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that the cavils of some late opponents of the authenticity, and particularly Mr. Malcolm Laing's, are scrutinised and refuted. On this account, we shall refer as much to the Report of the Committee of the Highland Society, as to Dr. Graham's Essay, in what we are to submit to our readers concerning the Caledonian bard; nor shall we follow the exact order of subjects which Dr. Graham has prescribed to himself, though it is, on the whole, perspicuous and well-suited to his purpose. He considers" The period in which these poems are said to have been composed; the state of society and manners, in the age in which Ossian is supposed to have flourished; the mode in which these poems are represented to have been transmitted to us; and, finally, the manner in which they have been collected, translated, and published, by Mr. Macpherson."

We consider it as perfectly established, in the first place, that, from time immemorial, traditionary poems have existed in the Highlands of Scotland, concerning a race of heroes, called Fingalians, from their principal chieftain, Fion, or Fion na Gael, modernized into Fingal; and that, by the general voice of the Highlanders, these poems, or at any rate the most beautiful of them, are ascribed to Ossian, the son of Fingal, the last of that redoubted race. So current have these traditions been among the Highlanders, that many of their proverbial sayings are founded upon them. Thus the Report of the Highland Society informs us (p. 16) that when the boys in their sports cry out for fair play, they use the expression, Cothram na feine," the equal combat of the Fingalians." Ossian an deigh nam fiann, "Ossian, the last of his race," is proverbial, to signify a man who has had the misfortune to survive his kindred. And servants, returning from a fair or wedding, were used to describe the beauty of young women whom they had seen there, by the expression, Tha i cho bordheach reh Agandecca, nigheau ant sneachda, "She is beautiful as Agandecca, daughter of the snow." To the same work we owe the curious information, that so long ago as the year 1567, complaints were made by Bishop Carswell, in his preface to a Gaelic translation of Forms of Prayer, &c. printed at Edinburgh, that those who cultivate the Gaelic language, were "more desirous and more accustomed to compose vain, tempting, lying, worldly histories, concerning the Tuatha de dannan, and concerning warriors and champions, and Fingal, the son of Cumhall, with his heroes,-than to write and teach and maintain the faithful words of God, and of the perfect way of truth."

It appears equally certain, that, from the most remote periods, traditionary ballads concerning the very same heroes, VOL. IV.

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Fion, Ossian, Oskar, or Uskar, &c. have been familiarly known in Ireland. A translation of some of the Irish poems concerning the Fingalians, was long ago published by Miss Brooke; and every native of Ireland has occasionally heard of such legends. In a letter to Dr. Blair, on the subject of Ossian, Mr. Hume represents Edmund Burke as saying, that, on the first publication of Macpherson's book, all the Irish cried out, "We know all those poeins; we have always heard them from our infancy."

That such poems have been long popular in the mountainous districts of Ireland and Scotland, seems, therefore, to be settled beyond all doubt. But a material point of the controversy is, were these poems collected and translated by Macpherson ; or did he not rather impose upon the public some modern productions of his own, in which the names only, and perhaps a few incidents and descriptions, of the ancient ballads are preserved; but of which the sentiments, imagery, and style, are entirely his own? This question was rendered much more difficult to be resolved by the conduct of Macpherson himself, who haughtily refused to give the public that satisfaction to which they were justly intitled; and who in the end seems to have been not at all averse to enjoy that mixture of censure and applause which accrued to him as the supposed author of the poems and deceiver of the public.

Much, however, was done by Dr. Blair, and some other early admirers of Ossian, to establish the fidelity of Macpherson's translations; and much more has lately been accomplished by the Highland Society, in the same way. An extensive correspondence has been opened with the different districts of the Highlands; Gaelic originals have been procured from a variety of sources; and the result is, that many separate parts of Macpherson's translations have been proved to be authentic, and not to have materially deviated from the traditionary poems which they professed to exhibit in an English dress. Thus it seems very fairly proved, by the correspondence which the Highland Society has published, that several of the most admirable passages in Macpherson's Fingal have been currently recited in the Highlands for a very long period of time, nearly in the form in which he has given them to the public. Such in particular are the Description of Cuchullin's chariot; (Fing. vol. i. p. 11.) The Episode of Faineasolis, (b. iii. p. 45.) Ossian's adventures at the lake of Lego; and his courtship of Evorallin (b. iv. p. 50.) Fingal's combat with the king of Lochlin, (b. v. p. 62.) The same authority equally establishes the genuineness of certain other passages of Macpherson's translations; such as the battle of Lora Darthula, the combat between Oscar and Ullin, and

the lamentation of the spouse of Dargo. It seems proved therefore, not only that many of the fragments which Macpherson has given to the public are genuine traditionary poetry, but that much also of what he has moulded into an epic poem was derived from the same source.

