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rejoice, and his arm be ftrong in the land. Ye are brave, o warriors, and like the ftorms of the defart; they meet the rocks without fear, and overturn the woods.

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But let us move in our strength, flow as a gathered cloud. Then fhall the mighty tremble ; the Spear fhall fall from the hand of the valiant. — We fee the cloud of death, they will fay, while fhadows fly over their face. Fingal will mourn in his age, and see his flying fame. The steps of his chiefs will ceafe in Morven: the mofs of years fhall grow in Selma.

Cairbar heard their words, in filence, like the cloud of a fhower: it ftands dark on Cromla, till the lightning burfts its fides: the valley gleams with red light; the fpirits of the ftorm rejoice. So ftood the filent king of Temora; at length his words are heard.

Spread the feaft on Moi-lena; let my hundred bards attend. Thou, red-hair'd Olla, take the harp of the king. Go to Oscar chief of fwords, and bid him to our feast. To-day we feaft and hear the fong; to-morrow break the fpears. Tell him, that I have

raised

raised the tomb of Cathol *); that bards have fung to his ghost. Tell him that Cairbar has heard his fame at the ftream of refounding Carun **). Cathmor ***) is not here, Borbar. duthul's

*) Cathol the fon of Maronnan, or Moran, was murdered by Cairbar, for his attachment to the family of Cormac. He had attended Ofcar to the war of Inis thina, where they contracted a great friendship for one another. Ofcar imme diately after the death of Cathol, had fent a formal challenge to Cairbar, which he prudently declined, but conceived a fecret hatred against Ofcar, and had beforehand contrived to kill him at the feaft, to which he here invites him.

**) He alludes to the battle of Oscar against Caros, king of Ships; who is fuppofed to be the fame with Caraufius the ufurper.

***) Cathmor, great in battle, the fon of Borbarduthul, and brother of Calrbar king of Ireland, had, before the infurrection of the Firbolg, pafs ed over into Inis - huna, fuppofed to be a part of South Britain, to asfiit Conmor king of that place, against his enemies. Cathmor was fuccefsful in the war, but, in the courte of it, Coninor was either killed, or died a natural death. Cairbar, upon intelligence of the defigus of Fingal to dethrone him, had dispatched a meffen

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duthul's generous race. He is not here with his thousands, and our arms are weak. Cathmor is a foe to ftrife at the feaft: his foul is bright as that fun. But Cairbar fhall fight with Ofcar, chief of the woody Temora! His words for Cathol were many; the wrath of Cairbar burns. He fhall fall on Moi-lena: my fame fhall rife in blood.

Their faces brightened round with joy. They fpread over Moi - lena. The feast of fhells

is prepared. The fongs of bards arife. We the voice of joy on the coaft: we thought.

heard

ger for Cathmor, who returned into Ireland a few days before the opening of the poem.

Cairbar here takes advantage of his brother's abfence, to perpetrate his ungenerous defigns against Ofcar; for the noble spirit of Cathmor, had he been prefent, would not have permitted, the laws of that hofpitality, for which he was fo renowned himself, to be violated. The brothers form a contraft: we do not deteft the mean foul of Cairbar more, than we admire the disinterested and generous mind of Cathmor.

(*) Fingal's army heard the joy that was in Cair-`

bar's camp. The character given of Cathmor is agreeable to the times. Some, through ostenta

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thought that mighty Cathmor came.

Cathmor

the friend of strangers! the brother of red-hair

ed

tion, were hofpitable; and others fell naturally into a custom handed down from their ancestors. But what marks ftrongly the character of Cathmor, is his averfion to praife; for he is reprefented to dwell in a wood, to avoid the thanks of his guests; which is ftill a higher degree of generosity, than that of Axylus in Homer: for the poet does not say, but the good man might, at the head of his own table, have heard with pleasure the praise bestowed on him by the people he entertained.

It was

No nation in the world carried hospitality to a greater length, than the ancient Scots. even infamous, for many ages, in, a man of condition, to have the door of his house shut at all: LEST, as the bards express it, THE STRANGER SHOULD COME AND BEHOLD HIS CONTRACT

ED SOUL. Some of the chiefs were posfeffed of this hofpitable dispofition to an extravagant degree; and the bards, perhaps upon a selfish account, never failed to recommend it, in their eulogiums. Cean-nia' na dai', or the point, to which all the roads of the strangers lead, was an invariable epithet given by them to the chiefs; on the contrary, they diftinguished the inhofpi

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ed Cairbar.

Their fouls were not the fame.

1

The light of heaven was in the bofom of Cath

mor.

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table by the title of the cloud which the strangers Shun. This laft however was fo uncommon, that in all the old poems, I have ever met with, I found but one man branded with this ignominious appellation; and that, perhaps, only founded upon a private quarrel, which subsisted between him and the patron of the bard, who wrote the poem.

We have a ftory of this hofpitable nature, handed down by tradition, concerning one of the first Earls of Argyle. This nobleman, hear. ing that an Irishman, of great quality, intended to make him a vifit, with a very numerous retinue of his friends and dependants, burnt the caftle of Dunora, the feat of his family, left it fhould be too fmall to entertain his guests, and received the Irifh in tents on the fhore. Extravagant as this behaviour inight seem in our days, it was admired and applauded in thofe times of hofpitality, and the Earl acquired confiderable fame by it, in the fongs of the bards.

The open communication with one

another,

which was the confequence of their hospitality,

did not a little tend to improve the understanding

and

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