The Poetical Works of Aubrey De Vere

Silent as shades the shadowing monks
O'er cloistral courts might glide;
But the War-Bard strode through the church itself
Like hunter on mountain-side.

The Priest might soften his Compline psalm
Till it seemed but the night-wind's sigh:
Oiseen, if the stag-hunt swept by at mass,
Would echo the stag-hound's cry!

169

And thus one day, while his beads he told,
Fierce thoughts, a rebel breed,
Burst up from old graves in the warrior's heart,
And he stormed at priest and creed.

‘Woe, woe! for the priestly tribe this hour
On the Feinè Hill have sway!
Glad am I that scarce their shapes I see;
Half-blind am I this day.

‘Woe, woe, thou Palace of Cruachan!
Thy sceptre is down and thy sword;
The chase goes over thy grassy roof,
The monk in thy courts is lord!

‘Thou man with the mitre and vestments broad,
And the bearing of grave command,
Rejoice that Diarmid this day is dust!
Right heavy was his clenched hand!

‘Thou man with the bell! I rede thee well:
Were Diorring living this day,
Thy book he would take, and thy bell would break
On the base of yon pillar grey!

‘Thou man with miraculous crosier-staff,
Though puissant thou art, and tall,
Were Goll but here he would dash thy gear
In twain on thy convent wall!

‘Were Conan living, the bald-head shrill,
With the scourge of his scoff and gibe
He would break thy neck, and thy convent wreck,
And lash from the land thy tribe!

170

‘But one of our chiefs had spared thy head—
My Oscar, my son, my child:
He was storm in the foray and fire in the fight,
But in peace he was maiden-mild.’

Then Patrick answered: ‘Old man, old man,
That Pagan realm lies low:
Our home is thine! Forget thy chiefs,
And thy deeds gone by forego!

‘High feast thou hast on the festal days,
And cakes on the days of fast:’
‘Thou liest, thou priest, for in wrath and scorn
Thy cakes to the dogs I cast!’

‘Old man, thou hearest our Christian hymns:
Such strains thou hadst never heard:’
‘Thou liest, thou priest! for in Letter Lee wood
I have listened its famed blackbird!

‘I have heard the music of meeting swords,
And the grating of barks on the strand,
And the shout from the breasts of the men of help
That leaped from the decks to land!

‘Twelve hounds had my sire, with throats like bells,
Loud echoed on lake and bay:
By this hand, they lacked but the baptism rite
To chaunt with thy monks this day!’

Oiseen's white head on his breast dropt down,
Till his hair and his beard, made one,
Shone out like the spine of a frosty hill
Far seen in the wintry sun.

171

‘One question, Patrick! I ask of thee,
Thou king of the saved and shriven:
My sire, and his chiefs, have they their place
In thy City, star-built, of heaven?’

‘Oiseen, old chief of the harp and sword,
That questionest of the soul,
That City they tread not who love but war:
Their realm is a realm of dole.’

‘By this head, thou liest, thou son of Calphurn!
In heaven I would scorn to bide
If my father and Oscar were exiled men,
And no friend at my side.’

‘That City, old man, is the City of Peace:
Loud anthems, not widows' wail:’
‘It is not in bellowings chiefs take joy,
But in songs of the wars of Fail!

‘Are the men in the streets like Baoignè's chiefs?
Great-hearted like us are they?
Do they stretch to the poor the ungrudging hand,
Or turn they their heads away?

‘Thou man with the chaunt, and thou man with the creed,
This thing I demand of thee:
My dog, may he pass through the gates of heaven?
May my wolf-hound enter free?’

‘Old man, not the buzzing gnat may pass,
Nor sunbeam look in unbidden:
The King there sceptred knows all, sees all:
From Him there is nothing hidden.’

172

‘It never was thus with Fionn, our king!
In largess our Fionn delighted:
The hosts of the earth came in and went forth
Unquestioned, and uninvited!’

‘Thy words are the words of madness, old man,
Thy chieftains had rule one day;
Yet a moment of heaven is three times worth
The warriors of Eire for aye!’

Then Oiseen uplifted his old white head:
Like lightning from hoary skies
A flash went forth 'neath the shaggy roofs
Low-bent o'er his sightless eyes:

‘Though my life sinks down, and I sit in the dust,
Blind warrior and grey-haired man,
Mine were they of old, thou priest over bold,
Those chiefs of Baoignè's clan!’

And he cried, while a spasm his huge frame shook,
‘Dim shadows like men before me,
My father was Fionn, and Oscar my son,
Though to-day ye stand vaunting it o'er me!’

Thus raged Oiseen—'mid the fold of Christ,
Still roaming old deserts wide
In the storm of thought, like a lion old;
Though lamblike at last he died.

University of Virginia Library

I. THE GREAT CONTENTION.