Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

Ah! my heart is weary waiting,
Waiting for the May—
Waiting for the pleasant rambles,
Where the fragrant hawthorn brambles,
With the woodbine alternating,
Scent the dewy way.
Ah! my heart is weary waiting,
Waiting for the May.

Ah! my heart is sick with longing
Longing for the May—
Longing to escape from study,
To the young face fair and ruddy,
And the thousand charms belonging
To the summer's day.
Ah! my heart is sick with longing,
Longing for the May.

Ah! my heart is sore with sighing,
Sighing for the May—
Sighing for their sure returning,
When the summer beams are burning,
Hopes and flowers that, dead or dying,
All the winter lay.
Ah! my heart is sore with sighing,
Sighing for the May.

Ah! my heart is pained with throbbing,
Throbbing for the May—
Throbbing for the sea-side billows,
Or the water-wooing willows,
Where in laughing and in sobbing
Glide the streams away.
Ah! my heart, my heart is throbbing,
Throbbing for the May.

Waiting sad, dejected, weary,
Waiting for the May.
Spring goes by with wasted warnings,
Moon-lit evenings, sun-bright mornings;
Summer comes, yet dark and dreary
Life still ebbs away:
Man is ever weary, weary,
Waiting for the May!

DEVOTION.

When I wander by the ocean,
When I view its wild commotion,
Then the spirit of devotion
Cometh near;
And it fills my brain and bosom,
Like a fear!

I fear its booming thunder,
Its terror and its wonder,
Its icy waves, that sunder
Heart from heart;
And the white host that lies under
Makes me start.

Its clashing and its clangour
Proclaim the Godhead's anger—
I shudder, and with languor
Turn away;
No joyance fills my bosom
For that day.

When I wander through the valleys,
When the evening zephyr dallies,
And the light expiring rallies
In the stream,
That spirit comes and glads me,
Like a dream.

The blue smoke upward curling,
The silver streamlet purling,
The meadow wildflowers furling
Their leaflets to repose:
All woo me from the world
And its woes.

The evening bell that bringeth
A truce to toil outringeth,
No sweetest bird that singeth
Half so sweet,
Not even the lark that springeth
From my feet.

Then see I God beside me,
The sheltering trees that hide me,
The mountains that divide me
From the sea:
All prove how kind a Father
He can be.

Beneath the sweet moon shining
The cattle are reclining,
No murmur of repining
Soundeth sad:
All feel the present Godhead,
And are glad.

With mute, unvoiced confessings,
To the Giver of all blessings
I kneel, and with caressings
Press the sod,
And thank my Lord and Father,
And my God.

THE SEASONS OF THE HEART

The different hues that deck the earth
All in our bosoms have their birth;
'Tis not in blue or sunny skies,
'Tis in the heart the summer lies!
The earth is bright if that be glad,
Dark is the earth if that be sad:
And thus I feel each weary day—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

In vain, upon her emerald car,
Comes Spring, “the maiden from afar,”
And scatters o'er the woods and fields
The liberal gifts that nature yields;
In vain the buds begin to grow,
In vain the crocus gilds the snow;
I feel no joy though earth be gay—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

And when the Summer, like a bride,
Comes down to earth in blushing pride,
And from that union sweet are born
The fragrant flowers and waving corn,
I hear the hum of birds and bees,
I view the hills and streams and trees,
Yet vain the thousand charms of May—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

And when the Autumn crowns the year,
And ripened hangs the golden ear,
And luscious fruits of ruddy hue
The bending boughs are glancing through,
When yellow leaves from sheltered nooks
Come forth and try the mountain brooks,
Even then I feel, as there I stray—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

And when the winter comes at length,
With swaggering gait and giant strength,

And with his strong arms in a trice
Binds up the streams in chains of ice,
What need I sigh for pleasures gone,
The twilight eve, the rosy dawn?
My heart is changed as much as they—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

Even now, when Summer lends the scene
Its brightest gold, its purest green,
Whene'er I climb the mountain's breast,
With softest moss and heath-flowers dress'd,
When now I hear the breeze that stirs
The golden bells that deck the furze,
Alas! unprized they pass away—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

But when thou comest back once more,
Though dark clouds hang and loud winds roar,
And mists obscure the nearest hills,
And dark and turbid roll the rills,
Such pleasures then my breast shall know,
That summer's sun shall round me glow;
Then through the gloom shall gleam the May—
'Tis winter all when thou'rt away!

KATE OF KENMARE.

Oh! many bright eyes full of goodness and gladness,
Where the pure soul looks out, and the heart loves to shine,
And many cheeks pale with the soft hue of sadness,
Have I worshipped in silence and felt them divine!
But Hope in its gleamings, or Love in its dreamings,
Ne'er fashioned a being so faultless and fair
As the lily-cheeked beauty, the rose of the Roughty,
The fawn of the valley, sweet Kate of Kenmare!

It was all but a moment, her radiant existence,
Her presence, her absence, all crowded on me;
But time has not ages and earth has not distance
To sever, sweet vision, my spirit from thee!
Again am I straying where children are playing,
Bright is the sunshine and balmy the air,
Mountains are heathy, and there do I see thee,
Sweet fawn of the valley, young Kate of Kenmare!

Thine arbutus beareth full many a cluster
Of white waxen blossoms like lilies in air;
But, oh! thy pale cheek hath a delicate lustre
No blossoms can rival, no lily doth wear;
To that cheek softly flushing, thy lip brightly blushing,
Oh! what are the berries that bright tree doth bear?
Peerless in beauty, that rose of the Roughty,
That fawn of the valley, sweet Kate of Kenmare!

O Beauty! some spell from kind Nature thou bearest,
Some magic of tone or enchantment of eye,
That hearts that are hardest, from forms that are fairest,
Receive such impressions as never can die!
The foot of the fairy, though lightsome and airy,
Can stamp on the hard rock the shape it doth wear;
Art cannot trace it, nor ages efface it:
And such are thy glances, sweet Kate of Kenmare!

To him who far travels how sad is the feeling,
How the light of his mind is o'ershadowed and dim,
When the scenes he most loves, like a river's soft stealing,
All fade as a vision and vanish from him!

Yet he bears from each far land a flower for that garland
That memory weaves of the bright and the fair;
While this sigh I am breathing my garland is wreathing,
And the rose of that garland is Kate of Kenmare!

In lonely Lough Quinlan in summer's soft hours,
Fair islands are floating that move with the tide,
Which, sterile at first, are soon covered with flowers,
And thus o'er the bright waters fairy-like glide.
Thus the mind the most vacant is quickly awakened,
And the heart bears a harvest that late was so bare,
Of him who in roving finds objects of loving,
Like the fawn of the valley, sweet Kate of Kenmare!

Sweet Kate, though again I may never behold thee,
Though the pride and the joy of another you be,
Though strange lips may praise thee, and strange arms enfold thee,
A blessing, dear Kate, be on them and on thee!
One feeling I cherish that never can perish—
One talisman proof to the dark wizard care—
The fervent and dutiful love of the Beautiful,
Of which thou art a type, gentle Kate of Kenmare!

The river of Kenmare!

Near the town is the “Fairy Rock” on which the marks of several feet are deeply impressed. It derives its name from the popular belief that these are the work of fairies.

A LAMENT.

The dream is over,
The vision has flown;
Dead leaves are lying
Where roses have blown;
Wither'd and strown
Are the hopes I cherished,—
All hath perished
But grief alone.

My heart was a garden
Where fresh leaves grew
Flowers there were many,
And weeds a few;
Cold winds blew,
And the frosts came thither,
For flowers will wither,
And weeds renew!

Youth's bright palace
Is overthrown,
With its diamond sceptre
And golden throne;
As a time-worn stone
Its turrets are humbled,—
All hath crumbled
But grief alone!

Whither, oh, whither,
Have fled away
The dreams and hopes
Of my early day?
Ruined and gray
Are the towers I builded;
And the beams that gilded—
Ah! where are they?

Once this world
Was fresh and bright,
With its golden noon
And its starry night;
Glad and light,
By mountain and river,
Have I bless'd the Giver
With hushed delight.

These were the days
Of story and song,
When Hope had a meaning
And Faith was strong.

“Life will be long,
And lit with Love's gleamings;”
Such were my dreamings,
But, ah, how wrong!

Youth's illusions,
One by one,
Have passed like clouds
That the sun looked on.
While morning shone,
How purple their fringes!
How ashy their tinges
When that was gone!

Darkness that cometh
Ere morn has fled—
Boughs that wither
Ere fruits are shed—
Death bells instead
Of a bridal's pealings—
Such are my feelings,
Since Hope is dead!

Sad is the knowledge
That cometh with years—
Bitter the tree
That is watered with tears;
Truth appears,
With his wise predictions,
Then vanish the fictions
Of boyhood's years.

As fire-flies fade
When the nights are damp—
As meteors are quenched
In a stagnant swamp—
Thus Charlemagne's camp,
Where the Paladins rally,
And the Diamond Valley,
And Wonderful Lamp,

And all the wonders
Of Ganges and Nile,
And Haroun's rambles,
And Crusoe's isle,
And Princes who smile
On the Genii's daughters
'Neath the Orient waters
Full many a mile,

And all that the pen
Of Fancy can write
Must vanish
In manhood's misty light—
Squire and knight,
And damosels' glances,
Sunny romances
So pure and bright!

These have vanished,
And what remains?—
Life's budding garlands
Have turned to chains;
Its beams and rains
Feed but docks and thistles,
And sorrow whistles
O'er desert plains!

The dove will fly
From a ruined nest,
Love will not dwell
In a troubled breast;
The heart has no zest
To sweeten life's dolour—
If Love, the Consoler,
Be not its guest!

The dream is over,
The vision has flown;
Dead leaves are lying
Where roses have blown;

Wither'd and strewn
Are the hopes I cherished,—
All hath perished
But grief alone!

THE BRIDAL OF THE YEAR.

Yes! the Summer is returning,
Warmer, brighter beams are burning
Golden mornings, purple evenings,
Come to glad the world once more.
Nature from her long sojourning
In the Winter-House of Mourning,
With the light of hope outpeeping,
From those eyes that late were weeping,
Cometh dancing o'er the waters
To our distant shore.
On the boughs the birds are singing,
Never idle,
For the bridal
Goes the frolic breeze a-ringing
All the green bells on the branches,
Which the soul of man doth hear;
Music-shaken,
It doth waken,
Half in hope, and half in fear,
And dons its festal garments for the Bridal of the Year!

For the Year is sempiternal,
Never wintry, never vernal,
Still the same through all the changes
That our wondering eyes behold.
Spring is but his time of wooing—
Summer but the sweet renewing
Of the vows he utters yearly,
Ever fondly and sincerely,
To the young bride that he weddeth,
When to heaven departs the old,

For it is her fate to perish,
Having brought him,
In the Autumn,
Children for his heart to cherish.
Summer, like a human mother,
Dies in bringing forth her young;
Sorrow blinds him,
Winter finds him
Childless, too, their graves among,
Till May returns once more, and bridal hymns are sung.

Thrice the great Betrothéd naming,
Thrice the mystic banns proclaiming,
February, March, and April,
Spread the tidings far and wide;
Thrice they questioned each new-comer,
“Know ye, why the sweet-faced Summer,
With her rich imperial dower,
Golden fruit and diamond flower,
And her pearly raindrop trinkets,
Should not be the green Earth's Bride?”
All things vocal spoke elated
(Nor the voiceless
Did rejoice less)—
“Be the heavenly lovers mated!”
All the many murmuring voices
Of the music-breathing Spring,
Young birds twittering,
Streamlets glittering,
Insects on transparent wing—
All hailed the Summer nuptials of their King!

Now the rosy East gives warning,
'Tis the wished-for nuptial morning.
Sweetest truant from Elysium,
Golden morning of the May!
All the guests are in their places—
Lilies with pale, high-bred faces—
Hawthorns in white wedding favours.
Scented with celestial savours—

Daisies, like sweet country maidens,
Wear white scolloped frills to-day;
'Neath her hat of straw the Peasant
Primrose sitteth,
Nor permitteth
Any of her kindred present,
Specially the milk-sweet cowslip,
E'er to leave the tranquil shade;
By the hedges,
Or the edges
Of some stream or grassy glade,
They look upon the scene half wistful, half afraid.

Other guests, too, are invited,
From the alleys dimly lighted,
From the pestilential vapours
Of the over-peopled town—
From the fever and the panic,
Comes the hard-worked, swarth mechanic—
Comes his young wife pallor-stricken
At the cares that round her thicken—
Comes the boy whose brow is wrinkled,
Ere his chin is clothed in down—
And the foolish pleasure-seekers,
Nightly thinking
They are drinking
Life and joy from poisoned beakers,
Shudder at their midnight madness,
And the raving revel scorn:
All are treading
To the wedding
In the freshness of the morn,
And feel, perchance too late, the bliss of being born.

And the Student leaves his poring,
And his venturous exploring
In the gold and gem-enfolding
Waters of the ancient lore—
Seeking in its buried treasures,
Means for life's most common pleasures;

Neither vicious nor ambitious—
Simple wants and simple wishes.
Ah! he finds the ancient learning
But the Spartan's iron ore;
Without value in an era
Far more golden
Than the olden—
When the beautiful chimera,
Love, hath almost wholly faded
Even from the dreams of men.
From his prison
Newly risen—
From his book-enchanted den—
The stronger magic of the morning drives him forth again.

And the Artist, too—the Gifted—
He whose soul is heaven-ward lifted,
Till it drinketh inspiration
At the fountain of the skies;
He, within whose fond embraces
Start to life the marble graces;
Or, with God-like power presiding,
With the potent pencil gliding,
O'er the void chaotic canvas
Bids the fair creations rise!
And the quickened mass obeying
Heaves its mountains;
From its fountains
Sends the gentle streams a-straying
Through the vales, like Love's first feelings
Stealing o'er a maiden's heart;
The Creator—
Imitator—
From his easel forth doth start,
And from God's glorious Nature learns anew his Art!

But who is this with tresses flowing,
Flashing eyes and forehead glowing,
From whose lips the thunder-music
Pealeth o'er the listening lands?

'Tis the first and last of preachers—
First and last of priestly teachers;
First and last of those appointed
In the ranks of the anointed;
With their songs like swords to sever
Tyranny and Falsehood's bands!
'Tis the Poet—sum and total
Of the others,
With his brothers,
In his rich robes sacerdotal,
Singing from his golden psalter.
Comes he now to wed the twain—
Truth and Beauty—
Rest and Duty—
Hope, and Fear, and Joy, and Pain,
Unite for weal or woe beneath the Poet's chain!

And the shapes that follow after,
Some in tears and some in laughter,
Are they not the fairy phantoms
In his glorious vision seen?
Nymphs from shady forests wending,
Goddesses from heaven descending;
Three of Jove's divinest daughters,
Nine from Aganippe's waters;
And the passion-immolated,
Too fond-hearted Tyrian Queen,
Various shapes of one idea,
Memory-haunting,
Heart-enchanting,
Cythna, Genevieve, and Nea,
Rosalind and all her sisters,
Born by Avon's sacred stream,
All the blooming
Shapes, illuming
The Eternal Pilgrim's dream,
Follow the Poet's steps beneath the morning's beam.

But the Bride—the Bride is coming!
Birds are singing, bees are humming;
Silent lakes amid the mountains
Look but cannot speak their mirth;
Streams go bounding in their gladness,
With a bacchanalian madness;
Trees bow down their heads in wonder,
Clouds of purple part asunder,
As the Maiden of the Morning
Leads the blushing Bride to Earth!
Bright as are the planets seven—
With her glances
She advances,
For her azure eyes are Heaven!
And her robes are sunbeams woven,
And her beauteous bridesmaids are
Hopes and wishes—
Dreams delicious—
Joys from some serener star,
And Heavenly-hued Illusions gleaming from afar.

Now the mystic rite is over—
Blessings on the loved and lover!
Strike the tabours, clash the cymbals,
Let the notes of joy resound!
With the rosy apple-blossom,
Blushing like a maiden's bosom;
With the cream-white clusters pearly
Of the pear-tree budding early;
With all treasures from the meadows
Strew the consecrated ground;
Let the guests with vows fraternal
Pledge each other,
Sister, brother,
With the wine of Hope—the vernal
Vine-juice of Man's better nature—
Vintage of Man's trustful heart:
Perseverance
And Forbearance,
Love and Labour, Song and Art,
Be this the cheerful creed wherewith the world may start.

But whither have the twain departed?
The United—the One-hearted—
Whither from the bridal banquet
Have the Bride and Bridegroom flown?
Ah! their steps have led them quickly
Where the young leaves cluster thickly;
Blossomed boughs rain fragrance o'er them,
Greener grows the grass before them,
As they wander through the island,
Fond, delighted, and alone!
At their coming streams grow brighter,
Skies grow clearer,
Mountains nearer,
And the blue waves dancing lighter
From the far-off mighty ocean
Frolic on the glistening sand;
Jubilations,
Gratulations,
Breathe around, as hand-in-hand
They roam by Sutton's sea-washed shore, or soft Shanganah's strand.

Characters in Shelley, Coleridge, and Moore.

“The Pilgrim of Eternity. whose fame
Over his living head, like Heaven, is bent,
Al early out enduring monument.”

Byron. (Shelley's “Adonois

THE VALE OF SHANGANAH.

When I have knelt in the temple of Duty,
Worshipping honour and valour and beauty—
When, like a brave man, in fearless resistance,
I have fought the good fight on the field of existence;
When a home I have won in the conflict of labour,
With truth for my armour and thought for my sabre,
Be that home a calm home where my old age may rally,
A home full of peace in this sweet pleasant valley!
Sweetest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
Greenest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
May the accents of love, like the droppings of manna,
Fall sweet on my heart in the Vale of Shanganah!

