Ossian Collection > Fingal

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THE
WAR of INIS-THONA*:
A POEM.
OUR youth is like the dream of the hunter on the hill of heath.
He fleeps in the mild beams of the fun ; but he awakes amidft
a ftorm ; the red lightning flies around : and the trees fliake their
heads to the wind. He looks back with joy, on the day of the
fun ; and the pleafant dreams of his reft !
When fhall Offian's youth return, or his ear delight in the found
of arms ? When fliall I, like Ofcar, travel -f- in the light of my
iteel ? — Come, with your ftreams, ye hills of Cona, and liften to
the voice of Offian ! The fong rifes, like the fun, in my foul 3 and
my heart feels the joys of other times.
I BEHOLD thy towers, O Selma ! and the oaks of thy fliaded
wall : — thy flreams found in my ear ; thy heroes gather round.
Fingal fits in the midil ; and leans on the fliield of Trenmor : — his
* Inis-thona, i. e. the ijland cf waves, woven. The work itfelf is loft, but fome
was a country of Scandinavia fubjeft to its epifodes, and the ftory of the poem, are
own king, but depending upon the king- handed down by tradition. There are
dom of Lochlin. — This poem is an epifode fome now living, who, in their youth, have
introduced in a great work compofed by heard the whole repeated.
Offian, in which the aflions of his friends, f Travelling in the greatnefs of his
and his beloved fon Ofcar, were inter- flrength. Isaiah Ixiii. i-
fpear