fuNWWSlTVHUGHTS OUNPHV cnu.f r ' t ’2'i Receiveo 1922 m 'x t z? e STORIES OF WICKLOW. c i y o BY THE SAME AUTHOR. A GARLAND FROM GREECE. Fcap. 8 vo. Price gs. POEMS: LYRICAL AND DRAMATIC. A New Edition. Fcap. 8 vo. Price 6s. UGONE : A TRAGEDY. A New Edition. Fcap. 8 vo. Price 6s. KING SAUL. (The Tragedy of Israel, Part I.) Fcap. 8 vo. Price 5 $. KING DAVID. (The Tragedy of Israel, Part II.) Fcap. 8 vo. Price 6 $. KING SOLOMON. (The Tragedy of Israel, Part III.) Fcap. 8 vo. Price 6s. THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF EDMUND J. ARMSTRONG. Fcap. 8 vo. With Portrait and Vignette. Price ys. 6d. EDITED BY THE SAME AUTHOR. THE POETICAL WORKS OF EDMUND J. ARMSTRONG. A New Edition, containing poems not before published. Fcap. 8 vo. With Portrait on Steel by Jeens, and Vignette. Price 5s. ESSAYS AND SKETCHES OF EDMUND J. ARMSTRONG. Fcap. 8 vo. Price 5 J. LONGMANS AND CO. STORIES OF WICKLOW. BY GEORGE FRANCIS ARMSTRONG, ^ M.A., D.LIT. LONDON : LONGMANS, GREEN, AND Co. 1886. [All rights reserved.'] BOSTON COLLEGE LIBRAE? CHESTNUT HILL, MASS. CHISWICK PRESS : — C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE. 32376 TO THE MEMORY OF MY MOTHER. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015 https://archive.org/details/storiesofwicklowOOsava DEDICATORY STANZAS. i. Y EAR by year the mountains roaming, Roaming all alone along the stormful shore, Roaming underneath the lonely woodlands’ branches old and hoar, Where the golden rills of Wicklow foaming Flash from rock to rock through many a dark ravine, Where the crags above the hollows and the lakes in splendour lean, I, who grasp the living hands no more, Hear amid the winds and waters as they swirl and roar, Hear amid the sighs of leaves and grasses as in light they sway, Voices of the Lost Ones silent now for many a weary day, DEDICATORY STAJVZAS, viii See amid the gleams and shadows of the branches as they play, In the rosy beams of sunset, in the rainbows of the spray, Faces of the Lost Ones smiling with the tender love of old, — Mix the dust of latter days with all the former seasons’ gold. ii. Mother, — thou the tenderest-hearted, Ay, of all that ever soothed the sore of life ; Bravest of the souls that ever nerved this breast in pain or strife ; Soul that strength of men to men imparted ; Thou who oft with Him, our stainless Father, led Us thy children wild of fancy o’er the hills with eager tread, Far above the wide and heathy vale, Through the flickering woodland on from flowery dale to dale ; Daughter of the warrior-race whose old-world pride thy bosom bare, DEDICATORY STANZAS. IX Dowering us thy sons with hope the loftier deeds of men to share, Ready thou the deeps of Death for us thy well- beloved to dare ; Thou who, child at heart through all thy days in love of Nature fair, Doomed no more thy fathers’-fathers’ sword-won Heights to call thy home, Foundest home and childlike joy where’er these hills thy feet might roam ; — in. Can I, yearning toward these mountains, Thus to-day or ever till thy peace I find, Sing of them and hear not still thy voice in every wandering wind ? Can I quaff afresh the magic fountains Whence our Edmund drew a life of joy and light Ere he left us and thy chequered day became a beamless night, And forget the love he bore to thee ? With thy Name I bind amid a wide and shoreless sea X DEDICA TOR Y STANZAS. This, a broken purpose rounded with a fainter heart and will, Wrought with hands that droop and tremble now his guiding hands are still, Semblance of the Dream we fashioned, he and I, by wave and hill Ere the heavenward pinion faltered, struck by that untimely chill, — My poor debt of fancies weaving with his opulent wreath of rhyme, While I follow a fleeting splendour through the fitful mists of Time. CONTENTS. D edicatory stanzas An Invocation .... De Verdun of Darragh Lugnaquillia ..... By Wicklow Shores .... The Living and The Dead . The Glen of the Horse Vignette ...... The Fisherman ..... The Wreck off Mizen-Head Altadore ...... The Wanderer ..... The Bursting of Lough Nahanagan Autumn Memories .... The Wraith of De Riddlesford’s Castle The Scalp To Wicklow ..... To G. B In the Mountainland .... An Invitation ..... PAGE vii i 4 158 181 184 187 202 203 229 236 277 280 29I 292 352 353 356 357 360 xii CONTENTS. PAGE Love of Nature ........ 363 Luggala : The Hollow of Sweet Sounds . . . 364 To Luggala ........ 420 To M. E. A 421 To Francis and Raymond Savage Armstrong . . 423 Song-Time is Over ....... 426 Song-Time To Come 428 Notes 429 AN INVOCATION. C OME back to me, come back and bear, With sounds of stream and tree, The clearness of the mountain air, The fragrance of the sea ; Bring the cool dews of Clorah’s lawn Where purple foxgloves blow, Or one deep draught of water drawn From “ warbling Anamoe ; ” Enchantress of my happiest hours, O Spiritual Maid, Blithe Mountain-Muse in wildwood flowers And garlands green arrayed, Who found me on the hills, a child, In rapture wandering, B 2 AN INVOCATION i\nd nursed my love of wave and wild, And moved my lips to sing ; Come back, and teach me to attain A more etherial song, Unlike the luscious laboured strain That soothes the sensual throng ; Come from thy dewy mountain woods, Revive my heart that lies Lulled by the time's luxurious moods And dabbled with its dyes. Thy waving hair, thy venturous mien, Thy tameless woodland ways, May stir the paltry critic's spleen, May miss the worldling's praise ; But I will clasp thy snow-white hands, And through the indifferent crowd Go down across the loveless lands, In thy possession proud. And haply some may yet rejoice Thine hour is still to run, May hail the freedom of a voice That claims applause of none, AN INVOCATION 3 May own that one clear mountain-chant Breathed from thy natural heart Can more assuage the deeper want Than seas of sensual art. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Part I. L i. O YE pine-woods in the moonlight high against the white clouds swaying, Tossed i ? the warm and redolent tempest blowing over the moonlit sea, How ye draw me from my doors that I may hear the clear winds playing In your pungent plumy branches their tumultuous harmony, — Treading here the tumbled cones amid the mossy woodland places, By my home upon the mountain where my rivulets leap and sing, All the glory of night above me in the luminous sea-blue spaces, Flying mists, and throbbing stars, that lift my spirit on aery wing ! DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH i 5 2 . Even now, within my chamber o’er the Sage’s volume bending, Dashed with sorrow, and troubled, brooding on the riddle of Life and God, As I strained the aching brow, and, far my helpless hands extending, Groped amid the cavernous blackness, blind, with never a staff or rod, Murmuring, 44 Lo, of all his weary ceaseless toil is this the teaching — His, of living sons of men the amplest dowered with force and brain- — Only this — that soul and body are but one thing ; this his preaching : In the endless thronging spheres of light and shadow, of sweets and pain, In this universe, resplendent from its germ atomic springing, Growing, varying, forthshooting world on world as flower on flower, There is room for all we dream of ever in Fancy’s wildest winging 6 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH Save the Spirit's immortal heritage and a Father of love and power ? — Suddenly o’er the trees without the muffled shore- like music streaming Broke upon my languid senses with its deep melodious psalm, And I rose and loosed the shutter, and the moon in heaven was beaming, And I flung my cloak about me, wandering out in the woods of balm. 3 - Now, as the winds around me warble, as the earth in its orbit wheeleth, And I seem in the stir and music drifting far in the deeps of air, All the subtle and gorgeous beauty that the fleshly veil concealeth Openeth in my sight, revealing miracle after miracle bare ; Thick as dust in the desert hurricane whirl the worlds in their mystic dances, Narrowing, widening in their circles, round and round in wildering flight ; DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ 7 Shoot the comets from the abysses, meteors hurl their myriad lances, In the mystery of motion, in the mystery of light; Miracle of the orbs unnumbered, miracle of the life unfailing, — Man and beast and bird and worm and herb and fruit and waving tree, — Sweeps before me, sways me, thrills me, through the shoreless ether sailing, Draws my heart to an unseen Presence in a rare exultancy. 4 * Whence it cometh or whither it vanisheth, whether of Chance or Aim created, Whatsoever I am or shall be, now is the infinite Marvel mine. On what strong impetuous pinion borne, my spirit, revived, elated, Revelling in the exuberant joy of quickening sense, of a health divine, Rising high in boundless liberty, onward wide and wider soaring 8 BE VERDUN OF DARRAGH Through the fathomless starry spaces yawning round, beneath, above, Reaches toward a Mind invisible, with a longing, an adoring, Bends before a living Deity with a deep and passionate love ! 5 - Wherefore ’mid the broadening vision from my heart of hearts arises All this rapture of love and fealty, irrepressible gratitude, Lifting thus my puny being in its wonder and glad surprises To a life wherein it ranges loftier-minded, mightier-thewed ? Surely is there something yet the Sage’s hand hath scarce unfolded. Mind behind the works and systems kin to that which itself achieves Looks for living Mind, disdains a world by blind vacuity moulded ; Spirit, yearning after Spirit, in the Spirit it needs believes. DE VERDUN OF DARK A GH. 9 6 . In our keen-eyed earnest searching shall this force be all-forgotten 'Mid the multitudinous motions that have woven the web of Man ? We like beasts have rent each other, we for greed or lust have foughten, 'Mid a pitiless strife for life the world hath grown with never a plan . . Nay, but out of the Spirit's yearning toward a Spirit, a Will supernal, Out of love and out of worship of an imminent conscious Power, Through the heart's supremest longing for the wells of light eternal From the beast hath man arisen ; so ariseth he hour by hour. 7 - Mind, and Will, and Love’s beneficence, can I dream of these nor fashion In imagination's crucible for solace in calm or storm, IO DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Something human in its shape, to yield response to human passion ? Will, and reasoning Mind, and Purpose, — can I sever their life from Form ? Can I feel the Thing that Is, the dread, profound, ineffable Wonder That abides and throbs about me, which I seek to see in vain, And not clothe It in light for raiment, mix Its going with noise of thunder, Granting still the Form I cherish but a fantasy of the brain ? Do I sin against Thy might, against Thy measure- less depth and glory, O Thou dread inscrutable God whose seas of being we shall not sound, Moulding thus in the fairest image Thou hast shown in Earth’s long story, — Man’s, — an idol of Thee to kneel to, in this eddy of darkness wound ? Lift me, hidden infinite Deity, bear me on Thy billowy ocean DE VERDUN OF DARRAGR n Wheresoever Thou wilt ; the law that sways my being, ordained of Thee, While I drift before its breath, within me stirs in kindred motion All my spirit in awe and reverence with an equal certainty ; And I yield to the power constraining with a ready, a full surrender, Trusting Thee in the roughest whirlwind, in the cloud of the thickest night, While I watch and hope in silence for the dawn of a richer splendour, Musing, “ What new gift awaits me, what of Knowledge, or Love, or Light ? ” . . 9 - Here to-night ’mid thoughts that vex me, as in aimless mood I wander In the homeland of my fathers, by my old an- cestral towers, After years of battle and travel, late returned, to rest, and ponder (Still so young) the endless problem, in my lonely and loveless hours, i2 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. O ye woods of pine and oak and beech and chestnut wildly streaming From the mountains and the lowland fields afar to the Wicklow Sea, How your surging jubilant music bears my heart in its aery dreaming Back once more with happier fervour Hope’s divine philosophy ! . . Never in fierce Crimean onsets, in an eager and reckless daring Charging with my bravest comrades in the loud victorious fight — I, a youth of twenty summers there an Empire’s triumph sharing — Have I felt as rich elation, have I quaffed of as keen delight As of old amid your shadows, in my childhood roaming listless, I have known, and here to-night beneath your boughs I find once more, In the vision of nature’s glory, in the touch of a Hand resistless Beckoning, leading, or impelling far my spirit from shore to shore. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 13 10. Still of God let Nature's voice to me, i’the seas and breezes drifted, Speak, as I roam so void at heart, by human love unsatisfied ! . . I, from whose parched lips the sacred cup of woman's love uplifted Hath been dashed or e'er its magic had been tasted or yet denied, I, who lack the sweet response of trustful eyes, the hand’s dear pressures, — What should lead me to the loftier paths that I aspire to tread, What incite to selfless action, yield me Virtue's affluent pleasures, If the palms in prayer should falter, if all hope in the heart lay dead ? i 4 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. II. i. M ORNING upon the sea. The winds Far off ’mid alien mountains rove, And breathe in other ears, and move With other fancies other minds. A morning of pervading rest That fills with rare tranquillity The dreaming brain, the sentient breast. I scarcely wish to quit my chair, Here in the old dim Library Beside the blazoned window fair Part open to the temperate air, But sit and watch the woods beneath, The sapphire Peak, the Headland bold, The hill-tops girt with blossomed gold, The fraughans yellowing in the heath, And, out beyond the pines and limes, The sea that tells of summer climes. DE VERDUN OF DA ERA GET. 15 2. Which was it ? — yonder cypress-plume A-sway beside the cedar-tree, Or that delicious keen perfume Blown from the open orangery, Or something wafted from the firs, Or silvery lines of azure sea, That bore me back, with sudden start, To Southern bays, and wakes and stirs The lost love-longing in my heart ? . . Let me relive it ; let me sit And paint once more in memory That happy season that doth flit Before my fancy fitfully, Repeat its history bit by bit As if I whispered in some nook To some life’s friend, or in a book For stranger-eyes recorded it. . . 3 * What ! can three years of joys and cares Prove thus so powerless to erase The image of that earnest face, 1 6 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. That perfect form, that unawares Possessed my being in one brief day And passed into the world away ? . . 4 - By paths that like two wandering streams Move, meet, and then diverge once more, We twain were drawn in days of dreams To that divine Italian shore, To lean a moment heart to heart, To meet, to love an hour, and part. 5 - My home was on the olived steep And hers beside the laughing sea. From loggia and from balcony She saw the sun at morning sweep Round a bald headland where a town Gleamed pale above the brightening coves, And at the amber eve go down O’er headlands cloaked with olive-groves. From terrace-levels ivy-grown I hailed him hurling his keen brands O’er clusters high of mountain-peaks DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 17 That held our blue bay’s bended creeks Girt from the storms of northern lands, And rose above the olive-bowers, ’Mid clouds that hung in golden streaks Or reared themselves like airy towers And changed through all the morning hours . . How oft I ’ve watched them curl and climb, Slip from the clefts or idly cling Through half the dreamy morning-time, And then arise with lazy wing, Far soaring o’er the summits bare, And vanish in the fleckless air ! 6 . I roved about the dales of pines, And o’er the hills by mule-paths rough That wound along their rocky spines. I climbed by many a craggy bluff Through myrtle-boscage, cistus-flowers, Tall heaths, arbutus, rosemaries, To heights that held old ruined towers Built far back from the dangerous seas To mock the pirate’s hovering sail. To hollows where the nightingale c 3 8 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Sang lavishly the livelong day I would descend through flowery glades, And find clear streams in bright cascades With rainbows fleeting in their spray. By cliff and boulder, belts of wood Storm-shattered, to the topmost rim Of all the peaks I wound, and stood Above the dwindled mountains . . . lo, Far north the snowy ranges, dim With clouds and tempest, and below The dazzling blue unshadowed deep With fringes hoar from reach to reach, And headland, town, and woody steep, And red road winding by the beach . . . O pleasant days of ease and rest, Sweet to the soldier’s hardened breast Too early taught the troublous joy And passionate hope and strain intense Of war’s wild raptures that destroy The gentler loves, the tenderer sense ! 7 - The light rock-pines are crookt and bent, Are green and dry and redolent BE VERB UN OF BARRA GH. i Along the rocky promontory ; One stoops as though with bended knee Beside the mule-path strewn with cones And brown and soft with fallen sprays, And one spreads low and lightly lays His crest along the dappled stones, And one leans outward o’er the tide And throws his shadow on its face ; And round their roots in that sweet place The lentisks throng on every side, The myrtle with its glossy leaves In every cleft and crevice cleaves, And the wild olive and wild vine And milky-stemrned euphorbia clear, Sweet herbs and shrubs and trailers twine And breathe and bloom through all the year. What haunt could more delicious be ? Beneath a pine-tree’s canopy, Above the billowy waters blue That splashed and plunged with drowsy sound, How oft I lay, and ever found Serenest peace and fancies new ! Between the twisted branches brown I gazed across the sparkling bay 20 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Toward the white-walled, red-roofed town, With church and tower and villa gay And glittering campanili white. All round the bowery olives lay Rolling in sunshine green and grey ; Beyond, the ruddy cliffs a-light As if with sunset or sunrise ; And, girdling all, and bare and keen, High on the blue air seemed to lean The great peaks crowding in the skies. There once amid the rosemaries green I lingered till the pink clouds wove At eve their slender threads on high, Then ere the twilight through the grove I wandered homeward listlessly. 8 . The brown paths from the pine-trees’ shade The white paths from the olives meet ; Through pine-wood and through olive-glade We moved with slow unconscious feet ; A kiss of the wind’s breath on my lip, A waft of the wind’s wings o’er my face, Made from my brain a dull thought slip, JDE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 21 And down she stept with wildering grace ; A moment her rich beauty shone About me, — and I wandered on, To question what the charm might be That changed all earth that hour for me. 9 - High on a mountain sheer and bold That soars above the olive-lands Hangs a grey castle built of old For refuge from the Corsair bands ; And nigh its ruined bastion stands A village with a chapel small And rude piazzetta. There each year The village-folk make festival, And thither from the mountains near And leafy valleys upward press Gay lads and girls in gala-dress, To dance amid the mountain breeze Their lively measures. Thither I, Who loved the village-revelries And olden customs well to spy, At noon upon the festa-day Up by the rocky zig-zag way 2 2 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH Climbed through the olives from our bay. A string of saddled mules at rest, With mule-boys come up from the sea, I passed below the mountain’s crest. No villagers in rustic glee Had come with these, but ladies bright And courtly men of high degree. Who might they prove ? . . I passed, and sped Up to the topmost grassy height Among the ruins . . . O delight Beyond all hope ! What lure had led My footsteps thither? . . There she stood, Alone, her dark and stately head In self-forgetful rapturous mood Thrown back, and all her face a-glow, As o’er the vales and sea below She gazed in silence. In surprise She started, and her calm grey eyes Met mine, then drooped their lashes long, And pinker than the peach’s flower The blush beneath their blackness spread ; Then quick she sought the joyous throng Of friends beneath. High on the Tower With listless eye the scene I viewed, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH Descending, left the festa gay, And wandered, musing, far away Amid the mountain solitude. 10. Nights after with Count Gasparo I stood within the frescoed hall Of gay Prince Victor, in the flow Of mirth and whirl of Carnival. We eyed the dancers curiously; The matrons sitting by the wall With languid spirits, wearied eyes ; The old men, sliding with bent knee, Precise in outworn courtesies And loyal to lamented rules ; Fantastic fops, and frisking fools; And staid men in their laughter wise ; And ladies lisping low replies Behind their kissed and fondled fans ; And lovers painting dreamy plans For years that laughed in mockery, Well-knowing what the end would be. We eyed them with a critic glee, Clear through the body read the heart, 24 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ And, scanning, chatting, lounged apart. A keen shrewd eye had Gasparo ; He caught strange creatures in his net, Probed, pierced, and pried, and let them go ; His humour sets me smiling yet. I knew not how it came to pass, His mirth fell fluttering from its height Like skylark faint with song and flight Down-dropping to the meadow-grass ; And, hardly heeding me, “ No stain,” He cried, “No vulgar shadow or stain Could anger cast or grief or pain Across that brow, no fear repress That proud unconscious stateliness.” His eyes upon her face were bent. How true his words were ! As she stept Amid the throng that round us swept, It seemed the dear accomplishment Of all the poets sigh for, all They dream of grace with sweetness blent, In every thought and motion breathed. So passed she onward, — stately, tall, Young, simple, proud, — her forehead wreathed In her own dark hair’s coronal. DE VERDUN OF BARRA GR. 25 11. O night of bliss, so brief, so sweet ! . . The flush that faintly lit her cheek A moment, as Prince Victor came And led me lightly to her feet, And paused, and lightly named my name, And set us soul with soul to speak, Swift as it kindled left her pale As the white windflower of the vale ; And then her low rich voice I heard Make answer to my earliest word ; And never breath of summer air The myriad-waving woodland stirred In wildering movement everywhere With more delicious deep unrest Than that low voice my lonely breast. 12. O, when we rested from the dance, Out in the loggia o’er the sea, In some delightful waking trance I seemed to hear her speak to me, And never word or sigh or glance, 2-6 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. I thought, in clearer truth could prove We loved and claimed each other’s love. . . x 3* What face was that, that on our sight Sprang from the darkness ? Who was he That, passing through the loggia’s light, So startled her that hurriedly Her hand upon my arm she laid, Scarce knowing it, and, trembling, prayed That I once more should lead her in Amid the dancers and the din And joyous music of the hall? Why should that vision so appal Her spirit, with that mask of sin? — A sable-bearded sallow face, Where passions fierce had left their trace In every line of cheek and brow . . I see its pallor even now As round it turned from her to me With rage and rancorous jealousy; A guilty face, with guilt half hid By bold defiance ; yet amid Its stains of sin and blots of earth DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Lingered the grace of gentle birth. I wondered, “ What his name, his rank, And what his power from whom she shrank, Whose passing, like a shadow fleeting Across some sunny landscape, chills My blood with presage vague of ills ? ” And to my heart I kept repeating, “ What thought can bend a life like hers In terror to a soul so base, And what strange hidden sorrow stirs Her breast in such an hour and place, Thus parented ? ” . . In little while Back, with blithe converse, came her smile, But never wholly passed again Her spirit from that cloud of pain. 14. As up the wooded vale I passed Beneath my villa, gleaming white In the low moon, that happy night, I murmured, “ I have found at last All my soul thirsts for” . . . found, and yet Forebodings of near sorrow swayed Weak Fancy, thronging fears beset 28 DE VERDUN OF DARK AGE. My heart, and would not be allayed ; And restless in the olives’ shade I wandered till the moon had set. . . 15 - Well, well, but what can it avail To brood upon a love that flowered For but one day, to droop and fail, With one light whirlwind overpowered, Before its lips could drink the dew And close the night its leaflets drew? . . 16. I went down reading ’mid the roar Of the glad waves, as evening fell. Up toward her villa by the shore, With clattering hoof and tinkling bell, A carriage, by swift horses drawn, Sped. At the sound my head I raised And idly-careless upward gazed. Within she sat ; one with her. Wan, Weary, with straining sight far round She scanned the highways. Eagerly, As if what she had sought was found, BE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. She rose erect, and dwelt on me With yearning sad, as if to tell Some grave dark tidings with her eyes ; And in that look mine eyelids fell — So strange it seemed that she should yield (I could not read it otherwise — And yet what spell had I to wield ?) Her whole soul up to me that hour With such an unreserved dower. A moment, and the gates had swung Wide and had closed her from my sight. A weight like lead about me clung. I moved into the swathes of night, And saw the sun's last rosy light Fade from the mountain's hollows high, And pallor fell o’er peak and sky. i7- Was that wild yearning look of pain, That seemed of love and grief to tell, Her heart's appealing mute farewell, And knew she till the setting sun Should beam again upon us twain In any place long years must run DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Their span, if ever in any land The years might bring so dear a boon ? . . With doubts that pressed a cold dead hand Upon my breast, next day at noon Beneath the sun I passed beside Her villa. All above the tide The blinds were shut ; the hot sun burned Upon their green ; and when I turned Toward the mountains, I descried Not one to the sweet breezes wide ; From chimney rose no lightest curl Of faint blue smoke of olive-log ; Nor murmured song, nor laughter's purl, Nor warble of bird, nor growl of dog Came from within. A man might wait All day beside that idle gate And hear no sound of foot, no noise Except the dry. cicala's voice And on the shore the surge's beat. 18. I moved away with aimless feet. I raised my eyes ; I gazed around. The naked mountains in the heat DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 31 Burned sharp against the living blue. Far up the wheeling swallows flew. The clear bright sea flashed rolling fire, And all its length the scorched shore Glowed like a smouldering funeral-pyre. I wandered through the olives hoar Toward the vales. I could not look Upon their beauty. Every nook Amid the trees and rocks had whips To sting me with. I had hid my brows Beneath the tall heath's bloomy boughs, Among the olives' silent shades, 'Mid the long moss and crimson tips Of gladioles ; but the flowers were blades Of steel to pierce me and to slay. I found but pain in the fair bay, Pain on the heights and headlands green. I could not face the little town, Or any spot where she had been And left her mournful memory. There was no depth wherein to drown The dream whereby my heart was tossed, Of love so sweet so swiftly lost. My home was no more home to me ; 32 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH I scarce could bear again to see Its terraces. The very bells That pealed at sunset joyously Across the forests and the dells, Were pain, pain, pain. Where’er I sate Or moved, the earth was desolate. 19. How morn and even, by sun and star, I watched her villa near and far For sign of life ! . . Ay me, the day I thought all ill had passed away, When, as I paced the shore, it seemed The jalousie of her window gleamed Half open ! — What if back indeed My love had come, and Heaven had freed My life from sorrow ! . . It was the wind Loose in the night the clasp had blown While far in other lands she slept. A heavier sadness o’er my mind With keener, icier chillness crept. By the dry river-bed, alone In the lone noon, unnerved and weak, I sank upon the sward, and wept. DE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. 33 20. Then how I rose, resolved to seek My treasure lost about the world, My treasure lost — if ever won ! Vain search ! In shrouds of darkness furled She moves I know not where ; and none Could guide me in my random quest, So deep a mystery seemed to rest About a life so innocent. . . 21. But now my spirit, lowly bent And weighed upon for many a day, Hath it not risen as time hath run, And found once more its natural play, And spread its blossoms to the sun ? What boot these idle dreams, then ? . . Yet The heart is cursed that can forget Its purest holiest happiness Or scorn its own divine distress. And still the famine of the heart Remains ; and still my subtlest art Will stifle not the thoughts within D 34 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. That ever and anon will start With question, “Why should I have failed To find thee, searching east and west, And why should one so free of sin, And stainless as the novice veiled, Fly in an hour of love and rest To hide her in the deepest night ?” And still I muse, “The world is wide, And souls might drift upon its tide Afar, and never glad the sight Again, till death should sweep between ; And yet so narrow that we glide, We know not whence, in ways unseen, Adown its diverse currents fleeting, And meet in most despair of meeting ; And I may find thee yet once more By some no less delightful shore.” But then a cloud across me flies, The happier fancy droops and dies. That face, — whence came it ? What could be Its bane, and what the mystery That muffles in the self-same gloom Her ways and his ? What dangers loom, What gathering tempests brood and sink DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH . 35 About her path across these sands Of life ? I press impatient hands Upon my brow, and think and think, And fail the hidden truth to wrench From Fate that holds it in her clench As rocks their ingots. Only this I say : The beauty and the bliss Of Italy are strangely sprent With natural horror, human crime, And in that sweetest saddest clime Is room for such entanglement Of life with death, of hate with love, As never wayward poet wove For wonder with his. quaintest rhyme. . . Enough ! My hour of reverie,. Wherein I ’ve lived my fairest days Thus over, far has wafted me From later Wisdom’s calmer ways. Let pass the vision ! . . Come once more, O mine own hills and woodland shore, Before my spirit’s eyes, and take, For what of loftier thought ye bring, The love yourselves alone awake With fervour of the earlier spring ; 36 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. What though the heart, that yet will yearn For action in your peaceful air, Doth, missing that sweet image, turn Too often with a dull despair Toward the silent funeral-urn That guards within its sacred mould A fruitless fancy’s ashes cold. 22. Cannot ye bring me again, Arrayed in your garment of light, The thoughts that above all pain Uplifted me yesternight? Is the Earth by day so far Adrift from its Maker and Lord That it yieldeth us less than a star, Or a moonbeam laid on the sward, Glimpses and hints of a life Vaster and deeper than this? In the beams of the sun shall I miss That wherewith darkness is rife, Dream but of earthly bliss, Losses and sorrows and strife ? DE VERDUN OF BARRA GN. III. I N the morn I sat a-dreaming (O so long !) of Italy, While the azure channel, gleaming O’er the trees, entranced me ! Half the night awake I lay Picturing in forms express Mountain-peak and lake and bay, — All its lavish loveliness. Strange ! And hither comes to-day O’er the seas with whirlwind speed Rumour of so rare a deed, Fame of such august endeavour Of Italian hearts to sever Those fell bonds that o’er them lying Stilled the life that leaped of yore, That my pulse, to theirs replying, Throbs as ne’er it throbbed before. 38 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Now doth Glory, long delaying, O'er the Lombard's citied plain Hover, wide her wings displaying, Seeking there her home again. All the earth with wondering eyes Turns to-day where Piedmont lies Under those enchanted skies. There Sardinia lifts her lance Toward the Austrian Tyrant’s throat, While the flags of succouring France, High i’ the Alpine breeze afloat, Fluttering wide in Freedom’s name, Fan the Nation’s hope to flame. 2. Sword, my sword, in the beam of the morning Glittering high on the oaken wall, There, ’mid the arms of my sires adorning Our dear and quaint old Gothic hall ; Sword, my sword, is it well to have hung thee With shield of dead baron and spear of dead knight ? Five swift years since my young hand swung thee, Battling afar in my first wild fight, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 39 Charging the Muscovite’s sullen array There where my father, who led us that day, Shot through the heart in the reckless affray, Dropt from his battle-steed dead in my sight, Leaving me lonely, the last of his name, Lord of his titles and heir of his fame. Nearest to his I have hung thee, my sword, Over Sir Gilbert’s and under Sir Guy’s, Hard by the shield of Sir Roland whose grave Lies where he routed the Saracen’s horde, Under the dome of the Palestine skies, Where the plumes of the palm-trees of Abana wave. 3 - Of sterner stuff my sires were made Than I perhaps ; or why should I Thus have laid so early by My scarce-indented battle-blade, While the blood of youth is leaping Still in every vein ? None of them but now is sleeping With the slayers or the slain, While I roam from land to land Seeking but the joys of life, 4 o BE VERB UN OF BARRA GH. Pondering questions manifold That perplexed the wise of old, Dreaming in the sunshine bland, Mingling not in any strife. Whence the clay of softer mould Out of which my heart was fashioned? I who deem it bliss to gloat O’er the little eyebright’s gold, I who on a leaf can dote, I who pore with love impassioned O’er the ocean tempest-rolled, — Owns my heart the blood indeed Of that iron Norman breed By whose strokes the fields were won Where I languish in the sun ? 4 * Yet toward thy hilt what power impels my hand And moves me thus to lift thee from thy place And draw thee from thy scabbard, while I stand Musing on Italy and that proud race That rises up to-day, by faith made bold, To hurl the hated Tyrant from his hold ? . . How my heart thrilled and sprang when suddenly BE VERB UN OF BARRA GH. 41 The tidings came of that sublime decree That rouses from her sleep The Aurora of our earth at whose awaking Light dawned upon the darkness of the deep, And at whose rising new the beams are breaking From the cloven clouds that o’er wide heaven are spread, Gladdening the world with rays from all their rifts outshed. 5 - But who that ever held on high His blade at any battle-cry Could hear the mighty voice from far That rouses such a realm to war, And sit one moment more at ease Amid his gardens and his trees ? Or where is he so shrunk and tame, Who recks the thunders of her name, Who quaffed in boyhood’s fancy, free, The fountains of her poesy, Amid her ruined splendours strayed Or o’er her mountain-heights delayed, That, seeing with what hope to-day DE VERDUN OF BARRAGE . The dull old earth grows lithe and gay, An idle dreamer still could stand, Nor yield all help of brain and hand In such a stdfe, in such an hour, So waged in Freedom’s dear defence, So rich in mightiest consequence, That till a thousand summers shower Their mingling hues of leaf and flower No fairer vision shall unfold, No lovelier, stranger tale be told? 6 . Nor shall I in the tents abide While that wild war-cry rends the air. I rise and go, whate’er betide, The rapture and the risk to share. DE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. 43 IV. nifHY should you fight for the land of a V V stranger ? ” Quoth Lovel, my neighbour, last night, Lifting his claret, — “ This courting of danger, Friend, is it sober and right ?” . . Lovel, abide with your deer and your grouse, Make brilliant your gardens and gorgeous your house, Expound of your dogs and your horses the lore, And welcome your guests as they throng to your door. Each bosom the instinct within it obey. Yours tells you to tarry, mine bids me away ; Your spirit finds room in the hive of a bee ; Mine faints for the prairies that roll like a sea. . . 44 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 2 . “ Little my arm that can wield but one sword, Little my will with one life to command, Little may I with a thrust or a word Work in the strife or achieve for the Land; Nothing akin to the men that aspire I who would fight to the death with their foes Feeding not vanity ; void of the ire, Blood-thirst or greed that of butchery grows ; Born in a realm that the freest would choose, Never have tasted of tyranny’s pain ; Nothing in Austria’s loss can I lose, Nothing in Italy’s victory gain.” . . 3 - True, but I hold that to fight for the right Alway uplifts us the nearer to God. Seeing the summits of Virtue in sight, Shall we not perish who leave them untrod ? 4 - Ever so little to feel as they feel, Fired with their fervent heroic intent, DE VERDUN OF DA ERA GET. 45 Soar in the strength of their spirit’s appeal, Bend at the shrine where a nation is bent ; Ever so little to fight for the Light, Strike at the bonds that have bound as in death Her who was folded in garments of night, Her who hath breathed in our bosoms her breath, Mingling her life with the life of the world ; Stand by her banner of Freedom unfurled ; Bear but my part in the noblest assay Earth shall behold as from gloom into gloom Fleetly I traverse my zonelet of day, Clutching the dearest delights of my doom. 5 - “ What should I find on the war-stricken shore ? ” . . What have I coveted ? — This, and no more. 46 DE VERDUN OF DARK A GET. V. I WHO have faith in a God, can I doubt That not without aim I am whirled afar Thus, — like a seed that is driven about, Tossed i J the wind over river and scar, Till it falls in a calm on a fruitful ground, Or is spent on the sands, or is lost in the sea Nay, for an Arm is about me wound Day and night wherever I be ; And never yet hath my spirit obeyed An impulse born of a pure desire And found itself in the end betrayed ; And the thought that arose like a flame of fir Kindling my heart with a passionate heat — That grows not cold, as my swift wheels fly, Flashing by forest and stream and street, Now, in the light of the Gallican sky, — Is the dower of Heaven, a gift of grace, Fraught with some undreamed-of fate DE VERDUN OF DA ERA GET. Small, no doubt, in the vaults of space, In this world, my life, supremely great ; And I know that yonder in Italy, Whither I drift on the whirlwind’s breath, A wonder awaits me . . what shall it be ? Knowledge, or Glory, or glorious Death ? 4 8 DE VERDUN OF DARR A GET. VI. L O there the edge of the Pass, and beyond is the Land of Light, As the steep white clouds piled up in the heaven’s deep blue declare ! And the wind blows fresh from the peaks as I mount to the snow-crowned height, Rolling its cool sweet streams over bosom and throat thrown bare. 2. Welcome, O wind of the South, that singest so loud in mine ear Songs of the lands of summer and songs of the Inland Sea, Wind of the South rushing out of the skies in thy far career, Cooled by the breath of the snow as thou soarest from Italy ! DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 49 3 - Welcome ! For with thee there cometh a vision of wonder to be Woven with the gorgeous dream of a glory that ’s passed away. Lo, where the lightning had shattered and age had withered the tree Springeth a branch thick-leaved in the beams of the latter day ! 4. A truth to the world is spoken, a gospel of hope is unrolled : A people that once hath aspired, and in strenuous labour attained, Dead though it seem for a season in slumber, or faint in the fold Of a serpent-tyranny knotted about it and coiled and chained, Out of the trammels that deaden the limbs that were lithe and strong, Breaking its centuries’ sleep, may arise with the might of its prime, E 50 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Gladden the earth as of old with a fulness of light and song, Mingle anew the noise of its deeds with the thunders of time. 5 * And I muse, if the race that of yore, in the bountiful heavenly Land, Wrought with its wonderful brain and its passionate heart of flame A dower so vast for the world that its strength to the end shall stand Knit with the systems of things, to endure with its deathless name, What may our old earth reap from the seeds that the loosed hands sow, The toil of the tombless life, the dreams of the mind made free ? What help from the stroke that to-morrow may fall for the world shall grow, To palsy the hand that oppresses, to strengthen the servile knee ? DE VERDUN OF BARRAGE. 51 6 , Welcome, O wind of the South, for thy songs in mine ear are sweet, Now as in joy upscaling the ridge of the snows I gain Gaily the rims of the Pass, and afar in the clear air greet With a waving of hands out sunward the light of the Piedmont Plain ! 52 DE VERDUN OF DARK A GET. Part II. I. i. F AIR city, laved by that majestic river Whose fructifying streams through years of glory Have graced the Lombard’s towered plains that never Shall fade in fame or be outsung in story, — Torino, in whose midst the heights of snow, Dreamlike amid the morning’s roseate glow, Or darkening in the thunder-storm’s caress, Or vivid in hot noonday, the eye meets, A presence everywhere, and which pervade With Nature’s influence (of her loveliness Or of her sternest forces born) thy streets, And woo the sense with beauty or o’ershade With wonder and fear, — blest fountain mayest thou be DE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. 53 For Italy of joy and hope and might, While Freedom, breaking up the reign of night, Irradiates from thy heart from sea to sea ! . . 2. How that wild hour of raptures, hopes, and pains, Wherein, borne on amid the proud display Of Britain’s resolute prowess, to the strains Of trump and cymbal, through the crowded way I marched, a beardless soldier, to the fight, When Italy and England gloriously With France against the crafty Muscovite Stood banded, here in these fair streets to-day, ’Mid war’s awakening din, returns to me And stirs my breast once more with reinless ecstasy ! 3 - And I, amid my old companions brave Who fought beside the Euxine’s wintry wave, Have drawn my sword in holier strife, to save This casket of earth’s jewels and fine gold, Following Savoy’s flag in the glad winds unrolled. 54 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 4 * Bray out, shrill clarions, to the city-roofs ; Roar, drums, till every bosom palpitates, Smit by your mimic thunders ; open gates, And let the Gallic war-steeds’ echoing hoofs Through street and square their gladdening music clash, While o’er the pavement rolls the clattering gun, And lance and bayonet and sabre flash, Moving against the gay Italian sun ; For France, across the Alpine passes pouring Her saviour-soldiers, speeds against the foe, As her proud Eagle, o’er the mountains soaring, Flies, heralding Oppression’s overthrow. