156 



;)n Sir John Sinclair, in his dissertation, has brought forward a new 

 argument in support of his favourite hypothesis.* He affirms that — 



" 7%e existence of Swaran, and other personages mentioned in the poems of Ossian, is aulhen. 

 ticated by Banish historians. With a view of ascertaining this point," says he, " I applied to 

 the Rev. Mr. Rosing, pastor of the Danish church in London, from whom I received the fol- 

 lowing particulars, from a work of great authority, namely, Sumh's History of Denmark." 



This author gives an account of Gram, a Norwegian prince, who 

 espoused the cause of a princess who was persecuted by a rude suitor, 

 the celebrated Swaran : 



" This Swaran was the son of Stamo. He had carried on many wars in Ireland, where he 

 had vanquished most of the heroes that opposed him, except Cuehullin, who, assisted by the 

 Gaelic or Caledonian king, Fingal, in the present Scodand, not only defeated him, but even 

 took him prisoner, but had the generosity to send him back again to his country j and these 

 exploits can never be effaced from men's memory, seeing they are celebrated in the most inimi- 

 table manner by the Scotch poet, Ossian ; and Swaran has thereby obtained an honour which 

 has been denied to so many heroes greater than he. With such an enemy Gram was now to 

 contend. They met in single combat, and Swaran lost his life." 



The reader of this passage, we doubt not, has formed the same 

 judgment of it as ourselves, that the only authority of the Danish 



'Before Ossian's time,' he tells us, 'the Druidic religion was set aside.' — But he goes on : 

 'The power of the Druids to elect a Vergohretus became hereditary, and the established reli- 

 gion was abolished.' This is the substance of his long-winded detail of the ruin of the 

 Druids. All our remains of ancient history are against him, and what authority does he 

 oppose to their testimony ? — His own ; his own only ! Who, ever, before the appearance of 

 this new historical revelation, heard of a Vergohretus (so called) among the Caledonians? 

 or, indeed, among any other Celtic people, the Mdui, in Gaul, alone excepted. It is Caesar 

 who gives us the name, and describes the office, and that in a comer only of the extensive 

 country he conquered. Had Caesar never wrote, we should never hear of the name." — 

 ©'Conor's Dissertation. 



•Sir John Sinclair's Dissertation on the Authenticity of the Poems of Ossiau, 

 pp. Ixii. Ixiii. Ixir. 



