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BERRATHON:

A POEM.

BEND thy blue course,

narrow plain of Lutha.

O stream, round the
Let the

Let the green woods

hang over it, from their hills: the sun look on it at noon. The thistle is there on its rock, and shakes its beard to the wind. The flower hangs its heavy head, waving, at times, to the gale'.

The sun look on it at noon.---The flower hangs its heavy head, waving, at times, to the gale.] Croma, 10. From THOMSON'S Autumn.

Attempered suns arise,

Sweet beamed, and shedding oft through lucid clouds

A pleasing calm, while broad and brown below

Extensive harvests hang the heavy head;

Why dost thou awake me, O gale,” it seems to say, "I am covered with the drops of heaven"? The time of my fading is near 3, the blast that shall scatter my leaves. To-morrow shall the traveller come; he that saw me in my beauty shall come. His eyes will search the field, but they will not find me?" So shall they search

Rich, silent, deep, they stand; for not a gale
Rolls in light billows o'er the bending plain.

"Bend thy blue course, O stream! round the narrow plain of Lutha." Such coincidence of epithets is no more fortuitous than the concourse of atoms. Macpherson having refreshed his mind with the perusal of a favourite passage in Thomson, the epithets which he had imbibed were transfused insensibly into his own composition.

2 Why dost thou awake me, O gale, it seems to say, I am covered with the drops of heaven.] From Solomon's Song. I sleep, but my heart waketh---for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of night. v. 2. And from POPE'S

Eloisa.

Come, sister, come, it said, or seemed to say, But I am afraid that this seeming apostrophe of the flower to the gale, is more sentimental than truly antique.

3 The time of my fading is near.] The time of my departure is at hand. 2 Tim. iv. 6. The arts of concealed imitation are observable: "The steps of my departure," in Crona: "The time of my fading," in Berrathon.

4 His eyes will search the field, but they will not find me.] They shall seek me early, but they shall not find me. Prov. i. 28. For now shall I sleep in the dust, and thou shalt seek me in the morning, but I shall not be. Job, vii. 21. "So shall

in vain, for the voice of Cona, after it has failed in the field. The hunter shall come forth in the morning, and the voice of my harp shall not be heard. "Where is the son of car-borne Fingal?" The tear will be on his cheek! Then come thou, O Malvina, with all thy music, come. Lay Ossian in the plain of Lutha: let his tomb rise in the lovely field.

Malvina where art thou, with thy songs, with the soft sound of thy steps? Son of Alpin, art thou near? where is the daughter of Toscar? "I passed, O son of Fingal, by Tor-lutha's mossy walls. The smoke of the hall was ceased. Silence was among the trees of the hill. The voice of the chace was over. I saw the daughters of the bow. I asked about Malvina, but they answered not. They turned their faces away: thin darkness covered their beauty. They

they search in vain, for the voice of Cona, after it has failed in the field. The hunter shall come forth in the morning," &c. The traveller returning in search of the flower, and the hunter in quest of the voice of Cona, are repetitions from Dar-thula, where the man, who in Homer rears a young olive in a lonely place, is happily converted into the traveller who beholds three lonely trees on the hill.

were like stars, on a rainy hill, by night, each looking faintly through the mist."

Pleasant be thy rest, O lovely beam! soon hast thou set on our hills! The steps of thy departure were stately, like the moon on the blue, trembling wave. But thou hast left us in darkness, first of the maids of Lutha! We sit, at the rock, and there is no voice; no light but the meteor of fire! Soon hast thou set, O Malvina, daughter of generous Toscar! But thou risest like the beam of the east, among the spirits of thy friends, where they sit, in their stormy halls, the chambers of the thunder 5! A cloud hovers

over Cona. Its blue curling sides are high. The winds are beneath it, with their wings. Within it is the dwelling of Fingal".

There

5 Where they sit, in their stormy halls, the chambers of the thunder.] THOMSON'S Winter.

And now impetuous shoot

Into the secret chambers of the deep,

The wint❜ry Baltic thundering o'er their head.

From the chambers of the south, in Job, ix. 9.

• A cloud hovers over Cona. Its blue curling sides are high. ---Within it is the dwelling of Fingal.] The dwelling of Fingal, and the apotheosis of Malvina, are transcribed from the Hunter, with little alteration.

A hill there is, whose sloping sides of green
Are by the raptured eye at distance seen-

the hero sits in darkness. His airy spear is in his hand. His shield half covered with clouds,

is like the darkened moon; when one half still remains in the wave, and the other looks sickly on the field!

His friends sit around the king, on mist! They hear the songs of Ullin: he strikes the half-viewless harp. He raises the feeble voice. The lesser heroes, with a thousand meteors, light the airy hall. Malvina rises, in the midst; a blush is on her cheek. She beholds the unknown faces of her fathers. She turns aside her humid eyes 7. "Art thou come so soon ?" said Fingal, “daughter of generous Toscar. Sadness

Or,

Within the king of fairies makes abode,

And waves o'er prostrate crowds his regal rod-
Upon the wall, supply the want of day,

Arranged lamps that dart a glimmering ray.

"The lesser heroes, with a thousand meteors, light the airy hall."

7 Malvina rises in the midst; a blush is on her cheek.---She turns aside her humid eyes.] Id.

While clad in woe the lovely Xanthe comes,
And lightens with her charms the shady rooms;
All start, the monarch tumbles from his throne,
Why weeps my daughter, why that tender moan?
Why, why that sigh, my dear, the parent cries,
What sorrow veils thy beauty sparkling eyes.

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