Among other testimonies to Ossian's popularity in England are the numerous experiments at versifying MacPherson's prose. These were not over-successful and only a few of them require mention here. The Rev. John Wodrow, a Scotch minister, "attempted" "Carthon," "The Death of Cuthullin" and "Darthula" in heroic couplets, in 1769; and "Fingal" in 1771. In the preface to his "Fingal," he maintained that there was no reasonable doubt of the antiquity and authenticity of MacPherson's "Ossian." "Fingal"--which seems to have been the favorite--was again turned into heroic couplets by Ewen Cameron, in 1776, prefaced by the attestations of a number of Highland gentlemen to the genuineness of the originals; and by an argumentative introduction, in which the author quotes Dr. Blair's _dictum_ that Ossian was the equal of Homer and Vergil "in strength of imagination, in grandeur of sentiment, and in native majesty of passion." National pride enlisted most of the Scotch scholars on the affirmative side of the question, and made the authenticity of Ossian almost an article of belief. Wodrow's heroics were merely respectable. The quality of Cameron's may be guessed from a half dozen lines: "When Moran, one commissioned to explore The distant seas, came running from the shore And thus exclaimed--'Cuthullin, rise! The ships Of snowy Lochlin hide the rolling deeps. Innumerable foes the land invade, And Swaran seems determined to succeed.'" Whatever impressiveness belonged to MacPherson's cadenced prose was lost in these metrical versions, which furnish a perfect _reductio ad absurdum_ of the critical folly that compared Ossian with Homer. Homer could not be put in any dress through which the beauty and interest of the original would not appear. Still again, in 1786, "Fingal" was done into heroics by a Mr. R. Hole, who varied his measures with occasional ballad stanzas, thus: "But many a fair shall melt with woe At thy soft strain in future days, And many a manly bosom glow, Congenial to thy lofty lays."