Blair Collection > Galic antiquities

574 D U T H O N A:
decay ; and the blue face of my feas fliall be calm behind, when
you retire to reft in the green groves of the defart. — Yes, thy
ftrength, O wind, Ihall fail ; but the fame of Fingal fhall remain:
my renown fliall be heard in the land that is diftant.
The king fpoke, and his heroes gathered around. The bufliy
hair of Dumolach fings in the wind. Leth bends over his fliield
of brafs ; it is marked with many a fear. Morlo tofles^ in air his
glittering fpear ; and the joy of battle is in the eye of Gormallon.
We rufla throvigh ocean's furgy foam. Whales, trembling, fly
before us on the deep. Ifles fee vis, and fly out of our way ; they
hide themfelves behind the path of our ftiip. Duthona lifts its
head like a rock of ooze, which the diftant wave feems, at times,
to intercept. " It is the land of Conar," faid Fingal ; " the land
of the friend of my people !"
Night defcends on the fable deep. The mariner cries. It is
dark. He w^anders from his courfe : he looks in vain for the
guiding ftar. — He half-fees it, through the torn flcirt of a fliowery
cloud : with joy he bids his companions behold it. They look
up ; but the window of the cloud is fliut, and the light is again
concealed. — The fteps of the night, on the deep, are dark. Let
our courfe be to the fliore till morning arife with her yellow locks
in the eaft ; till dark waves clothe themfelves in light, and moun-
tains lift their green heads in day.
Our courfe is to Duthona's bay. — But fee that dim ghoft on the
rock ! He is tall as the gray pine to which he leans. His fliield is
a broad cloud. Behind it rolls in darknefs the riflng moon. That
column of dark-blue mift, ftudded above with a red ftar, is his
ipear ; and that meteor that gleams on the heath, his fword. Winds,
in