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 55 II. 1. V ISION of paradise, veiling away from my sight Thus, 'mid the mustering for battle to left and to right, All that the heart of a soldier may throb to behold, Face of my loved-one more lovely than ever of old, Seen . . for I dreamed not . . again, the true face I adore, Seen for a moment, — ay me! but to lose it once more ! . . 2. As we went gallantly out through the city to-day, Vanguard of Italy marching in battle array, Now to the clarion's melody, now to the drum, Thinking of those that we left, and the struggle to come, 56 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Mothers and little ones clung to us, mixed with our bands ; Sobbing, the wives and the mothers laid hold of our hands ; On through the city to battle as wildly we went, Ladies, the noblest of Italy, silently leant Out from the balconies waving their gracious adieus ; On as we marched with the lives that we grudged not to lose, Blessings and prayers of the crowd with our battle- songs blent, Citizens thronging kept time with us, cheering us out, Mingling their cheers with our trumpet-calls, shout upon shout, Sorrow and madness of joy in the cries as they rose, Cheering us on to the battle with Italy’s foes. There, as I rode in the midst of them, musing, my heart Touched with the griefs of the people, the tear on my cheek Dropping in spite of the pride that disdained to be weak, BE VERDUN OF BARRA GET. 57 Swayed with their griefs and their fervour in which I had part, Suddenly lifting my eyes to a balcony’s rail, Out of the rows of sad faces there, broke on my sight, Shone like a star of the heaven, so pure and so white, Beamed the sweet face I had sought and despaired to behold Ever till out of Death’s darkness the Day should unfold. . . 3 - What! is my full heart beating e’en here in the old sweet way ? Have I again beheld thee to lose thee indeed once more, Beautiful face that has lived in my memory, fading away Still as the months went by and I dreamed on the Wicklow shore? Now as I sit with my face to the foe in the tumult of men, 58 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. One with the sons of Italy, moved with a passion divine, Mingling with frenzy of battle, transforming my being again, Love maketh mighty my soul with the draught of his wild glad wine. . . 4 - Yonder they close ! . . I exult as the pageant unrolls like a dream, Heedless of danger and death, in a whirlwind of hope and of joy, While the guns with their tongues of fire flame out from the hill, and the gleam Of the eddying bayonets blinds as the enemy’s lines deploy. 5 - Roar with your throats of fire, ye cannon ; hiss from the smoke, Bullets in showers from the rifles uplifted in line and square ! . . Charge ! . . . Lo, the Austrian swords, as the horse from their cover have broke, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 59 Hundreds of sabres aloft, in the sunlight of Italy bare ! . . Nay, is the blood of my fathers so warm in my pulses yet ? . . I have caught the sweet perfumes of Eden, 0 love, since to-day we have met ! . . On, till we close with our foes ! . . I am happy, and rich is the gain, Though, fighting for thee, light and freedom, I perish the first of the slain. 6o DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Part III. I. i. I N boyhood, when my fires of life were low, Through unknown fields a-straying, I have thought (With nerves unstrung or fancy overwrought), “ Might it not be that but an hour ago Death’s stroke upon my mortal body fell, And now in the vague After- World I dwell, My spirit swept even at a breath away Into the regions of unending day ; Or haply I have lain an age of years Coffined in dust, but late the Trump hath blown, And I have risen half-conscious and alone To wander ’mid this realm of formless fears Thus troubled, all things seeming from my hand To drift and slide away as shadows fly DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 61 On breezy days beneath a sunny sky, Fleeting we know not whither across the land? What proof emerges that this is not so ? None can be and the weird imagining Around my darkened spirit still would cling Until the mind and sense once more would flow Back to their customary moods, and seem To prove the old thought truth, this but a dream. 2. And surely, waking here within this pictured hall, Strange faces o’er me stoopt with such pity in their eyes, These beds around me ranged along the gilded wall, Where the wounded lie and moan in their lin- gering agonies ; Where the gentle white-capped Sister beside her patient sits, And from couch to couch in silence the grave physicians move, And ’mid noble stately figures, bent to soothe the dying, flits, Like a gleam of God’s own Heaven, the sweet face of Her I love — 62 BE VERB UN OF BARRA GH. Ah, surely I might hold that a change as weird and swift Had o’erta’en me in a life that transforms but endeth not, That amid the roar of battle round me whirled a phantom drift Of thick mist, and arms enwound me, and the earth was all forgot, And I rose in death or sleep to a region strange and far, Where Pain and Sorrow dwell with Delight and Love and Joy, To a hall of Death and Beauty reared in some mysterious star, Where yet I breathe among the blest a bliss with- out alloy ! 3 - But thus with gathering strength I sift From fancy and from ignorance The grains of truth, and thus I lift The veil that fell when fell my trance, Amid the battle’s noise and strain, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 63 That morning on the Lombard plain. I know that thence, when all but slain I lay, a helpless heedless weight, They bore me with their bleeding freight In hither to this palace old, Where in the picture-brightened hall, Beneath the frescoes and the gold, They Ve fashioned their rude hospital ; And laid me with my comrades brave, Where some have died, and some yet rave Of battle on their sleepless beds, And to and fro their weary heads Roll restless as a tossing wave ; And where all night the moan of pain Makes sad the watcher’s kindly heart, That yields its sympathy in vain To lives that linger but to part Before the morning breaks again, Yet finds at times a rare delight When some poor sufferer in the night In sweetest slumber glides away To wake refreshed with wakening day, And breathe his thanks with fervent breath To those that strove for him with Death. 64 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 4 - And here the fairest of fair Italy Have cared with tenderest ministry Their wounded countrymen; and here hath passed Among us One whose gentle eyes have power To soothe the sufferer in Death’s icy blast, To stay his spirit in its loneliest hour; And by my couch too she has sat, I know, In dull night-watches bathed my brow, And in the noonday heat has fanned my face, And bent above me wistfully to trace Life’s glimmering light returning, till at length I raise my head once more in refluent hope and strength. 5 - And thus I wake and find her near, The woman’s part performing well Whereof her own lips loved to tell : “To nurse, to soothe, sustain and cheer In days of darkness and suspense, To shield the weary breast from care, To aid the hero’s heart to dare, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 65 Rewarding manhood’s toil intense With love and help and reverence.” 6 . Lo, as full oft on some lone heath I sadden in a sunless heaven, And watch the dull grey lands beneath, — When all at once, by faint wind riven, The clouds unfold an isle of blue, And out a shafted sunbeam breaks And falls with sudden golden hue On some dark hill, and, passing, shakes Its light on hidden rills that flash From distant hollows bald and bleak, And strays away afar to dash Its glory on a purple peak Or glimmer on a lonely lake, And, slowly stealing, nearer glides, Till all my languid powers awake And life o’erflows in freshening tides, For o’er my body from head to feet In breadth and warmth its lustre streams, And all the clouds in wavelets sweet Divide, and all the landscape seems F 66 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH To brighten in unbounded day, And Heaven’s peace is round me shed ; So have I watched her as I lay, So, entering, pass from bed to bed, Till, moving on, she reaches mine, And asks me gently of my want, And all her splendours o’er me shine, And lave me in their lucent font, And I no more in anguish pine, With godlike strength my spirit stirs, And rises interfused with hers, Transfigured to a life divine. 7 - And now I learn my danger o’er, And Death for once is driven to flight, And I shall pass into the light And motion of the world once more, Ayith health’s delicious dreamy tide Inflowing sweetly hour by hour, And haply linger by her side, Rejoicing in the steadfast power Of Italy, and hear her speak, And hail the heath’s pink to her cheek BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH, 67 Returning, as we drink the air Perchance ’mid Alpine forests fair, Or where the pines in the summer breeze Sigh by the blue Ligurian seas. 68 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH II. i. W HENCE cometh, 0 Love, thy power, That a waft of thy wand may drench at a breath The whole wide lands with light, and shower Sweet upon sweet o’er dales and leas, Waking a slumbering world from death? As the Spring, delaying by wintry seas, Arriveth at last with the rains of May ; And out we walk with azure day, In a glory of colour in fields and trees, With the delicate scent of the primrose-flowers, With the note of the dove and the cuckoo coy, And the winds and bees in the linden-bowers; For the earth and the heaven are ringing with joy. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 69 2. Here as I lie O11 the ledge of the Apennine hill, Under the measureless warm blue sky, In a calm so still I might almost hear The flight of the broad-winged butterfly, In a day so pure and light and clear That far as the shores of Garda Lake I pore on the sea-like plains below Stretching away till they heave and break At the feet of the thousand peaks of snow That soar to the great white clouds, and glow Whiter than they in the noonday glare, Or, towering high over them lone and bare, Glimmer in violet deeps of air ; Here, from the gate Of Death with a mystic merciful hand Drawn once more by a kindly fate, As I gaze on the earth’s divinest land, To what changed senses all earth’s fairest things Display themselves, and how my pulses tingle With sudden vibratings, yo BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. Struck by the sights, scents, sounds that part and mingle, That sprinkle me like spray of a white fall, Or drench me like a wave of the cool seas, Or come like onsets of the summer breeze, Or rouse me like a sudden trumpet-call, And make me tremble with surprises sweet And quiver with strange bliss from head to feet, Revelling in delicate delicious agonies ! 3 - For the touch of the spirit of one so pure Has worked its magical change in me. How long will the tumult of joy endure, The wildering sweet expectancy ? Surely, surely soul with soul We have mingled, and the wine Of her spirit all divine I have taken into mine, And the life that lacked completion that communion maketh whole ; And hence this ampler, richer, nobler being, This finer hearing, subtler seeing, All this tremulous delight BE VERDUN OF BARRA GIL 71 In the day and in the night, This foretaste faint of attributes and powers The immortal spirits through eternities Wear in a world of new strange energies That may be ours, may yet be ours. 72 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. III. i. W HEN, wandering in the chestnuts’ shade, My lips had leave to speak To-day, I saw the roselight fade To pallor on thy cheek, Then, then thy fringed eyelids rose And let thy heart its love disclose. 2. And thou hadst not forgot me Those many many days, From crowd to crowd hadst sought me, And chidden Time’s delays, And lifted hands to Him in prayer Who led me near thee unaware. DE VERDUN OF DARK AG If. 73 3- O, I will live all over The years of lonely pain If I may but recover Thy vanished face again, And feel that sudden rapture sweet That thrilled me in Torino's street ! 4- And I will front the flashes Of gun and bursting shell, And hail the sabres' gashes Amid the battle's hell, If I may wake again and see Thy dear eyes bending over me. 5- Yea, I will enter fearless With hand entwined with Death His portals cold and cheerless, If with reviving breath, Once more I may my love impart, And hear the murmur of thy heart. 74 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 6 . I thank the Hand that swayed me By my tempestuous shore, That all but pulseless laid me Amid the battle’s roar, To crown me with a joy like this, To change my being with thy kiss. 7 * And now go I to meet thee Above the purple bays, To claim thee and to greet thee My bride of golden days, And we shall bless the sorrows past That blossomed into bliss at last. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 75 IV. 1. T HE face that loomed upon her sight, When first we met, that happy night At old Prince Victor’s masquerade, That struck her silent, and dismayed Her heart so strangely, “ that was his, — Del Scoglio’s.” What had this Del Scoglio done, I asked last evening, that our bliss Should thus be closed ere half begun And darkened with so dense a cloud, Because he chanced from out the crowd Of merry guests to pass our way, A gloomy shape amid the gay ? 2. Then with what trembling lips she spoke In answer, and her story told ! — 76 DE VERDUN OF DA ERA GIL 3 - The Count del Scoglio, fierce and bold And brute-like in his passions, broke Upon her peace ere yet her life Had blossomed into vernal flower, In hope to win her for his wife And make his base heart’s ministers Her beauty and her ample dower — Such double greed such bosoms stirs ; And she in loathing and disdain (To whom his very breath were pain) Back to his flats the reptile hurled ; But he from that most fatal hour, By baffled longing, wounded pride, In passion’s turbid eddies whirled, Had ever struggled to her side, Had dogged her steps about the world, Resolved her gentle heart to scare, By force to seize or guile to snare. 4 - But not alone of private ill He seemed the avenger now to roam. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 77 Broken in fortunes, wild of will, An outcast from a wasted home, Though in the bright world mingling still, She knew he herded furtively With Italy’s worst children, men That masked beneath a fictive love Of country hate of every life Their country bore that towered above Their baser levels ; hearts at strife With all that stood betwixt their greed And others’ fame or wealth or power ; Well-pleased to see their country bleed At every pore so they but snatched Advantage from her sorest need And plunder in her weakest hour ; Who, cloaked in secret conclave, hatched Their counterplots to thwart the aim Of minds they could not comprehend, Of godlike natures wealth nor fame Nor power nor luxury could bend, Nor fear nor mean ambition goad From duty’s sacred arduous road ; Whose eyes were all too dull to see That law is one with liberty 78 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. And order universal gain ; Their narrow bosoms all too vain To own their littleness and pay Meet homage to the nobler arm In God's foreknowledge framed for sway ; Their hearts too slight to own the charm Of well-attempered government ; On selfish purpose alway bent, Content alone in discontent. Into that scum of things, by law Of Nature that hath power to draw With swift attraction fixed as Fate Like body unto like, this weight, Del Scoglio, fell. So seems it. 5 - Now, The Marquis d’Alba (of whose name, As white as seraph's wings in fame, With every attribute and grace Of stately feature, stainless brow, Of liberal instinct, gentleness And pride in manner, heart and face, My lady lives inheritress), BE VERDUN OF BARRAGE 79 Calm, watching from his potent place Of trust and sway in Florence, best And wisest at the council-board, Contriving at his nature’s hest His country’s weal, and half adored By half the noblest of the land For temperate spirit, resolute hand, And labouring day and night to ground Upon a base that should abide The columned temples fair and wide Of Union and of Freedom, found With calm clear eye made keen by use And knowledge of the world’s abuse. As close he scanned the turbid sea Of agitated Italy, This monster hiding its rude head And crawling from its slimy bed With dangerous purpose. By and by The thing of fears and secrecy Grew conscious of his wakeful eye, And skulked into a darker deep, And seemed to crouch in harmless sleep. He waited, slowly drew his net Athwart it, held as by a spell 8o DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Its bulk in moveless languor set. Of that malignant eft of Hell The Marquis stood the single foe, Overmastering. It must strike some blow, And quickly, or must perish. 6 . Well, One night the Marquis d’Alba fell, Pierced by three bravos’ daggers, dead, In fair Lung’ Arno, as he stept, ’Mid the moon’s mellow light that slept O’er Florence, on the flag that led Up to his palace-door. And She, O’erleaning from the balcony To watch his coming and to drink The freshness of the Italian night, Beheld this same Del Scoglio slink Adown the near stradella grey. His bad face in the pallid light Gleam ghastly out, and pass away. Just as the three advanced ; and saw Her father fall — and saw no more, Smit faint and blind by what she saw ; DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 81 But, tottering backward to her room, Dropt swooning on the porphyry floor. 7 - Thereafter with her father’s doom Ever Del Scoglio’s pallid face And furtive muffled shoulder swung Round in the moonlight as he turned The dim stradella’s corner, clung, A hideous memory, in her brain And deep into her spirit burned. And well knew he she had striven in vain To prove the fell significance Of that swift step and sidelong glance And stealthful flight, as out the three From darkness sprang, like hounds let free From leash to slake their thirst of blood. And well knew too that craven brood. 8 . He lived in fear of her ; and still The old desire his reason swayed ; And still he dogged her steps, assayed With threats and wiles to bend her will, And hung beside her wheresoe’er G 82 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. They chanced amid the world to meet, In theatre or church or street, At ball or feast or carnival. For safe he deemed it thus to dare A busy moving world to face Too self-involved to dream or trace Through what ignoble ways he crawled. And ever where their paths converged There Danger’s menacing arm emerged From deepest shadow, and appalled Her brave, true heart. 9 - From him she fled In sudden baffling flight that day Of darkened hope that o’er us shed The mists God’s breath has swept away. TO. Thus seems it that in twofold dread She lives of twofold danger. First, From this Del Scoglio’s selfish thirst Of wealth and beauty that, unquenched, Makes mad his brutal heart and brain, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 83 And masters life and conscience wrenched And warped through all their nature's grain ; Next, from the dark confederacy That through her father’s bleeding breast Hath wrought a grief that long oppressed Her life with wordless agony, — They knowing that a link or twain If found and woven with the chain She, standing lonely in the land, Holds, threatening, in her stainless hand, Might yet with sudden vengeful power Confound and quench them in an hour. . . 11. A story strange of plots and crime And complex motives, which the time Hath bred not sparely, but hath shed Spawn-like in turbid pools and spread O’er many a stream of Italy, But which the sun of Liberty, Re-risen on heaven’s verge, we trust, Will scorch and shrivel into dust. 84 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 12 . And now for many a month his face Hath vexed her not in any place. ’T is well. Yet only yesternight A warning sent from viewless hand Came, whence she knows not, urging flight From him and from his noisome band . . If danger threaten, is mine arm Not near to shield thee, love, from harm? ! 3 - I muse upon this tale of sin And passion. Can we call that love That hurts the heart it yearns to win, Yea, that would rather soil and slay The beauteous thing that soars above Its hands’ endeavour, tread in clay The delicate life it fails to clasp, Than suffer it to sport one day On wings unsullied by its grasp ? . . DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 85 14. Howe’er it be, I trust our days May run unbroken in their stream By this Del Scoglio ; that, our ways Dividing, his may lead his feet To safer pastures in the gleam Of happier suns ; and, if they meet Hereafter, we in lands of peace May wander forward scorning strife ; Or, if indeed the twain should merge Beyond this planet’s utmost verge, All dreams of fear and hate shall cease ’Mid splendours of the larger life. 86 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ V. i. O , LET me hold thy hand indeed and know Thou art no more a memory of the mind, Or any fleeting vision, baffling dream, — God’s loveliest truth, real as the rocks that glow Here as we sit amid the mild sea-wind, Screened by the spreading pine from noonday’s beam, Watching the silvery olives idly sway High o’er the myrtly steeps and bright cerulean bay. 2. Let us drink deep the sweetness of the clime. The earth hath nothing fairer, love, than this, Nor yieldeth any land a livelier bliss, Nor hath the world yet known a happier time, — A day that stirred the fervent heart DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 87 With toils and triumphs more sublime, Wherein we twain have borne our part. For we have watched this People from its tomb Arise, and to its lips the roseate hue Of life returning — strong to run its race anew; And we have seen the gloom And blackness as of midnight broken through With lightnings and with dawn. O let us rest A moment, from the strain and press withdrawn, And dream of calmer years to be, Sitting amid these gardens o’er the sea, Fanned by the light breeze wandering from the West. 3 - The nightingales half-hidden in the leaves How lusciously they sing ! See, near us, the brown throat how fast it heaves, In that delicious rapture vibrating. How with all dreamy sounds with power to charm Come the rich perfumes of magnolia-flowers, And spices breathing in the sunbeams warm From the thick pines and bloomed orange-bowers ! 88 DE VERDUN OF DARR A GET. 4 - Hardly a cypress curves its flexile crest, So gentle is the breeze ; the palms at rest Wave not a plumy branch ; no shadow stirs Across the carven maenad whose white neck The glossy clambering ivy-leaves enlace, Or darkens with one fleck The glittering gossamers Woven o’er yon still, dim wood-god’s drowsy face Where all day long he dozes in the firs. 5 - Hark how the pine-cones crackle in the heat, Or drop from bough to bough unto our feet, Startling with transient fear The little lizard climbing at his whim The urn’s agave, or around its rim Darting, to pant and peer, Where, drooping languidly, The tea-rose, tangled in the pepper-tree, Sheds its light leaves upon the terrace-wall Without a breath to move them where they fall. And, if the senses weary with the stress DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 89 Of so much luscious loveliness, List to the fountain's cool refreshful sound, Heard through the notes o' the fitful nightingales, As dropping it o’erflows the basin’s round, Or shoots to heaven in life that never fails ; Or let the eyes along the waterduct Roam ’mid the light green tresses of the ferns That from each crevice the clear dews have sucked, Cooling the sight half-dazzled with the showers Of yonder scarlet streaming mesem-flowers Trailed o’er the terrace from its lines of urns. 6 . Look with what silvery undulations sweep The olive-woods, with here a villa gay And there a farm, far, from the mountain-steep Through all the hollows of the hills away Down to the bright blue deep, Where yonder little town along its bight, With its red roofs and campanili tall And ruined tower and crumbling rampart-wall, Amid the breadth of summer light In keenest lustre shines, — 9 o DE VERDUN OF DARK A GIL Whence sail the frail feluccas white Round the lone islet glimmering through the pines. 7 - O, in this landscape, ’mid the glow Of yon blue heaven and the sounds And odours of these citron-bowers, How all the streams of memory flow Back to the clear unshadowed hours When first thy spirit, dearest, thrilled My being by this very sea, Those three long heavy years ago ! . . O my heart’s promise well fulfilled ! . . And thou hast solved the mystery Of that most strange and sudden flight That snatched thee from my baffled sight ; And thou hast told me (tell once more) Thy heart was sad as mine that night, When in the carriage by the shore A moment in the fading light, Just ere departing, thou didst stand, With never word or lifted hand, And let thine eyes in yearning dwell On mine before the lashes fell DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Upon thy cheek, and that last day Swept with thy vanished face away. . . 8 . Methinks that ardent lover’s threat That scared thy kinsfolk, drave thee thence, Was well so hidden. We who fret, In rains that drench and winds that freeze, Amid the rough wild Northern seas, Have passions pent in us intense As your Italians, wills more strong, I ween, and hatred of a wrong Not lightly from its purpose tost ; And had thy Count del Scoglio crost My path . . . the dastard ! with his boast Of vengeance on the gentle life He swore he loved, his lifted knife That left the heart he failed to win So darkened by that deed of sin . . . Perhaps I could not here to-day Rejoice, in this delicious clime, That I may clasp thy hands and say, “ These palms were never stained with crime.” 92 DE VERDUN OF DARR A GET. 9 - Nay, let him be. The time’s too blest To cherish anger in the breast . . . Dear, in my land beneath those stormier heavens That yet have splendours all unknown to these — Gaunt shapes of mist and cloud, bright pageantries Of blowing dawns and loud tempestuous evens, May not we, dwelling in our tranquil home, Forget old troubles, or with hearts at peace Remember them to use them but as keys To the dark doors of Wisdom’s golden dome ; Yielding the hand its holiest exercise In helpful ministry to others’ needs, In fair accomplishment of loveliest deeds ; And daily with the noblest of the Wise, ’Mid the deep treasures of their deathless thought, Revelling in joys with no forebodings fraught ; Helping each other ever to attain That higher life made void of Passion’s stain, Which, if the dream of immortality Be — as God grant ! — no weak- wit’s fantasy, Is surely best of all things here to grasp, Being the prelude fair and hopeful Spring DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 93 Of endless Summer, whose far sweets we clasp Already in this gloom our ways so fashioning. . . 10. Come, let us wander down to the blue sea, And hear it whisper of its thousand shores ; And when in far-off seasons dreamily We sit beside it where it breaks and roars Round my rough headlands, or in sheltered creeks Dashes the sea-pinks with its jets of spray, Or on some pebbly strand in gentlest murmurs speaks, Let its familiar voice of this sweet day — O love, the sweetest yet that ever rose Out of its deeps to lave my pathways dim With Heaven’s effulgency, — As its glad tide around us leaps and flows, Remind us, — warbling of bright Italy And this deep draught of life we quaff beside its brim. 94 DE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. VI. i. I KNOW not which is fairer, night or day; But best I love the night, when more of Heaven Is ours than ever in bright noon is given, When thus the moonbeams through the branches stray, And thus the myriad worlds, toward which our souls Soar upward through the unfathomable blue, Are not less palpable and clear and true Than yon pale blossom that the dew uprolls. . . 2 . Let us not part so soon. Once more, O, tread with me the fragrant walk Between the cedars and the cypresses, In the mild light of the descending moon, So sweet it is to dwell with thee and talk DE VERD UN OF DARRAGH 95 Of the strange past and those fair years that press Forward to greet us with so rich a boon. . . O, strange beyond all wonder that I find thee Once more through all Earth’s tumults and its storms ! O, sweet beyond all rapture that I wind thee Thus — Life of Life — within these very arms ! Body from soul may Death divide, but never Thy soul and mine love-bound shall Death or Time dissever. . . 3 - Whose was the shadow crossed the path but now, Yonder, beside the clear white steps that gleam Above the myrtles ? . . Was it but a bough Moved by the faint sea-wind ? . . Why should we dream Of shadows ? . . Once more let us turn, and then, Alas, for yet one spell of loneliness I lose thee ! . . Well, but I may ride again To-morrow through the olive-yards and pines, And climb the path that wanders through the vines Up hither to thy kinsman’s terraces And hospitable doors. . . Then comes the morn That bathes in golden light my life no more forlorn. . . 96 BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. Part IV. I. i. S O — he has found her at last ; and we Have foiled the knave in his devilish plot For this time only, it may be; For seldom is wounded pride forgot, And hate that is born of jealousy Is as the worm that dieth not. But the wild hours past already seem The caprices of a dream, While with clouded heart I pace Here, a sentinel, up and down, Guarding in this lonely place O'er the little Alpine town My soul’s treasure, snatched away From the dagger raised to slay Or to forge a direr doom Than can lurk in any tomb. BE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 97 2. In the moon's declining light, To and fro the cypress-walk — (Thus I link the rings aright) — As we wandered in the night, Musing, or in dreamy talk, Something brushed against the boughs Of the drooping cedar near, Scarcely rough enough to rouse One cicala from its sleep ; Which she heard not, and mine ear Hardly heeded. Then, ascending By the gentle wooded steep Toward the statued terrace high, Back my face a moment bending, A cloaked figure caught mine eye Creeping upward stealthily Close behind us, one hand laid On the marble balustrade. Then, ere I could breathe the word “ Lo, who comes ? ”, another had stood Clear in front, and out a third Had glided from* the dusky wood, H 98 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. And right above my darling’s breast A dagger in the moonlight flashed, And I had striven the thing to wrest From the spoiler’s grip, and dashed The gleaming weapon high in air, And, grappling with the foremost foe, Both hands about his bearded throat, Down the glittering marble stair Had hurled him to the walk below, And left him lying thus for dead ; And scarce had time to pause and note His frighted bravos as they fled ; But, clasping close my stricken dove, Sped to the villa-doors above ; Whence gazing back I saw the twain From the wood, where they had lain Sheltering from the sudden storm, Steal, and lift that muffled form, And pass into the gloom again. 3 - And now I wot not if this hand The stain of the dastard’s blood must bear Or what his secret murderous band DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ 99 For vengeance on our lives may dare ; Or whether of his single greed Or passion this Del Scoglio planned In evil brain the baffled deed ; Or if that blow that laid him low Or stunned or slew him. This I know, That whatsoever murderer’s knife Would reach thy heart must through this breast Strike deep and suddenly, true Wife, — Vittoria, mine through Time and Chance, Made mine by God’s high ordinance, — Soul drifted to my soul o’er stormy seas, To mould one perfect life amid the war Of forces and the dread immensities Of earth and sun and star. too DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. II, i. M YSTERY darkens mystery. Here post- haste A letter comes, presented by a hand No sooner seen than vanished, while I stand In the verandah, looking toward the waste White mountain-fields, and wafting from my lips, Oblivious, the grey fragrant wreaths afloat. I take in languor ’twixt my finger-tips, Scarce feeling it, the proffered little note ; Then turn to seek the giver, and find him fled ; Wonder a moment ; open the broad seal, And read, and learn the Abbot of Haute-Combe, “led By love of God and of His people’s weal,” Entreats that, swift as hoof and hurrying wheel Can whirl us o’er the mountains, we two fly Hence to the shelter of his Monastery, “ Strange things to hear, and of our gentleness To help a weary soul in its distress/. . DE VERDUN OF BARRA GET. ioi 2 . I know the good old Abbot. Years ago, Wandering from Chamberi — from lake to lake, — Filled with wild dreams and memories of Rousseau, And drawn in youth’s glad eagerness away (Careless of time and distance, so it take The sweetest onward path), the autumn day Swept into night, and darkness ere I knew Each mountain downward for his vizard drew ; When on mine ear amid the tempest fell The sound of Haute-Combe’s monastery-bell Tolling; and, by that welcome music led, I struggled to the little greensward spread Around the Abbey’s walls, and gained the gate, Rang, and found entrance. To the Abbot’s room A barefoot Brother led me through the gloom. Bleak, dismal, cold and dim and desolate It seemed at first ; but when the Abbot came, With welcome beaming over all his face, All things were changed, no cobweb looked the same ; A kind of magic splendour filled the place, Shed from his nature’s mild benignity ; Yea, even what slender comforts he could shower io2 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. From hospitable hands assumed a power Akin to wealth and warmth and luxury — So gracious was the giving ; the hard seat, The few dry faggots kindled on the hearth, Dry crust, thin wine his sugar left not sweet, Soothed my chill body with a glow like mirth. 3 - As pleasantly we talked of other lands And folk afar to either known, I thought, “ I speak with one who grasps and understands The world he hath elected to forsake ; This is no carp fetched from an unfished lake, Or foolish trout in virgin streamlet caught.” Versed was he in all sweetest courtesy, Well-read in writings of the laic pen, And learned in the ways and hearts of men, And prompt in every gentle ministry ; And doubtless out of purity of soul And guileless faith and simple tenderness He there had shelter sought from the keen stress Of life and Earth’s immeasurable dole, Not out of bigot hates, or the false light That whilom lured afar the luckless eremite. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 103 4 . Three days I lingered there his happy guest, Nor ever rose but straight to stay was prest. And still his face so bright a radiance shed Across the years, that lately, as I sped Through Savoy, hurrying to the glorious War, I paused at Haute-Combe ; and the kindly hand Once more was laid in mine, as blithe and bland Mine old host met me, greeting me from far. And though our aim was alien to his heart, Yet did he wish me well in my poor part In the great strife whose end he half foreknew. And when I wounded fell in the fierce fight, And to his watchful ear the tidings flew, He wrote declaring that by day and night His prayers for me were raised in that retreat Beside the waters of his mountain-lake. A gentler or a truer heart ne’er beat In any bosom. Therefore let us heed The Abbot’s summons, and, ere morning break, To Haute-Combe o’er the clear white mountain speed. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. III. i. S TORM upon Bourget Lake, — Each blue wave with its crest Rolling in shoreward to break In the wind as it roars from the west ! Wild is the Lake in its throes, Wild as our Wicklow sea When a bleak nor’-easter blows Hissing in chasm and tree. Far as the mountains that glimmer Yonder, out-thrust from the cloud, In the faint sun glisten and shimmer The waves as they hustle and crowd, Heaving white heads in the deep, Strewn with the froth and the weeds, Dashed upon crag and steep, Snapping the tall green reeds. DE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. 105 Storm in the waters and sky . . Lo there, by Aix whence we came, The poplars leafy and high, In their lines that we deemed so tame, How they wrestle and fight with the blast, Shivering in branch and spray, While their leaves like sleet fly past In the wind of the doom-like day ! 2. But we, — we can loiter no more ; In Haute-Combe’s Convent ere night . . There, o’er the cloud-wrapt shore, Seest thou, flickering white ? . . Shelter and rest must be found, Dearest, for thee and for me. Fear not the rough storm’s sound Or the plunge of the wave as we flee. . . 3 * Hie, sturdy boatmen and strong ! . . A boat ! . . and away from the slip ! . . Speed ye. The way will be long. Tighten each oar in your grip; io6 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. For the hurricane volleys and roars, And higher the huge waves rear, And around us the white spray pours, As away to the deeps we steer. DE VERDUN OF DARR AGE. 107 IV. 1. H A ! there goes our good friend the Abbot . . . but hark ! the bells sound Plaintively over the lake and the mountain, and see Each Monk at the summons drops down with his knees on the ground, Wherever he stood at the moment by rock or by tree ; And that shape kneeling yonder white-hooded beneath the green oak Is our Abbot himself! . . ’T is a magical shifting of scene. • Look round the wild hill-side, above and beneath at a stroke All the life of the place is suspended in field and ravine, io8 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH . And it seems like a picture, a vision, the landscape a-glow With the figures that kneel in the sunset so silent in prayer ; No babble of voices, no sound of artificer’s blow; All spirits, but ours, with the Father — how strange, and how fair ! . . 2. Ay me ! let us leave them to worship the way that seems best. That they worship at all, love, I hold, is an infinite good ; For a world that can feel not an awe or a love in ' the breast As it raises its eyes to the heavens, or bendeth to brood On the wonder of life in itself, on the beauty and bliss, On the horror and pain, on the wealth of the fathomless deeps, Is accurst in its sensual thickness; its nature, amiss, Must dwindle and rot in the slime where it wal- . lows and sleeps. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 109 I too, I uncover my head, though I bend not or kneel ; My soul is not moved to adore at the clink of a bell; Yet I reverence, deep in my bosom, my brothers who feel E’en thus toward the Mind that hath moulded the worlds with its spell. . . 3 - Amid the peaked Apennines I wandered once alone, The road ran high across the Pass, no human face was near, Around me in the chestnut-woods the winds were making moan, And heavy, heavy was my heart with vague and formless fear. I thought of Death and all the woe that might beyond it lie, Of sins committed, stains of soul no hand could purge away, And then of that great gloom that folds God’s face from human eye. no DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. The anguish of my spirit made a twilight of the day. Then all at once I raised my eyes, and o’er the leafy height I spied a little brazen Cross above the clustered trees, And then a little chapel rose with turret glittering white, And from its tower the vesper-bell rang out upon the breeze. I pushed against the mouldering door that yielded to my hand, And in I walked with noiseless step along the silent aisle, And up the little chancel toward the altar rudely planned, Where hung the ghastly bleeding Christ and smiled a sickly smile. Awearied with my wanderings, with doubts and fears o’erwrought, In utter languor knelt I down before the altar’s rail, And at a breath the burthen bleak of doubt and lonely thought Slipt from me like the lawine-snow that slides into the vale. DE VERDUN OF DA RRA GIF m A moment seemed it I had found within that chapel dim A refuge from the doubts and fears and sad un- certainties That made the universe without so homeless, void, and grim — An ark of shelter in the storm amid my shoreless seas. A moment o’er me stole the charm of that alluring creed That holds the Infinite mystic Mind by human lips will speak, That man through man may converse hold with God in every need, And God through man to man unveils the goal of all we seek. “ O comfortable dream,” I cried, “ if I in my de- spair Might wrap myself in thee and know my yearning satisfied, An end of all my searching found, an end of all my care, Might I not couch and feel no more the worlds so weird and wide?” . . 1 12 BE VERDUN OF BARRAGH. But no, it could not be ! My soul, revived with transient rest, Sprang up like toughest bow relaxed, too strong to warp or break. “ For me,” I cried, “ the larger faith, the life with freedom blest, And God make brave my heart to front the doubts that yet may wake ! Enough, enough if I can breathe beneath the wide blue sky Uncrampt by lettered forms, and seek the Im- measurable Power; Enough if Love impel to Virtue’s paths austere and high, And Faith, a beam across the storm, illume my darker hour!” . . 4 - But see, our Abbot, risen from prayer, Comes smiling toward us. Step we up To meet him, that his lips declare What poison ’s in our cup. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 113 Part V. I. P AST, love, and gone, we trust, our dreariest hour, The one dark cloud swept from our peaceful sky ; And yet as thus, where these mossed boughs embower, Amid the lonely Schwarzwald’s fragrant shade We rest without a care, the memory Of that which has been with its lingering dye Still seems to stain the heavens. It will fade ; For we remember not our deepest pain So long as a great joy ; and we shall gain By a brief sorrow, in the growth not less Of the mind's strength than the heart's tenderness. . . 2. Yet, from my sight I cannot cast The image of that piteous face, 1 1 1 4 BE VERDUN OF BARRAGE . Those eyes that stared at me aghast With terror in the quiet place Where the vexed soul a haven found On lonely Haute-Combe’s hallowed ground ; Nor wholly hush the voice’s sound That spake to me that stormy night, As by the convent cresset’s light With stifled breath I bent beside Del Scoglio’s bed, and wondering heard His tale of sin, his latest word, Ere in his agony he died. Nor could I trust myself to tell His whole confession while thy tear Of pity for his sufferings fell, Nor while the mournful convent-bell Tolled out its one word, “ Death, death, death, Next morning to the stricken ear. In my soul’s sadness it sufficed The Murderer with his latest breath Had craved forgiveness of his Christ, And I to him from thee had borne Sweet pardon for the evil done, And from a spirit so forlorn Had rolled one burthen — even one. DE VERDUN OF DA ERA GET. Nor would I in an hour so drear Tell of that corpse upon its bier — A sight so hideous — scarred and bruised And battered, as it lay at rest When all the feverous agonies And passions fierce and aims confused Were over, and the fiery breast Had found at last its night of peace ; But said, “ The truth will come to her In softer hues when by-and-by It seems a bygone history.” . . 