Ossian Collection > Ossian, his principal poems

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CAXTO IV.
Who comes descending from yon hill on high,*
Bright as the bow that paints the showery sky ?
'Tis fair Malvina ; — to thy Oscar's praise
Shall aged Ossian tune his sounding lays?
"Where Cona's waters wander o'er the plain
We'll sit, and pour the melancholy strain. —
Alas ! my son, for thee my sorrows flow,
And my heart throbs with ever-during woe.
"When shall I cease to mourn, when find relief?
My youth in war consnm'd, my age in grief!
* Fingal beiu^' asleep, and the action suspended by night, the
poet introduces the story of his courtship of Evirallin, the daughter
of Branuo. This episode is necessary to clear up several passages
that follow in the poem ; at the same time that it naturally brings
on the action of the book, which may be supposed to begin about
the middle of the third night from the opening of the poem. — This
book is addressed to Malvina, the daughter of Toscar. She appears
to have been in love with Oscar, and to have affected the company
of the father after the death of the son. — Jlacjy/ierson.