Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian > Volume 1

CXXVl A CRITICAL DISSERTATION
to the habitation of heroes, and the introduction
to the story which follows from the mention which
Ossian supposes the father of Malvina to make of
him in the hall of Fingal, arc all in the highest
spirit of poetry. '' And dost thou remember Os-
'^ sian, O Toscar, son of Comloch? The battles
" of our youth were many: our swords went to-
'^ gether to the field." Nothing could be more
proper than to end his songs with recording an
exploit of the father of that Malvina, of whom
his heart v, as now so fall ; and who, from first to
last, had been such a favourite object throughout
all his poems.
The scene of most of Ossian's poems is laid in
Scotland, or in the coast of Ireland opposite to
the territories of Fingal. When the scene is in
Ireland, we perceive no change of manners from
those of Ossian's native country. For as Ireland
was undoubtedly peopled with Celtic tribes, the
language, customs, and religion of both nations
were the same. They had been separated from
one another, by migration, only a few genera-
tions, as it should seem, before our poet's age;
and they still maintained a close and frequent in-
tercourse. But when the poet relates the expedi-
tions of any of his heroes to the Scandinavian
coast, or to the islands of Orkney, which were
then part of the Scandinavian territory, as he does
in Carric-thura, Sulmalla of Lumon, and Cath-
loda, the case is quite altered. Those countries
were inhabited by nations of the Teutonic descent,
who, in their manners and religious rites, differed
widel)^ from the Celta? ; and it is curious and re-
markable, to find this difference clearly pointed
©ut in the poems of Ossian. His descriptions