Fair is this isle—this dear child of the ocean—
Nurtured with more than a mother's devotion;
For see! in what rich robes has nature arrayed her,
From the waves of the west to the cliffs of Ben Hader,
By Glengariff's lone islets—Lough Lene's fairy water,
So lovely was each, that then matchless I thought her;
But I feel, as I stray through each sweet-scented alley,
Less wild but more fair is this soft verdant valley!
Sweetest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
Greenest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
No wide-spreading prairie, no Indian savannah,
So dear to the eye as the Vale of Shanganah!

How pleased, how delighted, the rapt eye reposes
On the picture of beauty this valley discloses,
From that margin of silver, whereon the blue water
Doth glance like the eyes of the ocean foam's daughter!
To where, with the red clouds of morning combining,
The tall “Golden Spears” o'er the mountains are shining,
With the hue of their heather, as sunlight advances,
Like purple flags furled round the staffs of the lances!
Sweetest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
Greenest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
No lands far away by the swift Susquehannah,
So tranquil and fair as the Vale of Shanganah!

But here, even here, the lone heart were benighted,
No beauty could reach it, if love did not light it;
'Tis this makes the earth, oh! what mortal could doubt it?
A garden with it, but a desert without it!
With the lov'd one, whose feelings instinctively teach her
That goodness of heart makes the beauty of feature.

How glad, through this vale, would I float down life's river,
Enjoying God's bounty, and blessing the Giver!
Sweetest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
Greenest of vales is the Vale of Shanganah!
May the accents of love, like the droppings of manna,
Fall sweet on my heart in the Vale of Shanganah!

Lying to the south of Killiney-hill, near Dublin.

Hill of Howth.

Killarney.

The Sugarloaf Mountains, county Wicklow, were called in Irish, “The Spears of Gold.”

THE PILLAR TOWERS OF IRELAND.

The pillar towers of Ireland, how wondrously they stand
By the lakes and rushing rivers through the valleys of our land;
In mystic file, through the isle, they lift their heads sublime,
These gray old pillar temples, these conquerors of time!

Beside these gray old pillars, how perishing and weak
The Roman's arch of triumph, and the temple of the Greek,
And the gold domes of Byzantium, and the pointed Gothic spires,
All are gone, one by one, but the temples of our sires

The column, with its capital, is level with the dust,
And the proud halls of the mighty and the calm homes of the just;
For the proudest works of man, as certainly, but slower,
Pass like the grass at the sharp scythe of the mower!

But the grass grows again when in majesty and mirth,
On the wing of the spring, comes the Goddess of the Earth;
But for man in this world no springtide e'er returns
To the labours of his hands or the ashes of his urns!

Two favourites hath Time—the pyramids of Nile,
And the old mystic temples of our own dear isle;
As the breeze o'er the seas, where the halcyon has its nest,
Thus Time o'er Egypt's tombs and the temples of the West!

The names of their founders have vanished in the gloom,
Like the dry branch in the fire or the body in the tomb;
But to-day, in the ray, their shadows still they cast—
These temples of forgotten gods—these relics of the past!

Around these walls have wandered the Briton and the Dane—
The captives of Armorica, the cavaliers of Spain—
Phœnician and Milesian, and the plundering Norman Peers—
And the swordsmen of brave Brian, and the chiefs of later years!

How many different rites have these gray old temples known!
To the mind what dreams are written in these chronicles of stone!
What terror and what error, what gleams of love and truth,
Have flashed from these walls since the world was in its youth?

Here blazed the sacred fire, and, when the sun was gone,
As a star from afar to the traveller it shone;
And the warm blood of the victim have these gray old temples drunk,
And the death-song of the druid and the matin of the monk.

Here was placed the holy chalice that held the sacred wine,
And the gold cross from the altar, and the relics from the shrine,
And the mitre shining brighter with its diamonds than the East,
And the crosier of the pontiff and the vestments of the priest.

Where blazed the sacred fire, rung out the vesper bell,
Where the fugitive found shelter, became the hermit's cell;
And hope hung out its symbol to the innocent and good,
For the cross o'er the moss of the pointed summit stood.

There may it stand for ever, while that symbol doth impart
To the mind one glorious vision, or one proud throb to the heart;
While the breast needeth rest may these gray old temples last,
Bright prophets of the future, as preachers of the past!

OVER THE SEA.

Sad eyes! why are ye steadfastly gazing
Over the sea?
Is it the flock of the ocean-shepherd grazing
Like lambs on the lea?—
Is it the dawn on the orient billows blazing
Allureth ye?

Sad heart! why art thou tremblingly beating—
What troubleth thee?
There where the waves from the fathomless water come greeting,
Wild with their glee!
Or rush from the rocks, like a routed battalion retreating,
Over the sea!

Sad feet! why are ye constantly straying
Down by the sea?
There, where the winds in the sandy harbour are playing
Child-like and free,
What is the charm, whose potent enchantment obeying,
There chaineth ye?

Oh! sweet is the dawn, and bright are the colours it glows in,
Yet not to me!
To the beauty of God's bright creation my bosom is frozen!
Nought can I see,
Since she has departed—the dear one, the loved one, the chosen,
Over the sea!

Pleasant it was when the billows did struggle and wrestle,
Pleasant to see!
Pleasant to climb the tall cliffs where the sea birds nestle,
When near to thee!
Nought can I now behold but the track of thy vessel
Over the sea!

Long as a Lapland winter, which no pleasant sun-light cheereth,
The summer shall be;

Vainly shall autumn be gay, in the rich robes it weareth,
Vainly for me!
No joy can I feel till the prow of thy vessel appeareth
Over the sea!

Sweeter than summer, which tenderly, motherly bringeth
Flowers to the bee;
Sweeter than autumn, which bounteously, lovingly flingeth
Fruits on the tree,
Shall be winter, when homeward returning, thy swift vessel wingeth
Over the sea!

OH! HAD I THE WINGS OF A BIRD.

Oh! had I the wings of a bird,
To soar through the blue, sunny sky,
By what breeze would my pinions be stirred?
To what beautiful land should I fly?
Would the gorgeous East allure,
With the light of its golden eves,
Where the tall green palm, over isles of balm,
Waves with its feathery leaves?
Ah! no! no! no!
I heed not its tempting glare;
In vain should I roam from my island home,
For skies more fair!

Should I seek a southern sea,
Italia's shore beside,
Where the clustering grape from tree to tree
Hangs in its rosy pride?

My truant heart, be still,
For I long have sighed to stray
Through the myrtle flowers of fair Italy's bowers.
By the shores of its southern bay.
But no! no! no!
Though bright be its sparkling seas,
I never would roam from my island home,
For charms like these!

Should I seek that land so bright,
Where the Spanish maiden roves,
With a heart of love and an eye of light,
Through her native citron groves?
Oh! sweet would it be to rest
In the midst of the olive vales,
Where the orange blooms and the rose perfumes
The breath of the balmy gales!
But no! no! no!—
Though sweet be its wooing air,
I never would roam from my island home
To scenes though fair!

Should I pass from pole to pole?
Should I seek the western skies,
Where the giant rivers roll,
And the mighty mountains rise?
Or those treacherous isles that lie
In the midst of the sunny deeps,
Where the cocoa stands on the glistening sands,
And the dread tornado sweeps!
Ah! no! no! no!
They have no charms for me;
I never would roam from my island home,
Though poor it be!

Poor!—oh! 'tis rich in all
That flows from Nature's hand;
Rich in the emerald wall
That guards its emerald land!

Are Italy's fields more green?
Do they teem with a richer store
Than the bright green breast of the Isle of the West,
And its wild, luxuriant shore?
Ah! no! no! no!
Upon it heaven doth smile;
Oh, I never would roam from my native home,
My own dear isle!

LOVE'S LANGUAGE.

Need I say how much I love thee?—
Need my weak words tell,
That I prize but heaven above thee,
Earth not half so well?
If this truth has failed to move thee,
Hope away must flee;
If thou dost not feel I love thee,
Vain my words would be!

Need I say how long I've sought thee?—
Need my words declare,
Dearest, that I long have thought thee
Good and wise and fair?
If no sigh this truth has brought thee,
Woe, alas! to me;
Where thy own heart has not taught thee,
Vain my words would be!

Need I say when others wooed thee,
How my breast did pine,
Lest some fond heart that pursued thee
Dearer were than mine?
If no pity then came to thee,
Mixed with love for me,
Vainly would my words imbue thee,
Vain my words would be!

Love's best language is unspoken,
Yet how simply known;
Eloquent is every token,
Look, and touch, and tone.
If thy heart hath not awoken,
If not yet on thee
Love's sweet silent light hath broken,
Vain my words would be!

Yet, in words of truest meaning,
Simple, fond, and few;
By the wild waves intervening,
Dearest, I love you!
Vain the hopes my heart is gleaning,
If, long since to thee,
My fond heart required unscreening,
Vain my words will be!

THE FIRESIDE.

I have tasted all life's pleasures, I have snatched at all its joys,
The dance's merry measures and the revel's festive noise;
Though wit flashed bright the live-long night, and flowed the ruby tide,
I sighed for thee, I sighed for thee, my own fireside!

In boyhood's dreams I wandered far across the ocean's breast,
In search of some bright earthly star, some happy isle of rest;
I little thought the bliss I sought in roaming far and wide
Was sweetly centred all in thee, my own fireside!

How sweet to turn at evening's close from all our cares away,
And end in calm, serene repose, the swiftly passing day!

The pleasant books, the smiling looks of sister or of bride,
All fairy ground doth make around one's own fireside!

“My Lord” would never condescend to honour my poor hearth;
“His Grace” would scorn a host or friend of mere plebeian birth;
And yet the lords of human kind, whom man has deified,
For ever meet in converse sweet around my fireside!

The poet sings his deathless songs, the sage his lore repeats,
The patriot tells his country's wrongs, the chief his warlike feats;
Though far away may be their clay, and gone their earthly pride,
Each god-like mind in books enshrined still haunts my fireside.

Oh, let me glance a moment through the coming crowd of years,
Their triumphs or their failures, their sunshine or their tears;
How poor or great may be my fate, I care not what betide,
So peace and love but hallow thee, my own fireside!

Still let me hold the vision close, and closer to my sight;
Still, still, in hopes elysian, let my spirit wing its flight;
Still let me dream, life's shadowy stream may yield from out its tide,
A mind at rest a tranquil breast, a quiet fireside!

THE BANISHED SPIRIT'S SONG.

Beautiful clime, where I've dwelt so long,
In mirth and music, in gladness and song!
Fairer than aught upon earth art thou—
Beautiful clime, must I leave thee now?

No more shall I join the circle bright
Of my sister nymphs, when they dance at night
In their grottos cool and their pearly halls,
When the glow worm hangs on the ivy walls!

No more shall I glide o'er the waters blue,
With a crimson shell for my light canoe,
Or a rose-leaf plucked from the neighbouring trees,
Piloted o'er by the flower-fed breeze!

Oh! must I leave those spicy gales,
Those purple hills and those flowery vales?
Where the earth is strewed with pansy and rose,
And the golden fruit of the orange grows!

Oh! must I leave this region fair,
For a world of toil and a life of care?
In its dreary paths how long must I roam,
Far away from my fairy home?

The song of birds and the hum of bees,
And the breath of flowers, are on the breeze;
The purple plum and the cone-like pear,
Drooping, hang in the rosy air!

The fountains scatter their pearly rain
On the thirsty flowers and the ripening grain;
The insects sport in the sunny beam,
And the golden fish in the laughing stream.

The Naiads dance by the river's edge,
On the low, soft moss and the bending sedge;
Wood-nymphs and satyrs and graceful fawns
Sport in the woods, on the grassy lawns!

The slanting sunbeams tip with gold
The emerald leaves in the forests old—
But I must away from this fairy scene,
Those leafy woods and those valleys green!

Written in early youth.

REMEMBRANCE.

With that pleasant smile thou wearest,
Thou art gazing on the fairest
Wonders of the earth and sea:
Do thou not, in all thy seeing,
Lose the mem'ry of one being
Who at home doth think of thee.

In the capital of nations,
Sun of all earth's constellations,
Thou art roaming glad and free:
Do thou not, in all thy roving,
Lose the mem'ry of one loving
Heart at home that beats for thee.

Stranger eyes around thee glisten,
To a strange tongue thou dost listen,
Strangers bend the suppliant knee:
Do thou not, for all their seeming
Truth, forget the constant beaming
Eyes at home that watch for thee

Stately palaces surround thee,
Royal parks and gardens bound thee—
Gardens of the Fleur de Lis:
Do thou not, for all their splendour,
Quite forget the humble, tender
Thoughts at home, that turn to thee.

When, at length of absence weary,
When the year grows sad and dreary,
And an east wind sweeps the sea;
Ere the days of dark November,
Homeward turn, and then remember
Hearts at home that pine for thee!

THE CLAN OF MAC CAURA.

Oh! bright are the names of the chieftains and sages,
That shine like the stars through the darkness of ages,
Whose deeds are inscribed on the pages of story,
There for ever to live in the sunshine of glory,
Heroes of history, phantoms of fable,
Charlemagne's champions, and Arthur's Round Table;
Oh! but they all a new lustre could borrow
From the glory that hangs round the name of Mac Caura!

Thy waves, Manzanares, wash many a shrine,
And proud are the castles that frown o'er the Rhine,
And stately the mansions whose pinnacles glance
Through the elms of Old England and vineyards of France;
Many have fallen, and many will fall,
Good men and brave men have dwelt in them all,
But as good and as brave men, in gladness and sorrow,
Have dwelt in the halls of the princely Mac Caura!

Montmorency, Medina, unheard was thy rank
By the dark-eyed Iberian and light-hearted Frank,
And your ancestors wandered, obscure and unknown,
By the smooth Guadalquiver and sunny Garonne.
Ere Venice had wedded the sea, or enrolled
The name of a Doge in her proud “Book of Gold;”
When her glory was all to come on like the morrow,
There were chieftains and kings of the clan of Mac Caura!

Proud should thy heart beat, descendant of Heber,
Lofty thy head as the shrines of the Guebre,
Like them are the halls of thy forefathers shattered,
Like theirs is the wealth of thy palaces scattered.
Their fire is extinguished—thy banner long furled—
But how proud were ye both in the dawn of the world!
And should both fade away, oh! what heart would not sorrow
O'er the towers of the Guebre—the name of Mac Caura!

What a moment of glory to cherish and dream on,
When far o'er the sea came the ships of Heremon,
With Heber, and Ir, and the Spanish patricians,
To free Inisfail from the spells of magicians.
Oh! reason had these for their quaking and pallor,
For what magic can equal the strong sword of valour?
Better than spells are the axe and the arrow,
When wielded or flung by the hand of Mac Caura!

From that hour a Mac Caura had reigned in his pride
O'er Desmond's green valleys and rivers so wide,
From thy waters, Lismore, to the torrents and rills
That are leaping for ever down Brandon's brown hills;
The billows of Bantry, the meadows of Bear,
The wilds of Evaugh, and the groves of Glancare,
From the Shannon's soft shores to the banks of the Barrow,
All owned the proud sway of the princely Mac Caura!

In the house of Miodchuart, by princes surrounded,
How noble his step when the trumpet was sounded,

And his clansmen bore proudly his broad shield before him,
And hung it on high in that bright palace o'er him;
On the left of the monarch the chieftain was seated,
And happy was he whom his proud glances greeted:
'Mid monarchs and chiefs at the great Fes of Tara,
Oh! none was to rival the princely Mac Caura!

To the halls of the Red Branch, when conquest was o'er,
The champions their rich spoils of victory bore,
And the sword of the Briton, the shield of the Dane,
Flashed bright as the sun on the walls of Eamhain;
There Dathy and Niall bore trophies of war,
From the peaks of the Alps and the waves of the Loire;
But no knight ever bore from the hills of Ivaragh
The breast-plate or axe of a conquered Mac Caura!

In chasing the red deer what step was the fleetest?—
In singing the love song what voice was the sweetest?—
What breast was the foremost in courting the danger?—
What door was the widest to shelter the stranger?—
In friendship the truest, in battle the bravest,
In revel the gayest, in council the gravest?—
A hunter to-day and a victor to-morrow?—
Oh! who but a chief of the princely Mac Caura!

But, oh! proud Mac Caura, what anguish to touch on
The one fatal stain of thy princely escutcheon;
In thy story's bright garden the one spot of bleakness,
Through ages of valour the one hour of weakness!
Thou, the heir of a thousand chiefs, sceptred and royal—
Thou to kneel to the Norman and swear to be loyal!

Oh! a long night of horror, and outrage, and sorrow,
Have we wept for thy treason, base Diarmid Mac Caura!

Oh! why ere you thus to the foreigner pandered,
Did you not bravely call round your emerald standard,
The chiefs of your house of Lough Lene and Clan Awley
O'Donogh, Mac Patrick, O'Driscoll, Mac Awley,
O'Sullivan More, from the towers of Dunkerron,
And O'Mahon, the chieftain of green Ardinterran?
As the sling sends the stone or the bent bow the arrow,
Every chief would have come at the call of Mac Caura.

Soon, soon didst thou pay for that error in woe,
Thy life to the Butler, thy crown to the foe,
Thy castles dismantled, and strewn on the sod,
And the homes of the weak, and the abbeys of God!
No more in thy halls is the wayfarer fed,
Nor the rich mead sent round, nor the soft heather spread,
Nor the clairsech's sweet notes, now in mirth, now in sorrow,
All, all have gone by, but the name of Mac Caura!

Mac Caura, the pride of thy house is gone by,
But its name cannot fade, and its fame cannot die,
Though the Arigideen, with its silver waves, shine
Around no green forests or castles of thine—
Though the shrines that you founded no incense doth hallow,
Nor hymns float in peace down the echoing Allo,
One treasure thou keepest, one hope for the morrow—
True hearts yet beat of the clan of mac Caura!

