sailed to that part of Scotland opposite Ireland, where he
planted a colony as an establishment for Carbry Riada, his
cousin-german. This colony was often protected from the
power of the Romans by the Fion, under the command of
Fingal, occasionally stationed in the circumjacent country
“Hence,” says Walker, “the claims of the Scots to Fin.” In
process of time this colony gave monarchs to Scotland, and
their posterity at this day reign over the British empire.
Fingal fell in an engagement at Rathbree, on the banks of
the Boyne, A. D. 294; from whence the name of Rathbree was
changed to Killeen, or Cill-Fhin, the tomb of Fin.
“In Ireland there were soldiers called _Fynne Erin_, appointed to keep
the sea-coast, fearing foreign invasion, or foreign princes to enter
the realm; the names of these soldiers were Fin M’Cuil, Coloilon, Keilt,
Oscar, M’Ossyn, Dermot, O’Doyne, Collemagh, Morna, and divers others.
These soldiers waxed bold, as shall appear hereafter, and so strong,
that they did contrary to the orders and institutions of the Kings of
Ireland, their chiefs and governors, and became very strong and stout,
and at length would do thing without license of the King of Ireland,
&c., &c--It is added, that one of these heroes was alive till the coming
of St. Patrick, who recited the actions of his compeers to the Saint.
This hero was Ossian, or, as we pronounce it, _Ossyn_; whose dialogues
with the Christian missionary is in the mouth of every peasant, and
several of them preserved in old Irish manuscripts. Now the Fingal of
Mr. Macpherson (for it is thus he translates _Fin M’Cuil_, sometimes
pronounced and spelled Fionne M’Cumhal, or _Fion_ the son of Cumhal) and
his followers appear like the earth-born myrmidons of Deucalion, for
they certainly have no human origin; bear no connexion with the history
of their country; are neither to be found in the poetic legend or
historic record * of Scotland, and are even furnished with appellations
which the Caledonians neither previously possessed nor have since
adopted. They are therefore abruptly introduced to our knowledge as
living in a barbarous age, yet endowed with every perfection that
renders them the most refined, heroic, and virtuous of men. So that
while we grant to the interesting poet and his heroes our boundless
admiration, we cannot help considering them as solecisms in the theory
of human nature.
* I know but of one instance that contradicts the assertion
of Father Johu, and that I borrow from the allegorical
Palace of Honour of Gavvin Douglass, Bishop of Dunkeld, who
places Gaul, son of Morni, and Fingal, among the
distinguished characters in the annals of legendary romance;
yet even _he_ mentions them not as the heroes of Scottish
celebrity, but as the almost fabled demi-gods of Ireland.
“And now the wran cam out of Ailsay,
And Piers Plowhman, that made his workmen few
Great Gow Mac Morne and Fin M’Cowl, and how
They suld be goddis in Ireland, as they say.”
It is remarkable, that the genius of Ossianic style still
prevails over the wild effusions of the modern and
unlettered bards of Ireland; while even the remotest lay of
Scottish minstrelsy respires nothing of that soul which
breathes in “the voice of Cona;” and the metrical flippancy
which betrays its existence, seems neither to rival, or cope
with that touching sublimity of measure through whose
impressive medium the genius of Ossian effuses its
inspiration, and which, had it been known to ihe early bards
of Scotland, had probably been imitated and adopted. In
Ireland, it has ever been and is still the measure in which
the Sons of Song breathe “their wood notes wild.”
“But with _us_, Fingal and his chiefs are beings of real existence,
their names, professions, rank, characters, and feats, attested
by historic fact as well as by poetic eulogium. Fingal is indeed
romantically brave, benevolent, and generous, but he is turbulent,
restless, ambitious: he is a man as well as a hero; and both his virtues
and his vices bear the stamp of the age and country in which he lived.
His name and feats, as well as those of his chief officers, bear an
intimate connexion with our national history.
“Fionne, or Finnius, was the grandsire of Mile-sius; and it is not only
a name to be met with through every period of our history, but there
are few old families even at this day in Ireland, who have not the
appellative of Finnius in some one or other of its branches; and a
large tract of the province of Leinster is called _Fingal_; a title in
possession of one of our most noble and ancient families.
