which, if we were to meet side by side with the "Ode to Night," by
Alcman, in the Greek anthology, we would not be surprised; or those
lines on page 203, Vol. I., the song of Cuculain, forsaken by his
people, watching the frontier of his country--

"Alone in defence of the Ultonians,
Solitary keeping ward over the province"

or the death [Note: Publications of Ossianic Society, Vol. I.] of
Oscar, on pages 34 and 35, Vol. I., an excerpt condensed from the
Battle of Gabra. Innumerable such tender and thrilling passages.

To all great nations their history presents itself under the aspect
of poetry; a drama exciting pity and terror; an epic with unbroken
continuity, and a wide range of thought, when the intellect is
satisfied with coherence and unity, and the imagination by extent
and diversity. Such is the bardic history of Ireland, but with this
literary defect. A perfect epic is only possible when the critical
spirit begins to be in the ascendant, for with the critical spirit
comes that distrust and apathy towards the spontaneous literature
of early times, which permit some great poet so to shape and alter
the old materials as to construct a harmonious and internally
consistent tale, observing throughout a sense of proportion and a
due relation of the parts. Such a clipping and alteration of the
authorities would have seemed sacrilege to earlier bards. In
mediaeval Ireland there was, indeed, a subtle spirit of criticism;
but under its influence, being as it was of scholastic origin, no
great singing men appeared, re-fashioning the old rude epics; and
yet, the very shortcomings of the Irish tales, from a literary
point of view, increase their importance from a historical. Of