Mac Carthaig, or Mac Carthy.

The eldest son of Milesius, King of Spain, in the legendary history of Ireland.

The Round Towers.

The Tuatha Dedannans, so called, says Keating, from their skill in necromancy, for which some were so famous as to be called gods.

At Tara. See Keating's “History of Ireland” and Petrie's “Tara.”

In the palace of Emania, in Ulster.

Diarmid Mac Caura, King of Desmond, and Daniel O'Brien, King of Thomond, were the first of the Irish princes to swear fealty to Henry II.

THE WINDOW.

At my window, late and early,
In the sunshine and the rain,
When the jocund beams of morning
Come to wake me from my napping,
With their golden fingers tapping
At my window pane:
From my troubled slumbers flitting,
From my dreamings fond and vain,
From the fever intermitting,
Up I start, and take my sitting
At my window pane:—

Through the morning, through the noontide,
Fettered by a diamond chain,
Through the early hours of evening,
When the stars begin to tremble,
As their shining ranks assemble
O'er the azure plain:
When the thousand lamps are blazing
Through the street and lane—
Mimic stars of man's upraising—
Still I linger, fondly gazing
From my window pane!

For, amid the crowds slow passing,
Surging like the main,
Like a sunbeam among shadows,
Through the storm-swept cloudy masses,
Sometimes one bright being passes
'Neath my window pane:
Thus a moment's joy I borrow
From a day of pain.
See, she comes! but—bitter sorrow!
Not until the slow to-morrow
Will she come again.

AUTUMN FEARS.

The weary, dreary, dripping rain,
From morn till night, from night till morn,
Along the hills and o'er the plain,
Strikes down the green and yellow corn;
The flood lies deep upon the ground,
No ripening heat the cold sun yields,
And rank and rotting lies around
The glory of the summer fields!

How full of fears, how racked with pain,
How torn with care the heart must be,
Of him who sees his golden grain
Laid prostrate thus o'er lawn and lea;
For all that nature doth desire,
All that the shivering mortal shields,
The Christmas fare, the winter's fire,
All comes from out the summer fields.

I too have strayed in pleasing toil
Along youth's fair and fertile meads;
I too within Hope's genial soil
have, trusting, placed Love's golden seeds;
I too have feared the chiling dew,
The heavy rain when thunder pealed,
Lest Fate might blight the flower that grew
For me in Hope's green summer field.

Ah! who can paint that beauteous flower,
Thus nourished by celestial dew,
Thus growing fairer, hour by hour,
Delighting more, the more it grew;
Bright'ning, not burdening the ground,
Nor proud with inward worth concealed,
But scattering all its fragrance round
Its own sweet sphere, its summer field!

At morn the gentle flower awoke,
And raised its happy face to God;
At evening, when the starlight broke,
It bending sought the dewy sod;
And thus at morn, and thus at even,
In fragrant sighs its heart revealed,
Thus seeking heaven, and making heaven
Within its own sweet summer field

Oh! joy beyond all human joy!
Oh! bliss beyond all earthly bliss!
If pitying Fate will not destroy
My hopes of such a flower as this!
How happy, fond, and heaven-possest,
My heart will be to tend and shield,
And guard upon my grateful breast
The pride of that sweet summer field

FATAL GIFTS.

The poet's heart is a fatal boon,
And fatal his wondrous eye,
And the delicate ear,
So quick to hear,
Over the earth and sky,
Creation's mystic tune!
Soon, soon, but not too soon,
Does that ear grow deaf and that eye grow dim,
And nature becometh a waste for him,
Whom, born for another sphere,
Misery hath shipwrecked here!

For what availeth his sensitive heart
For the struggle and stormy strife
That the mariner-man,
Since the world began
Has braved on the sea of life?
With fearful wonder his eye doth start,
When it should be fixed on the outspread chart

That pointeth the way to golden shores—
Rent are his sails and broken his oars,
And he sinks without hope or plan,
With his floating caravan.

And love, that should be his strength and stay,
Becometh his bane full soon,
Like flowers that are born
Of the beams at morn,
But die of their heat ere noon.
Far better the heart were the sterile clay
Where the shining sands of the desert play,
And where never the perishing flow'ret gleams
Than the heart that is fed with its wither'd dreams,
And whose love is repelled with scorn,
Like the bee by the rose's thorn.

SWEET MAY.

The summer is come!—the summer is come!
With its flowers and its branches green,
Where the young birds chirp on the blossoming boughs,
And the sunlight struggles between:
And, like children, over the earth and sky
The flowers and the light clouds play;
But never before to my heart or eye
Came there ever so sweet a May
As this—
Sweet May! sweet May!

Oh! many a time have I wandered out
In the youth of the opening year,
When Nature's face was fair to my eye,
And her voice was sweet to my ear!

When I numbered the daisies, so few and shy,
That I met in my lonely way;
But never before to my heart or eye,
Came there ever so sweet a May
As this—
Sweet May! sweet May!

If the flowers delayed, or the beams were cold,
Or the blossoming trees were bare,
I had but to look in the poet's book,
For the summer is always there!
But the sunny page I now put by,
And joy in the darkest day!
For never before, to my heart or eye,
Came there ever so sweet a May
As this—
Sweet May! sweet May!

For, ah! the belovéd at length has come,
Like the breath of May from afar;
And my heart is lit with gentle eyes,
As the heavens by the evening star.
'Tis this that brightens the darkest sky,
And lengthens the faintest ray,
And makes me feel that to heart or eye
There was never so sweet a May
As this—
Sweet May! sweet May!

FERDIAH;

OR, THE FIGHT AT THE FORD.

An Episode from the Ancient Irish Epic Romance, “The Tain Bó Cuailgné; or, the Cattle Prey of Cuailgné.”

Cuchullin the great chief had pitched his tent,

From Samhain time, till now 'twas budding spring,
Fast by the Ford, and held the land at bay.
All Erin, save the fragment that he led,
His sword held back, nor dared a man to cross
The rippling Ford without Cuchullin's leave:
Chief after chief had fallen in the attempt;
And now the men of Erin through the night
Asked in dismay, “Oh! who shall be the next
To face the northern hound and free the Ford?”
“Let it now be,” with one accord they cried,
“Ferdiah, son of Dâman Dáré's son,
Of Domnann lord, and all its warrior men.”
The chiefs thus fated now to meet as foes
In early life were friends—had both been taught
All feats of arms by the same skilful hands
In Scatha's school beneath the peaks of Skye,

Which still preserve Cuchullin's glorious name.
One feat of arms alone Cuchullin knew
Ferdiah knew not of—the fatal cast—
The dread expanding force of the gaebulg
Flung from the foot resistless on the foe.
But, on the other hand, Ferdiah wore
A skin-protecting suit of flashing steel
Surpassing all in Erin known till then.
At length the council closed, and to the chief
Heralds were sent to tell them that the choice
That night had fallen on him; but he within
His tent retired, received them not, nor went.
For well he knew the purport of their suit
Was this—that he should fight beside the Ford
His former fellow-pupil and his friend.
Then Mave, the queen, her powerful druids sent,
Armed not alone with satire's scorpion stings,
But with the magic power even on the face,
By their malevolent taunts and biting sneers,
To raise three blistering blots that typified
Disgrace, dishonour, and a coward's shame,
Which with their mortal venom him would kill,

Or on the hour, or ere nine days had sped,
If he declined the combat, and refused
Upon the instant to come forth with them,
And so, for honour's sake, Ferdiah came.
For he preferred to die a warrior's death,
Pierced to the heart by a proud foeman's spear,
Than by the serpent sting of slanderous tongues—
By satire and abuse, and foul reproach.
When to the court he came, where the great queen
Held revel, he received all due respect:
The sweet intoxicating cup went round,
And soon Ferdiah felt the power of wine.
Great were the rich rewards then promised him
For going forth to battle with the Hound:
A chariot worth seven cumals four times told,
The outfit then of twelve well-chosen men
Made of more colours than the rainbow knows,
His own broad plains of level fair Magh Aie,
To him and his assured till time was o'er
Free of all tribute, without fee or fine;
The golden brooch, too, from the queen's own cloak,
And, above all, fair Finavair for wife.
But doubtful was Ferdiah of the queen,
And half excited by the fiery cup,
And half distrustful, knowing wily Mave,
He asked for more assurance of her faith.
Then she to him, in rhythmic rise of song,
And he in measured ranns to her replied.

MAVE.
A rich reward of golden rings I'll give to thee, Ferdiah fair,

The forest, where the wild bird sings, the broad green plain, with me thou'lt share;
Thy children and thy children's seed, for ever, until time is o'er,
Shall be from every service freed within the seasurrounding shore.
Oh, Daman's son, Ferdiah fair, oh, champion of the wounds renowned,
For thou a charmèd life dost bear, since ever by the victories crowned,
Oh! why the proffered gifts decline, oh! why reject the nobler fame,
Which many an arm less brave than thine, which many a heart less bold, would claim?

FERDIAH.
Without a guarantee, O queen! without assurance made most sure,
Thy grassy plains, thy woodlands green, thy golden rings are but a lure.
The champion's place is not for me until thou art most firmly bound,
For dreadful will the battle be between me and Emania's Hound.
For such is Chuland's name, O queen, and such is Chuland's nature, too,
The noble Hound, the Hound of fame, the noble heart to dare and do,
The fearful fangs that never yield, the agile spring so swift and light:
Ah! dread the fortune of the field! ah! fierce will be the impending fight!

MAVE.
I'll give a champion's guarantee, and with thee here a compact make,

That in the assemblies thou shalt be no longer bound thy place to take;
Rich silver-bitted bridles fair—for such each noble neck demands—
And gallant steeds that paw the air, shall all be given into thy hands.
For thou, Ferdiah, art indeed a truly brave and valorous man,
The first of all the chiefs I lead, the foremost hero in the van;
My chosen champion now thou art, my dearest friend henceforth thou'lt be,
The very closest to my heart, from every toll and tribute free.

Ferdiah.
Without securities, I say, united with thy royal word,
I will not go, when breaks the day, to seek the combat at the Ford.
That contest, while time runs its course, and fame records what ne'er should die,
Shall live for ever in full force, until the judgment day draws nigh.
I will not go, though death ensue, though thou through some demoniac rite,
Even as thy druid sorcerers do, canst kill me with thy words of might:
I will not go the Ford to free, until, O queen! thou here dost swear
Bysun and moon, by land and sea, by all the powers of earth and air.

Mave.
Thou shalt have all; do thou decide. I'll give thee an unbounded claim;
Until thy doubts are satisfied, oh! bind us by each sacred name;—

Bind us upon the hands of kings, upon the hands of princes bind;
Bind us by every act that brings assurance to the doubting mind.
Ask what thou wilt, and do not fear that what thou wouldst cannot be wrought;
Ask what thou wilt, there standeth here one who will ne'er refuse thee aught;
Ask what thou wilt, thy wildest wish be certain thou shalt have this night,
For well I know that thou wilt kill this man who meets thee in the fight.

Ferdiah.
I will have six securities, no less will I accept from thee;
Be some our country's deities, the lords of earth, and sky, and sea;
Be some thy dearest ones, O queen! the darlings of thy heart and eye,
Before my fatal fall is seen to-morrow, when the hosts draw nigh.
Do this, and though I lose my fame—do this, and though my life I lose,
The glorious championship I'll claim, the glorious risk will not refuse.
On, on, in equal strength and might shall I advance, O queenly Mave,
And Uladh's hero meet in fight, and battle with Cuchullin brave.

Mave.
Though Domnal it should be, the sun, swift-speeding in his fiery car;

Though Niaman's dread name be one, the consort of the God of War;
These, even these I'll give, though hard to lure them from their realms serene,
For though they list to lowliest bard, they may be deaf unto a queen.
Bind it on Morand, if thou wilt, to make assurance doubly sure;
Bind it, nor dream that dream of guilt that such a pact will not endure.
By spirits of the wave and wind, by every spell, by every art,
Bind Carpri Min of Manand, bind my sons, the darlings of my heart.

Ferdiah.
O Mave! with venom of deceit that adder tongue of thine o'erflows,
Nor is thy temper over-sweet, as well thine earlier consort knows.
Thou'rt truly worthy of thy fame for boastful speech and lust of power,
And well dost thou deserve thy name—the Brachail of Rathcroghan's tower.
Thy words are fair and soft, O queen! but still I crave one further proof—
Give me the scarf of silken sheen, give me the speckled satin woof,
Give from thy cloak's empurpled fold the golden brooch so fair to see,
And when the glorious gift I hold, for ever am I bound to thee.

Mave.
Oh! art thou not my chosen chief, my foremost champion, sure to win,
My tower, my fortress of relief, to whom I give this twisted pin?
These, and a thousand gifts more rare, the treasures of the earth and sea,
Jewels a queen herself might wear, my grateful hands will give to thee.
And when at length beneath thy sword the Hound of Ulster shall lie low,
When thou hast ope'd the long-locked Ford, and let the unguarded water flow,
Then shall I give my daughter's hand, then my own child shall be thy bride—
She, the fair daughter of the land where western Elgga's waters glide.

And thus did Mave Ferdiah bind to fight
Six chosen champions on the morrow morn,
Or combat with Cuchullin all alone,
Whichever might to him the easier seem.
And he, by the gods' names and by her sons,
Bound her the promise she had made to keep,
The rich reward to pay to him in full,
If by his hand Cuchullin should be slain.
For Fergus, young Cuchullin's early friend,
The steeds that night were harnessed, and he flew
Swift in his chariot to the hero's tent.
“Glad am I at thy coming, O my friend!”
Cuchullin said: “My pupil, I accept
With joy thy welcome,” Fergus quick replied:
“But what I come for is to give thee news
Of him who here will fight thee in the morn.”
“I listen,” said Cuchullin, “do thou speak.”
“Thine own companion is it, thine own peer,
Thy rival in all daring feats of arms,
Ferdiah, son of Dáman, Daré's son,

Of Domnand lord and all its warrior men.”
“Be sure of this,” Cuchullin made reply,
“That never wish of mine it could have been
A friend should thus come forth with me to fight.”
“It therefore doth behove thee now, my son,”
Fergus replied, “to be upon thy guard,
Prepared at every point; for not like those
Who hitherto have come to fight with thee
Upon the Tain Bó Cuailgné, is the chief,
Ferdiah, son of Dáman, Daré's son.”
“Here I have been,” Cuchullin proudly said,
“From Samhain up to Imbule—from the first
Of winter days even to the first of spring—
Holding the four great provinces in check
That make up Erin, not one foot have I
Yielded to any man in all that time,
Nor even to him shall I a foot give way.”
And thus the parley went: first Fergus spoke,
Cuchullin then to him in turn replied:

Fergus.

Time is it, O Cuchullin, to arise,
Time for the fearful combat to prepare;
For hither with the anger in his eyes,
To fight thee comes Ferdiah called the Fair.

Cuchullin.

Here I have been, nor has the task been light,
Holding all Erin's warriors at bay:
No foot of ground have I in recreant flight
Yielded to any man or shunned the fray.

Fergus.

When roused to rage, resistless in his might,
Fearless the man is, for his sword ne'er fails:
A skin-protecting coat of armour bright
He wears, 'gainst which no valour e'er prevails.

Cuchullin.

Oh! brave in arms, my Fergus, say not so,
Urge not thy story further on the night:—
On any friend, or facing any foe
I never was behind him in the fight.

Fergus.

Brave is the man, I say, in battles fierce,
Him it will not be easy to subdue,
Swords cut him not, nor can the sharp spear pierce,
Strong as a hundred men to dare and do.

Cuchullin.

Well, should we chance to meet beside the Ford,
I and this chief whose valour ne'er has failed,
Story shall tell the fortune of each sword,
And who succumbed and who it was prevailed.

Fergus.

Ah! liefer than a royal recompense
To me it were, O champion of the sword,
That thine it were to carry eastward hence
The proud Ferdiah's purple from the Ford.

Cuchullin.

I pledge my word, I vow, and not in vain,
Though in the combat we may be as one,
That it is I who shall the victory gain
Over the son of Dáman, Daré's son.

Fergus.

'Twas I that gathered eastward all the bands,
Revenging the foul wrong upon me wrought
By the Ultonians. Hither from their lands
The chiefs, the battle-warriors I have brought.

Cuchullin.

If Conor's royal strength had not decayed,
Hard would have been the strife on either side:
Mave of the Plain of Champions had not made
A foray then of so much boastful pride.

Fergus.

To-day awaits thy hand a greater deed,
To battle with Ferdiah, Dáman's son.
Hard, bloody weapons with sharp points thou'lt need,
Cuchullin, ere the victory be won.

Then Fergus to the court and camp went back,
While to his people and his tent repaired
Ferdiah, and he told them of the pact
Made that same night between him and the queen.

The dwellers in Ferdiah's tent that night
Were scant of comfort, a foreboding fear
Fell on their spirits and their hearts weighed down;
Because they knew in whatsoever fight
The mighty chiefs, the hundred-slaying two
Met face to face, that one of them must fall,
Or both, perhaps, or if but only one,
Certain were they it would their own lord be,
Since on the Tain Bó Cuailgné, it was plain
That no one with Cuchullin could contend.

Nor was their chief less troubled; but at first
The fumes of the late revel overpowered
His senses, and he slept a heavy sleep.
Later he woke, the intoxicating steam
Had left his brain, and now in sober calm
All the anxieties of the impending fight
Pressed on his soul and made him grave. He rose
From off his couch, and bade his charioteer
Harness his pawing horses to the car.
The boy would fain persuade his lord to stay,
Because he loved his master, and he felt
He went but to his death; but he repelled

The youth's advice, and spoke to him these words—
“Oh! cease, my servant. I will not be turned
By any youth from what I have resolved.”
And thus in speech and answer spoke the two—

Ferdiah.

