The grandeur of the similes is another feature which characterizes great poetry. Ossian seems to speak a gigantic and universal language. The images and pictures occupy even much space in the landscape, as if they could be seen only from the sides of mountains, and plains with a wide horizon, or across arms of the sea. The machinery is so massive that it cannot be less than natural. Oivana says to the spirit of her father, "Grey-haired Torkil of Torne," seen in the skies,
"Thou glidest away like receding ships."
So when the hosts of Fingal and Starne approach to battle,
"With murmurs loud, like rivers far,
The race of Torne hither moved."
And when compelled to retire,
"dragging his spear behind,
Cudulin sank in the distant wood.
Like a fire upblazing ere it dies."
Nor did Fingal want a proper audience when he spoke;
"A thousand orators inclined
To hear the lay of Fingal."
The threats too would have deterred a man. Vengeance and terror were real. Trenmore threatens the young warrior whom he meets on a foreign strand,
"Thy mother shall find thee pale on the shore,
While lessening on the waves she spies
The sails of him who slew her son."
If Ossian's heroes weep, it is from excess of strength, and not from weakness, a sacrifice or libation of fertile natures, like the perspiration of stone in summer's heat.
