poetic fragments still floating about the Highlands of
Scotland. By the aid of Mr. John Home, the author of _Douglas_, and his
friends Blair and Ferguson, he published, in 1760, a small volume of sixty
pages entitled, _Fragments of Ancient Poetry translated from the Gaelic or
Erse Language_. They were heroic and harmonious, and were very well
received: he had catered to the very spirit of the age. At first, there
seemed to be no doubt as to their genuineness. It was known to tradition
that this northern Fingal had fought with Severus and Caracalla, on the
banks of the Carun, and that blind Ossian had poured forth a flood of song
after the fight, and made the deeds immortal. And now these songs and
deeds were echoing in English ears,--the thrumming of the harp which told
of "the stream of those olden years, where they have so long hid, in their
mist, their many-colored sides." (_Cathloda_, Duan III.)

So enthusiastically were these poems received, that a subscription was
raised to enable Macpherson to travel in the Highlands, and collect more
of this lingering and beautiful poetry.

Gray the poet, writing to William Mason, in 1760, says: "These poems are
in everybody's mouth in the Highlands; have been handed down from father
to son. We have therefore set on foot a subscription of a guinea or two
apiece, in order to enable Mr. Macpherson to recover this poem (Fingal),
and other fragments of antiquity."

FINGAL.--On his return, in 1762, he published _Fingal_, and, in the same
volume, some smaller poems. This Fingal, which he calls "an ancient epic
poem" in six duans or books, recounts the deliverance of Erin from the
King of Lochlin. The next year, 1763, he published _Temora_. Among the
earlier poems, in all which Fingal is the hero, are passages of great
beauty and touching pathos. Such, too, are found in _Carricthura and
Carthon, the War of Inis-thona_, and the _Songs of Selma_. After reading
these, we are pleasantly haunted with dim but beautiful pictures of that
Northern coast where "the blue waters rolled in light," "when morning rose
In the east;" and again with ghostly moonlit scenes, when "night came down
on the sea, and Rotha's Bay received the ship." "The wan, cold moon rose
in the east; sleep descended upon the youths; their blue helmets glitter
to the beam; the fading fire decays; but sleep did not rest on the king;
he rode in the midst of his arms, and slowly ascended the hill to behold
the flame of Sarno