Let us go to this challenge,
Let us fly to the Ford,
When the raven shall croak
O'er my blood-dripping sword.
Oh, woe for Cuchullin!
That sword will be red;
Oh, woe! for to-morrow
The hero lies dead.

Charioteer.

Thy words are not gentle,
Yet rest where thou art,
'Twill be dreadful to meet,
And distressful to part.
The champion of Ulster!
Oh! think what a foe!
In that meeting there's grief,
In that journey there's woe!

Ferdiah.

Thy counsel is craven,
Thy caution I slight,
No brave-hearted champion
Should shrink from the fight.
The blood I inherit
Doth prompt me to do—
Let us go to the challenge,
To the Ford let us go!

Then were the horses of Ferdiah yoked
Unto the chariot, and he rode full speed
Unto the Ford of battle, and the day
Began to break, and all the east grew red.

Beside the Ford he halted. “Good, my friend,”
He said unto his servant, “Spread for me
The skins and cushions of my chariot here
Beneath me, that I may a full deep sleep
Enjoy before the hour of fight arrives;
For in the latter portion of the night
I slept not, thinking of the fight to come.”
Unharnessed were the horses, and the boy
Spread out the cushions and the chariot's skins,
And heavy sleep fell on Ferdiah's lids.

Now of Cuchullin will I speak. He rose
Not until day with all its light had come,
In order that the men of Erin ne'er
Should say of him that it was fear or dread
That made him from a restless couch arise.
When in the fulness of its light at length
Shone forth the day, he bade his charioteer
Harness his horses and his chariot yoke.
“Harness my horses, good, my servant,” said
Cuchullin, “and my chariot yoke for me
For lo! an early-rising champion comes
To meet us here beside the Ford to-day—
Ferdiah, son of Daman, Daré's son.”
“My lord, the steeds are ready to thy hand;
Thy chariot stands here yoked, do thou step in;
The noble car will not disgrace its lord.”

Into the chariot, then, the dextrous, bold,
Red-sworded, battle-winning hero sprang
Cuchullin, son of Sualtam, at a bound.
Invisible Bocanachs and Bananachs,
And Geniti Glindi shouted round the car,
And demons of the earth and of the air.
For thus the Tuatha de Danaans used
By sorceries to raise those fearful cries
Around him, that the terror and the fear
Of him should be the greater, as he swept
On with his staff of spirits to the war.

Soon was it when Ferdiah's charioteer
Heard the approaching clamour and the shout,
The rattle and the clatter, and the roar,
The whistle, and the thunder, and the tramp,
The clanking discord of the missive shields,
The clang of swords, the hissing sound of spears,
The tinkling of the helmet, the sharp crash
Of armour and of arms, the straining ropes,
The dangling bucklers, the resounding wheels,
The creaking chariot, and the proud approach
Of the triumphant champion of the Ford.

Clutching his master's robe, the charioteer
Cried out, “Ferdiah, rise! for lo, thy foes
Are on thee!” Then the Spirit of Insight fell
Prophetic on the youth, and thus he sang.

Charioteer.

I hear the rushing of a car,
Near and more near its proud wheels run
A chariot for the God of War
Bursts—as from clouds the sun!
Over Bregg-Ross it speeds along,
Hark! its thunders peal afar!
Oh! its steeds are swift and strong,
And the Victories guide that car.

The Hound of Ulster shaketh the reins,
And white with foam is each courser's mouth;
The Hawk of Ulster swoops o'er the plains
To his quarry here in the south.
Like wintry storm that warrior's form,
Slaughter and Death beside him rush;
The groaning air is dark and warm,
And the low clouds bleed and blush.

Oh, woe to him that is here on the hill,
Who is here on the hillock awaiting the Hound;
Last year it was in a vision of ill
I saw this sight and I heard this sound.
Methought Emania's Hound drew nigh,
Methought the Hound of Battle drew near,
I heard his steps and I saw his eye,
And again I see and I hear.

Then answer made Ferdiah in this wise:
“Why dost thou chafe me, talking of this man?
For thou hast never ceased to sing his praise
Since from his home he came. Thou surely art
Not without wage for this: but nathless know
Ailill and Mave have both foretold—by me
This man shall fall, shall fall for a reward
Just as the deed: This day he shall be slain,
For it is fated that I free the Ford.
'Tis time for the relief.”—And thus they spake:

Ferdiah.

Yes, it is time for the relief;
Be silent then, nor speak his praise,
For prophecy forebodes this chief
Shall pass not the predestined days;
Does fate for this forego its claim,
That Cuailgné's champion here should come
In all his pride and pomp of fame?—
Be sure he comes but to his doom.

Charioteer.

If Cuailgné's champion here I see
In all his pride and pomp of fame,
He little beeds the prophecy,
So swift his course, so straight his aim.
Towards us he flies, as flies the gleam
Of lightning, or as waters flow
From some high cliff o'er which the stream
Drops in the foaming depths below.

Ferdiah.

Highly rewarded thou must be,
For much reward thou sure canst claim,
Else why with such persistency
Thus sing his praises since he came?
And now that he approacheth nigh,
And now that he doth draw more near,
It seems it is to glorify
And not to attack him thou art here.

Not long Ferdiah's charioteer had gazed
With wondering look on the majestic car,
When, as with thunder-speed it wheeled more near,
He saw its whole construction and its plan:
A fair, flesh-seeking, four-peaked front it had,
And for its body a magnificent creit
Fashioned for war, in which the hero stood
Full-armed and brandishing a mighty spear,
While o'er his head a green pavilion hung;
Beneath, two fleetly-bounding, large-eared, fierce,
Whale-bellied, lively-hearted, high-flanked, proud,
Slender-legged, wide-hoofed, broad-buttocked, prancing steeds,
Exulting leaped and bore the car along:
Under one yoke, the broad-backed steed was gray,
Under the other, black the long-maned steed.

Like to a hawk swooping from off a cliff,
Upon a day of harsh and biting wind,
Or like a spring gust on a wild March morn
Rushing resistless o'er a level plain,
Or like the fleetness of a stag when first
'Tis started by the hounds in its first field—
So swept the horses of Cuchullin's car,
Bounding as if o'er fiery flags they flew,
Making the earth to shake beneath their tread,
And tremble 'neath the fleetness of their speed.

At length, upon the north side of the Ford,
Cuchullin stopped. Upon the southern bank

Ferdiah stood, and thus addressed the chief:
“Glad am I, O Cuchullin, thou hast come.”
“Up to this day,” Cuchullin made reply,
“Thy welcome would by me have been received
As coming from a friend, but not to-day.
Besides, 'twere fitter that I welcomed thee,
Than that to me thou shouldst the welcome give;
'Tis I that should go forth to fight with thee,
Not thou to me, because before thee are
My women and my children, and my youths,
My herds and flocks, my horses and my steeds.”

Ferdiah, half in scorn, spake then these words—
And then Cuchullin answered in his turn.
“Good, O Cuchullin, what untoward fate
Has brought thee here to measure swords with me?
For when we two with Scatha lived, in Skye,
With Uatha, and with Aifé, thou wert then
My page to spread my couch for me at night,
Or tie my spears together for the chase.”

“True hast thou spoken,” said Cuchullin; “yes,
I then was young, thy junior, and I did
For thee the services thou dost recall;
A different story shall be told of us
From this day forth, for on this day I feel
Earth holds no champion that I dare not fight!”
And thus invectives bitter, sharp and cold,
Between the two were uttered, and first spake
Ferdiah, then alternate each with each.

Ferdiah.

What has brought thee here, O Hound,
To encounter a strong foe?
O'er the trappings of thy steeds
Crimson-red thy blood shall flow.
Woe is in thy journey, woe;
Let the cunning leech prepare;
Shouldst thou ever reach thy home,
Thou shalt need his care.

Cuchullin.

I, who here with warriors fought,
With the lordly chiefs of hosts,
With a hundred men at once,
Little heed thy empty boasts.
Thee beneath the wave to place,
Thee to strike and thee to slay
In the first path of our fight
Am I here to-day.

Ferdiah.

Thy reproach in me behold,
For 'tis I that deed will do,
'Tis of me that Fame shall tell
He the Ultonian's champion slew.
Yes, in spite of all their hosts,
Yes, in spite of all their prayers:
So it shall long be told
That the loss was theirs.

Cuchullin.

How, then, shall we first engage—
Is it with the hard-edged sword?
In what order shall we go
To the battle of the Ford?
Shall we in our chariots ride?
Shall we wield the bloody spear?
How am I to hew thee down
With thy proud hosts here?

Ferdiah.

Ere the setting of the sun,
Ere shall come the darksome night,
If again thou must be told,
With a mountain thou shalt fight:
Thee the Ultonians will extol,
Thence impetuous wilt thou grow,
Oh! their grief, when through their ranks
Will thy spectre go!

Cuchullin.

Thou hast fallen in danger's gap,
Yes, thy end of life is nigh;
Sharp spears shall be plied on thee
Fairly 'neath the open sky:
Pompous thou wilt be and vain
Till the time for talk is o'er,
From this day a battle-chief
Thou shalt be no more.

Ferdiah.

Cease thy boastings, for the world
Sure no braggart hath like thee:
Thou art not the chosen chief—
Thou hast not the champion's fee:—
Without action, without force,
Thou art but a giggling page;
Yes, thou trembler, with thy heart
Like a bird's in cage.

Cuchullin.

When we were with Scatha once,
It but seemed our valour's due
That we should together fight,
Both as one our sports pursue.
Thou wert then my dearest friend,
Comrade, kinsman, thou wert all,—
Ah, how sad, if by my hand
Thou at last shouldst fall.

Ferdiah.

Much of honour shalt thou lose,
We may then mere words forego:—
On a stake thy head shall be
Ere the early cock shall crow.
O Cuchullin, Cuailgné's pride,
Grief and madness round thee twine;
I will do thee every ill,
For the fault is thine.

“Good, O Ferdiah, 'twas no knightly act,”
Cuchullin said, “to have come meanly here,
To combat and to fight with an old friend,
Through instigation of the wily Mave,
Through intermeddling of Ailill the king;
To none of those who here before thee came
Was victory given, for they all fell by me:—
Thou too shalt win nor victory, nor increase
Of fame in this encounter thou dost dare,
For as they fell, so thou by me shall fall.”
Thus was he saying and he spake these words,
To which Ferdiah listened, not unmoved.

Cuchullin.

Come not to me, O champion of the host,
Come not to me, Ferdiah, as my foe,
For though it is thy fate to suffer most,
All, all must feel the universal woe.

Come not to me defying what is right,
Come not to me, thy life is in my power
Ah, the dread issue of each former fight
Why hast thou not remembered ere this hour?

Art thou not bright with diverse dainty arms,
A purple girdle and a coat of mail?
And yet to win the maid of peerless charms
For whom thou dar'st the battle thou shalt fail.

Yes, Finavair, the daughter of the queen,
The faultless form, the gold without alloy,
The glorious virgin of majestic mien,
Shalt not be thine, Ferdiah, to enjoy.

No, the great prize shall not by thee be won,—
A fatal lure, a false, false light is she,
To numbers promised and yet given to none,
And wounding many as she now wounds thee

Break not thy vow, never with me to fight,
Break not the bond that once thy young heart gave,
Break not the truth we both so loved to plight,
Come not to me, O champion bold and brave!

To fifty champions by her smiles made slaves
The maid was proffered, and not slight the gift;
By me they have been sent into their graves,
From me they met destruction sure and swift.

Though vauntingly Ferbaeth my arms defied,
He of a house of heroes prince and peer,
Short was the time until I tamed his pride
With one swift cast of my true battle-spear.

Srub Dairé's valour too had swift decline:
Hundreds of women's secrets he possessed,
Great at one time was his renown as thine,
In cloth of gold, not silver, was he dressed.

Though 'twas to me the woman was betrothed
On whom the chiefs of the fair province smile,
To shed thy blood my spirit would have loathed
East, west, or north, or south of all the isle.

“Good, O Ferdiah,” still continuing, spoke
Cuchullin, “thus it is that thou shouldst not
Have come with me to combat and to fight;
For when we were with Scatha, long ago,
With Uatha and with Aifé, we were wont
To go together to each battle-field,
To every combat and to every fight,
Through every forest, every wilderness,
Through every darksome path and dangerous way.”
And thus he said and thus he spake these words:

Cuchullin.
We were heart-comrades then,—
Comrades in crowds of men,
In the same bed have lain,
When slumber sought us;
In countries far and near,
Hurling the battle spear,
Chasing the forest deer,
As Scatha taught us.

“O Cuchullin of the beautiful feats,”
Replied Ferdiah, “though we have pursued
Together thus the arts of war and peace,
And though the bonds of friendship that we swore
Thou hast recalled to mind, from me shall come
Thy first of wounds. O Hound, remember not
Our old companionship, which shall not now
Avail thee, shall avail thee not, O Hound!”
“Too long here have we waited in this way,”
Again resumed Ferdiah. “To what arms,
Say then, Cuchullin, shall we now resort?”
“The choice of arms is thine until the night,”
Cuchullin made reply; “for so it chanced
That thou shouldst be the first to reach the Ford.”
“Dost thou at all remember,” then rejoined
Ferdiah, “those swift missive spears with which
We practised oft with Scatha in our youth,
With Uatha and with Aifé, and our friends?”
“Them I, indeed, remember well,” replied
Cuchullin. “If thou dost remember well,
Let us to them resort,” Ferdiah said.
Their missive weapons then on either side
They both resorted to. Upon their arms
They braced two emblematic missive shields,
And their eight well-turned-handled lances took,
Their eight quill-javelins also, and their eight
White ivory-hilted swords, and their eight spears,
Sharp, ivory-hafted, with hard points of steel.

Betwixt the twain the darts went to and fro,
Like bees upon the wing on a fine day;
No cast was made that was not sure to hit.
From morn to nigh mid-day the missiles flew,
Till on the bosses of the brazen shields
Their points were blunted, but though true the aim,
And excellent the shooting, the defence
Was so complete that not a wound was given,
And neither champion drew the other's blood.
“'Tis time to drop these feats,” Ferdiah said,
“For not by such as these shall we decide
Our battle here this day.” “Let us desist,”
Cuchullin answered, “if the time hath come.”
They ceased, and threw their missile shafts aside
Into the hands of their two charioteers.
“What weapons, O Cuchullin, shall we now
Resort to?” said Ferdiah. “Unto thee,”
Cuchullin answered, “doth belong the choice
Of arms until the night, because thou wert
The first that reached the Ford.” “Well, let us, then,”
Ferdiah said, “resume our straight, smooth, hard,
Well-polished spears with their hard flaxen strings.”
“Let us resume them, then,” Cuchullin said.
They braced upon their arms two stouter shields,
And then resorted to their straight, smooth, hard,
Well-polished spears, with their hard flaxen strings.
'Twas now mid-day, and thus 'till eventide
They shot against each other with the spears.
But though the guard was good on either side,
The shooting was so perfect that the blood
Ran from the wounds of each, by each made red.
“Let us now, O Cuchullin,” interposed
Ferdiah, “for the present time desist.”
“Let us indeed desist,” Cuchullin said

“If, O Ferdiah, the fit time hath come.”
They ceased, and laid their gory weapons down,
Their faithful charioteers' attendant care.
Each to the other gently then approached,
Each round the other's neck his hands entwined,
And gave him three fond kisses on the cheek.
Their horses fed in the same field that night,
Their charioteers were warmed at the same fire,
Their charioteers beneath their bodies spread
Green rushes, and beneath the heads the down
Of wounded men's soft pillows. Then the skilled
Professors of the art of healing came
With herbs, which to the scars of all their wounds
They put. Of every herb and healing plant
That to Cuchullin's wound they did apply,
He would an equal portion westward send
Over the Ford, Ferdiah's wounds to heal.
So that the men of Erin could not say,
If it should chance Ferdiah fell by him,
That it was through superior skill and care
Cuchullin was enabled him to slay.

Of each kind, too, of palatable food
And sweet, intoxicating, pleasant drink,
The men of Erin to Ferdiah sent,
He a fair moiety across the Ford
Sent northward to Cuchullin, where he lay;
Because his own purveyors far surpassed
In numbers those the Ulster chief retained:
For all the federate hosts of Erin were
Purveyors to Ferdiah, with the hope
That he would beat Cuchullin from the Ford.
The Bregians only were Cuchullin's friends,
His sole purveyors, and their wont it was
To come to him and talk to him at night.

That night they rested there. Next morn they rose
And to the Ford of battle early came.

“What weapons shall we use to-day?” inquired
Cuchullin. “Until night the choice is thine,”
Replied Ferdiah; “for the choice of arms
Has hitherto been mine.” “Then let us take
Our great broad spears to-day,” Cuchullin said,
“And may the thrusting bring us to an end
Sooner than yesterday's less powerful darts.
Let then our charioteers our horses yoke
Beneath our chariots, so that we to-day
May from our horses and our chariots fight.”
Ferdiah answered: “Let it so be done.”
And then they braced their two broad, full-firm shields
Upon their arms that day, and in their hands
That day they took their great broad-bladed spears.

And thus from early morn to evening's close
They smote each other with such dread effect
That both were pierced, and both made red with gore,—
Such wounds, such hideous clefts in either breast
Lay open to the back, that if the birds
Cared ever through men's wounded frames to pass,
They might have passed that day, and with them borne
Pieces of quivering flesh into the air.
When evening came, their very steeds were tired,
Their charioteers depressed, and they themselves
Worn out—even they the champions bold and brave
“Let us from this, Ferdiah, now desist,”
Cuchullin said; “for see, our charioteers
Droop, and our very horses flag and fail,
And when fatigued they yield, so well may we.”
And further thus he spoke, persuading rest:—

Cuchullin
Not with the obstinate rage and spite
With which Fomorian pirates fight
Let us, since now has fallen the night,
Continue thus our feud;

In brief abeyance it may rest,
Now that a calm comes o'er each breast:—
When with new light the world is blest,
Be it again renewed.”

