Mulhern Donation IRISH POEMS AND LEGENDS; HISTORICAL AND TRADITIONARY, WITH ILLUSTRATIVE NOTES. BY THOMAS C. IRWIX GLASGOW: CAMEHON & FERGUSON, 88 WEST NILE STREET, GLASGOW : DUNN AND WRIGHT, PRINTERS. Betucate THIS BOOK IRISH BALLADS, SKETCHES, AND SONGS, TO MY COUNTRYMEN, NATIVE AND E3IIGBANT. 761904 PREFACE. THIS volume commences with a few legendary Ballads illustrative of the successive periods of ancient Irish History, Pagan and Christian. Ballads on general sub- jects follow ; and to these succeed Songs, Sketches, and Poems, which reflect, however imperfectly, the feelings and scenery of the Race and Land. As political themes not being very capable of poetic treatment do not enter into the composition of this book, it may be trusted that it will be acceptable to all classes who read Irish or English verses. Of mine, the public will form an estimate, favourable or the reverse. Of the cost at which the book is presented, there can be no difference of opinion ; as one which contains nearly six thousand lines of Original Poetry for Sixpence or One Shilling, according as it is sold in paper or bound, may challenge comparison with even the cheapest American reproductions of British literature. As the object of the Publishers, Messrs. CAMERON & FERGUSON, is to adapt a volume of Irish VI PREFACE. Poetry to the means of even the poorest of the intel- lectual classes of those Islands and the Colonies, it is to be hoped that the richer classes will not before per- usalestimate its literary merits by its cost. Just now Manchester outsells the world, and Glasgow bids fair to compete with Manchester in "prints" of another de- scription. T. C. I. CONTENTS, Paga From Asia to Erie Miletus, 9 The Departure, 12 The Voyage 14 Eodga and Mugha 17 The Legend of Diortha, the Bard, 26 St Patrick and Aengus, 31 St Columba's Spell, A.D. 560, 39 The Battle of Cill Mosanhog, 41 The Wanderings and Lamentations of Queen Gormilaith, ... 47 Ebba and her Sisters, 63 The Story of the Lord of Tarbert 1630, 67 The Prisoner of Limerick, 63 A Legend of King Arthur's Days, 66 Castle and Bower, 70 The Peasant's Pilgrimage, 75 The Sea Serpent 77 Skeleton Stories 79 The Phantom Ship, 79 Old Tor Quid's Yarn, 82 The Pursuit, 85 The Fiend Face, 86 Una, 89 Before the Battle 91 The Evening. 91 The Night, 92 The Death Storm, ... 93 The Potato Digger's Song, 96 The Emigrant's Voyage 93 Evening, 93 Morning, 93 The Old Sword of Ireland 93 The Irish Girl to her Dead Mother, 100 A Vision of Erie, 103 Swift, 106 Vlll CONTEXTS, Page Grattan Ill Squibs from the Crimean War 112 Before Sebastopol, 114 An Irish Mother's Dream, 115 The Hosts of Night, 117 The Old Minstrel's Fireside, 118 The Poor Poet to his Verses, 119 Song of All Hallow's Eve, 121 Song of Spring, ... 123 Song, ... 124 St Patrick's Night in Old Times 125 A Lament for Donnybrook ... 127 Song The Fair, 129 A Health to the Nations, 130 A May- Day Revel, 133 A Student's Summer Ramble 137 Morning, 137 Noon, 133 Student's Song, 139 Evening, 141 Song 142 The Exile's Lament, 143 Hymn of Progress, 114 NOTES, 147 IRISH BALLADS, SKETCHES, AND SONGS, BY THOMAS C. IRWIN. WITH ILLUSTRATIVE ^NGTES FROM ASIA TO ERIEi - " l ' OW Colonizing Days (Pafjan Period. ) MILETUS i. GOLDEN evening fronted the Carian coast many citied and villaged; A land of white shores and mountains blue, and broad plains wooded and tillaged; From the roofs of the blossomed chesnuts deep, and syca- mores of the valley, O'er hollow and slope the numerous nightingales were begin- ning to rally, While other birds surceased their song, awakening amid the glory, To chant in a stillness, all their own, their emulous evening story, From cape to cape, in the radiant calm, exuberant and unceasing, Like palpitant waves of a fresh spring tide multitudiiiously increasing. Hose hues bathed the Messogian summits and lawns, where, sheep surrounded, Lay the herdsmen under the foliage; and as the low sun rounded, Flaming across the azure Asian sea and its islands famous- Green Ikarid, Patmos, Cos to the west, and northward Samoa Stretching steep headlands into the glow circled by many an arbour, Along the leafy hills to the south, Miletus' city and harbour Was seen, with temples white, and mole by vessels numerous masted O'ertopp d all the black sails up-clewed that Boreas often had blasted io Wlien vapours of the thundering pole, from the Etixine were rolling grey on, And tempest scudded the foam of the swollen tenebrous Aegean, But, lustrous level were now the waters; by curved shores yellow sanded The wave worn fisher vessels in lines beyond the sprays were stranded; While by the smoky hall of a house above a grassy meadow A sea coast group sat under the stoney porch's sheltering shadow; Young men and ol, friends, at length the season has come when the sailing stars invite us To seek new regions, whither the winds may carry, or thy will, light us; To-morrow Milesus, king of men, with a colony of three hundred, Will leave the city haven there, and, with omen good for it thundered As the priest was offering sacrifice to Neptune the earth shaker Upon the prow of our loftest barque, and the captain has vowed to take her With the other nine Biremes of the fleet, out into the western ocean, Even to Hyperborean skies, beneath which, he -has a notion, Earned from some mariners of Phcenice, that an Island, grassy and spacious, Projects to the south of the winter heaven of shadow, its regions gracious, Wherein wild cattle abundant feed where lake and river are teaming With fish, as its. sheltered shores, with flocks of fowl in- numerate screaming; And where, 'tis said, are scattered a few dull barbarous Men of Cattle, Slaves to a tribe from the north of the sunset land, o'ercoino in battle; And these we doubt not to subdue, and awe from barbarous pillage By force of arms and minds, and mould them into servants of tillage; 11 For the law of the gods is this that the boor must yield to superior races, Even as the savage hunter clears the earth of the wild beasts' traces. Then say, friends, which of your strong sons hero will join our expedition, Of whose success the oracle yonder tells the holy tradition." Then one arose and said "Lo! I, Hereraon, and my brother, Eru, will take the voyage;" and hushed were the group, nor spake another, Until the young sea hero's sister fair and their aged mother Brake into sobs : for a while so still was the place, th' stream that tinkled Under the cliff was heard. Then the weeping woman, her forehead wrinkled, Raising from out her robe, said .sadly: "Sons, whom I've nursed and tended, I thought with me you still would abide until my years were ended; But now you desire to scatter my hopes of happy home and daughters Duteous and fruitful, by adventuring forth upon mighty waters Known to gods only; whence I may never see you again returning, Never again your voices hear, when the winter hearth is burning; Or in the fields of spring and autumn, or through the twilight rowing With boats fish-full to the creek beneath, when Hesperus is glowing; Yet, ne'eiiess sons of mine, youth's days are those shaped for adventure, Go, if ye will, nor from your parents expect reproach or censure The gods will guard ye but, 'tis hard to part " 110 more she uttered, While eager to course the seas remote, the youths together muttered, Yet rose when they saw that mother weeping, and kissed her forehead, crying, Clear voiced " Too full of life are you, our mother, to think of dying, Many a year's to come for you no less than us; but the ocean Draws all the youths away from this coast who take delight in motion 12 Cpon its bosom why then should we remain at home to wither Like unto trees rooted in rock, when the vastness draws us thither, To add new lands to those now known, and spread, whatever befaie us, Even to the isles where rest the stars, the glory of our Miletus, Which long has covered the north sea's coasts with cities Tomi, Cercesus, Odessus, Opollonia grand, rich Sinope and Trapezus; And such, even by the northern foam, we sons of the east will raise us. But fear not that, in day no more we'll meet, but in Hades only, Or that your lives, dear parents, will descend to winter lonely, We on the waves unseen: not so; familiar now with the heaven, The orbs, the winds, wherever about the seas we may be driven, Though all inhabited lands had sunk in the roaring ocean sunward, And our ships through the snow-drift's blinding sheet, by the pole sailed stormily onward, Our sure return expect, when some few hundred suns have faded, Or furthest, when spring greens the hills that winter thrice has shaded; M ay chance, with blocks of solid gold our shining poops upon set, Great deeds to tell, and wondrous tales of lands beyond the sunset. " THE DEPARTURE II. Next morn, when o'er Miletus' city the bright Opoll was soaring In splendour, harbourward an eager multitude came pouring Down the steep streets to the huge sea wall piled loftily over the dashing Billows, and from the Meander's wave past wooded villages flashing; In skiffs, too, from the haven's isles, Perne, green shored and shady Dronicus fronting the offing's tumbling surge, and clear springed Lade, To see the colony under its chief, sail forth for the unknown regions Beyond where the Cyiiese dwell, and the Cletoeh marshal their legions; 1.3 And thronged was every house-top soon with people cheering and hailing Their friends upon the waves; and a shout of mingled acclaim and wailing Rung through the glare, as the curved vessels rounding seaward surged By the lighthouse tower, with beat of oars through the breezy azure urged. And when the chaunt of the sacrifice, the priestesses} gathered together Round the old altar on the mole, had offered for fair weather, And the last prayer to the winds had ceased in the sacred hush that followed Those nearest the fleet on the promont's end the waves in caves had hollowed, For a while could hear the bleat of the sheep in the holds of the vessels blending, With the cries of the women and girls on the decks and over the high sterns bending; Seeing the waters widen between the ships, and their dear homes growing Dimmer and dimmer on city and shore, as the land wind freshlier blowing Bellied the stiff skin sails; while along the bay's marge auburn sanded, Running in crowds to look their last, and wave adieus white- handed Women, Ionian, Celtic, Carian, gathered, praying and weeping For their sea lovers, sons and brothers, close to the blue wave sweeping Its chill sprays over their sandalled feet; their robes of various tincture Blown backward like their yellow hair and bosoms loosened cincture; And some screamed shrill to the dwindling faces, and others overwhelmed With sorrow mutely dropp'd their tears in the brine, as the lofty helmed Vessels sunk down the windy bay, and along the golden low line Of sunset, had become as small as a scarce distinguished crow line. And still from the city's towers some watched the black fleet westward sailing; But, ere the night o'erhung the deep, and those shores of loss and wailing, 14 The city returned to its works and pleasures the streets were full of clamour, Again rung the armourer's shops with the chink of metal and and beat of hammer. In the troughs of colour the dyer steeped the long soft sunny fleeces, At the looms the women spun the cloths, and cut them in purple pieces For the needle of the embroiderer to fashion in costly ap- parel, Elaborate with device of silk, sardonix, silver, and beryl; With worshippers filled the twilight temples, whither, offer- ings varied, Meats and drinks, roses and fruits for the gods, by many were carried; And feasted the rich town folk in their chambers opening airily over The sea. At the city gates sung the bards, while white- robed girl and lover, Under the starry roof of the plane trees skirting the full volumed river, Whispering, wandered, or danced, as the moon on the current began to quiver; While down the windy sea-skies rounding in circles never ending, Of undulant water and azure air, the voyagers westward tending Followed the sun that followed them; and new moona over the mountains Grew full, or dwindling at midnight set on the groups by the sacred fountains. And year followed year, and the Pleiads thrice in the spring skies rose, but never Again returned those ten black barques to Miletus city and river. THE VOYAGE. III. Westward they steadily cleft the seas, at morn past sunny islands Their steep shores ranged with hamlets white under um- brageous highlands By temples top'd, whence waterfalls like threads of silver quivered, Down the oak-clothed heights to the verdant valleys, shining rivered, Where, in the golden spreading glow, from cottage roof and from altar, Straight rose the smoke till its slender azure pillar appeared to falter 15 In air from leafy steep to steep like hauling hazy bridges ; By headlands where the lazy billow tumbled along the ridges Of grey cliff overhung by clambering pale sea vine and sedges, And then the land was lost, and then it re-appeared and faded; And now the wind dropp'd to a calm o'er the heaving waste o'ershaded; And again was seen the sombre wave mounting the steep cape foamy, And shadowing gusts swept down from the north, that far away grew gloomy, Crossed by dark horizontal clouds, boding a breeze sail shaking, When night had fallen, and the hatches were closed, and the wave-strained timbers aching. Thus many a day those black ships voyaged, by storms dis- astrous scattered On populous coasts refitting in haste their sea gear, billow- shattered Between far blustering Thrace and the realms beneath whose cloudland sad is The black-jawed mountain barrier leading down to retumless Hades; And, south, the night-dark Ethiop nations past the desert sea line And the Lotus eaters, dreamily girt from the world by their giant tree line. Thus sailed those guests of the void by lengths of living lands, in sightless Distance sunk, whence zephyrs breathe from the wat'ry heavens nightless; Or, where from earth's Cimmerian north the cold broad winds Borean Blow under Bootes hung in gloomy blue, their hybernal pa3an; Driven through the wildiierness of foam and darkness, or with dawning Making some bay where bubbled the pure spring under its olive awning; Till at length the summits of Afric and Iberia, cloud sur- rounded, World against world frowned, over the Ocean plumet never sounded, Into whose starry vagueness suddenly by a storm they were carried, And, for a time, where distance itself had vanished, furiously hurried. 1C Then fear on them fell, for that shoreless waste they deemed a thing supernal The all-encompassing infinite of waters grey and eternal- Awful as an unknown God in the day and the dark it seemed Even when they hugged the winding coast and the cheerful sunlight beamed Immensity primeval, home of storms and invisible powers, Space where the isles divine of sunset open their valleys of flowers, Viewed but a moment as in a dream, and faint as through summer showers White beeches smiling with purple shells beneath elysian woodlands, Rivulets faint as the voices sweet that swoon from those golden flood sands; Whence, on the azure calm came floating ambrosial boughs, but rarely Seen by the mariner at the helm in the death still morning early, Weighed wdth celestial fruitage cold, rounded in sunset'3 blushes, Dropp'd from immortal arbourage, golden, wet, enchanted, luscious, Whose sweetness who can taste, may count on fortunate days, with ending Soft as Hesperian twilight into the starry waters blending. Thus, dauntless purposed, they sailed to the unknown north, by winds befriended Through dangers many on sea and shore, until that voyage ended On the southern coasts of a spacious Isle with deep blue bays serrated, Amid whose grassy plains of cattle and forests green it was fated Their lives should pass in a rainbow clime of showery airs and sunny, Where the fields abounded with milk, the rivers with fish, the oaks with honey; Where they were destined to teach its race the arts of the Celtic nation, That long had forgotten their wandering days in an Asian civilization ; And, far from the sunrise, lay their bones for ever on stony pillows, Under the northern stars, beside the long Atlantic billows. 17 KODGA AXD MUGHA. (I\ifjan Period, about GS A.D.) L A TALE of the times of old: in Erie, the noblest isle of the north, Which spreads its ample expanse of turf to the circling foam of the main, Where the mountains rise, like kings of the past, and the rivers flowing forth From their showery crests, make rich with their waters, the kiiie- abounding plain, Where the woods that give our slave-race shelter, in sun- heat and storm and rain, Yield up their loftiest oak and beech, for our palace walls and halls, For the multitudinous fleets of chieftains, many-oared and strong, High-built o'er the wave, with their warrior-rooms, wine- stores and cattle -stalls, To breast the surge of the swollen seas, whenever the mandate calls The hosts to the plunder of sightless shores, or avenge a monarch's wrong. Here are lands of white mantles and thronging spears, where hospitably gleams, The fortress fair, and the castle's fire, by the salmon-abound- ing streams. Here are headlands high, whence flames at night the beacon, far on the brine; Blue bays, where at anchor frequent float the foreign fleets of wine, And valleys of music, where Scolaidhe's bards, in times succeeding wars, Attune their golden harps in the leaves, 'mid the twinkle of tranquil stars; Here are harbours many, and deep and secure, whencever the tempests blow; Strong trench' d mansions and plains of cattle, milk and honey, and mead, galore; Here yearly, twice the flocks increase, twice with apples the orchards groan, Here circles perpetual April fresh, and summer in months not her own; And a puissant race, renowned no less for song than the spear and bow, Sons of the Sun they worship, hold the land from shore to shore. 13 *Twas the time when Guyon tlie Wiso had died, and his people had raised him a mound, Whose high green slope is seen but a league from the stately roofs of Tara, Where, shining through banks of grass, and groves of sweet beech murmuring round, Flows to the sea, by village and rath, the clear-waved Fionuara. King Guyon, whose reign was calm, as a day at the plente- ous time of the year When folk say summer looks over its shoulder, had left two princely sons, Eoclga the fair, and Mugha the black; to him they were equally clear, Though save in valour, different each as the thin swift ashen spear, That sightlessly whistling, pierces to death; and the heavy mace that stuns; .And the King had given his lands unto them, with equal division of all His ample riches ; valleys of swift-footed horses, tracts of corn, Tracts of cattle, rivers of fish, and shadowing woodlands tall, With herds of fat, slow moving swine, in the glens of oak and thorn, Watched by huge serfs, the slow heavy men of the Fear Bolg conquered of yore ; Stables of chariots for battle and travel, and hosts of martial men la iron armed, from the foot to the breast, and the glittering helms they wore; Of spinning handmaidens, each thrice seven; of attendants ten times ten, And numberless chests of garments many-coloured, cloaks of white And robes of purple, yellow, green, and silver, foreign attire, Girdles and collars and brooches, and as beh'tted their might And noble birth, two jewelled swords, and crowns that gleamed like fire. Ill, Though the seed of a calm, wise, chief, both Eodga and Mugha were practised in war, For to Leogir both, while beardless yet, had voyaged over the sea, When the great Buadice, assembling the mountain nations of Albin, as yet free, 19 Came clown like a storm on the Romans, and sunk, alas ! with her star : Had engaged, too, in many a knightly encounter, in Eric here at home ; From the cold grey hills of Ulida, clown to Leath Moglia, the warm and green, And in raids from the friendly sea of the South to the Isles, of the Whales in the foam, Where their long victorious black battle barques were a many times seen ; And 'twas there in a war with the fierce strong-boned painted men of that coast, Of the deadly whirl -tide, snow-storm, and fog, that contend- ing on shore and billow, Eodga cleft down to the breast the great Loarin. at the head of his roaring host, And M ugha, with one mighty blow, in his armour, crushed Sitric Forillo. Many a wide land echoed the fame of those thunderbolts of war; The wolves of the fastness followed their track, and the eagles knew them from far ; Nor ever came either from foray or battle, without some trophy of power, Tributes ot" cattle, of maids and slaves, and ship loads of armour bright, Or the tall spear, strung with their enemies' sanguined skulls a vociferous sight To the thronged shores, where they landed by day or by red torch light. And those skulls grace the flaming temple of Crom, at Magh Sleacht, to this very hour. IV, For a year those heroes lived on their lands, nor adventured in any strife, But passed their days in sport with their tribes, in matches of swimming and bole, In the race of horses, the play of tables ; and in all they were kings of life, Likewise, in the fight of winged resounding speech that conquers the soul ; But, though many a maiden thronged their courts, the loveliest in the land, For there was Blathnaid, sweet as a rose, andFionola of the shoulders of snow, Murgel, with breast like the pure sunn'd spray, and Orflath wealthy in land, And pleasant Feith failo, whose words and whose song were smooth as the river's flow ; 20 Yet never till rare Lassairfhina appeared like the dawn 'a red cloud on the billow, When the sea breathes music, and morn's star shines with a secret and lovesome glow, Pid Eodga or Muglia e'er sigh for the light of a woman's smile on the pillow Albeit this beauty was daughter of Irrah once Guyon's deadliest foe. v. Her form in its sleepy luxurious smoothness and beauty of mould Resembled the rainbow -hued snake in the meadows of sun- heated grass, That gliding indrawn with co'y graces, half -hidden, appears as you pass, Xow tempting and blithe in retreating, now beauteously bold ; Her eyes were like jewels of magic, whose meaning no soul can divine ; On her mouth was the bloom of the midsummer rose, and the warm red gold Of her plenteous autumn of odorous hair, whether floating like wings Of the morning, when loosed to the wind of the chase, or eiishiningly rolled O'er her forehead, as fair as the spring sea's foam, but as false as a wave, Cherished love in each amorous wreathe, and love's cunning in every twine ; Her motion was soft as low music, her voice like the music of strings, While her converse alluring and sweet, whether joyous, soft, subtle or grave, Caught the soul of each listener, and fired every pulse like the spirit of wine. Short time had elapsed since the coming of rare Lassairfhim, to court, When first great Eodga, and then mighty Mugha, felt stricken with love to the core. Their attendants remarked how indifferent both had become to the pleasures of sport. Such as chieftains delight in ; how careless of all save the sumptuous garments they wore; 21 That their exploits of strength were forgotten, and nothing attracted them now but the song Of the bard in the sunny soft chamber of women, or bower by the orchard's clear stream; That both, grown unwontedly silent, delighting in solitude, wandered along By wild ways and silent, by day and by night, like men in whose bosoms a wrong Burns smouldering ever, dividing them off from their kind, as in fear, Lest any discover the purpose they nursed, till occasion of vengeance were near. But keener eyes seeing how each, as with pain seemed avoid- ing the other When they chanced to encounter abroad, or at feast in the hall, and who saw How they were enraptured with rare Lassairfhnia, whose words were their law, Soon discovered the subtle enchantress, to either had made herself dear, And that love so enkindled, had wakened in secret, the hatred of brother for brother. Then it came to be known to the listening slaves, that each chieftain had asked her ns wife Seeking occasion alone; while the blue-veined beauty, as cunning as bold, Seemed affected to both, though when present with both, appeared charmingly, carelessly cold ; And all saw in the challenge of secret hot passion, thus fronted, implacable strife. VII. It happened one day, when they'd ridden by separate ways with their bands, To the chase, on the western frontier, which marked their division of lands, That a great elk and swift, through a forest way starting, was seen of them then, And for many a mile in a gallop, they followed his horng with their men, Until, sudden as fish sinks, the beast disappeared in a glen, leaving all The hunters at bay, in confusion, well wearied, and ruffled with gall At his loss; while the hounds keenest scented, yelped round them in piteous rage, Sore grieved and wild, as a bird flock that beats at the bars of a cage. 22 So the companies rode 011 together, until they caino out of the glen, And the broad-rivered plain spread around them, all dotted with cattle and men, Where the women were cutting the rushes, for couches, along the green streams; Where the naked slaves bound the reel sheaves of the corn in the sinking sun's beams; Where the tall shepherds stretched under trees in the meadows, because of the heat, And panted the sheep and the horses with drought in the hollows of peat. VIII. Two moons, it was said, had grown dim in the sky since the chiefs had exchanged, Save in trivial words, their dark minds, so averse had they grown, and estranged; And their trains felt a dubious joy, when they saw them once more side by side Bide palace ward; until they heard fierce Eoclga cry "She is my bride. " While Mugha, whose brow had grown wrathful and som- brous, drew rein on his horse, And fronting its head to Eodga's, had suddenly stopped on the gorse. Then as round them their men gathered, seeing the hour lon^ expected had come, And while some of them murmured in whispers, and others held dumb, Eodga, uncovering his forehead, and pointing away to the sun, Called out to both trains to be witness of what should be said to be done. Then spake to his brother "Now, Mugha, my brother, all vain are the arts By which men lov'ii^ bctli the one woman as we, seek to smother their hearts ; From our youth upward, even till now, you and I, who are fruit of one womb, Together have sported, together have voyaged, together have fought side by side, While the ghosts of our ancestors looked from the clouds o'er our combats on plain and on tide; And we held it a hope and a truth that in time we should rest in the self-same tomb; But another fate that we guessed not of has now fallen between us twain, Until each has become in the sight of the other a sight of wrath and of pain; 23 For the beauty and soul of this nudden we love, like somo magical spell Has broken our faith in each other, and broken our past lives as well. I love Lassairfhina, whoso blood beats to mine as her breath to my breath. And no man and no god of the land shall prevent her being mine, soul and body, save Death. Yield up, then, this maiden to me as my own, and, in lieu, take all manifold things I hold here in Erie, possessions and riches bequeathed by our long race of kings ; Then peace and then love shall be ours, and our lives shall be bright as they were in the hour When our grey father, Guyon, departing, decreed us the equal heirs of his power. If not, there's but one way for us, Mugha, for mine shall this maiden be If I live : or if another's bride, 'twill be his that shall dio with me." His words ceased in foam on his lips; white and fixed as fata was his face, White and fixed was Mugha's also, in which love was usurped by hot hate, And as like seemed those furious chiefs as the figures of rock at the gate Of their palace, by Alabrha carved. Then cried Mugha, whose hand on his mace Showed each knuckle bone white, and of every sinew tho strong rigid trace. 1 Eodga, as we two are brothers whose love for one maid Has awakened a hate that alone in hot blood can be layed, Few words will suffice. I have but to repeat the same words which you said: 1 love Lassairfhina, whose heart beats to mine as her breath to my breath, And no man and no god of the land shall prevent her being mine, saving Death. If, instead of the wealth you would buy her of me with, it3 store Were as broad as the earth, and as deep as the sea at its ultimate shore, It would weigh in the scale of my purpose more light than the down Of yon thistle more worthless than one drop of rain on the gold of my crown. ?o, as you offer insult, in insult 1 offer alike for her hand- And all will be smooth again with us my wealth and my power and my land, But I see that your hatred grows stronger as stronger waxed mine When you spake; and, behold! the great Sun-God descends to the brine, Look your last on his glory, Eodga, as I maychance do, For I swear by his splendour, I swear by my valour, I swear by this isle and our race, Of which, like the last lonely oaks of a great wood we're left, that his face One or other no more shall behold 'till this anger is quenched 'twixt us two. " IX. Thus Mugha retorted his wrath to Eodga enraged; And the multitude, moved like an ocean in tempest or fleet in a gale, Some crimson with rivalrous anger, and some very pale, Roared out to the Sun that by iron alone could their wrath be assuaged. First the brethren glanced at each other, then pointed away to the west, AY here rose the grey hills in whose bosom a deep lake lay deadly and still, And without other word rode away from the place to the place they thought best To decide unappeasable fury ; the while their numerous train Silent also, in groups took their way to their dwellings of rest, Leaving each to revenge on the other, as fate should decide it, his will. 'Twas sunset: and as the two, passing the broad sweeping kine-covered meadows, And ford by the river, ascended the steep rocky hill-side, the shadows Grew deeper, and gleamed on the black lake a moon in the wane. x. At length when they came to a bare open space, where the gloomy hills round Cast their shade on the deep cjuiet waters, they sprang from their steeds on the ground. Next instant, their brands in the moon shimmered lightnings amid the dark air, And rang the harsh echoes of blow upon blow through the arid rocks there. But though wild with fierce hatred, and fired with fierce hope, each of gaining his prize, Yet, so mightily matched were those leaders of battle in practice and strength, That the combat hung bloodless, while sword turned on sword, eyes to eyes Flashed their quick fires ; like keen angry eagles that circling wheel through the skies Near and nearer, till plunging together they tear out their heart's gore. At length Both their heavy swords sprang into fragments : Then came a dread pause, That seemed for a moment to balance the love and the wrath of this cause; For something of anguish gleamed ghastly from cither's pale cheek As they saw, like a smile from the dead, in their faces their mother's face meek, Which, despite of their fury, made both for a second's space trembling and weak, And each to each other, in strong sudden kindness seemed moved to speak, WLen the rocky path rung with the trampling tread of a horse, and the night with a shriek, And the fair Lassairfhina, more lovely and fell than that fiend of the brine That springs up from the depths to the shipwrecked, and swimming with sleek eyes that shine With ruth, clasps and drags him below stood before them and cried, "His am I 4 * Who in combat shall win me, and who for my beauty dare die !" As when in some loud crashing storm of the night comes a lull, when you hear The woods only quiver their boughs, and the dim seamoan drear, Till the red beauteous lightning gleams fearfully, signalling on The thundering powers of the tempest, and the force of the rage that was gone Rushes back on the world, where the frowning clouds bury once more The stars, and the maddened woods roar, and the mighty sea tramples the shore, So the chiefs, when they saw the fell beauty accursed, breathing deep, Blind with fury, love maddened, rewrapp'd in the storm of their hate, Rushed together once more with a hunger death only could sate, And clasped in one mighty last writhing embrace, reeling over the steep 20 That was higher than fifty tall oaks, and as straight as a spear, Plunged and sunk down for ever in the fathomless depths of the meer; While the fierce Lassairfhina, who watched from the cliff till she saw they were dead, Rode away to the realm of her kindredher love vented ven- geance thus sped, Crying, "Irrah, my father, King Guy on once wrought you a wrong years ago, And instead of an army you sent me with beauty to combat your foe, And behold, with love's weapons alone have I wiped out your woe, And dead in the depths of the lake the last heirs of his throne have laid low!" Thus perished Eodga and Mugha, the mightiest chiefs of their time. Lassairfhina was blasted with lightning, 'twas said, but a month from that night. So vanish the lives of the greatest and fairest, like dim changing clouds of the height, Like the leaves 011 the wind, like the song of a bard: I have ended niy rhyme. THE LEGEND OF DIORTHA, THE BARD, i. FROM noonday to dark had the fields of Gno Beag and Gno More Been covered with dead and with wounded, and deluged with gore, In the battle that Guaire Aidhne fought with Flaithbeartach the Famed, Till, with hardly a thousand, he fled along Orbsen's grey shore, To the woods for a rest and a rally. In Guaire Aidhne 'a force Was Diortha the bard; to the foe, by his helm and his horse, Ever known fighting foremost, till his steed, by an arrow well aimed, From a fugitive handful in ambush, sunk dead in a gorse, AVhom he followed on foot, slaying some ; for, if stricken in years, None rivalled the warrior poet in the combat of spears, 27 Save Iniligh, his son, who, though lost to his eyes in the light, Was too mighty a sworder to waken his fatherly fears : So, his blood still with victory afire, waving wild his red brand, He, the enemy flying, pursued through the forests near hand, In whose branches a tempest, arisen with the fall of the night, Drowned the wounded's drear moan and the cries of each conquering band. At length, when he'd come to a place where the night's cloudy frown "Was doubled in shade by the horrent wood's gloomiest crown, Of a sudden a figure sprang out 'twixt the boughs but as soon Sprang Diortha's keen sword through the dark on his foe bearing down. And next moment he knew he had plunged it right through, by the rush Of gore spouting into his eyes ; while the man, repulsed, fell in a bush. All was dark ; all around roared the forest, and there was no moon, As the victor, dim groping, knelt down on the vanquished, to crush Out his last breath, hard -breathed and blood-blind ; but that last breath was gone : Then, feeling about for the neck of his foe lying prone, Tearing off as a trophy the heavy gold torque he had worn, Took it to him, exulting in soul at the deed he had clone. And wearied in limb and in brain with the rnany-houred toil Of the battle, lay down in the dark by the side of his spoil, And slept till above the grey hills by the ocean, pale morn Touched the graves of the heroes far off on the heights of Tir Moil. II. When Diortha awoke, his first thought was the collar of gold, Which, in pride, he had laid by his heart in his vesture's blue fold, And, arisen the while the sun flamed through the trunks of the trees, From the clear joyous heavens on the distance of green wood feud wold, On the bird-singing branches and fresh dewy grasses around Had but glanced at his warrior treasure, when lo! without sound, But with both arms up flung in despair, he sunk down on his knees, Then, fallen flat, dashed his grey brows again and again on the ground ; For, alas ! and alas ! when he looked on that torque he had won, The name met his eyes of his son, of his best beloved son, Of Irnligh, his warrior's pride, the strong branch of his heart, His dead mother's glory, his age's last darlingest one ; Of Imligh, whose heart his cursed arm, his cursed sword, had pierced through, The heart that had beat to his own, ever tender and true, Whose eyes used to shine as he voiced the high strains of his art, In the bower or the fortress's hall, till their lives as one grew; Whose dear blood ah, why had his eyes been restored to the day, So heinously blotted that hour; on his robe and hands lay, His sweet blood, the fount of his own brighter youth, emptied now Of its vigour for ayne by his curs'd sire, left lonely and grey. What demon had darkened the night ? nay, what demon Him, Diortha, whose sword had thus slaughtered his own son, his best ? Impelled by a fate from the damned with that cruel blind blow Yes, a demon had seized on his soul, and was now its dark guest. Inhuman in deed, feeling human no longer, he rose, Tore his grey hair in handfuls, and tore from his body its clothes In the sun standing naked as on the same hour he was born Then, for care of the thing hated most, as a madman oft does, Clutching up his red brand, rushed away through the Woods, over dale, Past the cots by the lake, where all, seeing him furious and pale, 20 Fled before him, and hid from his sight and the light of the morn, 'Till his dread form was lost, and had vanished the sound of his wail. in. Wild wandering over theLand where the tribes who had heard Of his madness-made woes, with dark awe and with deep pity stirred, Though they fled him, left food by their closely barred doors, when he came And eat, now at night in the moonbeam, or when the first bird Sang clear to the dawn's yellow streak from the hedge or the tree Came Dithora one neon where the ocean spread boundless and free. 