316 



of Gaelic poetry, and is certainly incomparably much more like an 

 original than the Gaelic of the Society, which runs thus : 



" La ghabh sinn an glacaibh a cheile 

 Air Meallmor, 's bu threun ar spairn 

 Thuit coille for chomhrag nach geilleadh ; 

 Thionnduidh sruith, 's chriothnaich an cam ; 

 Tri la a dh'uraich an stri 

 Chrith laoich bu treun, air cul lann." 



This extract has all the same faults which we have shown are to be 

 found in the first seventeen lines of the poem of Fingal, but we shall 

 avoid pointing them out particularly, and leave our Gaelic readers to 

 compare these passages with the Irish original, page 223, and let them 

 decide for themselves. 



One of the most remarkable plagiarisms in the feigned Scotch 

 Ossian is, that of the plot of the entire poem of Fingal, taken from 

 the old Irish poem called " Laoidh Mhaghnuis mhoir" ascribed to 

 the Irish Ossian, and translated and published by Miss Brooke in her 

 " Reliques of Irish Poetrt/" pp. 37 and 271. In the Irish poem 

 Ossian relates to Saint Patrick that Fionn and his host were one day 

 hunting, and beheld from an eminence a great fleet approaching to 

 the shore. Fionn despatches his son Fergus to know who was its 

 leader, and is informed that the Chief is Maghnus, (ManusJ the 

 supreme king of Loghlainn. Fergus then asks the cause of his com- 

 ing, and says, if it be to ask friendly union, his voyage was good. 

 Manus, roughly replies, that he will by force carry off with him 

 Finn's wife and his dog Bran. Fergus as stoutly answers him that 

 he shall never take either, but that Fionn and the Fionns will give 

 him and his host a severe battle. Fergus then returns to Finn and 

 his friends, and relates the result of his embassy. The Fionns gather 



