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

^74 A DISSERTATION CONCERNING, ^'c.
6.tx to do this effecftually, they found it neceflaiy to rejedi
the genuine poems, as every line was pregnant with proofs'
of their Scottifh original, and to drefs up a fable, on the
fame fubjedt, in their own language. So ill quaUfied, how-
ever, were their bards to efFedtuate this change, that amidft
all their defires to make the Fiona Irifhmen, they every now
and then called them Siol Albin. It was, probably, after a
fucceflion of fome generations, that the bards had effron-
tery enough to eflablifh an Irifh genealogy for Fron, and
deduce him from the Milefian race of kings. In fome of
the oldeft Irifh poems, on the fubjeft, the great-grand-
father of Fion is made a Scandinavian ; and his heroes are
often called Siol Lochlin na beum ; i.e. the race of
Ldchlin of qvounds. The only poem that runs up the fami-
ly of Fion to Nuades Niveus, king of Ireland, is evidently
not above a hundred and fifty years old ; for, if I miftake
not, it mentions the Earl of Tyrone, fo famous in Eliza-
beth's time.
This fubjedtj perhaps, is purfued further than it defcrves ;
but a difcuffion of the pretenfions of Ireland to Offian, was
become in fome meafure necefTary. If the Irifh poems»
concerning the Fiona, fhould appear ridiculous, it is but
juflice to obferve, that they are fcarcely more fo than the
poems of other nations, at that period. On other fubjeds^
the bards of Ireland have difplayed a genius worthy of any'
age or nation. It was, alone, in matters of antiquity, that
t'hey were monflrous m their fables. Their love-fonnets,'
and their elegies on the death of perfons worthy or renown-
ed, abound with fuch beautiful fimplicity of fentiment, aiid
wild harmony of numbers, that they become more than an
atonement for their errors, in every other fpecies of poetry.^
But the beauty of thefe pieces, depend fo much on a cer-
tain curio/a felicitas of expreffion in the original, that they'
muft appear much to difadvantage in another language.
A CRITICAL