'Twas late autumn ; through sombre mists glimmered tho sun's withering flame On the barren high mountains and headlands of grey in the sea. Then, as standing up gaunt in the wind turned his hollow- eyed glance On the endless majestical glory of Lir's mighty foam-waved expanse ; And, as at his feet heavy thundered the green-billowed tumult of foam, And the spray on his naked form drifted, his soul rose sublimed in a trance ; * And he felt that his nature was one with the wind and the wave, With the sun and the ocean, with phantoms returned from the grave, And that earth and the heavens and the heights and the depths were the home Of a spirit, howe'er through its wilderness sorrow might rave ; And that death was the change of the cloud from the waters upfurled From darkness to light, that in shadow, in splendour now curled, Careering in wind, everlastingly followed the sun, Or was by the sun followed along the vast reach of the world. But short was the clear orbed dream of a fancy astray ; Soon a voice in the breeze, like his son's, from the dim dying day Turned his mind on the keen-panged past, as with head sunk upon His bosom of sobs, through the twilight he held his sad way. 3J IV. Thus roved he for years through the brown moors of Conniaicne Mara, The wild woods of Crumann, the bounteous green elopes of Ceara, O'er Echtges's grey hills, from which Grian is seen flowing south; By the towns of Clann Cathel, the frowning high forts of Diainara; Through the lake vales of Luaigne, by Magh Luirg, famed for horses of speed, [of mead, Where the great race of Aodha renowned for the banquets Filled up plenteous the bowls of white stone for the traveller's mouth, And had ever a sheep, horse or cloak for the stranger in need. But lone as the wind was Diortha, whose heart was the food Of remorse, of a sorrow that maddened each fugitive mood Of his spirit, which, like an oak blasted, but yielded tho sound Of its harsh gnarring boughs, whose green leaves could no more be renewed ; Through his veins a wild light like the fire of the fen ever ran; He, a man w r ho had slain his own son, his beloved, hated man, His own shape, with a hatred insane that forbiddingly wound Like a serpent, but widened the range of humanity's ban. Yet, often at times, morn and even, as the naked one lone Stretched, in cavern or wood, when the song of a bird broke his moan, He would tell to the wind his sweet verses, or sing to tho seas Ancient memories of time and great wars, in a faint monotone; Old fancies of scng would spring up through his brain, like the glow Of the strange flitting lights of the North o'er a mountain of snow ; And the stormy melodious surge of his soul's rhapsodies, Bursting forth for a little would drown irredeemable woe. At length, on an evening of beauty, when the air and the ocean were still, When the showery spring cloud was veiling remotely the green sloping hill, SI When aloft the black lines of tho crows floated woodward athwart the dim sky, Beneath the tide rippled, and near him through mosses the clear bubbled rill, While the twilight orb sparkling 'mid hazes of rose on tho breast Of the sea, blent its beam with the emerald wave of the west At the loot of an oak on the shore weird Diortha had lain to die, His white giant bones weather-bleached, with life weary, and yearning for rest. Then, as comes to one pacing the evening fields, from afar Undulating, a strange and vague stream of sweet sound, from that star Camo across the calm waters along the thin radiance it cast A whisper harmonious from the realms where tho blessed ones are, Whispering, "Come, wearied Poet soul, coine to the regions above, Here is peace; here await thy sad spirit the friends whom you love;" Then a smile lit his face, as he sighed and that sigh \vas his last ! On the hush came the dirge of the seas, from the woodlands the moan of the clove. ST PATRICK AND AENGUS, Christian Period. FROM the wintry wild West fell the daylight's last gleam of grey gold, Over iJladh's dim pastures, all dotted with hamlet and fold; O'er the long ridge of mountains that ended in one higher still, Whose pyramid fronted the desert seas, stony and cold, Crowned with storm cloud; and deepened the blank windy darkness below, Hound the wavy Snarnh Aignech and the sullen shores dreary with snow, Where the white woodlands moaned in the blast, when upon a white hill Through the solitude shone a light, faint, but with steadfastcst glow, Which came from the casemented niohe of a Church rude and small, With barn and with dwelling surrounded by oaks bare and tall, In whose chamber two Figures were seated before a wood fire, Which flashed on the smoky brown roof and on either stone wall, On a table, where bread, milk, and honey in bowls had been placed, On a scriptural scroll whose dim parchment was worn and defaced, On a staff, ivory tippeJ, and a cloak stiff with frost and with mire ; On the men in black robes girdled in with a rope at the waist. One was still in his youth, and though pale, courage -fronted and strong, Whose bright eyes as he listened were hid by his black lashes long; While the other was far on his way to the region of Death, Whose moonlight fell cold on his locks and his white beard among; But in whose deep eyes shone the holy and conquering light Of a soul that had won many souls from the armies of night; And a vigour immortal flamed round his broad brow, and Christ's breath From his pale lips breathed calm of the conquests of Love and of Eight. Long had he been speaking, and then as the slow gathering tear Dimmed the young abbot's eyes, said : " Yes, Aengus, my time draweth near, But the younger will follow my footsteps, and lead up to God From the gloom of the heathen this people, to me ever dear; 1 ' Shall tend the poor sheep I have snatched from the wolf in the dark, Shall guard them till sinks this wide deluge in Christ's saving ark, Till the whole isle, illumed by the seed I have sown as I trod, Shall be His, when beyond the earth's sunset has sailed my eoul's barque. "What although still Hibernia spreads round from the flood to the flood, Hardly here arid there sacredly shining from His love and blood, Like a cloud that looms low in the air, from the eastern dawn, But tinged on its loftiest summits for the rest wild and rude, "Yet nevertheless, thanks to the Heavens, somewhat has been done Since the dim rolling arduous years when my work was begun; And already the shades of the Past from the island with- drawn, Have let on its nations the light of the new risen sun. "Ah me! what vicissitudes gloomy have passed, since, a child At Nemthur I lived, amid forests and races as wild, Save those of the Britons who came from the Southern towns, Who had learned in the churches the story of Christ undefiled, "Which I took to my heart with rejoicing, as one waked with fear 'Mid the savage dark woods full of beasts, sees the dawn rising clear; And grew stronger than though on my forehead I wore the world's crowns; But that golden hour passed, and a period of terror was near "For, scarce on the Ichtian sea, with my people I'd past, To visit our kindred at Letha, when came 011 the blast The fleet of King Sectmaid's, who deluged all Gussrigh with gore, Killing most, save the young, whom they bore to their black vessels fast, "There Conches, my mother, was wounded, and the rest of us torn From our hearth, bound with cords, o'er the seas to Hibernia were borne; Some escaped, but there Lupait was sold on Conaille Murthemne's shore, And I, when our vessel had reached Dalaraidhe's wild bourne. "There for six years I lived in the woods tending kine, but each day Wrapped in prayer, which drew down on my bondage a Heaven-sent ray; o 31 For one morn at that time to the beach came a wandering ship, In the which I escaped, and was borne by the Pagans away. * ' For three suns we sailed, and at length I was cast on a land Like a wilderness waste, where for ten days and six by the strand I wandered alone, nor save water and roots crossed my lip Other foocl, 'till one sunset I saw through the vapours a hand ' ; Point South, which, though weak unto death, I then followed; and soon God gave me both fire, food, and rest and the next rounded moon Saw me once again girt by my friends at the Athcluid for a space And I thanked my great God who had granted that bountiful boon. ' ' There it was that I heard a Voice call nie one night in a dream, Crying: * Succat, Hibernia revokes you to teach and redeem With Christ's faith, from the kingdom of Satan, her night- dwelling race. ' And, as one filled with new life I rose, and with morning's first beam " Took ship on the green rolling seas to this island of green, Where many a danger awhile threatened round me I ween, Preaching Truth to the heathen, but where as years sped I was known As the Apostle of God in the land where a slave I had been. " At length when I'd preached to the chieftains of Uladh, and to The Gaels of Ath Cliath, and founded of churches a few, The noise of my mission around the broad land being blown, And many accepting the Gospel as holy and true. 4 ' Through the tillages goodly, and fair fields, towards Tara I came, On that festival eve when the Druids had quenched every llame, Save the fire of the King Laoghaire that antique Pagan rite When I lit on a hill, with the f ew who had followed my fame, " The fire of the Paschal. Then saw I his host all in arms, Horsed, on foot, and in chariot, and his Druids with staves and with charms, Approach with the noise of brown shields and horns blown through the night ; And arrived^ while the king from his charger averted all harms, " Keen Dubtach, his Druid, advancing cried out unto me: * Oh, Succat, declare to us here this unknown Deity Whom you worship, and would have our people to worship, who long With more reason than you have but bent to the gods they can see; li ' Grian, lord of the heavens, filling nature with glory divine; JAile Easga, the queen of the dead; Lir, the God of the brine; These know we because we behold, and with sacrifice vari- ous and song These adore, inasmuch as they serve us: now say how much better is thine ?' " Then I said: c Say, oh ! Dubtach, whether them canst behold thy own thought, The spirit that moveth within thee, and without which thy body were naught; Which invisibly acts in thy being, as in all things around thee, in sooth, Views and governs all, and stores up whatsoe'er it is taught ? " 'Even such is the Spirit we worship, omnipresent in nature and life, Though unseen the bright source of the world, and the heavens with his excellence rife; In thy head when thou thinkest, thy heart when thou feelest with truth; He it is, who beholding the Heathen rolled in darkness and strife, " ' Has late caused to appear His own Son, Holy Christ, from above, To teach love to man, and redeem all the nations through love. The faith that I teach is the faith in this spirit of Power, As of Goodness, whose wing is not that of the eagle but dove "'God, whose spirit once entered into us through a pure heart and prayer, Our soul enters into the bliss which his chosen but share, Loving all, serving all, grows impregnable from the same hour To the evils of life he has taught us to mend and to bear. 33 " ' Sun and moon look alike on the fields of sweet corn and red war; The senseless sea wafts us to friends as to battles afar; But when tempest has shaken the skies, when the light- ning has riven The clouds, our heart kindles with joy looking on the first star; " ' Not like sun or like moon is our God, but a Father whose eyes Watch His children with love ever more, day and night from the skies, And whose infinite love is a sea that but bears us to Heaven, While disposing in earth and in Heaven their vast destinies. ' " Then the King, who had listened while closely his Druids around Had gathered in dread lest that I, with some potent spell crowned, Should win him to me after saying that more I should speak On some common day, not like that Feis day, rode off from the ground. ' * But numbers gave ear, though he went unannealed to the dead, And throughout the isle I with the Faith many multitudes fed, Where various, who ere that I came from Paladius the Meek Had been Christ's, brought a many to hear ' what Patricius said. ' " But as yet was my mission unauthorised, save by the will Of my passionate heart to make His this dark race, and fulfil Christ's commands to go forth and to preach to the Gentiles his Word, And that Voice in the heaven-sent dream which inspired me, until " Having raised numerous churches to guard the good tidings, I sailed Hence to Gaul, and was there at Auxerre, by Germain, the Saint hailed Of Hibernia; and his learning illumed me and his eloquence stirred Me to journey to Rome, and obtain Jesus' staff, and pre- vailed ; 37 " So, soon by Segetius, the presbyter, valiant and true Companioned, 1 passed the proud tribes of the Senoneg through, And up the defiles of Jurassa ascended the snow To the crown of the world, whence beneath us spread Lemanus blue; 1 ' And, the higher hills traversed, descended the Paduan plain } Spreading rich in the sun its expanses of vineyard and grain; And through olive groves yellow from Mediolan followed the flow Of the river, the Cassian Way, and Etruria's train ' ' Of aged and opulent cities ; 'till one starry night Mighty Rome, marble pilled 011 its mountains, saluted our sight ; And we passed the steep streets amid temples to churches now turned, And where fortified palaces, many lamped, shone from each height. " There the Pagans delighted indeed in the sumptuous display Of superlative luxuries aureate and silken array, In their villas and baths, where the client crowds bent to the knees, In their chariots of silver, white horsed, on the Appian Way. " For the fear of the Goth's giant armies and fierce swarthy Hun, Had passed like a thunder cloud from that domain of the sun; And the nobles still trifled with time and its poor vanities, While the militant Churches triumphed in the peoples they'd won. " There the while in the foreigner's quarter, the thronged Aventiiie, We tarried; Germain with seven deacons arrived by the brine, And his coming was bread to my hungry heart, when I found By his influence sweet that the consecrate gift should be mine. " And, verily, soon it befell in a glorious hour, As I knelt in the aisle of Petros, near the altar's bright bower, By the heir of his Keys, Celestine, holy Papa, I was crowned, While the court of the Emperor crowded each galleried tower. 88 " While about me white-robed, multitudinous ministers thronged; While the music rose, hymning the story divine, many- tongued, Of the Magi who came to His cradle, illumined by the star, Ijwas clothed by his hands with the pallium for which I had longed " In the presence of mild Theodosius, who late had arrived From imperial Ravenna at Christian Rome, to be shrived, And to witness the bishop -made priest, who had come from the far Britannise, where Christ's sword had freed many Satan had gyved. " Then, as Celestine's Legate, returned I from, wonderful Rome, By the Middle Sea's shores and Iberia's, to this island Home; For Attila's barbarous armies were ravaging Gaul, And more dangerous then were its roads than the path of the foam. " And, at Uldali arrived, Daire, the wealthy, kiiri chieftain bestowed Upon me Drium Sailech, then a hill with a wild willow wood, As a place for a church and a synod, whate'er might befall ; And being sick he was healed, and his sins washed away in Christ's blood. '" Then I went forth baptizing the tribes from the east to the west, From the north to the south ; and of many a chief I was guest, For the heads once won o'er the clans follow nor until the whole isle Was converted to God. would my soul from its sacred toil rest. " And of late in a vision, I seemed caught up into the air, And saw from the height o'er the lands I had traversed in care, From Rome to Hibernia, a long line of light like a smile That seemed to join both with a lustre eternal as fair. " Now the Churches are many, the laws of the Pagan improved ; I have gathered about me my people long lost and long loved, Now the hell-given power of the Druids is clouding away; our various peoples by Christ's saving spirit are moved. 39 " By God's grace, I, Patrick, have grown the isle's spiritual King ; But my time drawcth near : and night wanes, and the dismal winds sing, So come, my good Aengus, let us kneel ere we rest us and pray To the One who for ever shall shelter us under His wing : " ' Holy Christ, by Thy great love, we bind us to live in Thy light, By Thy power to shield us from the black incantations of night, And we bind to us through Thee the powers of the universe vast, To aid us in spreading Thy Scripture, eternal as bright. * ' ' Oh ! Christ, be thou with us, our guard upon sea and on shore, While th' idolaters rage, and around us disasters outpour, Until Thou in the clouds of the heavens reappearing at last, In that glory the Blessed ascend to Thy peace* ever more.' " ST COLUMBA'S SPELL, A,D. 580. KINO DIARMUID had wronged Saint Columba, for he had assailed Eoch Tiorrnacara, the King of Connaught, many valed, Who through the Saint's influence long had been Christ's; and a spell Had been layed on his life, the which hearing he trembled and paled. Two hundred moons rolled through the sky, when at length in a fight With Aodh Dub of Dalarada, he fell by his spearmen at night ; But although for his body they searched through the corse covered dell, Never more was that body revealed to humanity's sight. But, after ten clays, as some hunters passed through a wild wood, Of a sudden they stopp'd, and with horror and wonderment stood; For, lo ! at the foot of a hollow oak, watched "by a wolf, Lay the blue ghastly head of the monarch all goutecl with blood, 40 Which knowing, they seized; and then riding as fast as the wind, Bore it off through the gloom from the monster whose red eyes behind Still following flamed, till they came to the brink of a gulf ; This they leaped, when it vanished, as they looking back- ward opined; And arrived at the shore of a lake then illumed by the moon, Where some clerics and monks stood, awaiting the corrach that soon Was to bear them across to their church in an island with trees, To those holy men gave for interment the sad-fated boon ; And, being vassals of Diarmuid and Christians, entreated that they Would pray for the soul while they buried the royal red clay, Which they did, and, moreover, with kingliest ceremonies, At Clanmacnoise reared it a tomb which is seen to this day. Meanwhile came to Enna his son, who had lived a learned year With the abbats of Alba, the news of his father's death drear; And spreading white sails unto Erin he sailed o'er the sea, With whose brine was commingled many a wind-scattered tear; And arrived at Ath Cliath, he hurried, by night and by day, The galloping steeds of his chariot along the high way, To the new church that reared over Clanmacnoise' emerald lea, Its turrets and walls in the evening tranquil and grey. But after reflection and prayer, when all had retired To their cells, moved with anguish, with restless anxiety fired, That royal sad head once again to behold, he arose, And although with his sorrow and voyage and travel sore tired, Having kindled a torch, with a strong iron implement armed, Through the chill aisle, that save by the sunbeam had never been warmed, With echoing footsteps approached the tomb: then with blows Sought to burst it asunder not knowing the while, it was charmed. At length when with one mighty effort the stone he had raised And rolled aside sudden with terror he startled and gazed, 41 For, lo! from the place where the bloody head lay in the gloom Sprang a black Demon Shadow whose eyes with ferocity blazed; A shadow that now seemed a wolf 011 the ground, and that now Like a human form wavering in darkness and fire seemed to grow, Which with threatening gesture held guard by the black gaping tomb, Silent, horrible, hellish, potential, impervious to blow, Deaf to anguish and prayer; for the prince had first struck at the shade Till he found but the hollow vault rung with the clash of his blade ; Then in terror implored it to let him but look once again On that face, ere for ever its form from his memory should fade; When the Thing springing forward had touched him the while with a cry, He fell, and remained as if dead 011 the pavement anigh; And when he awoke, he was stretched in a cell, full of pain, And seemed mad for a time, nor could sleep, save with one watching by. The tomb wasreclosed; but another moon rounded and died, Ere his cheek gained its bloom, or his spirit its vigour and pride, When he rode with his retinue splendid, with cloak and with spear, Toward Rath Mora, to visit young Emer, his beauteous bride, Through rich shady regions of apples and oaks, by great forts, Towns with churches and crosses by many a broad river's ports, Tracts of pasture and corn; and arrived at the palace made clear By the pulse of his heart, passed a period in revels and sports. Day by day his great grief and dark fear for the relic entombed, Floated off like a cloud in the morning that love had relumed For Emer, and sunlight possessed his w r hole soul for a space, Nor guessed he the destiny yet unto which he was doomed Because of the spell; nor am ore of that Shadow thought he, But of Enter 's blue eyes, where the spring sparkled amiably; Of the secret soft love-light that beamed from her fair oval face; Her voice, like the wind of the dawn breathing over the sea, 42 Tlie amber pale hair clustering round her pure brow like the hue That rings round a vaporous moon; of her words soft as dew, Her white hand, but more than all else of her dear music soul, And that snow-vestured heart that to his beat as tender as true. It happened just then as one 110011 Enna wandered alone, Through the beech wood's green shadowypaths, beneath roofa summer blown, That, full of sweet fancies, he stretched beneath one giant bole And slept; till a sudden his slumber was stirred by a moan; When, springing afoot, he looked round. It was sunset; the light Here and there upon tree-trunks and branches was goldening bright, And with radiant angels the forest's recesses seemed filled. And the drift of a cascade alone broke the calm when his sight Was horrored; for there by a lightning struck oak in a dim Xook anear, stood the hideous (Shadow form glaring at him, Black as night, fixed as fate, when a shuddering terror pulse chill'd All his blood, blanked his mind, and awhile stiffened every limb. At length while he prayed, vigour back to him slowly returned, And he gazed on the demon whose eyes in the heavy gloom burned The redder, nor moved it until he had moved; then as down The forest he hurried, still followed him until he turned I'rom its shores on the grey evening meadows and highway that led To the palace, when looking behind him, he found it had fled. Fled but to return ; on the youth ever rested its frown, And Enna was haunted henceforth by the Demon of the Dead. Sometimes when the morning ray sundered his lids, its black form Would seem bending o'er him, sometimes from the azure noon warm In the orchards with Einer it watched them l>y him alone seen It pursued him at night when he rode in the gloom of the. storm ; 43 Xow, o'er tlie white plains of the snow when he travelled afar, The moon blent its shadow with his; in the thick of the war Dimm'd his eyes when he fronted the foeman, or rose like a screen When voyaging in tempest he gazed on some ship-guiding star, When the mountainous billows rose round, and their hoarse hungry roar Boded death 011 the rocks of some sightless precipitous shore. By its presence all places, all times were made fearful; in prayer Its influence diverted his spirit howe'er it might soar In pure faith to the heavens, and wintered each radiant hour Of the lovers when whispering at sunset in chamber and bower. Companioned or lonely, on land or on ocean, all where Like his shadow lived by him this hell-shadowed, feared Phantom Power, Thus three restless years had rolled on 'mid the pleasures and din Of the court and the field, and the shade -haunted prince had grown thin, And his sighs were half loves and half deaths; when a voice in a dream Proclaimed that the fate he endured was because of the sin Of his father, whose demon he knew not till then was the Thing Which pursued him; and counselled, that spreading swift sails on the wing Of the winds, he, with Emer companioned, with morning's first beam Should hie to the bay of Feal Lodain, and thence voyaging O'er the northern seas to Columba at Hy, should entreat With prayer the great saint to remove by his influence sweet, And power with the heavens, the spell he had layed on the soul Of the monarch; and banish the demon that followed his feet. >So the lovers set forth in a pinnace which held but the twain, O'er the breezy blue spacious waste of the foam-lined main ; And although like a cloud, it still followed their course toward the pole, Its approach by their hymns was averted, and its power seemed to wane. And when the late moon in its fulness arose in the sky, Arose o'er the waters the hills and the churches of Hy, 44 The cliffs of the streams, the blue inlets with crosses and tombs, The white strand of the monks, Oran's grave and the Carbeal Muiri, And passed copses of nut trees, and yellow furze down, and pure well, They entered the church, and along by each anchorite's cell Approached the high altar beneath where the great turret looms, And prayed to its patron Columba, to banish the spell. And as they yet knelt, and with whispers the stillness beguiled Enna stooped like a young ash, Emer like a sea-flower wild A figure gigantic stood by them, majestic in mien, Lightning- eyed, but whose countenance seen through his cochal was mild; Who saluted each forehead with the kiss of sweet peace and with prayer, And deep incantation averted the curse from the pair; And their spirits were freed, and the Shadow no longer was seen, A s they bent to that warrior of Christ smiling down on them there. THE BATTLE OF CILL MOSANHOG. (Eathfarnham. ) Danish Period October, A.D., 917. E centuries after Christ ascended to glory, Through the deep eastern heavens, and in Eire his reign For four hundred golden years had hallowed the main ; When the Northmen reddened our shores and ruined our temples hoary, Opens our battle story, Here in Ath Cliath, ruled by Sitruic Imar, the Dane. It was a morn of autumn, splendrously glowed the sun Over the tranquil space of the dazzling azure bay, Spreading from green Ben Edair to Cualan's mountains grey, Sloped and spired from their woods upon the listless cascades run Over many a dun, Built on the shady plain by river and winding way. 45 Along the sandy shores of the Life currenting bright, Up to the trenched walls of Dublin fort by the shore, Long black barques of battle were anchored, and many more Of commerce of the Gaels, with skin sails spread in the light Many were vessels of might; With lofty decks and armoured sterns and raven banners floating o'er. Niall Glundub, Uladh's monarch, long had he been enraged, Seeing the Danar's armies ruling the coast and south of the town, Seeing the life of the people gloomed in the foreigners' frown; Long in mustering the septs of theJDalarads was he engaged; Many the wars he had waged, And now resolved to a tinal fight to carry his sword and crown. 'Twas on a morn, in the midst of the month that ends the autumn year, When harvest was gathered, and plenty reigned through the head and heart of the land, He led the manifold host that marshalled beneath the com- mand Of ten strong succouring kings, across the Life's narrowest weir: It was a spectacle grand To see that long battalioned host advance in its warlike gear. In shirts of mail were the soldiery attired and tunics gay, Each bore a variegated shield, a hazel spear and sword, Or pike or heavy headed axe a proud and valorous band, Laughing and glittering in the sun, just risen above the bay, Their active ranks moved toward The grassy plain of Cill Mosanhog, where the Danar's army lay. The Danar's lines advanced to combat fire-like and heavily; Their corslets triple-plated flamed, dazzling aside the light; Some bore the scymitar and some the long sword weighty and bright; Some ponderous battle-axes gleaming keen and awsomely: The war-clubs' iron tree, And spears innumerable that swayed like waves in a rocky sea. On Cill Mosanhog's meadows, front to front embattled, Under the wooded slope of the hills, for a moment stood The foreigner's host and army of Eire; splendidly from the flood 40 Shone the sun on the spacious plain, viliagcd and many cattled; The next the arrows rattled, A storm of steel, and the battles roared, and the front ranks spouted blood. And noa, noa ! roared the Norsemen, clashing on their arms, As rank and rank, a wall of brass and iron they onward came, Invoking Thor and Odin breasts and helmets all a flame, Chaunting furious battle-songs while dealing deadly harms, Answering our alarms, Hushed on us 'mid the thunder of armisonous acclaim. And hand to hand the green swords met the blue swords, and the clash Of armour-cleaving axes rung, and together rolled the horse, Like thunder-clouds, while chariots galloped over many a corse; Battalion with battalion fierce encountering 'mid the crash Of breastplates and the smash Of bones and spears, till thousands writhed upon the bloody gorse. Champions of mighty stature, whose renown in singing tales Was to re-echo from that day, yielded in fight their breath. And, drunk with battle, hosts of heated warriors bit the heath, While the fierceness of the Danar, the proud valour of the Gaels, Through terrored woods and vales Swept raging to their ruin underneath the cloud of Death. For hours the combat lasted, when a storm began to blow. And thunder clamoured o'er them, where the lurid moving heaven Seemed imagining our combat 'mid the vapours lightning riven; And Niall, though outnumbered, fought o'er thousands laid below, When Imar cried out " Lo! The Yalekyrse's horses come to bear our brave to heaven!" Then, dread grew the kingly slaughter on Gill Mosanhog that day, For Niall himself was spear-transfixed in the foremost press of the war, And Conaing, Eire's heir to be, and mighty Conchobar; Flaithbhertach, likewise Maelme, son of Flangan, king of Bregh, The golden-helmed Aedh, And Congalach, Mailinuire, Eremhon, each a red battle star. 47 THE WANDERINGS AND LAMENTATIONS OF QUEEN GORMFLAITH.