“Nay, if you please, you shall hear our old nurse run through the whole
genealogy of Macpherson’s hero, which is frequently given as a theme to
exercise the memory of the peasant children.” *
“Nay,” said I, nearly overpowered, “Macpher-son assures us the
Highlanders also repeat many of Ossian’s poems in the original Erse:
nay, that even in the Isle of Sky, they still show a stone which bears
the form and name of Cuchullin’s dog.” **
* They run it over thus: Oscar Mac Ossyn, Mac Fion, MacCuil,
Mac Cormic, Mac Arte, Mac Fiervin, &c., &c. That is, Oscar
the son of Ossian, the son of Fion, &c.
** There is an old tradition current in Connaught, of which
Bran, the favourite dog of Ossian is the hero. In a war
between the king of Lochlin and the Fians, a battle
continued to be fought on equal terms for so long a period,
that it was at last mutually agreed that it should be
decided in a combat between Ossian’s Bran and the famous
Cudubh, or dark greyhound, of the Danish monarch. This
greyhound had already performed incredible feats, and was
never to be conquered until his name was found out. The
warrior dogs fought in a space between the two armies, and
with such fury, says the legend, in a language absolutely
untranslatable, that they tore up the stony bosom of the
earth, until they rendered it perfectly soft, and again
trampled on it with such force, that they made it of a rocky
substance. The Cudubh had nearly gained the victory, when
the baldheaded Conal, turning his face to the east, and
biting his thumb, a ceremony difficult to induce him to
perform, and which always endowed him with the gift of
divination, made a sudden exclamation of encouragement to
Bran, the first word of which found the name of the
greyhound, who lost at once his prowess and the victory.
“This is the most flagrant error of all,” exclaimed the Prince, abruptly
breaking his sullen silence--“for he has scynchronized heroes who
flourished in two distant periods; both Cuchullin and Conal Cearneath
are historical characters with us; they were Knights of the _Red
Branch_, and flourished about the birth of Christ. Whereas Fingal, with
whom he has united them, did not flourish till near three centuries
after. It is indeed Macpherson’s pleasure to inform us that by the Isle
of Mist is meant the Isle of Sky, and on that circumstance alone to rest
his claim on _Cuchullin’s_ being a Caledonian; although, through the
whole poems of Fingal and Temora, he is not once mentioned as such; it
is by the translator’s notes only we are informed of it.”
“It is certain,” said the priest--“that in the first mention made of
_Cuchullin_ in the poem of Fingal, he is simply denominated ‘the son of
Se-mo,’ ‘the Ruler of High Temora,’ ‘Mossy Tura’s Chief.’” * So called,
says Macpherson, from his castle on the coast of Ulster, where he dwelt
before he took the management of the affairs of Ireland into his hands;
though the singular cause which could induce the lord of the Isle of Sky
to reside in Ireland previous to his political engagements in the Irish
state, he does not mention.
* The groves of Tura, or Tuar, are often noticed in Irish
song. Emunh Acnuic, or Ned of the Hill, has mentioned it in
one of his happiest and most popular poems. It was supposed
to be in the county of Armagh, province of Ulster.
“In the same manner we are told, that his _three_ nephews came from
Streamy Etha, one of whom married an Irish lady; but there is no mention
made of the real name of the place of their nativity, although the
translator assures us in another note, that they also were Caledonians.
But, in fact, it is from the internal evidences of the poems themselves,
not from the notes of Mr. Macpherson, nor indeed altogether from his
beautiful but unfaithful translation, that we are to decide on the
nation to which these poems belong. In Fingal, the first and most
perfect of the collection, that hero is first mentioned by Cuchullin as
Fingal, _King of Desarts_--in the original---_Inis na bf hiodhuide_, or
_Woody Island_; without any allusion whatever to his being a Caledonian.
And afterwards he is called King of Selma, by Swaran, a name, with
little variation given to several castles in Ireland. Darthula’s castle
is named Selma; and another, whose owner I do not remember, is termed
Selemath. _Slimora_, to whose fir the spear of Foldath is compared, is a
mountain in the province of Munster, and through out the whole, even
of Mr. Macpherson’s translation, the characters, names, allusions,
incidents and scenery are all Irish. And in fact, _our Irish spurious
ballads_, as Mr. Macpherson calls them, are the very originals out of
which he has spun the materials for his version of Ossian. *
“Dr. Johnson, who strenuously opposed the idea of _Ossian_ being the
work of a Scotch bard of the third century, asserts that the ‘Erse never
was a written language, and that there is not in the world a written
Erse manuscript a hundred years old.’ He adds, ‘The Welsh and Irish are
cultivated tongues, and two hundred years back insulted their English
neighbours for the instability of their orthography.’ Even the ancient
Irish _letter_ was unknown in the Highlands in 1690, for an Irish
version of the Bible being given there by Mr. Kirk, was printed in the
Roman character.
