Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian, the son of Fingal

Book IV. AN EPICPOEM. 249
depart, no boy in the field was he, who only marks the
bed of roes, upon the echoing hills. My ilTuing forth
was with kings, and my joy in dreadful plains : where
broken hofls are rolled away, like feas before the wind."
So fpoke the king of Alnecma, brightening in his rifing
foul : valour, like a pleafant flame, is gleaming within his
bread. Stately is his ftride on the heath : the beam of
eafl is poured around. He faw his gray holt on the field,
wide-fpreading their ridges in light. He rejoiced, like a
fplrit of heaven, whofe fteps come forth on his feas, when
he beholds them peaceful round, and all the winds arc
laid. But foon he awakes the waves, and rolls them
large to fome echoing coaft.
On the rufhy bank of a llream, llept the daughter of
Inis-huna. The helmet had fallen from her head. Her
dreams were in the lands of her fathers. There morning
was on the fi.eld: gray llreams leapt dov/n from the rocks;
the breezes, in faadowy waves, fly over the rufliy fields.
There is the found that prepares for the chafe ; and the
moving of warriors from the hall. But tall above the
reft is the hero of flireamy Atha : he bends his eye of love
on Sul-malla, from his fl:ately Heps. She turns, with pride,
her face away, and carelefs bends the bow.
Such vv'ere the dreams of the maid when Atha's war-
rior came. He faw her fair face before him, in the midfl:
of her wandering locks. He knew the maid of Lumon.
What fhould Cathmor do? His figh arofe: his tears came
down. But fl:raight he turned away. " This is no time,
king of Atha, to wake thy fecret foul. The battle is rol-
led before thee, like a troubled fl;ream."
He ftruck that warning bofs*, wherein dwelt the voice
of war. Erin rofe around him like the found of eagle-
wings. Sul-malla ftarted from lleep, in her difordered
locks. She feized the helmet from earth, and trembled
in her place. " Why fliould they know in Erin of the
daughter of Inis -huna ?" for flie remembered the race of
kings, and the pride of her foul arofe. Her fl;eps are be-
I i hind
* la order to ijnderftand this paffage, it is neceflary to look to the defcription
of Cathmor's fliield which the poet has given us in the feventh book. This fhiel4
had feven principal bofies, the found of each of which, when ftruck with a fpear,
conveyed a particular order from the king to his tribes. The found of one of them,
as here, was the Cgnal for the army to aflemble.