3 * In his own cell, amid the stir Of the loud storm, the Abbot old The purport of his summons told To me alone. Beside the Lake, Half-hidden in a bulrush-bed, They had found Del Scoglio — thus he said Just as the light began to break With rosy promises of morn High o’er Mont-Cenis’ crest of snow. Wounded he lay there, gashed and torn n6 BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. \ In scalp and breast, and some fell blow His right arm from the trunk had shorn Well-nigh away. Half-conscious, weak With loss of blood, with hunger, thirst, With hours of pain, he lay, — a streak Of crimson o’er the water shed In circle round him ; and at first They deemed him dead ; but presently The eyes moved, and he strove to speak. Then to their silent Monastery They bore him ; gave him wine and bread, And bound his gashed and bleeding head, And laid him on a couch ; and then, Surrounded by those holy men, With strength revived, with tongue set free, He told his sorrows brokenly. Repentant in the shadow of doom, He spoke of thee and some great woe That had befallen long ago. And prayed that ere the tongueless tomb Should open for him he might know Thou hadst forgiven him ; and he named My name, and, with a spirit tamed By pain and fear, a conscience roused DE VERDUN OF BARRA GN 117 From the drugged sleep wherein it drowsed, Declared that he could meet his end With cheerier heart if he might hear My voice, and speak as friend with friend. And at my name our Abbot’s ear Pricked up, remembering the year When I — a livelier, happier guest Than poor Del Scoglio — found sweet rest At Haute-Combe in my wanderings, And the fair friendship born of it ; And, after eager questionings Now here, now there, at last he traced Our footsteps, and the missive writ That drew us to his mountain-waste. 4 - So spake our host with mournful air. Then to Del Scoglio’s chamber bare He led me. Horror-struck I hung A moment at the threshold. There, Upon his narrow pallet flung, The ghastly murdered Murderer lay. His face and brows and matted hair 1 8 DE VERDUN OF DARK A GET. Upon the meagre pillow rolled In ceaseless motion ; the thin ray Of a dim lamp the chamber cold Illumined ; and beside the bed An aged Brother sat, and fanned The ever-restless fevered head. The Watcher with his wrinkled hand Bade silence, and with noiseless tread I crossed the flags, and by the bed Stood, breathless, gazing. Languidly Awaking from some weary dream, He saw my face in the cresset’s gleam, And moaned in terror. “Fear not me,” I whispered ; “ I have come to soothe, Not torture thee. If I might smooth Thy pillow, mitigate thy pains, ’T would be a treasured memory.” He murmured, “Thou art welcome. Sit, If thou canst bide an hour. ’T is fit I tell with what of strength remains My life’s whole story, and atone For the deep sin that brands and stains My soul. Take thou within thine own My hand in proffered fellowship. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 119 Thus lies all lingering wrath subdued ; Ay, but a se’nnight since my lip Had shrunk not if thy heart’s hot blood Had spirted on it while I plunged My dagger in thy breast for hate. Now hath repentance, though so late, Old passions from my soul expunged. I pray the God whom I denied To pardon me before I glide Storm-swept into the boundless gloom Of Death’s devouring ocean wide. O, ere they bear me to the tomb, Surely it were but just that He Should count my pangs and pity me ! ” 5 * Thus murmured he, and so much fear and pain, Such torment all his being seemed to fill, That had he pity craved for deadlier ill Done unto me, he had not asked in vain. “Yea, surely God must pity thee,” I cried, If such as I do.” Turning on his side, Then, in a voice that oft would pause and fail, He told all out. Hear now Del Scoglio’s tale. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 6 . “ Alas ! ” he cried; then ceased again, As if he inly strove for calm — “ Alas, I never felt, as men Oft on the verge of sin have felt, The semblance of a mother’s palm Laid lovingly upon the wrist To draw it backward; never knelt, All sorrows from mine eyelids kissed, Beside a mother s knee to pray ; And yet I knew my mother, dwelt Within her influence many a day ; But she was careless, heartless, gay, Vain, sensual, to her marriage vow False ; and I scented soon enow In homely fields the slot of Sin. I little recked the formal rede My father taught me, foul within And fair without, a shallow creed Whereof he held that babes had need And women ; well to teach, but ill To follow with a strong man’s will, Though other light were none to lead. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ 121 I tossed the thin restraint aside ; I plunged into the giddy tide Whereon my parents seemed to glide So fearlessly. All anger, threats, Commands, rebukes and faint regrets From mouths I found so false I laughed To utter mockery as I quaffed With eager thirst the shallow mirth, The pleasures and the sins, of earth. At Paris, Naples, Venice, Rome, Where’er the wort of Folly blows, In dens of sin I made my home ; And if a voice of warning rose Within, to drown its feeble cry Wine, wine from deeper cups I drained. Then where the pale-faced croupier reigned And piled his golden columns high Before the hungry gamester’s eye, There night by night in chambers bright, With earth’s poor moths, amid the light And music till the dawn was grey I bent in reckless maddening play, And won and lost ; and rose and fell My heart with passions born of Hell. . . 122 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 7 - “ ’T was in an hour of loneliness, When Heaven deigned my life to bless With something of its niggard grace, With gentler, holier, purer thought, That first I saw thy Lady's face ; And that impetuous passion wrought Within my loveless soul a change So swift, so sweet, so deep, so strange Some other orb I seemed to range, With airs of paradise caressed, And winged with light. Then when she spurned My proffered love, more fiercely burned The longing in my tortured breast. I wandered forth in dire unrest From town to town. Yet while I yearned That pure, proud, stainless heart to win, I could not breathe her holier air, But, maddening in my mute despair, I plunged in loathlier pools of sin, — Ay, held my baffled hope a plea For self-abasement, setting free The soul for filthier revelry. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 123 8 . “ Then came the sowing of the seed As fruit whereof to-night I bleed. Well knows thy Lady — well knew he, Her father (for whose death no doubt, By my contriving brought about, God, using mine own tools, though rude Yet double-edged for deeds of blood, Hath whelmed me in this misery) — That I of that dark Brotherhood That slurs the name of Italy Was one, — the secret murderous brood, The Firebrands, Nature’s foulest spawn. . . Down the fierce whirlpool was I drawn Resistless. In the deep of night With blasphemous and ghastly rite, Their pistols planted in my breast, Upon a blood-stained knife I swore, With penalties too dire to tell, Their blasphemous oath, their bond of Hell — Obedience to their Leader’s hest, And secrecy for evermore, Slave to their laws on every shore. . . 124 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. Dolt ! in my vanity and dearth I dreamed that I, of nobler birth And strong in social privilege, Should in a crowd of men so base Attain the foremost honoured place, And with that guard of groundlings hedge My life from hurt. Among the worst I ranged myself of that bad crew, Ambitious to be deemed the first, And gaining but my natural due, The brand of serfdom. With their growth I inly rotted at the root, In substance blasted. Hand and foot Bound up their thrall, by that dark oath Sworn on the knife with gasping breath, By abject hourly dread of death For promise broken, mandate given From some hid source and not obeyed (Forgetting that in sight of Heaven I stood with brain and heart displayed, All nakedness), I sank to be Of that most mean confederacy The delegated agent. Fool ! Wandering in darkness, lashed and tied DE VERDUN OF BARRA GB. 125 Closer and closer to the rule That swayed I knew not whence or how And watched my motions myriad-eyed, A miserable life, I reeled Hither and thither, forced to bow To powers I loathed, my lips fast-sealed Against all utterance by that fear Of vengeance ever hovering near To leap upon me suddenly ; All hope cut off of all release From my accursed slavery; Deprived for ever of the peace That free confession yields the breast ; With burthen deep of crimes oppressed ; With jibes and insults hourly stung . . . Better the death from which I fled Shrieking one night through Naples’ streets With mantle rent and naked head, When sudden three assassins sprung, Far in the City’s dim retreats, Across me from a doorway dark, With lifted daggers — sent to mark My doings, and to prove what ill Awaited him who crossed the will 126 BE VERDUN OF BARRAGE Of the unseen Tribunal. Yes, Far better death 7 s deep silences Than such a life of littleness. . . 9 - “ Amid my deepest shame and grief There came a mandate from the Chief, One morn, ‘To Florence ! There await On such a night at such an hour Alone by San Miniato Gate One passing who will cast a flower Of wolf s-bane at thy foot, which raise And, raising, murmur clear and low The secret word, the mystic phrase ; And if the stranger bares his brow, And, turning, whispers, “ Nature calls, 77 Make for the Marquis d 7 Alba 7 s home, And linger underneath his walls Until you see the Marquis come From his nocturnal councils by; Then three times lift your hand on high, And watch what follows ; which being done, Bide not the rising of the sun, But speed from Florence back to Rome, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 127 And thence to Naples, and confide The event to one who in the gloom Of Posilipo’s Grotto met Will walk ten paces by thy side, And on thy neck his left hand set, And speak the word and give the sign Which none but Nature’s sons divine.’ . . 10. “ Full well I knew to what fell deed This mandate marshalled me. Yet I, Who boasted of a conscience freed From dreams of God and Hell beneath, With such a dire intensity Of hourly terror shrank from death, That at the murmur of the word I sped toward Florence, driven and spurred By fear, by fear alone, and wrought Well-nigh to madness at the thought Of him whose doom my journey sealed, Whose life I could, but dared not, shield. Without the moonlit City late I crossed my cloaked confederate. I heard and spoke the passwords meet, 128 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. And hurried to the well-known street, And to the Marquis’ steps advanced, •And saw him in the moonlight stride Homeward along Lung’ Arno wide, And three times raised my hand, and glanced Back, as I turned the corner near Retreating in my craven fear, And saw Vittoria lightly move Into the balcony above, And saw three muffled figures glide Out of the shadow, and swift as light Three daggers flashed into his side. He fell. And far in breathless flight, Sick at the mournful ghastly sight, With chattering teeth, and failing feet Scarce firm enough to bear my weight, I sped, by bridge and square and street, And passed beyond the Roman Gate.” . . ii. Nay, love, but let not the old grief prevail To break that tranquil joy which here is ours; Dry once again thine eyes ; and hear the tale Of crime unto the end. These boughs, these flower: DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 129 Rise up refreshed from rains that have o’erweighed Their wealth of life. So let thy heart rebound ; And, bating not thy love of that high soul Whose loss such anguish on thy years hath laid, Thank Heaven for the sunlight we have found, And free in His bright beams let the new Spring unroll. . . 12. He passed his hand across his face, As if in shame. “ A life so base/’ He murmured faintly, “ now was mine I scarce can force my tongue to speak Its wretchedness. Week after week The roots of evil seemed to twine More closely round me. I had learned The murderer’s art, and even earned Renown among the Brotherhood, And idleness would ill beseem A weapon and a wit so good ! . . O God, what guerdon, what esteem ! Because my hand had dipt in blood, More blood must straight be found to shed, Till all my body with blood was red ! K 1 3 o DE VERDUN OR DARRAGH. J 3- “ Drugged, stifled, quenched my Conscience lay. I almost deemed my Pride had shrunk And perished in a like decay, So meanly through the crowd I slunk, Compelled by terror to obey Such masters — Italy’s lowest dross. My fathers, had they dared to cross Their paths with even smiles and becks, Had set their heels upon their necks And crushed them in the dust and clay. But Pride that ’s kneaded with the blood May sleep or languish many a day, And yet arise in fiery flood With blind impetuous energy, Deep at its hidden sources stirred Some moment, at a thought, a word. And so at last it was with me. One evening journeying alone, The lights of sunset round me thrown, It chanced beneath a ruined keep That soared upon an Alpine steep High as some magic castle sung DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH . 13 1 In wonder-tales of Faerie, I paused. The cool wind wooingly Breathed o’er my face ; and down I flung My cloak, and, in the shade reclined, Gazed idly long with eyes intent On that aerial castled peak, And watched the slender pathway wind Up, up, until it seemed a streak Below the skyey battlement. Then all at once I seemed to trace The memory of an ancient story That linked the fortunes of our race With that high crag in deeds of glory, That breathed of olden time and told How our first Baron had built that hold, And o’er the valleys many a day Had ruled with semi-regal sway. And as I roamed in fancy far Through that dim eld, and seemed to war Amid the valiant knights whose name My skulking deeds had stained with shame, Back to the paltry present swept My mind, my pulses throbbed and rang, The hot blood to my forehead leapt 132 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH And burned upon my cheek. I sprang Erect, and swore aloud to sever The chain that cramped my life, for ever. 14. “ When came the next dark emissary From that veiled Court of crime to me And spake its mandate, up I rose, And answered fiercely, — ‘ Back to those Who sent thee hither, slave, and say, I Count del Scoglio from this day Their utmost braggart power defy And flout their lawless tyranny/ He started from me back in awe, Then, gathering courage, made reply, — ‘ Refuse to do this deed, and draw Their anger down, and thou shalt die/ ‘ Enough ! if I must die,’ I cried, ‘ At least a freeman I shall fall ; ’ And in a moment from my side His shadow vanished from the wall, And in the street alone I stood, Not free — a yet more abject slave. For still the tramp of Death pursued DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 133 My footsteps ; still from street to street As fast I fled as from my grave I seemed in every eye to meet The glance of enmity and hate ; And shadows black of hovering Fate Through every inmost deep recess My soul an utter darkness made, And all life’s colours seemed to fade With all life’s joys and hopes for aye Amid my wintry wretchedness. I shunned the daylight — vain assay ! For night but teemed with livelier fear; And that keen Knife that alway near I felt but saw not then became A lambent tongue of living flame. No footstep heard behind me fall But could my nerveless breast appal ; I shivered as the shadows sped Of the shrill swallows overhead ; I almost yelled if suddenly Out from some dark and silent place, From portico or sombre tree, Flashed on mine eyes a human face. At last I rose resolved to flee BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. From deathful homeless Italy, In hope in distant climes to find The calmness of the healthier mind. . . * 5 - “Yet ere I fled one pearl I still Would grasp. Vittoria lived. I thought, ‘ Might I not bend her to my will By one last desperate stroke, and wrest, If not the love within the breast, At least the gold that I have sought . Full speedily my plans I wrought Whereby I might her body seize, Forged in a brain made apt and deft For plots and foul conspiracies, — Intent that sweetest life to steal With all its beauty by one theft Away, and rather than appeal To the world’s pity, or whine and kneel For alms or mercy anywhere, With sin supreme all earlier sin Outdo, my worst last venture dare, Crush the proud heart I failed to win, Swift to some distant refuge bear DE VERDUN OF BARRA GN. 135 By violence the precious life ; Ere thou couldst name Vittoria wife, Compel her to my purpose, chain Her being to mine in iron bands, And with her gold in other lands Buy safety from the bitter bane Of poverty, and move again Beneath the sun with chainless hands. . 16. “ Thou knowest the rest. A path I found With my two creatures in the night Up to her kinsman’s villa-ground, And hid below the terrace-height. I knew thy noble name and fame In Italy, nor sought to tame Thy spirit, but had heart to cope With Satan’s self ; nor failed the hope Of finding there alone my prey, And dragging her by stealth away. . . Not long beneath the boughs we lay. Brief was the struggle. Well thou knowest Thy life, her liberty, thou owest To thine own courage and the fear 1 36 DE VERDUN OF DARR A GET. Of my confederates. Life is dear To worms like those, to whom to die Would seem the sweeter destiny. I know not whether caution, love, Or pity drew them from their lair To help me in my helpless plight ; But down they bore me through the grove Slow in the moon’s declining light, And in the carriage, waiting there Amid the pine-woods by the sea, They laid me almost tenderly. Then on we sped — I knew not where ; I only know I woke to find The carriage speeding by the shore, The moonlight streaming through the blind And then I seemed to see no more. Perhaps I swooned from pain’s excess, Perhaps I slept from weariness, But when my lids again I raised, The blue sky leaned above me laced With leaves that glistened in the wind, And faint and green a pathway twined Amid a woodland past my feet ; And, rising, feebly on I fared, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGB. 137 Still by the old drear fancy scared, On through the woods in the morning sweet, And found at last the highway wide, .And journeyed forward till I spied Fair Genoa. Then I counsel took With my lone heart, and I forsook The city, wending wearily My way to Turin, with intent To pass the snowy boundary. From Turin toward the Alps I bent My steps with painful slow advance, To find some port in Northern France, And o’er the ocean of the West Seek what the earth might yield of rest. . . i7- “ One day I crept at evenfall Round Susa’s immemorial wall, And courting rest and secrecy There sought a humble hostelry, And ate my slender meal, and slept. Next morning in the sala small, As o’er my meagre cup I bowed, Two travellers through the doorway stept 138 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH And glanced at me, then called aloud For wine, and sat them down, and drank. I knew not wherefore ’t was I shrank Like some blind brainless zoophyte Back on myself in vague affright As their cloaks touched me. Yet my tongue Responded to their travellers’-talk, And, as from clenched teeth, they wrung My answers — ‘ Did I lately bide In fair Torino ? ’ — £ Yes.’ — ‘ I walk, Not ride, from Susa o’er the Pass ? ’ — 4 Well, . . yes.’ — ‘And make for Aix?’ . . Alas, I had too much patrician pride To learn the baseborn coward’s art Of crafty lying ! . . Then they eyed Each other o’er the goblet’s side, And muttered some brief phrase apart, And presently arose, and went. 18. “There on my hands my face I leant, And moaned : £ O fool, in such a world, With coils of danger every hour In snake-like rings around thee curled, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 139 Thy secrets all abroad to shower In every idle traveller's ear ! 9 . . I shook aside the haunting fear, And started up the mountain ground. 19. “ Towards noon as o’er the steeps I wound I saw far up against the snow Two wayfarers ascending slow, Who turned and seemed to gaze at me ; Then on with swifter pace they sped. I knew them as the self-same twain That scared me at the hostelry, And watched them with a deeper dread. And then I saw them not again, As up the shorter paths they strode And slow I climbed the zig-zag road. At last I crossed the Pass, and grew Gay as the north-wind o’er me blew ; And downward sped with broadening hope Along the mountain's northern slope. . . i4o DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 20 . “ Lone was the way, the evening light Was lingering on the rosy height, When on before me, crouched, half-seen, ’Mid rocks and rhododendrons green, Once more I spied the twain, and knew They lurked in ambush, to entrap And murder me in that lone gap. Back from the path of death I drew, And halted. Feebly toward my belt My faint hand for my dagger felt. I searched where any path might lie By which for refuge I might fly. Well had the murderers chosen their ground ; By rocks close-girt the spot was bound ; No flight was possible save back And upward o’er the mountain-track. I stood irresolute. Prayer to Heaven I dared not breathe. The dews of even Clung to my brows. A faintness spread Through all my muscles. One step more, And I should quit the narrow shore Of life, to face that Ocean dread ! . . BE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 141 Just then above me, ringing clear, The Diligence-bells in merry peal And crack of whip and shriek of wheel Broke in blithe music on mine ear. It seemed as if God's voice had spoken My life's reprieve by that glad token. Then in a moment more I heard The driver's shouts, and many a word Of happy travellers hurrying fast In giddy motion. Down they passed. The horses swept beside my feet . . With one wild leap I sprang, and clutched The footboard, swift the leathers touched, And climbed into the topmost seat, 'Mid liveliest laughter, and surprise And wonder in the travellers’ eyes, Nor cast one glance at those that lay Still crouching, fearing yet to rise, Robbed, ere they recked it, of their prey. . 21. “ Of no man dared I sue for aid Lest I mine own dark crimes betrayed. At Aix I pondered : ‘ On the trail 1 42 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. They follow. How shall I escape Their murderous knives, what barrier shape To balk them ? If, alas, I fail The scent to deaden or confuse, I die a brute's death. Win or lose, One way alone is left to choose — Fly by the mountain-ways and seek Protection of the Brethren meek Of some lone hospice.' Then the thought Of Haute-Combe rose, and with it brought A beam of hope. Ere morning broke From snatches brief of sleep I woke, And fled the town. By Bourget shore I cast aside the garb I wore At Susa, and, in workman’s guise Arrayed, with ever-watchful eyes I struck into the hill-paths rough. . . 22. “ As o’er the Lake from bluff to bluff I pushed through many a printless way, I noticed, hovering half the day, Upon the waters blue afloat, From creek to creek, a sailless boat. BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH. 143 It was a pretty sight to see Amid my toil and agony, And oft I longed to feel as free And happy as its idle freight Seemed to my heart so desolate. . . At evening down the slopes I crept Toward the knoll where Haute-Combe slept, O’erjoyed I reached the wooded bank, And heard amid the rushes rank The clear cool waters murmur low, The peaceful breeze of evening blow. A mile along the shore I saw The boat in steady motion draw Around a foreland that opposed My path and, rising steeply, closed White Haute-Combe and its bay from sight ; And o’er it spread the gloom of night. 2 3 - “ I climbed that steep with weary feet, And downward in the sunset sweet Once more descended to the beach, And hailed my refuge well in reach ; And on with dreams of rest I went, 144 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. And passed into the lake-side wood. . . Sudden the sound of footsteps rent My heart in that deep solitude. I scarcely dared to turn or fly . . . Nay, but what danger there could lie ? Christ ! the next moment in my neck I felt the keen stiletto plunged. I staggered forward. Then I turned. The old brute-courage in me burned. I held my two fell foes in check With naked hand. I struck and lunged Against them with my staff. I stood Amid the darkness of the wood, Propt by a beech’s iron bole, And with a fencer’s utmost skill I fought. I felt the blood down-roll Along my side. I saw the hill Recede in darkness. All things shrank From me. And still I fought — in vain. At last, insensible with pain And blood-loss, to the grass I sank ; And knew not life’s return again, Till, bleeding, mangled, well-nigh dead, I woke amid the reedy bed DE VERDUN OF DA RR A GIL 145 By Bourget’s margin — woke to find Above me bent the Brethren kind, Who bore me to their sanctuary, Where thus — this wreck — thou seest me lie, Too void of life to fear to die.” . . 24. This was Del Scoglio’s joyless history— A sea of sullen waters with no spot Whereon the gentle eye of Love might dwell — Miserable ! . . Yet may we triumph not. A few steps downward on the perilous slope And even the best of us beyond all hope Perchance had fallen as Del Scoglio fell. And yet in all that texture woven of sin Men called Del Scoglio where did good begin Or evil end ? Black in desire and deed, Cursed through his fathers’ sins with some defect Of nature which his life too early wrecked, He sought not Virtue, knowing not her need, Birth-blasted at the roots. . . This makes that creed Which holds that Death may purge away Life’s grime And recompact with finer element The sin-stained being for unending time L 1 46 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. So welcome, when, with Nature malcontent, We murmur, brooding on her waste and woes, And wondering for what end from Chaos she uprose. 2 5 * O, let it pass ! The Hand that from afar Led me to thee, and lent me strength to save Del Scoglio from one crime, thee from the grave, Beloved, shall we trust It not, or mar Our lives It makes so happy with one doubt, Or from our cells of life shut one fair sunbeam out ? DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH II. i. O UT from deck — the green waves leaping Gaily round our vessel’s prow, While the healthful breeze of ocean Lifts the hair and fans the brow — Look with me, love, o’er the waters. Yonder from the clouds updrawn Lo my sunlit mountains gleaming In the clear fresh Northern dawn ! 2. Hail them, love, with me ! . . O welcome, Cape and coppice, peak and moor Southward far from blue Ben Edar Circling round the sunlit shore ! . . Lo the treble-pointed Giltspear Radiant in his robes of heath ! Lo the green and purple Headland Plunging to the waves, beneath ! 1 48 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 3 - Lo Slieve-Cullinn’s cool blue summit Soaring in the dawn-light sweet, Lawn and harvest-field and forest Rolling inland to his feet ! . . There the bowery glens are hanging High amid the moorlands dun, There the rocks and rolling torrents Flash amid the broadening sun. 4 - See the shores, the slopes, the lowlands Dotted white with farm and town, Stately halls and park and pleasaunce, Bushless crag and cultured down, Meads and woods and mountains surging Upward far, till o’er the crowd Lugnaquillia’s brightening ridges Lift the last light lingering cloud ! . . 5 - Let the good ship cleave the billows, Dash the spray and beat the foam, Speed us on with lightning motion Eager toward my mountain home ! BE VERDUN OF BARRA GH 149 III. 1. Y ES, this is Wicklow ; round our feet And o’er our heads its woodlands smile ; Behold it, love, — the garden sweet And playground of our stormy isle. 2. Look round thee from this wooded height Where, girdled in its sheltering trees, Our home uprears its turrets bright, — Our own dear home of rest and peace. 3 - Is it not fair, the leafy land ? — Not boasting Nature’s sterner pride, Voluptuous beauty, scenes that stand By minds immortal deified ; i5o DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH . 4 - Yet fraught with sweet resistless spells That wake a deep, a tranquil love, — The witchery of the ferny dells, The magic of the murmuring grove, 5 - The ever-present varying sea, The graceful Peaks, the violet hills, The fruitful lawn and flowery lea, The breezy moors, the golden rills. 6 . A land with every delicate tint Of fleeting shadow, wandering light Rich as the rainbows when they glint O’er its own bays ere falls the night. 7 > Here all the year the mountains change From month to month, from hour to hour, Now rosy-flushed, now dim and strange, Now sparkling from the sunlit shower, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 15 1 8 . Now far in moving clouds withdrawn ; Or gilt with yellowing fern and larch, Or smit with crimson beams of dawn, Or silvered with the sleets of March. 9 - Fair when the first pale primrose shines, The first gay moth the furze has kissed ; When under Little Giltspear’s pines The bluebells seem an azure mist ; 10. When summer robes with all her leaves The rough ravine, the lakelet’s shore, Or when the reaper piles his sheaves Beside the pools of Avonmore ; IT. When the brown bee on Croghan bites In eager haste the heathbell through, And children climb Gleneely’s heights To gather fraughans fresh with dew ; IS 2 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ 12 . When grouse lie thick in lonely plots On Lugnaquillia’s lofty moor, And loud the sportsmen’s echoing shots Ring from the rocks of Glenmalure. 13 - Fair when the woodland strains and creaks As loud the gathering whirlwinds blow, And through the smoke-like mist the Peaks In warm autumnal purples glow ; 14. When madly toss the brackens’ plumes Storm-swept upon the seaward steep, As far below them foams and fumes On beach and cliff the wrathful deep, 15 - Till cloud and tempest, creeping lower, Old Djouce’s ridges swathe in night, And down through all his hollows pour The foaming torrents swoln and white ; DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH 153 16. Or when o’er Powerscourt’s leafless woods, With crests that down the tempest lean, Bend, braving winter’s fiercest moods, The pines in all their wealth of green. i7* A tract of quiet pastoral knolls ; Of farms; of gardens breathing balm ; Grey beaches where the billow rolls With wandering voice in storm or calm ; 18. Of sombre glen and lonely lake, Of ivied castles, ruined fanes, Wild paths by crag and skyey brake, And dewy fields and bowery lanes ; 19. With glimpses sweet and prospects wide Of sea and sky from wood or scar, And faint hills glimmering from the tide That roll 0 f other realms afe** 1 54 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH . 20 . A spot that owns the priceless charm Of gentle human hearts and minds — A people whom the roughest storm True to its kindlier impulse finds; 21 . A kindly folk in vale and moor, Unvext with rancours, frank and free In mood and manners, — rich with poor Attuned in happiest amity ; 22 . Where still the cottage door is wide, The stranger welcomed at the hearth, And pleased the humbler hearts confide Still in the friend of gentler birth ; 23 - A land where alway God's right hand Seems stretching downward to caress His wayward children as they stand And gaze upon its loveliness. DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 155 24. O, couldst thou love, True heart, its mountains with but half the love Wherewith I have loved thy gorgeous Italy, Love this my land, being mine, and find it fair, Methinks from out its deeps would speak to thee A Voice that from yon summits doth declare Daily to me the presence of a Mind Whose thoughts embodied shine in earth, heaven, seas, Whose subtle infinite ingenuities In hand, foot, muscle, eye or brain I find, And, in beholding, wonder ; a Spirit that moves In man’s heart prompting to the purer life ; A Will that shapes the worlds through all their strain and strife. * 5 - And surely if our lives may teach us aught Of that which but through symbols we may learn, With these fair lessons are their memories fraught : That Something yet man’s spirit may discern Amid the darkness and the mysteries 156 DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH \ Of being more responsive to its needs Than conflict of blind forces, violent rage Of lust and hunger, seeming symmetries Chance-born of Chaos ; that that Mind yet leads The planets in their orbits age on age, And moulds no less our homelier destinies ; That, casting from his bosom this high faith, Man crawls along his paths in living death, Self-stifled, feeling in him less and less The purer loves, the nobler impulses, And sinks beneath life’s weight in utter weariness. 26. Yea, though the perfect Truth I shall not grasp, My highest being but folly, and my brain Incapable as children’s to sustain Aught ampler than its puny cells may clasp, And hardly knows the eye the thing it sees, And morning’s sureties prove the noon’s uncer- tainties ; Yet the Indefinite, Awful, Infinite Vibrates about me, and these scenes have grown The tokens of Its life and of Its power, And, yielding to the pulses of Its might, DE VERDUN OF DARRAGH. 157 And worshipping before Its viewless throne, My spirit widens toward a larger light. So may that Voice still speak from hill, wave, flower, Love, to thy heart and mine ; so teach from hour to hour ! . . 27. Come, let us watch the mowers in the lawn ; And, as we walk beneath the cool green limes, From whose thick creamy bells the sun has drawn Delicious odours, wooing the faint breeze, Let us forget awhile the richer climes Wherein we drank the light of love’s dear dawn, And, wandering hand in hand, Here take into our lives the influences Of this sweet Northern land. LUGNAQUILLIA. “ 73 E I your guide ! ” said Mowbray. “ Yon -O long hill Seems but a slope of velvet. Let us take The rougher path, and scale the wall of crag That breaks and cleaves the Mountain’s grassy top, Leaning above the bare and lonely Glen Where yonder blocks and boulders in the sun Sparkle and those sheer heights of stubborn cliff Tower like thick rows of columns in the blue. Our ‘ grand old mountains,’ glorious in their tints And musical with streams and dear to us With happy memories, only once an age Reward the climber with the climber’s prize Of broken neck or ankle — they ’re too tame ! Let ’s make the most of them. There lies my way.” So Mowbray, standing foremost of our group On brown Lugduff, above the long deep vale LUGNAQUILLIA . 1 59 Of Glenmalure, just where the rocky steeps Plunge from the moss and heather, cried, and turned His handsome sunburnt face to us, and smiled, And, waving high his staff, with wild ‘ hurrah ! ' Ran down the slopes, we following. Where he led We could not choose but follow. . . Mowbray, Mowbray, Through what far region dost thou wander now, Exploring, daring, gladdening with thy dreams Of danger braved and new bright knowledge won ? We linger still amid the quiet glens, And sigh for thy lost face and silent voice. Alas for those old days ! . . Well, down we sped, And, leaping, stumbling, laughing, singing loud Snatches of mountain-songs, now stayed by rocks Thwarting our paths, now slipping in the track Of trickling streams, we touched at last the road, And, crossing the torn bridge of Avonbeg, Faced the lone Glen o’ the Horse, the Rebelk Grave. There upward by the rivulet we pushed Amid the fraughan-tufted granite-blocks i6o LUGNAQUILLIA . And plots of plumy bracken, heath and rush, Still Mowbray leading us, and up the cliff Climbed slowly, hands and knees in eager toil, Till from above we heard his clear glad voice Cry “ Yonder is the summit ! ” and beneath (Fat, scant of breath, and ever in ascent A laggard) honest Corbould reverently Muttered “ Thank God ! ” and all we others laughed Until the crackling echoes pealed again. Then one by one we reached the brown dry grass, And with light feet sped to the topmost cairn. Grand Lugnaquillia ! There we lay at peace, Cooled by the summer wind, and gazed adown To left and right athw r art the rolling hills To the blue sea, and round the cultured plains Basking to westward in the midday beam. For many a mile the tawny mountains heaved In rough confusion. Here amid the heaths A brown dull tarn reflected the heaven’s blue, Or the slow-moving shadow 7 of a cloud Darkened a cliff or valley. Northward far Slieve-Cullinn, dwindled to an arrowy point, Lifted his rosy peak beyond grey Djouce, LUGNAQUILLIA, 161 That in a cleft amid the summer woods Showed, nestling, Luggala-; and near us ran The Avonbeg by Fananierin’s base Away to mingle with bright Avonmore, And low amid Ovoca’s wooded vale We traced the wedded waters to the sea ; Then, turning, watched beneath in wide Imahl Far-winding Slaney glittering in the noon, And fashioned for our fancies in the haze Faint in the west the rims of Galteemore. What set us thinking as we rested thus Of Life and Death ? — Some power the mountains wield To thrill us with a sense of loneliness And littleness, and make less palpable To the hand’s touch the earth’s familiar crust, Stirred the quick heart of Mowbray, and a thought Spread from within and shadowed all his face. Long silent sat he gazing o’er the plain, His staff held listlessly across his knees, Forgetful of our presence. Bracourt said, M 1 62 LUGNAQU1LLTA . Jesting, “ See, Mowbray sits and meditates Some new sweet sonnet on the Wicklow hills ! ” But Mowbray woke our wonder all at once, Suddenly chanting in his clear sweet tones That Sophoclean choral melody, — “ Would that I were . . . beside the gleaming shores Where the dread goddesses those hallowed rites For mortals keep, whereof the golden key Hath even come upon the tongue O' the ministeri?ig Eumolpidai. . . Ah me,” He cried, and bent his head upon his breast, “ If all should perish, and the aspiring soul, Taught by its fairest habitudes to crave A loftier life, a rich activity, Should be but one with this frail mechanism And crumble with these nerves into the dust ! . . A miserable creed ! If they who mocked The passers-by upon Cephissus-bridge, Wending to Athens from Eleusis’ shore, Had from the ministering Eumolpidai But found some reason for a hope so quenched, Well might they triumph o’er the ignorant crowd, And laugh its best to scorn.” LUGNAQUZLLIA. 163 Then I, who loved Upon the mountain-tops to be at peace And sponge-like suck into mine inmost cells Sweet upon sweet their happiest influences, Not tapping the recipient brain, or straining Poor Reason (that frail staff of purblind man) In futile climbings amid broken paths And darkness, muttered, “ The Eumolpidai ! Good Mowbray, ’t is a sudden leap and long From Lugnaquillia to Eleusis-beach. Nay, let us tarry in Wicklow ; ” and at ease Stretching* my limbs upon the grassy sward, Gazed upward at the great white wandering clouds And the blue heaven, and half as in a dream Heard them speak on beside me. “ Let us hear What Mowbray sighs for,” Bracourt urged. I turned My brows from the blue deeps toward Mowbray’s face, And watched and listened, ’mid the mountain-grass Reclining still. And Bracourt spoke again : “ A brittle basis of philosophy The mysteries of the Eumolpidai, I fear.” 164 L U GNA Q UJLLIA. “ Ay, but that hope of immortality ! ” Cried Mowbray, and the colour in his cheek Spread higher as he spoke, his large eye flashed, And his voice trembled. “ Give me but that hope, And I will dare the deeds that Caesar wrought And rival Alexander. Yestermorn, When you in the clear depths of Poulanass Were plunging like some river-god, and Charles Was gathering wildflowers, Elliott butterflies, And Corbould in the little lake-side Inn Folding his hands for one more morning sleep, I sat and read my Phczdo on the crags Of Glandalough in peaceful loneliness, And lent myself in willing servitude To the persuasive reasoning of the Sage. Then with the last words sinking on my heart, — ‘ And Crito closed His mouth and eyes/ — I rose, And like illimitable rippling seas Beheld the Ages stretching, year on year, And felt my being’s boundless range, each sense Quickening in tremulous life, as if the flesh Transformed itself to spirit. If some poor man, Some outcast lying on his squalid couch, Should wake with noise of voices at the door, L UGNA Q UILLIA. 1 6 5 4 Hail, King ! Arise, that we may crown thy brows, Clothe thee in purple, lead thee to thy throne, And set the sceptre of unbounded fields In thy right hand ; ’ and loud the clamour rang, 4 This is the heir, and he shall rule the realm ; ’ An awe more vast and sweet he could not know Than mine when flashed as on my bodily eyes That vision, and I cried with lifted face, 4 These hands, these lips, may perish, but my spirit, This Me that thinks and wills, no dart can pierce, I shall live on for ever. While that thought Sways me, I ’ll tread the world with airy feet, And know no weariness ; earth’s crippling cares, Spite, jealousy, disdain of puny men, Baffled ambition, stings of poverty, Hunger or thirst, I ’ll reck not ; shame and grief Will lightly bear, and laugh at Death’s worst pang.’ If by the 4 torch-lit beach ’ I might such hope Rekindle, would, I say, this hour I sat Among the Mistai mocking at the Bridge ! . . What can ye set against a dream like that ? ” 44 This,” Elliott struck in eagerly : 44 Attune Thy heart to that whereof thou standest sure, — i66 LUGNAQUILLIA . Life this side of the grave. This life thou hast — Must live it. See if thou canst find no charm To make it worth the living. Dost thou love The beauty of the earth ? Make eye and ear Thy mind’s unweariable ministers, For ever harvesting the world’s best fruits To gladden and revive it. Knowledge love, And thou shalt find a pasture for thy soul Fair as Eternity. Thy restless wing Scorns our poor narrow skies of mortal life, Yet cannot in its steadiest straining flight Outsoar them. Go, exhaust all springs of joy, Coast round the bourns of life from sea to sea, Taste of all dishes that the gods provide; Then say thy heart is over-great for earth, And I ’ll believe it. Hast thou learnt all flowers That brighten Lugnaquillia ? Dost thou know The deep seas’ wonders well as thine own palms ? Has every Himalayan mountain-horn, And every bosky dell of Arcady, And every ocean-island yielded up Its treasures and its secrets to thine eye ? Hast thou yet sailed the waste and unknown seas, LUGNAQUILLIA . 167 Or followed Phoebus in his nightly round While Britain sleeps below the calm white stars ? Nay, hast thou, lying on the piney hills, Drained heaven of its marvels in a night ? Knowest thou where the lightnings have their home, Or hast thou tracked across the blackening void The thunders in their chariots ? . . O, my heart This life overwhelms with wealth immeasurable, As the thick grasses of the meadow-lands The little child’s a-straying thrill with awe When, standing with their tassels o’er his head, He peers into their green and endless deeps ! ” “ Those are the nobler habitudes,” said Mowbray, “ Whereof but now I spoke, that train the spirit For vaster fields of action, and implant That longing for a life unquenchable Which makes the dream of unawakening Death Strike as with leprosy the heart of Joy.” “ Nay, but a life thus to its natural end In ever-varying intellectual play Lived freely, closing in a painless sleep, In sleep unconscious of its own surcease,— LUGNAQUILLIA. 168 What wouldst thou covet more ? ” — So Elliott asked, Half-doubtful in himself. “ Life void of pain, Love without taint, no severance of dear souls, Oppressions none, no treachery, no lies, No envy of false friends — these,” Mowbray cried, “ I covet. Weariness of hand, heart, brain No more, no want and no satiety, No stumbling of the mind in doubt or gloom ; Life without pain, life affluent of joys, Pure pleasures that should leave the spirit unsoiled, Sweet contemplation in unbroken peace, The mysteries that baffle mortal eyes For ever to the clear undazzled sight Unfolding age on age. Faith in such life, I hold, can make the passage to the grave Seem fair, and every wreck of earthly storms But nothing, as we move.” “ Yet who are they Whose spirits are worthy of an endless life,” Said Bracourt. “ What are we that we should claim Bliss inexhaustible? For most of us, 169 LUGNAQUILLIA. Meseems, this little path into the pit Is long enough, and oft 1 ’ve Nature thanked That she has set the mouth of each man’s grave So near his cradle, and so deep a sleep Awaits us at the last. There ’s many a dog That sniffs the Wicklow mountain-shepherd’s heels As worthy of that endless life of ease As thou or I. To all men wouldst thou grant Such guerdon ? ” " I would crave for all the hope” He answered. “Nobler, sweeter, blither life, Be sure in all it sways it doth create. Think of it, friends. The pleasure for each moment Is not that moment’s transitory sweet, Which passes ere we know that it hath been, But the expectation of some bliss to come, Or memory of some happiness enjoyed. We dwell not in the present; we subsist By hope and recollection. Sadness comes With retrospect ; but hope excludes all pain ; It is the larger source of the heart’s life. What can the barren field of mortal days Yield of prospective bliss, to fortify 170 L UGNA Q UILLIA . The heart bereft of all that ministers To its particular needs? The hope of sleep When all is over ? O, ’t is not for sleep Men long, but for the waking at the dawn With strength renewed for vaster enterprise And more abounding bliss. What amulet Can the mere promise of oblivious sleep Provide in days of sorrow ? At the best A sullen patience the poor dream may breed, A passionless resignation, a dull drug That paralyses action, and exhausts Vitality. The forward-looking spirit That sees beyond the narrow walls of life Life infinite, will triumph o’er disease And grief and separation from loved friends, Will bear earth’s burthens light as flakes of snow, Will find a deeper beauty in things fair, Will toil with healthiest fervour, and attempt, Feeling itself immortal as the gods, Deeds worthy the ambition of a god.” Here Corbould, puffing with deliberate pause Blue streams of fragrant smoke, and lying back L U GNA Q UILLIA . 