“Let us desist, indeed,” Ferdiah said,
“If the fit time hath come.”—And so they ceased.
From them they threw their arms into the hands
Of their two charioteers. Each of them came
Forward to meet the other. Each his hands
Put round the other's neck, and thus embraced,
Gave to him three fond kisses on the cheek.
Their horses fed in the same field that night;
Their charioteers were warmed by the same fire.
Their charioteers beneath their bodies spread
Green rushes, and beneath their heads the down
Of wounded men's soft pillows. Then the skilled
Professors of the art of healing came
To tend them and to cure them through the night.
But they for all their skill could do no more,
So numerous and so dangerous were the wounds,
The cuts, and clefts, and scars so large and deep,
But to apply to them the potent charms
Of witchcraft, incantations, and barb spells,
As sorcerers use, to stanch the blood and stay
The life that else would through the wounds escape:—
Of every charm of witchcraft, every spell,
Of every incantation that was used
To heal Cuchullin's wounds, a full fair half
Over the Ford was westward sent to heal
Ferdiah's hurts: of every sort of food,
And sweet, intoxicating, pleasant drink
The men of Erin to Ferdiah sent,
He a fair moiety across the Ford
Sent northward to Cuchullin where he lay,
Because his own purveyors far surpassed
In number those the Ulster chief retained.
For all the federate hosts of Erin were
Purveyors to Ferdiah, with the hope

That he would beat Cuchullin from the Ford.
The Bregians only were Cuchullin's friends—
His sole purveyors—and their wont it was
To come to him, and talk with him at night.

They rested there that night. Next morn they rose,
And to the Ford of battle forward came.
That day a great, ill-favoured, lowering cloud
Upon Ferdiah's face Cuchullin saw.
“Badly,” said he, “dost thou appear this day,
Ferdiah, for thy hair has duskier grown
This day, and a dull stupour dims thine eyes,
And thine own face and form, and what thou wert
In outward seeming have deserted thee.”
“'Tis not through fear of thee that I am so,”
Ferdiah said, “for Erin doth not hold
This day a champion I could not subdue.”
And thus betwixt the twain this speech arose,
And thus Cuchullin mourned and he replied:

Cuchullin.

O Ferdiah, if it be thou,
Certain am I that on thy brow
The blush should burn and the shame should rise,
Degraded man whom the gods despise,
Here at a woman's bidding to wend
To fight thy fellow-pupil and friend.

Ferdiah.

O Cuchullin, O valiant man,
Inflicter of wounds since the war began,
O true champion, a man must come
To the fated spot of his final home,—
To the sod predestined by fate's decree
His resting-place and his grave to be.

Cuchullin.

Finavair, the daughter of Mave,
Although thou art her willing slave,

Not for thy long-felt love has been
Promised to thee by the wily queen,—
No, it was but to test thy might
That thou wert lured into this fatal fight.

Ferdiah.

My might was tested long ago
In many a battle, as thou dost know,
Long, O Hound of the gentle rule,
Since we fought together in Scatha's school:
Never a braver man have I seen,
Never, I feel, hath a braver been.

Cuchullin.

Thou art the cause of what has been done,
O son of Dáman, Daré's son,
Of all that has happened thou art the cause,
Whom hither a woman's counsel draws—
Whom hither a wily woman doth send
To measure swords with thy earliest friend.

Ferdiah.

If I forsook the field, O Hound,
If I had turned from the battleground—
This battleground without fight with thee,
Hard, oh, hard had it gone with me;
Bad should my name and fame have been
With King Ailill and with Mave the queen.

Cuchullin.

Though Mave of Croghan had given me food,
Even from her lips, though all of good
That the heart can wish or wealth can give
Were offered to me, there does not live
A king or queen on the earth for whom
I would do thee ill or provoke thy doom.

Ferdiah.

O Cuchullin, thou victor in fight,
Of battle triumphs the foremost knight;

To what result the fight may lead,
'Twas Mave alone that prompted the deed;
Not thine the fault, not thine the blame,
Take thou the victory and the fame.

Cuchullin.

My faithful heart is a clot of blood,
A feud thus forced cannot end in good;
Oh, woe to him who is here to be slain!
Oh, grief to him who his life will gain!
For feats of valour no strength have I
To fight the fight where my friend must die.

‘A truce to these invectives,” then broke in
Ferdiah; “we far other work this day
Have yet to do than rail with woman's words.
Say, what shall be our arms in this day's fight?”
“Till night,” Cuchullin said, “the choice is thine
For yester morn the choice was given to me.”
“Let us,” Ferdiah answered, “then resort
Unto our heavy, sharp, hard-smiting swords,
For we are nearer to the end to-day
Of this our fight, by hewing, than we were
On yesterday by thrusting of the spears.”
“So let us do, indeed,” Cuchullin said.
Then on their arms two long great shields they took.
And in their hands their sharp, hard-smiting swords.
Each hewed the other with such furious strokes
That pieces larger than an infant's head
Of four weeks' old were cut from out the thighs
And great broad shoulder-blades of each brave chief.
And thus they persevered from early morn
Till evening's close in hewing with the swords.
“Let us desist,” at length Ferdiah said.
“Let us indeed desist, if the fit time
Hath come,” Cuchullin said; and so they ceased.
From them they cast their arms into the hands
Of their two charioteers; and though that morn
Their meeting was of two high-spirited men,
Their separation, now that night had come,

Was of two men dispirited and sad.
Their horses were not in one field that night,
Their charioteers were warmed not at one fire.
That night they rested there, and in the morn
Ferdiah early rose and sought alone
The Ford of battle, for he knew that day
Would end the fight, and that the hour drew nigh
When one or both of them should surely fall.

Then was it for the first time he put on
His battle suit of battle and of fight,
Before Cuchullin came unto the Ford.
That battle suit of battle and of fight
Was this: His apron of white silk, with fringe
Of spangled gold around it, he put on
Next his white skin. A leather apron then,
Well sewn, upon his body's lower part
He placed, and over it a mighty stone
As large as any mill-stone was secured.
His firm, deep, iron apron then he braced
Over the mighty stone—an apron made
Of iron purified from every dross—
Such dread had he that day of the gaebulg.
His crested helm of battle on his head
He last put on—a helmet all ablaze
From forty gems in each compartment set,
Cruan, and crystal, carbuncles of fire,
And brilliant rubies of the Eastern world.
In his right hand a mighty spear he seized,
Destructive, sharply-pointed, straight and strong:—
On his left side his sword of battle swung,
Curved, with its hilt and pommel of red gold.
Upon the slope of his broad back he placed
His dazzling shield, around whose margin rose
Fifty huge bosses, each of such a size
That on it might a full-grown hog recline,
Exclusive of the larger central boss
That raised its prominent round of pure red gold.

Full many noble, varied, wondrous feats
Ferdiah on that day displayed, which he

Had never learned at any tutor's hand,
From Uatha, or from Aifé, or from her,
Scatha, his early nurse in lonely Skye:—
But which were all invented by himself
That day, to bring about Cuchullin's fall.

Cuchullin to the Ford approached and saw
The many noble, varied, wondrous feats
Ferdiah on that day displayed on high.
“O Laegh, my friend,” Cuchullin thus addressed
His charioteer, “I see the wondrous feats
Ferdiah doth display on high to-day:
All these on me in turn shall soon be tried,
And therefore note, that if it so should chance
I shall be first to yield, be sure to taunt,
Excite, revile me, and reproach me so,
That wrath and rage in me may rise the more:—
If I prevail, then let thy words be praise,
Laud me, congratulate me, do thy best
To stimulate my courage to its height.”
“It shall be done, Cuchullin,” Laegh replied.

Then was it that Cuchullin first assumed
His battle suit of battle: then he tried
Full many, various, noble, wondrous feats
He never learned from any tutor's hands,
From Uatha, or from Aifé, or from her,
Scatha, his early nurse in lonely Skye.
Ferdiah saw these various feats, and knew
Against himself they soon would be applied.

“Say, O Ferdiah, to what arms shall we
Resort in this day's fight?” Cuchullin said.
Ferdiah answered, “Unto thee belongs
The choice of weapons now until the night.”
“Let us then try the Ford Feat on this day,”
Replied Cuchullin. “Let us then, indeed,”
Rejoined Ferdiah, with a careless air
Consenting, though in truth it was to him
The cause of grief to say so, since he knew

That in the Ford Feat lay Cuchullin's strength,
And that he never failed to overthrow
Champion or hero in that last appeal.

Great was the feat that was performed that day
In and beside the Ford: the mighty two,
The two great heroes, warriors, champions, chiefs
Of western Europe—the two open hands
Laden with gifts of the north-western world,—
The two beloved pillars that upheld
The valour of the Gaels—the two strong keys
That kept the bravery of the Gaels secure—
Thus to be brought together from afar
To fight each other through the meddling schemes
Of Ailill and his wily partner Mave.

From each to each the missive weapons flew
From dawn of early morning to mid-day;
And when mid-day had come, the ire of both
Became more furious, and they drew more near.
Then was it that Cuchullin made a spring
From the Ford's brink, and came upon the boss
Of the great shield Ferdiah's arm upheld,
That thus he might, above the broad shield's rim,
Strike at his head. Ferdiah with a touch
Of his left elbow, gave the shield a shake
And cast Cuchullin from him like a bird,
Back to the brink of the Ford. Again he sprang
From the Ford's brink, and came upon the boss
Of the great shield once more, to strike his head
Over the rim. Ferdiah with a stroke
Of his left knee made the great shield to ring,
And cast Cuchullin back upon the brink,
As if he only were a little child.

Laegh saw the act. “Alas! indeed,” said Laegh,
“The warrior casts thee from him in the way
That an abandoned woman would her child.
He flings thee as a river flings its foam;
He grinds thee as a mill would grind fresh malt;
He fells thee as the axe does fell the oak;
He binds thee as the woodbine binds the tree;

He darts upon thee as a hawk doth dart
Upon small birds, so that from this hour forth
Until the end of time, thou hast no claim
Or title to be called a valorous man:
Thou little puny phantom form,” said Laegh.

Then with the rapid motion of the wind,
The fleetness of a swallow on the wing,
The fierceness of a dragon, and the strength
Of a roused lion, once again up sprang
Cuchullin, high into the troubled air,
And lighted for the third time on the boss
Of the broad shield, to strike Ferdiah's head
Over the rim. The warrior shook the shield,
And cast Cuchullin mid-way in the Ford,
With such an easy effort that it seemed
As if he scarcely deigned to shake him off.

Then, as he lay, a strange distortion came
Upon Cuchullin; as a bladder swells
Inflated by the breath, to such a size
And fulness did he grow, that he became
A fearful, many-coloured, wondrous Tuaig—
Gigantic shape, as big as a man of the sea,
Or monstrous Fomor, so that now his form
In perfect height over Ferdiah stood.

So close the fight was now, that their heads met
Above, their feet below, their arms half-way
Over the rims and bosses of their shields:—
So close the fight was now, that from their rims
Unto their centres were their shields cut through,
And loosed was every rivet from its hold;
So close the fight was now, that their strong spears
Were turned and bent and shivered point and haft;
Such was the closeness of the fight they made
That the invisible and unearthly hosts
Of Spirits, Bocanachs and Bananachs,
And the wild wizard people of the glen

And of the air the demons, shrieked and screamed
From their broad shields' reverberating rim,
From their sword-hilts and their long-shafted spears:
Such was the closeness of the fight they made,
They forced the river from its natural course,
Out of its bed, so that it might have been
A couch whereon a king or queen might lie,
For not a drop of water it retained,
Except what came from the great tramp and splash
Of the two heroes fighting in its midst.
Such was the fierceness of the fight they waged,
That a wild fury seized upon the steeds
The Gaels had gathered with them; in affright
They burst their traces and their binding ropes,
Nay even their chains, and panting fled away.
The women, too, and youths, by equal fears
Inspired and scared, and all the varied crowd
Of followers and non-combatants who there
Were with the men of Erin, from the camp
South-westward broke away, and fled the Ford.

At the edge-feat of swords they were engaged
When this surprise occurred, and it was then
Ferdiah an unguarded moment found
Upon Cuchullin, and he struck him deep,
Plunging his straight-edged sword up to the hilt
Within his body, till his girdle filled
With blood, and all the Ford ran red with gore
From the brave battle-warrior's veins outshed.
This could Cuchullin now no longer bear
Because Ferdiah still the unguarded spot
Struck and re-struck with quick, strong, stubborn strokes;
And so he called aloud to Laegh, the son
Of Riangabra, for the dread Gaebulg.
The manner of that fearful feat was this:
Adown the current was it sent, and caught
Between the toes: a single spear would make
The wound it made when entering, but once lodged
Within the body, thirty barbs outsprung,

So that it could not be withdrawn until
The body was cut open where it lay.
And when of the Gaebulg Ferdiah heard
The name, he made a downward stroke of his shield,
To guard his body. Then Cuchullin thrust
The unerring thorny spear straight o'er the rim,
And through the breast-plate of his coat of mail,
So that its farther half was seen beyond
His body, after passing through his heart.

Ferdiah gave an upward stroke of his shield,
His breast to cover, though it was “the relief
After the danger.” Then the servant set
The dread Gaebulg adown the flowing stream;
Cuchullin caught it firmly 'twixt his toes,
And from his foot a fearful cast he threw
Upon Ferdiah with unerring aim.
Swift through the well-wrought iron apron guard
It passed, and through the stone which was as large
As a huge mill-stone, cracking it in three,
And so into his body, every part
Of which was filled with the expanding barbs
“That is enough: by that one blow I fall,”
Ferdiah said. “Indeed, I now may own
That I am sickly after thee this day,
Though it behoved not thee that I should fall
By stroke of thine;” and then these dying words
He added, tottering back upon the bank:

Ferdiah.

O Hound, so famed for deeds of valour doing,
'Twas not thy place my death to give to me;
Thine is the fault of my most certain ruin,
And yet 'tis best to have my blood on thee.

The wretch escapes not from his false position,
Who to the gap of his destruction goes;
Alas! my death-sick voice needs no physician,
My end hath come—my life's stream seaward flows.

The natural ramparts of my breast are broken,
In its own gore my struggling heart is drowned:—
Alas! I have not fought as I have spoken,
For thou hast killed me in the fight, O Hound!

Cuchullin towards him ran, and his two arms
Clasping about him, lifted him and bore
The body in its armour and its clothes
Across the Ford unto the northern bank,
In order that the slain should thus be placed
Upon the north bank of the Ford, and not
Among the men of Erin, on the west.
Cuchullin laid Ferdiah down, and then
A sudden trance, a faintness on him came
When bending o'er the body of his friend.
Laegh saw the weakness, which was seen as well
By all the men of Erin, who arose
Upon the moment to attack him there.
“Good, O Cuchullin,” Laegh exclaimed, “arise,
For all the men of Erin hither come.
It is no single combat they will give,
Since fair Ferdiah, Dáman's son, the son
Of Daré, by thy hands has here been slain.”
“O servant, what availeth me to rise,”
Cuchullin said, “since he hath fallen by me?”
And so the servant said, and so replied
Cuchullin, in his turn, unto the end;

Laegh.

Arise, Emania's slaughter-hound, arise,
Exultant pride should be thy mood this day:—
Ferdiah of the hosts before thee lies—
Hard was the fight and dreadful was the fray.

Cuchullin.

Ah, what availeth me a hero's pride?
Madness and grief are in my heart and brain,
For the dear blood with which my hand is dyed—
For the dear body that I here have slain.

Laegh.

It suits thee ill to shed these idle tears,
Fitter by far for thee a fiercer mood—
At thee he flung the flying pointed spears,
Malicious, wounding, dripping, dyed with blood.

Cuchullin.

Even though he left me crippled, maimed, and lame,
Even though I lost this arm that now but bleeds,
All would I bear, but now the fields of fame
No more shall see Ferdiah mount his steeds.

Laegh.

More pleasing is the victory thou hast gained,
More pleasing to the women of Creeve Rue,
He to have died and thou to have remained,
To them the brave who fell here are too few.

From that black day in brilliant Mave's long reign
Thou camest out of Cuailgné it has been—
Her people slaughtered and her champions slain—
A time of desolation to the queen.

When thy great plundered flock was borne away,
Thou didst not lie with slumber-sealèd eyes,—
Then 'twas thy boast to rise before the day:—
Arise again, Emania's Hound, arise!

So Laegh addressed the hero, though he seemed
To hear him not, but mourned his friend the more.
And thus he spoke these words, and thus he moaned:

“Alas! Ferdiah, an unhappy chance
It was for thee that thou didst not consult
Some of the heroes who my prowess knew,
Before thou camest forth to meet me here,
In the hard battle combat by the Ford.
Unhappy was it that it was not Laegh,

The son of Riangabra, thou didst ask
About our fellow-pupilship—a bond
That might the unnatural combat so have stayed;
Unhappy was it that thou didst not ask
Honest advice from Fergus, son of Roy;
Or that it was not battle-winning, proud,
Exulting, ruddy Connall thou didst ask
About our fellow-pupilship of old.
For well do these men know there will not be
A being born among the Conacians who
Shall do the deeds of valour thou hast done
From this day forth until the end of time.
For if thou hadst consulted these brave men
About the places where the assemblies meet,
About the plightings and the broken vows
Uttered too oft by Connaught's fair-haired dames;
If thou hadst asked about the games and sports
Played with the targe and shield, the sword and spear,
If of backgammon or the moves of chess,
Or races with the chariots and the steeds,
They never would have found a champion's arm
As strong to pierce a hero's flesh as thine,
O rose-cloud hued Ferdiah! None to raise
The red-mouthed vulture's hoarse, inviting croak
Unto the many-coloured flocks, nor one
Who will for Croghan combat like to thee,
O red-cheeked son of Dáman!” Thus he said,
Then standing o'er Ferdiah he resumed:
“Oh! great has been the treachery and fraud
The men of Erin practised upon thee,
Ferdiah, thus to bring thee here to fight
With me, 'gainst whom it is no easy task
Upon the Tain Bó Cuailgné to contend.”
And thus he said, and thus again he spake:

Cuchullin.

