with such spirit, that Macpherson's hesitation and doubts of success were at once surmounted". A considerable subscription was raised among the advocates and men of letters; and Macpherson was dispatched that same summer, on a poetical mission to the Highlands and Isles. When he returned in winter, laden with the hidden treasures of Celtic literature, he spent his time, as he said, in translation; and the Irish manuscripts which he certainly collected, and which are probably still extant, appeared to those who were unable to read them, to be satisfactory because they were old, and much sullied with smoke and snuff". In

collection might be made for bearing his expences? &c." June 23d. (1760).

11 Mr Mackenzie's Report. Appendix, 58.

12 Report 80. Appendix, 59. 65. Blair informs us, "that some gentlemen, particularly Professor Adam Ferguson, told me that they did look into Macpherson's papers, and saw some which appeared to them to be old manuscripts; and, that in comparing his version with the original, they found it exact and faithful in VOL. I.

the course of a twelve-month, an epic poem was prepared for the press, and by the advice of his friends he removed to London, where, under the patronage of Lord Bute, Fingal and the lesser poems were published by subscription, about the beginning of the year 1762. The Temora and the remaining poems were published early in the following year, with inferior success; and in a critical dissertation by Blair on the

poems of Ossian, the palm of heroic poesy was indirectly transferred from the Greek, to the Celtic bard.

Such, then, was the origin, and such the progress of those celebrated poems, in which the very first step was an imposition practised upon the easy credulity of Home and Blair. To them the supposed beauties of the Frag

any parts which they read:" Whereas Doctor Ferguson merely says, that "the fragments I afterwards saw in Mr Macpherson's hands, by no means appeared of recent writing; the paper was much stained with smoke, and daubed with Scotch snuff;" the only proof which he gives of the authenticity of Ossian.

ments were the sole proofs of antiquity ; without even any previous enquiry whether those beauties were really original, or from what sources of imitation they were derived. From the first forgery of the Death of Oscar, Macpherson was conducted, step by step, to other fabrications, by their importunity and zeal; and encouraged by the unexampled success of the Fragments, especially when compared with the miscarriage of the Highlander, he availed himself dexterously of the enthusiasm of his countrymen to possess a national epopee, and gave them his own compositions under another name, as the genuine productions of a remote antiquity. His different prefaces contain a plain explanation of the fact; and a careful reservation of his latent claims to the rank and merit of an original poet. "But indeed he did not affect "to conceal from those with whom he was "particularly intimate, that the poems were

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entirely his own composition; as Sir John

“Elliot, then an eminent physician in Lon"don, informed Dr Percy," the venerable Bishop of Dromore, whose words I have transcribed, and whose attestation of the fact will be read with pleasure.

"The Bishop of Dromore has allowed "Dr Anderson to declare, that he repeatedly received the most positive assuran

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ces from Sir John Elliot, the confidential "friend of Macpherson, that all the poems published by him as translations of Ossian, were entirely of his own composi❝tion 13."

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I understand that Macpherson made similar declarations to other friends; as will appear from the following declaration in particular, by the Rev. Mr Lapslie, minister of Campsie in Scotland.

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Living at Antwerp in the year 1778, along with the present Sir James Suttie

13 Letter from the Bishop of Dromore to Dr Robert Anderson of Edinburgh, dated Dromore-house, April 16, 1805.

"Bart. of Balgonie, I had an opportunity of

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being often in the house of General Plun"ket, Governor of the Citadel of Antwerp,

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an Irish gentleman in the Imperial service. "The conversation between him and me

"sometimes turning upon the poems of Os

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sian, General Plunket said, that Mr Mac

pherson had declared to an old and inti"mate companion of his and the General's, "that having given an exceeding good poem "to the public, which passed unnoticed, he "then published as ancient, some fragments "of his own, which were so much applaud"ed, that henceforth he resolved to give the "world enough of such ancient poetry."

to me.

Campsie, May 18. 1805.

14" Dear sir, Such was General Plunket's declaration From my total ignorance of the Earse language, I was unable to enter into the controversy with his Excellency; nor am I able, at this moment, to give my opinion upon the subject, so far as my knowledge of that language, or acquaintance with the manners and customs of the Scotch Highlanders, would entitle me to be heard; and I even consider it as delicate in me to speak about what a gentleman said, who is long