Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian

204 • FINGAL.
on his dark-brown face : his eyes roll in the fire of his
valour. Fingal beheld the son of Starno : he remembered
Agandecca. For Swaran with the tears of youth had
mourned his white-bosomed sister. He sent Ullin of
songs to bid him to the feast of shells : For pleasant on
Fingal's soul returned the memory of the first of his loves !
Ullin came with aged steps, and spoke to Starno's son.
" O thou that dwellest afar, surrounded like a rock, with
thy waves ! come to the feast of the king, and pass the
day in rest. To-morrow let us fight, O Swaran, and
break the echoing shields." "To-day," said Starno's
wrathful son, " we break the echoing shields : to-morrow
my feast shall be spread ; but Fingal shall lie on earth."
" To-morrow let his feast be spread," said Fingal with a
smile. "To-day, O my sons ! we shall break the echoing
shields. Ossian, stand thou near my arm. Gaul, lift
thy terrible sword. Fergus, bend thy crooked yew.
Throw, Fillan, thy lance through heaven. Lift your
shields, like the darkened moon. Be your spears the
meteors of death. Follow me in the path of my fame.
Equal my deeds in battle."
As a hundred winds on Morven ; as the streams of a
hundred hills ; as clouds fly successive over heaven ; as
the dark ocean assails the shore of the desert : so roaring,
so vast, so terrible, the armies mixed on Lena's echoing
heath. The groan of the people spread over the hills :
it was like the thunder of night, when the cloud bursts
on Cona ; and a thousand ghosts shriek at once on the
hollow wind. Fingal rushed on in his strength, terrible
as the spirit of Trenmor ; when, in a whirlwind, he comes