corner, was wont to recite the wonderful songs of his youth, and to celebrate the mighty battles and hunting feats of the big-boned Fingalians--and in these songs Cuchullin stood with his terrible spear upraised, and his beautiful wife sat amid her maids plying the distaff. To these songs Peter of the Psalms gave attentive ear, and, being something of a penman, carefully inscribed them in a book. One day Peter had been more than usually successful in the chase, and brought home on his shoulders the carcass of a huge stag. Of this stag a leg was dressed for supper, and when it was picked bare, Peter triumphantly inquired of Ossian, "In the Fingalian days you sing about, killed you ever a stag so large as this one?" Ossian balanced the bone in his hand, then sniffing intense disdain, replied, "This bone, big as you think it, could be dropped into the hollow of a Fingalian blackbird's leg." Peter of the Psalms, enraged at what he considered an unconscionable crammer on the part of his father-in-law, started up, swearing that he would not peril his soul by preserving any more of his lying songs, and flung the volume in the fire: but his wife darted forward and snatched it up, half-charred, from the embers. At this conduct on the part of Peter, Ossian groaned in spirit and wished to die, that he might be saved from the envies and stupidities of the little people whose minds were as stunted as their bodies. When he went to bed he implored his ancient gods--for he was a sad heathen, and considered psalm-singing no better than the howling of dogs--to resuscitate, if but for one hour, the hounds, the stags, and the blackbirds of his youth, that he might confound and astonish the unbelieving Peter. His prayers done, he fell on slumber, and just before dawn a weight upon his breast awoke him. He put forth his hands and stroked a shaggy hide. Ossian's prayers were answered, for there, upon his breast, in the dark of the morning, was couched his favourite hound. He spoke to it, called it by name, and the faithful creature whimpered and licked his hands and face. Swiftly he got up and called his little grandson, and they went out with the hound. When they came to the top of a little eminence, Ossian said to the child, "Put your fingers in your ears, little one, else I will make you deaf for life." The boy put his fingers in his ears, and then Ossian whistled so loud that the whole sky rang as if it had been the roof of a cave. He then asked the child if he saw anything. "Oh, such large deer!" said the child. "But a small herd by the trampling of it," said Ossian; "we will let that herd pass." Presently the child called out, "Oh, such large deer!" Ossian bent his ear to the ground to catch the sound of their coming, and then, as if satisfied, he let slip the hound, who speedily overtook and tore down seven of the fattest. When the animals were skinned and dressed, Ossian groped his way