There is even satisfactory evidence, that he obtained a great part of his materials in the form of ancient manuscript; a fact which we should not have been disposed to admit without very direct proof. The Report of the Highland Society contains a letter from the Rev. Mr. Andrew Gallie, minister of Kincardine in Ross-shire, stating that he himself saw such manuscripts in the hands of Macpherson, and assisted in translating passages from them. They were small octavos, written on a coarse vellum, bound in strong parchment, and had been obtained from the laird of Clanranald. Every poem had its first letter elegantly flourished and gilded; and at the close of several of the volumes it was stated, that the contents had been collected by Paul Macmhuirich bard Clanraonail, about the beginning of the 14th century. Mr. Gallie was afterwards informed by Clanranald, that these Gaelic manuscripts were not known to exist, till, to gratify Macpherson, a search was made among his papers. The correspondence mentions various other manuscripts, which fell into the hands of Macpherson; and a respectable correspondent of Dr. Blair's, the Rev. Dr. John Macpherson of Sleat, states, that about the year 1739 he had seen a Gaelic manuscript in the hands of an old bard, out of which he heard read the exploits of Cuchullin, Fingal, Oscar, Ossian, Gaul, Dermid, and the other heroes celebrated in Macpherson's translations. This bard, he adds, was descended of a race of ancestors who had served the family of Clanranald, for about 300 years, in quality of bards and genealogists, and whose predecessors had been employed in the same office by the lords of the isles, long before the family of Clanranald existed. Their name was Macmhurich; and Mr. M. had personally seen, and repeatedly conversed with, the last man of the tribe who sustained the character with any dignity." He was," adds Dr. Macpherson, "a man of some letters, like all or most of his predecessors in that office, and had, to my certain knowledge, some manuscripts in verse, as well as prose, in his possession.'

But what, it will be asked, has become of all those ancient and very curious written documents; and why have they not been produced to put scepticism to the blush? The motives which Macpherson had for withholding them from the public, can only be surmised; but certain it is, that he was very unwilling to allow them to be inspected. The late Clanranald, as we are informed by the Report of the Highland Society,

was very anxious to recover his family property from that gentleman; and, after some ineffectual correspondence, actually gave directions that an action at law should be brought for, their recovery. No steps, however, were taken till Macpherson's death; a careful search was then made for the Gaelic manuscripts; but, to the astonishment of his executors, none of any antiquity were found, except one, comparatively modern, and of very little value, as it contained none of Ossian's poetry. The evidence that Macpherson once possessed other and more valuable MSS. is too direct to be questioned; and we are therefore driven to the conclusion, that this heteroclite mortal, as Hume styles him in one of his letters, voluntarily destroyed these ancient documents, in order to leave the question involved in doubt and obscurity. But though these valuable originals are probably lost for ever, several Gaelic MSS. are still in existence, which contain, among other materials, various specimens of Ossian's poetry. Several of these are in the possession of the Highland Society; and one in particular, which was pronounced by the late keeper of the Register-office at Edinburgh, to be a writing of the 13th century.

Although no ancient manuscripts of any value were discovered among Macpherson's papers, yet nearly the whole Gaelic originals of the Ossianic poetry which he had published in English, were found fairly written out, and prepared for publication; for which purpose, a sum of money was allotted by his last will. A great part, if not the whole of these, has at last been given to the public, who were before in possession of the seventh book of Temora, in Gaelic, edited by Macpherson himself. Our acquaintance with this venerable language does not intitle us to decide authoritatively on the arguments, which have been derived from this new body of evidence, for the genuineness of the poems. The Gaelic scholars pronounce them to be unanswerable. They boast of having discovered irrefragable proofs of antiquity in every line of these finals. They declare it impossible that Macpherson, who was but a moderate proficient in Gaelic, could have composed all, or even a part of these originals, had he been inclined to undertake so irksome a task. They produce various passages in which he has mistaken the sense of his author, and very many in which the beauty of the original is greatly superior to that of the translation. It appears very wonderful, we must confess, that Macpherson, who was never known in early life to compose in Gaelic, should have been able to accomplish this very difficult imposture and even by comparing a literal translation of some parts of the Gaelic Ossian with the English of Macpherson, we can feel that, in

stead of the simple and affecting pathos of the original, this boasted translator has given us fustian and bombast. We all know how he caricatured Homer, in his version of that immortal poet; and it would be strange if the Gaelic bard should, on every occasion, have escaped a similar fate.

At the same time we cannot by any means admit, that Macpherson is intitled to no share of the applause which the public has bestowed on the supposed works of the son of Fingal. We think that he has done much more for him, than Lycurgus and Pisistratus together did for Homer, when, out of his scattered rhapsodies, they digested a regular Iliad and Odyssey. We can scarcely bring ourselves to allow that Ossian, like Homer, was the author of two long epic poems ; and we must allot to Macpherson a considerably greater share in the Fingal and Temora, than that of merely arrang ing their dispersed materials, and embellishing them with epi sodes, judiciously introduced, and naturally connected.

It appears to us a more material point to ascertain what is the character of those passages of the Ossianic poetry, which it is almost certain Macpherson did not himself compose, but derived either from tradition or from ancient MSS. Do they contain those sentiments of tenderness, of generosity, of respectful affection for the female sex; in short, of intellectual refinement, which Dr. Johnson thought as incompatible with the character of the barbarous "Celt," as that they should have cloathed themselves with a pair of embroidered breeches instead of a tartan philibeg? This we have always thought the most curious part of the inquiry, as it tends to enlarge our knowledge of the history of the mind, and to throw light on the distinctive characters of the different races of men. Even here we think there is evidence in favour of Ossian, nearly sufficient for the conviction of any, unless the determined sceptic. All these beauties occur in the passages which we have quoted above, as proved to be traditionary by the evidence of Dr. Macpherson of Sleat. That gentleman further mentions, in his letters to Dr. Blair, from which our quotation is made, that he compared Macpherson's translation of these passages with the originals, as he heard them recited, and considered it on the whole as faithful, though occasionally deviating from the Gaelic, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. A like testimony is given by several other respectable correspondents; and we may add, as corroborative evidence of this remarkable peculiarity, that some of the Ossianic poetry which has been published by other translators, and which is generally allowed to be genuine, exhibits all this tenderness and refinement of sentiment; we mention in particular, the Death of Gaul, first published

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