Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian

Temora. 403
Lavthon blessed the vvell-kuown beam, as it faint
gleamed on tbe deep.
Beneath the spear of Cathmor, rose that voice
which awakes the bards. They came, dark-winding
from every side ; each with the sound of his harp.
Before him rejoiced the king-, as the traveller, in
the day of the smi ; when he hears, far rolling
around, the murmur of mossy streams : streams
that bui-st, in the desert, from the rock of roes,
" Why," said Fonar, "hear we the voice of the
king, in the season of his rest ? Were the dim
forms of thy fathers bending in thy dreams ? Per-
haps they stand on that cloud, and wait for Fonar 's
song ; often tliey come to the fields where their
sons are to lift the spear. Or shall our voice arise
for him who lifts the spear no more ; he that con-
sumed the field, from Moma of the groves?"
' ' Not forgot is that cloud in war, bard of other
times. High shall his tomb rise, on Moi-lena, the
dwelling of renown. But, now, roll back my soul
to the times of my fathers : to the years when first
they rose on Inis-huna's waves. Nor alone pleasant
to Cathmor is the remembrance of wood-covered
Lumon : Lumon of the streams, the dwelling of
white-bosomed maids,"
" Lumon* of the streams, thou risest on Fonar 's
soul ! Thy sun is on thy side, on the rocks of thy
bending trees. The dun roe is seen from thy furze ;
the deer lifts his branchy head ; for he sees, at
times, the hound on the half-covered heath. Slow,
on the vale, are the steps of maids ; the white-armed
daughters of the bow : they lift their blue eyes to
the hill, from amidst their wandering locks. Not
there is the stride of Larthon, chief of Inis-huna.
He mounts the wave on his own dark oak, in
Cluba's ridgy bay. That oak which he cut from
Lumon, to bound along the sea. The maids turn
their eyes away, lest the king should be lowly laid;
* A hill, in Inis-huna, near the residence of SiU-malla.