O my Ferdiah, O my friend, forgive:
'Tis not my hand but treachery lays thee low:—
Thou doomed to die and I condemned to live,
Both doomed for ever to be severed so!

When we were far away in our young prime,
With Scatha, dread Buánnan's chosen friend,
A vow we made, that till the end of time,
With hostile arms we never should contend.

Dear was thy lovely ruddiness to me,
Dear was thy gray-blue eye, so bright and clear,—
Thy comely, perfect form how sweet to see!
Thy wisdom and thy eloquence how dear!

In body-cutting combat, on the field
Of spears, when all is lost or all is won,
None braver ever yet held up a shield,
Than thou, Ferdiah, Dáman's ruddy son.

Never since Aifé's only son I slew,
Not knowing who the gallant youth might be,—
Ah! hapless deed, that still my heart doth rue!—
None have I found, Ferdiah, like to thee.

Thy dream it was to win fair Finavair,
From Mave her beauteous daughter's hand to gain;
As soon might'st thou in the wide fields of air
The glancing sunbeam's swift-winged flight restrain.

He paused awhile, still gazing on the dead,
Then to his charioteer he spoke: “Friend Laegh,
Strip now Ferdiah, take his armour off,
That I may see the golden brooch of Mave,
For which he undertook the fatal fight.”
Laegh took the armour then from off his breast,
And then Cuchullin saw the golden pin
That cost so dear, and then these words he spake:

Cuchullin.

Alas! O brooch of gold!
O chief, whose fame each poet knows,
O hero of stout slaughtering blows,
Thy arm was brave and bold.

Thy yellow flowing hair,
Thy purple girdle's silken fold
Still even in death around thee rolled,—
Thy twisted jewel rare.

Thy noble beaming eyes,
Now closed in death, make mine grow dim,
Thy dazzling shield with golden rim,
Thy chess a king might prize.

Oh! piteous to behold,
My fellow-pupil falls by me:
It was an end that should not be,
Alas! O brooch of gold!

After another pause Cuchullin spoke:—
“O Laegh, my friend, open Ferdiah now,
And from his body the Gaebulg take out,
For I without my weapon cannot be.’

Laegh then approached, and with a strong, sharp knife
Opened Ferdiah's body, and drew out
The dread Gaebulg. And when Cuchullin saw
His bloody weapon lying red beside
Ferdiah on the ground, again he thought
Of all their past career, and thus he said:

Cuchullin.

Sad is my fate that I should see thee lying,
Sad is the fate, Ferdiah, I deplore,—
I with my weapon which thy blood is dyeing,
Thou on the ground a mass of streaming gore.

When we were young, where Scatha's eye hath seen us
Fond fellow-pupils in her schools of Skye,
Never was heard the angry word between us,
Never was seen the angry spear to fly.

Scatha, with words of eloquent persuading,
Roused us in many a glorious feat to join;
“Go,” she exclaimed, “each other bravely aiding,
Go forth to battle with the dread Germoin.”

I to Ferdiah said: “Oh, come, my brother,”
I to the ever-generous Luaigh said,
I to fair Baetan's son, and many another:
“Come, let us go and fight this foe so dread.”

Crossing the sea in ships of peaceful traders,
All of us came to lone Lind Formairt's lake,
With us we brought four hundred brave invaders
Out of the islands of the Athisech.

I and Ferdiah were the first to enter,
Where he himself, the dread Germoin, held rule,
Rind, Nial's son, I clove from head to centre,
Ruad I killed, the son of Finniule.

First on the shore, as swift our fleet ships flew there,
Bláth, son of Calba of red swords, was slain;
Struck by Ferdiah, Luaigh also slew there
Fierce rude Mugarne of the Torrian main.

Bravely we battled against that court enchanted,
Full four times fifty heroes fell by me:
He, by their savage onslaught nothing daunted,
Slew ox-like monsters clambering from the sea.

Wily Germoin, amid so many slaughters,
We took alive as trophy of the field,
Him o'er the broad, bright sea of spangled waters
We bore to Scatha of the bright broad shield.

She, our famed tutoress, with kind endeavour,
Bound us from that day forth with heart and hand,
When met fair Elgga's tribes, that we should never
In hostile ranks before each other stand.

Oh, day of woe! oh, day without a morrow!
Oh, fatal Tuesday morning, when the bud
Of his young life was scattered! Oh! the sorrow,
To give the friend I loved a drink of blood!

Ah, if I saw thee among heroes lying
Dead on some glorious battlefield of Greece,
Soon would I follow thee, and proudly dying,
Sleep with my friend triumphant and at peace.

We, Scatha's pupils, ah, how sad the story!
Thou to be dead and I to be alive:
I to be wounded here, all gashed and gory,
Thou never more thy chariot's steeds to drive.

We, Scatha's pupils, ah! how sad the story;
Sad is the fate to which we both are led:
I to be wounded here, all gashed and gory,
And thou, alas! my friend, to lie here dead.

We, Scatha's pupils, ah, how sad the story!
Sad is the deed and sorrowful the wrong:
Thou to be dead without thy meed of glory,
And I, oh! shame, to be alive and strong!

Laegh interposed at length, and thus he said:
“Good, O Cuchullin, let us leave the Ford,
For long have we been here, by far too long.”
“Let us then leave it now,” Cuchullin said,
“O Laegh, my friend, but know that every fight
In which I hitherto have drawn my sword,
Has been but as a pastime and a sport
Compared with this one with Ferdiah fought.”
And he was saying, and he spake these words:

Cuchullin.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford,
I played but with the spear and sword:
Alike the teaching we received,
Alike were glad, alike were grieved,
Alike were we by Scatha's grace
Deemed worthy of the highest place.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford,
I played but with the spear and sword:
Alike our habits and our ways,
Alike our prowess and our praise,
Alike the trophies of the brave,
The glittering shields that Scatha gave.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford,
I played but with the spear and sword:
How dear to me, ah! who can know?
This golden pillar here laid low,
This mighty tree so strong and tall,
The chief, the champion of us all!

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford,
I played but with the spear and sword:
The lion rushing with a roar,
The wave that swallows up the shore,
When storm-winds blow and heaven is dim,
Could only be compared to him.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford,
I played but with the spear and sword:
Through me the friend I loved is dead,
A cloud is ever on my head—
The mountain form, the giant frame,
Is now a shadow and a name.

The countless legions of the Tain,
Those hands of mine have turned and slain:
Their men and steeds before me died,
Their flocks and herds on either side,
Though numerous were the hosts that came
From Croghan's Rath of fatal fame.

Though less than half the foes I led,
Before me soon my foes lay dead:
Never to gory battle pressed,
Never was nursed on Bamba's breast,
Never from sons of kings there came
A hero of more glorious fame.

This poem is now published for the first time in its complete state.

Autumn; strictly the last night in October. See O'Curry's “Sick Bed of Cuchullin.” Atlantis, i., p. 370).

Culann was the name of Conor Mac Nessa's smith, and it was from him that Setanta derived the name of Cu-Chulainn, or Culann's Hound.

Iorrus Domnann, now Erris, in the county of May o. It derived its name (“Bay of the Domnanns,” or “Deep-diggers,”) from the party of the Firbolgs, so called, having settled there, under their chiefs Genann and Rudhraighe. (See “The Fate of the Children of Lir,” by O'Curry, Atlantis, iv., p. 123; Dr. Reeve's “Adamnan's Life of St. Columba,” note 6, p. 31; O'Flaherty's “Ogygia,” p. 280; and Hardiman's “West Connaught,” by O'Flaherty, published by the Irish Archæological Society.)

The name of Scatha, the Amazonian instructress of Ferdiah and Cuchullin, is still preserved in Dun Sciath, in the island of Skye, where great Cuchullin's name and glory yet linger. The Cuchullin Mountains, named after him, “those thundersmitten, jagged, Cuchullin peaks of Skye,” the grandest mountain range in Great Britain, attract to that remote island of the Hebrides many worshippers of the sublime and beautiful in nature, whose enjoyments would be largely enhanced if they knew the heroic legends which are connected with the glorious scenes they have travelled so far to witness. Cuchullin is one of the foremost characters in MacPherson's “Ossian,” but the quasi-translator of Gaelic poems places him more than two centuries later than the period at which he really lived. (Lady Ferguson's “The Irish before the Conquest,” pp. 57, 58.)

For a description of this mysterious instrument, see Dr. Todd's “Additional Notes to the Irish version of Nennius,” p. 12.

On the use of mail armour by the ancient Irish, see Dr. O'Donovan's “Introduction and Notes to the Battle of Magh-Rath,” edited for the Archæological Society.

For an interesting account of this sovereign, so famous in Irish story, see O'Curry's “Lectures,” pp. 33, 34. Her Father, according to the chronology of the “Four Masters,” is supposed to have reigned as monarch of Erin about a century before the Christian era. “Of all the children of the monarch Eochaidh Fiedloch,” says O'Donovan (cited in O'Mahony's translation of Keating's “History,” p. 276) “by far the most celebrated was Meadbh or Mab, who is still remembered as the fairy queen of the Irish, the ‘Queen Mab’ of Spenser.”

“The belief that a ferb or ulcer could be produced,” says Mr. Stokes, in his preface to ‘Cormac's Glossary, “forms the groundwork of the tale of Nêde mac Adnae and his uncle, Caler.” The names of the three blisters (Stain, Blemish, and Defect) are almost identical with those Ferdiah is threatened with in the present poem.

A cumal was three cows, or their value. On the use of chariots, see “The Sick Bed of Cuchullin,” Atlantis, i. p. 375.

“The plains of Aie” (son of Allghuba the Druid), in Roscommon. Here stood the palace of Cruachain (O'Curry's “Lectures,” p. 35; “Battle of Magh Leana, p. 61).

“Fair-brow” (O'Curry, “Exile of the Children of Uisnech,” Atlantis, ii. p. 386).

Here in the original there is a sudden change from prose to verse. “It is generally supposed that these stories were recited by the ancient Irish poets for the amusement of their chieftains at their public feasts, and that the portions given in metre were sung” (“Battle of Magh Rath,” p. 12). The prose portions of this tale are represented in the translation by blank verse, and the lyrical portions by rhymed verse.

“Ugainè Mor exacted oaths by the sun and moon, the sea, the dew, and colours ... that the sovereignty of Erin should be invested in his descendants for ever (Ib. p. 3).

The high dignity of Domnal may be inferred from the following lines, quoted from Mac Lenini, in the preface to “Cormac's Glossary,” p. 51:—

“As blackbirds to swans, as an ounce to a mass of gold,
As the forms of peasant women to the forms of queens,
As a king to Domnal ...
As a taper to a candle, so is a sword to my sword.”

She was the wife of Nêd, the war-god. See O'Donovan's “Annals of the Four Masters,” vol. i., p. 24.

Etán is said to have been muime na filed, nurse of the poets (“Three Irish Glossaries,” preface, p. 33).

At Rathcroghan was the palace of the Kings of Connacht.

A name of Ireland (“Battle of Magh Leana,” p. 79).

So the night before the battle of Magh Rath, “the monarch, grandson of Ainmire, slept not, in consequence of the weight of the battle and the anxiety of the conflict pressing on his mind; for he was certain that his own beloved foster-son would, on the morrow, meet his last fate.”

In the “Battle of Magh Leana” these mysterious beings are called “the Woman of the Valley” (p. 120)

For this line and for many valuable suggestions throughout the poem I am indebted to the deep poetical insight and correct judgment of my friend, Aubrey de Vere.

“Derg Dian Scothach saw this order, and he put his forefinger into the string of the spear.” “Fate of the children of Tuireann,” by O'Curry, Atlantis iv., p. 233. See also “Battle of Magh Rath,” pp, 140, 141, 152.

Bregia was the ancient name of the plain watered by the Boyne.

According to the marginal note of the learned editor, the last four lines appear to be a sort of epilogue, in which the poet extols the victor.

THE VOYAGE OF ST. BRENDAN.

A.D. 545.

The Vocation.

O Ita, mother of my heart and mind—
My nourisher, my fosterer, my friend,
Who taught me first to God's great will resigned,
Before his shining altar-steps to bend;
Who poured his word upon my soul like balm,
And on mine eyes what pious fancy paints—
And on mine ear the sweetly swelling psalm,
And all the sacred knowledge of the saints;

To whom but thee, dear mother, should be told
Of all the wonders I have seen afar?—
Islands more green and suns of brighter gold
Than this dear land or yonder blazing star;
Of hills that bear the fruit-trees on their tops,
And seas that dimple with eternal smiles;
Of airs from heaven that fan the golden crops,
O'er the great ocean 'mid the blessed isles!

Thou knowest, O my mother! how to thee
The blessed Ercus led me when a boy,
And how within thine arms and at thine knee,
I learned the lore that death cannot destroy;
And how I parted hence with bitter tears,
And felt, when turning from thy friendly door,
In the reality of ripening years,
My paradise of childhood was no more.

I wept—but not with sin such tear-drops flow;—
I sighed—for earthly things with heaven entwine;
Tears make the harvest of the heart to grow,
And love though human is almost divine.
The heart that loves not knows not how to pray;
The eye can never smile that never weeps:
'Tis through our sighs hope's kindling sunbeams play
And through our tears the bow of promise peeps.

I grew to manhood by the western wave,
Among the mighty mountains on the shore:
My bed the rock within some natural cave,
My food whate'er the seas or seasons bore:
My occupation, morn and noon and night:
The only dream my hasty slumbers gave,
Was Time's unheeding, unreturning flight,
And the great world that lies beyond the grave.

And thus, where'er I went, all things to me
Assumed the one deep colour of my mind;
Great nature's prayer rose from the murmuring sea,
And sinful man sighed in the wintry wind.
The thick-veiled clouds by shedding many a tear,
Like penitents, grew purified and bright,
And, bravely struggling through earth's atmosphere,
Passed to the regions of eternal light.

I loved to watch the clouds now dark and dun,
In long procession and funereal line,
Pass with slow pace across the glorious sun,
Like hooded monks before a dazzling shrine.
And now with gentler beauty as they rolled
Along the azure vault in gladsome May,
Gleaming pure white, and edged with broidered gold,
Like snowy vestments on the Virgin's day.

And then I saw the mighty sea expand
Like Time's unmeasured and unfathomed waves,
One with its tide-marks on the ridgy sand,
The other with its line of weedy graves;
And as beyond the outstretched wave of time,
The eye of Faith a brighter land may meet,
So did I dream of some more sunny clime
Beyond the waste of waters at my feet.

Some clime where man, unknowing and unknown,
For God's refreshing word still gasps and faints;
Or happier rather some Elysian zone,
Made for the habitation of his saints:

Where Nature's love the sweat of labour spares,
Nor turns to usury the wealth it lends,
Where the rich soil spontaneous harvest bears,
And the tall tree with milk-filled clusters bends.

The thought grew stronger with my growing days,
Even like to manhood's strengthening mind and limb,
And often now amid the purple haze
That evening breathed upon the horizon's rim—
Methought, as there I sought my wished-for home,
I could descry amid the waters green,
Full many a diamond shrine and golden dome,
And crystal palaces of dazzling sheen.

And then I longed, with impotent desire,
Even for the bow whereby the Python bled,
That I might send one dart of living fire
Into that land, before the vision fled,
And thus at length fix thy enchanted shore,
Hy-Brasail, Eden of the western wave!
That thou again wouldst fade away no more,
Buried and lost within thy azure grave.

But angels came and whispered as I dreamt,
“This is no phantom of a frenzied brain—
God shows this land from time to time to tempt
Some daring mariner across the main:
By thee the mighty venture must be made,
By thee shall myriad souls to Christ be won!
Arise, depart, and trust to God for aid!”
I woke, and kneeling, cried, “His will be done!”

Ara of the Saints.

Hearing how blessed Enda lived apart,
Amid the sacred caves of Ara-mhor,
And how beneath his eye, spread like a chart,
Lay all the isles of that remotest shore;

And how he had collected in his mind
All that was known to man of the Old Sea,
I left the Hill of Miracles behind,
And sailed from out the shallow, sandy Leigh.

Betwixt the Samphire Isles swam my light skiff,
And like an arrow flew through Fenor Sound,
Swept by the pleasant strand, and the tall cliff,
Whereon the pale rose amethysts are found.
Rounded Moyferta's rocky point, and crossed
The mouth of stream-streaked Erin's mightiest tide,
Whose troubled waves break o'er the City lost,
Chafed by the marble turrets that they hide.

Beneath Ibrickan's hills, moory and tame,
And Inniscaorach's caves, so wild and dark,
I sailed along. The white-faced otter came,
And gazed in wonder on my floating bark.
The soaring gannet, perched upon my mast,
And the proud bird, that flies but o'er the sea,
Wheeled o'er my head: and the girrinna passed
Upon the branch of some life-giving tree.

Leaving the awful cliffs of Corcomroe,
I sought the rocky eastern isle, that bears
The name of blessed Coemhan, who doth show
Pity unto the storm-tossed seaman's prayers;
Then crossing Bealach-na-fearbach's treacherous sound,
I reached the middle isle, whose citadel
Looks like a monarch from its throne around;
And there I rested by St. Kennerg's well.

Again I sailed, and crossed the stormy sound
That lies beneath Binn-Aite's rocky height—
And there, upon the shore, the Saint I found
Waiting my coming through the tardy night.
He led me to his home beside the wave,
Where, with his monks, the pious father dwelled,
And to my listening ear he freely gave
The sacred knowledge that his bosom held.