171 Full-length, with eyes half-closed in sunshine, growled : “ Cannot we jog along the road of life Quietly, vexing not our little minds With problems far beyond their power to solve ? . . I speak, as a plain man, plain prose.” (His eye Twinkled on Mowbray with a sidelong glance.) “ Cannot we jog along the road of life, And find sufficient pleasure day by day, Looking just far enough in front to save Our heads from knocking against posts . . I speak Plain prose . . and cherishing just so much faith In a Hereafter as to lay up stores Of provender against, a possible pinch ? I noticed as we crossed the Vale below The comfortable kine that take no thought Even of the morrow (much less of a life Such as friend Mowbray with abysmal maw Yearns for in restless craving unappeased), But browse the level meads of Glenmalure, Quite happy, working out their destiny, And careless of the doom they can \ foreknow ; And to myself I sighed, and said, ‘ We men Are troubled with a little too much light 172 L U GNA Q U ILL I A . Or not sufficient ; happier belike The beasts that walk in darkness ?’ Yet I think Most men go browsing up and down life’s meads With the calm wisdom of the mild-eyed cow, Nor look before or after — look not past The nearer tussock ; and the world goes well, Goes well enough, with those that have the sense To take it calmly, and not look too far.” Then Mowbray turned his kind dark eye of blue Slily toward Corbould, just in time to meet His stealthful glance cast round to watch the dart Of raillery strike, and, each so caught by each, Both laughed outright. But Mowbray cried aloud : “ Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, How wert thou blest ! — When Corbould walks all- fours, And eats the grass, and clings upon the slopes With nails a cubit long, he shall have found What all the wise have sought from Time’s dim dawn, The summum bonum ! . . Nay, but Corbould’s sigh For the beast’s lot shows something much amiss With man ; no end before him but the beast’s, L U GNA Q UILL1A. i73 He grovels beastlike and is less than man. And yet the kine of Glenmalure, that wooed Corbould to loiter while we climbed and soared, Will serve me in my need. For what upholds Your hungry ox but the vague hope of food? What shall uphold the passionate heart of man Starved in its holiest longings, but the hope Of finding yet its natural sustenance ? What solace know ye for the spirit bereaved Save hope of somewhere finding in wide Time The spirit swept away ? What shall requite The soul that, labouring through its span of days, But suffers woe on woe, save some fair hope Of some sweet recompense in happier zones ? — I base no claim on justice. I but speak Of the heart’s gain from hope, and say but this, — That the dear hope of immortality Exalteth us, makes smooth the thorniest path, Sustains the spirit when weary, and impels To lordliest labours. Strike it from the forces That fashion the proud heart of sensitive man, And back to bestial flats the race must fall.” Then lifting up his glorious face to heaven. 1 74 L U GNA Q UILLIA . He sang his aspirations like a hymn : “ If that which lives and thinks and suffers here, That / which speaks with you, must die indeed And perish utterly, then let the end Come now. What need to carry on the strife With Nature longer? Wherefore should I irk These nerves, these sinews, this too-sensitive frame With one fresh pang, with one day’s lassitude, When with a leap from yon high precipices I might end all this moment? . . Not for me A life that drifts from wave to wave, and whirls In eddies of the sea, and breaks and bleeds With dashings on the crags, and finds no shore Of safety or of calm. Being free to choose, I should choose death, — not pain or fitful joys Whose certain end is pain. Life hath no ill Hope makes not light, I say, and tolerable. Nay, trusting that it doth the mind enrich And disciplines my spirit for full life Hereafter, miser-like I garner pain, And treasure sorrow as men treasure gold. And if you ask me what the vision is That lures my heart, I answer, ; T is a dream LUGNAQUILLIA . *75 Of life unending and invulnerable ; A life of tranquil joy; communion close With godlike spirits in untroubled love ; Glad operance in the labours infinite Of the dread Mind that shapes the infinite worlds ; Of ever-widening knowledge of the cause And birth and growth of the innumerable Immeasurable products of that Mind ; A life of motion, and of rapturous toil That fevers not nor strains ; of ministering help In angel-errands on from orb to orb ; Of painless conflict with the powers confused Of Chaos and of Darkness ; and the shaping Of Light, of Beauty, Order, Peace, and Law ; A life of contemplation and of thought ; Of aspiration and unthwarted aims, Of sweet companionship with souls beloved Whose parting left this little life of earth A burthen and a blackness ; of all bliss, All pleasures of the eye, the ear, the heart Earth yields, intensified, sublimed, and purged Of evil, visiting a nature cleansed, Exalted, amplified, unweariable ; Of unity and unison with God. 176 LUGNAQUILLIA. “ In such a life, in peaceful painless hours, Talk with lost friends and wise, how sweet it were, On grander mountains than uplift their peaks O’er earthly valleys, or beside blue seas Where never ship was broken, — tranquil talk Of well-femembered days, delights and griefs Of long-past mortal years, that there would seem So little and so brief, and yet would show A purpose high, a vast significance Whereof we here not dream ! . . Such hope I crave, And with such hope, I say, my sufferings Are blunted ; disappointment, loss, disease, — Ay, the ever-baffled effort to secure Knowledge and light and to uplift the veil That hides fair Truth, are borne with patient heart ; And all the beauty of the world to me Grows lovelier, as it shadows to my spirit The imperishable glories I shall see.” So Mowbray ended, and none answered him. There fell upon our hearts a kind of awe, Our dear companion seemed so far from us, Our spiritual perceptions matched with his So mean. LUGNAQUILLIA. i77 O, often while he spoke as then We felt a strange foreboding, and a dread Of early separation. Many a time Amid our happiest converse there would fall A sudden darkness over us, like clouds That from our changeful Irish skies will cast An unexpected shadow o’er the heights Where but a moment gone we lay and basked In boundless sunshine. Yet of all our band He seemed the most secure from every blight Of sorrow and of sickness — strong, erect, Insensible of danger or fatigue. Down passed we by the heathy mountain-side, He leading in his lightest merriest mood, Our laughter echoing at his endless jests And inextinguishable mirth ; and sought Beside Drumgoff the little hostelry ; And, after supper tasted, stories told Of other rambles, mysteries of thought Handled and left once more upon their shelves (The Insoluble that each o’er-sanguine age Assails with a like impotent chemistry), Lulled by the music of the hurrying stream, N 178 LUGNAQUILLIA. We slept, — intending in the morn, I think, To climb o’er Fananierin, and descend By some wild track into Ovoca’s Vale. Ten years had passed, when, by two diverse waves From diverse regions tossed, on Malta’s shore Corbould, returning from his Indian toils, And I, from journeyings in Armenia, met; And, as amid a cafe’s din we talked, I heard a voice that back in memory bore At once the faces and the scenes and dreams Of College rooms and Wicklow wanderings ; And, turning, met the brown observant eyes Of Elliott, glancing from a bearded face Beneath a forehead bald before its time. Then followed mutual greetings of the three. And Elliott told how to the East he fared, Sent by the State to sound some secret deep Of Nature yet unfathomed ; and had come Fresh from the breezes of the Irish hills. Then elsewhere, as we chatted, he retailed The ten years’ changes, — failures, triumphs, deaths Of those we best remembered. Some had grown Famous already ; some beyond all hope L UGN A Q UILLIA. I 79 Had fallen. Corbould listened to the end, Then cried, “ But what of Mowbray, what of him, Our strongest and our noblest, matched with whom In all the gifts of Nature all the rest Were but as phantoms — Mowbray, whom to meet Once more is the one joy on Irish shores I have most yearned for ? ” Elliott bent his head. “ Dear Mowbray ! If his bright philosophies Be sound, we yet may find him— but not here ! ” Then Corbould hid his face and sobbed aloud. Yes, in a town of Southern Spain it seemed He had sojourned ; fever broke upon the place ; Death, gathering in his captives, roamed the streets From house to house and seized on old and young ; And they that should have stayed to tend the sick Fled, leaving them to perish. Not so Mowbray. Nursing some wretch struck down in his abode Daily and nightly, on his own pure life At last the cruel hand remorseless fell. LUGNAQUILLIA . i So Beneath the white Sierras lies his grave. To-day I wander lonely in the Yale, And gaze at Lugnaquillia’s desolate crags, And think of him who passed from these dim shapes So young — from shadow into shadow passed, — Our Mowbray, first in every venturous feat, And first of all our band to brave dark Death. What hast thou found, our brother? — In dull tracts, By paths that run with mist on either hand And mist before and after, still we fare, Nor know we whither ; and with lapse of years The old fervours fail, and old beliefs and hopes And longings shrink away. . . O for one hour On the bright hill-tops with that glorious voice Singing once more of immortality And pure aspiring joy, and that grand face Turned toward us with such love in its deep eyes ! BY WICKLOW SHORES. (to f. y. e.) I. F ULL twenty years have rolled in mist away Since thou and I within the self same Walls Quaffed of the cup of strange philosophies With hearts all eager in life’s opening day ; And twenty years have bound with golden ties Our happy friendship. By the waterfalls, The glens of Tyrian purple, we have roved, With a like loss of lives the best-beloved Left desolate, and yearly each to each, Through a like want, like sorrow, unexpressed, Drawn closer. Here beside the grey sea-beach Once more I clasp thy hand, my home ’s thrice- welcome guest. ii. And here beneath Slieve-Cullinn’s ghostly peak, In summer’s storm and rain we walk, with minds 182 BY WICKLOW SHORES. Through twenty years of life’s experience changed, Matured and chastened ; and once more we speak Of Death and Life, and roam as we have ranged On Thought’s free wing unfettered as the winds, And find not one dry spot whereon to set The foot amid the waters wide. And yet Hope lives though Knowledge is not ; and that Hope Sustains us when we brood upon the Past, And as we move toward Death along Life’s slope Tells that the lips long mute may be unsealed at last. hi. What though the dream were vain, our journey over, Will, motion, thought, and sensibility The Universe should suck up like a sponge, And consciousness and memory its seas cover, Absorbing all things as they roll and plunge ; Still welcome the exultant fantasy, Hope, without whose clear beam we stumble blind And the arm fails and barren lies the mind, BY WICKLOW SHORES. 183 And we amid the world’s adventurous band Find not a heart the deeds of men to dare ; Welcome the memories woven with this dear Land That, waking, wake the Love that will not brook despair ! THE LIVING AND THE DEAD. i. O UR dead sleep on. Draw closer to the fire, And keep the poor life warm in the lorn breast A little longer — for the months or years. I marvel which is worthier of desire, — Their lot who lie in that cold seeming-rest, Or ours, with aching hearts and bursting tears, Who mourn for them, and stretch our hands and cry To bring them back to us, or start to find The old seats vacant and no dear one by To learn the last bright thought that flashes from the mind. ii. O, lovely are the earth and the wide heaven ! How fair a world to close the eyes upon THE LIVING AND THE DEAD . 185 For ever ! They who loved these breaking waves And these green woods, and yon pale tints of even, See them no more. The wandering breeze of dawn Makes music in the grasses of their graves ; The birds about their bright homes tenantless Warble to infant ears ; the sunbeams creep Into their chambers’ utter nakedness ; The rills beside their doors in light unheeded leap. hi. But we have still our Mountains that we love, And the full streams with all their melodies, Boughs brightening with a promise of sure spring F the level beam that gilds the winter grove, Still the quick blood that tingles in the breeze, Warm sleep secure of dawn’s awakening, Reviving hope that reasserts her sway Even in the saddest heart, soft twilight hours Wherein to dream our weariness away, Still the keen eye and still the mind’s unvanquished powers. 1 86 THE LIVING AND THE DEAD. IV. Compensates their cold rest the loss of these, Joy of hale hearts, the rapture of the strife, Imagination’s ecstasy, the flight Of venturous thought, the meditative ease, The summer seasons of tempestuous life ? Or, find they larger bliss and lovelier light Beyond the Doors none enter save alone ? Whether ’t were good to follow them and dare, As they have dared, the void of Death unknown Which of them shall arise from darkness and declare ? THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. i. Y ONDER ’S the cleft in the Mountain, their 4 Glen of the Horse/ Lonely, with bulwarks of granite to left and to right Lifted above its great boulders, its bracken and gorse Hiding the rillet that gurgles in giddy delight Hurrying down to the valley of grey Glenmalure. What is the legend that haunts it, of wizard or sprite, Mortal or devil or angel or dragon impure ? ” — 44 This. I have reason to know it, none living so well. 1 88 THE GLEN OF THE HORSE . I am a part of the story that blackens the Glen. Ever the name of it rings in mine ear like a knell ; Ever its memory darkens my path among men. . . 3 - “It was an evening of summer in red ( ’Ninety- Eight ’ When, as we climbed from the Valley, my troopers and I, Up by the mule-path, and drew in the breezes, elate, Reaching the Pass of Imahl and the moorlands on high, Suddenly rose from a gully the torrents had torn Wide in the heather a Horseman in Rebel’s array, Leapt with his steed from the cover he lay in forlorn, Sprang like a hare when it starts at a loud 4 hark- away ! Turned for a m oment to scan us, then, striking his spurs Deep in the sides of his chestnut, away to the height, THE GLEN OF THE HORSE . 189 Out toward the brown Lugnaquillia through bracken and furze Rode for his life o’er the moors in the face of the night. 4 - “ ‘ Follow ! ’ I shouted. 4 That Horseman, by Heaven, is a prize ! Thoroughbred chestnut he rides, and he rides like a king. Follow him, men . , follow me; for, as fast as he flies, Surely my bay is a bird of as rapid a wing.’ . . 5 ’ “ Up then and out o’er the mountain I leaped as he led, Looked not behind or to left or to right as 1 flew, Watching the flanks of his steed, and the plumes o’er his head Glancing away toward the moon as she rose in the blue. Now on the sward and the heather, and now at a dash 1 9 o THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. Clearing a torrent, or plunging hock-deep in the peat, Now in the wet mountain-mosses with splash upon splash, Now on the gorse and the gravel with galloping feet, Struggling, we rode such a ride as a madman might dare. . . Mad? . . I was mad that I followed, not he that he fled; Flying from death was my quarry, made strong with despair ; Wild with the joy of the chase was my soul as I sped. 6 . “ ‘ Where will he lead me,’ I thought, ‘ to what pit or what pool ? — Let him lead on to Hell-gates, I will follow him still. Now that I ’m well on his track, shall I turn like a fool? Never a man of my name had a tameable will.’ Proud of its old Norman blood was the heart that I bore, THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. 19 1 Proud of my race that had battled six centuries through Beating the kern from the lands we had conquered of yore. — ‘ What ! shall the Keltic knave baffle me ? — Slay, as we slew, Slay me he may if he can, but not force me to yield. On, little mare, to the doom ; never livelier chase ; On, gallant bay ; ever first thou hast been in the field, First over water and wall and the first in the race ; On till we run him to earth, or he runs us to death ! ’ 7 * “ So to my hunter I murmured. She heard me, and sprang Up from the hollow we strove in, and over the heath Bounded with stride ever swifter and audible clang, Striking the masses of granite that broke from the clod ; Forward still fleeter, and close at the heels of our prey; Nearer and nearer with thunder of hoofs on the sod, 1 92 THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. Scattering the russet-brown peat-dust about us like spray. 8 . “ Foam from my bay with the foam of his chest- nut flew by . . 4 Yield, in the King’s name !’ my lips all but mut- tered, so nigh Snorted the nose of my horse to the knave’s saddle- bow, — When all at once from the holster his pistol he snatched, Turned, and let fly at my forehead, but, aiming too low, Close by my neck whizzed his bullet — and left me unscratched. 9 - “ Loud then I laughed at the Rebel as anger and pain Flashed in the gleam of his teeth, and he galloped away, Spurring more fiercely the sides of his chestnut. Again THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. 193 Out of my reach he had swept, and I urged on my bay. 10. “ Then in a moment he doubled. With face to the Vale Downward he swerved with a start as if driven with a goad. Headlong he galloped, I after him, hard on the trail. . . Ay, but I knew what he saw not, that right in his road, Dim in the twilight, yon precipice, sudden and sheer, Broke o'er the Glen, with Death staring up grim from the gap ! . . 4 Let him go forward ’ (I laughed) 4 in his frantic career ; Out on the verge of the crags he is caught in a trap ; There he must rein in his steed, he must turn on his track ; There he must lie in my grip, or for liberty fight.’ o i 9 4 THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. Then for the first time I thought of my men, and looked back ; Saw them behind in the moor coming on with the night. 1 1 . “ 4 If he resists now/ I said, 4 we shall fight all alone. Dexterous doubtless he 'll prove, and of sinew and bone Tough, quick of eye and of wrist, by no danger dismayed ; Short will the duel be, surely, with pistol or blade. . . 12 . “ 4 Nay, but he ? s nearing the verge. . . Will he fail to discern The abyss ? Will he rein not his steed till it yawns at his feet ? ’ . . Nearer and nearer . . 4 The nearer the sharper the turn ; Now in a trice he recoils at the chasm, and we meet.' . . THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. 195 U3- “ Close in his wake I was bounding . . ‘ Great God, is he blind ? ’ . . Right in his way the great precipice plunged like a wall . . Out there in front there was nought but the gulf and the wind ! . . Giddy and horrible seemed it, a sight to appal ! . . ‘ What ! has he lost his command of the brute that he strides ? . . Nay, do I see but a spectre that flies in the gloom, See the wild phookah of Erin that haunts the hill- sides, Galloping wildly for ever, a phantom of doom ? ’ . . 14. “ Up from my heart came a cry with a catching of breath, — 4 Stay ! — Though I love not thy cause, I would save if I might Foe more detested than thou from so ghastly a death ? . . Vainly I cried. Man and horse like a flash from my sight 196 THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. Out o’er the edge of the crag with a wild leap in air Sprang . . . and a sickness came o’er me as, tighten- ing the rein, Blankly I stared at the valley, and murmured a prayer For the wretch I had hunted to death, and had hunted in vain. T 5- “ Mournfully, silently, down from the summit I crept, Round by the slopes of the mountain, as over me sailed, Dull in the mist, the faint moon, and the valley- wind swept Coldly my forehead, and round me the wild plover wailed, 1 6. “ Huddled beside his dead charger, bruised, broken, and dead, There ’mid the green beds of bracken, his face to the sky, THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. 197 Pale with death's pallor, more pale for the moon overhead, There I beheld in his blood the poor fugitive lie. I 7- “ Laying a pitying hand on the heart that was still, Gently a picture I drew from the bosom laid bare, Lifted it up in the moon from the dusk of the hill, Gazed for a moment, and started . . ‘So young and so fair ! . . Nay, but her features I know . . O my God, can it be ? . . Florence, — thy face on his bosom ! . . Alas ! was the youth, Florence, thy lover, thine, Cousin — thine, slain, and through me ? ' . . Then all at once on my spirit outbroke the whole truth. 18. “ Bending above the dead man once again, I beheld Dimly the face of the friend I had known long ago,— Randal, the bold young enthusiast, madly impelled, I 9 S THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. Breaking away from his kindred, to strike a wild blow Thus for the race that his fathers had swayed with the sword — Randal, the eloquent talker, the graceful, the brave, Randal, the chivalrous ever in act and in word, Randal, poor Florence’s chosen, brought thus to his grave ! 19. 4 4 Down on my knees in the heather I knelt at his side, Felt all the rapture of living fade out in eclipse, Claspt the dead hand that in life had been proudly denied, Bent o’er his face in loud sobbing, and kissed his cold lips. Then, as men hunt for excuses to justify wrong Ever when conscience is sorest and deepest their guilt, Idly I sung to my conscience the hypocrite’s song,— 4 Surely in doing my duty this blood have I spilt . . THE GLEN OF THE HORSE . 199 Duty, ay, Duty, what crimes have been wrought in thy name ? — Was it my passion for Duty alone that inspired? How much of prejudice, hatred, a hunger for fame, How much the thirst for mere blood by the brute’s heart desired? . . Randal, my friend of old days, if thy spirit could bend Out of the cold azure heaven and see me this hour, Could’st thou have love to forgive the deep wrong of thy friend Done not in virtue, but ignorance? . . O Sovran Power, God of the worlds who hast made us, and knowest full well Us and the forces that fret us Thyself hast or- dained, Here in Thy lonely waste places of mountain and dell Stretch I my hands to the worlds by Thy wisdom sustained, Here, face to face with the awe of Thy being re- vealed, 200 THE GLEN OF THE HORSE. Here, with the gulfs of deep Horror around me rent wide, Kneeling, I cry to Thee, God, who with purpose concealed Mad’st me, and light in my need to my footsteps denied. Thou who hast girdled our lives with the river of Death, Save us, O God, from this horror of horrors, that men Die by the hands of their brothers ! . , O, deep in its sheath Bury the sword that divideth us; back to their den Drive Thou the furies that rend us ; expunge and efface, Father, the frenzies .that shatter our Isle in their sway, — Vengeance, the passions of party, the rancours of race, Angers that madden and darken, and hates that betray F . . 20. “ Long o'er the dead in mine agony cried I to God. THE GLEN OF THE HORSE . 201 There by the body still kneeling they found me that night ; There with our sword-blades we hewed out his grave in the sod. . . 21 . “ Never that evening of blood shall be swept from my sight ; Never that chase of the brave human heart in the gloom ; Never the vision in front of the beautiful form Swaying in strong airy motion away to its doom ; Never the face in the bracken, the bosom still warm Bearing that picture , . ah God ! . . o’er the heart that was still ; Never the gloom of the Vale in the silent night-air, As again, with face bent o’er the saddle, I climbed the dark hill, Sick with the anguish of Cain, in my lonely despair.” VIGNETTE. I WOULD some subtle spirit at the root Might still delay your growth, ye tasselly boughs Of larch and silver-gleaming birk that shoot Sunward in life so eager it allows No pause in your wild increase; so that here, Returning in sweet summers year by year, I still might sit beside this fir-tree’s feet And watch half-dreaming in the noontide hour Within your leafy frame that picture sweet Unchequered, — far away the rosy cliffs Of the long Mountain with its beacon-tower White in the sunshine, nearer in full day The Islet basking and the light-winged skiffs, And those three Hills with furze all gala-gay Guarding the waters of the calm blue Bay. THE FISHERMAN. BOAT ! Which boat shall we choose,” I “To take us hence from the fields away In the mellowing light of the eventide, At the close of this long hot summer’s day, To take us out for a whiff of the sea, For a draught of the redolent salt-sea air ? ” Then a fisherman, lying listlessly High on a ledge of the shingly beach, As if a storm had tossed him there And left him out of the billows’ reach, A lifeless waif the sands might cover And the dry sea-thrift blossom over, Sudden his face from the shingle raised, Sprang to his feet, and stood, and gazed With eyes so hollow and wild and dim cried, 204 THE FISHERMAN. My heart grew sad with the vision of him — “ A boat ? Take mine ; it is sound and light. I ’ll row you anywhere, day or night, For the land and the sea are one to me.” Then I mused, l( It would blacken the brightest day To sail with a skipper so weird and grey.” For a face so sad on the Wicklow shore I think I never had seen before. I rallied the man with a passing joke ; But never a smile from the darkness broke That over him hung like a mourner’s cloak ; And I thought, “ That weird and terrible sadness Is surely a melancholy madness ! Is it safe to venture out in a boat With a man who might suddenly cut his throat With his fishing-knife, or with never a word Of warning fling himself overboard, Or row us away for the currents that flow To the Polar bears and the Esquimaux? ” Our little Peveril held my hand ; To sail the sea was his delight — THE FISHERMAN. 205 “ O let us go just this one night ! O, father, let us quit the land, And row across the waters bright ! ” So into the boat we stept, all three, Peveril, I, and Rosalie. I set my boy beside my knee As we packed in the stern ; and either oar Was dropt in the rowlock ; and soon the shore Glided away, as with stroke on stroke Silent the grim sad fisherman rowed. No sound the ocean-stillness broke Save that of the ripple that flapt and flowed From prow to stem, and the measured creak Of the oar in the rowlock, as languidly The weird grey oarsman twirled the blade. But ever, as up and down he swayed, His eyes toward little Peveril strayed, And seemed to brood on the rosy cheek And the golden hair of infancy Mournfully and wistfully. Then all at once a tear ran down 206 THE FISHERMAN The face so hollow and worn and brown, And, resting abruptly on his oar, Over his bosom he bent his head ; Then, wandering, gazed from sea to shore ; Then turned to me and said : sc My boy was not as old as he . . God help me ! . . when I brought him hither, From the forests of the West, Across the wide Atlantic sea, Sheltered from the wind and weather, Like a lamb, within my breast. Well nigh thirty years ago Across the wide Atlantic foam I bore him in my lonely woe, And now he has gone home, gone home ! . . “ Beneath yon Headland I was born, And seventeen years from morn to morn By beach and cliff, by fern and thorn I played : and many a night I sate, Girdled in my seaman’s-coat, With my father and his mate In our storm-tost fishing-boat, THE FISHERMAN. 20 7 And learnt to fish and row and sail And dare the dangers of the gale. “ At fourteen years my mother’s face ’Was veiled from me for evermore, And ere my eighteenth year had run, My father to the Silent Place Our gentle-hearted neighbours bore Away from sea and wind and sun. Then to yon little dell I crept Up there above the green sea-bay, And down amid the heather lay, And cried to God, and wept and wept, Alone, through all the weary day. “ The neighbours all were true of heart; And pitied me ; and many a one Would willingly have shared a part Of his own slender board to make A home for me from pity alone ; And many for my parents’ sake Were kind to me ; but I was proud, Unhappy, and as day by day I watched the ships along the coast 20 8 THE FISHERMAN With blithsome breeze in every shroud Go gliding to the summer lands, I longed to wander far away, As other lads could make their boast, And earn my living with my hands. And so I bade farewell to all I knew and loved on earth, and found A ship for Valparaiso bound, And in it as a seaman sailed In hail and tempest, shower and squall, In arctic snows or tropic glare, Among the Indian islands fair Or rocks whereon the seamews wailed Where wild auroras faint and flare . . “ Four years I voyaged east and west, And Fortune smiled upon our sails, But in the fifth, as down the shore We swept of stormy Labrador, Our gallant ship was sorely prest By currents thwart and adverse gales, And at the last a tempest blew So wild and fierce that all our wit And courage could not cope with it. THE FISHERMAN. 209 The ship was driven upon the sand, And I alone of all the crew Reached through the surf the lonely land. “ I wandered thence for many days, Half-naked, starving, penniless, Along the dreary forest-ways, And earned my bread in dire distress In farms and new-built villages That here and there amid the trees Allured me in my weariness. . . “ At last I reached a little town, Well-built, upon a woody bay With bright ships sailing up and down. “ There on the lonely shore one day I sat with head in sorrow bowed, And thought of the old home far away Across that Ocean rough and loud, And tears ran down my face ; And then great sobs, I knew not why, Rose from my bosom painfully. I strove those memories to efface; p 210 THE FISHERMAN, I struggled with my childish woe, And rose, and walked along the strand To let the sea-wind o’er me blow And brace me. In that distant land I had no friends. 44 But how it came I knew not. Toward the village quay I sauntered slowly, and in shame, Because I knew my eyes must be All red with weeping. Suddenly I heard a girl’s light laugh of glee Behind me. Ere I well could turn, Or wonder whence the laughter came, A light hand on my shoulder lay, And all amazed I heard my name Called in the dear old Irish way, With, 4 Do n’t .you know me, Lawrence Byrne?’ 44 Quick turned I round, and two brown eyes Laughed into mine. — 4 What, Kate ? ’ I cried, 4 And is it you indeed I greet ? . . Can you too dwell beneath these skies ? . . I have been thinking much of home, THE FISHERMAN, \ 2 I I And of our heathery Headland’s side ; And maybe in a dream you ’ve come ; ’ . But where in dreams could mortal meet A heart so true or a face so sweet ? . . “ As children we had played together Amid the Headland’s purple heather In happy Wicklow. Often we With other children by the sea Had gambolled in the cloudless days, Or climbed the winding rocky ways Up to her father’s cottage white Whence curled above the woods of fir. With all their dark green tops astir, The blue smoke rising high and light ; And evermore Kate Leonard’s face Made brighter still that pleasant place. “ Since I had left (five years before), Her parents both, like mine, had died. Closed was the pretty cottage door, And on the rugged mountain-side The little farm was tilled no more. 212 THE FISHERMAN. “ And Kate across the sea had sped, ‘ To seek her fortune ’ — so she said, And in that little town she dwelt. . . Ah ! at her voice’s cheerful sound With lightest feet I trod the ground, And o’er my lonely heart I felt The icy shackles break and melt. “ Then much of Wicklow-folk we talked, As up and down the shore we walked— Who of our mates that used to play Along the wild blue Irish bay Were married, who had left their home, Like her and me, the world to roam, And who were there unmarried still, And who their dear companions wept, And who among the aged slept In the old Churchyard on the hill. “ Again we seemed the hills to climb, Amid the heath and brackens tall, And hear as in the olden time The pine-woods and the waterfall Together mingle music sweet ; THE FISHERMAN. Again we seemed to hear the breeze Steal round the purple mountain’s feet With murmurs of the velvet bees ; Again by meadow, cliff, and cove The Wicklow wilds we seemed to rove. “ Well, time went by, and still we found No bliss upon that foreign ground Save when together we might be Talking, or gazing o’er the sea, Picturing our distant homes that lay Here by yon long shore’s margin grey Amid the rainbows and the showers. “ Well, what should come of love like ours Save holy marriage? We were wed The next fair summer, Kate and I ; And underneath the boundless sky On souls that loved more steadfastly God’s benison was never shed. “ Then, gay at heart as marriage chimes, I toiled as ne’er I toiled before, A fisher by the winding shore 2 14 THE FISHERMAN. Of the vast River ; or at times, A sailor, up the stormy coast In trading-vessels I was tost To Newfoundland, or southward sailed Across the Gulf of Mexico ; And love betwixt us never failed Whatever wind of heaven might blow. “ Then when the little boy was born That went home ... ah ! God help me ! . . he That the Great Father took from me Last winter . . . when our child was born We were too happy. It may be That I forgot His clemency Who left my days without one thorn ; But when my boy was two years old The heart that gave him life was cold. “ She died the day our second child, A little girl, was born. I laid The two together by that shore ; And many said that I grew wild Then ; and I think my senses strayed THE FISHERMAN. 215 At times, and that my mind no more Was clear as it had been before. a That country, that had grown so dear, Seemed now more desolate and drear Than when an outcast on its beach I sat that eve . . ah Christ ! . . when she Assuaged my grief with homely speech And from all sorrows set me free . . So desolate ! . . The loneliness Lay on my heart and on my brain Like some great weight that seemed to press Heavier and heavier day by day. Strange fancies in my mind had sway, And every thought was pain. Then the wide lands, so limitless, And Ocean stretching to the sky Were awful in their majesty. I scarce could lift my hand or head. All day I seemed to sigh and sigh ; And from my kind I shrank with dread ; And if one spake, with sudden cry I woke as from a trance and stared As if by ghostly visions scared. 2 l6 THE FISHERMAN, “ One care alone I had. That kept My brain from madness. Hour by hour I watched him while he waked or slept, My little child, the sweet frail flower She left with me, — my little boy, Whose only dreams were dreams of joy, Who laughed and gurgled on my knee. God knows I loved him tenderly — Scarce could his mother have loved him more “ But ever languid by that shore I sat. I felt if there I stayed That of that sorrow I must die, Or be to some dark deed betrayed. So I resolved to take my child And to some land less mournful fly . . But whither? A murmur sweet and mild Beside my ear came breathing low, 4 Home, home to Wicklow ! ’ And I know My heart grew light at that dear word, And I believed it was her voice That thus with hope my bosom stirred, And made it in its gloom rejoice. . . THE FISHERMAN. 217 “ He had his mother’s soft brown eyes And the same dimple in his cheek, My boy ; and when he learned to speak, In every tone I loved to trace The music of her glad replies. Even when he grew a stripling tall, Tanned by the sun and rain and squall, Her smile would brighten o’er his face And move me with sad memories. . . “ To the great Port we passed, and there I carried him aboard the ship. The blue flag fluttered in the air, Straining toward home. The wind was fair And steady as we sailed away, And from my heart awhile did slip That burthen huge of pain. All day I watched my little child at play Or sleeping in his tiny berth, And cared him as his mother might. Though rough my voice and hand, by night I learned to soothe my child to sleep ; And in my sadness made him mirth Till he forgot to wail or weep. 2 I 8 THE FISHERMAN. And women and men the voyage through Were kind on board to him and me; For, eyeing us, full well they knew The reason of my misery, And pitied me as thus I bore The little infant, motherless And frail, from that unhappy shore, And cheered me in my wretchedness. . . “ At last we sighted mine own land. I stood on deck, and felt the breeze Blow from the Irish mountains bland And sweet with perfumes of the whin, And when I saw the yellow leas Ablaze along the sunny shore, Sobbing I fell upon my knees, And gave God thanks that I had seen, Though sad at heart, our Isle once more. . “ Snug in the train my child and I, Beneath the homely Irish sky, Toward Dublin travelled. Wrapt and lain In his own mother’s shawl, he slept, While I with tears of joy and pain THE FISHERMAN 219 My loving watch beside him kept, Till, fresh from April’s glancing rain, At last amid the evening light I saw afar the soft blue chain Of Wicklow’s mountains clear and bright ; And then he woke, and eagerly I set him standing on my knee, And showed him there, in stately line, His mother’s native hills and mine. . . “ Ah ! the great God have pity on me ! I taught my boy to love the sea, That never storm or fog or squall His heart could trouble or appal. And round the Head by cave and cove We floated in the summer’s light Above the great white rocks, to haul The lobster-pots, or in the night Adown the shingly beach we drove Our boat, beneath the moon to rove The rippling waters far away, Returning at the dawn of day With brown sail wet with dashing spray, And baskets laden with our spoil. 220 THE FISHERMAN. And the boy liked our watery toil. A lither lad on Wicklow’s shore Climbed not the hills or plied the oar, Or pulled with fairer speed and grace, The foremost in the straining race. . . “ I do n’t know whether you remember, Sir and my lady, that great gale So fierce with lightning and with hail That came upon us one December Three or four years since. All the shore Is changed since then for a mile or more And looks not as it looked of yore. “ Well, my poor boy and I that night Were out alone. We lost our sail And all our oars, and by-and-by Our steering-gear began to fail, And we were left in piteous plight, And the big waves were mountains-high, And we were helpless. Then said I, ‘ Charlie, my lad, we ’ll bale the boat Long as we may, and we may float To shore somewhere, if God so will ; THE FISHERMAN. 221 If not we are together still ; And happy, Charlie, will it be — Most happy, lad, for thee and me — If we together, hand in hand, May go to-night to that sweet Land Where for our coming, early and late, Your mother and baby-sister wait.' — He took my hand in his, and said, 4 Of death I shall not be afraid While you are near me, father dear ; ’T is but the leaving you I fear, Not Death or danger. We will pray To God the tempest to allay, And waft us safe to our own bay.’ . . And in the wet beside my knee He knelt, just as a little child He used to kneel ; and presently, Right through the mist I saw afar The Baily beacon like a star ; And sure enough the tempest wild By dawn into a little cove Our shattered boat in safety drove ; And there we plunged into the tide, And swam the breakers side by side . . . 222 THE FISHERMAN. No child did ever his father love More faithfully than my poor lad. . . “ Home, said I ? — Ay, God took him home, The lorn man cried, with voice so sad Our own tears flowed ; and all his face Quivered and trembled o’er with pain — “ God took him home from wind and rain Last winter to a happier place . . . He is gone home . . my boy ; s gone home.” Then resting on his oars, his head Turned eastward o’er the waste of sea, He checked the rising sob, and said : “ It was the twelfth of January . . . I told them there was wind i’ the sky, I knew that the clouds that drifted by Foretokened storm . . and sure they too, They must have known as well as I What every seaside stripling knew. . . They shoved the boat off, four of them. My boy, the tallest of the four, Ran thigh-deep down the shelving shore THE FISHERMAN. 223 To drive her clear ; then to the stem He clambered ; and the sail was spread, And the last gleam of sunlight shed A gold-like glow across its white, And soon they vanished in the night. . . “ That was the last I saw of him, My lovely boy . . O Merciful Father in Heaven ! . . The night grew dim, And on the beach with murmurs dull The rising tide began to heave. I lay within our cabin poor. I scarce had heart to close the door. I tried my senses to deceive With thoughts of safety and of rest ; But a great dread my heart oppressed ; And ever from my fitful sleep With sudden painful start I broke. . . At last at midnight I awoke With a great trembling, and the sweep Of the huge waves was in my ear, And all my heart was cold with fear ; For like a tiger in his rage That leaps against his quivering cage 224 THE FISHERMAN. The storm had sprung on us that night At once with all its awful might. . . “ Up from my bed I rose, and out Ran to the beach, and found a band, In eager haste, with oath and shout, Dragging the boats far up the strand For safety. Willingly I lent What help I could ; but I grew weak And faint with fears, and idly bent Above each boat with nerveless hand, And could not move my lips to speak. . . “ And when the rest, their business done, Went back to slumber, all alone I walked amid the storm ; and there I knelt on the shingle wet and bare, And raised my face to God, and cried, 4 Save, save my Firstborn from the tide ! * . . “ Next morning all the sea was white With breakers, but the sky was clear. I went down in the dawning light And swept the waters far and near THE FISHERMAN. 