3."^2 TRANSACTIONS OF THK CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [VoL. IV. 



Hugh and John MacCallum, and which were pubh'shed at Montrose in 

 1816. A hst is appended of the name and residence of the persons 

 from whom the poems that form the collection were received. 



In a letter from Ewen MacLachlan, of Aberdeen, which is inserted, 

 these very sensible remarks are made : "If the works of Ossian are a 

 forgery, we have sufficient grounds for believing that the imposition can- 

 not be charged on modern times. Antiquity has ascribed the contents of 

 your work to Ossian, as far as we can rely on the faith of Celtic MSS. and 

 on traditions which we have imbibed with our maternal milk, and whose 

 impressions on our minds will be as permanent as our existence." " The 

 Dean of Lismore's Book, a selection of ancient Gaelic poetry, from a MS. 

 collection made by Sir James MacGregor, Dean of Lismore, in the begin- 

 ning of the sixteenth century :" Such is the writing on the title-page of 

 a manuscript and a translation of the Dean of Lismore's Book which was 

 published by the Rev. Dr. MacLauchlan, of Edinburgh, in 1862. It con- 

 tains 2,500 lines of Ossianic poetry, and therefore sets forth a complete 

 refutation of the statement of Johnson who visited the Hebrides in 1773, 

 " that five hundred lines cannot be recovered in the whole Erse language 

 of which there is any evidence that they are a hundred years old." 

 " Leabhar na Feinne : Heroic Gaelic Ballads, collected in Scotland chiefly 

 from 1512 to 1871:" Such is the designation which Mr. J. F. Campbell 

 gave to the collection of Gaelic poetry which he published in 1872. 

 " Reliquiae Celticae :" Such is the name which has been given to Texts, 

 Papers and Studies in Gaelic Literature and Philology by the late Dr. 

 Alexander Cameron. The book in question was published during last 

 year. The editors assert that it ma}' be called a complete corpus of 

 Ossianic poetry. It contains an independent manuscript of the Dean of 

 Lismore's Book. The quantity, therefore, of Ossianic poetry that is still 

 available, is by no means insignificant. 



In deference to the many objections which were raised against the 

 genuineness of the poems of Ossian that were given to the world by Mac- 

 Pherson, the Highland Society of Scotland, towards the end of the last 

 century so far as I can ascertain, resolved to submit a series of exhaus- 

 tive questions to clergymen and others who resided in the Highlands of 

 that country. The object of those questions was to ascertain whether 

 poems similar to those which were collected and published by Mac- 

 Pherson still existed in the Highlands. Minute inquiry was made 

 as to whether the poems published by MacPherson could be iden- 

 tified with poems that were still in circulation. The Report of 

 the Highland Society was published in 1805. Conclusive evidence 

 was adduced to show, that the history of Fingal and his followers, 

 of Ossian and his poems, was commonly known, and that poems 



