Matheson Collection > Popular tales of the west Highlands > Volume 4

OSSIAN — TRADITIONS, WRITINGS, ETC. 75
the first time in English, I should in like manner
recognise my traditional version of the " death of
Osgur," though it is not the Gaelic of 1807, nor Gaelic
from which the English of 1760 could have been trans-
lated.
It seems, then, that during the eighteenth century,
and before MacPherson's time, attention had been
drawn to the manners and customs, poetry and amuse-
ments of the Highlanders, who, in 1715 and 1745, had
startled England and the Lowlands out of their
propriety ; and the first bit of direct evidence which
tells strictly for the authenticity of MacPherson's
translation dates from about a period when some collec-
tor might be expected to cater for the public taste, as
Stone did. I think it highly probable that some one
before MacPherson may have done that which Dr.
Smith tells us he did after him, namely, gather all he
could get, and tinker it according to his own notions of
what an old Gaelic poet ought to have written in the
third century, but, with the exception of the Earquhar-
son manuscript, I have found no mention of any
thing to support MacPherson's publications, so far,
either in manuscript or print, though MacPherson's
heroes pervade a whole series of early documents
and Gaelic literature of all ages, Scotch and Irish,
and his poems include bits which are clearly old.
My theory then is, that about the beginning of the
eighteenth century, or the end of the seventeenth, or
earlier, Highland bards may have fused floating popular
traditions into more complete forms, engrafting their
own ideas on what they found ; and that MacPherson
found their works, translated, and altered them ; pub-
lished the translation in 1760; made the Gaelic ready
for the press; published some of it in 1763, and made