225 For hull or sail. No sign, no mark Of aught except some pilot-bark That heaved and plunged with reefed sail And ran before the slackening gale. Three boats had left the beach that night, And all the village neighbours now Stood on the shore or on the height With chill hand arched above the brow, With anxious heart and wearied sight Searching the sea for mast or prow. . . “ All day the women stood about Or paced the shore, and up and down The men went idly, — full of doubt And fear and sorrow. To the Town Afar I journeyed, seeking there Some tidings from the pilot-folk And skippers who that night had been About the Channel anywhere Caught in the gale. To many I spoke; But none had any traces seen Of man or boat. Where'er might be A chance of tidings from the sea I sought, and sought ; and back that night Q 226 THE FISHERMAN. Returned with heart from which all light And joy had faded utterly. “ Next morning we had news — one boat To Drogheda port had found its way ; And that, ’mid-Channel, far afloat, A steamer at the dawn of day Had ta’en on board a fisher-crew And borne them on to Holyhead ; And soon the happy tidings flew From lip to lip, and then I knew All fear from every breast had fled Save mine. My lad’s three comrades good Were orphans, and no parent stood To watch for them in frenzied mood. For them few tears were shed. On me All eyes now rested pityingly. “ I paced the beach till evening’s close. At night I could not rest, but rose And wandered out in the storm and rain, I could not think my prayers were vain, And he would never come again, — THE FISHERMAN. My lovely boy that I had reared Even as a mother, my sweet child That I across the ocean wild Had borne, so many years ago ; My boy that gave me hope, and cheered My lonely hearth in life-long woe ; My child I sheltered in my breast, The one strong link that bound my heart To the dark world where I must rest Till God permit me to depart And clasp my darlings by His throne. “ And I was left alone, alone, — Last of my kin beneath the skies. And I am desolate. My eyes Are weary, weary, and fain would close, And the world daily drearier grows. . . “ Ay, folk are kind to me — all kind ; They do their best my life to brighten ; But there ’s a darkness in my mind No word or look of man can lighten. . . “Well, God is good and wise, and we 228 THE FISHERMAN, Know not his purpose.” — As he ended, We touched the beach, and heard the sea Roll, with its myriad murmurs blended, Along the shores for many a mile. He lifted up our little child ; He tried upon the boy to smile In vain ; his sorrow dark and wild Grew deeper on the weird wan face Where griefs had left their piteous trace. He set the child upon the sand, And hid his eyes with hardened hand ; Then said : “ God’s blessing on you rest This night, and may you never know, 0 never, never, such a woe As mine I . . There ’s wind, there, in the west Ere morn a heavy gale will blow. 1 ’ll drag the boat high up the beach Out of the cruel waters’ reach.” THE WRECK OFF MIZEN-HEAD, i. “ /^\ WHO could lie a-snoring V_y , Or who carousing be While such a storm is roaring And raving o’er the sea ? . . A Ship to death is drifting. Faint hands in prayer uplifting, With hearts in anguish failing, The wives and mothers, wailing, Look out from cliff and lea ; And beacon-fires are glowing, And, fierce and fiercer growing, The sleety blasts are blowing O’er rock and roof and tree. Come out from giddy dances And songs and vain romances And idle dreams and trances, And man the boat with me. THE WRECK OFF MIZEN-HEAD. 2 . “ Come down while thunders deaden The minute-guns afar, And the lightnings as they redden Make pale the signal's star ; Come down where waves are leaping And the stricken folk stand weeping, Our gallant boat uncover, And through the wet sand shove her, And speed her o'er the bar ; For though she 's but a light one, For such a sea a slight one, She 's a trim one and a tight one, And where to-night is he Whose yearning would not waken To help the lives forsaken? Come down with hearts unshaken, And brave the deep with me 1 ” 3 * So Guy the ever-daring One fierce September night, While beacon-fires were flaring Along the Mizen's height — THE WRECK OFF MIZEN-HEAD. As I, from pastimes shrinking, Of Rose's scorn was thinking — Cried, all at once upspringing ? Mid dance and mirth and singing And games and laughters light ; And Hugh the eager-hearted Out to the portal darted, And Wolfe and Wilfred started And Donald, Ralph, and I ; And, prayers and sweet imploring From maiden lips ignoring, With spirits wildly soaring We faced the seas and sky. 4 - As down the beach descending We drave the quivering boat, A gleam of moonlight, rending The darkness, showed afloat The labouring Vessel, shattered, With tackle rent and tattered, Amid the tempest heaving, Her course to ruin cleaving ; Then fast the surf we smote, THE WRECK OFF MIZEN-HEAD . . And, boldly toward her steering, Still Guy our courage cheering, The deadly breakers clearing, We strained across the tide ; And on, ? mid lightnings gleaming, — The winds about us screaming, The rain in rivers streaming, — We struggled to her side. 5 - The Vessel still to seaward Came drifting down the bay, And, steering in to leeward In surf and rain and spray, Athwart her sides we floated ; And there on deck we noted, With faces outward gazing, Their piteous hands upraising As all forlorn they lay, A helpless band together (Like birds in wintry weather With feather pressed to feather Close huddled from the blast) ; A moment, weirdly flashing, THE WRECK OFF MIZEN-HEAD. We saw them, ’mid the lashing Of billows wildly dashing O’er bulwark, deck and mast. 6 . Four times we all but touched her, Four times adrift were flung, The fifth I sprang and clutched her, And leech-like there I clung ; And thus to Guy’s enclasping, With one arm tightly grasping, Those famished forms I lowered, Till, well-nigh overpowered, I trembled where I hung. Then Guy and Wilfred, straining, New strength from victory gaining, Drew down the last remaining, Till all were safely stowed ; And shoreward with our treasure, All pain transformed to pleasure, With oars in mirthful measure At break of dawn we rowed. 7 - Ay, well do I remember 234 THE WRECK OFF MIZFN-HEAD . The morning stormy-bright That dawn of wild September, As through the breakers white We rowed the brave boat laden With man and babe and maiden, While o’er the sandy spaces, The dawn-beams on their faces, Looked out with straining sight The crowd that there had waited, Each heart with anguish freighted, As slow the storm abated Along the Brittas strand ; And how they cheered us, rending The winds, as slow ascending, Beneath our burthens bending, We waded to the land ; 8 . And when the last was landed, And homeward faint and cold We turned, how, eager-handed, (Guy leading as of old), High on their shoulders proudly They set me, cheering loudly, THE WRECK OFF MIZEN-HEAD. And bore me on, declaring The triumph of my daring ; — And how my love I told That eve amid the gloaming To Rose as we were roaming Where Aughrim stream was foaming, And how she smiled and sighed, And, 'mid the sunset's splendour, Laying her white hand slender In mine in love’s surrender, My prayer no more denied. ALTADORE. RICH are the nobler, — they who bear un- The summers and the winters of our Earth, Still hardening with the suns and storms and snows ; Or they whose natures, delicate and fine And fraught with love and beauty, for a day Endure and with the splendours of an hour All hearts draw wondering toward them, but one frost Hath power to slay ; who at a breath bud, bloom, And perish, of more subtle essences Compounded than the oenothera-flower That spreads its pure white tender leaves at noon, To flush all pink as with excess of life Ere sundown, and before the dews have fallen Swoon in a rosy death and fade away ? moved ALTADORE. 237 A little Glen hangs in the seaward hills. Adown its clefts a stream with many a fall Leaps, a white light, amid the sunless gloom Of yews and pines and lindens. To its deeps, Death-darkened in his noon of love and life And yearning for some sombre solitude Wherein his mind, undazzled with the world, Might hold before it one beloved face Vanished from sense for ever, Aylward Burgh, With one fair child to woo him from his woes, Returned from summer lands to make his home. Rupert the boy’s name was. The father’s eyes Dwelt with a yearning and remorseful love On the young brows when, climbing eagerly, The child would gaze into his mournful face ; Ay, watching him amid his keenest mirth, He sighed with weighted bosom — all but wished He too with that lost form had passed away Rather than lived to taste the bitterness Of baffled hope thereafter— man’s sure doom ; Yet other joy had none. Sad was his home 238 ALTADORE . Amid the shadows of the sombre Glen, But fair as sad. For round the porches clave Sweet-scented woodbines, rarest creeping-plants And trailers close about the windows hung In tasselly lilac, purple, white, and pink, — Rose and westeria, fuchsia, clematis ; And — for he loved the gardener’s peaceful craft — Sown by his hands, the smooth green terraces Through half the year were all ablaze with flowers. Rupert, although his father’s mournfulness Oft passed across him as a cloud in heaven Dusking a sunny path amid the woods, And saddened him he knew not why, in joy Gambolled and grew. He loved the leafy Glen And the deep darkness of its beaded yews ; He loved the silvery pines that hung their cones High o’er their neighbour lime-trees ; in their tops He sought the heron’s nest, with knees and hands Clambering aloft among the unstable boughs ; And oft with squirrel-leaps from tree to tree Traversed the grove adventurous. O’er the falls He climbed, and plucked the spray-bedabbled fern From the wet rock, or, hanging o’er dark pools, ALTADORE. 2 39 Picked the cool berries from the fraughan-beds. Later to far-off streams with rod and fly He journeyed, oft returning proud at heart With basket heavy with the speckled prey ; Or from the heathery mountain-side elate, With hare or rabbit slung across his back, Came like a hunter, striding through the moors. For many a mile around his father’s home His young fair face the kindly peasants knew ; And never visitor more welcome crossed The cottage threshold. Ever for his cheer The crackling furze was kindled on the hearth, The best seat set for him before its blaze ; And there he loved to sit and hear them tell Tales of the mountains and their own hard life. So to his fifteenth year he lived, and still Out of his father’s founts of learning drank The cup uplifted to an eager lip With ever-careful ever-loving hand. Then suddenly into his spirit came Strange aspirations stormier than a boy’s ; His boyish pastimes from his heart he spurned, And when he climbed into the leafy crests 240 ALTADORE. It was to pore upon some poet's page, And when he rambled o'er the hills alone, Or wandered eastward to the grey sea-beach, It was to dream and meditate. With eyes Watchful his father brooded on his face, Pleased, yet with touches of disquietude, — Pleased at the bright ambition of his breast, But fearing, from a set despondency, Danger and failure on the giddy heights. A guest to a near kinsman's house, that stood Amid the mountains looking from its limes Across the lawns and undulating woods To the blue Channel studded white with sails, Came, like a rare sweet bird that sings its song A little while, and makes the hearers gay With an unwonted gladness. Muriel Vane, Now in her eighteenth summer, beautiful With a rich beauty foreign to our clime, From whose dark eyes and face of delicate mould, Lighted with smiles that seemed like words of love To all she spoke to smiling, woman nor man Could draw their gaze away — young Muriel, Wild with life's affluence, ignorant of her spells ALTADORE . 241 And heedless of her beauty, feeling only All the wide world was reverent and kind And life amid the love of friendly souls Infinite rapture — lightly to and fro In ever-broadening circles of glad friends Moved, and to every lip one comment drew, " O, passing fair, and loveable as fair ! ” And even the old grew happier through her charms, Scarce knowing ; for she slid into their hearts With light and warmth like some stray beam that makes Its silent breach into the thick-leaved woods And stirs with sudden sense of splendour shed Through ampler heavens and earth the lives within. One morning, merry in the meadow-paths, ’Mid fair girl-faces hers the fairest flashed On Rupert wandering, and a moment’s space She dwelt with dark eyes lovingly on his, Unconscious of her eyes’ deep lovingness Or that she gazed at all ; for all things fair Drew thence responsive that sweet light of love. The dew that drenched the bowers of Paradise R 24 2 ALTA BORE. Wrought not a change more magical and swift Than in the soul of Rupert that one look. . . O mystic World, when love makes keen the eye And the heart quickens, is it thine own face That with such transport gladdens the young breast, No fantasy or effluence of the mind, But thy true glory which the languid sense Knows not and sordid Care obscures and mars ? . . In a new earth beneath another heaven Young Rupert seemed to wander from that hour. All sounds of bird or stream or leaf or wind Swayed him with tremulous joys, and every tint Of melting blue and silver in the sea Or melting blue and amber in the skies Wrought on his heart like music’s ecstasy. And soon beneath the self-same roof they met, And friendship, free as children’s friendships, sprang Between them. Kin they were to mutual kin, And guests at homes of kinsmen. To the Glen With others she would come, or all alone With gift or message stepping down the glades And all the joy of morning in her face ; ALTADORE. 243 And Rupert saw his father’s saddened brows Brighten when lightly through the rustic gate She tript into his garden, — rosier-cheeked And livelier-eyed from walking through the woods In sweet cool mountain air — and stretched to him Her dainty hand, and smiled her winsome smile ; Nay, often would his father in his gloom Wish for her coming, praising her frank speech, Her all-unconscious grace and quenchless joy. Then Rupert with a lover’s eye of hope Read happy omens in his father’s moods, And half-believed his father’s wish and his Were one. “ And she may be a daughter to him,” He thought, “ and help these harder hands to make His pathway toward life’s sunset smooth and gay.” He saw it not, but watched them, pleased at heart, As butterflies on wing or lambs a-field, And dreamt not they could love. Nor did he guess Why Rupert, sitting late into the night, Pored o’er his books with such laborious care, And talked, his eyes dilating as he spoke, Of glory he would win and splendid fame ; 244 ALTADORE. Only well-pleased beheld him at his toil, Counselling caution and more temperate zeal, And gladdening in his triumph when he came Home with his first bright Honour nobly won From College, victor in the peaceful lists At earliest onset, and with such renown As shed its light along the years to be. After an absence brief, the Wicklow woods Brightening, a welcome guest at every home, Muriel, fairer yet for one year’s change, He found once more. Her greeting seemed all love, Even as her parting scarce a year before Seemed, in the lingering hand and wistful eye, Love’s testament and promise. Here and there, At pic-nic, dance, sweet walks amid the glens, Or saunterings by the mountain-lakes, they met And spoke ; and one pure cloudless afternoon, Alone amid the woods of Luggala, He told his love and the strange miracle It wrought upon his life. She heard him speak, And in the tears that started to her eyes, And her hand’s pressure, and her faltered words, “ Rupert, I love you too,” his yearning heart ALTADORE. 245 Found satisfaction for its bitterest pain, And he believed her love, as his to her, Plighted for ever. Once again she left. Back from the balmy mountains and the Glen To the dim City and his College rooms Returning, with his heart's ambition's fire New-kindled, closer to his work he clave With sterner self-denial. Hour by hour Through the -long day, all trivial thought shut out, All pleasure shunned, and hour by hour alone, Through half the night full often, by the lamp Bending above his texts (in midst of toil Swayed by the mightiest dreams of Greece or Rome, And mingling with the riches of his being The spirit of the world's divinest dead) He laboured cheerfully ; and seldom paused To rest, save sometimes when the sweet dark face * Stole in betwixt the volume and his eyes And swept his heart away in happy flight A moment, quickly rescued with a smile And “ Nay, for thee, for thee alone these fasts, 246 ALTADORE. These vigils ; tempt me not to thine own self To prove a traitor.” But how sweet it was When, pressing close his forehead with his palms, He suffered the strained Memory to rest, And let Imagination loose to build What way it would its aery palaces With ever that one Spirit to hold as queen ; Or when, the day's allotted labours o'er, Lightly adown the well-worn stairs he passed, And, muffled from the wind, the moonlit squares He paced in meditation o'er and o’er Beneath the may-trees' thorny winter-boughs, Or in and out amid the cloistral gloom Of Library or Bell-tower, to the stars Uplifting his young face, and evermore Dreaming of happy days amid the hills And the dear heart far off for whom he strove ! 4 So laboured Rupert in his lonely rooms, So dreamed, with letters cheered from week to week From her he loved. For Muriel afar ALTADORE . 247 Wandered — in France, in radiant Italy ; And still her letters breathed of earnest love. Then all at once their current seemed to freeze. No longer did his cheek, in reading, flush And his heart leap with gladness. . . “ Here we stayed, And hence to-day we travel. Yesterday We saw the Christ of Guido . . this the tale They tell of how he painted it. . . I danced At such a ball. At Carnival I sat In a window in the Corso and beheld This sight or that. From Naples we shall make For Florence once again ; for Venice next ; Thence journey homeward. We may meet perhaps Next summer in Wicklow ”. . . Such poor chaff he read, And cast her letter down in sudden ire . . “ Is this her love — just this — these faint cold words ? . . A stranger might have written even as much Nor sinned against propriety. O Heaven, Can Time’s brief sun so parch our river of love ? Nay, for my Muriel is gentle and true— 248 ALTADORE. She could not wrong me willingly. Fie, fie, False heart and fickle temper ! Mine the blame, Not hers. . . Nay, I unknowingly have dealt Some wound that rankles — some too bitter word Mayhap escaped me in my weariness. Perchance I seemed, my lot being bitterer, To grudge her those light pleasures of the South Whereof she writes so gaily. Shame upon me If this were so !” He laid aside his books, And wrote wild prayers for pardon if in aught He might have pained her. But with blank neglect He would have pained her less. Her love had strayed Far from him, tempted by a gaudier lure. Friends, parents, and her own too lightsome heart Had chosen a lordlier suitor, and the smiles For which the brave lad pined amid his books Made glad a heart that scarce had need to woo. She read his letter hurriedly one mom At Naples, standing in her balcony That overlooked the Chiaja. Petulant, ALTADORE, 249 She crumpled it away amid her wools. “ Why should he teaze her with reproaches ” — her, Young rose expanding in life’s happy spring ? Why trouble her with such implied rebuke, Her, the world’s darling, whom no lip but praised ? . , “ We were but children when we met that year, And quicker grows the girl to womanhood Than the raw boy to manhood. By-and-by He will forget me, and when grown a man Will find a younger than himself to love — One young enough to reverence him in love. I did not love him with the love that seals The bond of marriage. Foolish I have been To fancy that I loved him. Foolish too — Most foolish — to permit the boy to write His silly letters, and with silly words To flatter his boy-dream !” She would not tell The whole truth now. It was a secret yet, Her coming marriage. Nay, it scarce were kind To undeceive him suddenly. . . “ I will write As friend to friend — but seldomer — and speak Of ordinary matters ” . . let his love 2SP ALTADORE . Cool gradually, as we cool a bottle, Lest, plunged at once in icy chill, it burst ! — So Worldly- Wisdom of her worldly-wise Children is justified ! . . Ah child o’ the world, So ripe already — even to rottenness ! . . Alas for Rupert ! . . Gaily from her heart That day she tossed aside a transient care, Close by her lover in the white-winged boat Gliding toward Capri, languid with the warmth, The light, the loveliness of peak and isle And glittering headland, azure sky and sea, And flattered by the gaze of manly eyes And well-turned phrases of a practised tongue, And proud that she, a novice in love’s sport, Had in the world’s mid forest with slight shaft And one keen wound brought down such kingly game. He read her pitiless answer in the night In his still chamber by his lonely hearth, With eyes aweary with his daylong work, And nerves depressed. The letter from his hand ALTAI) ORE. 2 5 T Fell to the floor. Back in his chair he sank Shivering, and on his forehead the chill dew Clung as the damp on some sepulchral wall, And from his limbs all vigour ebbed away. Then, struggling for self-mastery with strong will, Back to his books he went and read aloud The Attic page, to deafen if he might His mind’s ear to the mournful voice within. But, while the lips mechanically moved, To all that sound the bodily ear was dead, And the heart’s cry alone was audible To mind and body — “ false, false, false, O false ! O Muriel, my Muriel, my lost love ! ” • Then ’gan he his own temper to upbraid, Against his own reproaches wrathfully Contending, forging for her frigid mood Excuses and defences without end, And with a mind preoccupied and vexed, Stared idly at the page and nothing saw. He rose and paced his chamber till the morn Broke through the shutters ; then an hour or two Slept ; then arose with hope renewed, Chasing his doubts, as dawn the dark, aloof ; 252 ALTADORE . Re-read her letter with his love for gloss, By hope’s sweet light each word interpreting, Until he grew contented yet again; And, sitting down, once more all gentleness And trustful love, he wrote, as if no shade Of doubt or pain had crossed him, loyally And void of all reproach,- the old sweet way. She then, with her world-science, hiding well The secret that she feared to break to him, And well disguising with a rosy mask Her dead love’s lightless face, lest he she wronged Should thunder on her peace with words of scorn, And hold too close the mirror to a heart Too cowardly to peer into itself, And he yet trusting her false vows of love, And drawing from her coldest sentences Ever some sweet imaginary warmth, What wonder if the earliest beam of day Still fell upon his opened page, and still The midnight clock struck on his heedless ear, Bent studious by his lamp with one dear aim ? But when the swallows to their summer haunts ALTADORE . 253 Were winging, back too from the luminous South Came Muriel, far lovelier in face And figure — lovelier in everything Save the heart's innocence and guileless truth. Then when he sought to see her all at once She felt herself deserted of her craft And sudden Hate usurped Love's emptied throne. She wrote declaring that she loved not him ; Chid him that from her letters' cold reserve He had not seen her converse, lessening with him Month after month, was but of friend with friend ; Refused all interviews “ until his mood Should change, and he could smile away his dream." But Rupert sat him down and wrote once more, Pleading with her. “ Can love so swiftly change — True love, the first and purest? We, whose hearts Were yet untainted by the world’s deceits, Could not deceive each other. You, whose lips Could utter nought but truth, have whispered to me The sweetest word that ever out of Heaven Man’s spirit may hear. It is no dreain of love, No childish fancy that has changed my life 254 ALTA BORE. From listless reverie and idle play To strenuous activities, and strung My sinews for the stubborn strife with men. Think, Muriel, think on what indeed hath been — Our happy meetings in the fresh green woods, Our wanderings beside the mountain-lakes, Our love-vows breathed above the moonlit sea. Over and over in my lonely hours I murmur your sweet unforgotten words, And gain from them new energy and hope. My life is like a tree beside sweet waters Planted ; from that one source all sustenance It draws ; dry up the stream, and from its roots, Blanched as with lightning to the topmost spray, It withers and will perish. Muriel, Muriel, Let me not, losing my sweet faith in thee, Stumble upon the threshold of the world.” To this no answer came. Perplext in craft, Angered, and conscious of the wrong she dealt, Yet knowing that she could not love him more, And eager for the life of ease and power And breadth and splendour lying at her beck, And petted by the world, she would not brook ALTADORE. 2 55 Remonstrance or reproaches. With flushed cheek She read his poor heart’s murmurings ; then rose And tore his letter with remorseless hands, And trod it under foot. Long mournfully He ’waited her reply, nor yet gave o’er His labour for her sake, but still in hope Strove on. At last one day in crowded street He met her. Resolute her eyes she turned From him y and so passed onward, cold and proud. He, like some poor wight spurned in asking alms, Staggered aside ; then by a window leant, And stood there gazing at he knew, not what, Incapable of thought or motion ; then Feebly along the street with head bent low, Age-stricken in a moment, toward his rooms Crawled, while the porters at the College-gates Gaped at him, and his fellow-students stared,. As tottering he went by and saw them not, — Stared and said laughingly, “ Poor Burgh, he grows ALTA BO RE. 256 Stranger each week. He burns the lamp too late. The sleepless archer baffles his own shaft.” Once more he wrote, and as he wrote the tears Fell fast, as back into his memory The old meetings, and her smiles, and her sweet tones And joyous silvery laughter, and his dreams, And plans and young ambition all for her, As things belonging to a far-off past, In sad pathetic pageant thronged upon him, Hope drifting ever farther hour by hour, And darkness deepening round him. Thus he wrote : “ Since that sweet season when the Wicklow woods First waved above us wandering alone Along the rills by odorous ferny ways, And on my arm thy hand’s dear pressure clung, Day after day, night after night, one hope Has dwelt within me, making my young life Strong with a double manhood. Can you deem That I but covet Honour’s empty wreath. ALTADORE. 257 Or sought the petty triumphs of this place From boyish vanity, content to win And vaunt a paltry honour as the end Of studious effort ? These were but the assays About the mountain’s base before I found A pathway to the summit — in themselves Nothing. What anodyne hath Vanity To quell the recollection of the hope Which you would coldly slay ? O Muriel, For you alone I have toiled — deep in the night Bent by my lamp, and with the earliest beam, In my dull chamber ever with your face (Seen alway when I lifted up mine eyes For rest a little, there a living shape) Made bright as blossoming bowers of Paradise. You seemed to lean above me tenderly And bid me still despair not ; your white palm Rested upon my shoulder, or at times When, very weary, back upon my chair I leaned my head, with gentle wafture cooled My hot and feverish brows; and I would say, Half-dreaming, in your visionary eyes Gazing, “ Thanks, Muriel, messenger of joy,” And seem to take your pure white hand in mine s 258 ALTADORE . And press it to my lips. . . 0 dream of Heaven ! Dear months of toil made light with gleams of love — All, all, all over ! . . O, there have been men Have blasted with wild curses the false souls That have deceived and wronged them. Muriel, Your love has left me with a purer heart Than such as can be swayed to sudden sins By even this agony ; and I have loved you, Love you too well to vex you with one word Of scorn or chiding. Henceforth as you will Live fearless, make your choice of such delights As best you deem may yield your spirit peace And puff the sails of Pleasure. In myself I bury the dear secret of our love, And I will struggle with this terrible doubt That hath struck cold my heart, and left my hand Palsied, and makes the whole world seem to-day A wilderness of loose and shifting sands Wherein companionless and sick and lame I wander, with no pathway for my feet, No beacon and no goal.” He closed the note, And tried to front his friends with tearless eyes. ALTADORE. 2 59 That evening as he sat and dined in Hall, Silent and all-absorbed in painful dreams, His nearest messmate, talkative and kind, Happy and careless, spoke of many things, And passed from mightiest themes beyond his scope To gossip of the hour, wherein his feet Touched solid ground and homely, and at last Whispered a secret he had learned that day, That the rich baronet Sir Grenville Gage, Whom Muriel Vane had met a year ago In London, meeting her some dozen times In Italy, had offered her his hand, And they were to be wedded in a month. And Rupert when he heard the dismal truth, Straining his nerves and struggling with his pain, Diverged into a rambling criticism Of fiction and of song, his cheek a-flame And his eye glassy with a dangerous light ; Till, Commons over, and the Latin grace Mouthed by the Scholar from the pulpit, out Amid the press into the air he moved, Up to his chamber climbed, with trembling hand Unlocked, with hasty swing shut fast, the door, 260 ALTADORE . And down beside his hearth in agony Dropt, powerless to reason or to strive. Next week competing for a College prize, He failed — first failure written on his page Since the first day he wore the student’s gown, — A wonder to the rest who knew his powers, Most to the victor, who with generous voice Declared himself the victor but by chance, And said, “ I could not have defeated Burgh If Burgh were Burgh, and not a broken reed — Look at him ! ” — And in sooth to all he seemed Shattered and spent. They said, “ He worked too hard, Up late and rising early. Yet he seems Robust beyond his fellows, light of foot I ? the race, deft oarsman, hardy mountaineer — Some hidden delicacy preys on him And saps his strength.” But he, unhappy, moved Among them listless; moped beneath the trees O’ the Park until the peremptory bell PvOused him and porters warned him from the gates ; ALTADORE. 261 Moped in his rooms, long staring at his books, Incapable of study ; walked the streets In vacant mood ; with hurrying footsteps passed Beyond the city-bounds, returning late Dinnerless to his chambers, there to seek Once more to wrap himself away from thoughts That racked him in the thoughts of other minds — All vainly. Heart-sick, lonely, paralyzed In hand and will, deprived of the one aim And source and spring of action, far adrift, A rudderless life, he swept through shoreless seas. But on the wedding-morn he strayed away To the near city-church, drawn to its doors He knew not why — perhaps he longed once more To gaze upon the features he had loved ; Wished too, in some vague way, to put to proof His loyal resolution to resign All he had loved to him whom she had chosen, Disdaining his poor self ; to ratify By his own presence for his conscience 5 ease The bond that broke his own right noble heart. But that she might not know a moment’s pain 262 ALTADORE. In seeing him, up to the gallery He passed, and, gliding in among the crowd Of friends and idle gossips, sate him down In a dim corner whence he might behold In secrecy her eyes and hear her voice, And bear unseen his silent lonely woe. Close by the altar-railing, tall and fair, With frank blue eyes that ever and anon Turned toward the doors seeking the veiled face For which all waited, graceful, proud and calm The victor-lover stood — so noble-seeming He could not choose but love him. Inwardly He gave God thanks, and blest him in his heart. Then all at once all faces one way bent, And, leaning on her kinsman, Muriel Passed up the aisle. Back came the old wild love Throbbing within him, and awhile he rose And with involuntary worship stretched His arms out toward her ; then with resolute will Conquered himself, and, rigid, stern, and cold, His shoulder pressed against the gallery-wall, He waited till her clear sweet murmur rose Repeating the dread vow before God’s throne ALTADORE. 263 Wherein she yielded up to him she loved Her will, her life, her love, beyond recall For ever. At those words, by Rupert's ear Never before from gentle woman’s lip Heard whispered, now by Muriel’s not for him , A faintness came upon him, and he sank Back shivering to the seat from which he had risen ; Till, the loud organ pealing in glad tones The jubilant wedding-march and all the crowd Moving with that light music, roused, once more To his blank world and desolate he was borne, And down the gallery-stairs with feeble steps Last of the throng he went, and from the doors Passed to the street unnoticed. There he stood, Not knowing whither he should bend his steps, All purpose lost, all pleasure in the world Dead, no desire to work or live, no aim, No trust in any friend, his faith in Heaven Confused and darkened. Lifting up his face, Far off beyond the tree-tops’ budding green, At end o’ the long red street, the dark blue hills Greeted his wandering gaze, their level rims 264 ALTADORE. Folded in mist and cloud. They seemed to him More friendly than the faces of his friends, Those mates of his bright childhood. Scarce aware Which way he wended, toward their feet he moved. Onward he walked, beyond the City’s verge, Beyond the river winding from the hills, Through distant villages, by park and lane, On to the mountain moors. The gathering mists Broke in thick rain about him as he strained Against the strong south-wester o’er the wastes Of Cruagh whistling from Seefingan’s heaths And black Kippure. At midday wet and cold He rested, crouching ’mid the rocks and ferns Beside the Lough all foamy with the storm, And knew not why he rested ; weariness He dreamed not of nor felt ; but the great Crag And the brown tempest-beaten waters lent Some quiet to his spirit. Then the rain Adown the waste more pitilessly drove, Yet stayed him not. Up the grey winding road Channelled and torn, and flooded like a stream, He pushed his way. A longing in his heart To roam once more beside the wooded shores ALTADORE. 265 Of Luggala where he had told his love And kissed the bright pure lips — dead, dead to him For ever — sprang at sight of the veiled heights And gave a purpose to his onward march. Against the tempest leaning, forward still He fared, among the brown deep gullies rent By rain and rivulet in the mountain peat, Among the rank morasses and swol’n swamps And stormy ridges clad with their blown heath And undulating bracken. Now a hare, Starting beside him, lifted her lithe ears And, springing through the marsh with bound on bound, Splashed the white water spray-like from her heels, And vanished. Now the sudden lapwing rose And swerved upon the wind with desolate cry ; Now, frighted at his footsteps, the wet sheep Fled through the rushes, or in rapid flight The fluttered grouse out of their cover whirred. But on, with eyes that saw not anything Save the mind’s visions, through the gale he sped, Turned at the Gap, scarce hearing as he moved The stormy voices of loud Anamoe 266 ALTA DO RE. And all its tributary torrents roar Beside him, reached the woods o’er Luggala, And plunged amid their branches, seeking there The little hollow ’twixt the mossed grey rocks Pine-sheltered, where her broken vows were breathed. And now as by the shores of the dark Lake He wandered, on the winds he seemed to hear A voice that called him ever by his name, “ Rupert, O Rupert,” and a phantom shape Leaned on his arm, and upward in his face Beamed the dark eyes of Muriel, and the voice Still murmured, “ Wherefore have you wronged me, Rupert ? I never have been false.” In rapturous love He bent his head and kissed the Phantom’s lips ; And the face faded; and the mist and rain Drave through the woods. But still he heard the voice Wandering now here, now there, so sweet, so sad, The voice of Muriel whispering his name. Then right before him, in a glorious sun, Behold, beneath the branches of the pines Sat Muriel, and beside her on the sward, ALTADORE. 267 Clasping her palm, that Lover, and she raised His hand and kissed it, and the dimple played In her soft cheek, and merrily she laughed . . And Rupert lifted up his arms and cried, “ O God, have mercy ! ” And the vision passed ; And other voices seemed amid the storm To call to him, and other faces leaned Out of the laurels ; and he felt his mind Masterless, and he saw not where he moved. Then in his feebleness he turned his face, With the bird’s instinct, homeward, climbing slow The heathery steep, not knowing to what bourn He wandered, voices ever in his ears Ringing, and phantoms fleeting from his grasp. . . . . At night his father in his lonely home Was sitting idly by a dying fire, And listening to the wind and rain without, O’er-saddened by their melancholy sound, And thinking, “ Well, the summer grows apace, And soon my boy will visit me again, And cheer me with his talk of men and books, And tell me of his triumphs and his hopes 268 ALTADORE. Of loftier successes.” All at once He started, — such loud knocking at the door Smote on his nerves. “ Who is J t that knocks so late? Some stranger, or some neighbour seeking help In sudden need, — sickness or accident To wife or child or parent? No, belike Some drunkard late returning from the fair, And eager for a brawl. Whoe’er it be, Best go myself and open.” — Thus he mused, And to the door he went, withdrew the chain. “ Well, who stands knocking there so late i’ the night ? ” “ Open, for God’s sake ! ” cried a wild sad voice. He opened half in anger. “ Sir, your business ? ” . . In tottered his own son haggard and faint, His hair, his face adrip with the cold rain, His scanty raiment to his thin lithe form Clinging — so drenched with the long pitiless showers, And spattered with the soilure of the roads And mountain-moors through which his long day’s march ALTADORE. 269 Had led him reckless. As he staggered in, He lifted up his face, red with the flush Of fever, and his large and lustrous eyes Shone ghastly in the candle's flickering light. There to the floor he sank, and hid his face Beside his father’s feet, and cried aloud A weird delirious cry ; then piteously He fell a-sobbing like a desolate child. “ Nay, Rupert, nay ; if thou wouldst frighten me, It is well-acted, lad,” his father laughed ; “ But up, now, lest the serious element Extinguish the mad merriment of the play. Those dripping clothes will prove but suits of woe If not soon changed for drier, and those boots Turn tragic buskins if you wear them long ! . . Heavens ! he must have swum here ! . . Ha, ha ! . . Rupert, Up, my brave lad, and change, and eat and drink ! I am right glad to see thee, though thou comest In such a watery shape ! Enough, enough ! ” Then the boy brake from sobs to laughter too — “ Ah ! ha, ha, ha ! . . My father ! . . Lift me up, 270 ALTADORE. O, lift me up, and I will tell thee all, Will tell thee all.” His father lifted him, Looked in his face, beheld the fatal light O’er cheek and eye, and trembled. “ O my God,” He cried, “ What evil have I done that Thou Shouldst visit me with this sorrow? . . My poor boy ! . . Come, come, change all, and get thee quick to bed. Thou shouldst not thus have left me ignorant Of the dire malady lurking at thy gates.” That night with tremulous hands they laid him down In burning fever in his well-loved room Where the red roses round the casement peered, And swallows built their nests beneath the eaves. His father shuddered when he saw his frame How wasted and how thin it was, and thought “ Will there be strength within to outlast the siege Of this dread sickness ? ” The poor lad had toiled Too eagerly — too careless of his sleep, ALTADORE. 271 His meat, his drink, his exercise. His brain Was overtaxed, perhaps, in the wild strife Of intellect with intellect. His pain, His conflict with himself, the stern restraint Of the dear love that like an earthquake rocked His being while he strove to master it, That morning’s bitterest agony, and his walk (The fever, working secretly within, Impelling him thus blindly) all day long In rain and tempest, by the streaming roads, Wet moors and dripping woodlands, in mute care And pent-up sorrow, — these confederate ills, Against his body’s wasted powers arrayed, Had struck and overwhelmed them. Morning’s light Stole through the shutters o’er that weary frame Tossing in throes of fever — the poor brain Wandering, the burning face from side to side Turning upon the pillow, the hot lips Moving in broken and fantastic talk O’ the mountains and his books ; his father, bent Above him, moistening the dry parched mouth, Bathing the aching forehead. ALTAI) ORE. 272 Later came The keen physician, hurrying from the Town, Stared at the thin frail body, shook his head Mournfully, ill-disguising his own doubt And sorrow. “ If his strength endures,” he said, “ All may be well ; and there is ample hope — Rupert has led so pure a life — no taint In nature to contend with. But alas ! He has worked unwisely — poor lad, for the best Doubtless, but with such strain and self-neglect That Art can lend hurt Nature little help. All hangs upon his strength, and he is young, And youth has stores of strength we scarce can gauge ” So lay he many days. His foster-nurse, Leaving her household cares and humble hearth, Came from her mountain-home to tend him. Friends From all sides sent, with gentle messages For child and father, all that they might yield Of help, and gifts to soothe the sufferer’s pain, All delicate and dainty offerings To cheer or strengthen. From the hills and farms ALTA BORE. 273 The gentle-hearted peasants, who had known And loved him as a boy, and in his woe The father pitied, came with sympathy And proffered aid of the rough kindly hand. And College-mates down from the City rode, To bear back tidings of the laurelled brows So lowly laid, to eager questioners In Hall or chamber — friends and rivals, all Grieving that one so brilliant, generous, true, Should stumble in the midmost of the race And let the unworthier win. But none divined The cause of his great ill — none save the Nurse, Who read his secret with a mother’s eye. She, night and day beside him watching, heard One name so often murmured by his lips, She could not choose but learn. “ Ay, ay,” she thought, “ Miss Muriel, now my Lady Gage, they say, Squire Verney’s pretty little brown-eyed niece I used to see with Master Rupert here Of old. Yes, pretty, sure, she was, and sweet, Merry, and friendly with us, rich or poor — Ay, but I took not to her. Such bright things T 274 ALTADORE . That never seem to know a moment’s grief Have cold and little hearts. May God forgive her ! She shook her wise old head, and held her peace. At last the fever, like a stormy tide Receding from the torn and altered shore, Left him; and calm and tranquil on his couch Lay the poor wasted sufferer weak and pale, So feeble that his father, bitterly Weeping and bending down his ear to hear, Scarce caught the words his lips assayed to breathe ; But thus he seemed to whisper : “ O my father, Mourn not for me, for I am happier now Than ever since the dear old childish days When we were all to one another, I A child, and thou so gentle, wise and kind, Surrendering manhood’s high prerogatives To make thyself companion to a child For the child’s joy and welfare. O, forgive me That I so long have lingered from thy side ! There was none true as thou wert. Nay, but weep not, ALTADORE . 275 For I indeed am happy, with no pain Of body and no spiritual fear.” Next evening, after a long weary watch, The father, yielding to his heaviness, Had slept. The Nurse's voice beside his ear Woke him, “Come quickly!” To the room they passed. The fair young face white on the pillow lay Motionless as in slumber. There they hung Intent and breathless. In a little while - The blue eyes, opening, on the Nurse's face Dwelt for a moment, then with yearning love Rested upon the father's. The wan lips Moved, and the fringed eyelids drooped again, And the tired spirit sighed itself away. . . In the bright light of a May morn, the birds Singing above them in the budding boughs. In the old churchyard girdled with its limes They laid him down to rest, from near and far Assembling, friends and kinsmen, peasant-folk From many a hillside farm, and from the Town His class-mates. And upon his father's face 2j6 ALTADORE. Blanched with long watching, desolate and sad, There bent in stupor o’er the open grave, All eyes in reverence and compassion gazed. Leaning upon a mourner’s arm he stood, And tottering they led him to the gate. Seldom he spake thereafter. By the fire He sat in silence ; or with sudden start He would arouse himself ; then droop again, Piteously moaning, “ O my boy, my boy !” Or to his little garden he would go, And take his tools, and set himself to dig ; But with his foot upon the spade would stand, Stare idly at the earth, nor turn one clod. But ere the daffodils about his porch Thrice flashed to blossom in the winds of spring, Another corpse was o’er the threshold borne, Once more around the grave where Rupert slept The mourners stood, and when it closed again The father’s ashes rested with his son’s. THE WANDERER. i. S WEET flower of Clara, rose of Avonmore, Dear nursling of the mountains, whose fair face Left happier all who gazed upon its grace And lovelier this Vale, why by the shore Of death and danger wouldst thou wander, why Thy home for some imagined joy forsake, For what the dread recoil of Sin defy, The bonds of holier loves inconstant break ? Return, return to Clara’s Vale of rest As to a saviour’s breast. 