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her lover, in a desert isle, where they perish, with their followers, by mutual wounds, without a single survivor to bury the dead, is sufficiently extravagant. But nothing can be more absurd than the conduct of the poem, which opens with a conversation between Ossian and the ghost of Conlath, and which is conducted as a dramatic dialogue between different ghosts, rehearsing, and acting over again, in Ossian's presence, the last speeches and scenes of their lives. For it seems, that the souls of the deceased could no more be happy, in the Highlands of Scotland, without the funeral service, or song of fame, than the Grecian shades without the rites of sepulture.

CONLATH AND CUTHONA:

A POEM.

DID not Ossian hear a voice? or is it the sound of days that are no more? Often does the memory of former times come, like the evening sun, on my soul. The noise of the chace is renewed. In thought I lift the spear. But Ossian did hear a voice! Who art thou, son of night? The children of the feeble are asleep. The midnight wind is in my hall. Perhaps it is the shield of Fingal that echoes to the blast. It hangs in Ossian's hall. He feels it sometimes with his hands. Yes! I hear thee, my friend! Long has thy voice been absent from mine ear! What

brings thee, on thy cloud, to Ossian, son of generous Morni? Are the friends of the aged near thee? Where is Oscar, son of fame? He was often near thee, O Conlath, when the sound of battle arose.

GHOST OF CONLATH.

Sleeps the sweet voice of Cona, in the midst of his rustling hall? Sleeps Ossian in his hall, and his friends without their fame? The sea rolls round dark I-thona. Our tombs are not seen in our isle. How long shall our fame be unheard, son of resounding Selma ?

OSSIAN.

O that mine eyes could behold thee! Thou sittest, dim, on thy cloud! Art thou like the mist of Lano? An half-extinguished meteor of fire? Of what are the skirts of thy robe? Of what is thine airy bow? He is gone on his blast, like the shade of a wandering cloud. Come from thy wall, O harp! Let me hear thy sound. Let the light of memory rise on I-thona. Let me behold again my friends! And Ossian does behold his friends, on the dark-blue isle. The cave of Thona appears, with its mossy rocks and bending trees. A stream roars at its mouth.

Toscar bends over its course. Fercuth is sad by his side. Cuthóna sits at a distance, and weeps. Does the wind of the waves deceive me? Or do I hear them speak?

TOSCAR.

The night was stormy. From their hills the groaning oaks came down. The sea darklytumbled beneath the blast. The roaring waves climbed against our rocks. The lightning came often and shewed the blasted fern. Fercuth! I saw the ghost who embroiled the night'. Silent he stood, on that bank. His robe of mist flew on the wind. I could behold his tears. An aged man he seemed, and full of thought!

1 It was long thought, in the north of Scotland, that storms were raised by the ghosts of the deceased. This notion is still entertained by the vulgar; for they think that whirlwinds, and sudden squalls of wind, are occasioned by spirits, who transport themselves, in that manner, from one place to another. MAC

PHERSON.

This vulgar notion is to be found only in Macpherson's Hunter, in which the fairy princess is thus transported to her father's court.

She spoke; the eddying whirlwind sweeps the skies;
Borne on a blast, the fleeting Flavia flies;

Clods, dust, and straws, in one confusion fly,

And trembling atoms mingle with the sky.

FERCUTH.

2

It was thy father, O Toscar. He foresees some death among his race. Such was his appearance on Cromla, before the great Maronnan fell. Erin of hills of grass! how pleasant are thy vales! Silence is near thy blue streams. The sun is on thy fields. Soft is the sound of the harp in Seláma 3. Lovely the cry of the hunter on Cromla. But we are in dark I-thona, surrounded by the storm. The billows lift their white heads above our rocks. We tremble amidst the night.

TOSCAR.

Whither is the soul of battle fled, Fercuth, with locks of age? I have seen thee undaunted

2 Ma-ronnan was the brother of Toscar. The translator has a poem in his possession concerning the extraordinary death of that hero. MACPHERSON.

Ma-ronnan; from the Battle of Lora, the preceding poem : but the name, in the Irish ballad of Erragon, in the translator's possession, is Macronnan, the son of Ronnan, not of Kinfena the father of Toscar.

3 Selámath, beautiful to behold, the name of Toscar's residence, on the coast of Ulster, near the mountain Cromla. MAC

PHERSON.

Altered to Tura, in the episode of Lamderg and Gelchossa. Fingal, v. 16.

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