“When Dr. Young, ** led by tasteful enterprize,
* “Some of the remaining footsteps of these old warriors are
known by their first names at this time [says Keating] as
for instance, Suidhe Finn, or the, Palace of Fin, at Sliabh
na Mann, &c., &c.” There is a mountain in Donegal still
called Alt Ossoin, surrounded by all that wild sublimity of
scenery so exquisitely deliniated through the elegant medium
of Macpherson’s translation of Ossian; and in its environs
many Ossianic tales are still extant.
In an extract given by Camden from an account of the manners
of the native Irish in the sixteenth century--“they think,
[says the author] the souls of the deceased are in communion
with the famous men of those places, of whom they retain
many stories and sonnets--as of the giants Fin, Mac Huyle,
Osker, Mac Osshin, &c., &c., and they say, through illusion,
they often see them.”
** Dr. Young, and Bishop of Clonfert, who united in his
character the extremes of human perfection; the most
unblemished virtue to the most exalted genius.
visited the Highlands (on an Ossianic research) in 1784, he collected a
number of Gællic poems respecting the race of the Fiens, so renowned in
the annals of Irish heroism, * and found, that the orthography was less
pure than that among us; for, he says, “the Erse being only a written
language within these few years, no means were yet afforded of forming
a decided orthographic standard.” But he augurs, from the improvement
which had lately taken place, that we soon may expect to see the Erse
restored to the original purity which it possesses in the _mother_
country. And these very poems, whence Mr. Macpherson has chiefly
constructed his Ossian, bear such strong internal proof of their Irish
origin, as to contain in themselves the best arguments that can be
adduced against the Scottish claimants on the poems of the bard. But in
their translation, ** many passages are perverted, in order to deprive
Ireland of being the residence of Fingal’s heroes.”
* See Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, 1786.
** “From the remotest antiquity we have seen the military
order distinguished in Ireland, codes of military laws and
discipline established, and their dress and rank in the
state ascertained. The learned Keating and others, tell us
that these militia were called Fine, from Fion Mac Cum-hal;
but it is certainly a great error; the word fine, strictly
implying a military corps. Many places in the island retain
to this day the names of some of the leaders of this body of
men, and whole volumes of poetical fictions have been
grafted upon their exploits. The manuscripts which I have,
after giving a particular account of Finn’s descent, his
inheritance, his acquisitions from the king of Leinster and
his great military command, immediately adds, ‘but the
reader must not expect to meet here with such stories of him
and his heroes as the vulgar Irish have.’”--Dr. Warner.
“I remember,” said the Prince, “when you read to me a description of a
sea fight between Fingal and Swaran, in Macpherson’s translation, that I
repeated to you, in Irish, the very poem whence it was taken, and which
is still very current here, under the title of _Laoid Mhanuis M’hoir_.”
“True,” returned the priest, “a copy of which is deposited in the
University of Dublin, with another Irish MS. entitled, ‘_Oran cadas
Ailte agus do Maronnan_’ whence the battle of Lora is taken.”
The Prince then, desiring Father John to give him down a bundle of
old manuscripts which lay on a shelf in the hall dedicated to national
tracts, after some trouble produced a copy of a poem, called “The
Conversation of Ossian and St. Patrick,” the original of which, Father
John assured me, was deposited in the library of the Irish University.
It is to this poem that Mr. Macpherson alludes, when he speaks of the
dispute reported to have taken place between Ossian and a Culdee.
At my request he translated this curious controversial tract. The
dispute was managed on both sides with a great deal of polemic ardour.
St.
Patrick, with apostolic zeal, shuts the gates of mercy on all whose
faith differs from his own, and, with an unsaintly vehemence extends
the exclusion in a pointed manner, to the ancestors of Ossian, who, he
declares, are suffering in the _limbo_ of tortured spirits. *
* Notwithstanding the sceptical obstinacy that Ossian here
displays, there is a current tradition of his having been
present at a baptismal ceremony performed by the Saint, who
accidentally struck the sharp point of his crozier through
the bard’s foot, who, supposing it part of the ceremony,
remained transfixed to the earth without a murmer.