2 . Are not the fields about thy father’s cot Fresh to the eyes and cool about the feet ? The wild-rose and the honeysuckles sweet Peep from the hedges, and the daisies dot 278 THE WANDERER. The clover-purpled pastures of the Vale. Are not the glens with birks and rowans drest, And ferns in every cool and leafy dale Fragrant and green, and all things fair and blest ? Home, home thou poor lorn child, nor farther stray Down the world’s perilous way. 3 - A little thou hast erred, but O ! kind hearts To bid thee welcome wait and weep at home. Why shouldst thou choose in alien tracts to roam, And make thy breast a mark for Danger’s darts ? Home, and once more thy mother’s neck entwine, And on her bosom weep away thy woe ; Turn thee, and take thy father’s hand in thine, And lay thy palms upon his locks of snow ; And feel the love of guileless souls, and be Childlike and pure and free. 4 * The little children playing nigh the door Will cling to thee and tender lips upraise To crave thy kisses ; on the dewy braes The lambs will be thy yeanlings as of yore ; THE WANDERER. 279 The little calves will learn to know thy voice, And the weaned kids will butt at thee for play ; All gentle things will love thee and rejoice, And soothe thy care and pain and shame away. No more, poor child, amid the darkness roam; Turn, turn thee to thy home. THE BURSTING OF LOUGH NAHANAGAN. i. O , THE race and the rescue that day in the Vale I can never forget ! . . To stand in the stirrups and ride, neck and neck, as men cheer the spent steed, Or to run in the meadow-levels a-foot for a prize or a bet, Human lungs against lungs and muscle with muscle and speed against speed, Is madness enough, Heaven knows, in the vehe- ment stress and the strain ; But to run in a race with the waters of Nature let loose from their bound, With the floods of the mountain down-whirling in thunder and foam to the plain, In a race with the forces you know not, whose measure no mortal hath found, LOUGH NA LIANA G AN. 281 Whose strength is the strength of the earth and the heavens, — the pitiless foes That are tame to the hand of weak man for a moment, and then at a breath Will arise in the storm or the earthquake and leap from their placid repose And shatter the works of his hands and con- found him in ruin and death, — O, this is a strife you ’re overmatched in, a fever of heart and of brain, A torment of spirit, an agony fierce as the tortures of Hell. And this was the race that I ran in the Valley, and ran not in vain, When the waters of dark Lough Nahanagan broke over moorland and dell. As I toiled up the Valley my spirit was callous and cold was my heart, For Winnie, my girl with the brown Wicklow eyes and the wavy dark hair, I had loved O ! so long and so truly, my Winnie had thrust a keen dart 282 THE BURSTING OF In my breast with her pretty caprices, and I — as all men in love’s snare Are but fools — I had spoken my doubts of her faith and her honour that day, And had bid her farewell with wild words in a whirlwind of anger and spleen, And out in a sullen contempt to the mountains had wandered away, With nor fear of the blight that would fall nor regret for the bliss that had been. 3 - Low down by the mouth of the Valley, low down ’mid the meadows that lie So smooth by the side of the river that brightens the grey Glendassaun, Within touch of the musical waters that wander in melody by, O’ertasselled with fuchsias her dwelling rose green in its girdle of lawn. 4 - As upward I passed from her portal, alone in the light of the sun — LOUGH NAHANAGAN 283 (The rains had been heavy that week, and the rillets were loud in their play) — I said, “ I will blot out her image ; to-day is a new life begun ; I will crush from my heart the old love, and go forth in the world and be gay. Farewell to the bonny brown eyes and the cheeks that are pink as the rose That she culls in her garden of roses to set in her breast or her hair ; Farewell to the coy false lips; and, O, welcome the spirit’s repose ! If I lose the sweet rapture of love I shall lose too its pain and despair.” And I strode up the moor, with a glance now and then at the heather-clad hills, Now and then at the wheels of the mines as they clattered aloft in the air . . For the mountains were gashed by the miners, the moorlands were cloven with drills For their runnels of water, the coverts of heather were peeled and left bare ; And up to the Lough’s side itself they had gone with their picks and their spades, 284 THE BURSTING OF And poked in its banks where the streamlet ran out in its musical mirth, Till they left them as thin as a creel, as they hacked at the heathery glades For the glittering ore that lay buried beneath in the bowels of earth. 5 - Then back went my thought to the love that was dead. . . Hark ! . . a roar as of thunder Broke over the hills ! . . I looked up toward the Lake, and — great God ! — like a sea The waters rolled out from the side of the mountain cleft deep and asunder. White-crested like billows that sweep to the shore when the tempest blows free ! . . 6 . Not a second I paused. Like an arrow shot straight at the twang of the bow Down, down through the moorland I ran right ahead of the voluble flood. In a race with the deluge of waters that swept toward the Valley below, LOUGH NAHANAGAN. 285 With one thought in my brain, and one fear, and one hope, making fire of my blood. 7 - I had seen at a flash what had happened, — foreseen all the woes it might wreak. “ Fools ! Madmen ! ” I cried, as I sped, “ They had left the Lake’s barrier so frail It could bear not the weight of the waters so swoln with the rains of a week ; And the people that dwell in the meadows be- neath . . O great God ! . . in the Vale, The old men and women and children may die in their confident rest . f And she . . O my loved-one ! . . her cottage lies low by the brink of the stream ! ” . . All my anger, my scorn and my jealousy dwindled to nought in my breast, All the dastardly doubts that had harassed me drifted away like a dream. . . 8 . How strange is the being of man ! As the shadows of dreams are our minds ; 286 THE BURSTING OF There are moments, I think, when we live not at all, or the things that appear And are not with their influence change us to phantoms as fleet as the winds, And the Self that we claimed as our Self we can find not afar or anear. We are made by the Thought that strikes deepest and clings with most might to the brain ; That rules us and sways us in passion and whirls us about at its whim ; And now \ is a foretaste of Heaven, and now ? t is a nightmare of pain. But we — what are we and our lives but a rainbow dissolving and dim ? I believed that I loved her no more, that her nature was fickle and cold, That ? t was /, my true Self, that had cast her away as a flower that is spent, That my will in its clench was as firm as my tongue in its vaunting was bold, Yea, that now though she bowed her in tears at my feet I should never relent . . When suddenly dawned on the eyes of my spirit that vision of death, LOUGH NAHANAGAN. 287 And the love in my bosom revived with a might I had known not of yore, And her heart seemed as clear as the cups of the lilies that sway in the breath Of the pure sweet wind of the dawn blowing down from the mountain shore. . . 9 - Far in front of the crest of the white foaming billow of waters I stood When it reared from the side of the mountain and writhed like a huge white snake, Hissing loud through the moorland and rending the earth in a ruinous flood ; And it seemed that a living spirit of Hell had got into the Lake And set out on his devilish errand; with that did I seem to contend As I strove on before the dread torrent that ever strove, gaining on me. On, on o’er the moorland I bounded with strength that love only could lend, Light-footed and scared as a stag when he turns from the hunters to flee, 288 THE BURSTING OF On swift by the sweep of the road as it curves to the deep Glendassaun, With a brief wild warning word to each wayfarer tossed as I passed, And a cry to the folk in the valley below me as. breathless I ran, — “ Speed, speed up the hillside, all care but for life from your bosoms be cast, For the Lake has burst out from its banks, and a deluge is loosed on the Vale ! ” And I mused with myself as I ran : “ There is hope if I keep but ahead Of the flood till I Ve passed the rough steep where the rivulet springs to the dale ; ” And I brought all the craft of an athlete to help me as faster I sped. io. I was well past the gap of the Glen, and her cottage was full in my sight Beneath in its islet of meadow beside the gold pools of the stream, When I turned, and there, flashing, stupendous, the cataract over the height LOUGH NAHANAGAN. 289 Heaved, leaping in clouds of thick spray with a horrible echoing scream . . And headlong I plunged down the slopes . . Which shall reach her the first, it or I ? . . I cursed the vast flood with its cruel white tongues as it writhed on its way, And it grew to my brain in my fever half man and half fiend, to defy, To wrestle with, fight with, a life, and a foe, to be clutched and to slay ; And it ran as I ran toward the pools by her portal still tranquil and clear. . . “ Ha ! Back, thing of Hell ! ” in my madness I shouted, nigh fainting for breath, As the throbs of my heart and each pulse like a mill-wheel drummed in mine ear, And the air all around me grew black with the wings of the phantom of Death. 11. “ God’s curse be upon you ! ” I gasped, and the tongues of its torrents, thrust wide, Licked out toward the hedge of her garden, and deep in the foam from the bank u 290 LOUGH NAHA NAG AN. I sprang, and, whirled on by the current, half- blinded, nigh drowned in the tide, Clasped close in mine arms mine own love as she stretched out her hands ere she sank ; And, as if in a nightmare, still buffeting, swept from each rock where I stood, Borne round by the eddy of waters, all hand- grip and foothold denied, At last to an islet I struggled, and mocked at the hurrying flood, And climbed, and laid down the dear burthen, and sank in a swoon at her side. AUTUMN MEMORIES. i. W HEN russet beech-leaves drift in air, And withering bracken gilds the ling, And red haws brighten hedgerows bare, And only plaintive robins sing, When autumn whirlwinds curl the sea, And mountain-tops are cold with haze, Then saddest thoughts revisit me, — I sit and dream of the olden days. 2 . When chestnut-leaves lie yellow on ground, And brown nuts break the prickled husk, And nests on naked boughs are found, And swallows shrill no more at dusk, And folks are glad in house to be, And up the flue the faggots blaze, Then climb my little boys my knee To hear me tell of the olden days. THE WRAITH OF DE RIDDLES- FORD’S CASTLE. A RUINED Tower with ivies green That stands the summer woods between, So like the leafy woods in hue It scarcely seems a tower of stone Save when, as winds around it moan, The branches shiver through and through And nought save it is left unstirred — The Castle of De Riddlesford Beside its lakelet black and still, Beneath the purple peaked hill Of Little Giltspear, guards the vale Wherethrough the grassy bridle-ways Ran winding from the Norman Pale By forests dim, in the olden days, Till, dwindling down from less to less, They vanished in the wilderness. DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE . 293 No lovelier spot in all the Isle Than that wherein the Donjon stands ; And from the turrets of the pile, If one might climb with daring hands, As fair a realm would greet the eyes As ever basked in Summer’s smile ; For, curving round in varied skies, South, west and north the mountains rise, From the near Headland’s rocky height To bluff Ben Edar’s beacon white, — The purple peaks, the domes of blue, Brown moors and heathy solitudes, Kippure’s grey crags and dark Glendhu, And Powerscourt’s undulating woods, And Dargle’s bowery oaken glade, And then the green umbrageous plain, Now half in sunshine half in shade, Now veiled with streaks of summer rain ; While eastward, where the woodland ends, The sea in liquid light extends, Or shimmers in the evening beam Beneath the pendent rainbow’s gleam. But, fair as is the scene by day 294 THE WRAITH OF And mute as is that ivied Tower, Beneath its shadow at midnight hour There are who never dare to stray ; For sometimes on the turret’s height, Lone in the dull and moonless night, A Woman clothed in ghostly white Is seen her pallid arms to raise As if in agony she prays To God for help in deadly plight, Or prays that some great ill may light On one who hath done her nameless wrong ; And sometimes from the rampart strong A Hand will beckon wearily, Or sudden in the wanderer’s eye Will beckon from the ivied door, While, issuing from the grass-grown floor, A moan as of a soul in pain Swells on the wind and dies again. I. D E RIDDLESFORD the Norman Knight Came o’er the sea with Strongbow’s band, And by his sword in many a fight DE RIDDLESFORDS CASTLE. 295 And deeds of highest chivalry He won that lovely length of land Between the mountains and the sea, There built his feudal towers, and there Enjoyed his day of power and pride, O’erawed his foes, kept watch and ward ; And on the morning that he died The dark-eyed Baron Ralph, his heir, Became the Castle's haughtier lord. A stern and loveless man was he As e’er wore helm or lifted lance ; His vassals trembled at his glance, And never word of sympathy He spake or made one burthen light ; And round his motions mystery Clung like the darkness of the night. But ere his father among the dead A year had slept, one summer’s day Home to his Hall in bright array — Men thought with livelier mien — he led His bride, the Lady Winnifred, The heiress of a Chieftain old 296 THE WRAITH OF Whose lands were wide, whose touch was gold ; And it was whispered that the Knight Had won her by unworthy art, Forced her by threats her troth to plight, And torn her from her father’s heart ; That for her wealth alone he strove Nor cared one leaflet for her love. Yet, when an heir to him she bore His stern eye softened day by day ; He seemed to love her more and more ; And, sitting by his trustful wife, And gladdening with his child at play, The cloud that clung about his life Appeared to lift and melt away. Still saw she oft with sudden pain Across his brow and seamed cheek The gathering darkness fall again, And feared to gaze at him or speak Lest back might come his colder mood ; And, for her gentle infant’s good, She prayed for his weal on bended knee, And bore her sorrow silently. DE RIDDLE SF ORE'S CASTLE. 297 Fair grew the boy; his golden curls Fell to his shoulders like a girl's ; Dark with the shade long lashes threw, His eyes were of aerial blue ; His dimpled cheek the sea-pink's hue. Yet strongly knit was Hugo's frame, And hard his spirit to bend or tame. He seemed no fear to know of man Or living thing ; but when at times They sang him old and ghostly rhymes His eye would glaze, his cheek grow wan, His little limbs would tremble o’er, And with claspt hands he would implore That none would sing to him or tell Of days remote or men of yore Or dreams of things invisible. II. I T was the dusk of an autumn even, Thick darkness falling over heaven. The Baron with little Hugo, late, From walking in the orchard-ground, Came to the Castle's postern-gate 298 THE WRAITH OF And stood a moment gazing round Upon the woodlands huge and dim, When all at once the bloodhound grim That leashed he led with sudden bound Gave warning from his chained throat And struggled toward the empty Moat. u Down, Thorbrand, down !” his master cried, And, leaning o’er the Moat, he spied A Woman old and cloaked and bent That slow along the bottom went, And seemed to gather sticks or weeds Unheeding, on her toil intent. “ Ho ! ” cried the Baron, “ and who art thou ? What wouldst thou, prowling there below ? What is thy aim and what thy needs ? ” Her muffled form the woman swayed To and fro, nor answer made. Then on the wall her hands she laid, As if for foothold there she felt, Then down i’ the darkness slipt and knelt ; And, with face hidden still, and head Bent o’er her toil, she muttering said : “ I am a poor and helpless wight ; DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE. Small is my sin if here I ’m led To gather for the wintry night A few dry sticks and withered cones To warm my old and aching bones, A few dry leaves to make my bed.” “ Hence, hag ! ” he cried, “ My hests obey, Nor dare to bandy words with me.” She raised her head up wearily. Her face was withered, her locks were grey. Wizened and wrinkled, stoopt and small, She stood against the slimy wall ; She lifted an arm lean, shrunk and sear, And “ ha, ha, ha, ha ! ” with hideous leer She laughed aloud — “ O Baron brave, Give but a crust my life to save ! ” A shudder through the Baron’s frame Ran as that face before him came So suddenly. The hideous cry Rang to the Warder’s beat on high. The Baron seized young Hugo’s arm, And, smit with sudden and strange alarm, 3 °° THE WRAITH OF He pushed him toward the postern — “ Fly, Fly, Hugo — to thy mother, fast, In from the cold autumnal blast ! ” He grasped the rigid drawbridge chain, And bent above the Moat again. High on the ramparts overhead The Warder ceased his rounds to tread, And, listening with attentive ear, These words of his Master seemed to hear “I tell thee, woman, the day is gone When thou couldst hope to tame my will With tears or laughter, sigh or moan ; Nor hast thou power my heart to chill With witch’s charm or threats of ill. Hence, or I swear by God’s pure light No roof shall cover thy limbs to-night, Thy bones shall lie in the leafless wood, And dogs shall lap thy scanty blood.” Then she cried a cry so weird with woe, Now loud and keen, now sad and low, That, startled from their dark repose, DE RIDDLESFORjyS CASTLE. 301 The ravens from the tree-tops rose, And cawing wheeled in creaky flight, And hovered in a dusky shower, Drifting in the gloom of night O’er battlement and tower. Then three times toward the Castle’s wall, As to and fro her frame she swayed, She waved her withered hands, And, kneeling, raised her eyes, and prayed That on its people a curse might fall And on its goodly lands ; Then rose and o’er her thin locks drew Her tattered hood, and in the dew And darkness, swift and noiselessly Amid the leaves and nettles tall Ran like a rat along the wall, And vanished from his eye. Thick drave the leaves before the blast As through his gates the Baron passed ; He strode across the courtyard wide, And then began his fears to chide, And chafe at his disgrace, 3 02 THE WRAITH OF And anger flushed his pallid face. He stamped his heel upon the flags — “ What ! shall the withered beldam live To flout me at my Castle-gates, And shall I fear that thing of rags, — A witch that should in torment burn ? No, to the bloodhound’s fangs I ’ll give Her evil heart with all its hates And devil’s malice. Thorbrand, turn ! ” Back to the gate once more he sped, The bloodhound at his length of chain Struggling to fly with tightening strain. But ere he reached the postern-shed Down from his grip the leash was dashed, Out from the dark two pale Hands flashed, And on the pulses of his breast He felt their palms resistless pressed, And, staggering backward, o’er his sight A sudden blindness swept. It passed, and round him in affright He gazed. The furious hound had crept Close to his heels, and cowering hung With trembling limbs and lolling tongue. DE RIDDLESFORHS CASTLE. 303 The chain along the flags lay flung, And still as death the Courtyard slept. . . When back into his Hall he strode That night the bravest vassal there Dared not to meet the ghostly glare That in his eyeballs glowed. His Lady spared for fear to ask The cause of that despair He failed by oath or frown to mask. With lowering knee and bended head, Scared by his face, the menial shrank. He called for food in angry haste, But meat or bread he did not taste ; He called for the wine of Bordeaux red, And deep of the jewelled goblet drank. He said, “ My strength is faint to-night ; I would not long be left alone. My heart within is cold as stone. ” And ere he laid him down to sleep He said, “ In our chamber let not the light Be quenched till the last dark hour is gone And dawn is on the deep.” 3 ° 4 THE WRAITH OF III. I N the midnight silence dread, While all within the Castle slept, The Baron a lonely vigil kept, Tossing in his sleepless bed. His Lady murmured many a prayer To Jesu and His Mother mild To lighten her Lord of the hidden care That of its peace his heart beguiled. But just as with its grateful spell Gentle slumber downward stealing Softly o’er his senses fell, A scream of fear and agony, Round the vaulted chambers pealing, From end to end of the Castle rang, And trembling and with frenzied eye The Baron from his stupor sprang — “ That voice, that voice, that piercing cry It comes from the chamber of our child. I know the clamour eery and wild — The Death-Wail of De Riddlesford ! ” His trembling limbs he clad in haste, DE RIDDLESFORD'S CASTLE . 305 He girt his scabbard about his waist, And with his left hand seized a lamp And with his right his sword. He heard without the Warder’s tramp And the hiss and clash of the driving shower, As the flooding rain from the gargoyles spilled And the wind in the lattices moaned and shrilled ; The doors upon their hinges swung, And the Castle-bell with iron tongue, Swaying aloft in the stormy Tower, Tolled without the midnight hour As through the Castle’s murk and gloom He sped to Hugo’s lonely room ; And his vassals hurrying to and fro, Roused from slumber and pale with woe, As he reached the threshold dim Shrank back and cowered in awe of him. O sorrow to a parent’s heart ! Why did the armed Warrior start And mutely gaze and tremble sore As wide he flung the carven door ? There on the floor of the chamber dark x 306 THE WRAITH OF His bosom’s darling lay ; His little feet were bare and stark, His limbs were cold as clay, And in the cresset’s flame his face Amid the shadows of the place With deadly pallor gleamed — A sight to make the sternest weep ; Like one who had lain him down to sleep And died in sleep he seemed. His Mother called him by his name And kissed his brow and chafed each hand. A faintness o’er the Father came, A feebleness of nerve and will. He leaned in silence on his brand A moment, passionless and still ; Then bad no menial there should stand Save Hugo’s Foster-Mother dear That nursed him from his natal year. On the still breast his palm he laid ; “ He lives ! ’T is but a swoon,” he said. Then, straining all the art they knew, His spirit from its trance they drew, DE RIDDLESFORHS CASTLE. 307 And gently raised the languid head, And laid their darling on his bed. Opening wide his large blue eyes, The boy looked round in dull surprise — “ My Father and my Mother here ? Then was there nought that I should fear, And I but dreamed,” he said. — “ My child,” The Father cried, “ What fancy wild Disturbed thy slumber, why that scream Of terror, and what hellish dream Out on the floor with stagnant breath Hurled thee in swoon like one in death ? ” A shade of anguish crossed his face As back in thought he tried to trace The vision and the pain. “ My Father and my Mother dear, Sit by me still. I fear, I fear To be alone again. “ I woke amid the darkness drear, And at my lattice the wind was wailing, When, breaking through the storm and rain 3°8 THE WRAITH OF From the torn rack in the tempest sailing, A moonbeam round the chamber strayed And in the distant gloom displayed The face of a Woman who sat and wept Beside the hearth ; and then away Along the chamber-wall it crept And faded, and I lay In awe, and neither spake nor stirred. Then suddenly through the room I heard A footstep near and nearer creeping And the sound of some one weeping, And over my pillow that Face so dead Leaned, and two white Hands were spread As if my body to enfold ; On the finger of one was a ring of gold, And the arm and wrist were streaked with red And, as the Phantom nearer pressed, I saw — O horror ! — on her breast A crimson wound, and gouts of blood Trickled o'er her snowy hood." . . The Father, listening eagerly, With ear alert and steadfast eye, The tale in silence heard, DE RIDDLE SPORE'S CASTLE. 309 But when was breathed the latest word, “ On her breast was a wound with gouts of blood/’ He started, clutching at his sword. Aghast above his child he stood, And cried, “ I tell thee, boy, thou liest. There was no wound, no blood, no blood. Unsay it, or by the Cross I swear That God’s own Son upon it bare, By thy father’s sword thou diest.” The boy sank back in mute alarm, Shuddering at the sight, And covered with his nerveless palm His young sweet face so sad and white ; The Mother stayed the lifted arm, And clasping with one hand the sword, She strove with tears and prayers to calm The madness of her lord ; The faithful Nurse he loved so well Across her nursling’s bosom fell, And for his life implored. Swiftly the Baron’s passion passed, His arms about his child he cast And wept upon his neck — 3 IQ THE WRAITH 01 “ Forgive me, Hugo, gentle child ; My heart is sick, my brain is wild With cares thou couldst not reck. Rest, and forget the Vision drear, Forget thy father's brow severe; Once more in tranquil safety lie, And list thy Mother's lullaby." . . Then in the dawn-light pale and cold The Foster-Mother trembling told How once, ere summers four had shed Their duskier gold on Hugo's head, In the Castle at close of day He had strayed from her at play. Out from his chamber-door he sprang, And loud his merry laughter rang, When, as she lightly turned away, She heard him scream, and forward ran And claspt him cold and shuddering. Close did the child about her cling, Shrieking, “ Save me from its ban ! A Hand as of a spectre wan I saw across the darkness flit, And it waved to me to follow it ; DE RIDDLESFORDS CASTLE. 31 1 And on its finger seemed to cling The circlet of a golden ring ; But there was no one anywhere, Only the fair white Hand in air. What is it ? ” he cried, “ What doth it mean ? O, hide me from it, Evaleen ! ” And she had striven long in vain To lift his spirit bowed with pain And dazed with terror ; but she thought It boded evil to his kin, And some impending judgment taught For some concealed sin. The Baron leaning from his chair Had fixed his eyes with angry glare Upon her features blanched with care. Now, rising, to and fro the room He strode in meditative gloom, Till, pausing where in doubt she stood, A crucifix of sandal-wood Forth from his breast he drew, And held it to her lips to kiss, And made her swear by Him they slew In Jewry and her hopes of bliss 3 12 THE WRAITH OF That never to her dying breath, For love of gold or fear of death, To any ear she would unfold The tale that she that hour had told, Or what that night the Shape had been The Child had o’er him leaning seen. IV. S OME natures like the knotted beech Strike deep their iron roots in earth, Wide up the stormful heavens reach, And revel in the tempest’s mirth ; Let winter’s blasts around them blow With pelting hail or drift of snow, Their stubborn branches strained and bare Ring out rough music on the air. But some are like the seedling rare That faintest breezes keen and cold In-blowing from the eastern sea May blight through every artery And shrivel ere a flower unfold ; And such was he, that blue-eyed boy, With all his tender loves and joy. DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE . So chill that blast that o’er him swept Its bane through every fibre crept. For weeks in languor on his bed He lay, with senses scared and dazed ; And many a tear his Mother shed As on his piteous face she gazed ; And many a moan his bosom wrung As o’er his child the Father hung. But prayer of priest, nor leech’s skill, Nor gentle Mother’s nursing hand, Nor Father’s spirit with Heaven in strife, Prevailed against the conquering Will That drew Its coils around his life And twined it in Its tightening band. Four weeks he seemed to fade away, And in the fifth at break of day A lifeless shape young Hugo lay. Then such a weight of darkness fell Upon the Father’s tortured brain, That from the burthen of its spell ' Men thought he scarce could rise again. Muttering madness to the wind, THE WRAITH OF 3*4 Alone he wandered to and fro, And none could charm or simple find Wherewith to heal him of his woe. Men scarcely deemed that he could love His little boy so tenderly, That such a sullen heart could prove So deep a fount of tears to be. That gentle life had been to him A light in a cavern weird and dim. But now it seemed as though he stood In conflict with some mystic Power That drew him forth in solitude And dared him in his loneliest hour ; And that in lonely wanderings, Or brooding in his silent room, He fought with voiceless spectral things, The victim of a ruthless doom. But what could that dread shadow be That wrought his soul such misery ? V. T T was a night in winter late, -*• The storm was loud in earth and air. DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE. 315 De Riddlesford passed the Castle-gate Alone, and by the torch’s flare The Porter old who turned the key . Eyed his dark face furtively. Cloaked and in his armour dight, He passed into the raging night. The Porter mused, “ If all were right, I doubt my Lord on such a night Had hardly left his chamber warm To walk alone in the rain and storm.” Capricious was the Baron’s mind ; But who dared seek its aims to find, With word or sign or glance of eye Betrayed a wish to probe or pry, From his dark brow rebuke so stern As wages of his sin would earn That never after bribe of gold Could tempt him to such venture bold. But wherefore should a lord so proud Out of his gates at murkest hour Walk thus into the tempest loud, The roaring wind and icy shower ? 3 l6 THE WRAITH OF The Warder thought, “ His moods are strange ; And grief lies heavy on his mind ; Some ill dream drives him thus to range The forest black in rain and wind.” The Porter growled, “ My Lord is free To do what seemeth to him fit ; 111 though his choice, \ is not for me His vassal mean to question it.” Hour after hour in his chamber high The lamp was burning steadily ; The traveller in dismal plight, Amid the woods and marshy leas, Above the naked bending trees Might see afar its friendly light And gladden at the cheerful sight. But within the chamber lone, As the moments slipt away, The Lady sat and made her moan, And shuddered at her lord’s delay. The Porter pressed his drowsy lid And roused him as his senses slid Adown the pleasant gulfs of sleep. DE RIDDLE STORES CASTLE. 317 He strove his duteous watch to keep * In vain ; within his oaken chair He sat, his chin upon his breast, In slumber tangled unaware, And drifting into dreamful rest — When all at once a knocking swift Broke loud upon his drowsy ear. With tremulous hands he rose to lift The ponderous key, the bolts to draw, Then tottered back half dead with fear. . . Of the vision that there he saw To living wight he never spoke, But in, that moment, with the blast That through the opened wicket broke, Once more alone the Baron passed. The Baron’s foot upon the stair Rang through the vaulted passage bare, And, hastening on as if in flight, He sprang into the chamber bright. Pale was his cheek and wild his eye ; Hung o’er his brows his dripping hair ; His cloak was rent and soiled with clay, And stained his tabard’s gules beneath ; THE WRAITH OF 3i8 And in his hand he held on high A dagger naked from its sheath. Round like a wearied beast at bay He turned as for a last assay With all his ebbing powers prepared, And blankly at the darkness stared ; Then staggered backward from the door, And sank upon the chamber-floor. Softly the Lady toward him drew And round his neck her arms she threw — “ O husband, Ralph, what nameless ill Has fallen upon thee?” Wan and chill, He shivered at her touch of love, And shook her off impatiently. She stood his cowering form above A moment, then on bended knee For confidence, for love, implored ; But starting up, he grasped his sword, And screamed in terror, “ There, there, there ! ’T is a corpse’s face, and ah, how fair ! . . But horribly the dead eyes glare . . And why should the breast with blood be streaked?... DE RIDDLE S FORD'S CASTLE. 31 Hence, ghastly Phantom, hence \” he shrieked, And with his brand he smote the air, Till wearied with the ghostly fray, “ ’Tis gone — Thank Heaven ! ” he faintly said, And, sinking down against the bed, The strong man swooned away. From hour to hour his Lady leant, Cooling still his fevered head, While he lay obliviously Tossing in his agony ; Or at times she lowly bent And strove with clasped hands to pray To God his dolour to allay, Whatever its hidden cause might be. There day by day the Leech would stand And gaze upon the sick man’s eyes, And minister with faltering hand His simples and his remedies. VI. EXT day beside the Baron’s bed 3 2 ° THE WRAITH OF At last the wasting fever fled. He lay within the shadow of Death. Then to the Lady Winnifred, One evening when the wind was high And rain was streaming down the sky, He spoke with faint and painful breath, And low in troubled murmurs said : “ I pray thee make the chamber fast, That none may hear amid the blast Aught of the tale that I would tell. I cannot live, and keep within, Pent in the sick brain’s narrow cell, The weary secret of my sin, The hideous fancies born of Hell That haunt me in the sleepless night And flash upon my waking sight Even in the glory of the sun. My race on earth is well-nigh run ; Let my last days at least be free, Disburthened of this memory. Hear my dark tale and pity me, Knowing with what unending pain My sin is punished unconfessed ; DE RIDDLESFORHS CASTLE. 321 And if thy pity I may not gain, At least I shall have rent the chain Of silence dread that binds my breast, And soothed the madness of my brain. ” Then in the noise of the pelting rain And the roar of the pitiless hurricane, As if his voice of the storm were part And his tale by the whirlwinds told, In on her pure and guileless heart His words of frenzy rolled : “ Ere my Norman father brave Was laid to rest in his Irish grave, With passions heaving like a sea I felt his irksome tyranny, And loved in lonely paths to stray, As my one means of liberty. And once in wandering far away Amid the woods at eventide I lost myself on the hills of fern, And knew not whither my steps to turn For shelter in the desert wide. I lifted up my voice, in hope Y 3 22 THE WRAITH OF That somewhere on the mountain-slope Some wanderer might hear, and haste To lead me through the leafy waste, When 4 Holla, holla ! ; was answered quick, And, crashing through the branches thick, A woodsman broke, with wondering eyes, And greeted me in Gaelic-wise, And asked me of my need, and bade That I adown the ferny glade Would go with him to his forest home, Nor farther in the twilight roam, But rest beneath his roof, and share His shelter rude and humble fare, Until the morrow’s dawn, when he Would show the pathways to the sea. 44 He led me down the rocky steep Into a valley broad and deep, And there, beside a hurrying rill, Where its wild waters, checked and stayed, Lay in a lakelet glassy-still And mirrored back the mossy boughs, Amid the murmuring forest’s shade We found his lone and lowly house. DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE . “ Lo ! in the balmy air of even Beside the door a Maiden stood, So fair it seemed a beam of Heaven Had stolen into the leafy wood And lighted all the solitude. Her brown soft eyes ’neath lashes black Gazed for a moment on my face. She bowed her head with winsome grace, And, blushing, moved in silence back As reverently I entered there. I had not known a face so fair, A form so perfect, lithe and free. The crimson tint upon her cheek Spread high with maiden modesty, Then faded ’mid transparent white To purest opal’s roseate light ; And softly in the breeze afloat Rippled her dark luxuriant hair About her arms and rounded throat And lustrous shoulders smooth and bare. “That face before my waking sight Lived in the darkness of the night ; When sleep his silken meshes wove 3 2 4 THE WRAITH OF Round every sense, I dreamed that she Bent o'er my couch with eyes of love ; And then I sprang up eagerly And stretched my arms in vain to clasp Her form that faded from my grasp ; Then wakeful lay till dawn of day With love that grew in my boyish breast A passion fierce and terrible, That swayed my soul in long unrest, And held me helpless in its spell. “ And ere I left the lowly cot, To seek again my father’s lands, Our love with touch of trembling hands And glance of eye and flush of cheek Had pledged itself though words were not, Nor yet of love we had dared to speak. “ Back to that valley many a morn I strayed with hound and hunting-horn, And made excuse to loiter near, Her face to see, her voice to hear, And oft beside the murmuring stream Sat by her side to love and dream. DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE. 325 “ The months went by. With tranquil breath Her grey-haired Father sank in death. Her Mother watched with crafty eyne The growing love that in its twine Enwound her daughter’s heart with mine, And left us oft to roam unseen Amid the mossy forest green ; And there with circling arms we strayed, And there till twilight hours delayed, And there, in warm embraces pressed, I felt the beating of her breast. “When mine own father died, and I Was left with none beneath the sky To thwart my feet or curb my will, I clave to fair Erothlin still. “ It was the Mother’s dear desire To see Erothlin made my bride. Within her baneful breast the fire Of fierce ambition burned. She eyed My face with ever-eager watch, And laid her springes well to catch My heart unwary. Tired at last 3 2 6 THE WRAITH OF Of long delay, her bait she cast Before a rival suitor. Yea, But those who dare with Love to play May rouse a fiend they shall not lay. Young Ollill, fair of form and face And swayed with ardours of his race, Found loitering by Erothlin’s side Had power to sting my stubborn pride And fire my heart with jealous hate And swift decision firm though late. The long delay that irked her soul Was o’er. But that for which she wrought She had gained not. Ay, another goal Than the fair height her fancy sought She had found ; her child a darker fate. “ Too proud to make the forest-girl, The daughter of an alien churl, My wife and lady of my lands, I would not yield to baser hands That bosom white, that length of tress; I would not brook that other lips Save mine with kisses warm should press That rosy mouth so soft and small ; DE RIDDLE SFORD S CASTLE. 327 I would not brook that prince or thrall Should quench my pleasures in eclipse. Nay, I would keep by crime and sin The smooth white breast and the heart within. “ Amid the sunset lingering One day on her finger white a ring I set, and swore to make her wife — Ay, by the Christ who gave me life — If only she would fly with me In darkness and in secrecy To this my Castle, and here abide A little while till sacred hands Fast with the Church’s holiest bands Should bind her close, my stainless bride. “ High in the Castle’s western tower There hangs a secret chamber fair Well-fitted for a lady’s bower, To which a dark and hidden stair Winds from an oaken doorway tall That seems a part of the panelled wall Behind the arras of the Hall. The door, the springs, the darkened ways 3 2 8 THE WRAITH OF My father showed before he died To my much- wondering gaze. I furnished well that chamber wide, And to my faithful Seneschal, Whom I could trust my plots to hide, I breathed my purpose. “ In the gloom Of evening from her Mother’s door Through the dark woods my love I bore, And led her to that silent room. . . “ A year of secret sinful bliss, The long embrace, the lingering kiss, And love grew languid, weary, cold. My heart was young, and proud, and bold, And would not bind itself for aye To that one form that day by day Looked less a wonder, less a prize To gloat on with a miser’s eyes. “ By bribes of gold and promises Her Mother’s selfish heart I snared, And staunched the venom of her tongue. Awhile about my gates she hung, DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE . 329 And troubled oft my sinful ease ; But thin was the love in her loathly soul That less for that poor cageling cared, Less for her child, than the golden toll That from my hand by threats she wrung. “ Thrice in my parks that Rival’s face, The kindling cheek, the pale-grey eyes, (While, wandering under evening skies Where thickest boughs their leaves enlace, I passed along the lonely wood) Crossed me in oblivious mood ; And as I met his restless eye Its glance of rage and jealousy Woke in my heart a transient dread Of danger and of evil bound In some enwoven coil of Fate With that quick life of cunning and hate ; And to my guilty soul I said, 4 If at my hands some keener wound That man should suffer, a hate so deep With thirst of vengeance in his breast Would spring that never till the sleep Of Death should fall on him or me 330 THE WRAITH OF His mind would know an hour of rest Where’er he roamed by shore or sea.’ “ Thrice thus he crossed my path, and then In the world of shadows or world of men He vanished. Of that shifting face, All featureless and blurred to-day, I scarce an outline faint can trace, So by the years is it worn away. Once only since a Shape methought I *saw — perchance ’t was fancy- wrought — Pass in the twilight silently • That might have been his wraith or he. . . “ Then in thy maiden loveliness, I saw and loved thee — loved thee ? — Yes, No humble peasant-girl wert thou, The pride of race was on thy brow. I loved thee for thy beauty well, But I have sworn the truth to tell, And though thou scorn me, Winnifred, Ay, curse my name when I am dead — Let my whole sin this hour be told — I loved no less thy lands and gold. DE RIDDLESFORD'S CASTLE. 331 “ The loves that have not for their home The spirit’s inmost holiest shrine, That lajck the touch of love divine, Are but as beasts that prowl and roam In search of prey and provender, That slay and eat, and, satiated, Loathe the waste lives whereon they ’ve fed And spurn the fragments angrily. And such had been my love for her. I grew to hate the helpless life That stood betwixt mine arms and thee. I dared not lead thee home my wife While she within my walls abode. I dared not cast her forth to be A living blot upon my fame, Dishonouring my race and name. What should I do, to lift the load Out of my pathway ? . . “ Nay, but hear. It was my love of thee that made Her life a chain about my feet ; It was because thy face was sweet I rid my heart of ruth and fear 332 THE WRAITH OF And mingled with thy rival’s meat The subtile poison swift as light That laid her body cold and white And pulseless in that silent room, And wrought mine own eternal doom. . . “ At dead of night, when all within Slept unconscious of my sin, I lifted her body pale and cold And wrapt it in her mantle’s fold, And down the winding turret-stair The piteous burthen trembling bare. Into the vaulted crypt below I entered, staggering, faint and chill. Quick in that chamber damp and still I toiled, and struck with blow on blow The hard dry ground with axe and spade, Till there a shallow grave I made, And in that pit so narrow and small With neither coffin nor shroud nor pall The stiff and pallid corpse I laid. . . “ I loved thee while Erothlin’s face Still smiled in all its living grace ; But when in icy rest she lay DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE . 333 My love grew colder than the clay That wound her in that noisome place. “ My guilt lay heavier on my soul Beholding thee my wedded bride. Then from her grave in the midnight dread She would arise with eyes of dole And seem to press thee from my side. . . For but for thee, O Winnifred, She had not lain in that wormy bed ! . . “ Her mother still in lonely ways Often through the woods would steal, And break on me with crafty eye, And question of her daughter’s weal ; And I with many a craven lie Would ease the heart that all its days Found less in love than in golden store A medicine for its deadliest sore. “ At last to rid me of the fear That long as she should linger near My gates with shadow would overspread My paths in every glade and dale, I framed a false and cruel tale, 334 THE WRAITH OF And swore that, faithless even to me Though feigning meek fidelity, Erothlin in the night had fled. I said my watchful Seneschal Had seen beneath the Castle-wall The cloaked figure of a man Who lingered in the darkening air, And oft the turret's round would scan As if he sought some signal there, One evening : and the self-same night, When low in the west, a crescent white, The moon hung cold with lonely ray, He saw two figures glide away, And pass into the sombrous wood ; And that he sought with vain assay By many a path in the forest rude Their stealthful midnight flight to trace, Close following ; but that never more Was known within the Castle's door The glory of Erothlin’s face. “ With doubts the Dame my tale received, She doubted half and half believed ; She lifted her hands with stifled scream, DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE . 335 And a new strange light a moment shone In the flash of her teeth and her dull eyes’ gleam ; A moment more and the light was gone, And with a haggard face and wan She sought the pathways to the shore, And left me free of heart once more. . . “ Ay, with the lapse of months and years The memory of my hidden crime Grew faint, and with it died my fears. Then came the peaceful happy time Wherein our little Hugo grew A link to bind us each to each. Our hearts together closer drew. I e’en began to frame anew The prayers my mother used to teach When I a child like Hugo knelt Beside her knee, with bended head And little hands to Heaven spread, And in my sinless bosom felt All pain and childhood’s trouble cease. I almost thought, so sweet my peace, That God Himself my crime forgot, And (as our Holy Church declares), 336 THE WRAITH OF My alms and tears and daily prayers Already had my pardon bought, And that in life I stood forgiven, Clean in the sight of pitying Heaven. But God forgets not, nor remits His vengeance for His broken law. Still as a patient Judge He sits, Though Conscience to her rest withdraw. While feeble-handed Memory drains Oblivion’s drowsy goblet dry, The blot upon the Book remains, The sheathless Sword is hung on high. “ I hoped that Beldam’s body lay In some far grave, as day on day Dropt like the leaf in swift decay And never came with cloud or scath Her fateful form across my path. . . “ Late, as one autumn evening cold In from the orchard and the wold I led my little Hugo home, That Rival’s form I seemed to see Flit from- the postern noiselessly. BE R 1 BBLESF 0 RDS CASTLE . 337 He from darkness seemed to come And into darkness passed. Out of my thought the dream I cast, And through the postern-gate we stept — When lo ! a form more hateful smote My sight. . . There deep in the drained Moat That Woman through the coltsfoot crept, Down bent, as gathering sticks and leaves. Then rose my terror vague anew And o’er my soul its chillness threw; And like a sea that moans and heaves In some waste world forlorn and lost My life in its lonely anguish tost. Back rolled the veiling mist of Time And showed all bare my damned crime. My fleers, my threats the Beldam mocked, And to and fro her form she rocked, And, baring her face in the evening’s gloom, She cursed with swift remorseless doom My soul, my household, and my lands. She fled, and in my fear and wrath, Turning suddenly in my path, My arm toward the Moat I raised To set the Bloodhound on her track, z 33 & THE WRAITH OF But from the darkness two white Hands Flashed out and pushed me fiercely back • And in I staggered stunned and dazed — And well I know those Hands that pressed With such fierce anger against my breast. “ That night on little Hugo fell The Curse with all its cruel spell That robbed me of my purest bliss, His gentle dear companionship, The merry murmur of his lip, And all my hope that child of his Might bear my father’s noble name And wear like him a stainless fame. I knew that Shape that o’er him towered, That Face of death from which he cowered. “ Low to myself I spoke and said : ‘ Men tell that when the murdered dead Still lie in earth unconsecrate Their spirits may rise to speed the fate Of them who have their ruin wrought. Down in that chill unwholesome spot Her bones in earth unhallowed rot. DE RIDDLESFORD S CASTLE . My hands are palsied with my fear ; I cannot live while they are near. . . “ At midnight while the Castle slept Into that noisome vault I crept. I dug the earth, and bone by bone Drew forth the mouldering skeleton. I wound it in a linen sheet, I climbed the stair with failing feet, And in the secret chamber high — Where we in life were wont to meet And part with kisses close and sweet — I laid the loathsome burthen by. . . “ Next night amid the tempest late I passed alone the Castle-gate. Over my mail a cloak I wore, And under its ample folds I bore That burthen weird and dread. Out in the bitter storm I strode In terror with the ghastly load, To lay it with the dead ; To lay her bones in holy ground, Beneath some smooth and grassy mound 340 THE WRAITH OF That held within its clay Some happier one who had sunk to rest By gentle loving hands caressed, Whose soul had leave to pray Before the lips were sealed in death, Who, ere was breathed the latest breath, Had tasted of the blessed wine And Jesu’s body’s bread divine From palms of holy priest, — Not died as she— O Righteous God ! — Cast out and trampled as a clod, Unblest as carrion beast. “ Deep in the oakwood’s grassy glade A little ancient Churchyard lies, By the first martyred Christians made Who raised the Cross in stormy skies. There the old shrine in ruin stands Wrecked by the ruthless Viking bands Ere Norman Knight on Irish ground A breathing-space from battle found. There many a Christian heart hath rest, And holy is the earth that ’s bound About each silent Christian breast. BE RIBBLESFORUS CASTLE. 34i “The wind the naked branches clashed, The rain about me hissed and splashed, And ’mid the roar of thunder flashed The forked fire from tree to tree As through the forest tremblingly I dragged that burthen grim, Till into the little Graveyard green I passed amid the gloom unseen Beneath the yew-trees dim. “ Then from a grave the spongy sods I tore away, and broke the clods, Slowly digging the loamy clay. There in the consecrated bed I laid at last the hapless dead, And turned to haste away . . . “ But . . God ! . . as up my brows I raised And round the silent Churchyard gazed, What horror met my aching eyes ! Against the blackness of the skies From every grave there seemed to rise A pallid form with outstretched hand — Pale spectres in a gathering band 342 THE WRAITH OF They hemmed me round on every side, And in a circle dense and wide Nearer and nearer seemed to glide, Now to contract and now expand, — An eddy of corpses, ghastly all, Gaunt and towering, hunched and small ; And some on their breasts had gashes dire, And must have died in agony ; And some were burnt as if with fire ; And some were naked skeletons ; And some — a sickening sight to see — Showed upon their loosening bones The flesh’s black putridity ; And some I seemed to have known in life, — Ay, some were the dead I had slain in strife, And some the poor forgotten thralls, Crouchers by my Castle-walls, That long in the silent clay had lain, Whom I had wrought a life of pain With many a deed of pitiless wrong ; And some were strange and seemed to be Sent as from Hell to torture me ; And ever from the gruesome throng Their curses rose in mingled song ; DE RIDDLESFORDS CASTLE. 343 And when I shrank in my dismay, And sought to veil the crowd away, There, not three paces from my feet, That withered Hag had made her seat, And as I met her leering eye She laughed and cried, ‘ In vain, in vain ! Thou canst not wash away the stain That brands thee, Murderer, though thou die A death wherein thy lightest throes More fierce should be than all the woes Together of the ghastly race Assembled in this charnel-place To greet thee, now thy task is done, And thou hast buried her every bone ! ’ . . “ My dagger from its sheath I drew — - And yet all useless, well I knew, Was clench of muscle or gash of steel Against the foes that girdled me. I strove beside the grave to kneel ; I cried to Heaven piteously ; But gibberings loud and muttered jeers And ghostly howlings smote my ears. I plunged amid the hideous crowd ; 344 THE WRAITH OF I groped, and reached the pathway rude. On, on amid the rocking wood, Amid the rain and tempest loud, By that unearthly throng pursued, — Dread shapes upheaving everywhere, Or glancing from the branches bare, Or gathering in the stormy air, — I hurried, shrieking as I ran, A frantic and a helpless man, My dagger brandished o’er my head, Fainter and fainter as I sped, Till, struggling with my foes, I passed In through my gateways with the blast, And mounted to the echoing floor, And reached at last our chamber-door. . . “ Now have I told thee all, and yet A hand upon my heart is set That warns me that in sight of Heaven, Though penitent, I am not forgiven. O, fetch me hither, for Jesu’s sake, Some holy man, that in his ear My full confession I may make, And rid me of my wasting fear ! ” . . DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE. 345 Stunned by the tale of crime and madness, The Lady, silent, turned away. She could not speak her pain and sadness, Loathing yet pitying him, who lay In pangs of fear, remorse and grief That knew no respite or relief. Then to the Seneschal she said, “ Send swift and fetch to thy Master’s bed Some holy man to comfort yield ; Yea, the first cowled shape ye meet, O, lead him hither with pauseless feet, Ere night is on the weald ! ” VII. T HAT eve to the Baron’s bedside came A cowled Monk austere and grave. He heard the sick man’s tale of shame, But yet no absolution gave. Whene’er the Baron met his glance He paused, and gazed as in a trance Upon that cowled face, 346 THE WRAITH OF As if amid its lines he sought Some image faint and half-forgot Of olden days to trace. Now from the Monk’s thin breast a sigh Would rise as from a pitying heart ; But oftener from his pale-grey eye A flash of ruthless hate would dart ; And ever at his gathering frown The Baron’s soul in fear sank down. When all was told that Monk uprose ; And, “ If thy soul would find repose,” He murmured, “ in some holy fane Thine absolution must be ta’en, Not in this House, thou man of sin, Where all is rottenness within. “ To-morrow rise, and mount thy steed, And ride across the hills with speed, And ride alone by moor and fell To Glandalough, to Donagh’s cell, And there thy tale of murder tell ; And if thou hither comest again, Thy spirit shall not walk in pain.” DE RIDDLE SFOKD’S CASTLE. 347 VIII. A T the first faint crimson streak Of morn the Baron, worn and weak, Feebly mounted his coal-black steed, And passed his gates in haste. He rode through forest and park and mead, And away to the mountain- waste. As up Glencormack hollows he went He passed a bare and blasted oak, And there, beneath its branches bent, On a crutch that wrinkled Woman leant. Her voice the valley’s silence broke — “ If but thou payest the debt thou owest, God speed thee, Knight, on the way thou goest ! ” The Baron’s hand was on his sword, But he bore her taunt with never a word. As round Slieve-Cullinn’s base he rode, An Old Man from a cavern strode. His limbs were lean, his beard was white, And in his eye was a ghostly light. He laid his hand on the Baron’s rein, 343 THE WRAITH OF He lifted up a face of pain — “ Well may thy gallant coal-black steed Bear thee in thine hour of need ! Fleet be thy steed, O Baron brave, While he bears thy body this side the grave ! ” “ Back, Spectre, back ! ” the Baron cried, And plunged his spurs in his charger’s side. But when he reached old Calary rath, There sat that Monk beside the path High on a lichened stone ; And ere the Baron reached his seat, He rose, and sped with hurrying feet Along the mule-path lone. The Baron, wondering, rode his way, And passed into the moorlands grey. IX. A ND a night went by, — a night and a night, And a third grew dark on Slieve-Cullinn’s height, And when the fourth fair morning broke DE RIDDLESFORUS CASTLE. 349 As yet the Baron had come not home. Then fear in the hearts of his vassals woke. The Lady to the Seneschal Tremblingly in secret spoke : “ Send out by wood and grassy sward, Send far by moor and lake and fell, Send faithful men to seek thy Lord By cavern, heath and chasm and dell. He left the Castle alone to ride, He left with senses maimed and dim, And much I fear in the forests wide Some evil thing hath chanced to him.” And all that morning, ranging wide, They searched by many a woodland way. Far up the rocky mountain-side, And ’mid the brackens, in the spray Of the wild torrent shooting down From tawny heights, ’mid moorland brown And furze and heath, they searched with pain. They shouted on the mountain wind, They blew their hunting-horns in vain. No trace of man or horse they found, No voice arose with answering sound. 3So THE WRAITH OF At last through Calary moors they sought, As beamed the mild sweet evening star ; Then someone cried, “ Methinks I caught The neighing of a steed, afar. Thence came the sound ! Ere darkness fall Out thither let us haste, And sound afresh our clarion-call Amid the heathy waste.” The moon was rising keen and bright, When, out against the sunset-light, Gaunt in the gloom and feeble-kneed, Far off they saw the Baron’s steed All loose of rein and riderless And straying in the wilderness. Then from the foremost of the band There rose a sharp and mournful cry. He beckoned with his mailed hand, And to his side all silently, In awe, the weary searchers sped. A moment gazing stood they there. Then every warrior bowed his head, And knelt him down in prayer. DE RIDDLESFORD'S CASTLE. 351 There lay upon the heathery wold Their Seigneur’s body stark and cold. The gorget from his neck was gone ; Beside his shield his cuirass lay ; Pale in the dying sunset shone His face begrimed with peat and clay ; All gory hung his helmless hair, His cheek was scarred and seamed, And in his throat and bosom bare Three mortal gashes gleamed. THE SCALP. S TERN granite Gate of Wicklow, with what awe, What triumph, oft (glad children strayed from home) We passed into thy shadows cool, to roam The Land beyond whose very name could draw A radiance to our faces, till we saw, With airy peak and purple mountain-dome And lawn and wood and blue bay flecked with foam, The Land indeed, — fair truth without one flaw ! Never may I with foot of feeble age Or buoyant step of manhood pass thy pale And feel not still renewed that awe, that joy (Of the dim Past divinest heritage), — Seeking the sacred realm thou dost unveil, Earth’s one spot loved in love without alloy ! TO WICKLOW. T MS not alone because amid thy woods, JL O Land of rest, or listening to thy streams, Or loitering in thy rocky solitudes, I wander once again in happy dreams With lost companions and vain Memory broods Amid the flickering leaves and dancing beams On far off morns of mirth and boundless hopes, That I revisit still thy well-loved slopes j Not for this only ; but that I once more Relive a cloudless boyhood on these hills, And hear amid the waves upon thy shore And in the murmur of thy bounding rills A voice that breathes a more than earthly lore, That holier passion here my bosom fills, And nearer the fair unattainable Clear heights of Perfect Life I seem to dwell. A A 354 TO WICKLOW. Here Earth renews her freshness ; unconfined The heavenward aspirations that have slept Awake and soar ; old habits of the mind Resume their joyful sway; the spirit that crept With feeble foot, down-drooping, faint and blind, Forward once more on strenuous wing is swept ; Imagination’s self is lithe and free Between thy mountains and thy breaking sea. There comes a quickening of the subtler sense Years and the world have deadened, that received And gave into my being those intense And tremulous delights whereof bereaved I languish in a darkness wide and dense, Delicate joys, faint sorrows, winds that heaved The meadow-grass and shadows of the trees Could move,— vague fears, delicious ecstasies. And once more — feebly, yet once more — I feel In Nature’s deeps strange presences and powers, And dim pulsations to my touch reveal The heart of things in lone and quiet hours ; Rare energies along my pulses steal ; TO WICKLOW. 355 Fed with sweet air and dashed with freshening showers, Like the bare leas when May hath touched the grass, Into a golden summer life I pass. Therefore for thy dear mountain-paths I sigh Even where the nightingales the livelong day Warble beside Ilyssus, or the sky Bends o’er Rome’s columns or Byzantium’s bay ; Ay, yearn to make my dwelling where on high Slieve-Cullinn reddens in the morning ray, Where wave the pines o’er Clara’s bosky steep, Or blithe Ovoca wanders to the deep. TO G. B. I F no other joy were left me by the Power that hath bereft me Of that One who lent me all the joy of life from year to year, This sole bliss the World would brighten, this Earth’s deepest darkness lighten, — That I clasp the hand of him our Dearest held of men most dear, That with thee in the sweet weather, ’mid the purple Wicklow heather, I may praise Him, quote His mirth and golden fan- cies o’er and o’er, Hear thee tell the old glad stories of His triumphs, of His glories, On these mountains ever radiant with the feet that come no more. IN THE MOUNTAINLAND. D READ Spirit that, whate’er the uncertain tongue Of crude Conjecture unto credulous ears May stammer, still to me, with heart yet young To learn, to feel, from out the measureless years Speakest, and everywhere through earth, sky, sea, Dost palpitate in ceaseless energy,— Be it mine, while here these senses vibrating Reveal Thee, life to life, to watch the play Of Thine abounding forces, and to sing Thy might, Thy love, Thy beauty, day by day Gathering the tokens of Thy various power In midnight storm or iris of the shower. And is this idleness, — to sit alone Morn after mom above the moving sea, 358 IN THE MO UNTA1NLAND. Bending the ear to every separate tone Amid its multitudinous harmony, That comes from its great depths' unceasing roar Far off, or sighs along its voiceful shore ; To watch its myriad motions hour on hour, Each fleeting shadow and light that gleams and flies, On days of off-shore winds, when sun and shower And hurrying cloud with ever-varying dyes Career across its breaker-whitened deeps Where, light in gloom, the glimmering sea-bird sweeps ; And treasure in the inmost of the mind Its every delicate colour, swirl, and sound, As some most precious hint of Thee ; and find Fit words wherein to hold their beauty bound ? Or lie upon the mountains when the Spring At last has set the slow woods burgeoning, And brood upon the valleys lovingly, Learning the thousand hues that flame and glow IN THE MOUNTAINLAND. 359 On every brightening bush and kindling tree ; Or when glad tempests o’er the woodlands blow, Warm in some sheltered mossy nook reclined, Count every cadence of the wandering wind ; That so I may a nearer commune hold With Thee, who to deaf ears alone art dumb, And, back returning to a world grown cold Amid Thy signs to Thee from whom they come, Some unexpected sweetness I may bear To waken wonder or to shame despair? AN INVITATION. T URN ye your faces to the hills to-day, And let me be your leader. O, put by All straining after vain philosophy, And give your hearts their necessary play ! Leave ye your dusty theories on their shelves, And draw from Wisdom’s primal springs yourselves. For they that know not Nature as she is, The outward breathing Shape complete and whole, The Being animate with living soul, Who search alone her nerves and arteries, Oblivious of her splendours all life long ; And they that in the eddying human throng Strive eagerly, and move amid the dust And lumber of poor human cares and dreams ; And they that for their draughts of Nature’s streams AN INVITATION 3 61 To others’ far-borne pitchers idly trust, Alike the fairest feat of Heaven ignore, To God’s full purpose closing fast the door. Out, then, with me, and let us bare the mind To all the influence of the woods and sea, Nor strive in any mental rivalry (Moving amid this Eden deaf and blind), But quaff the nectar of the Earth, and talk Of simple things that greet us in our walk. And I will show you many a hidden sweet That I have loved and ye shall love as I, — Faint subtle radiances of sea or sky, Or tender gleams amid the springing wheat, Or fairy branchlets hid in ferny nooks, Or half-invisible rainbows of the brooks, Or peeps of glassy bays between the pines, And rich surprises while we wind our way Through breaking woods and round the moun- tains grey And sea or lake or peak before us shines, Unseen before or with aerial change Transformed in glory, spirit-like and strange. 3 62 AN INVITATION And for one whole day's length ye shall forget The jar gf minds, the problems dire that vex The brain, the doubts that daunt us and perplex. O, your free feet amid the bracken set ! Submit to-day to mine your hearts and wills. On, 'mid the air of heaven, into the hills ! LOVE OF NATURE. L OVE nothing base, keep clean thy heart, Thy senses clear of sensual slime, Live from the meaner strifes apart, Nor take the soilure of the time ; Then loose thyself in God's fair earth, Taste all the raptures of thy lot, Embrace its boons, drink deep its mirth, And let thy conscience vex thee not. LUGGALA: THE HOLLOW OF SWEET SOUNDS. Part I. i. I N the far time when Earth was free and young, Ere men, the nearest Heaven of breathing things, Had yet their wild-wood fancies from them flung, While still they quaffed of Nature’s purest springs, And o’er the wastes in boundless wanderings, Well-framed to leap, to scale, to swim, to run, With limbs as lithe as the giereagle’s wings, Elate, amid a life but just begun, They roamed with faces glad turned toward the setting sun ; LUGGALA. 365 II. In that dim dawn, amid the glades of pine High o’er the mighty stream since Donau named, A child was born of parents held divine, None knowing whence they sprang. With spirit untamed He grew, and oft the spear unerring aimed Against the horned elk, or wolf, or bear, And oft with swinging club the wild-boar maimed, In boyhood. Men adored him unaware, And called him Lionheart, such deeds he loved to dare. hi. His was no sluggard life in daily grooves, Like drowsy shepherd’s fluting ’mid his flock Idly upon the hill-side, who but moves Within the circling shade of bush or rock, Dodging the sun, save when with sudden shock He spies his wandering fleeces far away Following the restless wethers strong that mock 3 66 LUG GALA. His utmost speed. No crook loved he to sway, But in the tangled woods he found his venturous play. IV. Far in those mountain-forests would he roam With bow and quiver from his shoulder slung ; With lifted spear he leaped the torrent’s foam ; From the strained boughs o’er the dread chasm he swung ; On giddy cliffs, loud with the deafening roar Of Donau’s flood through rocky gorges flung, He climbed and to the lambent lightnings sung; And from the suckling bear her whelps he tore, And sheathed his knife with palms stained with the bison’s gore. v. Well too he loved to listen by the tent At evening when the sun was in the West To the wild poet as aloof he leant, Chaunting as day went down in golden rest LUG GALA. 367 Strange words that stirred strange hopes within his breast, — The white-haired poet by some spreading tree Singing of life more vast and rich and blest, Prophetic rapture, chaunts of things to be That prompted man’s high deeds and shaped Earth’s destiny. VI. And often he himself, amid the bands Of beardless hunters resting on the height, Would frame wild tales of undiscovered lands Beyond the sunset’s lines of turkis-light, Whereof he dreamed in watches of the night ; And his heart bounded with delicious stress As broadened the fair vision in his sight Of billowy wolds and forests limitless Through which with stubborn foot he yet his way might press. VII. And “ Yonder,” he would sing, with glowing cheeks, “ Out yonder past the crags and sable pines 3 68 LUGGALA. Stretch the great plains ; there rise the snowy peaks Whereon the moon above the white cloud shines ; There coil the snake-like streams their silvery twines ; And many a vale is there and bloomy lawn ; And heavier bunches load the bended vines ; And there, beyond the utmost woods withdrawn, Rolls a wide sea, men say, bright with the beams of dawn. VIII. “ ’T is said our fathers from the sunlands came, Far East, and, hither roaming, many a stream Have passed and many a mountain without name ; But nought that ever met their eyes, I deem, Can match those lands whereof I nightly dream. Thither, when I to man’s full strength have grown, I ’ll wend, beyond the day’s last golden gleam There under the rich sunset’s saffron zone. Say, shall I tread those realms companioned or alone?” LUGGALA. 369 IX. And when his boyhood’s latest March had blown, He stood the tallest ’mid the hunters’ race And shepherds’, toughest too of thews and bone, Of all that roamed the hills in toil or chase. Blue-eyed and fair and beautiful of face, His golden hair back from his temples broad Even to his shoulders fell in manly grace. Dauntless, with head erect, the earth he trod, And shone amid his tribe resplendent as a god. x. A man whom it were gladness to obey, Glory to follow. Even his elders felt The influence of his spirit’s natural sway, And at his feet in willing homage knelt The bravest youths that in that forest dwelt, And in the midst of danger where he stood The timid whose weak hearts for fear would melt Grew valiant. Such men ’mid the baser brood Are born to move the world with their impetuous blood. B B 370 LUG GALA. XI. One day in the young year, when life with Spring Grew wanner in the veins, and like a lyre Struck by wild hands all Nature seemed to ring With music, he arose, his mind on fire With daring thought, and all his heart’s desire Unfolded. He would brave the Unknown Land Ere the white sloes put on their green attire. Then seven strong huntsmen lifted each a hand, And sware that they would march the foremost of his band. . . XII. Out in a dawn that breathed of happiness Through the gum-scented firs, by many a glade Of plumed crags, they ’gan their way to press, Lithe-footed ; camping in the mighty shade When the night’s pall a deeper darkness made, And round their camp-fires, folded from the dews, Sleeping amid the forest unafraid ; While Lionheart, alone to watch and muse, Oft Nature’s sweetest gift of slumber would refuse. LUG GALA. 37 1 XIII. And through the woody vast their path they plied ’Twixt Rhein and Donau, cleaving oft their way With axe and club through roots entwined and tied In snaky knots and branches bearded grey Thwarting their feet and balking their assay ; For ever merry in that morn of life, With bounding hope no hardship could allay ; Alway most brave where danger most was rife, Ennobled by their needs and strengthening with their strife ; XIV. Till from the heights by Necker, past the wood, Afar, the glitter of Rhein’s glassy tide Flashed on the gaze of Lionheart, who stood Peering at dawn adown the steep hill’s side, Where some old storm had rent an opening wide Among the thick-grown pines ; and from the steep He led his ardent band, and gaily cried, “ Down to yon stream we go, and we will sweep Where’er its current rolls to whatsoever deep.” 37 2 LUGGALA. xv. And, floating in the stream or on its shore Lying, great drift of fallen trees they found, Pines by the blast uprent in Winter’s roar, Huge lichened pillars prostrate on the ground ; And these into a goodly raft they bound With thongs of skin from the dead buffalo Stript and sun-hardened, and with joyous sound Out ’mid the buoyant river’s stately flow They launched the quivering mass and downward drifted slow. XVI. And onward with the wide and tranquil stream, Betwixt the osiered isles, with spear or pole Guiding their rude raft, in the golden beam Of day they drifted toward their phantom goal ; On, where the noiseless placid waters roll By Taunus’ heights, until the evening fell, With cool wind breathed from heath and ferny knoll, O’er the broad waters coloured like a shell ; On, wooed by orange skies and sunset’s gorgeous spell. LUGGALA . 373 XVII. On in the morn by craggy bastions white That echoed back their loud and joyous song; On dreamily by noon and dreamy night With hands untaught they steered their course along ; On, the peaked rocks and woody hills among, Adown the foaming rapid breathless swept ; On, in mere joy of life elate and strong, Hearing the prattling ripple while they slept, And the soft river breeze as through their hair it swept. XVIII. And ofttimes to the river-bank they sprang To chase the horned herd that came to drink From the lone forest-glades ; and lightly rang Their shouts as to his bended knees would sink The piteous wounded stag ; and to the brink They dragged the antlered trophies of their might, Ofttimes the bow they bent with tightened link And pierced the wild swan poised amid her flight, Striking the soaring life down from its skyey height. 374 LUGGALA. XIX. And after many days ’mid level meads Browsed by great herds of cattle streaked and pied They glided, brushing past the tufted reeds And tubed grasses, and beheld divide The mighty stream in currents wandering wide ; And in their nostrils blew the salt sea-air As the flood broadened to the Ocean’s tide, And they beheld half-awed the breakers fair And the vast waters blue extending everywhere. xx. Then, wonder-struck at sight of that wide waste, Did Lionheart bid drive against the sand The watery raft, and, leaping out in haste, He marshalled on the beach his silent band. There at the verges of the firm dry land They stood and mused, as in against their feet The lithe wave gambolling with motions bland Dashed its white spray, and ran with music sweet In like a thing alive that stranger yearns to greet. LUGGALA. 375 XXI. Then sent he out his scouts along the bay. Toward noon one hurrying in with weary breath Declared that he had sighted far away, Across the tawny sands and purpling heath, Smoke rising up in many an azure wreath, And clustering habitations as of men Nestling the yellow hills and wolds beneath, Snug in the hollows of a tiny glen Beyond the level meads and flats of stream and fen. XXII. And thither moving as the evening fell They marched with spear and bow, prepared for fight. And when the folk that in the town did dwell Saw the tall forms against the sunset’s light, They ranged themselves in arms upon the height, And bode their coming. Then their Chief stept down, With eye of blue and locks of silvery white, 376 LUGGALA. And bad them welcome to the little town ; Nor lordlier brow than his e’er lifted kingly crown. XXIII. He spoke a kindred tongue, and seemed indeed Of race and blood not alien from their own. He asked them whence they came, and what great need Had driven them afar through lands unknown, To wander up and down the deserts lone, And smiled when Lionheart his purpose told, And pointed, with some sadness in his tone, To the bright billows in the distance rolled, Mirroring as they moved the level sunbeams’ gold. XXIV. And there for certain days in peace they bode, That grey old Chief with many an ancient tale Brightening the hours ; and in the creek he showed, Buoyed on the waves, his boats with oar and sail, And curious woven nets wherein to hale LUGGALA. 377 The silvery shoals unto the wet sea-beach ; And told how he had dared the wintry gale, And for his sea-prey roamed full many a reach, And offered Lionheart his sea-craft strange to teach. XXV. And morn by morn upon the sandy knoll Sat Lionheart and gazed upon the sea, And watched the many-coloured waters roll And the white breakers gambol in their glee, And pondered long the Ocean’s mystery, And yearned to sail across the waste of blue To whatsoever region there might be Beyond, beyond — that shore that no man knew Toward which the porpoise swam and the white sea-bird flew. XXVI. Then to that old and bright-eyed Jarl he spoke. He shook his white locks, smiling, and he said He past the rough-edged wave that flashed and broke Against the horizon in his skiff had led The stoutest of his tribe, now old or dead ; 378 LUG GALA. “ But never any shore beyond, I trow,” He cried, “ arose, and when night’s pinions spread Above us pallor fell on every brow. Back toward the cheerful land we turned our drip- ping prow.” XXVII. “ Build me a skiff,” cried Lionheart, 66 to hold My mates and me, and I with sail and oar Will dare the deep in light or darkness rolled. Yon swallow wings its way to some fair shore ; The wild-swan ranging the blue waters o’er Comes not, be sure, from brooding in the brine ; Around some other beach those waters roar, And brighter realms beyond yon azure line Bask in the midday beams when we in darkness pine.” XXVIII. Then with long months of toil a bark they reared Huger than ever in that lonely bay Had hardy fisher through the tempest steered ; And, choosing out a pilot old and grey, LUGGALA . 379 Wise in sea-lore and hardened in the spray, With food and water, helm and oar and sail He with his stalwart band at break of day, Sped, as the moon above the sun hung pale, Swift northward by the coast, blown by a favouring gale. XXIX. Blithe was the venturous voyage many a week, As onward by flat lands of beech and fir They sailed, now mooring in some tranquil creek Where nought the lonely silence seemed to stir Save the thronged sea-birds' shrieks and troublous whirr ; Now plying the long oars with tuneful stroke In the wide waters ; ever merrier As new fair regions on their vision broke, And each new morn in cloud or skies of fire awoke. XXX. They passed the lone Norwegian mountains frore, And inland by the pine-dad fiords they plied, Brushing the fringed firs with lifted oar, 3 So LUGGALA . Oft hearing as they loitered on the tide The splash of the white waterfalls that glide Adown their smooth-worn cliffs and flash and foam Into the green sea from the mountain-side ; And oft they pulled to shore, the woods to roam, And dream in their dark glades of Donau and their home. XXXI. Then some fell sick, and seemed to waste and fail In that vague voyage ; and with mournful eye Gazed Lionheart upon their faces pale, Compelled Death’s darkening shadow to descry ; And often from the weak hand tenderly He took the ill-timed oar himself to wield, And often when the lips were parched and dry To the sick mate his scanty cup would yield, And with his cloak the weak from sudden tempest shield. XXXII. On a lone shore beneath the short green turf Three mates they buried, and with reverent hand LUG GALA. 381 Great cairns of stone beside the roaring surf, — ■ To rest as marvels in the desolate land Whereby thereafter late-born men should stand Wondering, — they reared; and then with sad- dened breast Out once more through the wave the lessening band Fared onward over reef and foaming crest, In search of that sweet shore, their Chief’s imagined rest. XXXIII. But, after a wild sunset of red cloud And skies shot over as with streaks of blood, One night arose a storm with voices loud Of winds and waters, and the foaming flood, Lashed with sharp hail, arose in sullen mood, Heaving their skiff. Like paddock-pipes the mast Snapt, and the giant waves with splash and thud Broke through their bulwarks frail, and far and fast They sped they knew not where before the icy blast. 3 82 LUGGALA. XXXIV. And the grey Pilot, straining at the helm, Was swept into the deep and rose no more. And Lionheart amid the watery realm With two sick mates, afar from any shore, Was left with shattered skiff and useless oar, Where’er the storm might list, to sink or drift. Patient and calm the long suspense he bore, Till joyously he saw the storm-clouds lift, And the sweet sky and sun outpeer through many a rift. xxxv. Then, floating sunward under cloudless skies, They coasted many an isle and craggy peak White with its clustering sea-birds, whose wild cries Broke on their loneliness and seemed to speak A human language. Prostrate now and weak, One only friend was left in his despair To Lionheart. He on his pallid cheek Would gaze, with none his lonely grief to share, And watch with sad wild eyes the horizon blank and bare. LUG GALA, 383 XXXVI. When three bright days had passed a mist uprose Out of the East and caught them in its fold That fast around them snake-like seemed to close ; And past them swept the haze, thick, moist, and cold, Opening at times, at times so densely rolled Round their worn bark that nought on any side Appeared but the grey vapour as it shoaled ; And in that darkness o’er the waters wide They drifted slowly on, borne by the constant tide. XXXVII. Then in a placid morn the summer sun, Gathering on high the curtain of the mist, A glorious Land revealed of forests dun And rosy hills and peaks of amethyst And grey bright shores by the blue wavelets kissed, That on the starboard, basking in the light, Rose in the summer sky. And well he wist Either that sweet Land dawning on his sight 384 LUGGALA . Must he his bourn of rest, or Death and dreamless Night. XXXVIII. Inward the slow tide bore him toward a stream That wandered from those distant mountains blue. Its ripples, glittering in the morning's beam, Back from the sea in languid strife withdrew. Shoreward, while round his prow the seagulls flew And poised and dipped their bills amid the brine, With heart that yet no pulse of gladness knew He drifted, for beside him lay supine His dead mate stiff and cold, with half-closed light- less eyen. XXXIX. There on the untrodden beach with weary hands He scooped a shallow grave above the sea. From the rent vessel up the shingly sands He bore the rigid corpse, with straining knee And bended shoulder moving painfully. LUGGALA. 385 And there he laid the stiff cold limbs and spread Dry sand and shells and waifs of weed and tree Above them, coffining the piteous dead. Then, to the cloudless sky uplifting his bared head, XL. He cried to his dim gods his mind to bless With light, and sank upon the homeless shore, And sobbed aloud in that great loneliness, Remembering the lips that spake no more And the glad smiles the vanished faces wore In his life's morning. Then his resolute heart, That never yet Despair's fell bondage bore, Awoke ; and, rising up with sudden start, He armed himself anew with axe and spear and dart, XLI. And upward by the stream, in search of prey And some calm place of rest, his steps he bent ; And with the widening light and warmth of day, His heart grew firm as through the woods he went. c c 3 86 L UGGALA. And often silent on his axe he leant, And, peering through the woods, beheld anear Fair purple peaks beneath the azure tent Of heaven glitter like ensanguined spear, And blue or wooded hills their sunny slopes uprear. XLII. Upward through that long summer's day he pressed 'Mid the thick forest by the river's bed, His forehead ever set toward the West; And ever with sweet voice the waters sped Beside him, and the fern beneath his tread Its cool leaves bent, and loud the blackbird sang, And the woods sighed their music overhead Save when with sudden stroke and echoing clang On some prone baffling bough his axe resounding rang. XLIII. From level ways he passed into a Glen Of light and gloom through which with thun- derous roar The narrow torrent in its leafy den LUGGALA . 387 Plunged from brown-golden pools with spray- all hoar, Bounding from ridge to ridge, and downward tore In giddy joy. Beside its brink he strayed, Till close in front fair rocks he saw upsoar, Guarding a Pool profound in grateful shade, And o’er their summits grey green oaks luxuriant swayed. XLIV. In the deep hollow by the Pool he sate, Soothed by the stillness and the loveliness Of that fair spot. Beyond the rocky gate, Crested with yews and hung with many a tress Of ferns and ivies, from its dark recess The torrent sprang, and in the darkness there A tree rock-rooted waved in the light stress O’ the valley-breeze, and, glittering in the glare Of some stray beam, fluttered its leaves in air ; XLV. And the lithe wagtails flitted through the cleft, And up the stream the blue-winged fisher flew, 3 88 LUG GALA. Then Lionheart his axe’s glossy heft Seized, and beyond the chasm the weapon threw, And to that rock his spear, and downward drew And plunged into the Pool, and touched the spray Of the clear brook ; then climbed the steeps anew, And journeyed onward till at set of day The mountains round him rose and barred his lonely way. XLVI. A circle of steep heights, whereon the trees, Hung ’mid great rocks plumed thick with fern, and green, Golden and brown with gorgeous lichenries, Enwound him as he wandered ; and between The branching oaks, behold, with snowy sheen Out from the crags against the evening sky Flashed a white Waterfall behind a screen Of leaves and boughs, and o’er its ledges high Slipt in a rain of foam with clear sweet melody ! LUGGALA. 3 8 9 XLVII. And round the dark well underneath the Fall A wide green sward he found where rabbits fed In the cool grass, whereby ’mid brackens tall Stood the still antlered stag with lifted head And gazed at him, then up the mountain fled. And there with drift-wood gathered by the stream A fire he kindled, and with fern his bed Piled in a cavern brightened by the gleam, And slept until the morn roused him with golden beam. XLVIII. And when the sun had risen, amid the dew Treading, he climbed through that precipitous wood Up the steep mountain, straining every thew; And high upon the bare brown crest he stood, And saw the Ocean blue, and, many a rood Inland, the mountains rolling like a sea. Then ’downward by a torrent’s joyous flood .He passed, till there beneath him suddenly Broke on his gaze a scene of subtlest witchery. 39 ° LUGGALA. XLIX. For in a wide chasm of the wooded hill Far down thy little Lake in placid sleep Lay cradling, nourished by a golden rill That through green meadows ran with gentle sweep, And girdled by gaunt crags and leafy steep ; Nor could he from thy face his eyes withdraw, Still gazing down into thy sunny deep, Domed by the azure heavens without one flaw, O Hollow of Sweet Sounds, dream-breathing Lug- gala ! Part II. i. O NOT the crowd-applauded face doth take , Captive the heart in life-enduring love ; Not Nature’s proudest majesties can slake The thirst of wearied soul by flood or grove. Far oftener some sweet spirit that doth move Unnoticed in the throng the nobler breast Enthrals. Most winning is the graceful dove LUGGALA. 