* LATE was the eve in autumn time, from tlic dead and dreary west, The sunset shed a wildered flame where all was gloom and rest, O'er Fortuatha's leaden hills and silent sullen lakes, Touching along the steep sad shores the white foam's flying flakes That chaffed by the rising twilight breeze, fluttered up rock and beach: O'er the heron perched upon one leg within some rushy reach; O'er caverns yawning in the sides of precipices drear, Lone hermitages hanging o'er the fathomless black mere ; And o'er the ruined town the Danes destroyed in days fore- gone, Which spread afar, a dreary waste of ashes and of stone; And on the Churches greyly, clustering amid trees beneath The lofty tower that rose beside them on the sombre heath. For although rifled of their wealth those dim asylums stood Sole relics of war's ravages above the shadowy flood. Already night in cloudy desolation domed the sky, And the last crows flew towards Cualan's woods with faint inconstant cry, When by the road that drily wound through barren moun- tains where The brown heath shivered blankly in the gusts of upper air, Down by the well beside the cross, and through the thinning trees, Whose fallen leaves blent their withered sounds with the grey wind's litanies A woman, tall and aged, poorly garbed and deadly pale, Approached the Hospitable House above the dismal vale, And entered; where the large, low raftered room was full of din; Where the pine-torch lit a board with bread and meat and megathm; And by the hearth's hot oaken fire, stretched on the rushes green, A company of poor and boisterous travellers were seen: And by the door were horse boys, clowns, lampooners, jesters, layed, Disputing, drinking, quarrelling, while a drunken harper played. But, as the woman entered, of a sudden ceased the sound Of bitter words and laughter loudly clamouring around; * Pronounced Gunnley. 48 The clown's leer turned into a gape, and all seemed sore afraid. The minstrel stopp'd and made pretence to pat the sleepy hound Stretched at his feet, and even the Biatach obeisant bowed, Looking upon that wanderer's countenance, beautiful and proud; And as she motioned for a seat with an imperial air, All standing guessed with looks downcast that majesty was there. Alas! and something more than even majesty could show; For those blue eyes with all their deep divine and tranquil glow Were full of awe as they had looked on many scenes of woe, On horror, dole, and havoc : with that wasted figure drear, Seemed sorrow like its shade allied for many a gloomy year. "And who art thou?" with reverence asked the Biatach, while the fool With straightened face and upraised brows, first-brushed, then placed a stool. "A wanderer!" the woman gently answered, " who has been, Though little boots it now a monarch's daughter and twice queen. Hast thou ne'er heard of Gorniflaith, when her sire, Flami Simla's reign, G oldened in peace and plenty over Mumhain's spacious plain? Hast thou ne'er heard of Cormac my betrothed, the noblest man For learning, beauty, valour Erie's more unhappy Flann Of Cearbal, my first kingly sponsor, who with my angered sire, Alas ! in treacherous, hateful battle quenched his youthful fire At Beatagh Muahu? or again of Niall Glundub, King Of Uladh's warrior races ? Few the years that oil the wing Have passed to the great spirit-land beyond the starry space When I yet owned the majesty descended from my race. But now, alas ! the isle possesses but their dust alone, And I, a wanderer, haunt the tombs of those who held its throne. So give me food, good Biatach, and yield me rest, lest I, Enhungered and foot weary with my long day's travel, die, Before my mission is fulfilled in visiting this place; For I must see Saint Moula who lives nigh in sacred grace." The hours of the autumn night past, windy darkness possessed the wide earth; And the traveller company drowsed, or stretched sleeping around the wide hearth, 49 The fool and the jester were snoring, the cattle were dumb in their stalls, And wrapped in their leathern cloaks others slept under night by the walls, When the pale beggar Queen, all forlorn, slowly paced by the marge of the lake ; All was dark; through a cleft in the barren hills sinking remote The new moon just guided her way past a chapel, and boat Stranded nigh, when she saw some way out something white like a flake Of foam; and had cried to the darkness and echoes, "Oh, where, Moula, Saint of Fortuatha, art thou ?" when she was aware Of the monk in his robes lying prone in his cold penitential bed, For the black waters covered his form so that nothing was seen but his head. "Well, know I, oh G-ormflaith, thy voice," said the shadowy head from the wave, * 'And, were it another save thou who hast come like a ghost from the grave To break thus upon my night vigil and cold penitential prayer, Thou'd find me more dumb than the water that washes the rocky beach there; But I know that thou, daughter, has lost all that mortal can lose here below, And that death is the best gift that Heaven could send thee to quiet thy woe; But, 'tis sorrow will win thee that heaven, it is suffering only unlocks Those glorious portals, oh, Gormflaith, for thee, that for me by the shocks Of perpetual prayer and of pains self-inflicted, will yield, Though a million of devils opposing spat fire on the shield Of this soul I have tempered to conquer salvation; lo, here Night by night in those deadly cold waters I make me a bier, Till no more seems the dust of my body, my own, than the clay Of yon hills; till my spirit all purified seems like the ray Of the moon and the stars that shine 011 me remote from the life Of this hateful, accursed gloomy world, rolled in crime and in strife. Oft at night when my blood is as cold as the water wherein T lie for long hours, wrapped in prayer, to cleanse off all sin, I hear a sweet voice on the wind of the hills whispering In Christ's blessed accents the glory my penance will bring; Then the wind and the wave, and the star and the cloud unto me Make the vastness of nature my desolate sweet company; 50 And after I've numbered of aves three hundred and more, I see splendid angels descend from the hill to the shore, Who smile on me, saying, the rest of the saints shall be mine, And who number me with them in Christ's resurrection divine. But, daughter, approach, while my soul is exalted with prayer, That I hear thy confession, and shrive thee and bless thee, oh Queen, And make thy heart pure as the dew en the matinal green, Sanctified by my power, and freed from all sorrow and care!" So Gormflaith approached and knelt down on the sands by the shore Where the ripple scarce moved, while the wind in the clouds, hanging o'er, Opened up a calm space of blue sky, and a cluster was seen Like a throng of bright spirits. Beyond the lake's level the roar Of the cascade was heard faint and far in the hills evermore: From the moon, set beyond the great hills, passed a dolorous air Then the shadows closed round, as she spake in the cold silence. there. II Oh! woes, innumerable woes have crossed my life" she said, " Since, holy saint, upon thy knee I bent my maiden head; A beggar queen I pilgrim to the Churches here to pray For Cormac and for Flann, forNiall, even Cearbal, on my way. Dead are the glories of my people like yon sunless west, And night must reign within this heart till I have reached my rest; A few short days of sorrow, and then all for me is o'er; The light of life shall never more be Gorimiaith's, never more ! But I, though full of anguish, now have lost all taste of fear, For I have seen the worst that fate from hell can bring me here; Love lost, loves turned to hatred, wars of kindred, deadliest crime, Battles, revenges, terrors, unsurpassed in any time And when the worst of woes are seen, the lesser nothing are, And, save the Star of Christ, forme there's now no other Star. Lo ! in the windy darkness of the long nights wander I, When earth and sea are rolled in the same blackness as the sky, Over the desolate land alone, by passes drear where prowl The wolves and now by solitary cities where the owl Hoots at the moon; by tields of battle cumbered thick with dead Where I see the heavy eagle from his feast of famine red 51 Disturbed, a moment rise, and settle heavily again, With outstretched claw and bloody beak tearing the flesh of men; Or wandering in the high wrought tempest hear its distant roar; See the huge tumult of the vast rage round the thundering shore; Or, view, maychance, unshaken, by some sullen mountain mere In the glare of gloomy winter lightning, glimmering, low and drear, Some phantom sitting on the rocks above the deadly deep, Or gazing on some shipwreck from the stormy ocean steep. Such is the life of Gormflaith now, whose crown's resplendent ray Once shone from Boinn to Crith Cath Bhuide, from Sionain to Magh Breagh. Alone, alas ! I wander earth where lie my kindred's graves, Toward the night amid the years that roll like darkening waves, Poor and bereft of all I loved, of ail who held me dear Since when I saw the head of Cormac dripping from the spear That Cearbal raised above the fight; and fearful was my fate, To be the wife of him who slew my young heart's earliest mate, And daughter unto one who joined with him in deadliest hate: For, when at Naas, the war being over, Cearbal wounded la}', And I attendant watched beside him of a summer's day, Deeming him sleeping while I thought of Cormac, and my heart Burst from my eyes; a sudden from the couch I saw him start, And staring at me cry : ' What ! weeping, weeping, still for him, The traitor, whom in battle I have torn limb from limb - His death is this the cause that makes thee sorrow by the side Of Cearbal, who has honoured thee by making thee his bride ? ' And I outspoke : * Yes, Cearbal, 'tis for him my eyes o'er- flow And shall while ere I live no, murderer, never hope from me, Thy throne shall yet support a branch of hateful progeny; Did I give birth to son or daughter of thy blood, King, know I'd brain it to thy face! ' No more I spake, felled by a blow. Then rage possessed me and I fled unto my father's court, And dwelt there maddened till I heard that he at Cashel's fort Had fallen beneath the sword of Half, the Dane : and years sped on Till, married unto Niall, heaven sent us a sweet son, 52 Then for the first time in her life was Gormflaith overjoyed; But ah! what spirits of evil haunt yon universal void! For when I sent my little blue -eyed Domhail to the west By Orbsen to be fostered, and my heart a little rest Had tasted for thus life had gained an antidote to sorrow, And love made dear the rising light of every happy morrow Alas! my peace, my heart, my hope was stricken to the earth; My summer joys all withered and all wintered, my lone hearth, For soon, too soon came tidings that my boy had found a grave Within the sullen, cruel, grey, accursed Orbsen's wave. But soon was Erie destined to misfortune : in the gleam Of evening's sky portentous then, three cloudy shields were seen, One red as blood, one fierce with fire, and one as white as snow Heaven's prophecies of want and war and pestilence, we know. And soon with Zain and Jargus, the fierce Lochlans swept the south, And carnage reigned, and famine came, after two seasons' drought. Ah God! it thrills me to recall what, wandering one night Along the Bertha's barren banks all desolate with war, When winds had risen, nor through the thickened vapours shone a star, Losing my way in darkness, hideously met my sight. There had the Danars slaughtered all, and o'er the gloomy land The awful moon had risen, when I felt a sudden hand Pluck at my robes, and looking, I beheld a monstrous form A woman wild, whose clotted tresses streamed upon the storm, Seated upon a corse whose flesh her famished fangs had torn; The skeleton claw that clutched her food, she raised, and wiped away The blood from her gaunt chops, and towards her drawing me forlorn, Mumbled mid gory maniac laughters horrible 'Stay, stay; If you be hungered, here is food in plenty, fresh and raw; Take some, you'll find it good and rare' then grinning, with her claw Thrust a joint of human carrion in my face; and when I broke away, crouched down upon the bloody corse again. And through the fearful shadows of the field then could I mark The shapes of beast and bird, all famished, gluttoning in the dark, 53 The flap of wings, the cranch of bones, come on the pestilent wind, The ravenous growl of other creatures, groping famine blind, Till crawling here and there they came upon their human prey; Then from that place of death and horror sped I fast away Towards the neighbouring village, roofless now, a ruined heap Filled with the dead; and double desolation on me grew And sorrow, wandering thus forlorn; for well the place I knew In prosperous days of plenty, ere my youth began to wane, When charioting I visited my father's wide domain, When came to meet their queen, through April's evening dripping rain, The golden- ringleted maidens of the sunny villaged plain." Thus Gorrnflaith told the saint her sorrows for an hour or more ; And having prayed, was shrived; and passed along the gloomy shore; Then rested in an oaken wood, within a valley nigh. And morning came, windy and pale, along the seaward sky; But still she slept unseen until a woodman, passing by, Cried out, " Woman, awake, 'tis 110011" then flung his load aside, And kneeling sought to catch her breath ; but Gormflaith in the night had died. EBBA AND HER SISTERS. Lo ! from the Convent on the mainland shore, Just as dawn flashes, float a white-robed train, Ebba and her pale sisters, moving down The path that leads unto the plashy sands ; Their mission pure as love, passioned with faith, To reach the islands norward, dim in spray, Where on the disk of night a savage race Still worshipped ignorant gods, pouring fierce prayers Now to the ghostly hero -dwelling clouds, Or the chill crescent o'er the whistling heath. But valiant with the sacred power of Good, Strong with the light of the immortal hope, Whose lamp they bear in their white holy hands To the dark habitants of nature's isles, No fear can dim the glory of their hearts, Nor dread they the great sea and stormy stars : Onward they tread, sweet-voiced troubadours, Wandering the world, chaunting the music prayers The angels sing in Heaven. Beneath, a bark Swings in its restless moorage by the cliff: And entering now, one the dark sail expands, And one the rude helm ministers; until In the dim dawn wind, past the shadowing coast And rocky islets foaming round its cape, Clanged over by the mew, they speed; and with The wind and low bright sun accompanied, Cleave out their charmed voyage through the waste, All the still hours of the sea-lonely day, -A rid starry night and golden noon again. At length, when the third sun sunk broadening red Over the unknown waters toward the west, And, herald of the night, the strengthening gale Cold gusting, snowed the ever following wave, 'Mid darkness settling on the sailless sea Northward afar beneath the cloudy moon, A line of sounding surge rose angrily; And then a headland, wild above the haze, And the dark level of a fireless coast. Where, landing presently, they beached their bark On the hard sands; and up the wild sea banks, 'Mid ferns and grasses dolorously stirred, Through darkness made their way, until they reached A summit, whence 011 either hand appeared The dreary Oread inland bare, and grey, And lifeless, and the solitary sea, Koofed with its rounding cloud, all blank, save where Northward, 'mid rolling mist, one steady star Watched from the pole. Then in its light they knelt And prayed, nor felt alone, for as they prayed, In holy trance divine, the desolate night Became transfigured, and amid the clouds Moon bright and solemn moved, they seemed to soo Pure saintly faces smile, and in their folds Majestic, marshalling along the vast, The spiritual armies of the heavens Protecting; and above the mountain tops, A shining hand, as of an unseen Form Celestial, beckoning them into the Isle; Which viewing, all with one accord sang forth A hymn of Christ, first heard beneath the North. But ere the holy music died in night Lo! through the glooms, a wild maid of the land; Rude-robed, with eyes of bluest wonderment, And bare white feet, advancing timid, led The Sisters to a village in the vale, Where the dark people gave them sanctuary. And here awhile they dwelt ; then issued forth Upon their Sacred Mission through the tribes. Thenceforth for many a season, round the isles Of the stern North, pure Ebba and her train Moved pilgriniiiig among the wild Norse race The rude Sea Knights of stormy Orcades, Whose castles on the cliffs uncouthly loomed Over the savage sea; and through the huts Of heathy hamlets huddled in grey vales, Each rooted by its pine: And night by night Now in some stony fortress hall, amid Fierce figures stretched around the w r indy fire, Carousing over bowls of flesh and mead, Now whiling the lone heathen night with talk Of foray, battle, or maychance with songs Dream ballads, ghostly legends, champion songs Or burnishing their Aveapons, brand and axe, Amid the torches' smoky glare with smile Pure, earnest, and deep s"oul-breathed utterance, Told them the story of the Saviour mild The love-incarnate heart of Deity Whose natal star soft spleiidouring from the East To mankind universal heralded The golden dawn of an ennobled life, Exemplared by his own of conquering love Ineffable, whose empire on the earth Was doomed through endless ages glorified With lights immortal streaming from the heavens, Beyond death's shadow and the verge of Time Enduring to expand. And while she spake, as o'er some gloomly group Of giant trees the morning breaks and lights, And brooding emanates from goldeued branch, And foliage-hidden blossom, odours sweet, Until the space they shadowed erst, glows bright And rich the air so o'er their ruthless brows New aspects beamed, new natures quickening stirred, Spring like in hearts barbaric; while their souls Grew slowly toned to gentler harmonies, By her soft speech, and by those sacred eyes. So year by year from isle to isle they went, Diffusing light, and leaving in their track The traces of a presence more divine: Till slowly all around grew changed; wars ceased; Eude chapels rose within the Druid's grove; 56 And soon, instead of trumps uncouthly blown, Calling the tribes to battle, or the clash Of iron shields upon the fire -lit mound, Dolorously borne through the dim night upon The vast battalions of the viewless winds, Gloomily moving o'er the dismal land Sweet bells at morn and even fill the air, Sunnily ringing o'er a peaceful realm, Calling to worship, and harmonic blend With happy hearts, as altarward they tend In holy purity serene : while glowed The golden corn beneath the Sabbath sun, While evening's star, that penned the plenteous fold, Beckoned the weary fisher o'er the seas To the calm hearth ; or o'er the place of tombs In the dark vale, gleamed to the watcher's eye Symbolic of a home beyond the world. At length, when many a sun had set upon Her Christ-inspired travel sweet, her soul Resting upon the labour of a life Celestially secure, to Ebba came One last fond wish to cross the greyish seas, And lay her ashes amid kindred dust Under the soft skies of the old Green Land Whose convents gleamed by many a sliding stream And herd-strewn pasture many a castled wood And lone, calm, wild, recluse; where the day shone Through rainy lights upon the Holy Isle Christendom's northern vanguard. Then it was, As the last night upon the peaceful realm She brightened, rose around with all its stars, And in the rugged creek swung the brown bark, Heady to give her waftage with the dawn, A bright dream came to Ebba as she slept : A dream of weary pilgrimage across A space with dark impenetrably domed, Until, by slow and painful toil, she reached A summit, whence the wide world opened round Endless and dim. Then, sudden, as she gazed, A splendour seemed to cleave the heavens she saw The saintly crown drop down through holy air And rest upon her brows, and in its light A gloried future vision of the faith The Church throughout all lands ubiquitous; Community of souls around the earth, And spiritual empire fixed eterne In sovereign central unity divine; Imperishable faith, perishless love, 57 And power hereditary with the Heavens, 'Mid transitory thrones and shapes of Time. Then Ebba rose, and voyaged unto her home, In prayer, while round the morning goldened coasts A mighty congregation praying, gazed Upon her barque, until its sail was lost In the blue sky : and favouring breathed the wind Till the third eve, when in the sunset's depths Green hills appeared, and villaged bays beneath; And the fresh stars came up the eastern foam And brooded o'er the hush of sainted seas. THE STORY OF THE LORD OF TARBERT 16SO. I. THE PROPHECY. CALM and clear shone the April evening o'er Tarbert's castle, close by the Shannon's shore, Over its turrets rising 'mid oaks in bud, Over the azure level of spacing flood; Long grey stretching promoiit full in the light, And sails of fisher vessels, distant and white. Far away along the remotest main Superbest palace vapours of fresh spring rain, Billowing, lessened away to the faint low hills; The meadows were yellowed with stately daffoclills ; An air from the blossomed orchards was blowing sweet O'er the waving expanses of tall rough wheat, O'er the shower-wet roofs of the village aflame With sunset; over the river hazed in the heat, From whose green banks the smell of wild celery came, Scenting the humid wind; when Tarbert's lord Rode from the porch, and crossing the foamy ford, Spurring his black steed's sleek flank, cantered along By hedge-lined roadways, humming the musing song Of the sweet verses he had written to wile The noon, about some imaged mistress's smile; Clothing his thought with words, as a branch with leaves, Heaping rich fancies together like sun-lighted sheaves, Weaving line after line in a harmonised tune, Joyous or sad as the waves under the morning or moor Thus rode he along by ivy-draped park walls, Past drifting gusts of drizzling waterfalls, And long green caverned forest ways where through The wood-cutter plodded cottageward mid the dew, In the faint slant light, while in the lessening heat, Young birds chirped in the twigs round the beech -trees' feet; Past vistas of sloping grey hills drowsed in sleep; Dim plains to the east of quietness and sheep; Till round a hill's shoulder seaward saw he there The last stream of lustre lost on the verge of air; Then down a zig-zag path of the clayey ridge, In the spring valley, he stopped by a mouldering bridge To give his horse a draught of the freshes among Large-leaved water-plants skirting the arch that sung To the eddies that bubbled and swirled round the buttress brown Viewing the while the smoke from the distant town, Hearing the vesper hymn from a convent afar, Viewing 'mid lifting hazes the evening star: When, as he turned his horse's dripping head Toward the slatey road that forestward led, Lo! by an oak in the evening shadows dim A beauteous gipsy girl stood gazing at him: Her black eyes lustrous with the voluptuous light Of smiles within their lashes, ebon as night, Her oval sweet face dusk as the yellowing rind Of the olive, ripening in summer sunshine and wind, Her teeth like almonds whitely peeled of their skin, Flashing 'mid dimples that rippled her cheek and chin, Her deluge of blue black hair waved o'er each ear From the low level forehead and temples clear, Half hid in the hood of the cloak that parting showed Her lithesome waist and bosom swelling in bud- As with a linger she beckoned the lord to stay And hear from her lips his fate ere he rode away. Lord Tarbert stopped, enchanted in every vein. Then, throwing his bridle over his- horse's mane, Seized the small hand she willingly gave to hold, And crossing its hardened palm with a coin of gold, Said: "Not for a crown had I missed your form of grace, My darksome beauty in this loneliest place. " " Nor I," she answered, ** albeit poor as a weed, That smile of your face, in the which my art can read Noblest courtsey, courage, and kindness, too, And beauty enough to make all women woo ; Nay nay forbear my lips shall be ne'er but of one Be kissed and ere you kiss them much must be done." " Then what must I do for that, say, prettiest witch," He whispered. " Hear me," said she, " utter your fate." " I shall marry of course a lady wondrous rich," 59 He murmured, half with a sneer, and then with a sigh. "Not so," returned she, ''married you'll be ere you die, But not to a lady except a lady am /." Pleased was the young lord's blood, but the doubt in his brain Broke in a laugh of humour again and again, The while the gipsy, grave as a rock had grown; As dropping his hand she said in a sweet low tone : ' ' Laugh as you will, gay lord, and doubt as you may, The fate I promise for both shall be as I say; Adieu, thanks, and sweet dreams " and she hurried away Into the thick of the wood, and was lost to his sight ; As he, back looking, castleward rode through the night. No more thought Tarbert's young lord of the words he had heard From the gipsy's rubious lips than the song of the bird In the ivied window up in the tower when he woke In the golden light next morn; when, as down the stair Singing as gaily he strode to a chamber fair Opening over the river and eastern glow, A servitor handed a letter, whose seal he broke, And, standing in rapt peruse a minute or so, Learned that to foreign lands he must hurriedly go, Called by his heart away from his pleasant home To his dearest friend 011 earth, then dying at Rome. And that same evening as glowed the western ray O'er the blue rolling waves of Kilbaha's Bay His vessel, puffing her sail as Loop Head past, Swept toward the Southern shores with slanting mast, Swift and more swift in the widening ocean blast; Nor thought he more of the girl of the twilight wood Than of the stars that lonelily gleamed on the flood. O'er Italy's plains and mountains a year had rolled; And the friend he had sought lay hidden in marble and mould ; When once, as Lord Tarbert rode toward the fading day On by the Apennines north, of an evening fair, Just as Venus rose through the streams of air, Lemon-hued under a level roof of cloud, Against which loomed keen summits and castles proud Lo ! o'er Sorrento's vineyards, black from the main, An April tempest gathered flashed, and passed in rain; And slowly trickled the drops from leaf and spray; The freshes foamed from the piney heights, and around The pale vine blossoms scattered about the ground Filled with sweet the atmosphere cool and grey: 60 As wet and travel-wearied, lit by a moon in the wane, He stopped for the night at a lonely inn on his way. Swiftly rolled a torrent through poplar ranks a-near; Wood-crested hills above stood black in the sky; The stony road through a rocky chasm wound drear, And drearily swooned the breath of the night wind by; As, stooping under an aged vine that wound Like a snake the narrow doorway, an aged crone Volubly welcomed the traveller all alone; Led his horse to a stable behind, and found Fodder and food for both; and standing a while Attendant, chatted, smiling her withered smile. Then led the youth to a little room with a bed, Whereon o'erwearied, scarce had he laid his head When he slept; and the place was dark, and without a sound Save of his breath, and the dim wind broadening round. Hours passed away; the moon had set on the plain, And a few stars shone through clouds, when a shudder shook The sleeper; who in the darkness presently woke, And listening heard beside him a tap on the pane Of the narrow casement; then rising would have spoke But for a clear deep whisper thrilling the gloom: " Breathe not, Lord Tarbert, or this place is your tomb Murder is purposed the hag has gone for them quick And silently open the door." His heart beat thick More with amaze than fear, for the voice seemed one he'd known ; Then, dagger in hand, the door he had open thrown When marvel mixed with joy he saw before him there The gipsy girl of the Kerry wood in the starlight fair, Holding his horse by the bridle listening keen : But scarce had he clasped her hands in happy surprise, When figures advancing swift on the road were seen. Fain to his heart had he clasped that form grown dear, When a bullet sang by, and then another more near; For his pistols he felt they were gone. And then as he knew He was struck in the arm by the hot blood bursting through Lifting his saviour girl without more ado Into the saddle and springing behind, he fled In a gallop along the heath to the river bed Plunged in the current, when after a fight with its strengtn His good horse sprung up the fronting bank at length; Nor till the girl, who before him light as a wreathe Lay clasped, was far away from the whistling death That followed them, drew he the rein or paused for breath. 01 PART III, The months of the summer had passed from their golden prime, And the lord and the gipsy girl had lived in the clime, Travellers and lovers, together most of the time. One night he wandered by the ancient walls of Rome, The brown brick battlements of Tullitis overgrown With ivy, near the Viminal gate, in the stillness lone, Hearing the bleat of sheep on the commons dim, The stones from the ruined arches on the boughs and loam Falling; now and then the breath of a distant hymn; Stars and white clouds lit the austere azure dome, As through the straggling foliage of the vine The desert night wind fluctuated the red leaves; When sudden he saw sitting on a green mound Lura, whom he had loved ere on the plain the sheaves Gathered in gold embrace; their meetings day and night The sweeter because unknown to anyone round; And he had told her lately, that away Ireland ward fate must Imrry him some near day; And as he came to where beneath a cypress slight She sat, weeping upon her dream of yesternight, She rose, and viewed him mournfully with those eyes, Darker than Hades, and passioned with her sighs, The black hair deluging from the dusk sweet brow, Where met the twin thin crescents floating below Her Ceres bosom, swelling like milky corn Amiable in the exuberant light of morn; And in the starry dark and breathless stillness gazed Mute as a moanad statue, one arm raised In still expectancy, while the calm oval face Seemed paler than pale gold, nor from the full red mouth Of blossomed concentration, murmured a sound. Till whispered he in her ear what happy both Made them, that not for many moons should he return To his far Island home ; on the which she sprang To his embrace the first time since in the south They wandered; then the night with her joyous laughter rung; And round his neck he felt one covetous white arm turn, And one play with his hand; and on his cheek her breath Of love, that just of late maychance was that of death.; And then dislinked she stood with eyes of quiet light, And lowlily beat her heart in her bosom fair, Like the leafy listening sound of a tree at night Gently stirring inwardly in the air, 62 Then, after many a pledge had passed between Those lovers under the ruin's ivied screen, And as the half moon rising late in the south Thinly shed on the plain its shrinking light, Lura, happily holding his hand betwixt her own hands tight, Led the young Lord of Tarbert silently through the night Over columns and mounds, till they came to a cavern's mouth. " Come," she whispered, "come till I prove unto thee The fate I told thee of in the far green isle, From which I followed unseen over land and sea, My only guide, sweet love, and the laws of destiny: Now I who by chance have saved thy life, will show How thy life with mine may be blent indissolubly; Come." At the cave he paused a moment to kiss her smile In pleased wonder; then inward paced they slow, At first in darkness, until at length they came Where the moon through a leafy crevasse trembled in flame; When Lura, drawing aside a sleepy bough, Drooped from the wall o'er the basin of a dry well, Drew him down after her. Then as the clear light fell With spots of leafy shade on a marble floor, Lo! it gloried a wondrous treasure of jewels and gold, Piles of coin, vessels and trinkets manifold, Crusted with pearl and diamond opulent. A while in amaze o'er the heap his eyes were bent, For there, in sooth, were riches enough to endow A princess altarward led with diademed brow. Some minutes past, while Tarbert 's Lord held dumb, Now gazing on beauty, now wealth; when Lura said, "Come, Dearest, by chance 1 met thee, by chance I found This treasure unknown to any above the ground ; Both are thine own if thou wilt; if not, at least Take, for love of me, this treasure's divided store : To Ireland with thee; think of me in the west As one who saved thy life one thou wilt see no more !" 'Twas a wintry night at the close of this happy year, While the hearts of each to the other had grown most dear, And the moon which had lighted the gipsy girl and her lord O'er summits of ice and vales of vine, and poured Its light 011 their dangers, love, and golden store Over the Shannon's mouth 'mid clouds of snow Shone on the full sailed whitened vessel that fast Wafted them home where Tarbert's roofs were a-glow, With fires of welcome red, and smiled each room below With plenteous cheer, warm arrased from the blast Now happy are both as any the moon below, And Lura is Lady of Tarbert's castle at last. 03 THE PRISONER OF LIMERICK. A Legend of 16 . 