212 



this copy it is evident that the Highlanders beheved that Finn 

 Ossian, Oscar, Goll, &c., were Irishmen, and that the poem was an 

 Irish production. But if this copy should not be considered suffi- 

 cient to prove the Hibernian origin of the poem, let Mr. James 

 Macpherson himself be consulted, and it will be found that he possi- 

 tively asserts that the poem is Irish, and that it was known by the 

 title of " Teantach mor na Fiona." He gives the first stanza of the 

 original, which, except in one word, is exactly the same as the first 

 stanza as published by Doctor Young. — See " Dissertation on the 

 Poems of Ossian," prefixed to the edition of Ossian's Poems, London, 

 1807, p. 39. Mr. Gillies has suppressed the three first stanzas, and 

 made several alterations in the poem, for what purpose the Irish 

 scholar will be at no loss to account. 



Good copies of this poem are not uncommon in Ireland, and the 

 story forms the basis of a very entertaining tale in prose. 



In the text of Ossian's poems the word Culdee does not appear 

 but his annotator, who certainly knew more about his own Ossian 

 than any other man living, tells us, that by the words, " son of the 

 distant land," "lonely dweller of the rock," &c., is meant a Culdee. 

 We must, therefore, take it as a point settled, that Macpherson's 

 Ossian did mean such persons, and therefore we conclude, that, as such 

 such persons were not in existence until the commencement of the 

 ninth century, the mention of them in the poems ascribed to Ossian, 

 furnishes another powerful " internal proof" that those poems are 

 modern fabrications. 



XI. Lochlin. 



The mention of Lochlin, and the invasion of Ireland from that 

 country at so early a period as the time of Ossian, affords another 



