would rather
The blood that comes from thy throat hollow.

O may God bedew thy soul
With what I got of they sweet caresses,

With what I got of thy secret-speech,
With what I got of thy honey-kisses.

My prayer to thee, O King of the Throne,
That I go not in earth nor in linen,

That I go not in hole ground nor hidden-place
But in the tangle where lies my Ailean.

Alexander Carmichael in his "Carmina Gadelica" Vol II p 282 alludes to this song, saying :Anne Campbell, daughter of Donald Campbell, the entertainer of Prince Charlie at Scalpay, Harris, was exceptionally handsome. She was about to be married to Captain Allan Morrison, Crosbost, Lews. He was drowned on the way to his marriage. Anne Capbelll composed a beautiful lament for her lover."

*The old Celts drank a friend's blood as a mark of affection. In the early years of the 19th Century. Beathag Mhor, "Big Bethia" (MacDonald?) a poetess of Trotternish, Skye, drank "a mild intoxicating drink of the blood" of Martin, the tacksman of Duntulm, "and gave she thanks to Providence that she would have that much of her lover at anyrate." Alexander Carmichael has pointed out that both Shakespeare and Spenser refer to this custom.