Ossian Collection > Temora, an ancient epic poem, in eight books

An E P I C POEM. 15^
EviENiNG came down on Moi-lena. Grey rolled the ftreams of
the land. ILoud came forth the voice of Fingal : the beam of oaks
arofe. The people gathered round with gladnefs ; with gladnels
blended with fhades. They fidelong looked to the king, and beheld
his unfiniHied joy. — Pleafant, from the way of the dcfart, the voice
of mufic came. It feemed, at firft, the noife of a ftream, fir-diftant
-on its rocks. Slow it rolled along the hill, like the ruffled wing
of a breeze, when it takes the tufted beard of the rocks, in the
here, the Rorj of the viaiJ if Inh-huna,
which was foreign to the fubjeifl, would be
altogether inconfiftent with the rapid man-
ner of Oflian, and a breach on unity of
time and a6tion, one of the fundamental
.eflentials of the ep^paa, the rules of which
our Celtic bard gathered from nature, not
from the precepts of critics. — Neither did
the poet totally defert the beautiful Sul-mal-
Ja, deprived of her lover, and a ftranger,
as flie was, in a foreign land. Tradition
relates, that Oflian, the next day after the
deciilve battle between Fingal and Cath-
mor, went to find out Sul malla, in the
valley of Lona. His addrefs to her, which
is flill preferved, 1 here lay before the
leader.
"Awake, thou daughter of Conmor, from
the fern-flcirted cavern of Lona. Awake,
thou fun -beam in defarts ; warriors one day
tnufl fail. They move forth, like terrible
lights; but, often, their cloud is near. —
Go to the valley of ftreams, to the wan-
dering of herds, on Lumon ; there dwells,
in his lazy mift, the man ef many days.
But he is unknown, Sul-malla, like the
thiftle of the rocks of roes ; it {hakes its
grey beard, in the wind, and falls, unfeeii
of our eyes. — Not fuch are the kings of
men, their departure is a meteor of fire,
which pours its red courfe, from the defart,
over the bofom of night.
" He IS mixed with the warriors of old,
thofe fires that have hid their heads. At
times fhall ihey come forth in fong. Not
forgot has the warrior failed. — He has not
feen, Sul-malla, the fall of a beam of his
own: no fair-haired fon, in his blood,
young troubler of the field. — I am lonely,
young branch of Lumon, I may hear the
voice of the feeble, when my ftrength fliall
have failed in years, for young Ofcar has-
ceafed, on his field. * • * *
The reft of the poem is loft ; from the
flory of it, which is ftiil preferved, we
underftand, that Sul-malla returned to her
own country. Sul-malla makes a confider-
able figure in another poem of Oflian ; her
behaviour in that piece accounts for that-
partial regard with which the poet fpeaks
of her throughout Tcmora.
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