“From the wood-skirted waters of Lego ascend at times grey-bosomed mists; when the gates of the west are closed, on the sun’s eagle eye. Wide over Lara’s stream is poured the vapour dark and deep; the moon like a dim shield, is swimming through its folds. With this, clothe the spirits of old their sudden gestures on the wind when they stride from blast to blast along the dusky night. Often, blended with the gale, to some warrior’s grave, they roll the mist, a grey dwelling to his ghost until the songs arise.” Any reader who understands the Gaelic must allow, without hesitation, that while this is a free it is a fair rendering of the original; while he will be constrained to add that in point of force and elegance the Gaelic is superior to the English version. Many of the expletives in Gaelic are not rendered in English at all, and these add largely to the poetic force and beauty of the former. The orthography of the Gaelic will be seen to be most uncouth and unphilosophical. “Linna” for “Linne” has no principle to warrant it; so with “oicha” for “oidhche,” “Gellach” for “gealach,” “cruaim” for “gruaim,” “taisin” for “taibh-sean.” Then there are no accents to guide the reader except that the acute accent is used in such extraordinary words as “tón,” “fón,” which are written for “tonn,” “fonn.” Altogether it would appear that the writer of the Gaelic of this book of Temora was to a large extent unacquainted with Gaelic orthography, and was unable to write the Gaelic language accurately. The orthography is, indeed, a mere jumble. Still the fact is an interesting and significant one as connected with the whole history of the Ossianic poetry that, at so early a period, Macpherson should have given, as a debt which he felt to be due to the public, a large specimen of the original of one of his poems. If there is any cause of regret connected with the matter, it is that he did not let the country know where he found these poems, and refer others to the sources whence he derived them himself. These have never been discovered by any body else, although numerous pieces of Ossianic poetry are well known in the Highlands to the present day. There were various versions of Macpherson’s collection, but the most interesting of all was the Gaelic original of the whole poems published in 1807. In this edition a Latin translation was furnished by Mr Robert M’Farlane. The book is a very handsome one, and in every way creditable to its editors. Mr M’Lachlan of Aberdeen revised the Gaelic, and no man was more competent for such a duty. The introduction to the edition of 1818 is understood to have been written by an excellent Gaelic scholar, the late Rev. Dr Ross of Lochbroom, and is an eloquent and powerful composition. Several translations of Ossian’s poems have appeared, but the interest of the work is mainly associated with the name and labours of James Macpherson. SMITH’S SEAN DANA.