Page:The first and last journeys of Thoreau - lately discovered among his unpublished journals and manuscripts.djvu/151

 How beauteous, mighty man, was thy mind, etc.

The Death of the Sun combines many of the peculiarities of Ossian.

Their tears remind us of a weeping sinew. Crodar, blind and old, receives Ossian, son of Fingal, who comes to aid him in war,—

My eyes have failed, etc.,

says he. Here are more of Ossian's natural and vigorous similes. Cudulin is fighting,—

As rills that gush, etc.

And again Cudulin retires from fight,—

Dragging his spear behind, etc.

When a hero dies the bard utters a short biblical sentence, which will serve for epitaph or biography,—

The weak will find, etc.

And so of Fillan's tears. He weeps like a hero,—

Fillan was no veteran in war, etc.

The ancient blinded heroes passed the remainder of their days listening to the lays of the bards, and feeling the weapons which laid their enemies low. [103]