philologically than any other Gaelic books printed during the last hundred years. It could have no value like _The Book of Deer_, and _The Book of the Dean of Lismore_. Though a very inviting field, it is not here intended to enter into examination of the words of the text. When this question has been competently investigated some of our views which at present waver will be thoroughly confirmed. Let the question of the authenticity be in the meantime laid aside, and let the poems as they are be considered. One thing is certain—they are the clever productions of a Gaelic genius—of a master whose works have influenced the literature of modern Europe. The healthy and grand old figure of Ossian appeared on the scene of the artificial literary world of the eighteenth century, and his tenderness, his naturalness, and his keen sympathies with the external world of form, of colour, and of movement carried before him the conventionalities of a hollow generation. Ossian, along with Cowper, was the first influence at work in bringing back the rising poets of the day to the study and contemplation of nature. The poems were translated into all the languages of Europe. This “most magnificent mystification of modern times,” as a German writer has described Ossian, acted like a spell on poets in this country and on the Continent. Goethe and Lamartine felt the force of this spell; the former acknowledged it in the “Songs of Selma” in “Werther,” and the latter in “Memoirs of my Youth.” The illustrious French poet has vividly described in the following passage the enthusiastic admiration of Ossian that prevailed in France in his younger days.