'TwAs a hot autumn morn; the Old Town, with its gable fronts browned Like its stacks of tall chimneys by weather and smoke, spreading round, Was silent; few moved through the streets where their feet had the sound, From the height whence I listened, of a grass-hopper's clry- tongued song, Which stops shuffles stops as they lazily sauntered along, Or paused with a neighbour to gossip at window or door, Whence their voices came faint as the waves of some far level shore. At moments a swallow undulating in the void beneath flew, A fair cloud unrolling in sunshine, sailed under the blue, Throwing shade aslant spire and on roof-top; at times a cock crew, Half asleep in some dusty dull court, as it were with a yawn, All unlike to its stiff -throated sky-splitting carol at dawn. And at times from some mouldering belfry, the slow tolling hour Vibrated in waves along Limerick's high Prison Tower, From out of whose iron-barred casement of stone aged and grey I looked on the shimmering roofs and the hot, hollow day. How clearly the slightest things which I beheld at that time Come back to me, linked each to each like the lines of a rhyme ! In one fixed spot before me the dim midges circled in train, Slowly floating now twisting together now widening again; Above me the blue, buzzing, bustling fly beat at the pane; Where the sluggish moat deep underneath by the gloom of the wall Was cut blackly across, I could see the rat stealthly crawl Through the garbage and rank, sickly grass; and just from its nest's brink In the sheer wall, the sparrow's head peep; hear its chirrup- ing chink To its mate with a worm in its bill on the moat bank below; And the town was as still as the plain spreading off in the glow, When I heard in the narrow room next to his watcher's for I Was commissioned to watch him a sudden nerve-shudder- ing cry, And swift through the chink, that he knew not of, looked, when I saw Him gazing at something his black eyes dilated with awe, 64 And the terror drops slide from his noble dusk brow then he fell, The room dimm'd; and above him seemed brooding a shadow of Hell. Who this Prisoner was I know not, nor have ever I been told: Three years had rolled on since the winter night windy and cold When I first saw him pace the next chamber a tall, pallid form Erect, pausing now for a moment to list to the storm, As if on its wail there came voices he knew; then before The smouldering fire that threw shadows the colour of gore On his long ebon locks, leaning back in the old iron chair, Till all gloomed, save an amulet sparkling with diamond he wore Pendant over his heart. The stone chamber was dismal and bare, Save his couch, table, seat and habiliments, nothing was there; And yet day and night for long years seemed he never alone, For his thoughts seemed compamcAis, nor except in his sleep came a moan. Ofttimes he spoke low in a tongue I knew not, for long hours, As addressing in tones of command some invisible Powers; And oft in the darkness, in sooth, I used think there were two In that black stony space, where this man was alone, as I knew; Nor was it least strange that, when bringing him food, I used come Every morn, that he motioned thanks merely, as though he were dumb. When I first saw this terrible Shadow, I rushed down the stair To the warder; we entered his chamber; he only was there; And for months he lived just as he had lived, that spectre I saw Never more, nor was e'er his room darkened with visions of awe; And already I deemed that this sight was the work of my brain, Until one winter's night. Twelve had tolled; a thin moon in the wane Dimly lighted the cold wintry distance all sheeted with snow; Through the darkness a few frosty "stars glimmered sadly and low; G5 On the far stormy hills I could sec a wild beacon flame red Like a moon cloud-bewildered that glares on some dance of the Dead, And the Town was as hush as the ground; when, amid the blank night, I heard a strange music come swooning around the tower's height, And as I looked into his chamber, amazement and fear Possessed me, for, lo ! all the chamber seemed filled with a light Pure and living, but awesome, amid which he stood, as to hear The voices that momently sung through the darkness more near; And still as I gazed, through the tempest's bewildering hum, The trampling of horses seemed nearer and nearer to come, Till I heard them beneath in the courtyard. A minute scarce past When the door of his chamber flew open as burst by a blast, And a plumed phantom entering joyously, led by the hand A beautiful maiden a Shade from the dim sightless land. At first on her robe o'er her heart, as she paused at the door, There seemed a red rent like a dagger gash, gouted with gore, But as the soft light deepened round her I saw it no more. They gazed on each other, they rushed to each other; her face Looking up into his with a tender delight and sad grace, To the which I knew nothing to liken but a cloud without breath, Through which shine two stars, hovering over a lake still as death, Imaged silent and fair on the calm. There were whispers, faint sounds Like the echoes of lowest love laughter from twilighted grounds : Then the three disappeared; all was silence; the heavy door closed: For a second, a lingering light, as of vapours faint rosed, Curled and dried upon vacancy. Then from the pavement below, As they mounted, the clatter of hoofs muffled in the deep snow. I sprang to the window and gazed where the sounds seemed to go; But all black was the sky as the wide earth was white; the air was stirred As if wich some fierce rush of wings, and remotely 1 heard E 6G A noiso like the sound of some troop of swift horse hammer- ing on Wild music that faded away to the last star that shone, And then, where the sky o'er the low plain gleamed level and wan, Like a drift of swift darkness, beheld them sweep past they were gone. The commandant examined the warder and I the next day In private, and each to his questions said all we could say, And both were dismissed; but the warder, as I have been told Has long lived in Ulster, a man rich in flocks and in gold; And as for myself but there's mysteries, friend, I ne'er can Unravel twixt living and dead, while as yet I am man. On a night shortly after I dreamed that a treasure lay piled In a certain, old ruin that well I had known from a child; And, awaked, something forced me to search for it : whether 'twas mine You may guess : but this tale ever shakes my old nerves pass the wine. A LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR'S DAYS. ONCE, when King Arthur held his court At Camelot, the glorious time When through the land from brine to brine Old Britain's knighthood shone sublime When passed the days in tournay sport The nights mid feast and songs divine; It chanced, a lady fiend, the wife Of Urience, all amort Of some affront that came of wine, Hated the King, and vowed, in short, By fanning foes and raising strife, By magic, or aught other means Such as an injured fair besiens, To win her vengeance or his life. Just then, as it befell, one day The King, with two companions, they A knight, Sir Acolyn of Gaul, And Urience strong and tall, Horsed for the sport, rode swift and gay 67 From the towered gate fronting the dawn, Through the old oak trees on the lawn; And down a valley green withdrawn, Through Cornwall's forests wide away. 'Twas a dim morn, cloudy and still; Sometimes upon a heathy hill, Or yellowing roof of autumn wood, Or hazy space of stretching flood, Flickered awhile a hazy ray; Then passed, and all the sky was grey. in. A league and more the three had gone Along the monarch's broad domain, By stream and crag and grassy rath, Through branchy copse and forest path, Westward, whence spread the ocean lone Shadowed by slanting drifts of rain; When, sudden from a leafy spring A great hart raised its antlers brown, Glanced turned and flew, swift as the wing Of cormorant o'er the twilight sea, When thunder mutters gloomily, And on the waves with deepening frown A night of storm looms darkly down. 1 ' A chase !" King Arthur cried : ' now follow, Knights, to my lead " and spurred his horse In gallop over glade and gorse And swift they swept o'er mound and hollow. IV. Hour after hour they held the track Through marshy glen and woodland way, Until King Arthur, who in chase As battle, ever foremost rode, Fast pressing on the wearied prey, Plunged his strong ash spear spouting blood Into the hart's heart, as the day Was sinking, and a tempest black Came breaking o'er the distant bay; When, sidelong leaning from his hors A second time to strike with force, Down from a cliff he fell and rolled Into a wat'ry reach : then gained The bank, all wearied, breathless, maimed; And looking upward and around No egress from the ravine found. 63 The grey green level rolling sea Came foaming from the windy east, Whose cope of lurid rainy mist Rose o'er the waters distantly; And with the fresh tide, shock on shock Against the black-ledged stretching rock, The heavy curled billow broke In endless line, and burst in spray Upon its swinging, swollen sway; Till the next stopp'd its backward way, And surging on with hollow boom To shallower coves of clearer grey, Swung fluctuating, merged in foam. Slow mounting up the skyey height, The windy gull on wings of white Poised in the misty depths of light, Or, hovered low athwart the side Of hazy headland in the tide, Nigh whose far point dimly descried, A barque, in the strong distant blast Aslant, with blowing topsails past; Then, as King Arthur watched, drew near, And anchored by a jutting pier Of rock, where on a few oaks brown Bent in the gale, while red as blood A last ray struck the heaving flood: Then the stormy dusk of night, From inland wood and precipice height, Upon the wild blank sea came down. The King, who in the wavy reach Seemed prison-bound, at length with pain, Along the cliffs and round the beach, Now swept with heavy gusts of rain, With slow steps gained the promont's end, And signalled through the spray the barque ; Whence soon, through windy haze and dark, A boat with figures many-oared Were seen across the waves to bend; And soon arrived, took him aboard. On which the ship, rehoisting sail, Swept sidelong off before the gale. *' Whence are ye bound?" inquired the Ki'.ig, After his misadventure told Unto the helmsman, who, enrolled Tn sable garb, watched the black wing On which the vessel skirred the foain, 09 " To Camelot," the voice replied; ' * But as the wind too fierce and bold Blows from the shore, Sir Knight, to land On this nigh beech; be of my mind And quit awhile the rain and cold For our poor cabin, where you'll find Food served you by our sailor band. " The King descended through the gloom, And soon the cabin awning raised, Stood still with dazzled eyes amazed; For there a festal table, spread With wines and lamps, appeared, and round Six maidens beautiful with bloom Of summer on their cheeks, attired In rich voluptuous robes, who soon With courtesies and looks divine, A silver goblet like a moon Filling with costly crimson wine, Entreated him to drink. The King, Wearied and wet, the beauties pledged, And into converse entered, while One, with a soft alluring smile, Fingering a lyre, attuned its chords To a soft song of lovesome words. But scarce a verse had flown when he, Forgetful of all round him there, The lights, the feast, the lustrous fair, Sunk in a deep sleep heavily. VIII. How long he slept he knew not : when He woke there was a noise of men Upon the deck, and looking round He found him elapsed within the arms His head upon the bosom charms Of a young beauty; and before, All gazing through the cabin door With looks of strange amaze and sport, The ladies of the Camelot court; And mid them his fair Queen amort With deepest indignation fired, And hot disdain; as by her side The lady Urience cried, Mid laughter gay: "How now, grave King, Is this the mode, when far away From the Queen's couch, you pass the day In beauty's soft arms trifling ? " 70 The King sprang up, and through the throng Gaining the deck, beheld that he Had been swift wafted o'er the sea Up the Usk river where among The oaks the vessel anchored by A verdant bank. Laughters rung around As, all amazed, he sprang aground, Recalling his adventure late His hunt, his fall, the gloomy barque, His sightless voyage through the dark, The maidens fair, the cup of wine, Deep drugged, he drank when on the brine. Then saw the trick, awhile, dismayed: But calling swift a vassal, bade Him bring a horse, and rode away To Camelpt, his Queen beside, Soon stilled, when, in his knightly way, He told this story to his bride Of Urience's wicked spite. But she had vanished from their sight, Her vengeance foiled, nor many a night Dared enter Camelot's turrets gay. CASTLE AND BOWER, (AN OLD SEPTEMBER.) and grand the castle's tower Looks along the hazy seas; Autumn goldens roof and bower, Autumn perfumes every breeze: Branchy oaks and solemn larches Round the gardens weave their shade, While beneath their dark green arches Wander curled page and maid: By the fountain some are pacing, Some beside the mossy urn; Scarlet sash and ploom of ebon Waver at each windy turn : But hark ! anigh, a mingled cry Of joy and fear is echoing; To and fro the figures go Underneath the branches lo ! Through the shadows, through the glow Sways the silken swing. On a grassy mound o'ershaden By the mulberry on the lawn. Matron mild and bloomy maiden In a circle sweet have drawn; 71 Circle sweet of fairest faces Round an old Dwarf brown, and calm, Who with crooked finger traces Fortunes on each milky palm; Small hands tremble in his seizure, Foreheads glow with bright surprise, As he scans each vein of azure With his sorcerous raven eyes : But all heedless of the weather Changeful destiny may bring, With their hearts and faces glowing, Sash and golden ringlets flowing, Yonder youth and maid together Ply the silken swing. Now the air is warm and still, And the hay dries in the meadow; Silently the distant hill Is mapled o'er with autumn shadow; Round the misty seaward ridges Whitely sails the lazy gull; Sheep stand by the sultry hedges, Panting with their weight of wool. While through the yellow grained lea, Walks the harvest boy with cheek Ruddy as the apple streak ; Hark! he winds his noisy creek, Click-click-a-click click-click-a-click, Hark he winds his noisy creek, And a yo-ho-ho ! shouts he. Still the Dwarf with finger quaintly Many a tale of fortune weaves; Still the maiden and her lover Swing beneath the sycamore's cover, That around them murmurs gently, Pleased through all its leaves. Toward the group across the meadows Paces slow a youthful Knight; His eyes of blue are dreamy bright, His forehead touched with pensive shadows; For in fancies sweet and lonely, Wanders he in dreams apart, Musing constantly and only On the lady of his heart; And the matrons smile serenely, And one whispers " Tell us now, Of this beauty bright and queenly, Whose sweet image charms thy brow!" 72 Then the youth from sunny grasses Lifts a lute, and with a sigh Strikes a prelude faintly tinkled, 'Till the sunny air is sprinkled, Slowly as her image passes, With a memoried melody. When the youth with aspect lowly Drops the lute, whose music rare Like a myrrhine odour slowly Dies upon the burning air ; And the maidens muse together, Lo! a bronzed cavalier Springs a-foot upon the heather, Bright and shining as a spear; And against the mulberry leaning Bares his forehead to the day, Glances toward a lady screening From the foliage trickled ray. And as o'er his figure stately Netted lights and flecks of shade, Wink like frolic humours slyly Scattered by some spirit wily, With a golden voice thus featly Trolls a memoried serenade. Come, I long to wander wi' thee Summer time was made for roving, Summer time was made for loving, Come, my sweet, I prythee; And through forest paths and meadows, Through the sunshine and the shadows, Side by side to hearts in tune With the happy, sunny weather We shall wander 'mid the hum Of honied bees and fountains streaming, Whispering sweetest thoughts together Memories of twilight dances, Darling dreams and frolic fancies, Until o'er the mountain beaming Floats the festal moon: Come, come, come, come, List, my heart is beating wi' thee, Come, come, come, come, Dear, my sweet, I prythee. 73 If you rather love the town, Through its listless long arcades With the gallants and the maids Shall we pace it up and down; Or if wearied thus, we'll wing To some tilt yard's dusty ring; Watch the knights with levelled lances Jowsting in the lists, and see Fairest ladies lovesomely Smiling on their plumed advances. Leaving then their frolic war Shall we seek some rich bazaar: There shall critic Cupid choose Tiniest trinkets for thy use, Bracelets, shoe ties, bunched like roses, Scented gloves and rings with posies For those fingers soft and white, Whose designed and dainty pressure Signets ever sans eraseure Love's sweet seal 011 mine at night : Come, come, come, come, List! my heart is beating wi' thee; Come, come, come, come, Dear, my sweet, I prythee. in. Lo! some the trumpet wings away To glory on the Lowland plain, And some the golden thirst of gain To wondrous realms of western day : New regions rich as poet dreams, Where mountains, frosted thick with gems, By fruited woods, like anadems, Flash o'er the broad sun-fountained streams : But, while my comrades cross the sea And others plunge in storm and war, By the light of love's sweet star Would I live my life with thee; Pacing happily together Through each change of human weather; While within us, and around us Love's rich skies shall light and bound us : Then, come, fairest, come, List ! my heart is beating wi' thee, Come, come, come, come Dear, my sweet, I prythee. 74 Thus tuned to noontide's warm dispose The gallant voiced his listless lay; 'Till from the splendrous cloud that rose A-south above the level bay, Conies slowly on a floating shower, And folds in vapour hill and plain; The big drops strike on roof and bower; The lake is switched with drifts of rain : Up spring the group and mid the sprays Of thickest foliage make their home, Like nymphs and gods of ancient days Beneath some forest temple's dome; And as the phantom slants its wing Mid disentangling woofs of blue, A while no sound disturbs the wave Of silence, spreading greyly, save From patter-ings of the leafy dew, Or tonings of some fingered string. But now the day begins to wane; The forest tops in sunset rolled, Across the hazy wheateii plain Wave from the west farewells of gold : The terrace fountains flame; they see Along the tranquil spacing brine White summits flash, and distantly The purple mountains rippling line; And hear the reapers' rustic hail As through the upland's tented sheaves They wend into their cottage vale Amid the mist and withered leaves. In river reaches thick with reeds The quiet kine are clustered nigh; The crow on inky pinion speeds The levels of the fading sky : And silence spreads on azure wings, Till naught save lowest laughters there, Or music trembled whisperings Breathe through the precious starry air; But hark! the castle bell they rise, And as they scale its shadowing height, Whence bluely broadening shone the sea, Tinged by eve's planet, spleiidrously, One sings to the Hesperian skies A parting ditty in their light. 75 THE PEASANT'S PILGRIMAGE. ONE rnorn as through the dewy air The sun rose o'er the eastern flood, A peasant youth and maiden fair Within a hill-side cottage stood; And round them gathered young and old, Tall sires, and mothers grey and mild, And pressed their hands in happy fold, And murmured blessings on each child; For swiftly comes their marriage day, And by the custom of the age, Unto a saintly shrine to-day They'll pace in pious pilgrimage. With faith and love each bosom heaves, And happiness brims every heart, As clustering by the cottage eaves They stand to watch the pair depart. " Good by, good by," the inmates cry, And cheeks are kissed, and hands are pressed : The sunbeams fleck his bronzed neck, And brood upon her gentle breast; And warm and kind the summer wind Before them waves the woods divine, As down the path of purple heath They wander toward the sainted shrine. Now onward through the golden morn Above the summer ocean's flow, By side-long fields of poppied corn, And sunny winding roads they go. The warm wind busy with the leaves Of tinkling oaks that skirt their way, Comes breathing of the wheaten sheaves That tent the uplands o'er the bay; The smoke of cottage hearths arise, And through the wooded mountain breaks They see, amid the opening skies, The green ravines and purple peaks That look along the harvest land, And shadow many a singing guest; And lapped awhile in noonday dreams Beside a way-side well they rest, 76 He plucks the flowers that round it spring, And o'er her brow a chaplet weaves, The while their happy whispering Blends with the murmur of the leaves : Till once again by wooded glen And hills that greenly watch the brine, With autumn's sun they wander on Until they reach the sainted shrine. "Ah, what!" the peasant cried, "is wealth, That cannot banish care, asthore, Sure we've light hearts, and strength and health, And what can any lord have more; We've song and work for summer's hour, And cottage hearths for winter's cold, And peace is rarer far than power, And love, my Mary sweet, than gold." And as amid the woodland halls They pace from out the noonday flame, He hears the tinkling waterfalls, In spraey accents shape her name : All beauteous things that round him lie He loves to blend with her, and trace In glimmering lake, and golden sky, The tender image of her face; The sun itself is like her crown; He thinks the lustrous stream, that there Through shadows brown, is flowing down, Is like the ripple of her hair; And leaves that stray in crispy play, But fall to make her pathway fine, As softly o'er the forest floor, They wander toward the sainted shrine. Now o'er the distant slopes of heath The sea-ascending mists are roMsd; Now sinks the autumn sun beneath The cooling chasm of pallid gold : Beside the songless forests crown A star looks o'er their dusty way; Above the comfortable town The homely cloud of evening grey : And now beyond the wild ravine, Through branches wet with drizzling rills, In darkness clear and cold is seen The sullen lake and leaden hills 77 That guard the ruined isle below, And o'er its leafy altar brood, 'Mid hermit shadows moving slow Along the sacred solitude : And as before the Cross they stand Through breathless spaces of the night, The river murmurs glad, the land Breathes round in desolate delight; And clear and far each spirit star That sparkles through the depths divine, Seems pausing there to hear the prayer They murmur by the sainted shrine. Oh, sacred is the watch they keep, Throughout the live long night alone, In holy silence calm and deep, They worship till the stars are gone; And day flits past in wandering dreams, O'er lessening lengths of road, till down The western steeps sweet heaven seems To smile above their straw-thatch 'd town, Where welcome rings amid the glow Of yellow evening clear and still, And dear old faces smile below, As they ascend the homeward hill : Come maidens wreathe the village doors With greenest leaves, above, beneath; And deck the walls and strew the floors With apron full of blossomed heath ; And twine the bridal crown of corn, And leave it in the starlit air, Until the freckled autumn morn Shall touch it, and the youthful pair, 'Mid joyous eyes, and happy skies, And singing birds, and breathing kine, Along the ways of olden days Shall pace unto the Marriage Shrine. THE SEA SERPENT. i. UPON the level of the midnight sea Kested the blue dome of immensity, Spangled with starry clusters innumerate; Save to the east where lay a line of clouds Foam pale, but indistinct as unguessed fate; As statelily the full sailed ship cleft through The waste of heaving blue. 78 Beneath, the swinging oil lamp's yellow glow, Over his charts, the captain bent, below; Calmly secure, whence'er a wind should blow: The sailors sang at the helm, and in the shrouds. Three bells had gone, a dark cloud dimmed the moon, That underneath the wave would vanish soon; And in the solemn darkness before dawn All, save the helmsman, slept; when in the wake A strange and rushing sound turned his cheek wan; And looking o'er his shoulder, he beheld A something black that swelled And lengthened far away, while all around The monstrous head advancing, bound on bound, A storm of surge and watery thunder's sound Bursting the sea calm, caused his heart to quake. The last light of the moon was glimmering drear, As on the lonely ocean IT drew near Sending a mountain ridge of billows before; And straight behind the heaving stern he saw The million headed hydra black and frore With crest enormous o'er the surge, and eyes Yellow in moonlight rise; And as it shouldered aside and thundered past, The seas, foam maddened by the rushing blast Of its swift motion sloaky masses vast, Of serpent black, ravenous with mouth and claw. IV. Innumerable monsters joined in one Writhed from its sides and hissed its back upon, Erect with rage, or sleek with black disdain, Fierce eyed and multituduous, bursting forth Horrored for one dread mile the shaken main. But on the monster's brow risen from sleep Rested the awe of the deep: And round it spread a shadow and a breath Cold as the ice, and imminent as death, As dawn with moonlight mingled, from beneath Broadening, beheld it vanish toward the north. v. Stiffened with dread and dumb the helmsman stood, As through that long black valley in the flood The last huge monster of the early world, Shook the great seas with unaccustomed fears: And dumb remained when morning's crimson curled 79 Over the vast; nor spake lie 'till death's hour Of IT, whose shape of power, Sleeps underneath the sun and moon, alone In polar oceans' solitudes unknown, Mid alps of ice, lulled by the tempest's moan- Then, but to man appears, once in a thousand years. SKELETON STORIES. No. I. THE PHANTOM SHIP. I'VE sailed sixty years around the earth, With the stars, sun, and moon, 'Till more familiar far than the faces of my hearth They have grown to me; and better known the tune Of the winds and the waves in their calm and stormy mirth Than the voices I must leave for ever soon ; And many a yarn I've heard that the blood within me stirred, But ne'er a one so strange as this I heard from a sea loon, Which I'll tell you as he told it, word for word. Ten long voyages made the good ship Lorm From Dublin to Peru; Yet never lost she spar or topsail in a storm, So bounteously the fair winds blew Through the circles of the climates cold and warm; Nor did ever shadow sadden her gay crew, But when passing St Roque's Bay; where, whether night or day, Loomed in sunshine or in darkness the dim form Of a lonely soulless vessel under weigh. All mouldering seemed this sailorless dim barque, And rotten to the core; For, as often sailing near her they could mark How her weary timbers sighed and creaked sore; How her hull was overgrown with seaweed dark, And her withered sails and shrouds the semblance bore Of a dead man's skin grown grey, and worn with wind and spray, As she drifted o'er the waters, black and stark On her purposeless and solitary way. To all aboard the vessel Lorm, this sight, Like a dream of phantasy, Whether coming in the noon day or the night, Was worse than any tempest cloud could be; 80 For some grew sick, and some grew mad outright, 'Till her shape was lost betwixt the sky and sea: And once the Captain said, with hands pressed to his head " By the Lord, when next she heaves upon our lea I shall board her though she bear me to the Dead." It befell one night when they were homeward bound, Off St Paul's, ten leagues or so, When the tropic moon was full and the sea calm around, That a sudden straight before them shone a glow, And a sudden all anear there rose a sound, And they saw her swing at anchor to and fro. Then the Captain furious eyed to the mate beside him cried " Man the launch ;" and soon the crew were seen to row Toward the vessel, and to clamber up her side. When they came upon the quarter, covered thick With emerald weed and shells, Where they felt their feet each step to sink and stick In the sludgy-crusted timber's humid cells, Where the water gurgled with a dismal glick, And below, most like the drowning sound of bells; Lo ! the Captain leading on, tumbled o'er a Skeleton, Which, as both sprung up together, settled quick On his shivering arm its white claws strong and wan. It stood a moment fronting him, with hold On his arm as iron fast, Staring on him from its bony sockets cold; Seeming 'wilclered, as one wakened from the past ; Then dragged him on where heaps of bones and gold Lay strewn together round the mizen mast; And although his bravery had been tried on many a sea, As it hugged him down the hatch he strove aghast While across the ocean swept a mighty blast. Then the crew, who stood like statues, cried aloud " Let us save him, or he's dead," But a paralyzing prickling, like the stinging of a nowd, Stiffened every limb and checked their forward tread; And but one there was that, crawling o'er the hatchway, bowed, Looked below; when, through a glare of ghastly red, He saw the Captain stand 'mid a hideous Demon band, And before him on his hunkers, like a Z, The Skeleton imploring with each hand. 81 " 'Tis six hundred moons this night," he heard it say, 1 ' Since those bones, without a bier, Took ship from Dublin city, bound away To Janeiro, with my only daughter dear; And prosperous was our voyage, until the day Yon pirate ghost that, still with ghastly leer O'er her pallid beauty gloats, boarded us and cut all throats Saving hers, whose airy cries I still must hear Ever while this lonely doomed vessel floats. " Though I lay upon the deck dead and cold, Yet knew I what was done, By those pirates in their hellish cabin hold, All that dread night, and for yet another sun; How the treasure-chests they rifled of their gold, How they rioted to madness every one Then with pistol and red blade, fought together for yon maid; But what passed in that black hour can ne'er be told Until, save their leader, all in blood were laid. " As they fought, meanwhile, their barque in a great wind Was lost upon the wave; And this vessel, with its dead ones, floated blind O'er the pathless waste of ocean like a grave; Only she and yonder monster left behind. For two days I heard him curse and heard her rave; Then silence lived below, and I only heard the flow Of the seas of the world o'er which the vessel drave, Back and forward 'twixt the realms of fire and snow. ' ' Oh ! save us from this doomed life of death, good human soul, Let us rest in the deep. Nor drift, a sight accursed, o'er the brine from pole to pole; But let the ship be sunk that, we who mourn may sleep In the quiet of the ocean, 'till the judgment thunders toll, When as all have sown, so surely shall they reap. " But as round the Captain gazed, with dread his eyes were glazed Even to his inmost marrow seemed his very soul to creep, And without voice or motion for awhile he looked as crazed. For gazing at the cabin's end^he saw, Half in water and half out, A man, who by some fearful ocean law, Underneath had grown into a fish with snout, Shark-like, that grasped with one finny paw The phantom of a woman fair about, Who writhed in silent pain regarding him, her bane, While round them mowing moved a hideous rout, PJood-red, like clouds about a moon, in wane, F 82 7 ^ ,. 3 holy and strong; When a lightning bolt, descending through the night, Burst the bottom of the vessel; and the throng Of hideous demons vanished from his sight. All save the phantom wan, who toward the Skeleton Floated gently with a murmur like a song; And with a pure smile seemed to rest his neck upon. Up rushed the gurgling waters from below With thirsty thundering swoar; And the Captain quickly reached the deck, I trow, Where his men believed they ne'er would see him more; And in time they gained their boat, for to and fro The sinking vessel swung, and the winds were in a roar; Then all hands pulled their best o'er the midnight ocean's breast, To their own good ship, whose lights began to grow Faint and far along the surges toward the west. And as they rowed, ten minutes scarce had sped, When, on the sinking deck, Gleamed the Skeleton's tall, ghastly frame and head, And the Phantom's, with her arms about his neck, Like a moon shiny cloud behind a tree that's dead; And as the waves rose round, though dwindling to a speck, Still seemed to smile afar o'er the black seas like a star; Nor 'till they reached their vessel in the deeps were buried. A strange tale, messmates, this, methinks, as e'er was told by tar. No. II. OLD TOR QUID'S YAEN. I. 'TwAS in the spring of Seventeen Eighty-eight, That our vessel, having got aboard our freight, Dropt down the Liffey in as fair a wind As ever bellied sail. To India we Were bound, and of the Cerise I was mate. The fifth day Finisterre was left behind: At Cadiz for a week we shipped with w r ine, And holding thence our course along the brine Off bleak Cape Blanco met a gale; but fate Passed o'er us 'till we reached the Southern Sea; And then for three weeks more we never sighted shore, But straight abreast the Atlantic trades went scudding gal- lantly. 