39 1 Though flaunting not the gaudy peacock’s crest. Alway the tenderer love doth yield the holier rest. ii. Even so it was with Lionheart forlorn When, pausing in his wanderings, he stood And gazed amid the glory of the morn Downward upon thy Lake and glimmering wood, Thy steep grey crag, thy dreamy solitude, — Thou Fount of Light amid the desert hills. Soothing his spirit in its loneliest mood, Thy loveliness with hope his bosom fills, Thy smile of perfect peace his life’s fell fever stills. hi. And “ Here,” he cried, “ here will I make my home ; Here fight with Death in life-long loneliness ; Here rest these limbs that may no farther roam ; From Earth’s dry grape its utmost sweetness press, For life in life’s loss yearning less and less. 392 LUGGALA. Never across the seas to mine own land May I return, nor e’er my spirit bless Leading in ways unknown my dauntless band, Nor kiss the human lip nor clasp the human hand.” . . IV. By the white torrent shooting to the dale Adown he clomb, and by the Lake’s bright shore Lingered with love amid the wooded vale. From far-off pastures the sweet breezes bore The lowings of wild kine. Then past him tore Out of green glades and up the leafy steep Herds of brown deer. Ample was Nature’s store. Amid the Lake the eager trout would leap, Breaking with sudden splash the water’s summer sleep. v. Lifting his axe, he smote the nearest pine, And echoes like rich music filled the air ; He sang for joy, and voices half-divine Pealed from the leafy crags and summits bare ; LUG GALA. 393 And round him myriad birds with joyance rare Warbled, with warbling echoes hailed again ; And the near torrent warbled in its lair, And the leaves prattled like a gentle rain, And every breath of heaven swelled the aerial strain. VI. There with stout beechen planks and boughs of oak, Axe-hewn, a cabin by the stream he framed. There found he shelter from the storms that broke With rain or snow, or lightnings when they flamed Athwart the tree-tops. Patiently he tamed The tender fawn ta’en from the ferny nest. Companionship of living beings claimed The human heart that languished in his breast, And wild things by his door soon learned to browse and rest. . . VII. Thrice grew the green leaf yellow in the woods, Thrice clung the snows along the wintry height, 394 L UGGALA . Thrice from the heath the moor-fowl led her broods, Thrice southward fled the swallow in mystic flight, And heavier rolled the day and dragged the night, And lonelier his lonely spirit grew ; When, one day, straying in the morning light Eastward, a mist its folds around him threw, And in its dusk he felt he climbed some mountain new. VIII. Then from that mountain swerved the mist away, And under him he saw with brightening soul Once more the Ocean in its glorious play ; Gladdening amid the light it seemed to roll Its great green waves around each grassy knoll And caverned crag, upleaping as to scale The smooth grey cliffs in joy without control, And back retreating o'er its silvery trail, With deep and thunderous plunge or soft melodious wail. LUGGALA. 395 IX. Adown the ferny steep with eager blood He sped; he drank athirst the sea’s cool breath ; Then to the lichened crags he strode, and stood And listened to the full waves’ tones beneath ; Then clomb from crag to fern, from fern to heath, Till, bounding from the smooth sea-grass, his feet Struck on the beach. As one that hasteneth Even to a lover he moved the waves to greet, Curved in their slow advance or whitening in retreat. x. There as he mused, he lifted up his eyes, And lo ! a Bark around the foreland near Came tossing on the billows. In surprise He rose, and with a momentary fear Grasped in a tightening hand his hunting-spear. But then great wonder the fierce impulse stayed ; For on the deck, all glorious, did appear, A Maiden passing fair, in white arrayed, Who stretched her hands for help, scared by Death’s hovering shade. 396 LUGGALA. XI. White-robed she stood upon that storm-worn wreck, The winds her dark hair blowing loose and long Around her shoulders and her snowy neck, And her voice rose as in a piteous song Borne o’er the waters on the breezes strong ; And Lionheart beholding bowed his head, Not knowing whether of the human throng She came, or from the Spirit-World had sped, Or if some fateful mist around his sight was shed. XII. But such a light of love and gentleness Lived in her face, and with such sad appeal She waved to him her arms in her distress, He yearned her heart’s deep misery to heal And yield his manhood’s utmost for her weal. Wild joys and love and pity his spirit swayed. No selfish fear can love or pity feel. He plunged into the blue deep undismayed, And on the waves’ lithe necks his palms undaunted laid. LUGGALA . 397 XIII. Gently from that frail Vessel’s broken deck, Half-awed, her yielding lissome form he drew, And laid her lustrous arms about his neck. Then down he slid into the waters blue, And, swimming on with even strokes and true, Reached the shore’s verge and pressed beneath his feet The solid welcome rims of Earth, and knew That he had saved alive that Maiden sweet, And felt within his breast Love’s wakening pinions beat. XIV. And when that Maiden beautiful and strange Stood safe from Death and sheltered on that shore, Her beauty to new beauty seemed to change. Upon her knees she sank as to adore Him who had snatched her from the Ocean hoar. He took her hands in his and reverently Unclaspt them, and in pity did implore That there, beyond the limits of the sea, From every dream of ill she might her bosom free. 398 LUGGALA. XV. So were his lips from their long silence loosed, And, gathering many a half-forgotten word, He spake to her. His tongue, to speech unused, Faltered, as if in nightmare-pangs deterred ; And of its sounds it seemed she nothing heard, Or hearing understood not. Yet her eyes Spake and her spirit’s deep trust in him averred More than all voices with their melodies, Answering his heart’s wild prayer with earnest mute replies. XVI. But when he knew no answer from her lips Arose in any tongue, an icy dread Crept over him. What if in dire eclipse Her soul lay buried, to all utterance dead ! Y et nay ! the mind that such sweet influence shed Lived in the light of Heaven. But silence deep As Death’s own stillness o’er that mind was spread. Cold through his heart the unwelcome dream would sweep — Dumb were her lips — ay, dumb— locked in a life- long sleep ! LUG GALA. 399 XVII. “ O cruel fate/’ he cried, “ that I, so long A dweller in lone silence, thus at last Clasping a living hand, while Thought’s glad throng Crowds to my lips, should find that I but cast Words to the wind ! . . O beauteous shape that hast Such love in thy dark eyes, can never speech Tell of thy home, or of thy dangers past? Must thou so range beyond my spirit’s reach, And must we alway dwell so sundered each from each?” XVIII. But while he murmured, lo ! a wind awoke Blowing from shore with clouds and fleeting ray, And the whole sea in stormy spray-showers broke, With myriad rainbows hung amid the spray. Then swift across the waters in their play Sped the frail Wreck, and, borne in eddying air, Vanished amid the mists of the wild bay. Forlorn upon that shore so sad and fair, She fell upon his breast and wept in her despair. 400 LUGGALA. XIX. Then up the steep he led her silently, Following a little rillet through the fern, Until they reached the summit o’er the sea; And there he pointed to the Mountain stem That faint in the morn’s mist he could discern Screening from sight behind its purple wall His dear retreat. Then did he inly yearn To bear her thither to its pinewoods tall, Its lake, its wooded crags, and murmuring waterfall. xx. He pointed to the misty heights, and cried, “ Beyond that barrier lies my lonely home, — A hut of hewn wood by a lake’s green side, Safe from the storms and ruthless Ocean’s foam. If thou art not a dream, O Loveliest, come Thither with me, and I will give thee food, And guard thee from the beasts of prey that roam Yon forests, shelter from the tempests rude, And all the dangers vast of this fair solitude. LUG GALA. 401 XXI. “ And we shall grow to love each other there, As day by day we wander in the Vale Or sit beside the smooth Lake's margin fair ; And Winter’s snow or frost, or withering gale That follows in sweet Summer’s golden trail, Will vex thee not, so much of peace and rest In dear Companionship abides. We fail In loneliness, and languish self-opprest. In Fellowship life flows perpetual in the breast. XXII. “ O, speak to me ! ” he ended. Her dark eyes Alone gave answer. In their deeps he read Her meaning. O’er her cheek’s clear roseate dyes The rosier flush of love and gladness spread. Then toward the West she bowed her queenly head, And, lifting up her arms in stately grace, She waved them toward the Mountain. With light tread D D 402 LUGGALA . Adown the steep she moved a little space. He clasped her hand; and thus they sought the Mountain’s base. XXIII. Toward evening that wide Mountain’s silent height They reached, and o’er its slopes descending slow Behold the Valley broke upon their sight, The darkling crags, the tranquil Lake below Mirroring in its deeps the crimson glow Of rippling clouds, the woods, the level lea ! And lovelier all the Valley seemed to grow, Alluring with its glorious blazonry Of stream and rock and mead and dell and bowery tree. XXIV. And Lionheart down-led her through the grove To his lone hut. And ever day by day Deeper and holier grew his bosom’s love ; And, though that mystery of silence lay For ever on her lips, and he would pray . LUG GAZA. 40 3 His gods to grant her the one gift of speech Nightly in vain, yet deep as woman may She loved him, and their spirits by that beach Spake in a clearer tongue than human art could teach. xxv. Then grew the hunter’s life again to him A rapture and a revel ; for he braved No more from poor self-love the forest dim, And the deep hollows where the torrents raved, And the tall crag where the rent pine-trees waved, And the brown marshes and the mountain-mere. And never in the chase his spirit craved Or rest or shield from danger far or near, Sounding his depths of love for her he held so dear, XXVI. And crowned with rich requital when, returning Aweary homeward in the gloaming sweet When all the skies and heights in red were burning, Robed in etherial light with silent feet 404 LUGGALA. Along the Lake’s cool shore she moved to meet Her lover and her lord, with warm lips pressed His sunburnt cheek, thrice happy thus to greet Her life’s completion. By her hands caressed He sat him down content, calm in that Vale of rest. . . XXVII. O, oft she sat beside him by the beach And sang in such sweet tones that all life’s care And weariness would pass beyond the reach Of his full heart, — sweet tones that in the air Rose softly, as the mist of morning fair Spreads from the valleys upward toward the skies And fills the glens and hollows everywhere Until amid the aerial deeps it dies Gently away and blends with heaven in our eyes — XXVIII. A strange sweet voice of delicate melodies That seemed the natural speech of all her thought ; LUG GALA. 405 Of all her love ; of far-off memories Borne from some distant world with wonders fraught Whence she had wandered; or of something sought Amid the vast Unknown in dreamy longing, Strange visions by Imagination wrought In loveliest involution that came thronging Before her mind, — soft dreams to twilight hours belonging. XXIX. And through the music of that magic voice He found her veiled being's inmost springs ; For where our cold mechanic language cloys And clogs the spirit's heaven-scaling wings, Or like some tangling net about it clings, Comes Music with her wand to set it free, And, lighter than the light wind’s wanderings, It moveth as it listeth, perfectly Revealing its full life of love and ecstasy. XXX. But most the soul of Lionheart she moved Sitting below the stars in the soft night, 406 LUGGALA. And holding fast the hand of him she loved, Her face to heaven upturned in the clear light, While spirit with spirit enfolded in far flight Soared, as her voice, with joy ineffable Borne onward in Imagination’s might Through the unfathomed spaces, seemed to tell Of lovelier worlds than this where men enfettered dwell. . . XXXI. And, with the splendours of life-teeming Spring, Twin babes of more than mortal loveliness Made rich their habitation (ministering To the soul’s need, that evermore will press Toward that which draws it with its dear caress From dreams of Death to dreams of years to be) Twin boys, — a twofold fount of happiness ; One with his mother’s face of Faerie, One golden-haired, with eyes blue as the summer sea. LUGGALA . 407 XXXII. And Lionheart to them the language taught Of his far home ; and once again he heard The old familiar sounds of childhood (fraught With memories dear enclaspt in every word) Babbled beside his knee ; and longings stirred His breast to pass once more the sailless deep, Following the lithe and lightning- winged bird, When they should learn with bended oar to sweep The waters loud with storm or lulled in silvery sleep. XXXIII. But as they grew in years they seemed to him Far other than his mates by Donau stream, Whose faces through the mist of memories dim Came like the fleeting phantoms of a dream. A gentler beauty from their eyes did beam, And gentler loves to gentler things they bare Than the strong children of the woods beseem; And though the hunter’s feats they loved to dare, Yet in their moods of heart a loftier life had share. 408 LUG GALA. XXXIV. They loved the colours of the mountain-flowers ; They loved in April woods the reddening spray ; They brooded on the rainbows in the showers ; They watched the clouds far drifting as theyflay ; Strange carven forms they fashioned in their play; They knit wild fancies to the melodies That wordless from their mother’s lips would stray ; They followed in their rovings the brown bees, And mimicked the bright birds amid the summer trees. . . XXXV. Now had seven years made strong their supple forms, And yet no wrinkle on that Mother’s brow Was graven, nor had ever Winter’s storms Or suns of Summer on her breast of snow The whiteness sullied ; fair she seemed and young As on that morn, seven fleeting years ago, LUGGALA. 409 When the lone man his arms had round her flung And leaped with her faint life the rolling waves among. XXXVI. But now, as by the margin of the Lake One lustrous eve they sat, and Lionheart Held her smooth hand in his, and her eyes spake Assurance of deep love, with sudden start Loosening her gentle palm she stept apart And bent her eyes toward the farther shore, Where the gold waves of Anamoe out-dart ; And, following her gaze the waters o’er, He saw from the tall reeds emerge with plumage hoar, XXXVII. Together cleaving with one even stroke Of their invisible feet the rosy deep, Seven Swans, from whose white breasts the ripple broke In quivering circlets at each eager leap Of their clear forms, as on they seemed to sweep To some unheard sweet rhythmic melody, 4io LUGGALA . Still moving from the shadows of the steep, Slow toward the marge where, standing silently, She watched their proud advance in rapt expectancy. XXXVIII. Then such great joy and sorrow o’er her face, As on they came, he saw with wondering eyes, Such rapture and such anguish interlace Or with alternate sudden sway arise And pass, and saw her breast with such deep sighs Heaving and trembling as in bliss and pain, That with perplexed thought and dread surmise His spirit was shadowed. Still the beauteous Train Advanced, each snowy neck linked with a golden chain. XXXIX. She — standing on the verge with one arm raised As if to welcome that fair Team, and one Stretched backward toward her Lover where he gazed, As if for some neglect she would atone ; Her loosened hair wide from her temples thrown ; LUGGALA . 411 Her sweet face flushed with strange unearthly light — More lovely far appeared than when alone He first beheld her from that Headland’s height ; Lovelier than ever since through seven swift summers’ flight. XL. But now appeared (drawn by that snowy Team In golden traces), chariot-shaped, a shell All gold, wherein some viewless Spirit did seem To stand and guide by subtle magic spell Of Spiritland that gently o’er them fell Those Seven white beauteous Birds of Faerie, And shoreward o’er the waters did impel Their winged forms with deep abounding glee, In servitude more sweet than reinless liberty. XLI. Curving their necks as if for love and joy, Beside her feet they laid the Car at rest. Quick turned she to her children, and each boy Close in a passionate embrace she pressed. Then Lionheart she sought, and on his breast 412 LUGGALA. Fell, clinging with deep love and wild despair. Then some fierce power seemed her form to wrest From his strong grasp and to that Chariot fair To draw her and compel her feet to enter there. XLII. She entered, and the snowy Team once more, Driven by that viewless Spirit, the clear Car Drew o’er the waters from the tawny shore, Beneath the shadows of the mighty scar, With feet of sable moving fleet and far. Down to the brink ran Lionheart, each hand Raised as to plunge beyond the sandy bar, Following ; but, stayed as by an iron band, He stood with each strong foot firm-rooted to the land. XLIII. Stiffened as if to stone, the strong man gazed, While o’er the water she was borne away. Erect she stood, her snowy arms upraised And stretched to him. On by the mountain grey The faery Team still urged its silent way, LUGGALA. 4i3 Coasting the placid Lake, till, nigh the stream Whence first they seemed to ’gin their voyage gay, They turned amid the glorious sunset’s gleam, And round the woodland shore sailed in the kindling beam. XLIV. Then suddenly on broad white wings upsoaring They rose from the still Lake and sought the sky, Their wild way through wide heaven with pinions oaring. And, clasping his two sons, with desolate cry The Hunter in his lonely agony The eastern hill ascended. There he stood, Following their flight afar with yearning eye, As, skirting the rough hills and forest rude, They scaled in towering flight the skyey solitude. XLV. Between his children standing, round each neck An arm, spell-bound he followed, as it rose And curved in stately motion without check 414 LUGGALA. In its free course, far through the eve’s repose, That aery Chariot. Like a cloud that glows Against the setting beam, still drifting on Into that fount from which its glory flows, It moved into the deeps of light that shone Amid the burning West, slow toward the sunset drawn, XLVI. Farther and farther, dwindling as it went, In ’mid the rosy beams and wells of gold And lines of saffron and of azure blent, Till, gathered in the sunset’s fieriest fold, It passed, a speck, away. . . Then dark and cold The mountain-shadows fell upon the Vale. Down on the fallen leaves and fragrant mould Sank Lionheart, and from his lips a wail Of hopeless anguish rose, thrilling the darkening dale. . . XLVII. Three moons in silent sorrow in his hut Forlorn the Hunter crouched. The fourth he grew LUGGALA . 4i5 Calmer, and now no more his sad heart shut To Hope’s faint beam that still its radiance threw Into its drear recesses. Life anew Awoke in his firm frame, and forth he fared To chase the antlered braves amid the dew, And to the storms again his brow he bared, And with those two blithe boys the midmost forest dared. XLVIII. Yet sorrow ever back with rest would come, And life transformed itself to weariness Where’er by heath or forest he might roam. Mourning he roved the waste, and less and less His boys’ young love his heart with hope could bless ; Yea, sometimes in his bitterer grief and pain Back from his knees their fingers he would press, And then would clasp them to his breast again, While o’er his storm-worn cheek the bursting tears would rain. 4i6 LUGGALA. XLIX. Nine years as with a desperate armed foe Day after day with that strong grief he fought, And in the tenth, struck by a mortal blow From the fell sword, his strength became as nought. His hut’s deep shadow feebly then he sought, And on its fern and moss his limbs outspread, And, burthened with the weight of weary thought, He called his stalwart sons beside his bed, And through his life’s long past their wondering fancies led. L. He told them of the Donau forests hoar, And how from their vast shade in joyous youth He had wandered till he found the Ocean’s shore, And how he sailed the waters, and in ruth, By beaches white with foam and isles uncouth, He saw his brave companions one by one Droop at the oar and die ; and how in sooth LUG GALA. 4i7 He too had longed to sleep as they had done, Till there he found sweet rest beneath that temperate sun; LI. And how their Mother from the dread sea-wave He had snatched, and all the wonder of her love. And he besought them in some mountain-cave To lay his body that bright Vale above, Or on the hill-side nigh the voiceful grove, Looking toward the sundown. Then he laid His hands upon their foreheads, as he strove With Death, and on their lives a blessing prayed And darkness o’er him swept with evening’s deepen- ing shade. LII. Then those fair youths in silent sorrow bore His body to the hill-side, where an oak Stretched its grey branches toward the Lake’s green shore; And there his grave they hewed with many a stroke ; E E 418 LUGGALA. And from the crag a fragment rude they broke, And set it up the tale of death to tell. Then from grief’s numbness their young hearts awoke, And in the silence of the lonely dell Each on his brother’s neck with sobs of anguish fell. LIII. And one hath sung, “Those youths of mystic birth, Left lonely thus amid that lonely land Out from their natal Valley’s narrow girth Thereafter wandered to the grey sea-strand, With patient toil and cunning operant hand Built them a bark, and, eastward faring, found The goodly Isle whose shadowy mountains grand Oft-times in hunting o’er the moorland-ground Afar they had beheld beyond the sea’s blue bound ; LIV. “ And, round it coasting, passed another sea, And reached their Father’s land at last, and led Thence back a tribe in glad exultancy, LUG GALA. 419 To people the fair Vale where they were bred ; Whose children’s-children its wild woodlands tread To-day, or sow the fields by many a rill From many a stormy mountain-summit shed To the rough Wicklow bays, or bend to till The lowland glebe, or lead their flocks from hill to hill.” LV. And one hath sung, “Far toward the burning West They wandered through the inland forests fair, And sailed across the Ocean broad in quest Of visionary splendours, and they were The first of men that waste of waves to dare, And first to hail amid their lonely mirth Those mightier Shores that now all promise bear Of all that shall be done of loftiest worth In the full gorgeous noon and evening of our Earth.” TO LUGGALA. R AIN and rough storm the mountains swept that day When first we climbed into the heathery heights With hearts expectant, pressing on our way, Young voyagers, athirst for new delights, In search of thy long-sighed-for solitude ; And all was doubt and darkness as we passed Mile after mile through moorlands bleak and nude, ; Mid grasses whistling in the mountain-blast, By seething tarn and swollen torrent loud, Torn path and broken bridge ; till wide and sweet Beamed all at once the sun from mist and cloud, And lo, in light and glory at our feet Lay in their leafy hollow, like a dream, Thy smooth bright lake, grey crags, and winding stream ! TO M. E. A. T HINK of me, Dearest, by the breaking seas And by the streamlets murmuring through the vale ; O, blend thy thoughts of me with flowers and trees, With the wind’s sighings, with the seabird’s wail, The thrush’s plaint, the lark’s clear ecstasies, With splendours of wild sunsets in the west, With the white clouds adrift in starry skies, With all of earth that wakes a gladness in thy breast ! For then shall I from out thy memory’s range Never be cast, — yea, though I die this hour 422 TO M. E. A. And thou live on through years and years of change, I shall not be forgotten. Leaf and flower My name enamelled in thy sight will bear, The waves will moan of me, Earth’s silences Pervade thee with my presence unaware, And old love-dreams illume thy dreariest loneliness. TO FRANCIS AND RAYMOND SAVAGE ARMSTRONG. M Y little boys, if ye have from my heart Drawn aught of impulse, or to him whose name These mountain-pines shall murmur to our ears For ever stand as heirs in anywise, Hereafter ye will thank Eternal Heaven That ye have made the waves upon this shore Your playmates, and in broken baby-words Babbled to them, and on your faces felt The spray of the wild torrents of these hills, And deemed their rapture human like your own. And I have seen you loiter many a time, With eyes uplifted, gazing at the clouds 424 TO F AND R . S.-ARMSTKONG. That flecked the high blue summer-morning sky, Or, with your little hands outstretched and throats Strained backward, calling to the wasted moon White in the sunbeams. In the eventide Ye by the windows lingering, ere sweet sleep Folds you in darkness, toward the purple peaks Aspire, and wave to them a quaint “ good-night,” And to the rainbows o’er the showery sea Kiss your adieus. So love them to the last, So draw them to your spirits. Ye will not find The heart of Nature pulseless. She will speak With kindred love ; and ye are one with her As ye with me are one — bone of her bone, Flesh of her flesh. O, let your tenderest joys With her be wound, your childhood’s merriest hours Be spent with her ! So shall ye seldom miss The human-hearted Godhead in the World, The Spirit and the sympathetic Mind Man’s spirit craveth, — that divine response TO F AND R. S.-ARMSTRONG. 425 Of the illimitable, numberless Forces that are not he , which finding not The Universe is but his prison-cell, And all things outward pitiless and void. SONG-TIME IS OVER. i. S ONG-TIME is over, No soarings for me ; Winds pipe in the stubble, The frost ’s on the lea, The sun will not tarry, The air has grown chill, The heather hangs rusted, The hail ’s on the hill. 2. What joy were in singing Athwart the wet wind, In the lash of the sleet-shower Adrift and half-blind ? “ SONG-TIME IS OVER . 427 I will soar not again Till the sad seasons pass, But fold the tired wings And drop down to the grass. SONG-TIME TO COME. M UTE? — Ay, but bear me back once more To that dear Land of light Where magic memories haunt the shore, And breathe from every height ; My pulse will leap from this dull sleep, And heart and voice will sing Free as the lark when first he feels The sunrise on his wing. NOTES. Title-Page. “ Stories of Wicklow .” HT HE origin of this Title (and indeed of this Book) is ex- plained in the Life and Letters of Edmund J. Armstrong (Longmans), pp. 385, 386, 387. Of the “ Stories ” in this volume The Fisherman is a true narrative taken from the lips of a Wicklow seafarer, while The Glen of the Horse and The Bursting of Lough Nahanagan are both founded on fact. The incident of the rescue in Luggala and the character of the heroine of that poem have their counterparts in the legends of more countries than one, the most remarkable parallels being perhaps those which constitute the Modern- Greek myth of the birth of the Modern-Greek hero Petros Bey. The Swans play a conspicuous part in Irish-Keltic legendary lore. 43 ° NOTES. Page 4. Darragh . “ Darragh ” is here a pseudonyme ; but there is a stream so called which runs through a familiar and beautiful region of Wicklow. Page 147. Giltspear. The “Little Sugarloaf” mountain. To the two peaks known as “The Sugarloaves” tradition ascribes a Keltic name signifying Gilt Spear-heads , an epithet suggested, it is said, by the fact that their fine points catch the first rays of the rising sun, and retain the golden tints of sunset longer than the neighbouring hill-tops. I have never met any peasant who was able to corroborate this tradition in any way. Page 148. Slieve- Cullinn . The ancient Keltic name of the mountain commonly known as “ Big Sugarloaf.” The name signifies, I believe, The Mountain of Hollies ; but some have discerned in it an allu- sion to the Smith-God of Keltic mythology. NOTES. 43 1 Page 154. The Lord of Darragh here describes the Wicklow-folk as the Author in his rambles has always found them. May the description long continue applicable to them ! Page 236. Altadore. The name of this little glen seems to be an ancient Keltic compound (A/t-a-dur), which admirably describes its distinc- tive feature, — its water bounding from its cloven height in a succession of falls. Page 364. Luggala. Pronounced (as it is frequently spelt), Luggelaw. CHISWICK PRESS C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE. WORKS OF GEORGE FRANCIS ARMSTRONG. A Ox A RL AND FROM GREECE. Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price 9 s. “Mr. Armstrong maintains, and even improves, his position among the English poets of the day .... No writer of the time, except Mr. Matthew Arnold — and, if we are to take his ‘Transcripts’ into account, of course, Mr. Browning — has so thoroughly imbibed the classical spirit.” — Spectator. “We may confidently recommend the volume to all readers who may wish to realize so much of physical Greece as a book may convey. The variety of subjects and treatment is remarkable. But nowhere does Mr. Armstrong appear otherwise than at his ease .... Mr. Armstrong is under the marked influence of no particular school. His writing possesses individuality both of thought and expression, and he has at his command an abundant flow of melodious verse .... A very charming volume.” — Pall Mall Gazette. “It consists of a medley of poems, all dealing with the subject of Greece from topographical, historical, legendary, political, and other points of view. As might be expected, the legendary and antique poems are the best, especially ‘ Selemnos,’ a poem which would give more than one good subject to an artist, and the ‘ Closing of the Oracle.’ All the book is scholarly and thoroughly readable.” — Academy. “Mr. Armstrong has drawn enthusiasm from several sources. The actual scenery of Greece does not seem to impress him with the sense of desolation which it produces on some spectators. He is enthusiastically Phil-Hellenic as to the present inhabitants of the country ; and he has the classical sympathies and associations which might be expected from a cultivated Englishman. These various motives find expression by turns in his verse.” —A theneeum. “A delightful book .... A large part of the merit of this work lies in the choice of subjects ; but the treatment is very vigorous, and the ‘Brigand of Parnassus’ and ‘The Last Sortie from Mesolonghi ’ are especially fine .... There is one poem which is not of Greek origin, but has an extraordinary depth of analysis and emotion ; it is entitled ‘ Time the Healer.’ New York Evening Post. “Whatever may be the subject dealt with, it is always treated with delicacy and taste. The reader feels that not only is the local colouring true, that the places alluded to are accurately as well as picturesquely described, but that the characters introduced are real flesh and blood, and not merely lay-figures in a Greek dress .... A volume of poetry 2 which may not only be glanced at, but studied, with pleasure/’ — ■ Edinburgh Courant. “ Mr. George Francis Armstrong’s name and works will be familiar to all real students of the English poets of the day. He is the author of several volumes of really noble lyric and dramatic poems, which in the opinion of the judicious hold a far higher place than a great deal of verse that happening to be in accord with the superficial moods of the time, commands a greater temporary popularity .... Graceful word-pictures of Greek scenery, echoes and versions of old myths, and stirring ballads and tales in verse of the struggles of the modern Hellenes with their Mussulman oppressors, make up its contents. Mr. Armstrong employs many metres and shows himself a master of them all.” — Scotsman. “ [He] has long been placed high amongst living poets by all who can appreciate earnest thought and a worthy choice of subjects wedded to thoroughly good technical treatment .... Contains some of the Author’s finest work .... Hardly any praise could be excessive for such musical and stirring songs as the ‘Agoyat’ and the ‘ Klepht’s Flight' .... ‘The Death of Epicurus’ must be read; selections from this noble poem could only do it injustice .... These lines have not been surpassed by any living writer.” — Graphic. “A volume of poems from Mr. Armstrong is always sure of a welcome in the literary world. [He] has so often and so successfully proved his power ©f producing strong and musical verse appealing directly to the highest poetic sentiment, that his claim to distinguished notice amongst contemporary poets cannot be disregarded.” — Irish Times. “The present volume has merits quite distinctive and exceptional. But for the occasional apostrophes to England, the love of English ideals, and the purity of the English idiom we might take the book for the work of a native Greek .... Old tales and legends are charmingly revived in ‘The Satyr,’ ‘Orithyia’ and ‘Selemnos;’ Marathon and Chseronea receive their meed of loyal remembrance ; and the modern struggles of the Greeks for liberty are fitly pictured and sung in the 4 Brigand of Parnassus,’ ‘The Last Sortie from Mesolonghi,' and ‘The Chiote.’ With nature as with man the poet feels a full and friendly sympathy, and the humblest phases of the world’s life are reflected in his song.” — Boston (U S') Literary World. POEMS : Lyrical and Dramatic. A New Edition. Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price 6s. “ Mr. G. F. Armstrong, whose genuine poetical abilities have still, we hope, to bear good and lasting fruit, has re-issued his 4 Poems Lyrical and Dramatic,’ for the most part early works, full of the exuberant promise and vitality of youth.” — Guardian. “ Son livre le fait connaitre pour un esprit sincere, profonddment reli- gieux, mais n’accordant sa confiance a aucune des eglises ou des sectes de son pays, pour un cceur aimant qui s’epanchait dans des vers plutdt ten- dres que passionnes.” — Revue des Deux Mondes. 3 UGONE: A Tragedy. A New Edition. Fcap. 8vo., doth, price 6s. “ We notice with pleasure a new edition of this tragedy, which has been vigorously conceived, and written with sustained spirit and elegance . . . The explanations in the closing scene are spontaneous and thoroughly animated, the circumstances have been judiciously prepared, and the spectacle becomes absorbing and magnificent /’ — Pall Mall Gazette. “ A composition of really remarkable performance and of genuine pro- mise .” — Saturday Review . KING SAUL. (THE TRAGEDY OF ISRAEL, PART I.) Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price 5 s. '‘The violent, but always unsuccessful, efforts of remorse to find oblivion in a deliberate attitude of defiance, the sense of the hollowness of kingship when severed from the reality of influence, and the king’s still eager love of his people, though blurred always by despair, and sometimes by the brute impulse of impotent jealousy against the foredestined suc- cessor, have been taken up one after another in Mr. Armstrong’s drama in a really masterly manner .... We can scarcely find a higher commen- dation for the tragedy of ‘ King Saul ’ than to say that in choosing his subject its author did not overtax his legitimate strength.”— Saturday Review. KING DAVID. (THE TRAGEDY OF ISRAEL, PART II.) Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price 6s. “ There can be no doubt as to the imaginative vigour, and persistent intellectual power with which Mr. Armstrong pursues his task .... The sequence of events sweep along in his pages with a grand impressive roll, having the deep music of passion and imagination for an appropriate accompaniment.” — Guardian. “ Mr. Armstrong’s right to be numbered among our poets is conceded.” — Sunday Times . 4 KING SOLOMON. (THE TRAGEDY OF ISRAEL, PART III.) Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price 6s. “ Dramatic poems which can claim to have captivated the critics, not of this country only, but of France, Germany, and America.”— Edinburgh Review. “ There can be no doubt that this is in various ways a production dis- playing genuine power and original thought .... A vivid dramatic poem, dealing with various problems of human passion, suffering, and trial. The language and often the ideas, are entirely modern, but this only helps to bring out the essential humanity of the men before us, and the reality of their flesh and blood.” — Saturday Review. “ To the energy of purpose necessary to approach and grapple with a theme so gigantic, there has been joined a patience in execution which has allowed of no slovenly work to the best of its judgment ; no mean skill in the mechanism of verse ; a fancy fertile in conceptions which not seldom reach grandeur ; and a remarkable descriptive faculty . . . . ‘ King Solomon’ is in the portraiture of the hero the best of the three plays.” — A cademy. “ Quite uncommon mastery of language and much melody of versifica- tion distinguish it [‘ The Tragedy of Israel ’]. For energy of rhetoric, for the really poetical beauty of the lyrical portions of it, for the richness of imagery which adorns, even over-adorns it throughout, it takes high rank among the poems of the present day.” — Spectator. “ We must designate the attested powers of the poet as extraordinarily great — so elevated is his imagination ; so full of idealism his representa- tion of powerful emotions ; and, finally, so perfectly beautiful his lan- guage.” — Magazin fiir die Literatur des Auslandes (Berlin). “ Poete comme son frere Edmund, mort ll y a quelques annees, M. G. F. Armstrong s’etait fait connaitre par un recueil de Poemes lyriques et dramatiques et par une tragedie d 'Ugone, quand il donna le Roi Saul, qui a justement augmente sa reputation, accrue encore par le Roi David et le Roi Salomon .” — Polybiblion (Paris). “ As contributions to modern classics these work are destined to hold high rank and be universally admired.” — Boston (U. S.) Commonwealth. THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF EDMUND J. ARMSTRONG. Fcap. 8vo., with Portrait and Vignette. Price Js. 6d . “ There was a fulness of life, and of Irish life, in Edmund Armstrong, of which the years he lived afford no measure The faculties, elements, and activities which went with it were very various ; it was a 5 life abounding in happiness and hope, with seasons of gloom and sore dis- turbance ; abounding in loves and admirations— love and admiration of nature, love and admiration of books, and other and still more passionate loves and admirations ; full of reflection and emotion, giving out at one time ‘ Hyblsean murmurs of poetic thought, Industrious in its joy ; ’ Giving birth at another to battles of the spiritual instincts with their intel- lectual persecutors and destroyers ; and passing through all forms and phases of belief, unbelief, disbelief, and misbelief, though happily finding its way at last' to faith and peace In the biographies of these times the merit of all merits which is rarest is ‘ the tender grace of not too much.’ To this merit, as well as many others, the biography of Edmund Armstrong may fairly lay claim His life was a poem.” — Edinburgh R eview. “ His life had in it material enough for two lives of the same length — frolics of boyhood, the growth of a passion for external nature, ardent friendship, an unsatisfied love, the loss and restoration of a faith, author- ship in prose and verse, all these filled to the full the narrow count of his years The editor has done his work well, with all reverence and love for his dead brother, and with many lively and tender touches of his own . ” — A cademy. “Mr. George Francis Armstrong’s memoir of this remarkable youth is full of deep interest for all who care to follow the mental throes and ex- perience of a nature at once highly intellectual and exceedingly emotional — its struggles towards development, its yearnings and efforts in search of truth It is the growth of his mind, the influences under which it was shaped, and the processes through which it passed which his brother depicts with a literary grace all the more enjoyable because of its entire freedom from artificiality, and with a sympathy and insight inspired by hi's deep affection for his subject.”— Scotsman. “Armstrong had a varied, turbulent soul-life within himself, and he could truly be ranked with those among whom Georges Sand’s happy re- mark finds application, ‘ 11 y a des gens qui vivent beaucoup a la fois et dont les ans comptent double . . . . By the adoption of many of the charming original letters of the deceased, George Armstrong has, as far as the construction was possible, fashioned an autobiography out of a bio- graphy ; and by this means he has attained his object, to give the reader a vital picture of the poet. We fancy that we see before us the highly- gifted youth, to whom in an unusual measure it was given to awaken in- terest and sympathy, and make himself the centre of a circle of loving friends. His joyous inspiration works contagiously through his vivacity, and his nimble, merry fancy brings us in a moment from tears to laughter ; while on the other hand the daring with which his youthful spirit plunged into the darkest depths of the human soul, and the fortitude with which he bore severe bodily suffering, fill us with true reverence. Magazin fur die Literatur des Auslandes (Berlin). 6 EDITED BY THE SAME AUTHOR. THE POETICAL WORKS OF EDMUND J. ARMSTRONG. A New Edition, containing many Poems not before published. Fcap. 8vo., with Portrait on Steel by C. H. Jeens, and Vignette. Price 5«r. “Of course his powers in descriptive as well as in other poetry are seen to more advantage in his twenty-first than in his eighteenth year ; and a few lines from ‘ The Prisoner of Mount Saint Michael,’ written in 1863, will show not only his gifts in that kind, but something more. . . . The impressions from nature in such passages as these are skilfully inter- posed to afford the reader a short and very needful rest in the somewhat headlong course of a tumultuously tragic story ; and in this the skill is seen in the rhythm as well as in the change of scene. There could hardly be found elsewhere an example of blank verse written at so early an age with such happy measurements in its structure, and with move- ments so easy and so graceful The story is wildly frightful, but not at all beyond the bounds of what human nature can find room for in the way of possible guilt and crime on the part of the heroine, and possible weakness and bewilderment on the part of her lover As a plot for a melodrama no story could be better. . . . The power evinced [in its treatment] is very rare ; and it may be observed with equal truth that in these days the skill by which a good story is constructed is also rare. .... Into the extant lyrical poems of Edmund Armstrong — the extant miscellaneous lyrical, that is — as well as into the non-extant dramatic, the element of humour found its way ; not, however, into those which are lyrical in the stricter sense, not into the songs. These spring from an unmixed emotion, simple and sad ; and as in the case of Kingsley (to whose noble nature and wide range of faculties and feelings those of Armstrong have rather a singular resemblance), his saddest songs may be said to be born of the sea ; and his saddest are, of course, his sweetest.” — Edinburgh Review. “Lyrical, dramatic, and narrative, they exhibit considerable mastery of verse ; they betray a passionate temperament (often craving repose) and a vigorous, if sometimes unchastened, imagination.” — Academy. “ Poems lit by the fire of genius, beautiful in form, deep and lofty in thought, and displaying especially that intense love of nature and en- joyment of her mysteries and charms, the possession of which in full measure is accorded only to very few Of the poems the longest and most ambitious is the ‘ Prisoner of Mount Saint Michael,’ a wild story of passion and crime, which is full of unmistakable power. But it is in some of his shorter poems and lyrics that Armstrong’s genius is most fully revealed.” — Scotsman. “Among these [poems] ‘ The Prisoner of Mount Saint Michael ’ stands preeminent. It is a narrative in blank verse The conflicting passions are powerful and vivid, but also tender and rich in sensitiveness. Some descriptive passages, especially descriptions of landscape, are very delicate. A melodious tone runs through the whole Every verse of his breathes healthfulness, and has an effect as refreshing— a rarity in this ag ;/ ''■/ y\ ■■ t Y y Y TsY . Y x yyyy Yi