Sketches of the History of Man. Lord Kames (Henry Home)

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СКАЧАТЬ heard the mildest Everallin. One day she sung of Cormac’s fall, the youth that died for her love. I saw the tears on her cheek, and on thine, thou chief of men. Her soul was touched for the unhappy, though she loved him not. How fair among a thousand maids, was the daughter of the generous<450> Branno”^(a). “It was in the days of peace,” replied the great Clessammor, “I came in my bounding ship to Balclutha’s walls of towers. The winds had roared behind my sails, and Clutha’s streams received my dark-bosomed vessel. Three days I remained in Reuthamir’s halls, and saw that beam of light, his daughter. The joy of the shell went round, and the aged hero gave the fair. Her breasts were like foam on the wave, and her eyes like stars of light: her hair was dark as the raven’s wing: her soul was generous and mild. My love for Moina was great: and my heart poured forth in joy”^(b). “The fame of Ossian shall rise: his deeds shall be like his father’s. Let us rush in our arms, son of Morni, let us rush to battle. Gaul, if thou shalt return, go to Selma’s lofty hall. Tell Everallin that I fell with fame: carry the sword to Branno’s daughter: let her give it to Oscar when the years of his youth shall arise”^(c).

      Next to war, love makes the principal figure: and well it may; for in Ossian’s poems it breathes every thing sweet, tender, and elevated.

      “On Lubar’s grassy banks they fought; and Grudar fell. Fierce Cairbar came to the vale of the echoing Tura, where Brassolis, fairest of his sisters, all alone raised the song of grief. She sung the actions of Grudar, the youth of her se-<451>cret soul: she mourned him in the field of blood; but still she hoped his return. Her white bosom is seen from her robe, as the moon from the clouds of night: her voice was softer than the harp, to raise the song of grief: her soul was fixed on Grudar, the secret look of her eye was his;—when wilt thou come in thine arms, thou mighty in the war? Take, Brassolis, Cairbar said, take this shield of blood: fix it on high within my hall, the armour of my foe. Her soft heart beat against her side: distracted, pale, she flew, and found her youth in his blood.—She died on Cromla’s heath. Here rests their dust, Cuchullin; and these two lonely yews, sprung from their tombs, wish to meet on high. Fair was Brassolis on the plain, and Grudar on the hill. The bard shall preserve their names, and repeat them to future times”^(d). “Pleasant is thy voice, O Carril, said the blue-eyed chief of Erin; and lovely are the words of other times: they are like the calm shower of spring, when the sun looks on the field, and the light cloud flies over the hill. O strike the harp in praise of my love, the lonely sun-beam of Dunscaich: strike the harp in praise of Bragela, whom I left in the isle of mist, the spouse of Semo’s son.—Dost thou raise thy fair face from the rock to find the sails of Cuchullin? the sea is rolling far distant, and its white foam will deceive thee for my sails. Retire, my love, for it is night, and the dark winds sigh in thy hair: retire to the hall of my feasts, and think of times that are past; for I will not return till the storm of war cease. O Connal, speak of war and<452> arms, and send her from my mind; for lovely with her raven hair is the white-bosomed daughter of Sorglan”^(a).

      Malvina speaks.

      “But thou dwellest in the soul of Malvina, son of mighty Ossian. My sighs arise with the beam of the east, my tears descend with the drops of the night. I was a lovely tree in thy presence, Oscar, with all my branches round me: but thy death came like a blast from the desert, and laid my green head low: the spring returned with its showers, but of me not a leaf sprung. The virgins saw me silent in the hall, and they touched the harp of joy. The tear was on the cheek of Malvina, and the virgins beheld my grief. Why art thou sad, they said, thou first of the maids of Lutha? Was he lovely as the beam of the morning, and stately in thy sight?”^(b) “Fingal came in his mildness, rejoicing in secret over the actions of his son. Morni’s face brightened with gladness, and his aged eyes looked faintly through tears of joy. We came to the halls of Selma, and sat round the feast of shells. The maids of the song came into our presence, and the mildly-blushing Everallin. Her dark hair spreads on her neck of snow, her eye rolls in secret on Ossian. She touches the harp of music, and we bless the daughter of Branno”^(c).

