Page:Poems of Ossian.djvu/32

xxx

Dunbar also, in 1503, and Gawin Douglas before 1522, as well as Hector Boece in 1520, all mention the fame of these heroes. And in 1576, in the first book printed in Gaelic—Knox's Forms of Prayer and Catechism—Bishop Carswell, the translator, in his preface refers with pious severity to histories extant and popular in the Highlands "concerning warriors and champions and Fingal, the son of Comhal, with his heroes." Still further, in the Dean of Lismore's Book already mentioned, the manuscript of which, written before 1537, is still to be seen in the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh, are to be found many incidents and whole passages which occur in Macpherson's translation. Of these are the death of Oscar, the tales of Cuchullin and Conloch, and Fainasollis, the Maid of Craca, with references to many other of the heroes of Ossian. Several of these compositions, preserved by the Dean, are distinctly headed, "The author of this is Ossian, the son of Finn."

The existence of the two last-named books, it may be noted in passing, demolishes another of Dr. Johnson's dogmatic assertions—that there was not a book in the Gaelic language a hundred years old.