Ossian Collection > Fingal

A P O E M. 11^
is the king among his chiefs ! he is Hke the darkened moon, amidft
the meteors of night.
Come, faidFingal, from thy hall, thou daughter of my love ; come
from thy hall, Bofmina *, maid of ftreamy Morven ! Narthmor,
take the fteeds -j- of the ftrangers, and attend the daughter of Fingal :
let her bid the king of Sora to our feaft, to Selma's fliaded wall.
Offer him, O Bofmina, the peace of heroes, and the wealth
of generous Aldo : our youths are far diffant, and age is on our
trembling hands.
She came to the hoft of Erragon, like a beam of light to a cloud.
In her right hand fhone an arrow of gold : and in her left a
iparkling fliell, the fign of iVIorven's peace.
Erragon brightened in her prefence as a rock, before the fud-
den beams of the fun ; when they iffue from a broken cloud, divid-
ed by the roaring wind.
Son of the diftant Sora, begun the mildly blufhing maid, come to
the feaft of Morven's king, to Selma's fhaded walls. Take the peace
of heroes, O warrior, and let the dark fword reft by thy fide. — And
if thou chufeft the wealth of kings, hear the words of the generous
Aldo. He gives to Erragon an hundred fteeds, the children of
the rein ; an hundred maids from diftant lands ; an hundred hawks
with fluttering wing, that fly acrofs the fky. An hundred girdles :{:
(hall alfo be thine, to bind high-bofomed women j the friends of
the
* Bo(-m\\'\rLi,fcft and tender hand. She Roman province, which feems to be inti-
was the youngeft of Fingal's children. mated in the phrafe of ihejleeds ofjlrangers,
f Thefc were probably horfes taken in J Sanftified girdles, till very lately, were
the incurfions of the Caledonians into the kept in many families in the north of Scot-
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