      Had the Caledonians made slaves of<453> their women, and thought as meanly of them as savages commonly do, Ossian could never have thought, even in a dream, of bestowing on them those numberless graces that exalt the female sex, and render many of them objects of pure and elevated affection. I say more: Supposing a savage to have been divinely inspired, manners so inconsistent with their own would not have been relished, nor even comprehended, by his countrymen. And yet that they were highly relished is certain, having been diffused among all ranks, and preserved for many ages by memory alone, without writing. Here the argument mentioned above strikes with double force, to evince, that the manners of the Caledonians must have been really such as Ossian describes.

      Catharina Alexowna, Empress of Russia, promoted assemblies of men and women, as a means to polish the manners of her subjects. And in order to preserve decency in such assemblies, she published a body of regulations, of which the following are a specimen. “Ladies who play at forfeitures, questions and commands, &c. shall not be noisy nor riotous. No<454> gentleman must attempt to force a kiss, nor strike a woman in the assembly, under pain of exclusion. Ladies are not to get drunk upon any pretence whatever; nor gentlemen before nine.” Compare the manners that required such regulations with those described above. Can we suppose, that the ladies and gentlemen of Ossian’s poems ever amused themselves, after the age of twelve, with hide and seek, questions and commands, or such childish play. Can it enter into our thoughts, that Bragela or Malvina were so often drunk, as to require the reprimand of a public regulation? or that any hero of Ossian ever struck a woman of fashion in ire?

      The immortality of the soul was a capital article in the Celtic creed, inculcated by the Druids^(a). And in Valerius Maximus we find the following passage:—“Gallos, memoriae proditum est, pecunias mutuas, quae sibi apud inferos redderentur, dare: quia persuasum habuerint, animas hominum immortales esse. Dicerem stultos, nisi idem braccati sensissent quod palliatus Pythagoras<455> sensit”^(b).^* All savages have an impression of immortality; but few, even of the most enlightened before Christianity prevailed, had the least notion of any occupations in another life, but what they were accustomed to in this. Even Virgil, in his poetical fervency, finds no amusements for his departed heroes, but what they were fond of when alive; the same love for war, the same taste for hunting, and the same affection to their friends. As we have no reason to expect more invention in Ossian, the observation may serve as a key to the ghosts introduced by him, and to his whole machinery, as termed by critics. His description of these ghosts is copied plainly from the creed of his country.

      In a historical account of the progress of manners, it would argue gross insensibility to overlook those above mentioned. <456> The subject, it is true, has swelled upon my hands beyond expectation; but it is not a little interesting. If these manners be genuine, they are a singular phenomenon in the History of Man: if they be the invention of an illiterate bard, among savages utterly ignorant of such manners, the phenomenon is no less singular. Let either side be taken, and a sort of miracle must be admitted. In the instances above given, such a beautiful mixture there is of simplicity and dignity, and so much life given to the manners described, that real manners were never represented with a more striking appearance of truth. If these manners be fictitious, I say again, that the author must have been inspired: they plainly exceed the invention of a savage; nay, they exceed the invention of any known writer. Every man will judge for himself: it is perhaps fondness for such refined manners, that makes me incline to reality against fiction.

      I am aware at the same time, that manners so pure and elevated, in the first stage of society, are difficult to be accounted for. The Caledonians were not an original tribe, who may be supposed to have<457> had manners peculiar to themselves: they were a branch of the Celtae, and had a language common to them with the inhabitants of Gaul, and of England. The manners probably of all were the same, or nearly so; and if we expect any light for explaining Caledonian manners, it must be from that quarter: we have indeed no other resource. Diodorus Siculus^(a) reports of the Celtae, that, though warlike, they were upright in their dealings, СКАЧАТЬ