At intervals a gleam of light afar Glanced from the broad, blue, studded shield of war, As moved the king of chiefs in stately pride; With eager gaze his eye was turned aside To where the warriors' closing ranks he sees; Half-grey his ringlets floated in the breeze Around that face so terrible in fight And features glowing now with grim delight.--_Tem. B. V._ In order to introduce his hero with the greater _eclat_, the bard first places his friends in great straits; represents them, though brave, as overcome by the enemy and without hope, apart from Fingal. Both friends and foes speak of him in terms of respect, and even the greatest leaders acknowledge his superiority. When Fingal appears on the scene the poet rouses himself to the utmost. He piles simile on simile to give an adequate idea of his first charge-- Through Morven's woods when countless tempests roar, When from the height a hundred torrents pour, Like storm-clouds rushing through the vault of heaven, As when the mighty main on shore is driven, So wide, so loud, so dark, so fierce the strain When met the angry chiefs on Lena's plain. The king rushed forward with resistless might, Dreadful as Trenmor's awe-inspiring sprite, When on the fitful blast he comes again To Morven, his forefather's loved domain. Loud in the gale the mountain oaks shall roar, The mountain rocks shall fall his face before, As by the lightning's gleam his form is spied Stalking from hill to hill with giant stride. More terrible in fight my father seemed When in his hand of might his weapon gleamed, On his own youth the king with gladness thought When in the furious highland wars he fought.--_Fingal B. III._ The notion that Ossian drew in part, at least from real life, is favoured by the wonderful calmness and absence of effort evinced in delineating so great a character. Expressions that go far to heighten our admiration of Fingal are employed in a quiet matter of course way. "The silence of the king is terrible," is an expressive sentence. Or this again, "The heroes ... looked in silence on each other marking the eyes of Fingal." Nor are the gentler feelings less fully brought out in Ossian's favourite character. Nothing could speak more for his affability than the attachment shown by his followers. "Fear, like a vapour winds not among the host! for he, the king, is near; the strength of streamy Selma. Gladness brightens the hero. We hear his words with joy."[A] Gallantry and philanthropy we might expect to find in his composition, but the tenderness he frequently displays strikes us as remarkable in an uncivilized chief. His lamentation over the British city on the Clyde is as pathetic as any similar passage in our language.