Ossian Collection > Morison's edition of the Poems of Ossian, the son of Fingal

BOOK II. AN EPIC POEM.
tjs might along green Erin. Death dimly flrode
liehind his fword. The fons of Bolga fled, from
his courff, as from a ftrcam, that burfting from
the ftormy defart, rolls the fields together, with
all their echoing woods. Crothar " met him in
battle : but Alnecma's warriors fled. The king of
Atha flowly retired, in the grief of his foul. He,
afterwards, fhone in the fouth ; but dim as the
fun oi autumn ; when he vifits, in his robes of
mift, Lara of dark ftreams. The withered grafs
is covered with dew : the field, though bright, is
fad."
'* Why wakes the bard before me," faid Cath-
nior, " the memoi-y of thofe who fled ? Has fome
ghoft, from his dufky cloud, bent forward to thine
e^r ; to frighten Cathmor from the field with the
tales of Old ? Dwellers of the folds of night, your
voice is but a blaft to me ; which takes the gray
thiftle's head, and flrews its beard on flreams.
Within my bofom is a voice ; others hear it not.
His foul forbids the king of Erin to flirink back
from war."
Abafhed the.bard flarinks back in night : retired,
he bends above a ftream, his thoughts are on the
days of Atha, when Cathmor heard his foiig with
joy. His tears come rolling down : the winds are
in his beard.
EriD