The desert is enough to me, with all its deer and woods.  Rise on thy waves again, thou noble friend of Agandecca!  Spread thy white sails to the beam of the morning; return to the echoing hills of Gormal.’  ‘Blest be thy soul, thou king of shells,’ said Swaran of the dark-brown shield.  ’In peace thou art the gale of spring.  In war, the mountain-storm.  Take now my hand in friendship, king of echoing Selma!  Let thy bards mourn those who fell.  Let Erin give the sons of Lochlin to earth.  Raise high the mossy stones of their fame:  that the children of the north hereafter may behold the place where their fathers fought.  The hunter may say, when he leans on a mossy tomb, here Fingal and Swaran fought, the heroes of other years.  Thus hereafter shall he say, and our fame shall last for ever!’

‘Swaran,’ said the king of hills, ’to-day our fame is greatest.  We shall pass away like a dream.  No sound will remain in our fields of war.  Our tombs will be lost in the heath.  The hunter shall not know the place of our rest.  Our names may be heard in song.  What avails it when our strength hath ceased?  O Ossian, Carril, and Ullin! you know of heroes that are no more.  Give us the song of other years.  Let the night pass away on the sound, and morning return with joy.’

We gave the song to the kings.  A hundred harps mixed their sound with our voice.  The face of Swaran brightened, like the full moon of heaven:  when the clouds vanish away, and leave her calm and broad in the midst of the sky.

  FROM THE SONGS OF SELMA

  [COLMA’S LAMENT]

It is night; I am alone, forlorn on the hill of storms.  The wind is heard in the mountain.  The torrent pours down the rock.  No hut receives me from the rain, forlorn on the hill of winds.

Rise, moon! from behind thy clouds.  Stars of the night, arise!  Lead me, some light, to the place where my love rests from the chase alone! his bow near him, unstrung; his dogs panting around him.  But here I must sit alone, by the rock of the mossy stream.  The stream and the wind roar aloud.  I hear not the voice of my love!  Why delays my Salgar, why the chief of the hill, his promise?  Here is the rock, and here the tree! here is the roaring stream!  Thou didst promise with night to be here.  Ah! whither is my Salgar gone?  With thee I would fly, from my father; with thee, from my brother of pride.  Our race have long been foes; we are not foes, O Salgar!

Cease a little while, O wind! stream, be thou silent a while! let my voice be heard around.  Let my wanderer hear me!  Salgar! it is Colma who calls.  Here is the tree and the rock.  Salgar, my love!  I am here.  Why delayest thou thy coming?  Lo! the calm moon comes forth.  The flood is bright in the vale.  The rocks are grey on the steep.  I see him not on the brow.  His dogs come not before him, with tidings of his near approach.  Here I must sit alone!