The bard tenderly replies, “It is hard to believe thy tale, O man of the
white book! that Fion, _or one so generous_, should be in captivity with
God or man.”
When, however, the saint persists in the assurance, that not even
the generosity of the departed hero could save him from the house of
torture, the failing spirit of “the King of Harps” suddenly sends forth
a lingering flash of its wonted fire; and he indignantly declares, “that
if the Clan of Boisgno were still in being, they would liberate their
beloved general from this threatened hell.”
The Saint, however, growing warm in the argument, expatiates on the
great difficulty of _any_ soul entering the court of God: to which the
infidel bard beautifully replies:--“Then he is not like _Fionn M’Cuil_,
or chief of the Fians; for every man upon the earth might enter _his_
court without asking his permission.”
Thus, as you perceive, fairly routed, I however artfully proposed terms
of capitulation, as though my defeat was yet dubious.
“Were I a Scotchman,” said I, “I should be furnished with more effectual
arms against you; but as an Englishman, I claim an armed neutrality,
which I shall endeavour to preserve between the two nations. At the
same time that I feel the highest satisfaction in witnessing the just
pretentions of that country (which now ranks in my estimation next to my
own) to a work which would do honour to _any_ country so fortunate as to
claim its author as her son.”
The Prince, who seemed highly gratified by this avowal, shook me
heartily by the hand, apparently flattered by his triumph; and at that
moment Glorvina entered.
“O, my dear!” said the Prince, “you are just come in time to witness an
amnesty between Mr. Mortimer and me.”
“I should much rather witness the amnesty than the breach,” returned
she, smiling.
“We have been battling about the country of Ossian,” said the priest,
“with as much vehemence as the claimants on the birthplace of Homer.”
“O! I know of old,” cried Glorvina, “that you and my father are natural
allies on that point of contention; and I must confess, it was
ungenerous in both to oppose your united strength against Mr. Mortimer’s
single force.”
“What, then,” said the Prince, good humouredly, “I suppose you would
have deserted your national standard, and have joined Mr. Mortimer,
merely from motives of compassion.”
“Not so, my dear sir,” said Glorvina, faintly blushing, “but I should
have endeavoured to have compromised between you. To you I would have
accorded that Ossian was an Irishman, of which I am as well convinced
as of any other self-evident truth whatever, and to Mr. Mortimer I would
have acknowledged the superior merits of Mr. Macpherson’s poems, as
compositions, over those wild effusions of our Irish bards, whence he
compiled them.
“Long before I could read, I learned on the bosom of my nurse, and in
my father’s arms, to recite the songs of our national bards, and almost
since I could read, the Ossian of Macpherson has been the object of my
enthusiastic admiration.
“In the original Irish poems, if my fancy is sometimes dazzled by
the brilliant flashes of native genius, if my heart is touched by the
strokes of nature, or my soul elevated by sublimity of sentiment, yet
my interest is often destroyed, and my admiration often checked, by
relations so wildly improbable, by details so ridiculously grotesque,
that though these stand forth as the most undeniable proofs of their
authenticity and the remoteness of the day in which they were composed,
yet I reluctantly suffer my mind to be convinced at the expense of my
feeling and my taste. But in the soul-stealing strains of ‘the Voice of
Cona,’ as breathed through the refined medium of Macpherson’s genius,
no incongruity of style, character, or manner disturbs the profound
interest they awaken. For my own part, when my heart is coldly void,
when my spirits are sunk and drooping, I fly to my English Ossian, and
then my sufferings are soothed, and every desponding spirit softens into
a sweet melancholy, more delicious than joy itself; while I experience
in its perusal a similar sensation as when, in the stillness of an
autumnal evening, I expose my harp to the influence of the passing
breeze, which faintly breathing on the chords, seems to call forth its
own requiem as it expires.”
“Oh, Macpherson!” I exclaimed, “be thy spirit appeased, for thou hast
received that apotheosis thy talents have nearly deserved, in the
eulogium of beauty and genius, and from the lip of an Irishwoman.”
This involuntary and impassioned exclamation extorted from the Prince
a smile of gratified parental pride, and overwhelmed Glorvina with
confusion. She could, I believe, have spared it before her father, and
received it with a bow and a blush. Shortly after she left the room.
Adieu! I thought to have returned to M--------house, but I know not how
it is----
“Mais un invincible contraint
Maigre, moi fixe ici mes pas,
Et tu sais que pour aller a Corinth,
Le désir seul ne suffit pas.”
