Miscellaneous writings of the late Dr. Maginn :: :: University of Virginia Library

“Next follows Sheridan—a doubtful name,
As yet unsettled in the ranks of fame.
This, fondly lavish in his praises grown,
Gives him all merit—this allows him none.
Between them both, we'll steer the middle course,
Nor, loving praise, rob judgment of her force.

Just his conceptions, natural and great:
His feelings strong, his words enforced with weight,
Was sheep-faced Quin himself to hear him speak,
Envy would drive the color from his cheek:
But step-dame Nature, niggard of her grace,
Denied the social powers of voice and face;
Fixed in one frame of features, glare of eye,
Passions, like chaos, in confusion lie:
In vain the wonders of his skill are tried
To form destruction Nature hath denied.
His voice no touch of harmony admits,
Irregularly deep and shrill by fits:
The two extremes appear like man and wife,
Coupled together for the sake of strife.

His actions always strong, but sometimes such
That candor must declare he acts too much.
Why must impatience fall three paces back?
Why paces three return to the attack?
Why is the right leg, too, forbid to stir,
Unless in motion semicircular?
Why must the hero with the nailer vie,
And hurl the close clenched fist on nose or eye?
In royal John with Philip angry grown,
I thought he would have knocked poor Davies down.
Inhuman tyrant! was it not a shame
To fight a king so harmless and so tame?

But, spite of all defects, his glories rise;
And art, by judgment formed, with nature vies.
Behold him sound the depth of Hubert's soul,
Whilst in his own contending passions roll.
View the whole scene—with critic judgment scan,
And then deny his merit if you can.
Where he falls short, 't is Nature's fault alone;
When he succeeds the merit's all his own.”

102

“He stands before her now; and who is he
Into whose outspread arms confidingly
She flings her fairy self? Unlike the forms
That woo and win a woman's love—the storms
Of deep contending passions are not seen
Darkening the features where they once have been,
Nor the bright workings of a generous soul,
Of feelings half concealed, explain the whole.
But there is something words can not express—
A gloomy, deep, and quiet fixedness;
A recklessness of all the blows of fate—
A brow untouched by love, undimmed by hate—
As if, in all its stores of crime and care,
Earth held no suffering now for him to bear.
Yes; all is passionless: the hollow cheek
Those pale thin lips shall never wreathe with smiles;
E'en now, 'mid joy, unmoved and sad they speak
In spite of all his Linda's winning wiles.
Yet can we read, what all the rest denies,
That he hath feelings of a mortal birth,
In the wild sorrow of those dark bright eyes,
Bent on that form—his one dear link to earth.
He loves, and he is loved! then what avail
The scornful words which seek to brand with shame?”
“A light and lovely thing,
Fair as the opening flower of early spring.
The deep rose crimsoned in her laughing cheek,
And her eyes seemed without the tongue to speak;
Those dark-blue glorious orbs!—oh! summer skies
Were nothing to the heaven of her eyes.
And then she had a witching art
To wile all sadness from the heart;
Wild as the half-tamed gazelle,
She bounded over hill and dell,
Breaking on you when alone
With her sweet and silvery tone,
Dancing to her gentle lute
With her light and fairy foot;

103

Or to our lone meeting-place
Stealing slow with gentle pace,
To hide among the feathery fern;
And while waiting her return,
I wandered up and down for hours—
She started from amid the flowers,
Wild, and fresh, and bright as they,
To wing again her sportive way.”
“My early and my only love, why silent dost thou lie,
When heavy grief is in my heart, and tear-drops in mine eye;
I call thee, but thou answerest not, all lonely though I be:
Wilt thou not burst the bonds of sleep, and rise to comfort me?
Oh! wake thee—wake thee from thy rest upon the tented field:
This faithful breast shall be at once thy pillow and thy shield;
If thou hast doubted of its truth and constancy before,
Oh! wake thee now, and it will strive to love thee even more,” &c. &c.
“And so it was—our tearful hearts did cling
And twine together even in sorrowing;
And we became as one—her orphan boy
Lisped the word ‘Father,’ as his dark eyes gazed,
With their expressive glance of timid joy,
Into my face, half pleased and half amazed.
And we did dwell together, calmly fond
With our own love, and not a wish beyond.”
------ “In the autumn time,
By the broad Shannon's banks of beauty roaming,”

104

“That little outcast grew a fairy girl,
A beautiful, a most beloved one.
There was a charm in every separate curl
Whose rings of jet hung glistening in the sun,
Which warmed her marble brow. There was a grace
Peculiar to herself, e'en from the first:
Shadows and thoughtfulness you seemed to trace
Upon that brow, and then a sudden burst
Of sunniness and laughter sparkled out,
And spread their rays of joyfulness about,” &c. &c.
“When the sacred remnant of my wretched race
Gave England's Richard gifts to let them be
All unmolested in their misery.”
“Answering, there came
A deep, low tremulous sound, which thrilled my frame.
A moment, that young form shrunk back abashed
At its own feelings; and all vainly dashed
The tear aside, which speedily returned
To quench the cheek where fleeting blushes burned.
A moment, while I sought her fears to stay,
The timid girl in silence shrank away—
A moment, from my grasp her hand withdrew—
A moment, hid her features from my view—
Then rising, sank with tears upon my breast,
Her struggles and her love at once confessed.”
“Days, months, and years, rolled on, and I had been
A prisoner a century; had seen
Change after change among my keepers; heard
The shrieks of new-made captives,” &c.

105

“Graceful as earth's most gentle daughters,
That good ship sails through the gleaming spray—
Like a beautiful dream on the darkened waters,
Till she anchors in Killala bay.”
“And the Undying One is left alone.”