When I proclaimed the project that I nursed,
How 'twas for this that I his blessing sought,
An irrepressible cry of joy outburst
From his pure lips, that blessed me for the thought.
He said that he, too, had in visions strayed
Over the untracked ocean's billowy foam;
Bid me have hope, that God would give me aid,
And bring me safe back to my native home.

Oft, as we paced that marble-covered land,
Would blessed Enda tell me wondrous tales—
How, for the children of his love, the hand
Of the Omnipotent Father never fails—
How his own sister, standing by the side
Of the great sea, which bore no human bark,
Spread her light cloak upon the conscious tide,
And sailed thereon securely as an ark.

And how the winds become the willing slaves
Of those who labour in the work of God;
And how Scothinus walked upon the waves,
Which seemed to him the meadow's verdant sod.
How he himself came hither with his flock,
To teach the infidels from Corcomroe,
Upon the floating breast of the hard rock,
Which lay upon the glistening sands below.

But not alone of miracles and joys
Would Enda speak—he told me of his dream;
When blessed Kieran went to Clonmacnois,
To found the sacred churches by the stream—

How he did weep to see the angels flee
Away from Arran as a place accursed;
And men tear up the island-shading tree,
Out of the soil from which it sprung at first.

At length I tore me from the good man's sight,
And o'er Loch Lurgan's mouth took my lone way,
Which, in the sunny morning's golden light,
Shone like the burning lake of Lassaræ;
Now 'neath heaven's frown—and now, beneath its smile—
Borne on the tide, or driven before the gale;
And, as I passed Mac Dara's sacred Isle,
Thrice bowed my mast, and thrice let down my sail.

Westward of Arran as I sailed away;
I saw the fairest sight eye can behold—
Rocks which, illumined by the morning's ray,
Seemed like a glorious city built of gold.
Men moved along each sunny shining street,
Fires seemed to blaze, and curling smoke to rise,
When lo! the city vanished, and a fleet,
With snowy sails, rose on my ravished eyes.

Thus having sought for knowledge and for strength,
For the unheard-of voyage that I planned,
I left these myriad isles, and turned at length
Southward my bark, and sought my native land.
There made I all things ready, day by day,
The wicker-boat, with ox-skins covered o'er—
Chose the good monks companions of my way,
And waited for the wind to leave the shore.

The Voyage.

At length the long-expected morning came,
When from the opening arms of that wild bay,
Beneath the hill that bears my humble name,
Over the waves we took our untracked way;

Sweetly the morning lay on tarn and rill,
Gladly the waves played in its golden light,
And the proud top of the majestic hill
Shone in the azure air, serene and bright.

Over the sea we flew that sunny morn,
Not without natural tears and human sighs:
For who can leave the land where he was born,
And where, perchance, a buried mother lies;
Where all the friends of riper manhood dwell,
And where the playmates of his childhood sleep:
Who can depart, and breathe a cold farewell,
Nor let his eyes their honest tribute weep?

Our little bark, kissing the dimpled smiles
On ocean's cheek, flew like a wanton bird,
And then the land, with all its hundred isles,
Faded away, and yet we spoke no word.
Each silent tongue held converse with the past,
Each moistened eye looked round the circling wave,
And, save the spot where stood our trembling mast,
Saw all things hid within one mighty grave.

We were alone, on the wide watery waste—
Nought broke its bright monotony of blue,
Save where the breeze the flying billows chased,
Or where the clouds their purple shadows threw.
We were alone—the pilgrims of the sea—
One boundless azure desert round us spread;
No hope, no trust, no strength, except in Thee,
Father, who once the pilgrim-people led.

And when the bright-faced sun resigned his throne
Unto the Ethiop queen, who rules the night,
Who, with her pearly crown and starry zone,
Fills the dark dome of heaven with silvery light;—
As on we sailed, beneath her milder sway,
And felt within our hearts her holier power,
We ceased from toil, and humbly knelt to pray,
And hailed with vesper hymns the tranquil hour!

For then, indeed, the vaulted heavens appeared
A fitting shrine to hear their Maker's praise,
Such as no human architect has reared,
Where gems, and gold, and precious marbles blaze.
What earthly temple such a roof can boast?—
What flickering lamp with the rich starlight vies,
When the round moon rests, like the sacred Host,
Upon the azure altar of the skies?

We breathed aloud the Christian's filial prayer,
Which makes us brothers even with the Lord;
Our Father, cried we, in the midnight air,
In heaven and earth be thy great name adored;
May thy bright kingdom, where the angels are,
Replace this fleeting world, so dark and dim.
And then, with eyes fixed on some glorious star,
We sang the Virgin-Mother's vesper hymn!

Hail, brightest star! that o'er life's troubled sea
Shines pitying down from heaven's elysian blue!
Mother and Maid, we fondly look to thee,
Fair gate of bliss, where heaven beams brightly through.
Star of the morning! guide our youthful days,
Shine on our infant steps in life's long race;
Star of the evening! with thy tranquil rays,
Gladden the aged eyes that seek thy face.

Hail, sacred Maid! thou brighter, better Eve,
Take from our eyes the blinding scales of sin;
Within our hearts no selfish poison leave,
For thou the heavenly antidote canst win.
O sacred Mother! 'tis to thee we run—
Poor children, from this world's oppressive strife;
Ask all we need from thy immortal Son,
Who drank of death, that we might taste of life.

Hail, spotless Virgin! mildest, meekest maid—
Hail! purest Pearl that time's great sea hath borne—
May our white souls, in purity arrayed,
Shine, as if they thy vestal robes had worn;

Make our hearts pure, as thou thyself art pure,
Make safe the rugged pathway of our lives,
And make us pass to joys that will endure
When the dark term of mortal life arrives.

'Twas thus, in hymns, and prayers, and holy psalms,
Day tracking day, and night succeeding night,
Now driven by tempests, now delayed by calms,
Along the sea we winged our varied flight.
Oh! how we longed and pined for sight of land!
Oh! how we sighed for the green pleasant fields!
Compared with the cold waves, the barest strand—
The bleakest rock—a crop of comfort yields.

Sometimes, indeed, when the exhausted gale,
In search of rest, beneath the waves would flee,
Like some poor wretch who, when his strength doth fail,
Sinks in the smooth and unsupporting sea:
Then would the Brothers draw from memory's store
Some chapter of life's misery or bliss,
Some trial that some saintly spirit bore,
Or else some tale of passion, such as this:

The Buried City.

Beside that giant stream that foams and swells
Betwixt Hy-Conaill and Moyarta's shore,
And guards the isle where good Senanus dwells,
A gentle maiden dwelt in days of yore.
She long has passed out of Time's aching womb,
And breathes Eternity's favonian air;
Yet fond Tradition lingers o'er her tomb,
And paints her glorious features as they were:—

Her smile was Eden's pure and stainless light,
Which never cloud nor earthly vapour mars;
Her lustrous eyes were like the noon of night—
Black, but yet brightened by a thousand stars;
Her tender form, moulded in modest grace,
Shrank from the gazer's eye, and moved apart;
Heaven shone reflected in her angel face,
And God reposed within her virgin heart.

She dwelt in green Moyarta's pleasant land,
Beneath the graceful hills of Clonderlaw,—
Sweet sunny hills, whose triple summits stand,
One vast tiara over stream and shaw.
Almost in solitude the maiden grew,
And reached her early budding woman's prime;
And all so noiselessly the swift time flew,
She knew not of the name or flight of Time.

And thus, within her modest mountain nest,
This gentle maiden nestled like a dove,
Offering to God from her pure innocent breast
The sweet and silent incense of her love.
No selfish feeling nor presumptuous pride
In her calm bosom waged unnatural strife;
Saint of her home and hearth, she sanctified
The thousand trivial common cares of life.

Upon the opposite shore there dwelt a youth,
Whose nature's woof was woven of good and ill—
Whose stream of life flowed to the sea of truth,
But in a devious course, round many a hill—
Now lingering through a valley of delight,
Where sweet flowers bloomed, and summer songbirds sung,
Now hurled along the dark, tempestuous night,
With gloomy, treeless mountains overhung.

He sought the soul of Beauty throughout space,
Knowledge he tracked through many a vanished age:
For one he scanned fair Nature's radiant face,
And for the other, Learning's shrivelled page.

If Beauty sent some fair apostle down,
Or Knowledge some great teacher of her lore,
Bearing the wreath of rapture and the crown,
He knelt to love, to learn, and to adore.

Full many a time he spread his little sail,
How rough the river, or how dark the skies,
Gave his light corrach to the angry gale,
And crossed the stream to gaze on Ethna's eyes.
As yet 'twas worship, more than human love,
That hopeless adoration that we pay
Unto some glorious planet throned above,
Though severed from its crystal sphere for aye.

But warmer love an easy conquest won,
The more he came to green Moyarta's bowers;
Even as the earth, by gazing on the sun,
In summer-time puts forth her myriad flowers.
The yearnings of his heart—vague, undefined—
Wakened and solaced by ideal gleams,
Took everlasting shape, and intertwined
Around this incarnation of his dreams.

Some strange fatality restrained his tongue—
He spoke not of the love that filled his breast;
The thread of hope, on which his whole life hung,
Was far too weak to bear so strong a test.
He trusted to the future—time, or chance—
His constant homage and assiduous care;
Preferred to dream, and lengthen out his trance,
Rather than wake to knowledge and despair.

And thus she knew not, when the youth would look
Upon some pictured chronicle of eld,
In every blazoned letter of the book
One fairest face was all that he beheld:
And where the limner, with consummate art,
Drew flowing lines and quaint devices rare,
The wildered youth, by looking from the heart,
Saw nought but lustrous eyes and waving hair.

He soon was startled from his dreams, for now—
'Twas said, obedient to a heavenly call—
His life of life would take the vestal vow,
In one short month, within a convent's wall.
He heard the tidings with a sickening fear,
But quickly had the sudden faintness flown,
And vowed, though heaven or hell should interfere,
Ethna—his Ethna—should be his alone!

He sought his boat, and snatched the feathery oar—
It was the first and brightest morn of May:
The white-winged clouds, that sought the northern shore,
Seemed but Love's guides, to point him out the way.
The great old river heaved its mighty heart,
And, with a solemn sigh, went calmly on;
As if of all his griefs it felt a part,
But knew they should be borne, and so had gone.

Slowly his boat the languid breeze obeyed,
Although the stream that that light burden bore
Was like the level path the angels made,
Through the rough sea, to Arran's blessed shore;
And from the rosy clouds the light airs fanned,
And from the rich reflection that they gave,
Like good Scothinus, had he reached his hand,
He might have plucked a garland from the wave.

And now the noon in purple splendour blazed,
The gorgeous clouds in slow procession filed;
The youth leaned o'er with listless eyes and gazed
Down through the waves on which the blue heavens smiled:
What sudden fear his gasping breath doth drown!
What hidden wonder fires his startled eyes!
Down in the deep, full many a fathom down,
A great and glorious city buried lies.

Not like those villages with rude-built walls,
That raise their humble roofs round every coast,
But holding marble basilics and halls,
Such as imperial Rome herself might boast.

There was the palace and the poor man's home,
And upstart glitter and old-fashioned gloom,
The spacious porch, the nicely rounded dome,
The hero's column, and the martyr's tomb.

There was the cromleach with its circling stones;
There the green rath and the round narrow tower;
There was the prison whence the captive's groans
Had many a time moaned in the midnight hour.
Beneath the graceful arch the river flowed,
Around the walls the sparkling waters ran,
The golden chariot rolled along the road—
All, all was there except the face of man.

The wondering youth had neither thought nor word,
He felt alone the power and will to die;
His little bark seemed like an outstretched bird,
Floating along that city's azure sky.
It joyed that youth the battle's storm to brave,
And yet he would have perished with affright,
Had not the breeze, rippling the lucid wave,
Concealed the buried city from his sight.

He reached the shore; the rumour was too true—
Ethna—his Ethna—would be God's alone
In one brief month; for which the maid withdrew,
To seek for strength before his blessed throne.
Was it the fire that on his bosom preyed,
Or the temptation of the Fiend abhorred,
That made him vow to snatch the white-veiled maid
Even from the very altar of her Lord?

The first of June, that festival of flowers,
Came, like a goddess, o'er the meadows green!
And all the children of the spring-tide showers
Rose from their grassy beds to hail their Queen.
A song of joy, a pæan of delight,
Rose from the myriad life in the tall grass,
When the young Dawn, fresh from the sleep of night,
Glanced at her blushing face in Ocean's glass.

Ethna awoke—a second—brighter dawn—
Her mother's fondling voice breathed in her ear;
Quick from her couch she started, as a fawn
Bounds from the heather when her dam is near.
Each clasped the other in a long embrace—
Each knew the other's heart did beat and bleed—
Each kissed the warm tears from the other's face,
And gave the consolation she did need.

Oh! bitterest sacrifice the heart can make—
That of a mother of her darling child—
That of a child, who, for her Saviour's sake,
Leaves the fond face that o'er her cradle smiled.
They who may think that God doth never need
So great, so sad a sacrifice as this,
While they take glory in their easier creed,
Will feel and own the sacrifice it is.

All is prepared—the sisters in the choir—
The mitred abbot on his crimson throne—
The waxen tapers, with their pallid fire
Poured o'er the sacred cup and altar-stone—
The upturned eyes, glistening with pious tears—
The censer's fragrant vapour floating o'er;
Now all is hushed, for, lo! the maid appears,
Entering with solemn step the sacred door.

She moved as moves the moon, radiant and pale,
Through the calm night, wrapped in a silvery cloud;
The jewels of her dress shone through her veil,
As shine the stars through their thin vaporous shroud;
The brighter jewels of her eyes were hid
Beneath their smooth white caskets arching o'er,
Which, by the trembling of each ivory lid,
Seemed conscious of the treasures that they bore.

She reached the narrow porch and the tall door,
Her trembling foot upon the sill was placed—
Her snowy veil swept the smooth-sanded floor—
Her cold hands chilled the bosom they embraced.

Who is this youth, whose forehead, like a book,
Bears many a deep-traced character of pain?
Who looks for pardon as the damned may look—
That ever pray, and know they pray in vain.

'Tis he, the wretched youth—the Demon's prey;
One sudden bound, and he is at her side—
One piercing shriek, and she has swooned away,
Dim are her eyes, and cold her heart's warm tide.
Horror and terror seize the startled crowd;
Their sinewy hands are nerveless with affright;
When, as the wind beareth a summer cloud,
The youth bears off the maiden from their sight.

Close to the place the stream rushed roaring by,
His little boat lay moored beneath the bank,
Hid from the shore, and from the gazer's eye,
By waving reeds and water-willows dank.
Hither, with flying feet and glowing brow,
He fled, as quick as fancies in a dream—
Placed the insensate maiden in the prow—
Pushed from the shore, and gained the open stream.

Scarce had he left the river's foamy edge,
When sudden darkness fell on hill and plain;
The angry sun, shocked at the sacrilege,
Fled from the heavens with all his golden train;
The stream rushed quicker, like a man afeared;
Down swept the storm and clove its breast of green,
And though the calm and brightness reappeared
The youth and maiden never more were seen.

Whether the current in its strong arms bore
Their bark to green Hy-Brasail's fairy halls,
Or whether, as is told along that shore,
They sunk within the buried city's walls;
Whether through some Elysian clime they stray,
Or o'er their whitened bones the river rolls;—
Whate'er their fate, my brothers, let us pray
To God for peace and pardon to their souls.

Such was the brother's tale of earthly love—
He ceased, and sadly bowed his reverend head:
For us, we wept, and raised our eyes above,
And sang the De Profundis for the dead.
A freshening breeze played on our moistened cheeks,
The far horizon oped its walls of light,
And lo! with purple hills and sun-bright peaks
A glorious isle gleamed on our gladdened sight,

The Paradise of Birds.

“Post resurrectionis diem dominicæ navigabitis ad altam insulam ad occidentalem plagam, quæ vocatur Paradisi Avium.”—“Life of St. Brendan,” in Capgrave, fol. 45.

It was the fairest and the sweetest scene—
The freshest, sunniest, smiling land that e'er
Held o'er the waves its arms of sheltering green
Unto the sea and storm-vexed mariner:—
No barren waste its gentle bosom scarred,
Nor suns that burn, nor breezes winged with ice,
Nor jagged rocks (Nature's grey ruins) marred
The perfect features of that Paradise.

The verdant turf spreads from the crystal marge
Of the clear stream, up the soft-swelling hill,
Rose-bearing shrubs and stately cedars large
All o'er the land the pleasant prospect fill.
Unnumbered birds their glorious colours fling
Among the boughs that rustle in the breeze,
As if the meadow-flowers had taken wing
And settled on the green o'er-arching trees.

Oh! Ita, Ita, 'tis a grievous wrong,
That man commits who uninspired presumes
To sing the heavenly sweetness of their song—
To paint the glorious tinting of their plumes—
Plumes bright as jewels that from diadems
Fling over golden thrones their diamond rays—
Bright, even as bright as those three mystic gems,
The angels bore thee in thy childhood's days.

100

There dwells the bird that to the farther west
Bears the sweet message of the coming spring;
June's blushing roses paint his prophet breast,
And summer skies gleam from his azure wing.
While winter prowls around the neighbouring seas,
The happy bird dwells in his cedar nest,
Then flies away, and leaves his favourite trees
Unto his brother of the graceful crest.

Birds that with us are clothed in modest brown,
There wear a splendour words cannot express;
The sweet-voiced thrush beareth a golden crown,
And even the sparrow boasts a scarlet dress.
There partial nature fondles and illumes
The plainest offspring that her bosom bears;
The golden robin flies on fiery plumes,
And the small wren a purple ruby wears.

Birds, too, that even in our sunniest hours,
Ne'er to this cloudy land one moment stray,
Whose brilliant plumes, fleeting and fair as flowers,
Come with the flowers, and with the flowers decay.
The Indian bird, with hundred eyes, that throws
From his blue neck the azure of the skies,
And his pale brother of the northern snows,
Bearing white plumes, mirrored with brilliant eyes.