83 ii. At Ccidiz, as I just forgot to tell, We took aboard some passengers as well- All British they; a gentleman of wealth, Named Astor, with his servants, and also His doctor and lais daughter, Pauline Fell; A beauty she, but with a look of stealth And pride and sorrow in her brow and face. Upon the quarter oft I'd seen her pace Of evenings, when the sky was black as hell With tempest, and when all had gone below, With sullen tigress' tread in the gloom that grew like lead, Staring norward through the darkness o'er the lurid billows flow. in. As by the round-house fire we talked at night, Many a curious matter came to light; For, of Master Astor speaking, we were told This rich man loved the doctor's daughter fair, Who loved an English youth with all her might, Whom Astor, it was said, had bought with gold To give her up and stay at home, while he Bore her to India with him o'er the sea; But, though he loved her for beauty rare, We saw both by her manner, angry and cold, The wrong he'd done her stirred her wrath in glance and word, And made her look, when near him, like a wild beast in a lair. IV. One eve, when Isle Ascension was in view, And sea and sky were all one gold and blue, I stood to the wheel awhile; and as they leant Together o'er the bulwark, chanced to hear The Master Astor this fair lady woo. " You say," said he, " your will shall ne'er be bent ?" " Never!" she cried. " Then, by the Lord, you fear," . He hissed, "since thus you spurn me, mark me well, I swear it by the Heavens and by Hell, From which I own a dread, unnamed spell, If mine you shall not be, alive, upon the sea My skeleton shall yet embrace your beauty, Pauline Fell" v. No more he spoke, but went below. The day, As in those climes, died sudden; far away A. black cloud sprang up from the west, and soon With it a wind; all sail was taken in. And all made taut, the decks cleared right away. 84 On came the storm, and through the clouds the moon Plunged like our vessel 'mid the tempest's din. That midnight, when 'twas blowing a full gale, And I had gone below, a figure pale Passed me, but as she passed me smiled gay; And in the cabin's gloom, then lightless as a tomb, Was lost. Why 'twas I know not, but my instinct boded sin. Next morn, before a sudden, mighty blast The ship turned beam end on; the mizzen-mast Was cut away, and for a time we tried To wear the ship, in which a leak then sprung Showed five feet in the hold. The lead w r as cast And but ten fathoms found. Just then there sprung A cry, that Master Astor, too, had died, Which made each man that heard it stand aghast, For 'twas from her he wanted for his bride : We saw her father, while his hands he rung, Speak with her, but the fear of shipwreck was so near, And thick the sky, but little heed we spared to aught beside. An hour scarce past, when came a fearful shock, As struck our ship upon a bank or rock Some ten miles eastward of Ascension's coast. The waves washed over the Cerise, yet still She held together firm as in a dock. Though water-logged and wholly helpless, till Next morning; when, through vapours, like a ghost, A sloop appeared and presently hove to. And in her boats our passengers and crew Were ta'en aboard; all save the man late dead. Thence, in the Billow's King, we sailed on the wind's wing, Till o'er the surge of Pondicherry England's flag waved red. VIII. There waiting for a barque we stayed awhile, Nor heard I more of Pauline Fell, whose smile The hour of As tor's death ne'er left my sight, But in the Argus from Madras took sail For England; when one evening to beguile The time, when talking of that fearful night She passed me; an old comrade, growing white, Told me, that on the eve of that same gale 85 He saw her mix a something in the cup Of wine, that Astor presently drank up ; 33ut this he thought all fair, in' the doctor's daughter there, Till the guineas three she gave him made him doubt that all was right. IX. Our homeward voyage round the Cape was slow, From baffling winds, and fogs, and storms of snow; At length the icebergs dwindling in the sky, Gave us our rest o' nights again; and on Across the bounding trade wave's azure flow We saw our ship, all canvas-crowded, fly Under the spangling stars and flaming sun. Nor was it 'till again we voyaged by Ascension that a storm began to blow, Or that we spoke a barque our lea upon, Which passing told us how, under our larboard bow, A wreck had sunk, whose passengers they'd rescued all save That night spread dark with tempest o'er the main, The thunder roared, through deluges of rain, When, scudding under bare poles with the storm, We heard the foretop cry "Look out a wreck!" And forward running I was first to gain The shrouds, when I beheld I knew her well The old Cerise's hull, and on its deck Amid the surge a white boned skeleton, That clasped in its arms a female form, Which, by the Heavens, I swear was Pauline Fell! 'Twas but a moment when the lightning shone They passed then all was black the terrored sight was gone. THE PURSUIT. i. As down the steeps of twilight drop'd the sun seaward, Over tower and mountain shining yellowly, In a haze of glory mistily a-leaward Marked I there one sable barque scud up the burning sky. II. Then up my sail flew swiftly, swelling to the mastherd; O'er the waters night-ward dimly breasted we, As across a cloud-rack dusk and thunder blasted, Flies, a demon in his wrath, to meet an enemy. Oh ! well I knew his aspect black amid the glory, As we came with darkness on, up stood and snouted he- He that in my homestead glared so fierce and gory, O'er my brother's lurid visage stooping on his knee. The helm in hands of vengeance steadily I guided O'er the kindling surges, across the windy sea, As the last black billow like a monster glided Under, like a ball of battle midships thundered we. v. In a cry of curses side to side we swung them In that sea of fury, whence no soul could flee, Cleft them down in bloody heaps, and o'er the bulwarks flung them Flung the murderous masses down to putrify the sea. VI. Upon the bloody quarter, when the fight was ending, Throat to throat and dirk to dirk two grappled I and he, As I jerked him through and through I heard a sound ascending, And double darkness round us twain rose upward from the sea. VII. We raised a shout of triumph it dumbed upon the water; I know not why our triumph cry fell down so drearily But, leaping all we left the barge, just as the tempest caught her, And saw her 'mid the lightened foam drift blindly down the sea. VIII. Oft now in dreams of tempest gleam their faces nigh us; And often after night's carouse, when deckward clamber we, All viewthatdemon'd ship pass like a drift of midnight by us, Or in dark dawns or stormy moonlight hanging on our lea. THE FIEND FACE. IN a crimson-curtained chamber, hung with many a floating light, And with many a picture glowing, And with many a mirror bright, Young Lord Otho, pondering, paces in the still midnight, 87 Up and down the silent vista, from the broad and ashy hearth, To the lattice, where the beaming Of the moonlight lies a dreaming; There he stops, and looks across the shadows on the earth. Far beyond the bronzed wood, amid the moony haze appear Lowly lines of purple hills, And gleams of ocean, steely clear, Lying on the umbered lowland, like a glimmering spear. But with deadly eyes he gazes down the dcpthy river space, Where against the pallid vapour Lies the castle's turret trace, On the cliff that glooms the waters with its ebon face. There within her perfumed chamber Lady Sycroil slumbers newly; She, who won his heart, and after Turned her smiles of love to laughter, When a richer suitor glittered, whom she married duly. She, who played upon his spirit with a seeming pure devotion, Till the heart within his bosom Toward her turned in w r orship motion ; She, who was his orb of life, and swayed him as the moon the ocean. She, who uttered words of loving, fervently as heavenly prayers Turned, and mocked his helpless fury, Scorned his passion and his prayers, Like some cold, insensate demon, one might cling to unawares. Like to something, 'mid the shipwreck one might cling to desperately; But who finds when safe, rejoicing, 'Tis a demon of the sea Hears its mock while down the depthy deadly waters plunges he. Pondering, then his brow grows darker, curses on his lips are waking. 'Tis her nuptial night; grief, passion, Pride have kept his heart from breaking; Sudden comes revenge to trample out his spirit's aching. Wilder, hotter seethes his hatred when a-sudden he's be- thought him Of the dagger, diamond -pointed, In blue venom thin anointed, That in the reedy Roman town, from a poor noble he had bought him. S3 Toward the ebon cabinet, where the hellish steel is slirin'u J, Eager and black-browed he hurries In the ward the key he buries Lo ! the lank and subtle steel in his fierce hand is shining. And what is this he drops? a something round that black sheath tangled ; 'Tis a braid of her rich hair, That in the sunny morning air Floated round her stately neck, with nuptial jewels spangled. And he holds it as it were some tempting demon-sent illusion; And he cries, amid fierce laughter, Muttering round each gilded rafter, " Scarcely need I this, methinks, to sting my soul for retribu- tion." Quick as vengeance is resolve ; and thus he wills it, that in th' morning Stirring greyly now in habit Of a hooded monk adorning, While he shrives her he will deal a slight sharp penance for her scorning. Now he dons the gloomy robes; his heart on fire with hate and rancour Reckless he of time or future Still will lurid memory hanker, In his trampled pride, till vengeance eats away its canker. Now he's garbed for his dread venture. But, his hooded forehead bareing As he glances toward a mirror, Something strikes his eyes with terror Stead of his, a face of fiend amid its depths is glaring. Ha! it is his seething brain that conjures up this fiery phantom Or the imaged lamp perchance; No fancy from revenge must daunt him No face, though 'twere the sovereign fiend s, that yet across the earth may haunt him. But why thus ponder, idiot, fool? again he'll look; he is no shaker; " God ! this is some hellish error !" Once again he meets the mirror Falls upon his feeble knees, and prays in terror to his Maker. 89 UNA. i. BESIDE the February coast, o'erblown And bleak, remote from hamlet and from town, Arose the aged house of mouldering stone, Where, day by day, the season's smile and frown, Insensate to her woes, had flitted by; For, since she watched through autumn's bronzed light, Her lover's topsail sink in hazy night; Beneath the dewy ocean's ruddy dawn, The swallow flocks 'had drifted up the sky; The snows grown less along the hills withdrawn, And April's cloudy arm of dropping rain, And lights of silent summer on the plain. II. In that sad casement, turned to the sea- south, Where stood one oak, rock-rooted, land-ward bent, She'd known the heathy moor grow brown with drought, And heard the sparrow in his crevice-rent Chirp through the heat; then o'er the evening reef The billows roll, and the retreating sea Wane o'er its disk of sand, as, windily Rose the moon on the plain; and then, once more Wild winter deepened o'er her brow of grief, Hopelessly brooding by that desolate shore, Where comrade she had none in heat and cold, Saving a woman, deaf, and very old. in. " Alas! my heart," she mourned, "moon and moon Has filled and died throughout the dreary year, And heavy winter will have vanished soon, And spring will come, but come without him here ; Would with that cloud I watched so many hours Yesterday, moveless in the bitter breeze, 'Twere mine to sink beneath those gloomy seas, Looking upon them for my lover's barque Whether the wintry storm released its powers Or folded them in calm, through day or dark; Happier should I be searching anywhere, Than in this lone uncertain home of care. " IV. All through the night the snow had fallen thick, Blown with the sea-wind on her chamber pane, \Vhile by the desert hearth she listened, sick With dread, or dozing, soon awaked again 90 To hear the chimney funneling wind, the roar Of the hoarse sea remote, beneath its break Along the wild beach; fancying sounds of wreck, And voices in the tumult and expanse; But, when dull morning came she paced the shore Now silent, after night's tempestuous trance, Looking along the waves in every cove For what fear pictured, magnified by love. v. Sometimes, all indistinct in cruel haze, A rock far off would seem a stranded ship, Until through vapours over distant bays, A sheaf of beams disclosing it, would slip ; And, wandering still along the forlorn coast, From height to height she look'cl along the waves, Hours many, searching through the sunless caves, Or, thinking, past some headland too remote To reach, may chance her lover's pallid ghost Waited for burial, by some o'erturned boat, Watching the corse, with face turned to the sand, And, as sea-struggling still one out-thrown hand, VI. At noon the lurid roof of cold cloud clears, And through the still dead air a flake or two Flutters of falling frost; and dimly wears The day toward eve; when from the vacant blue Illum'd by heaps of horizontal snow, Whose pinnacles reflect their fading light Upon the waters spacing toward the night, And heathy spined hills and isles afar, A vague and icy wind begins to flow; And palely glimmers the one western star Over the silent earth and spacious sea, Wrapped in cold whiteness and calm purity. A kind of piteous calmness for a space Came to her bosom, born of that still scene; But night was falling, and with quickened pace She homeward turned beneath the shadowing screen Of lofty cliff; and threading her dim path Along the shore, amid the vapours grey, Taking what seemed the nearest, lost he? way. And wandering thus confused, the eager tide Moon-swayed at full, began to roll in wrath, Through rocky channels from the sands beside, When wading now through the impetuous wave, Breathless, she gained the porch of a dark cave. 91 VIII. And clinging to the inward rocky ledge, Deemed herself fearfully secure; the arch, Inward shelved sidelong like a ruined bridge, Anear her; and her lips began to parch, Seeing the ever-swelling billow burst Through the cave mouth, and from the watery gloom, Regurgitani with hollow awful boom, Wash o'er her feet; and thus she clasped the cliff Desperate, heedless of the coming worst, When the low snowy moon disclosed a skiff Drifting without, athwart the silver line Of lustre past the cavern down the brine. IX. And she was thinking," as the orb arose, How soon the tide would ebb, when on its swell, Something came floating, impassive in repose Even to her feet and fixed as by a spell, She gazed upon it, drifting past the rock, The limbs and then the face upturned in the beam- The face ah, God ! whence that despairing scream ? And now her place gleams vacant in the glare Of the cold moon just rounded and the shock Alone of sullen surges from the drear O'ershadowing ocean rises with the roar Of a great wind along that lifeless shore. BEFORE THE BATTLE : THE EVENING. THROUGHOUT the day the troublous air was dim And silent, save along the ocean rim Where the far hum of tempest seemed to brood, Hymning a cold and surfy murmurous hymn. At eve the sky cleared bluely overhead; But o'er the place there seemed to hang a dread Of some strange trouble, as from out the wood I paced along the dismal river bed. Long feathery slips and clouds of windy woe, Slept faint beyond the inland space a-glow With dots of straw stack, stubble streaked with sun, And bosky thickets ridging brown and low. While bridging o'er the bay, from cape to cape, A dim grey cloud of vague and ribbed shape, Like some enormous phantom skeleton Of pteroclactyle, seemed to stretch and gape 92 For prey unto the void. Seaward, a screen Of rugged reefs of granite slanting keen, Rise in grey air, whence, landward earth begins To flesh its giant rocky bones with green. Where the long valley fronts the setting day, A sombre fire touches the river's way Through furze and moss mound, on until it wins A glaring, shelved landslip, red with clay; And following further where its course divides In sodden marshy patches, sleekily glides Through matted sedge and rush, until it burns Upon the sullen pool where it abides Under a grey old mill whose broken wheel, Idle, and gapp'd with time, has ceased to reel, And hangs moss-rusted where the streamlet turns, Where flaggers in the downward current sweel, And marrish weed in swirling streaks a-nigh Floats on the windy ripples drifting by. Around, the dim-air ruffles shrub and grass; Far-off is heard the glimmering curlew's cry O'er shingly ledges and through humid caves, Where the sleek-swinging billow mounting laves, Bearing the dim light on its ridge of glass; And showery ringing of the shoreward waves Sounds from the beach. Whirring though twilight glooms, Now o'er th' uneasy grass the beetle booms : The long crow-lines push through the dusking height: Monotonous with moan of tempest dooms. The far grey sea-line sounds, sullen and frore; The broad wind rising gusts with foamy roar; Late birds in scattered flocks in the last light Fly o'er the fields and hedges from the shore. The last leaves sail the void ; the last pale glow Beneath the blank ridge of the earth sinks slow; The hills and fields are blotted out, and night, With tempest and with darkness, sinks below. THE NIGHT. So died the eve; but when from out the panes I looked at midnight through the clearing rains, Roused by the call of trumpets lost in wind, Drear tumults, and the tramp of martial trains, 93 I saw beyond the river's spectral trees (As one ere tempest or in vision sees The hills with thunder's dark encampment lined, Or by the ghostly moon in gloom and breeze, Squadrons of shadowy, silent horse beneath, Fudging in phantom lines some dreary heath) A host in ordered silence muster dark; War's living cloud and thunderbolt of Death, Who held in iron silence the dark ground, Who ere the next noon rolled in fire and sound, In terrors triumphing, or, cold and stark, Should pile the earth in many a bloody mound; For, past the dull hills sloping to the sky, The glare of fires proclaimed their foemen nigh. The rains beat; all the dolorous upper air Seemed moved with presages of eternity; And where the waves along the night sky roll, Lo ! the red moon, like a blood-stained soul, Seemed trembling 'twixt two trembling worlds to hear The earthquake horologe of Doomsday toll. THE DEATH STORM.* FAR beyond the blue skies, in the vast spirit spaces, In the realm of the Dead, where the earth's vanished races Are scattered like leaves in the winter of Time, In the shadow of God mantling o'er them sublime; The dusk phantom A rmies of many an age Rest apart in the gloom of their life's heritage; An innumerate Host, like the clouds that deform The wild broken north ere the burst of the storm. Still Spirits of Force, through yon infinite void Rolls their power when some region is changed or destroyed. Hark! a sound swoons along, and a shade, such as rolls On a world in eclipse, blankly drifts o'er their souls! How now what has roused them ? Some tiding of War Ringing over the plains of yon red mighty star ? Lo! it spreads like a meteor gathering light As it speeds, from the populous tracts of the night * It is well known that storms of unprecedented severity occurred during the deaths of Cromwell and Napoleon, 94 To tlie pale distant moons lying low in the gloom Of a broad orb, like lamps in a desolate tomb. What shout the long shadowy ranks that are flying ? " To the Earth, to the Earthour Emperor's dying." Now are they mustering fiercely and fast, Squadrons and armies glance gloomily past ; Others arise in the wastes of the night Like thunder mists surging in storm-lurid light From the dim sea and they mingle their cry ' ' 'Tis many an age since we hovered thus nigh To our old battle-fields. No, not since the hour Since we marched through the clouds to our spirit of power, That steel-breasted Chieftain, quaint, holy, and dark, Who lopped the pale head from the English monarch. Now greetings are mingled with hollow strange laughter, Now war-chants are echoed by lines hurrying after, Now old battle memories, such as were dwelling In souls for long a^ons the heroes are telling; Crying their tempest tales bloodful and many, Of fierce grey Pharsalia and noble-strewn Cannae Bosworth and Blenheim. ; while at the disaster Of red Waterloo the van ranks hurry faster; But each one is vaunting his glory and labour, And birth to the sky- world by cannon and sabre. v. In a steep island wild, waste, and rocked-serried 'Mid the sea's loneliness, weak and life wearied, Lies the great Chieftain. Within the low room Stand a few in the silence and shadow of doom. The death-clews are chill on that high brow of power, Like clamp on the wall of a moon-lighted tower, And faint is the sword flashing hand that was lifted Star-like, where victory wavering drifted. Earth rolls from beneath, and the vague space before him, More cold than the white Russian winter, comes o'er him. Shriiikingly fades the slow day from the Isle; Thickly the night -lamp is burning the while : O'er the dim tract of the rock-scattered hill Scant tree and herbage lie withered and still. 95 Death hangs in the numb clouds that skirfc the grey lea, And hushed as that chamber's the waste of the sea. Mutters the Chief in his strange fearless trance; His words are of battle, and glory, and France While the few, statue still, bending o'er his pale form Sudden start into life and cry, " Hark to the storm ! " VII. O'er them it rolls the gaunt mountain top rings, With the hurry of wild multitudinous wings ; Comes a deep roar from the surf y- sea stars Like the lost echo of earth's tempest wars ; Lo ! They're aloft in the lightning scarred sky, And Death knows the old ranks that hover on hi^h. Round the wide air the great squadrons are burning, While the Chief in the tempest blaze, haughtily turning. Mutters low ; but they catch the last sounds in their birth, " Again am I king of my armies of Earth." Over the seas through the infinite blind, Storm they along like a dusk desert wind; Round the great spirit they marshal! and throng, Chanting through night their imperial song; War tuned and earnest the clash of their words, And their eyes glitter keen as the flashing of swords. Over the lands where they battled and fell Pausing a space like a solemn death knell Then past the cloud Alps of the cold midnight fly Away to the warrior realms of the sky. SONGS AND POEMS. THE POTATO DIGGER'S SONG. i. COME, Connal, acushla, turn the clay, And show the lumpers the light, gosoon, For we must toil this autumn day, With Heaven's help till rise of the moon. Our corn is stacked, our hay secure, Thank God ! and nothing, my boy, remains, But to pile the potatoes safe on the flure, Before the coming November rains. The peasant's mine is his harvest still; So now my lad, let's dig with a will; Work hand and foot, Work spade and hand, Work spade and hand, Through the crumbly mould; The blessed fruit That grows at the root Is the real gold Of Ireland! Och ! I wish that Maurice and Mary dear Were singing beside us this soft day! Of course they'r far better off than here; But whether they'r happier who can say! I've heard, when it's morn with us, 'tis night With them on the far Australian shore; Well, heaven be about them wid visions bright, And send them childer and money gallore. With us there's many a mouth to fill, And so my boy, let's work with a will: Work hand and foot, Work spade and hand, Work spade and hand Through the brown dry mould; The blessed fruit That grows at the root Is the real gold Of Ireland! 07 in. All, tlun, Paddy O'Reardan, you thundering Turk, Is it coorting you are in the blessed noon ? < 'omc over here, Katty, and mind your work, Or I'll see if your mother can't change your tune. Well youth will be youth, as you know, IVIike, Sixteen and twenty for eacli were meant; But, Pat, in the name of the fairies, avic Defer your proposals till after Lent; And as love in this country lives mostly still On potatoes dig, boy, dig with a will : Work hand and foot, Work spade and hand, Work spade and hand Through the harvest mould; The blessed fruit That grows at the root Is the real gold Of Ireland! IV. Down the bridle road the neighbours ride, Through the light ash shade, by the wheaten sheaves : And the children sing on the mountain side, In the sweet blue smoke of the burning leaves. As the great Sun sets in glory furled, Faith, it's grand to think as I watch his face If he never sets on the English World, He never, lad, sets on the Irish Kace, In the West, in the South, New Irelands still Grow up in his light; come, work with a will: Work hand and foot, Work spade and hand, Work spade and hand Through the native mould; The blessed fruit That grows at the root Is the real gold Of Ireland! But look! the round Moon, yellow as corn, Comes up from the sea in the deep blue calm; It scarcely seems a day since morn; Well the heel of the evening to you ma'in. God bless the moon; for many a night, As 1 restless lay 011 a troubled bed, When rent was due her quieting light G OS lias flattered with dreams my poor old head: But see the baskets remain to fill Come, girls, be alive boys, dig with a will: Work hand and foot, Work spade and hand, Work spade and hand Through the moonlit mould; The blessed fruit That grows at the root Is the real gold Of Ireland! THE EMIGRANT'S VOYAGE. THE white sails are filled, and the wind from the shore Blows sad from the hills we shall visit no more; And the ship slowly moves o'er the ocean at rest, From the land of our hearts, in the light of the West. Though few are the friends on the land's sinking rim, Yet our eyes, straining into the sunset, grow dim; We are leaving for ever the walks where we strayed, And the graves where the dust of our dearest is Jaid. Now twilight has covered the isle in its gloom; Dark the village, and lost the old place of the tomb ; And we see but yon dusk mountain line in the light, We have watched from our cottage doors many a night. Ah, the stars on the ocean are glimmering nigh, Like the eyes of the dead looking up at the sky; And our ship speeds along as heart -wearied we sleep, 'Mid the waters of God, and the clouds of the deep. MORNING* Full stretched are the sails, dim and dewy the spars; On the spray-wetted deck falls the light of the stars; And the blue lonely morning breaks coldly, as we, In the wind, cleave the hurrying heaps of the sea. All alone in the world, without riches below, We have memories that wander wherever we go; And wild sorrow reasons, 'mid tears falling fast, That the present may still draw its light from the past. Oft of mornings to come, from our windows we'll bend, And look on the sun that bright following friend; Still fondly remembering his glory has shone On the land that we love, and the friends who are gone. 99 Oft, at even, when labour is o'er for a while, Will our hearts travel back to our own blessed Isle; Across the great sea we have traversed in gloom, And hover in prayer by the old lonely tomb. Yes, spirits beloved, though your home were as far From our world-wearied hearts as the loneliest star, Our prayers shall arise for ye from the far clime, Oh many, and many, and many a tima. We will hear the sweet voice, that on earth sounds no more, Still murmuring for us from the Heaven's happy shore ; We will hear those dim footsteps, at grey silent morn, That paced our lost home, long before we were born. Old scenes, where we wandered together, will rise The fair window landscape the soft, rainy skies ; The old green-patched hill, where the dewy light plays Where your shadows oft passed, on the old summer days. Not alone, not alone, will we labour and roam; Where your memories linger we still have a home. And shall still tread, in fancy, the paths ye have trot? Until death leads us up to our dear ones and God, THE OLD SWORD OF IRELAND, i. IN the gloom of the temple, all lonely and lorn, Great brand thou hast glimmered through ages of woe- With the grasp of our heroes thy hilt has been worn, And thy rust is the blood of the heritaged foe. Like that talisman hid in the emerald cave, Where the Angel of Liberty paused on his way, The mightiest heart to direct or to save, Shall still find thy fierce treasure and bare it to-day. IT. Oft clenched in the grasp of some chieftain of yore, Thou hast lighted the old Celtic chivalry on, Where the dun Danish barques swarmed the surf of the shore, Or the casques of the Saxon men sullenly shone. Oft clasped in carouse with the sabres of Spain, Thy blade has re-mirrored old Victory's light, While afar the tall towers, in the dusk of the plain, Flamed to welcome the warriors home through the nights 100 The exile has borne thee afar from the Power, He scorned to defend, and was sworn to destroy; The Ally has wreathed with the white lily's flower The shamrock that girt thee on wild Fontenoi. Yet still to the foes of thy country the same, Thy lustre has blazed like a meteor of war, On the edge of the onset, for Louis and fame, In the dusty French fields of battalia afar. Aye, they fondled thy fierceness through fear of thy blow, And blanched when thy blade was unsheathed to the light, Could they dare, would have broken for well did they know Thee un sympathised, save in the cause of the Right. And long o'er the Past where the ghosts of our dead Immortal in vengeance their terrors unfold, Thou hungst like the weapon that shook by a thread O'er the brow of Sicilia's tyrant of old. Yet dim was thy splendour when under the yoke Of the despots of Europe who chartered thee there i Of the cause of the contest all careless, thy stroke Opened victory up through the clouds of despair; But, of late in the West have those glories returned To thy blade, which great libertjr only can wreathe; Long a slave, for the rights of the slave, thou hast turned, Nor, till Freedom's trump sounded, once slept in a sheathe. Ah, where till a hope shall dissever the gloom, Shall we shrine for the future this memoried blade ! Where our mightiest man lies at rest in the tomb, 'Mid the laurels that cover him, let it be laid. Secure shall it lie o'er the dignified dust, Unseen as the ray of a long- vanished star, Till some morning of battle it flames from its rust, When a land's resurrection is sounded in war. THE IRISH GIRL TO HER DEAD MOTHER. ALL, all has changed since you are gone the world is bright no more: Even the blue hills seem darker now, seen from the cottage door; New faces come, new accents fill the ears, and so depart, But the noise of life will never drown one voice that haunts my heart. 