To the fourteenth fragment there is appended the following note:—“This is the opening of the epic poem mentioned in the preface. The two following fragments are parts of some episodes of the same work,” and they accordingly appear in the quarto, in the epic poem of Fingal.
The fourteenth fragment, however, relates to Cuchullin alone; and in those tales and poems which we know to be genuine, Cuchullin and Fingal are never brought together.
Macpherson seems, at this stage of his collection, to have conceived the idea of weaving the short poems into one epic; but his unskilful junction of Cuchullin and Fingal in the same transactions, betrays its artificial construction.
[ [30] Some years ago I happened to pass a couple of months in the immediate neighbourhood of Strathmashie, and I recollect having been informed at that time, but by whom I cannot now tell, that, after Lachlan Macpherson’s death, a paper was found in his repositories containing the Gaelic of the seventh book of Temora, in his handwriting, with numerous corrections and alterations, with this title,—“First rude draft of the seventh book of Temora.”
Mr. Gallie sent to the Highland Society a part of the Gaelic of Fingal, which afterwards appeared in the Gaelic version subsequently published. He said he had taken it from a MS. he had recovered, written by a friend “who was at that time with Mr. Macpherson and me, a gentleman well known for an uncommon acquaintance with the Gaelic, and a happy facility for writing it in Roman characters.”
On being pressed to say who this friend was, he says, “his name was Lachlane Macpherson of Strathmashy. He died in 1767.”
This Gaelic version seems, therefore, to have been put together before 1767; and if before 1762, it will account for the original of the seventh book of Temora having been published in that year, and also for an advertisement which appeared soon after the publication of the second quarto, that the originals were lying at the publisher’s, and would be published if a sufficient number of subscribers came forward; but as few subscribers appeared, and fewer came to look at them, they were withdrawn.
The so-called originals were, no doubt, this Gaelic version, which there is every reason to believe had preceded the English version in its preparation.
[ [31] In vol. iv. p. 230 of these Transactions, it is admitted that some of the poems transcribed in 1749 were the composition of the writer, Michael Comyn.
[ [32] Those poems published by the Ossianic Society which are of any length, and especially the poem termed the Battle of Gabhra, show evident indications of the same process of patching and dovetailing together of shorter poems which characterize Macpherson’s Ossian.