Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian > Volume 2

14 CATII-LODA :
fore mc, my father's shield. But often passes, a
beam * of youth, far distant from my cave. The
son of Starno moves in my sight. He dwells
lonely in my soul."
" Maid of Lulan/' said Fingal, " white-hand-
ed daughter of grief! a cloud, marked with
streaks of fire, is rolled along thy soul. Look
not to that dark-robed moon ; look not to those
meteors of heaven. IMy gleaming steel is around
thee, the terror of thy foes ! It is not the steel
of the feeble, nor of the dark in soul ! The
maids are not shut in our f caves of streams.
They toss not their white arms alone. They
bend, fair within their locks, above the harps of
Selma. Their voice is not in the desert wild.
We melt along the pleasing sound ! "
*****
Fingal again advanced his steps, wide through
the bosom of night, to where the trees of Loda
* By the beam of youth, it afterwards appears, that
Conban-carglas means Swaran, the son of Starno, with
whom, during licr confinement, slie had fallen in love.
t From this contrast, which Fingal draws between his
own nation and the inhabitants of Scandinavia, we may
learn, that the former were much less barbarous than the
hitter. This distinction is so much observed throughout