101 Your dear, your well-known garments, preserved with gentlest care, More faded seem each time I look, 'mid tears that tremble there; But in this many-memoried breast, beyond the dust's decay, Your image lives where time rusts not, nor death can take away. The memory of the happy days when you were on the earth, Which make my clearest comfort now your voice of love and mirth, Are lost each noon in the noisy life in which T mix with pain; But at clear morn and quiet eve, God brings them back again. Oft, oft the past returns; our evening vv-xlks along 'the stream, Until we came unto the turn tha.,o 'takes the nir,'3 last ber-m ; When from the green spring hedges ;, came trJe/ i\st girdle lonely cry, And ploughman's whistle through the mist of furrowed fields anigh. When by the busy bridge we stood, and saw beyond it shiver, The marge of sereing rush along the blue drift of the river; Heard the weary sound of waggons, and the drover's lazy tune, And the mellow dreamy crowing of some drowsy cock at noon. Here by the sycamore, oft we heard the soft midsummer rain Here, oft of February nights, the faint snow sift the pane Here, when the sickness of the time, came in thick autumn noons, I watched in awe till evening chimed beneath the clouded moons, Saw by the gate the ashy poplar shiver tipt with dawn, All fever- chill; and worn your cheek, your breathing faintly drawn, Oft checked my own to list; while chirped the sparrow in the straws, While on the roof the weathercock creaked with inconstant pause. Now lone, alas, I rest me in the window toward the west, Where often, as we sat at eve, in twilight's hour of rest, I saw you gaze upon my face, to get my looks by heart, And dry a tear, when thinking of the time when we must part. 102 While, fretful fond, I checked you; and we turned our tear- ful sight Where the windy trees were tossing in the sad slant evening .light, While the shadows of the trailers, and gateway poplars tall Fell, wavering o'er the pictures on the goldened fronting wall. It seemed to me oft then, as now, that we lived on a shore Which, to the senseless waves of time seemed crumbling more and more; And fear struck as I mused on that inevitable ill, Dear Mother, I would crush the thought, and love you dearer ^still. ' - - At length, one midnight desolate, came death's black, cruel - : barque; - ,* Tt foore.yo.u from my .life a-way into the voiceless dark; The morn came by all lustrously it only found me stand, With wildered brain and breaking heart, upon the lonely strand. Mother, do you know it ? Avhen your corpse beside me lay, I took from off your pallid brow a dear lock, mild and grey; And one into your clay-cold hand, tear-blinded, then I gave, That you might have a lock of mine beside you in the grave. Then my mind became one memory the past rose up again; Every joy and every sorrow in oblivion that had lain Sprung up afresh; but each dear hour a future torment bore, Since you, whose smile had hallowed them, were gone for evermore. Now, oft upon a winter's night, when fire-light shadows flit, I draw before the hearth the chair wherein you used to sit; And tears fall as my heart brings back the loved but voiceless tone Of the sweet old songs you sang for me in the quiet room alone. I hasten to the window and look out along the sky, Toward the grave where all I loved and all I love doth lie ; I see a star shine o'er the place perchance its lonely ray Illumed your spirit on the night when you were ta'en away. When all is bright within the room from old books, fire, and lamp, I think upon that silent tomb, so lonely, chill, and damp; I think, half envious of the tree that sighs there faint and drear, That I should be away from you, and it for ever near! 103 Yet I love it for being near you; and ever I believe, Since standing there beside you, one disconsolate dark eve, When autumn's winds like memories through its thin branches fled, It seemed to weep its withered leaves above your lonely head. I'm desolate now, for none again can love me like to you; And though I met with some one who would guard me firm and true, I ne'er would share my heart with them, for then I must betray My love for you, whose love for me no love could take away. Then, in my heart I'll live with you, and think upon the time 'When I shall leave this lonely earth, and hear the heaven's chime ; When I shall stray 'mid happy souls in search of you, my Mother, And, by a smile shed down from God, we shall see one another. A VISION OF ERIE. i. LET the pilgrim of Europe roam on as he may, From the snows of the North to the slopes of the vine, What space can unfold in the light of the day More versatile beauties, sweet region, than thine ii. Where the sun that at morn scatters fire on the crest Of the giant-browed Galtees, rounds southward, and takes A golden adieu, ere he sinks to his nest In the arbutus bowers of the legended lakes ? in. Here grey castles moulder like dreams of the past, In the sunshine the shadows and dews of the clime; Here round towers, haunted by legends, still last On the evening inland, like dials of Time. IV. Streams freshen the meadows by forests of green, By moss-covered Abbeys, all ruined and bare, Whose lone chancel casements at twilight are seen Like skeleton hands pointed heavenward in prayer; v. Here rise the great hills from the pasturing plains; Here goldens the cornland by village and lea; Here rolls the broad Shannon, enriched with the rains, By the turrets of Limerick, swift to the sea, 104 VI. Ah ! once by those waters great argosies cast From their broad vans, at sunset, a heroic gloom; Ah! once by those mouldering battlements past The dusky -browed Spaniard in armour and plume. VII. The pageant is o'er, but the blood which enshades The peasant's rich cheek from that fountain is drawn, And glows in the dewy-dark eyes of her maids, Like the sunned Guadalquivier's first ripple at dawn. VIII. Here feasted the chiefs by the castle's broad fire, And swelled the wild song of the wandering guest, Till the memoried music he struck from his lyre Stirred the sword in the scabbard, the heart in the breast. IX. Here oft, as the battle day gloomed o'er the flood, Their fierce cheers gave note of the enemy's flight, As they marched by the turrets of Desmond's wild wood, With their reddened spears raised in the evening light. x. But, lo ! while we muse in the light of thy streams, That sparkle in fresh diamond dances anigh, The souls of thy clime, like a splendour in dreams, Descend in a radiant train from the sky. XI. Floats up from the Shannon a shadowy blast, Where great Brian's Ceaimcorahd lies ruined and lone, And a phantom looks down from the clouds of the past, And mournfully sighs o'er the years that are gone; XII. When discord lay dead as his steel- shining hand Waved the terror-struck fleets of the Northmen away; When Peace crowned Victory shone in the land Like a warrior's plume on a midsummer clay. XIII. Rude years, but ennobled by patriot toil; Grey years, that still rise o'er the ages at rest, Like turrets that look o'er a fertilized soil, As they moulder in mist on the skirts of the west, XIV. And mark, after long barren ages of gloom, A new light burns broad on eternity's wing; And Grattan strides proudly by Liberty's tomb, With the tongue of a prophet, the brain of a king: 105 xv. Great chieftain of Freedom, proud Erinn's alone, Whose soul, like a thunder-cloud born in the blue, Crowned with glory the shadows of history's throne, While it nurtured the green native isle with its dew. XVI. Who treads by his side o'er the purple -belled heath, W r ith wild scattered hair o'er his forehead so wan? Whence flashes the upturned eye from its sheath, With a glance like the brown-hooded falcon's at dawn ? XVII. Ah ! rich native Fancy, thy flame never lit Such splendours as swarmed from our Curran's bright brain Scintillant as spar to the sparkle of wit, Yet soft as the blossom enriched with the rain. XVIII. And, late, what dear genial shadow appears Like a young autumn crescent 'twixt morning and night ? Bise Davis, whose pen in a few happy years Reaped harvests of thought like a sickle of light. XIX. Ah ! hadst thou but lived for the hearts of the land That shone with thy spirit, and throbbed with thy lyre, Success would have crowned them, nor Liberty's hand Been scorched at the altar while fostering its fire. xx. Orphan Isle of the Ocean ! how bright is thy sway, Though sadly thou sit'st by the western wave, When the song of thy Moore charms the world on its way, When the brain of thy Burke rules the age from his grave ! XXI. Ah! when shall thy Genius arise with the power To guide thy old storms o'er a fertilized mould, Pile them high o'er the west in tranquillity's hour, And magic their gloom to a glory of gold ? XXII. Despair not though shadowed by destiny long, Great spirits shall guard thee like planets of flame; And armoured by Heaven, prolific and strong, With the youth of eternity toil for thy fame. XXIII. Yes, nurtured to life by the sun of thy clime, New heroes shall pace where thy Glories have trod; And Voices, yet hushed in the silence of Time, Roll up with thine own living echoes to God. 106 SWIFT. i. Two women loved him, shapes of Heaven, Radiant as aught beneath the sky. One gentle as the summer moon, One ardent as the golden noon; And to the first his heart was given, And to the last his vanity, II. Equal in love, alike in doom - Content to yield in proud desire Their souls for shelter in that breast, Palsied with passion long unrest, Content to worship and expire Silent within its upas gloom. in. Yes, gentle hearts, thy legend's old Old thy ambitioned instinct, too. As turns the blossom to the light, Beauty's attraction bends to might, Though shrined within a brain as cold As yon great snow star in the blue. IV. Long years they loved, unknown, apart; In patient fond expectancy Of consummated hope. At last The shadow of each presence passed Across the pathway to his heart, And love grew dark with jealousy. v. Sweet Stella, anguished was the hour- Ah, piteous hour of proud despair, When trembled in thy little hand Thy restless rival's dread demand, Upon that breast whose earliest flower Sprung in thy smile, and blossomed there. VI. And poor Vanessa sadder still Thy weary worship at the shrine Where bent thy brow, where turned thy gaza, Dazzled to darkness in the blaze, And mastered by a sovereign will, Strong as the sun's sway o'er the brine. VII. Forsaken souls ! yon found at last The barren wreath for which you vie. I. 107 h, like the Greek girl, sought to draw Love from a breathless statua, Whose cold, eternal beauty cast The shadow in whose gloom you died. VIII. For what to him were loves of earth, That light the humblest soul below ? His planet flamed in wider skies, And moved for mightier destinies Than circle round a homely hearth, Or centre in its narrow glow. IX. What! should the spirit which had soared Ambition's eyrie as a King, And wielded with a giant's power The mighty movers of the hour, Be cozened by some passion-bird, And twitted with a feeble wing ? x. A truce with mockeries the weak Are greatest tyrants when they dare. Too long, too long had he forborne To check, in mere reserve of scorn, This puppet play of changing cheek- This fulsome puling of despair. XI. It was a dim October day, When clouds hung low on roof and splio, He dashed his horse, to gallop pressed, Along the old road leading west, Where Liffey's waters shimmering lay Beneath the noonlight's struggling lire. XII. A left, the slopes of tillage spread; And further, higher to the south, The sloping slate-grey mountains rose, Sun-pencill'd in the noon's repose, And by his path the river bed, Deep sanded with the summer drought. XIII. The city sunk in smoke behind, Before, the air rose blue and lone. At times, from ivied hedge and wall, Faint shrilled the robin's crystal call; And, from the west, the careless wind Was blowing in a monotone. 103 XIV. He marked not, as he swept along, The golden woodland's glimmering domesj He heard not as he trampled by, The foliage whispering to the sky, The laugh of children, or the song Of mothers in their rustic homes. xv. Unheeded all to eye and ear, The world's old genial beauty past; Nor reck'd he in that hour of wrath, Aught save the victim in his path, Though pity, justice hovered near Though God was watching from the vast. XVI. At length, beneath its woody gloom, Old Marley's cloister ends his way. He lights he knocks. The pigeon's plaint Swoons fitfully above and faint ; And glimmers through the garden's bloom The river's sheet of glassy grey. XVII. Lo ! from her memoried laurel bower, Where oft she sat alone, to hear His coining, she is hastening now, To meet him with a joyous brow, Though saddened by th* impending hour, And shuddering with an unknown fear. XVIII. She enters springs to meet him. God! Can passion demonize a brow Of spirit-splendour ! In a breath The letter's thrown; and he, like death, Is gone, Hark ! Ringing from the road His horse's trampling echoes now. XIX. In terrored trance she burst the seal. Ah, piteous aspect shape forlorn! .Doom darkness o'er her, and she falls Dead as the shadow on the walls Dead, holding in her heart the steel Brain-blasted by his silent scorn. xx. Ah, well! a purer, tenderer light Still smiles upon his barren years. Like a sweet planet glimmering o'er Some silent waste of vanished Avar, loo Sweet Stella charms life's falling night With eyes whose love outlives their tears. XXI. Yes ; thou art true, though love has wreathed Thy brow with cypress. Though the pall Encircles life, thy voice, no less, Is toned to soothe his loneliness, Like melancholy music breathed Through some funereal banquet hall. XXII. Star of fidelity! Thy light Soon set beneath the eternal wave, And from thy place of cold repose, Retributive remorse arose The fury of the deepening night, And heaven darkened o'er thy grave. XXIII. As twilight's leaden shadows fall, He sits within the casement lone. Bright letters from bright comrades lie Unheeded round him; and anigh One empty chair beside the wall: The world has vanished she is gone. XXIV. He muses not in scorn or mirth, And fondly clasps one raven tress; Still flames the spirit vision through Those deep-browed eyes of angry blue, Too mighty for the mean of earth Too critic clear for happiness. xxv. Now hums the past its ceaseless song, And through the chambers of his brain The tender light of parted days, Bright cordial smiles old winning ways, Remembered tones unheeded long, Rise from the silent years again. XXVI. Till, slowly deepens o'er his face A mournful light, rare and divine, Like Death's last smile; as silently, And with a sad simplicity, His aged hand essays to trace That relic with one trembling line. XXVII. " Only a woman's hair!" No more. The golden dreams of pride are gone; 110 And nought remains save this poor prize, Instinct with anguished memories; Life's tree is leafless now, and roar The bleak winds through its skeleton. XXVIII. The dusk cathedral glooms the while The bell tolls in the upper air; And silvering down the mouldered walls, The winter moonlight coldly falls Through one old window in the aisle, On one memorial tablet there. XXIX. Ah, what were fame's great trumpet breath, The proud applause of mightiest men, The storm, the struggle, and the crown, The world, that darkened in his frown The love that he had scorned to death, Were dearer than an empire then. xxx. Oh, wisdom, manhood, where were ye ; Thus in caprice of power to move To play with hearts whose truth you tried To watch, poor puppet of your pride, How long sweet, earnest constancy Would live with unrequited love. XXXI. Vain requiem o'er a ruined life Vain sorrow for the vanished bloom Of love's sweet blossom. Still with eyes Turned to its God, affection dies With curses cankering from the strife Ambition epitaphs its tomb. XXXII. Alone, long, dreary years alone, His days went down the darkened sky, Hacked with the heart's revenging war: A Saturn on his icy star, God-like upon a ruined throne, Friendless in his supremacy. XXXIII. Till, last, by that grey brow there came Some angel pitying his distress; And tamed the soul that burned within, Sin-like revenging upon sin, And quenched that hell of clearest flame, In ashes of forgetf ulness. ill XXXIV. His spirit lives within his page: Dissective subtlety of glance; Keen Truth, to make the merriest mourn, Fierce wit, that brightens but to burn, Are there; and cold, ironic rage, Withering a world it views askance. xxxv. What, though amid our warrior band, An alien patriot he be, Whose combat clang for Ireland's right, In reason half, if half in spite, Still shall we hang his mighty brand In Freedom's sombre armoury. xxxvi. And when we pace along the shrine That coldly closed 011 his despair, View, from his angered life apart, The passioned tremble of the heart That ripples in the little line 4 ' Only a woman's hair. " GPvATTAN. WHOSE the white locks wildly scattered O or that forehead veined and broad, Like the flakes of marble shattered From the brow of sculptered god ? Whose the firm lip of decision That now shone with thoughts elysian, Or flamed with fierce derision, As to dust his foe he trod; And the eye, clear and intrepid, Whose immortal glance was dreaded More than if that frame decrepicl With a giant's blood had fed it ? It is Liberty's High Priest, It is Ireland's first and best Who from halls of degradation Spurred a shadowed people onward, And to glory lead a Nation, Pointing ever, ever sunward. Though his the heart as sweet and pure As summer rivulet demure, That in the sun of Fancy plays In peaceful pleasance 'mid its rays His, too, the brain with Reason bright, A diamond gem of solid light Th' Imagination's earthquake power That moulds a people in an hour, And sways their spirits in control; The tongue instinct with fire intense, Flashing electric eloquence As some great tempest treads the night, 'Mid mighty hail and thunder-light, Annihilating in its might Of Heaven- winged lightning ires Of fierce thought -executing fires Tyrannic rule o'er Land and Soul: But leaving its strong spell withdrawn A clear- aired world, beneath a dawn. When, after ages of deep night, This patriot spirit, armed with Eight, In the dark Temple of the Land Stood strong beside its northern shrine, O'er-heaped with many a bloody chain, A light broke o'er his sworded hand: Our banner loosened to the breeze; And from the silent centuries A thunder peal burst o'er the main Proclaiming, " Destined for the free Has Deity exalted thee, Green Island o'er the Western Sea; And dowered with might to use thy right If but thou worshippest the Light, Henceforward thou shalt be: Awaken! Spirit and Time conform arise! Thy resurrection trumpet through the skies Sounds from the Throne of Destiny!" SQUIBS PROM THE CRIMEAN WAR. No. I I. AT length the great storm which the prophet forecast, From his lone ocean rock, is around us unfurled; The mandate is given the lightnings flame fast From the long gather'd clouds 011 the brow of the world ! Oh, who may declare how the Nations shall rise, When peace re-appears o'er the tempest of doom ? Vague forms of the future are shaped in the skies, Where the Cossack and Christian contend in the gloom: Rise, Demons of Force weep, Angels of Light Our crescent star rolls for a space into night. 113 Far off, 'mid the wastes of his many-zoned land, The Despot, enthroned o'er the pomp of the War, Grasps Glory's dread trump with a warrior's hand, And clarions a prayer unto Victory's star. Through the white stately streets of the city, this hour, Swells the mustering host's multitudinous hum, And the great bells are tolling from temple and tower, 'Mid the trumpet's drear blast, and the throb of the drum. Rise, Demons of Force weep, Angels of Light The Scythian is gathering the Armies of Night. Lo ! southward, where oft they have traversed of yore, Through the Mediterranean's azure expanse, By the ruins of Greece by the swart Afric shore, Speeds on to the war the bright phalanx of France. Blow, favouring winds, on the warrior's path Rise, memories of Moscow, through bosom and brain; Now the deep passion'd Fury, retributive wrath, Gives a flame to your chivalry once, once again: Speed, Spirits as bright as the sun and as warm, But fierce in your strength as the white Russian storm. Lo ! England, aroused from her torpor at last By the slow Scythian terror, moves mightily forth: Like the full feathered eagles aslant on the blast, Her thunder brimm'd Fleets surge along to the North. Oh, what may arise when from Cronstadt's grey steep The iron-tongued destinies roar through the fire The sea pride of Britain a wreck on the deep ? The snow city's towers a funereal pyre ? Speed on o'er the bleak wintry skies of the town The vengeance-browed God of Siberia looks down. Yes, the tempest's a-wing over ocean and glade, The Hosts hurry on to the plains of the War, Where throbs the low pulse of the quick cannonade, From the thundering heart of the battle afar. While the Slave strains his gaze to the Eastern space, As the shadow and storm of the time are unfurled, For that glory of freedom long sought by his Race In the new dawn of destiny folding the world; Where, elected by nations, the Sovereign Right May dictate a new code from his palace of light. 114 No. II. BEFORE SEBASTOPOL. Written in the Winter of 1855. I. LEADEN low broods the sky round the Crimean shore, Wild and red sets the sun through the drear water's roar: Over teiit-scatter'd mountain and rock-scatter'd coast, Its sullen glare strikes on a perishing host. Beneath them, the fierce bastions flame, and behind, Shrill and chill, from the North comes the death-breathing wind. Ah, desolate vision ! Soon, soon shall the grave Close over the last weary wreck of the Brave. Promised Victory pales in the plague -thickened air, And Glory fades oil from the G olgotha there. Cease, cannon of Russia, to roar for your prey The armies of England are wasting away. n. What doom is upon them ? A year has scarce died Since they circled the Throne in the plumes of their pride. Morn smiled on their parting each Southern steep Flashed its snowy farewell o'er the blue of the deep, As breasting the blast toward the orient sun, Her mighty armada surged buoyantly on. But, alas for the manhood it bore to their grave, And alas for the glory they sought o'er the wave. Now the wind of the steppe sounds their only acclaim Now the hospital's lair is their Temple of Fame. Cease, cannon of Russia, to roar for your prey The silent destroyer has swept them away, in. Lo ! bleak night has shrouded the world, from the vcrga Of the snow- whitened hills to the skirt of the surge. The trenches are hushed through the veil of the haze Flickers faint and unfrequent the bivouac's blaze; Or the pale lamp of the o'er- wearied warriors hold, As they scantily cover some corse in the mould. Hark ! a sound from yon gloomy tent stirs on the air. 'Tis no accent of terror 110 moan of despair; But the voice of a lost lonely heart for anigh, A poor Irish soldier has lain him to die. Cease, cease Russian cannon, to roar for ycui prey A silent destroyer will bear them away. IV. The thick mist of fever is hot on his eyes, As he turns his last look toward the Eastern skies. The Moon slowly rounds through the space of the night, thinks of one cottage that lies in its light 115 Far away, faraway on the lost native shore, Whose fields and whose friends he shall never see more, He sees, by the glow of its hearth, growing dim, That memoried group who are thinking of him. Then, as the death-pulse beats faintly and wild, He breathes a last prayer for wife, mother, and child. Cease, cease Russian cannon, to roar for your prey Frost, fever and famine will bear them away. v. Far away, by the storms of the desert o'erblown, They perish out-numbered, deserted, alone. Never more shall the soft, blessed balm of the air They have breathed by their mother's side circle them there Never more shall the yellow thatched cottage behold Their return to its roof, as in evenings of old. Never more, never more shall they rest by its hearth, 'Mid the true tender smiles of the dearest of earth. For the terrors of winter in pestilence rolled, Swoops down on Britannia's shepherdless fold: Cease, cannon of Russia, to roar for your prey The armies of England are wasting away, No. III. AN IRISH MOTHER'S DEE AM. I. ONE night, as the wind of the winter blew loud, And snow swathed the earth, like a corse in its shroud, An aged Mother mused in her dim cottage shed, O'er the young soldier- son of her heart far away, Where the camion flames red o'er the low dying dead, And the desolate Camp bleakly spreads in the day. And near stood her Daughter, with sad strained smile, And kind cheek of care, that long weeping had worn, As she whispered, " Now sleep, dearest Mother, awhile- God is good, and our Dermodwill surely return." ii. The poor Mother turned on her pillow, and there tSoon slept the kind sleep Heaven sheds on our care. Silence iilled the dusk chamber the low ashy hearth Sunk lower, and noiselessly sifted the snow O'er the white, spacious girth of the cold, solemn earth, Where the muffled moon fitfully glimmer'd below; But vanished the while are her visions of fear, And passed, for a space, is her sorrow and pain ; For an angel has wafted her soul from its sphere, And in dreams she beholds her own Dermod again. 116 Dear joy, how she loves him! A long year has passed Since she kissed his pale forehead, and hung on his breast; She looks in his face 'tis the same, still the same Still soft are those eyes as the dew on the sod : No thirst for the game of wild battle or fame Have lessened their love for her, thanks be to God! But away ! they are speeding o'er mountain and mooi* O'er city, and forest o'er tempest and tide; But little she heeds of their terrors, be sure, While that son of her bosom seems still at her side. IV. Lo ! at length they have passed the wild ocean, and stand On a summit that looks o'er desolate land; Far off, the great fortresses loom o'er the spray, Anear, the bleak tents drift the slopes of the ground ; And a sense of decay fills the solitude gray, For an army in ruins is scattered around. "And is it for this," said the poor dreaming soul, " My Dermod has wandered from home's blessed air? Here Death fills the wind blowing keen from the Pole Here the Pestilence strikes what the camion may spare." v. They passed through the streets of the tents lying still They passed by the trenches that ridge the brown hill They saw the pale faces that famine has worn; They pace where the wounded lie lonely and lost Where the corse, cannon-torn, to its red bed was borne Where the poor frozen sentinel died on his post. "Ah, why, my Dermod, why did you cross the wide foam, To fortune, my child, in this land of the dead ? Sure we'd plenty at home there was better to come : Why, for this, did you leave me, acuehla ?" she said. VI. " I thought as you grew fond and brave by my side, No sorrow could cloud us no fate could divide; I fancied the day when our home would grow bright, With the smile of some coleen I'd cherish for thee When I'd sing through the night by the hearth's ruddy light, With your boy, my own Dermod, asleep on my knee; And when, circled round by a few happy friends, Old age drooped my head, after many a year, As I passed to my God, through the deatli that He sends, The kind Father would bless me, and you would be near. " 117 Still close in the gloom seems lie standing by her; But hark ! 'tis the drum, and the camp is astir; And a sound fills the air, from the hill to the star, Like an earthquake, along the wild bastion it runs, While echoes afar roar the voice of the War, As it doubles its thunder from thousands of guns, And she wakes. In the gleam of the pale morning air One gives her a letter soon, soon is it read; But a low piteous moan only speaks her despair "Ah, Mother of God ! my own Dermod is dead !" THE HOSTS OF NIGHT. Hungarian War, 1848. i. DOWN the sombrous northern mountains wind the despot's armies slowly; Onward on the tracts beneath, the horsemen darkly troop along; Through the dizzy air the sun is blazing on that host unholy, Marching on a path accursed, championing the cause of wrong: ONE amid the Stars will doom them, And the deserts will entomb them, And the earth will chaunt their fate in Freedom's everlasting song. ii. Round them glows the sultry desert, burning winds the sands uprolling; Torture-faint with heat and thirst, the armed ranks falter and expire. They have met no foe, and yet across the world their doom is tolling; They are breathing in the wrath of God amid that waste of fire; Moving blindly o'er the burning Path o'er which there's no returning, Banded by a tyrant's will, but withered by a godly ire. in. Vanished now your martial might, your centuried fame at last is fading; Squadrons dark of stately spearmen, ringing ranks of musketeers Deadlier now yon silent Sun than thousand bastions can- nonading, And one hour of Heaven's displeasure deadler than the wars of years : iis By the iron ranks of thunder Horse and horsemen topple under, And the sand-storm sweeps resistless as the rushing of the spheres. IV. Few and faint they struggle onward, armless, hopeless, slowly wander; Where, ye armies, now the prize imperial you were launched to gain ? Where your song of triumph? Silent as the perished ranks that yonder Track the waste like wrecks that mark the vengeance of the mighty main: Lo ! from his sovereign throne on high, Blood red, down the western sky, Silent sinks the avenging Sun, Hushed, with his fiery Victory. THE OLD MINSTREL'S FIRESIDE. i. HERE by my hearth amid the fading light I muse upon the memoricd days gone by: The day is sinking and the rainy night Looms wild and dismal in the eastern sky. Though joy be fled, yet hope illumes my way, Like this poor flame that shines when daylight's past; Glow, friendly fire! content will life decay, If sinking peacefully like thine at last. ii. Oft in yon Castle's chambers I have sung 'Till streamed upon the revel morning's star While hundred voices round applausive rung- Of the delights of tournament and war; But as Time sets, even glory's gold grows grey, And kindlier crickets' song than trumpet blast:- Glow, friendly fire ! content will life decay, If sinking peacefully like thine at last. ill. Here, oft retreated from the worldly strife, I've sped the thought-winged hours from night to morn, Mused o'er the motley paradox of life, And borne its toils and cares with cheerful scorn; Within thy light, through many a sunless day, My ear recalled the voice of dear ones past; Glow, friendly fire! content will life decay, If sinking peacefullv like thine at last. 110 IV. Oft, when the night of windy autumn falls, With some old minstrel friend whom fate has given, I pace by lonely roads and vine-clad walls, And muse o'er olden songs, the dead, and heaven; Thy cheerful light illumes our homeward way, While clouds and leaves are hurrying on the blast; Glow, friendly fire! content will life decay, If sinking peacefully like thine at last. v. Oh, where is happiness except in calm, Or who has found it 'mid the mountain snows . Life's rosiest joys soon perish in their balm, And all its envied crowns are golden woes; Year follows year, and soon this shape of clay Shall yield its trembling tenant to the blast; Glow, friendly fire! content will life decay, If sinking peacefully like thine at last. VI. A s toward my rest with careless foot and slow, While old songs hover round me, through the gloom, 1 pace, content if winter's earliest snow Enwreath its quiet garland on my tomb, My scrolls and lyre shall form with thy dear ray A hearth-side trinity, while time shall last: Smile, friendly fire! content will life decay, If sinking peacefully like thine at last. THE POOR POET TO HIS VERSES. A WINTER SONG. I. COME to my fireside. Sing to me to-night, Poor Verses, echoes of my vanished years ; Though all unknown to fame and fortune's light, My heart still guards you with its smiles and tears. Old memories, though in jarring music sung, And rough to other ears, still sweet to mine, Your voice recalls the days when I was young, And morning makes the dullest things divine. Sing, Verses, sing! the night is dark and cold; Sing, though your voices gain but little gold. II. Rise, Scenes of Banquet, flashing far and wide, Your chambers silvered from the fountain's rain ! Pace proudly forward, Prince and beaming bride, And let the Minstrels sound their richest strain! 1-20 Alas! that feast so fragrant and so fine, Was coloured, as a contrast to the night, When, in my palace, water was the wine And winter's solemn moon, my only light. Sing by my fireside, as in days of old, Poor Singing Children gain but little gold. Come, Faery fancies, breathing of the moon, Dance, little Elves, through your enchanted bowers! In some dim garret rose the airy tune That timed your tiny footsteps o'er the flowers. Soar, daring Songs of Liberty, and Right, Let tyrants tremble! but, awhile be still, For in the landlady's sour face to-night The rent seemed scrawled as blank as in her bill: Sing by my ear but be not loud or bold Poor Singing Children gain but little gold. Rise, Strains of Passion, from the twilight land, Where Lovers pace along the glimmering stream, And whisper low, and press the parting hand, And homeward wander in a happy dream. Ah, where is she who woke my earliest lay, Whose fearless faith was mine for woe or weal? Along the noisy streets but yesterday Her carriage splashed me o'er from head to heel : Sing, Verses, by my hearth that tale is old, Poor Singing Children gain but little gold. v. Dear lonely offspring of a lonely heart, No rich saloon resounds with your acclaim; No eager student wafts you from the mart, Or critic stings you with an epigram: Beside me rest concealed from stranger minds, Content if some old comrade, loved and known, Lists to your lays by evening light, and finds Within your soul some tremblings of his own. Sing, Little Ones, and round me closer fold, Such Singing Children gain but little gold. Yes, we have wandered heart by heart unseen, Round foreign shores, and through the ocean's blast, Far from the memoried Isle whose fields of green Sleep in the spectral stillness of the past : 121 Oft, oft, when far away I've looked through tears Into the dying light that o'er them shone; Where all I loved amid the happier years, Where all save you who sing of them are gone. Sing, Memories, sing the heart that can behold Heaven in the sunset, little heeds its gold. SONG OF ALL HALLOW'S EVE. i. THE year is growing aged and dull; Late rise the days, and weary soon; With morning fog the fields are full, And fall the leaves with evening's moon. Shut to the doors, and gather nigh'r, Our summer time is scarcely past; Beside the fire, with cup and lyre, We'll soon outsing the winter's blast. Hour upon hour, Over our bower, Shining and swift, departs, departs; Time to-night Will quicken his flight, To follow awhile our bounding hearts. II. Lo! Autumn passed, with face of care, This eve along the dusky road, Nut clusters tinkled in his hair, And rosy apples formed his load. All friendless, by the withered thorn The kind brown spirit lingered long. Log heap the fire, sing higher, higher, And cheer his ghost with light and song. Hour upon hour, Over our bower, Mellow and mild departs, departs; Time to-night Must quicken his flight To follow awhile our bounding hearts. in. Send round the wine of summer earth, And speed the winter's twilight game; Bend, maidens, round the glowing hearth, And guess at lovers by its flame; Soon Love shall ring from yonder spire The joy each fairy nut foretells; Love strike the lyre, love guard the fire, And tune our lives like marriage bells. 122 Hour upon hour, Over our bower, Shining and swift departs, departs; Time to-night Has quickened his flight To follow awhile our bounding hearts. Smile, silvered Age, upon the band Of joyous children grouped below Bright travellers from the morning land Where we have wandered years ago. The dawning heart to heaven is nigher Than wisdom's snowiest brow can soar. Sing to the lyre, circle the fire, And mingle with your youth once more ! Hour upon hour, Over our bower, Shining and swift departs, departs; Time to-night Has quickened his flight To follow awhile our bounding hearts. v. Far off the monarchs march to war Amid the trumpet's storming tones, And frowning worship Victory's star Upon their sword-illumined thrones. The noise of chain and cannon dire Rolls bleakly through the barren hours. Sing to the lyre, close round the fire, Our only chains are chains of flowers. Hour upon hour, Over our bower, Sinning and soft departs, departs; Time, though a king, Has quickened his wing This night to follow our bounding hearts. Loud on the roof the tempest moans, And mirth would last as loud and lon^ But yonder bell, in trembling tones, Has blended with our ceasing song. The children drowse, the girls retire To dream of love and fortune's smile. Farewell, old lyre and friendly fire, And happy souls, farewell awhile. Hour after hour, Over our bower, Mellow and mild, departs, departs Now Time will sing Beneath his wing A soothing song to our dreaming hearts. SONG OF SPRING. BY METRODORUS O'MAHOXY. Now ancient owld Hyems departing Permits rosy Spring to draw near; Now Favonius wafts through the azure The clouds beyond sunny Cape Clear; And Love over boreen and cottage, Has spread his bright pinions, by dad, So that colleens and puers are courting From Galway to Ballmafad. Come, Cloe, beloved of my heart-strings, And seat yourself close to my left; Spes vivat in moestum no matter Of what other joys we're bereft; For what though the pig isn't purchased, And potato seed's riz, as I hear, Is that any reason, in logic, Why we shouldn't marry my dear ? Nabocklish : when beautiful Flora Produces her blossoms anew, And the wide awake goddess Aurora Palavers the mountains with dew; When the Heathen mythology, Cloe, Drops down from the regions above, Half an eye must be blind in concluding If 'tisn't the season for Love. Just look at the fowls and the ganders, Just look at the birds on the spray; Why, Mars couldn't utter his feelings In a manner much stronger than they ! All nature adjacent is courting And whispering and winking, you rogue, From the midge in the atmosphere sporting, To the ditch that contains the kerogue. In the paddock the owld ass is sighing, Poor sowl ! and the sheep who reside In the presence of great Lugnaquilla* Are thinking of nothing beside; * A mountain in the county of Wicklovr. 