height; the hard stone but scantily in part concealed by the red dusty lines crossing each other in every direction in shallow furrows, formed by the storms, and serving as soil and support for a few short blades of grass; which, together with some brown mosses and dark heath growing among the rocky fragments scattered over the narrow channel below, is the only vestige of vegetation that scarcely softens the horrific wildness of the scene. These dusty streaks and summits of sharp-edged perpendicular bare rock, remind one who has travelled in Switzerland of the tops of many of the Swiss mountains. The direction of the glen being commonly about due west, the descent from the general ridge is very rapid, so that the progress of travellers on horseback, or in carriages, is necessarily retarded, although the road itself is good, and much better than could have been well expected in this situation, probably the wildest and most remarkable in all the highlands. The upper part of the glen exhibits the same appearance of almost uniform wildness; but, about the middle, the scene is agreeably diversified by the stream of the Coan, issuing from a small lake at that point, and by the green herbage which there begins to adorn the opening valley; which, about three miles above the

lower extremity, turns to the north, and spreads out into a broad plain covered with rich verdant grass and natural wood, and bounded on the west by a considerable mountain green to the summit. In the face of one of the immense masses which rise above the lake, near the top, a large cavern appears, probably opened by the fall, from that place, of a piece of the rock loosened by some ordinary natural cause, but utterly inaccessible by any animal destitute of wings, unless by means of a rope let down from the summit. The length of this glen, from the Etie Shepherd to Loch Leven side, is about ten miles.

To those who believe in the authenticity of the poems ascribed to Ossian, and in the soundness of the conjecture that the stream of the Coan is the Cona celebrated by the bard, the wild and romantic scenery of this glen will be peculiarly interesting, from the associations connected with that belief. The existence of these poems, in any shape previous to the publication of the English translation, was so little known; their preservation during so long a period, in a language which had long ceased to be written, was so extraordinary; and much of the character and sentiment of the poetry itself was so inconsistent with the commonly received

notions of the state of society and manners in the highlands of Scotland, at the time of their original composition; that the best evidence of their authenticity, that could possibly have been procured, ought to have accompanied their first publication in English. The old manuscripts as they were found, and the recitations exactly as written down, with the names of the reciters, and proper attestations of accuracy, should have been placed where they would be open to general inspection; and it is to be lamented that this did not occur in its full force to those, who originally projected the collection of the poems, and furnished the means for carrying the design into execution, whatever might have been their confidence in any individual. This not being done, doubts as to their authenticity arose soon after they were published; and it has been stated that the manuscripts, meaning perhaps the old manuscripts, were left for a week at a bookseller's shop for inspection, and that notice of the circumstance was given by public advertisement. None, however, came to inspect, and from that time no answer to inquiries was given by the translator. Since his death, the poems have been published in the original language,

*Dr. Carlisle's Letter.

from manuscripts, it is understood, in his own hand-writing; but all the old manuscripts have, it seems, disappeared, and nothing is known respecting the recitations. A professor (Mr. Farquharson) in the Scotch College at Douay, had a large manuscript of Gaelic poems, which, before the appearance of the translations by Macpherson, he maintained to be equal or superior to the works of most of the Greek and Roman poets; and, after the publication of the translation, he frequently compared it with the original in his manuscript, and admitted its general accuracy.* When Mr. Farquharson died no care was taken to preserve the manuscript, nobody else about the college being aware of its value. Some inquiry was said to have been made about it, when Lord Lauderdale was in France negotiating for peace, during Mr. Fox's administration, but probably without effect. The question has, therefore, in a great measure, depended upon internal evidence derived from the translation and the published originals, and upon comparison with other ancient poems and fragments of poems collected in the highlands by different persons, especially by the late Dr. Smith, of Campbelton; who, although much

* Bishop Cameron's Letter.

more open and candid than Macpherson, has not been so full and particular in establishing the authenticity of his own collection as to place it beyond all question. In Macpherson's translation, as collated with his own originals, many errors, some of them very gross, and errors of that kind into which a person of his poetical taste was most likely to fall, have been discovered; and it has been said, with some show of reason, that to believe in a forgery, constructed with so much nicety, requires to the full as much faith as the belief in the authenticity. On the other hand it has been contended, that the suppression of the best evidence, the mystery in which these compositions were studiously involved, and the kind of management of which the alleged translator was supposed to be capable, even as an historian,* rendered it impossible to regard the authenticity of these poems as a matter of rationally confident conviction. To the force of this reasoning no unprejudiced person can be insensible; although it is possible that the design of the mystery and management might have been to encourage the notion, however erroneous, that the pretended translator was

* Mr. Fox's Letter to Mr. Laing.