Adieu, H. M.
LETTER XIII.
TO J. D. ESQ., M. P.
The conduct of this girl is inexplicable. Since the unfortunate picture
scene three days back, she has excused herself twice from the drawing
desk; and to-day appeared at it with the priest by her side. Her playful
familiarity is vanished, and a chill reserve, uncongenial to the native
ardour of her manner has succeeded. Surely she cannot be so vain, so
weak, as to mistake my attentions to her as a young and lovely woman,
my admiration of her talents, and my surprise at the originality of her
character, for a serious passion. And supposing me to be a wanderer and
a hireling, affect to reprove my temerity by haughtiness and disdain.
Would you credit it! by Heavens, I am sometimes weak enough to be on
the very point of telling her who and what I am, when she plays off her
little airs of Milesian pride and female superciliousness. You perceive,
therefore, by the conduct of this little Irish recluse, that on
the subject of love and vanity, woman is everywhere, and in
all situations the same. For what coquette reared in the purlieus of
St. James’s, could be more a _portée_ to those effects which denote the
passion, or more apt to suspect she had awakened it into existence, than
this inexperienced, unsophisticated being! who I suppose never spoke to
ten men in her life, save the superanuated inhabitants of her paternal
ruins. Perhaps, however, she only means to check the growing familiarity
of my manner, and to teach me the disparity of rank which exists
between us; for, with all her native strength of mind, the influence of
invariable example and precept has been too strong for her, and she
has unconsciously imbibed many of her father’s prejudices respecting
antiquity of descent and nobility of birth. She will frequently say,
“O! such a one is a true Milesian!”--or, “he is a descendant of the
_English_ Irish;” or, “they are new people--we hear nothing of them till
the wars of Cromwell,” and so on. Yet at other times, when reason
lords it over prejudice, she will laugh at that weakness in others, she
sometimes betrays in herself.
The other day, as we stood chatting at a window together, pointing to
an elderly man who passed by, she said, “there goes a poor Connaught
gentleman, who would rather starve than work--he is a _follower_ of the
family and has been just entertaining my father with an account of our
ancient splendour. We have too many instances of this species of _mania_
among us.
“The celebrated Bishop of Cloyne relates an anecdote of a kitchen-maid,
who refused to carry out cinders, because she was of Milesian descent.
And Father John tells a story of a young gentleman in Limerick, who,
being received under the patronage of a nobleman going out as governor
general of India, sacrificed his interest to his _national pride_; for
having accompanied his lordship on board of the vessel which was to
convey them to the East, and finding himself placed at the foot of the
dining table, he instantly arose, and went on shore, declaring that ‘as
a _true Milesian_, he would not submit to any indignity, to purchase the
riches of the East India Company.
“All this,” continued Glorvina, “is ridiculous, nay, it is worse, for
it is highly dangerous and fatal to the community at large. It is the
source of innumerable disorders, by promoting idleness, and consequently
vice. It frequently checks the industry of the poor, and limits the
exertions of the rich, and perhaps is not among the least of those
sources whence our national miseries flow. At the same time, I must own,
I have a very high idea of the virtues which exalted birth does or ought
to bring with it. Marmontel elegantly observes, ‘nobility of birth is
a letter of credit given us on our country, upon the security of our
ancestors, in the conviction that at a proper period of life we shall
acquit ourselves with honour to those who stand engaged for us.’”
Observe, that this passage was quoted in the first person, but not, as
in the original, in the second, and with an air of dignity that elevated
her pretty little head some inches.
“Since,” she continued, “we are all the beings of education, and that
its most material branch, example, lies vested in our parents, it is
natural to suppose that those superior talents or virtues which in
early stages of society are the purchase of worldly elevation, become
hereditary, and that the noble principles of our ancestors should
descend to us with their titles and estates.”
“Ah,” said I, smiling, “these are the ideas of an Irish Princess, reared
in the palace of her ancestors on the shores of the Atlantic ocean.”
“They may be,” she returned, “the ideas of an inexperienced recluse,
but I think they are not less the result of rational supposition,
strengthened by the evidence of internal feeling; for though I possessed
not that innate dignity of mind which instinctively spurned at the low
suggestion of vicious dictates, yet the consciousness of the virtues
of those from whom I am descended, would prevent me from sullying by an
unworthy action of mine, the unpolluted name I had the honour to bear.”