124 Amor vincit all things in creation, As the least classic knowledge may see, So come, dear, and learn education, ' Cloe Bawn asthore Cushlamacree. SONG. i. ONE cold winter even a wanderer came, From a far foreign land in the western brine, Where labouring manhood had wasted its flame In preparing a rest for the days of decline. And, as o'er the meadows long lost to his sight, He listlessly wandered, like sorrowful Euth, Two phantoms approached him one sombre, one bright- Old Time, and the radiant shade of his youth : Ah! happy is he who in memory's smile, Can pace to his grave in his own blessed Isle. They passed through the town, where the old house stood lone, Still hallowed by memories of friends and of kin, But, where revelled this even the stranger unknown There were lights in the windows and laughter wit'hin. In yonder old chamber, how often of yore, Had the hours floated bright in the fond smile of home ; And there, too, alas ! from its dumb darkened door, Had his dear ones been borne, hearsed in death, to the tomb Yet happy, ah ' happy is he who awhile, Can revisit the Past in his own native Isle. in. The bright Spirit stopped by a window that rayed Toward the garden, and said with a tear and a smile ; ' ' As a child by yon green ivied wall you have played, As a school boy, oft studied uneasily there In fear of the morrow ; and here is the spot \Vhere you plighted your troth to your first love, I wis, While the roses bloomed round, and 'Ha, ha, you are caught!' Cried the grandam, aroused from her doze by a kiss. " Yes, happy is he, who in memory's smile, Can revisit the scenes of his green native Isle. IV. Many more scenes arose as the lone Exile stood With his two Phantom friends 'mid the dreams of the past The sad day he left them to traverse the flood, With heart bowed by grief, as by tempest the mast For the great Land of Emigrants in the gold West ; And he said, as the Spirits, one bright and one dark, Smiled upon him: " Yes, here shall I sink to my rest, Here at length shall I anchor life's storm wearied barque." Thrice happy to rest 'mid the sweet sunset's smile, In some haven of peace, in my own blessed Isle. v. " Yes, here shall I live out my lingering days, With thee for my guest, radiant spirit, alone ; In the window will muse, 'mid the evening rays, On the friends who have loved us, the days that are gone. Calling back the dear hours that in sunset's faint light, Shall return to our hearts from the morning's sweet shore, Until thou, aged Phantom, some calm autumn night With a shadowy comrade shalt knock at my door." Ah ! thrice happy he who in memory's smile, Can thus pace to his rest, in his dear native Isle. ST. PATEICK'S NIGHT IN OLD TIMES. Scene: A Cabin in the mountains a Still in one corner: several Men seated round a table, by a window, through which is seen a moonlit ravine. Pat (loquitur): 9o'c. * ' MY name, as you know, is Pat, And here with the shamrock still in my hat Let any one dare to sunder it I sit at the table, Challenging any man round, Hale, hearty, and sound, Fierce, and able, To drink me under it. " 12 o'c. Well, twelve o'clock has chimed, And twenty glasses have gone Down the red lane; Yet here, friend Shane, We sit asthore, Clear as bells, And cool as wells, And ready for twenty more! But! who's that leaving the bohaun? What ! are the cowards gone? And have they left us, Shane, Both masters of the plain! 126 Though we've poteen before us plenty Still for twenty or twice twenty, Yet are we nothing daunted; For myself, T feel enchanted, All devoid of care and trouble: Though my body feels a tun, Yet niy head is like a bubble, Dancing in the morning sun ! 2A.M. Two in the morning eh? Well, sure we're steady still, Although the walls are turning, And double lights are burning, To the sight a little troubled, And ha, ha! even my glass seems do do doubled And hark ! on the moonlit hill, To the Faeries how they're churning, And drinking hand to fist, And dancing all in a mist; And some one must be dying, For there's the bainshee crying, In its dark, dismal way, And if I am not mistaken, You, Shane, ma boughal, seem shaken- No! then, T dare you still Another glass to fill, My drowsy, nodding brother, And another, and another, As I am doing hurrah! 3 A.M. Are we on sea or land ? The room is reeling, and How murdering close its grown, Ochone, Shane, ochone ! You're snoring like a drone; And I wish I was out there In the clear cold morning air, For my brain is in a reel, And I cannot rightly feel, Which is to topmost he head or heel Faith, when the house is turning round, We may conclude our Shamrocks drowned. 127 A LAMENT FOR DONNYB.ROOK. A LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL OF THE LIBERTY. Poeta Loquit. JIMMY, aghar, hand me my pipe; In troth I'm as wearied as man can be; My eye is as dim as the winter sea, And my nose as sharp as the bill of a snipe; For here for a week, a week and more, I have been labouring body and soul, Just sustained by whisky and sassages,* While I touched the finishing passages Of my Donnybrook rigmarole. Saints be about us, what are they driving at ? All sorts of people are taking their share- All have their heads together conniving at At the destruction of Donnybrook Fair. Once in the good oulcl times of the city, M.P.'s, farmers, the rich and the rare, Gentlemen, nobles, the wise, and the witty, Went for a trifle of element^ there. Then was the rail indulgement in jollity, Devil a one of them cared who was who; All took their glass of the old Mountain dew, And their hop in the tent on the ground of equality, But now it is over this is the last of them This is the last ould fair that well see; Now we must live as we can on the past of them- Such is the Corporation's decree, Ah, never again in this isle shall be seen, The rail boys up to the sweet oaken science Trailing their coats in courageous defiance, And shouting the pililiu over the green. Never again shall we see the shillelagh Joyously splintering forehead and limb, Or hear Molly Finucane crying " Oh, mela Murder, what have you done wid my Jim?" Never again> 'mid the turmoil or rattle, Shall we assemble to shoulder the door, Bearing dear friends, through the thick of the battle, Faithfully home to their widows, asthore; Leaving the pleasant old ground, when the short night Of August was melting In matinal dew, With a rib or two dinged, and an eye black and blue, Or a wound that would lay us up snug for a fortnight; While the rattle of sticks in the distance behind, Made old Donnybrook look like a wood in a wind, * Anfjlice-" Sausages," -f Efrment, i.e. fun. 128 Now all is over this is the last of them This is the last ould fair that we'll see; Now we must live as we can on the past of them- Such is the Corporation's decree. Now my song is complete In a halfpenny sheet; To the window repair, And, removing the hat That my glazier fixed there Friend Pat, Call out through the street For the singers ! Call Biddy O'Dooley, And Timothy Cooley, Whose Bet's always wrangling With the wife of the carman that takes in mangling, Who blackened Tim's eyes when he payed her addresses, But treated him decently after the fight; Call Paddy O'Shaughlin, And Mary M'Laughlin, Who cries in the morning her sweet water-cresses, And haddock at noon, and oysters at night; Then, the washers of crape, Don't let one of them 'scape; And the sellers of tape, Up to all sorts of hoaxes From turning suborners, And dodging the police round tavern corners, To dropping match-boxes, And crying they're fated To be ruinated, Till somebody quicker, Or tender with liquor, Takes out of his pocket A casual copper: When off, like a rocket, They rush for a cropper; Sure their poor hearts would droop If they didn't renew them, So much good may do them, The creatures their drop. Then call Maurice M 'Gundy, And Timothy Waller, a Decent young chap as you'd see of a Sunday; And Ould Kitty Cute, the vendor of apples, A widow she is since the cholera You'll find her near Michan's or James's-street chapels, 129 And give her a whetter Of stingo, at Morris's, For who has a better Ould tongue in the choruses; Troth, I don't know another, Except Judy Harrison, The chimney sweep's mother, Can bear her comparison. Well, you're corning at last. Ah, then, Patrick M 'Gundy, it's you that looks bright, Wid that old soldier's coat you're a beautiful sight ; But you'll never look better, gossoon, than I wish ye, And you're left eye looks better since Saturday night; If it wasn't, asthore, that your ankles are bare, And the crown of your cawbeen is gone, I declare, I'd suppose you belonged to the Galway Militia. Sit down, lad, and comfort your sowl with a blast There's a pipe on the hob. Well, ould Kitty Cute, And how do you thrive? Oh, the cost of the fruit, Sure, T know, and the horrible price of potatoes. Well, then, Kitty, my darlin', I'd wager a farden, 'Tis you that know how to inveigle the soft ones To give you a penny a couple for croftons. Sit down, and whatever misfortune may fate us, We'll just have a drain of cowld Busby to heat us. Now, away through the town wid ye, gossoon and man, Sing as loud, and collect as much cash as you can; And mind, if you happen to chance for to meet One of them organ boys deafening the street Just to lay him down easy, and show his disparity Wid people like us would be only a charity. It's myself that would wish them esconced in bil hazes ! For, sure, but it's hard for a national bard To see them chaps and their monkeys taking The tin that we we ought to be making, Wid grinding their foreign Marsellaises; Hairy fellows, that can't sing no more than a baby, And yet have their pockets as full as a bank, Wod their " Dear mister sir, I am very much tank;'' Oh, it's disgustingly shabby. Boys of the Liberty, don't stretch a fin to them Oh, pitch into them. SONG THE FAIR. There are pompous tumblers bestriding Platform and stage histrionic, Inebriate monsters confiding X 13D . Together 'mid hiccups and glasses, And lads entreating their lasses To strengthen their hearts with a tonic, Prescribed by a famous physician, Long known in the regions of swillery The still-born liquid elysian Of Jameson's hygiene distillery. No, Donnybrook's glory's not o'er, Or its frolicksorne fairy less frisky; Love there is as gay as of yore, Though he lives rather less upon whisky. Yes, all has grown changed of late, Scarce a row ruffles the constable, Leisurely plodding his bate, ^ Winking 'neath bonnets of Dunstable; No more the heads, masculine, smart, While the lasses in tent, shade, and tavern, For the innermost wounds of the heart Have found out a remedy sovereign; Now they sigh upon spruce ginger-beer, For which their adorers have paid; Who gallantly flatter each dear, Sipping goblets of strong lemonade. Yet, as we walk through the intricate Maze of the old Brook s development, Catch we at moments a wild, wicked " Hurrah there s nothing like element." While country girls, first looking shy at us, After their manner primordial, Wink, laugh, and then dance sky high at us All on a trifle of cordial. No, Donnybrook's glory's not o'er, Or its frolicksome fairy less frisky; Love there is as gay as of yore, Though he lives rather less upon whisky. A HEALTH TO THE NATIONS, i. DRINK to Italia, ! To its vales and snowy mountains, That guard the classic fountains, And spreading plains below ; Where the light of glorious dreams, With an antique glory gleams, On the ruin skirted streams, 131 And the fields of vanished war; To the mythologic shapes, That shine through groves of grapes, Or on olive covered capes, In the pure Virgilian star; Drink to Dante, Petrarch, Tasso, Likewise to her last great basso, To the long-haired folk who shrug and smoke, In each damp Venetian casa; To the stately dames with music names, Who flicker and glide like love's own ilames, In the twilight dusk Piazza ; And while we drain the purple rain, Of her bacchant sky, let's hope amain, That the brightening page of her present age, Is but the slender suture, That joins the past, glorious and vast, To a great exultant future ; Health to Italia, ! Next, a health to England, ! And who can say but she needs it ? Here's a health to the man who weeds it Of ignorance, want and woe. Yet, still as we think o'er the goblet's brink, Let's drain her a bumper full, and drink To her senates of eloquent faction, Her people of reason and action, To the enterprise that earnest flies, Joining the snow and tropic skies, In each great commercial paction; To the fields the Puritan fought on, To the railroads, roast bsef and cotton, And to great London town, Grave, foggy and brown ; With the wealth of the world and its river, Grey skies and good ale to them ever ; And when in the ray of an ampler day, The colonizing nation Bases its might in souls made bright From the Sun of Education; Men's hearts will beat with a higher heat, As they drain a cup to her fame and pour, On her altar raised, 'mid the billows' roar, A holier oblation Here's a health to England, ! 132 in. Here's a health to Scotland, ! To the breezy downs and highlands, Blue lakes and foamy islands, Where the northern tempests blow; To the hearts that fiercely bristle At the touch of force or wrong, Yet bend to the air of an olden song, Keen and pliant, keen and pliant, as a thistle; To their judgments clear and cold, That turn all they touch to gold, That drive away the cares of clay, With a deep, deep sup From the toddy cup, And a long disdainful whistle. Then, hurrah for the nation of s wipers, For the land of the thistle, hurrah ! For its blue bonnets, oatmeal and pipers, For the guid cakes they brown on the griddle, And the tunes on the old highland fiddle, Thy rosin with sulphur alway. Whether friend or foe on their coast may land, With a mercantile or an armed band, They'd be sure to make him pay, Either in blood or money Then to Scotland, blithe and bonny, Let's drink and cry hurrah Health to Scotland, ! IV. Last, a cup to Ireland, ! To the hills and dales that borrow, A charm from the mists of sorrow, Even while in the sun they glow ; To the honest Celtic faces, To the genius of her races, Which sheds its golden traces Wherever they may go ; To their courage, wit, affection, Their joyance and dejection, To the element that finds its vent At wake, fair, or election. May their souls burn ever brighter, Their griefs grow daily slighter. And while their hearts like feathers sail, Before bright fortune's sunny gale, Free from care and buoyant as air, Kicking the beam of life's old scale May their pockets never be lighter : Health to Ireland, I 133 A MAY-DAY REVEL. ONCE from the throne of Faery shrined, 'Mid wooded mountains, o'er the Bay Of sweet Rostrevor, issued forth An edict through the azure North, Granting a jocund holiday To beast and bird and insect bright Then breathing in the Summer light ; A gracious edict, well designed, Written in laughter, kingly kind, And published on the morning wind. Say, Muse of mountain wilds and streams, Of wandering airs and glancing beams, Say, frolic Muse, the cause of this ? A simple cause : the King who bore The ferny sceptre of Clough More Was wedded just ; his bride adored, A lively sprite of Carlingford, With soul so dignified and pure, And lips so lovesome and demure, That every Fairy round that shore Had given his kingdom for a kiss. She being asked to name the day, Fluttered her primrose fan, and then, Tn tones as timid as a wren, Said, " Let it be the first of May." Whereat the monarch bowed and broke The crimsoned silence, while he spoke As follows, 'mid his courtiers gay : '* With judgment hast thou chosen the hour, Thou sweetest Sprite of earth and air ; And here beneath those eyes I swear, By every sun-drop in the shower By every mountain-spray, and flower, "That, as of old, the festal sun That lights the day of good St John Shall view this space of shore and sea Entranced in rich festivity : Here, then, we yield by Sovereign law, To all whom it concerns around, By shore, or wood, or meadowy mound, A joyous saturnalia." He said : the scribe who waited near, With thistle pen behind his ear, Encharactered the royal brief In haste upon a willow leaf ; 1*4 The while that gracious king, intent On largess and the public weal, With smiling forehead, o'er it bent, And sealed it with his crocus seal, Scarce was the proclamation borne Along the wandering winds of Mourne, When, on a hill the sheep who cropped In slopes of dewy pasture green (A dull day business of routine), Pricked up their white mild ears, and stopped ; And toward the group a grave grey ram, With cunning horns, and face of calm, As such a patriarch king behoved, Came paged by an attendant lamb ; " You hear, my friends a holiday," That specious guide was heard to say L "Come, let us from those pastures pass ; Here have we cropped whate'er we can Of verdure, and to-day for man We need not care one blade of grass ; Come round by cool Kilkeel till dark, Let's go, and have a quiet lark ;" And heading straight his flock away, They passed in sunshine towards the bay. Then 'mid the giant oaks sublime Around a stately fronted hall, With ivied eaves and chimneys tall, Red brick embossed with mossy rime, The feathered choristers awake For some three hours of golden calm, At once surceased their matin psalm. Some sauntered to the distant brake, Whose ruddy berries hung profuse Their pendulous cups of summer juice ; Some winged them toward the waterfall That through the granite flashed in foam, And hopped, and dipp d, and drank their share, In joyousest abandon there ; While others, keeping nearer home, Thronged round the grassy garden lake. Oh, such a frolic revel ne'er Was seen beneath the dome of air ! Down from his chimneyed nest where ho Reflective, passed the smoky noons, The speckled magpie dropp'd below, Leaving his hoarded treasury 133 Of rags, and leaves, and gold doubloons, Of straws, and bones, and silver spoons; And with one black eye open wide, And head a little bent aside, Stood chaffing with a cautious crow. But what was this to the Tom Tit ? Beneath a broad laburnum's shade, Elate with morning air he hung Vivacious; chatted, prank'd, and sung; And though the Magpie in the sun Looked in sarcastic silence on, He cared not ! but around him made Each wren and robin of the glade Shake in their feathers at his wit. In fact, he held th' assembly's ear ; While round him, merrily and fast, Sweet song and conversation passed, 'Mid new removes of seed and berry; No lack appeared of jovial cheer, Or harmony, save once, when there A transient difference arose, But ended ere it came to blows Between two sparrows, for a cherry. Soon from his shadowy bed of straw, Where he had stretched the live-long night, With keen nose laid along his paw, The watch-dog stroll'd into the light, And shook himself : all through the noon Of darkness had he rested there, Quite undisturbed by noise or care; Though, now and then, for duty's sake, He growled, to mark th' obtrusive moon Her proper distance o'er the lake, Or barked to keep the house awake. There, near a pool whose placid space Was dimpled by the insect throng, Big fussy flies with buzzing song, Grey gnats adroit, with tickling stings, And harmless water-sprites with winga Of splend'rous emerald and blue, A flashing, light, finessing crew, That honest guardian took his place: He snapp'd he missVl again he snapp'd He miss'd for so the fortune happ'd; And as around him buzz d and spun The myriad mischiefs in the sun, With each mischance he tried to smile, And nodding toward them said the while- 136 That, after all " 'twas only fun ! M At which the Tit, with one neat mot, Convulsed the company : and, lo ! The grey Ass in the paddock stood, And gazed upon this passing sport With discontented eye amort, And gravely pondering, patient head. Then taking some half -hour to think, To knit each slow inductive link, Observe, deduce, revolve, conclude, With ears maturely raised, he said "Well, really this is very good." Thus sped the day o'er sky and earth, Grown instinct with fantastic mirth ; While elfest shapes beneath the trees Roved in ecstatic companies And blackbird's song and insect's joke On leafy branch or pleached flower, In melody and sparkle broke, To charm the sun's declining hour. There, in the pleasant summer cavern Of his honeysuckle tavern, Sidelong stretched a tipsy bee, Buzzing forth, inconstantly, Incoherent hummings, funny. Near, a comrade waxing spruce, As he pruned him in the sun, Droned a wise reproof to one Less overcome with luscious juice; Ere to his bachelor abode (An oak tree on the townward road, Hardby an effervescing spring) He wandered on unsteady wing, Chanting a bacchant song of honey. Yet, like the rest, he reached his homo Before the drowse of twilight gloom, Brimful of sunny recreation ; Nor felt the least necessity To use his sting that happy day, Save when a bat who whirred along The course of each returning throng, Was heard maliciously to say " Bless my good eyes what dissipation!'* Now falls the hour of evening rest: The fresh wind puffs the fisher's sails; The bee is hived, the bird's a-nest, The udders spirt in foaming pails; 137 And twilight deepens past the bay, 'Till o'er the inland town afar, 'Mid flakes of cloud still rosed with day, Sparks out some golden-cinctured star And strikes the river narrowing down, With ruffled current as it flows, By one old turret, lone and brown, Sea-lapped, and sentinelled by crows. Now, 'mid the slopes of furrowed earth, The peasant drives his wearied yoke; Now from the crackling cottage hearth Mounts tranquilly the azure smoke; Now, past the winding road anigh, The drover guides his dusty sheep; The lazy waggoner plods by, Behind his slow horse, half asleep: Now groups of rustic lad and lass Beside the shadowy ferry throng ; Now through the bright mid-stream they pass, With oars that time some homely song; And beached at length above the sea, Push homeward up each shadowy height, While glimmers red and distantly Their cottage window's welcome light. The farms are hushed; beside their way The dripping wheels of mountain mills Stream in the leafy trickling ray; The bon-fires blaze along the hills; They hear the distant voices ring In festal echoes of acclaim; They see the wild forms hurrying In twilight dances round the flame ; Till one by one each joyous sound Dies off upon the lonely air; The red fires drowse along the ground, The dances cease, the hills are bare; And as the sea-wind stirs the heath, And silvery spring-tide floods the shores, Nought save the moon on grey Omeath Moves by the quiet cottage doors. A STUDENT'S SUMMER RAMBLE. MORNING. Lo! 'tis an August mom as we, A Student group, move joyously Toward heathy Howth, a distant lying, Above its level gleam of sea. 133 The sky is bright, and breathing sweet, Through airy boughs that o'er us meet; The sun shines warm, and strews the roadway With netted shadows round our feet. And by the bay's side, warm and still, Through miles of leaves we pace, until Appears at length above the vapours The blue spine of the nearing hill. The dewy summer breathes before, The rain fed runnels trickling o'er The sunny chasms of ivied gorges, Stream freshly down the silent shore. Along the burning silver line Of morning sea, the vessels shine In brilliance indistinct: and near us Soft meadows specked with quiet kino. And distant cots in woodland shrined; White vapours crisp as snow behind; And on the bay the stately cutter, With prim sail pointed to the wind. Land, air, and sea, are full of light; Our pulses spin; and fancies bright Begin a healthy play, as upward, Deep breathed, we scale the topmost hen. NOON. Now flits the day o'er bud and bloom, On blossomed furze and tufted broom; Now darkening all the distance stretches The purple hills in velvet gloom. Killiney's peaks are lost in haze, And streaming south the vaporous rays Strike slanting o'er the Wicklow sunur; The azure coast, and sunny bays. While norward, Lambay sloped a-lea In passing noon lights, distantly, Through mists of gold and violet beauty, Shines like a dolphin o'er the sea. On high, the clover slopes among, We hear the corncrake's sultry song Mix with the blackbird's mellow flutinj, From, the copses, clear and long, 139 And in the caves beneath our foot, Tho ocean's slow mechanic beat; Tame summer swell of foamy surges, Lapsing languid in the heat; And voices from the deep mid bay, Where, past the wind-dark drifts of grey, The blithe yacht spoorning through the azure, Snows her slanting bows with spray. At length we reached a shadowy dell, Where the quick sparkling freshes fell, Through strawberry wild and ivy trailer, Into a bright and bubbling well, In mossy basin, brown and pure, That like a twilight fairy lure Poured out through leaves and winking waters, Its tranquil melody demure. High banks of grasses, sleek arid long, Curtain the current, where, among Blue violets, the prim-eared daisy, Drooping, listens to its song, And golden blossomed furze on high Scents all the blue. Meanwhile we cool Our glasses in the tinkling pool, And as around the w r ine Hask circles, "A Song, a Student Song," we cry. STUDENT'S SONG. I. "Stay, Students, ye whose bright eyes shino Beneath broad brows in evening's glow, What deem ye of this realm below, Bedecked with palace, camp and shrine ? What find ye here of truth divine What mode of life, what \Vorld is thine ? Ah! still a visioned world we find; Time touches not its years with grey But lit from empyrean day, It rolls for ever, heaven enshrined; Its flowers, the feelings soft and kind Its fruits, the growth of mighty mind ! 140 * * A world that grows from age to age, Still gathering splendour as its rolls From the wide Universe of Souls Who trace their record on its page; The Kings of Time, the bard and sage, Who make their lives our heritage, IV. 1 ' Each Spirit Shape whose labour cheers The generations on their way; Sons of the fruitful God are they : The living hearts that charm our tears, The vanished souls that o'er our years Reign from eternal sepulchres. " Theirs are the deeds the years enroll; The blazon theirs that in Time's sky Burns in eternal heraldry; Great minds that shine like heaven's pole, Proclaiming, as the Ages roll, Their souls' descent from the Great Soul. * ' Their armies tread the tracts of night : 'Mid ignorance embattled foes, Their charmed spirit armour glows: Heaven sounds the clarion for their fight, Where, conquering with swords of Light, They make the vanquished free and bright. VII. ' * With these we strengthen brain and heart With these we temper thought and will, Accumulating power still, In love, in wisdom, and in art, For future lives, beyond the dart Of death and care, in spheres apart: VIII. 4 The cultured blossom springs and grows Upon a well selected soil, And scatters round its seeded spoil That still arising springs and blows Superior: from the hedge briar glows The full-leaved, perfume-souled rose. 141 IX. " And thus with man: as he is here, So in the future will he be A weed throughout eternity, A nature, dimmed with dust and tear, Or sovereign soul companion, peer Of angels Poet, Saint, and Seer. ' Oh, while through lower life we stray, What matters if we poor remain, While labouring for eternal gain: Our wealth is that we bear away, To lives beyond the morning ray, Beyond the suns of ruined day. 1 Such is the world to which we've fled, Striving for pleasure less than peace To nourish spiritual increase; A sphere in which the Soul is fed: Searching for Truth with heart and head, Even, brothers, while we work for bread. ' Now sets the day on lowland brown, On woody mound and spired town, And sullen frith that narrows inland Blooded with sunset sinking down. Northward away, a billowy wreath Hangs in the mingling space, beneath Whose sallow light the streaks of stubble Stretch toward the dusky slopes of Meath. Tall merchant barques at set of sun With full-sailed triple masts surge on, White in the wind, as from the harbour Booms the hollow twilight gun. While far beneath the stealthy tide Laps the dun sands of Malahide; While ringed in wreaths of amber vapour The moon looks o'er the prospect vyide, And glimmers on the distant skiffs; The seagull wavers o'er the cliffs, Or, breasted on the brightning billow Yearns with a lonely cry, and dips 142 Secure within the silver wave, That lightning shores of pebbly pave, Washes, or sweeps its searching surges Into the throat of the gloomy cave. Toward inland woods of thickening gloom We see the crow-line winging home; And Englandward across the azure The steamship, with its wake of foam : We see the swift train passing o'er The crescent stretch of glooming shore, Now lost, now lightning hark! it crosses Some viewless bridge with rapid roar; And hies away with lessening hum, Through silence following grey and numb; - Till o'er the low red west 'tis broken, By the beat of barrack drum. . . Then, as along the evening bay We homeward pace in vesper's ray, One sings above the glimmering waters, This refrain of our wandering day. SONG. I. Away with grief, ambition, care; When summer round us glows, Let's seek the vale of life, nor dare Its summits and their snows. For fortune's smile is but a snare, And crowns are golden woes; Up, Comrade! joy breathes in the air, As perfume from the rose ! II. By hedges hums the bee, and seeks "His sweets; the pigeons coo From yonder poplar spire that breaks The ocean's line of blue : Come, student, come, the distant peaks Are radiant, it is true; But faster fly the sunny weeks Than ever pinion flew. in. Let others tread the tracts of war, Or voyage the rolling brine, The simplest pleasures sweetest are, And thought and peace be mine; ' ' ' 143 Rich day, that floods the world afar, Shall turn our blood to wine. And sleep still drop from evening's star, Its lotus wreath divine. TV. Thrice happy he whose will's command Can stem the tempest's might; Whose fancy shakes the sullen sand Of time till it grow bright; Whom Nature vast and Spirit grand Inspiring, morn and night, Trips gaily through life's shadows, and Luxuriates in its light ! THE EXILE'S LAMENT, i. On, my heart is with old times! My friends have passed like marriage chimes; And joy now breathes but from the rhymes Of minstrels that I loved when young; And in old songs that of a night By hearth or summer evening-light My dear conpanions sung. The few that last from the pale past Are silent, cold and grey. Youth has fled cares of existence Dim its rainbow in the distance; 'Mid falling tears the world, they tread, With age and weakness wearied, And souls that turn but to the Dead, Ah, welladay! II. Yon moon has never changed Since o'er the far off fields I ranged, Ere time grew dark or hearts estranged In life's disastrous fight. By windows then at eventide, My love and I sat side by side Amid the windy light. The moon clouds past, and she at last Is vanished far away. Now my heart with memory passes By her dear grave chanting masses; Heading her loved books, and talking With her as alone I'm walking Ah, welladay ! 