collect facts, it has been little solicitous to offer opinions, or to enter 

 into controversial discussion."* For its anxiety to collect facts, the 

 Society merits the praise of its panegyrist. Facts are always valua- 

 able. Give us these and w^e shall draw our own conclusions. Again, 

 he says, " the Committee has thought it beneath its dignity, to stoop 

 to the refutation of the arguments of Mr. Laing." Now we really 

 cannot conceive that the Committee would have suffered any loss of 

 dignity by refuting Mr. Laing. He was an adversary worthy of 

 being overcome. He was their own countryman, a gentleman, a 

 scholar, a member of Parliament, and an excellent historian. We 

 rather think the Committee would have gained more dignity by van- 

 quishing him, if they were able, in an honourable conflict, than by 

 exposing themselves to the ironically sarcastic charge of having 

 "been very laudably employed in collating one forgery with another, 

 and giving their sanction to a very gross fabrication. "-f- But the task 

 which the Highland Committee could not condescend to undertake, 

 was, it seems, not beneath the dignity of Doctor Graham. Accord- 

 ingly he has set forth in an ostentatious title, that he has refuted 

 Malcolm Laing, Esq., but whether to any one's satisfaction, except his 

 own, may well be questioned. As for " the sum of Doctor Johnson's 

 argument on this occasion, he deems it of too small amount to re- 

 quire any particular notice \"^ 



In 1807 came forth, in three splendid volumes, " The Poems of 

 Ossian in the original Gaelic, with a literal translation into Latin, 

 by the late Robert Macfarlane, A. M.; together with a Dissertation 

 on the Authenticity of the Poems, by Sir John Sinclair, Bart.; and a 

 translation from the Italian of the Abbe Cesarottis Dissertation on 



* Introduction, p. 12. f Id. p. 13. 



•f Lfiing's Preface. % Graham's Essay, Introduction, p. ix. 



