Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian

FINGAL 45
Inistore ! * Bend thy fair head over the waves, thou
lovelier than the ghost of the hills, when it moves, in a
sun-beam at noon, over the silence of Morven 1 He is
fallen ! thy youth is low ! pale beneath the sword of
Cuthullin ! No more shall valour raise thy love to match
the blood of kings. Trenar, graceful Trenar died, O
maid of Inistore ! His grey dogs are howling at home 1
they see his passing ghost. His bow is in the hall un-
strung. No sound is in the hill of his hinds !
As roll a thousand waves to the rocks, so Swaran's
host came on. As meets a rock a thousand waves, so
Erin met Swaran of spears. Death raises all his voices
around, and mixes with the sounds of shields. Each
hero is a pillar of darkness; the sword a beam of fire in
his hand. The field echoes from wing to wing, as a
hundred hammers that rise, by turns, on the red son of
the furnace. Who are these on Lena's heath, these so
gloomy and dark? Who are these like two clouds, and
their swords like lightning above them ? The little hills
are troubled around : the rocks tremble with all their
moss. Who is it but Ocean's son and the car-borne
chief of Erin ? Many are the anxious eyes of their
friends, as they see them dim on the heath. But night
conceals the chiefs in clouds, and ends the dreadful
fight!
It was on Cromla's shaggy side that Dorglas had
placed the deer ; t the early fortune of the chase, before
"*■ The maid of Inistore was the daughter of Gorlo, king of
Inistore, or Orkney Islands. Trenar was brother to the king of
Iniscon, supposed to be one of the islands of Shetland. The
Orkneys and Shetland were at that time subject to the king of
Lochlin. We find that the dogs of Trenar are sensible at home
of the death of their master, the very instant he is killed. It was
the opinion of the times, that the souls of heroes went imme-
diately after death to the hills of their country, and the scenes
they frequented the most happy times of their life. It was
thought, too, that dogs and horses saw the ghosts of the deceased.
t The ancient manner of preparing feasts after hunting, is