144 in. Tis a night of New Year's Day, The clanging chimes have ceased to play And the stars look pale and grey O'er the strange town where T dwell : There are laughters in the street Where the light young neighbours meet, And the aged their stories tell. But, there's One with me alone, Who from heaven came this day, (God grant my love speaks truly, In the fancy wakened newly;) Who from heaven came this day, To search the earth for me, By the grave that's o'er the sea, By the old house on the lea Ah, welladay! HYMN OF PROGRESS. Lo! Venus lights the West; the day is done; One hemisphere has darkened where it shone, Or gleams with light such as the dead have smiled; While courses our great planet through the vast, Silent, ponderous, fast, Its yearly journey, many millions railed. Now nightward turns our mighty land its face, Its cities, and its mountains, and its seas, Lorded by earth's progressive race, Toward th' innumerate heavens of the infinities, That late o'er Asia's realms their lustre cast; And, sleep to myriads, weary of the strife. Food to the resting brain, narrows all human life Here, unto nature's first created forms, The vegetable and tree. Now the great sun His glory from our latitude withdrawn, Showers his creative fire 'mid golden storms Over the western seas and lands, and pours On the Tartarian shores Its level-splendrous dawn : Revolve, oh earth, that while one-half thy race Wearied with labour for the other, rests, One waking, shall achieve God's high behests, Developing from nation unto nation, One ever brightening, broadening civilization In space, 145 HYMN OF PROGRESS. I. Lo ! from this temple of Time look upon us earth's mighty creations, Figures of light and colossi of gold, by the soul of the centuries cast; The saints holy hearted, the clear-eyed sages, the sovereign founders of nations, The prophet-kings of the future world, and poet-gods of the past. Behold ! how man has arisen from the narrow-browed friend of the brute, Hunting for food of the clay, unprospectively, dark to the next; How the human tree, barren for ages, now splendours with numerous fruit ; How every being who works is a sermon, with progress, the text. The free, rich life of Columbia and Europe productively shines in the day, And from the far East the long settled eclipse of the past is clouding away; Commerce, the strong civilizer of interest, the great educator of arts, Careers with its riches through every zone, illustrating earth's mutual marts; Land and ocean are conquered and utilized ; steam power with distance at strife, Triumphing over, tends to economise, heightening the value of life; And, while through the printing press, mind speaks to mind from pole unto pole, Feeding, the while unifying the myriads, as one human soul, Making each spirit a centre for the light of all intellect here, Developing ever the broadening circumference, radiant and clear; Thought swift flashes through the wire as the nerve, over mountain, through main, And the Telegraph narrows the round of our World to the size of the Brain ! IT. Lo! such are the victories man has achieved over nature anear and afar, With light and with time he measures their distance, satellite, planet, and star; Xay, e\eii the Infinite but awaits the instrument designed, To yield its wonders up to the senses, multiplied by mind. K 140 The past yields up its secrets; from its vague primeval birth, In the pages of the rocks he reads the annals of the earth; Old languages, forgotten for long ages, speak again, And ruins of the civilizations of forgotten men. Thus the Life Spirit of our Planet, mastering matter and time, Past, present, on the future now projects its light sublime. in. What yet may man achieve amid that future, who can say ? Th' aerial car may safely guide us through the night and day; N ew chemic compounds and new foods may lengthen human life, Annihilate all pain, increase our powers amid the strife; Wise Congresses of Nations, chosen brains, dowered with their might, Shall legislate for common freedom, benefit, and right ; Shall universalize relations between place and place, And neutralize by one symbolic tongue the bounds of race; Hold but the sword to guard the commerce of the furthest brine, And let a richer world enjoy the genial feast of life divine. Then shall true education deal with what the world requires, With living thought and speech instead of ashes and past fires, So that each generation, rising radiant as the sun, Shall learn what man mature has wrought, more than his youth has done, Inventions more than languages of buried Greece or Rome ; Discoveries that point to revelations yet to come; While, by experiment developed, highest faculties Shall multiply the power, light, love of all the Earth'* Societies. IV. Lo! nothing is too great or little now for man to comprehend; He analyses sightless life, excursions to creation's end; He pierces into nature's powers, minute or mighty, till we sec The monad's pulse, and now the forces acting through infinity; Determines where some viewless world should be, and when amid the blue, The comet, lost for ages, shall return to prove his figures true ; Thus intellect aspires to know, and all the works of God rehearse; Nay, weigh, even to a grain, each mighty telescopic universe. NOTES, FEOM ASIA TO EEIE. Page 9. Although the subject of this sketch is imaginary, and has no reference to tho Milesiau colony which arrived from the north of Spain some 1200 years B.C , all the primitive traditions of the Irish indicate the East Central Asia the cast of Europe, the west of Asia-Minor, and even Egypt and N.W. Africa, as starting points of their migrations. Such remote tradi- tions, like those of every ancient nation, must always remain cloudy and uncertain. At the same time, there are certain facts connected with even the most primitive, which give them an historical value, despite their legendary air despite also the adaptation of the Biblical chronology, &c., to the annals of Erie, as we find it in Keating, and many of the old Irish books. Genealogy was the essential form of the primitive history of the Kelts as of the Semites; and for many ages before the introduction of Christianity the custom of comparing, reviewing, and revising the annals of Ireland had been an institution. 'During what extended periods the early events in the life of nations were transmitted orally, we need not say. In this way the Vedas, the Homeric ballads, the Servian, and other ballad literatures have been preserved with a singular accuracy ; and in the f.-ame way the Finnic epic the Kalewala, which contains even Turanian reminiscences of extremely remote periods, has been committed to paper from the lips of the poor nomads of the north only within the present century. Unlike the Kelts, the Finns have never had any extensive litera- ture, while the Druids of the former in Ireland were in possession of the Ogham alphabets, which are iustrurr. ents as available as any others for the transmission of thought, for many pagan centuries. When we consider that Hibernian Celtic traditions were handed down with great accuracy during the prcechrlstian ages of this order, in an island fortuitously situated for their preservation, it being from its recluse position, removed from that chronic state of war which prevailed during those times on the continent conditions which have obliterated the traditions of the Celts of Gaul and Spain ; and that the races, of which the earliest chronicles exist had become extinct during a long series of colonizations and conquests we are impressed by a probability that an element of truth forms the basis of that cycle of migratory legends, which Keating, who wrote the prefatory part of his history from manuscript bardic literature, has conserved; and are not surprised that they are as vague as the first chapters of every Bcriptural record which embodies the long unwritten memories of ancient epochs. Before the Celtic Milesians arrived from Spain, Ireland was occupied by many other peoples, such as those called Neimedians, Fomo- niaus, Parthelonians, Fear Bolgs, Tuathas Do Duunaus. There is no reason to conclude that these immigrants were Gaels; and it is remark- able that many of the names of the descendants of such early colonizers, are much more Turanian aud Cushite in their etymology than Celtic a fact which illustrates the supposed occupation (in very ancient times) of Ireland by those peoples of whom neither Keating or the authorities from whom he compiled his work, had any idea. The oldest chronicles may be uaid, ia one sense, to be the most authentic, as the object of annalist and 143 NOTES. genealogist in such case was merely to fix the record of events without embellishing them. Tollaud, and of late many others much more skilled in the Celtic literature of ancient Ireland, have arrived at the opinion that it is the most ancient and valuable in Europe. Yet, this early history remains almost unknown, compared, for instance, with the kingly period of Rome, of which the events occurred in a district not as large as the County Dublin. There is a curious and oft quoted passage in Diodorus Siculis, which is supposed to relate to Ireland. He tells us that Hecataeus a native of Miletus, the capital of Caria who wrote history before Herodotus and some others, speak of an island not less in size than Sicily, lying in the ocean, over against Gaul, which is inhabited by the Hyperboreans, so called, because they are removed beyond the influence of the north wind. The climate is temperate, the soil so fruitful that they have two harvests in the year. There Latona is said to have been born, and there the worship of Apollo, (the Sun) obtains more than that of any other of the gods, he being honoured with perpetual praises. There he has a grove and a temple of round form, embelished with numerous offerings; there is a city also eacred to this god, in which the harpers hymn his praises. In ancient times, the Hyperboreans had a particular kindness for the Greeks, chiefly the Athenians and Delians. Some of the Greeks visited them and left; gifts, and Abaris, an Hyperborean, travelled into Greece, and renewed the old league with the Delians. One of the most curious details is that in which he states that the moon is seen so close from this island, as to appear but a little distance from the earth a statement which some have thought indicates the invention of the telescope in remote ages. This description certainly appears to relate more particularly to Ireland than any other island of the north, and illustrating the origin of the round towers, carries us back perhaps 3000 years. There is a Feunian poem describing the journey of Abaris to Greece. In Homer the Hyperboreans are called, Epigones, i.e., epheach-gom, the people of u vigorous kindred." The British Islands were known through commercial relations in extremely ancient times to the east, as is manifest from the allusions to them found in Sanskrit literature. There England is called " Sweta-Sula, Isle of the White Cliffs; and Ireland Surya Dwipa, the Island of the Sun, or of sun worship. England is also called the Land of Tapas, and the most fitting place for performing Tapasya-z'.e.. a religious austerity." In the great Indian epic poem, the Mahabarata, Norada sets out to Sweta-Dwipa in the remotest north-west, to worship the original form of Narayana, which lives in that island; and in the llamayana, when Kavaua asks, where the mighty ones dwell, he is told by Narada iu the white island. Ireland is also called Suvarna-dwipa, the land of gold. The quantity of ancient golden ornaments which have been found in Ireland verities this archaic title. The subject of the Mahaharata is the great war between the Kurus and Pandus, or black and white races, and refers to a period 1200 B.C., while the Kamayana is of a still earlier date. Possibly the passage from Hecatoeus refers to an epoch when Ireland was in possession of the Neimedians, whose name signifies "Worshippers of the Heavens" a branch of the Cushite race, who, in prehistoric times, created the civilizations of Iberia, Etruria, and other regions of western and southern Europe. The Fomonians, represented as a pirate colony, came from Africa. The presence of Cushites in Ireland thus con- nects the island in ancient times with Egypt, with Africa, and Southern Spain, and illustrates some of our written traditions. It is not less curious than true, that Ireland was once occupied by a people whoso typical tongue resembled that of the Berbers of Africa, and the Gallas of Abys- sinia. Vide Baldwin's Prehistoric Nations, an interesting compilation of modern research, containing several original views. Among the early colonies to Erie was that of Partholan, who is said to have come from Mygdonia in Thrace a region noted like all those from the north of the Euxine to the Caucasus, for the number of its races. The name, as explained by Phoenician and Celtic affinities, has pretty much the same meaning z.e. the man of the scattered race, or the source NOTES. 149 of a race ejected from this country a leader of exiles. Par-toll-ae (Celt) par tulm Phoenician. Among the Thracian peoples were the Getce. once supposed to have been the ancestors of the Goths, although differing widely from the Germans in manners. One of the ascertained Getic names is that of the god they worshipped Gebeleziu from whose Celtic roots gibeal lets, the outer or covering splendour, they appear to have been sun worshippers, while their own name, Getae, indicates their care of agriculture. The immortality of the soul was a doctrine of the Thracian eages. They believe that after death says Herodotus, they go to Zalmoxes i.e., Salm-mochd-leis, the great light of the sun. Thrace supplied the Greeks with many of their traditions. They had no writings in their country before those gained from the Thracian bards or Druids, who are identical with the Orphenas. " Linus," says Diodorus, " was the first who wrote the history of the elder Dionisius in Pelasgiau letters, which were also used by Orpheus." whose name, ur~fis, signifies, man of the trees, or perhaps of the " letters." The Ogharn alphabet possibly was in use among the Celtic and other nations of Thrace long before the introduction of the Phoenician characters of Cadmus, which, according to Herodotus, were afterwards changed both inform and Eound by the Greeks. It is noteworthy that the letters of the Irish alpha- bet have each the name of a tree ; and if with this fact we connect th supposition that Orpheus was a Thracian Druid, the fable of his having caused the trees (or letters) to follow the music of his lyre, resolves itself into an intelligible metaphor. Miletus. This city, the capital of Caria. was noted in ancient times as the chief colonizing centre in Asia-Minor. Seneca says the Milesians sent out 380 colonies, while others limit the number to 80. Many cities were colonized, if not founded by this people, on the shores of the Black Sea. It is singular that the meanings of these names are better explained from their Celtic than their Greek derivatives a peculiarity which applies still more to the local names in Greece. Thus we have Tomi (torn, a grove) ; Odessus odh es nss abounding either in food or intelligence, in the sense of news; Cyzicus ceith-each ccs--the great market of horses; Cerasus cur asaidh- the resting place of the expedition; Sinope sine obair the elder place of workmanship ; Cotyora coth-urach the place where food is protected a fortified granary, &c. To the north of Miletus rose Mount Messogis, a word identical with Ogygia, the old name of Ionia, meaning the new pleasant country. Miletus was called the Lelegean city, from its having been occupied, before the arrival of the louians, by the Leleges, who are numbered in the Iliad among the Trojan forces. Beyond uhere the Cim&ii dtceU and the Celtce marshal their legions. The Cynese are mentioned by Herodotus as the remotest people inhabiting beyond the gates of Hercules (Gibraltar) and the Celtoe. The name tine- sia, signifies the people of the sunset or evening. Celtae, according to Herodotus, was the name by which the Gauls were known to themselves. Diodorus particularly alludes to their remarkable attire, coats of variegated colours, interspersed as if with flowers, their tunics secured with gold and silver clasps and belts, their variegated shields with numerous emblems worked on them, and their imposing warlike habiliments. They are handsome in appearance, he says. The name Keltae evidently signifies (cel-tae) careful of then* dress. In the Scotch kilt we have a cor- ruption of the word Celt (raiment). The root, as Stokes in his edition of Cormack's glossary remarks, seems to be the Sanscrit, cal, to cover; or, eel, to conceal hence the old Norse, hele the hidden place, and our Anglo- Saxon " hell." In ancient Ireland caste was regulated by the colour of the dress. Thus, there was one colour for a slave, two for a soldier, three for officers, four for biatachs, five for lords of districts, six for an ollum or king. The Celts possibly adopted a characteristic name which distin- guished them from their neighbours. The Iberians and Celtebrians, whose universal dress was dark-coloured, and whose women wore black veilsa custom still preserved in Spain. Earth's Cimmerian North. In Homer, the Cimmerians inhabiting the Asiatic region, north of the Black Sea, are placed in a laud of darkness, 150 NOTES. lu Herodotus, whose geographical knowledge was more extended, they are placed in a region of day. Tbe name is identical with Scythian, or nomad cime riagh, always wandering; like the Etruscan Rasena ra sen, spring from wandering ancestors. Diodorus states that the word Gymbri is but a modification of Cimmerii. The brig/it OpoH.The Greek derivation for Apollo is, from a root mean- ing to defend or avert The Celtic Opoll, omnipotent force or splendour, conveys a more primitive idea of solar power. Hades ad (iuteusitive particle) and aes age the place of the old the grave. That the length of the voyages and knowledge of navigation possessed by ancient peoples has been much under rated by the moderns, is now rendered evident by philology, ethnology, and archeology. There seems strong grounds for supposing that the ancient Peruvian and Mexican empires, which so strikingly resembled the Egyptian, obtained their civiliza- tion from the same race which founded that of Egypt. The power of the descendants of Gush had become extinct before that of the Heleues had arisen ; one of the Greek traditions connected with the existence of the kingdoms they founded in the western continent, is now to be found in tho Atlantic Island of Plato, who derived his account from the Egyptian priests. But. even before the arrival of this people in Ireland, the island has passed through a series of occupations by other races, such as those who erected its cyclopean architecture. It is almost unnecessary to say that such monuments were not the forts or tombs of a Celtic people, but of one unknown, who had come from the Southern regions of the Asiatic World. In the Indian Deccan there are multitudes of such rude struc- tures, which extend along South Arabia, and North Africa, through Spain, and Western France The Celts were the first historic Indo-European people who passed from Asia to Europe, as the Greeks were the last, after an interval of several thousand years. Both the Greek and Latin languages were, it is said, developed from the Pelasgian, or that which prevailed in ancient times along the West of Asia Minor and in the Hellenic and Italic penin- sulas before their historic civilization. Some suppose the Pelasgians to have spoken a Sclavic dialect, others that its residue is to be found in the Albanian dialects chiefly; but, if it was this people to whom the ancient local names in the regions just mentioned are to be referred, there seems little doubt that they spoke an early form of Celtic. The Greeks whoso history, Josephus says, "was but of yesterday" found this nation in possession of the peninsula, in some parts of which they became mingled up with them, while in others as Attica they were, according to Herodotus, developed from them, and. hence, certainly derived from them th ss traditions which they subsequently enlarged and beautified in the Hellenic mythology. From this people Greece was anciently named, Pelasgia -fel-ascath-ia, the nation of champions and bards, and the name lingered long in Pelasgian Argos, and Thessaly. From those aborigines (ur-aighe-an-ae, valliant dwellers on or possessors of the laud) they derived a stock of traditions which, in their mythical form, are little intelligible. Many of the oldest come from Thrace and North Greece. Such as those of the Jupetrians and Titans. Of the former kings, Varro states there were 300 so called; and these, judging from the Celtic components of their titles ua-feth-tir, a ad ti-tan, were respectively the early people who possessed a knowledge of agriculture, and the later race who were acquainted with the use of metals and arms. This explanation illus- trates the story of the wars of which the Olympian region was tho scene. The agricultural race, unable to contend with a people better armed and weapoued, ascend the mountains, and hurl rocks upon them the thunderbolts of Jupiter. The light which Celtic derivations throw on some of the unintelligible Greek myths is at least curious. By simplifying they lead us back to their origin. For instance, Cerberus is, cer bar, the wrathful or raging stag, whose horns and head imagination trans- formed into a three-beaded monster. Orcus would be vr*ytis, the land of death, NOTES. 151 Ionia in Asia Minor was called Ogugia, a name which, according to Plutarch, was given to Ireland; og-uigh-ia, the new pleasant country. Ogygia has no Greek derivatives. Phyrgia was the cradle of the Greek languages, whose Ionic dialect became perfected in Western Asia Minor, as its Attic in Attica, and its .ZEolic, which has a closer affinity to the Sanscrit than the others, in Northern maritime Greece. The name of the loues is usually derived from ion, wandering, migratory. In the Puranas, however, they are called Yauvana. the youag people or nation the latest which had become known to the eastern Aryans, and are represented as the progeny of the Kshatriyas, the warrior caste of India. " So many destructions, 1 ' says Josephus, " have happened to the land the GreekK inhabit, blotting out the memory of former times, that they were always beginning a new way of living." And in a remarkable passage in the Timceus of Plato, the priest of Sals says, that they were always children; an old Greek never existed: they have all modern minds and no traditions or knowledge of any kind that has grown hoary with age. Scarcely had they invented writing and other arts, when there came down from heaven, at certain intervals, great floods which spared only the ignorant and unedu- cated, so that they had to start afresh from tho beginning, as though they were a young people and knew nothing of what had occurred in this country in the olden times, when it was inhabited by the fairest and. noblest race of men, from the small remnant of which that remained, the whole of the Greeks proper descended. Their past has been forgotten, because they who perished left no written records. Before those catas- trophes, he says, the Athenians were glorious in war and legislature; and. goes on to allude to the great empire which, in ancient times, extended over the Atlantic Island, which was as largo as Lybia and Europe, and which extended over Europe as far as Etruria. The flood mentioned, that of Ducalion, occurred from ihe melting of the snow on the Cambuniau mountains, by which the Vale of Thessaly was deluged, and its inhabitants destroyed. The old priest of Sais assigns a period. 9000 years previous, for the disappearance of the Atlantic Island, which many, who do not accept the idea of a communication having existed between the Ethiopian nations and America, regard as a fiction. According to a modern mathe- matical theory, deluges occur each 10,500 years from the change in the earth's axis. The deviation, which occurred in the position of parhelion from two centuries before 1248 A.D., caused that disappearance in tho (mows of the Alps and Switzerland, which since that time has rendered Europe warmer. Josephus does not believe that the Greeks had the use of letters at the time of the Trojan war, and adduces the many variations in the text of Homer to prove that the songs relating to that event had been handed down memorially; conditions which would imply that a bardic order, similar to that of the Druids, had existed in Western Asia. The Greeks, says Max Muller, knew as little about the original meaning of their myths as they did of their etymology. They changed the names of nations, "&e., says Josephus, to others wlrch sounded well in their own language. Pausinias, too, remarks that, having read tho poems of Liuius and Hesiod. he found them full of interpolations, and much altered from their original form; and it was the same with those which pass under the name of Homer. These. Pisastratus a name which implies, the man who con- veyed knowledge from beyond the sea brought from Ionia in the sixth century B.C. It is hardly necessary to remark, that the name Homer (omeros), even according to its Greek derivation, does not indicate tho individual authorship of the great rhapsodies of war and travel, but their collector or editor; like that of Vyasa, the arranger of the Motions con- tained in the Indian epic, the Mahaharata; yet both Homer and Vyasa have become historical personages with legendary biographies. In connection with the theory that the Pelasgiaus of Western Asia Minor and Greece were a Celtic speaking people, and with the fact that the original meaning of local names in Greece and Western Asia, and those of its legendary history, are rendered more intelligible by Celtic roots thau Greek derivations ; it may not be uninteresting to add. that 152 NOTES. the Celtic components of the name, "Omeros," would verify the supposi- tion of this word having been applied to the editors or collectors of the Ionian ballad literature, founded on Pelasgian traditions, relating to the great struggle between Peninsular Greece and Asia, known as the war of Troy; for, omhal-osadh. signifies, "a concord" or "confederacy of poets." It may be added, that the prefix of the Irish term for a poet (omhal), that is om, is the nrrystic word with which each of the Indian Vedas commence, and by pronouncing which God created the universe. In this respect it resembles the word, oiw (harmony or music), which, according to the Triads, had a similar interpretation and application; it being at once the name of Deity and his creative fiat. Oin in Sanscrit is a demon- strative particle meaning, that God, and in its general signification has a reference to creative power. Thus, the Celtic word Omhal may be a compound of this primitive particle o>n and ala, i.e., " creative skill or craft." Gladstone supposes the Pelasgians to have come from Media, where, to the present day, (Malcolm's Persia) a tribe named Elleat, bear a resem- blance to the Helli. Elleat is a Celtic word, meaning ell eata, the "ancient multitude," the old nation. We append a few Celtic derivations illustrative of the meaning of old Greek, Latin, local, and personal names, premising that the Greeks changed the Celtic f into p, and the Latins into v. Arcadia, ar-cadhach-ia, the laud of friendly husbandry. Argos, ar-gus, the power of husbandry. Actasa, the old name of the stony Attica, aca- teach, the rocky abode. Thessaly, tus-alach, the foundation or origin of the young generation. The vale of Tempe, tern feabh, dark with woods. Olympus, ol-ump-fos, the great earth wall, or wall of the earth. Macedonia, magh-ae-don-ia, the country of plain and city; it was anciently called Emathia, em, explative particle ; and atha, green plain. Lacouia, luch-on- ia, the country of suffering kindred, in allusion to the Helots ; eU-othar, the multitude of labour. Perea, fear-ia, the land of men. Mygdonio, magh-dun-ia, the country of plain and city. Marathon, mor-atha, the green - plain by the sea. Ithaca, etha-acha, the rocky corn land. Salamis, salamah, the island of the men of the sea. It has been recorded that Troy was a satrapy of Nineveh; but part of its population came from Thrace, i.e., the Teucrians who mingled with the Phyrgians, ieuch-reach, the men of great achievements. It is noteworthy that the Irish word, troid, means a place of contest. Troia was also called Dardania?, dur-danair, the city of the "foreigners of the sea." Achille's myrmidons signify, mur-mudan, the protecting wall or bulwark; the Danaoi of Argos, dan-aoi, the un- daunted confederacy. The Greek Vulcan is Uphastos i.e., Vpadh ais tos, the first hill sorcerer a title which carries us back to the times when tho race which had become acquainted with metallurgy were regarded a3 magicians. Ilythia, goddess who presided over the birth of children, was she who was invoked to give the mother -il-uth much suck. Among the Komans she was called Luciua. Ovid derives the word from Lucus, a grove, which shows how completely the original meaning hia sinne, the hire of the breast, was lost. The practice of spreading a couch for Juno Lucina in houses when a delivery was expected, illustrates the custom of preparing for the nurse. Among various personal names, mythologic and historic, take- Prometheus, fromhadh-us, the trial of skill or intelligence. Ducalion, the Noah of the Thessaliau flood; du-gal-ion, he who found his kinsmen a fitting land; or, perhaps, the word cala. a harbour, may enter into the name as into Calydpu, the fort or city of the harbour. Cadmus, cadh-mus, the agreeable or enlightened friend. Tantalus, tan-tala, he of the "hall of fire." Among Homeric heroes: Agamemnon, from agach. brave. Diomedes, dea-mead, the man of huge size. Achilles, ag-ifl-xs, the greatest destruction of battle. Aeacides, ae-agh-adaes, men superior in fighting. Nestor, nes-tor, ready in reply. Ulysses, oll-m-ate, man of the greatest intelligence. Aeolus, who invented sails ; ae-oll-is, the man potent on the water. The Danides, dan-adh, those of the terrible destiny. The Gorgons, whom some suppose to have been Amazons, and others huge birds; gorg, on. fierce and swift. NOTES. l-.l Medusa, meid-usahd, hugeness and power. The affinity between the Greek and Celtic is seen not only in traditional names, but those of kinga and poets, such as Lycurgus, luchar-gus, the force of light or intelligence. Anacreona, ana-creona, the old drinking cup, evidently a nick-name. Almost all the literary men of Rome, as Zeuss remarks, have Celtic names, most of them having come from Cisalpine Gaul, Samnium, and Apulia. Thus we have Catullus descended, doubtless, from some Celtic chieftain; cath-ail, rock of battle. Virgillus, fear-gil, or fear galla, the man of the water or of valour. Lucretius, Ivgh-creth, lively hearted. Caius Julius Caesar descended from the kings of Alba in Celtic Sammina, which was afterwards included in Latium. Caius or Gains, gai-ae, spearman; Julius, jul-,v, the leading or learned; and Ceesar, aes-er, godlike or superior man. Suetonius, who tells us on the occasion of the first letter of Ceesar on the statue of Augustus having been struck away by lightning (C stands for 100), the Auruspices interpreted the circumstance, that the Emperor would only live a hundred days, adds that asaris the Etruscan word for "God," in Irish; ae t man; and sar (sign of the superlative case), greatest. That a Celtic people gave its local names to Etruria, and that the old personal names of gods and men are likewise Celtic is evident. Thus the Etruscan Jupiter was called Tina. Tin has several meanings, such as the beginning, fire, the sun. In Irish God is named Ti mor, the great fire, the origin of all things, a title derived from the days of solar worship. Juno is called Kupra, from cupar t conception, she being the goddess who presided over marriage. Mars, was Mavors, ma-for-aes. the good guardian. Venus from bnn, root and origin ; and ae, men. Their Thatna, is the Irish Dagna, the good god Janus or Sanus, san-xs, eminently holy. Pluto was Mantus, i.e., old. We have before alluded to the name by which the Etruscans called them- selves Easena. ra sen-ae, men sprung from migratory ancestors. Of course the Celtic colonization of Etruria was long subsequent to its Ethiopian. Among the early names in Eoman history is Lars Por- seua, lar-por ceann, the ancestor of the tribe of the city, or chief ancestor of the hearth and home pater familias. Tullus Hostilius tulach, the chief; os tttlach. over -proud, aristocratic. Ancus Martius anchait. mareach, the friendly knight. Lucamo, name originally given to the chief men of the Etruscan cities, who exercised the functions of priest, auruspices, &c. Luch-itmo, the chief or conductor of bui'ials. We need not allude to the mortuary ceremonies which formed so important a part of Etruscan civilization, as it did in Egypt, from which they were perhaps copied. The universality of the image of the Sphynx in Etruscan burial grounds, as in those of the Tarquiui, show the close relations that existed between those lands. In both countries the home of the dead was of much more importance than that of the living, hence the permanent character of their tombs and the comparative fragility of their domestic archi. tecture. It would occupy too much space to show that all the Etruscan districts, hills, rivers, cities, bear Celtic names. The Eoman Tiber comes from tibhre, a spring or fountain. The pyramidical hill Soracte, so marked an object to the north-east of Eome, is sore ac/ia t the conspicuous rock. The snowy Nar, from nar, white as milk; Clanis, clan is, the river of the tribe. Even the Eoman Toga is Celtic togach, meaning election, the chosen. The dress of the gens togata was that of the chosen citizens. Sennatus, seannus, authority, collective power. The relation between the Celtic and Latin has, indeed, been long since shown. All words in the latter relating to war or policy, have their originals in the former language. In the oldest specimens of Latin,' such as the laws of Numa in Festus, the hymn of the Fraters Arvales, the old Celtic terminations in oi and od are still retained. The object of these brief derivative notes is to indicate the expansion of a Celtic speaking people over Europe in ancient times, to indicate their influence on the civilisation of those countries which were once called Pelasgian, and to direct the attention of scholars who, at present, rely on the Sanscrit as the chief derivative exponent of the Indo-European languages, rather than the more primitive Celtic, to a pubject which is, at 154 NOTES. loast, as well worthy of consideration as many of tho theories which abound in those days of philological speculation. Page 17. Leogir, the Celtic name of Southern Britain, as Cymru was of the West, and Albiu of the North. Buadice, commonly spelled Boadicia, the queen of the Iceui. The name is possibly derived from Buad-each, the power of the state; though it may also be taken from Buadeach, potent in horses, in allusion to her army, the greater part of which was composed of cavalry and chariots; "whose onset was not to be withstood," says Dion Cassius, in his description of the battle, which she fought with the Romans under their General Suetonius. Like most classicised Celtic names, it is but the fragment of a title. In Tacitus this queen is called Bodduca. Jtodhdli, pronounced Bod, was the Gaulish goddess of war, and the Irish also, as may be seen from the battle of Magh Rath. Bod also means ' war," and thus Bodduca, would signify 'the cause or originator of war." Doubtless various names were given to this famous queen, as customary by the Celtic bards. Loann and Forilloe were Pictish or Scandinavian heroes. Blathnaid is Celtic for blossom; Lassairfhina for the flame o\" blush of wine. Feithfailge is a pretty name, meaning "a honeysuckle of ringlets." The meaning of the other Irish female names which are always poetic like those of most old nations, is indicated. The Sea of Ic.ht.'or friendly sea, was to the south of Erin and the channel between Britain and France ; the northern the Sea of Ork, the I'-ish for a whale hence the name of the Orcades. Leath Mogha included Leiuster and Munster. Magh Sleachta, the plain of slaughter, was the site of the famous Druidical temple dedicated to Crom Cruach, the Moloch of the Pagan Irish, in Leitrini. Fear Bolg is usually and most absurdly de- rived from bolg, a bag. founded on some legend that the Fearbolgs brought bags of earth with them from Greece to Ireland; whereas it means simply, the men of cattle, the early pastoral people who were iu possession of the island before the arrival of the more civilized Tuatho,