Oft in the sunny mornings have I seen
Bright-yellow birds, of a rich lemon hue,
Meeting in crowds upon the branches green,
And sweetly singing all the morning through.

101

And others, with their heads greyish and dark,
Pressing their cinnamon cheeks to the old trees,
And striking on the hard, rough, shrivelled bark,
Like conscience on a bosom ill at ease.

And diamond birds chirping their single notes,
Now 'mid the trumpet-flower's deep blossoms seen,
Now floating brightly on with fiery throats,
Small-winged emeralds of golden green;
And other larger birds with orange cheeks,
A many-colour-painted chattering crowd,
Prattling for ever with their curved beaks,
And through the silent woods screaming aloud.

Colour and form may be conveyed in words,
But words are weak to tell the heavenly strains
That from the throats of these celestial birds
Rang through the woods and o'er the echoing plains.
There was the meadow-lark, with voice as sweet,
But robed in richer raiment than our own;
And as the moon smiled on his green retreat,
The painted nightingale sang out alone.

Words cannot echo music's winged note,
One bird alone exhausts their utmost power;
'Tis that strange bird whose many-voicéd throat
Mocks all his brethren of the woodland bower;
To whom indeed the gift of tongues is given,
The musical rich tongues that fill the grove,
Now like the lark dropping his notes from heaven,
Now cooing the soft earth-notes of the dove.

Oft have I seen him, scorning all control,
Winging his arrowy flight rapid and strong,
As if in search of his evanished soul,
Lost in the gushing ecstasy of song;

102

And as I wandered on, and upward gazed,
Half lost in admiration, half in fear,
I left the brothers wondering and amazed,
Thinking that all the choir of heaven was near.

Was it a revelation or a dream?—
That these bright birds as angels once did dwell
In heaven with starry Lucifer supreme,
Half sinned with him, and with him partly fell;
That in this lesser paradise they stray.
Float through its air, and glide its streams along,
And that the strains they sing each happy day
Rise up to God like morn and even song.

The Promised Land.

As on this world the young man turns his eyes,
When forced to try the dark sea of the grave,
Thus did we gaze upon that Paradise,
Fading, as we were borne across the wave.
And, as a brighter world dawns by degrees
Upon Eternity's serenest strand,
Thus, having passed through dark and gloomy seas,
At length we reached the long-sought Promised Land.

The wind had died upon the Ocean's breast,
When, like a silvery vein through the dark ore,
A smooth bright current, gliding to the west,
Bore our light bark to that enchanted shore.
It was a lovely plain—spacious and fair,
And bless'd with all delights that earth can hold,
Celestial odours filled the fragrant air
That breathed around that green and pleasant wold.

103

There may not rage of frost, nor snow, nor rain,
Injure the smallest and most delicate flower,
Nor fall of hail wound the fair, healthful plain,
Nor the warm weather, nor the winter's shower.
That noble land is all with blossoms flowered,
Shed by the summer breezes as they pass;
Less leaves than blossoms on the trees are showered,
And flowers grow thicker in the fields than grass.

Nor hills, nor mountains, there stand high and steep,
Nor stony cliffs tower o'er the frightened waves,
Nor hollow dells, where stagnant waters sleep,
Nor hilly risings, nor dark mountain caves;
Nothing deformed upon its bosom lies,
Nor on its level breast rests aught unsmooth,
But the noble field flourishes 'neath the skies,
Blooming for ever in perpetual youth.

That glorious land stands higher o'er the sea,
By twelve-fold fathom measure, than we deem
The highest hills beneath the heavens to be.
There the bower glitters, and the green woods gleam.
All o'er that pleasant plain, calm and serene,
The fruits ne'er fall, but, hung by God's own hand,
Cling to the trees that stand for ever green,
Obedient to their Maker's first command.

Summer and winter are the woods the same,
Hung with bright fruits and leaves that never fade;
Such will they be, beyond the reach of flame,
Till Heaven, and Earth, and Time, shall have decayed.
Here might Iduna in her fond pursuit,
As fabled by the northern sea-born men,
Gather her golden and immortal fruit,
That brings their youth back to the gods again.

Of old, when God, to punish sinful pride,
Sent round the deluged world the ocean flood,
When all the earth lay 'neath the vengeful tide,
This glorious land above the waters stood.

104

Such shall it be at last, even as at first,
Until the coming of the final doom,
When the dark chambers—men's death homes shall burst,
And man shall rise to judgment from the tomb.

There there is never enmity, nor rage,
Nor poisoned calumny, nor envy's breath,
Nor shivering poverty, nor decrepit age,
Nor loss of vigour, nor the narrow death;
Nor idiot laughter, nor the tears men weep,
Nor painful exile from one's native soil,
Nor sin, nor pain, nor weariness, nor sleep,
Nor lust of riches, nor the poor man's toil.

There never falls the rain-cloud as with us,
Nor gapes the earth with the dry summer's thirst,
But liquid streams, wondrously curious,
Out of the ground with fresh fair bubbling burst.
Sea-cold and bright the pleasant waters glide
Over the soil, and through the shady bowers;
Flowers fling their coloured radiance o'er the tide,
And the bright streams their crystal o'er the flowers.

Such was the land for man's enjoyment made,
When from this troubled life his soul doth wend:
Such was the land through which entranced we strayed,
For fifteen days, nor reached its bound nor end.
Onward we wandered in a blissful dream,
Nor thought of food, nor needed earthly rest;
Until, at length, we reached a mighty stream,
Whose broad bright waves flowed from the east to west.

We were about to cross its placid tide,
When, lo! an angel on our vision broke,
Clothed in white, upon the further side
He stood majestic, and thus sweetly spoke:

105

“Father, return, thy mission now is o'er;
God, who did call thee here, now bids thee go,
Return in peace unto thy native shore,
And tell the mighty secrets thou dost know.

“In after years, in God's own fitting time,
This pleasant land again shall re-appear;
And other men shall preach the truths sublime,
To the benighted people dwelling here.
But ere that hour this land shall all be made,
For mortal man, a fitting, natural home,
Then shall the giant mountain fling its shade,
And the strong rock stem the white torrent's foam.

“Seek thy own isle—Christ's newly-bought domain,
Which Nature with an emerald pencil paints:
Such as it is, long, long shall it remain,
The school of Truth, the College of the Saints,
The student's bower, the hermit's calm retreat,
The stranger's home, the hospitable hearth,
The shrine to which shall wander pilgrim feet
From all the neighbouring nations of the earth.

“But in the end upon that land shall fall
A bitter scourge, a lasting flood of tears,
When ruthless tyranny shall level all
The pious trophies of its early years:
Then shall this land prove thy poor country's friend,
And shine a second Eden in the west;
Then shall this shore its friendly arms extend,
And clasp the outcast exile to its breast.”

He ceased and vanished from our dazzled sight,
While harps and sacred hymns rang sweetly o'er
For us again we winged our homeward flight
O'er the great ocean to our native shore;
And as a proof of God's protecting hand,
And of the wondrous tidings that we bear,
The fragrant perfume of that heavenly land
Clings to the very garments that we wear.

So called from the number of holy men and women formerly inhabiting it.

The Atlantic was so named by the ancient Irish.

Ardfert.

The puffin (anas leucopsis), called in Irish girrinna. It was the popular belief that these birds grew out of driftwood.

St. Fanchea.

Galway Bay.

These stanzas are a paraphrase of the hymn “Ave Maris Stella.”

An angel was said to have presented her with three precious stones, which, he explained, were emblematic of the Blessed Trinity, by whom she would be always visited and proteeted.

The blue bird.

The cedar bird.

The golden-crowned thrush.

The scarlet sparrow or tanagar.

The Baltimore driole or fire-bird.

The ruby-crowned wren.

Peacocks.

The white peacock.

The yellow bird or goldfinch.

The gold-winged woodpecker.

Humming birds.

The Carolina parrot.

The grosbeak or red bird, sometimes called the Virginian nightingale.

The mocking-bird.

See the “Lyfe of Saynt Brandon” in the Golden Legend, published by Wynkyn de Worde, 1483; fol. 357.

“Nonne cognoscitis in odore vestimentorum nostrorum quod in Paradiso Domini fuimus.”—Colgan.

106

THE FORAY OF CON O'DONNELL.

a. d. 1495.

107

The evening shadows sweetly fall
Along the hills of Donegal,
Sweetly the rising moonbeams play
Along the shores of Inver Bay,
As smooth and white Lough Eask expands
As Rosapenna's silvery sands,
And quiet reigns all o'er thy fields,
Clan Dalaigh of the golden shields.

The fairy gun is heard no more
To boom within the cavern'd shore,
With smoother roll the torrents flow
Adown the rocks of Assaroe;
Securely, till the coming day,
The red deer couch in far Glenvay,
And all is peace and calm around
O'Donnell's castled moat and mound.

But in the hall there feast to-night
Full many a kern and many a knight,
And gentle dames, and clansmen strong,
And wandering bards, with store of song:
The board is piled with smoking kine,
And smooth bright cups of Spanish wine,
And fish and fowl from stream and shaw,
And fragrant mead and usquebaugh.

108

The chief is at the table's head—
'Tis Con, the son of Hugh the Red—
The heir of Conal Golban's line;
With pleasure flushed, with pride and wine,
He cries, “Our dames adjudge it wrong,
To end our feast without the song;
Have we no bard the strain to raise?
No foe to taunt, no maid to praise?

“Where beauty dwells the bard should dwell,
What sweet lips speak the bard should tell;
'Tis he should look for starry eyes,
And tell love's watchers where they rise:
To-night, if lips and eyes could do,
Bards were not wanting in Tirhugh;
For where have lips a rosier light,
And where are eyes more starry bright?”

Then young hearts beat along the board,
To praise the maid that each adored,
And lips as young would fain disclose
The love within; but one arose,
Gray as the rocks beside the main,—
Gray as the mist upon the plain,—
A thoughtful, wandering, minstrel man,
And thus the aged bard began:—

“O Con, benevolent hand of peace!
O tower of valour firm and true!
Like mountain fawns, like snowy fleece,
Move the sweet maidens of Tirhugh.
Yet though through all thy realm I've strayed,
Where green hills rise and white waves fall,
I have not seen so fair a maid
As once I saw by Cushendall.

109

“O Con, thou hospitable Prince!
Thou, of the open heart and hand,
Full oft I've seen the crimson tints
Of evening on the western land.
I've wandered north, I've wandered south,
Throughout Tirhugh in hut and hall,
But never saw so sweet a mouth
As whispered love by Cushendall.

“O Con, munificent in gifts!
I've seen the full round harvest moon
Gleam through the shadowy autumn drifts
Upon thy royal rock of Doune.
I've seen the stars that glittering lie
O'er all the night's dark mourning pall,
But never saw so bright an eye
As lit the glens of Cushendall.

“I've wandered with a pleasant toil,
And still I wander in my dreams;
Even from thy white-stoned beach, Loch Foyle,
To Desmond of the flowing streams.
I've crossed the fair green plains of Meath,
To Dublin, held in Saxon thrall;
But never saw such pearly teeth,
As her's that smiled by Cushendall.

“O Con! thou'rt rich in yellow gold,
Thy fields are filled with lowing kine,
Within thy castles wealth untold,
Within thy harbours fleets of wine;
But yield not, Con, to worldly pride,
Thou may'st be rich, but hast not all;
Far richer he who for his bride
Has won fair Anne of Cushendall.

110

“She leans upon a husband's arm,
Surrounded by a valiant clan,
In Antrim's Glynnes, by fair Glenarm,
Beyond the pearly-paven Bann;
'Mid hazel woods no stately tree
Looks up to heaven more graceful-tall,
When summer clothes its boughs, than she,
Mac Donnell's wife of Cushendall!”

The bard retires amid the throng,
No sweet applause rewards his song,
No friendly lip that guerdon breathes,
To bard more sweet than golden wreaths.
It might have been the minstrel's art
Had lost the power to move the heart,
It might have been his harp had grown
Too old to yield its wonted tone.

But no, if hearts were cold and hard,
'Twas not the fault of harp or bard;
It was no false or broken sound
That failed to move the clansmen round.
Not these the men, nor these the times,
To nicely weigh the worth of rhymes;
'Twas what he said that made them chill,
And not his singing well or ill.

Already had the stranger band
Of Saxons swept the weakened land,
Already on the neighbouring hills
They named anew a thousand rills,
“Our fairest castles,” pondered Con,
“Already to the foe are gone,
Our noblest forests feed the flame,
And now we lose our fairest dame.”

But though his cheek was white with rage,
He seemed to smile, and cried—“O Sage!
O honey-spoken bard of truth!
Mac Donnell is a valiant youth.

111

We long have been the Saxon's prey—
Why not the Scot as well as they?
He's of as good a robber line
As any Burke or Geraldine.

“From Insi Gall, so speaketh fame,
From Insi Gall his people came;
From Insi Gall, where storm winds roar
Beyond gray Albin's icy shore.
His grandsire and his grandsire's son,
Full soon fat herds and pastures won;
But, by Columba! were we men,
We'd send the whole brood back again!

“Oh! had we iron hands to dare,
As we have waxen hearts to bear,
Oh! had we manly blood to shed,
Or even to tinge our cheeks with red,
No bard could say as you have said,
One of the race of Somerled—
A base intruder from the Isles—
Basks in our island's sunniest smiles!

“But, not to mar our feast to-night
With what to-morrow's sword may right,
O Bard of many songs! again
Awake thy sweet harp's silvery strain.
If beauty decks with peerless charm
Mac Donnell's wife in fair Glenarm,
Say does there bound in Antrim's meads
A steed to match O'Donnell's steeds?”

Submissive doth the bard incline
His reverend head, and cries, “O Con,
Thou heir of Conal Golban's line,
I've sang the fair wife of Mac John;
You'll frown again as late you frowned,
But truth will out when lips are freed;
There's not a steed on Irish ground
To stand beside Mac Donnell's steed!

112

“Thy horses bound o'er Eargals' plains,
Like meteor stars their red eyes gleam;
With silver hoofs and broidered reins,
They mount the hill and swim the stream;
But like the wind through Barnesmore,
Or white-maned wave through Carrig-Rede,
Or like a sea-bird to the shore,
Thus swiftly sweeps Mac Donnell's steed!

“A thousand graceful steeds had Fin,
Within lost Almhaim's fairy hall,
A thousand steeds as sleek of skin
As ever graced a chieftain's stall.
With gilded bridles oft they flew,
Young eagles in their lightning speed,
Strong as the cataract of Hugh,
So swift and strong Mac Donnell's steed!”

Without the hearty word of praise,
Without the kindly smiling gaze,
Without the friendly hand to greet,
The daring bard resumes his seat.
Even in the hospitable face
Of Con, the anger you could trace.
But generous Con his wrath suppressed,
For Owen was Clan Dalaigh's guest.

“Now, by Columba!” Con exclaimed,
“Methinks this Scot should be ashamed
To snatch at once, in sateless greed,
The fairest maid and finest steed;
My realm is dwindled in mine eyes,
I know not what to praise or prize,
And even my noble dog, O Bard,
Now seems unworthy my regard!”

113

“When comes the raven of the sea
To nestle on an alien strand,
Oh! ever, ever will he be
The master of the subject land.
The fairest dame, he holdeth her—
For him the noblest steed doth bound—;
Your dog is but a household cur,
Compared to John Mac Donnell's hound!

“As fly the shadows o'er the grass,
He flies with step as light and sure,
He hunts the wolf through Trosstan pass,
And starts the deer by Lisànoure!
The music of the Sabbath bells,
O Con, has not a sweeter sound
Than when along the valley swells
The cry of John Mac Donnell's hound.

“His stature tall, his body long,
His back like night, his breast like snow,
His fore-leg pillar-like and strong,
His hind-leg like a bended bow;
Rough, curling hair, head long and thin,
His ear a leaf so small and round:
Not Bran, the favourite hound of Fin,
Could rival John Mac Donnell's hound.

O Con! thy bard will sing no more,
There is a fearful time at hand;
The Scot is on the northern shore,
The Saxon in the eastern land;
The hour comes on with quicker flight,
When all who live on Irish ground
Must render to the stranger's might
Both maid and wife, and steed and hound!”

The trembling bard again retires,
But now he lights a thousand fires;
The pent-up flame bursts out at length,
In all its burning, tameless strength.

114

You'd think each clansman's foe was by,
So sternly flashed each angry eye;
You'd think 'twas in the battle's clang
O'Donnell's thundering accents rang!

“No! by my sainted kinsman, no!
This foul disgrace must not be so;
No, by the Shrines of Hy, I've sworn,
This foulest wrong must not be borne.
A better steed!—a fairer wife!
Was ever truer cause of strife?
A swifter hound!—a better steed!
Columba! these are cause indeed!”

Again, like spray from mountain rill,
Up started Con: “By Collum Kille,
And by the blessed light of day,
This matter brooketh no delay.
The moon is down, the morn is up,
Come, kinsmen, drain a parting cup,
And swear to hold our next carouse,
With John Mac John Mac Donnell's spouse!

“We've heard the song the bard has sung,
And as a healing herb among
Most poisonous weeds may oft be found,
So of this woman, steed, and hound;
The song has burned into our hearts,
And yet a lesson it imparts,
Had we but sense to read aright
The galling words we heard to-night.

“What lesson does the good hound teach?
Oh, to be faithful each to each
What lesson gives the noble steed?
Oh! to be swift in thought and deed!
What lesson gives the peerless wife?
Oh! there is victory after strife;
Sweet is the triumph, rich the spoil,
Pleasant the slumber after toil!”

115

They drain the cup, they leave the hall,
They seek the armoury and stall,
The shield re-echoing to the spear
Proclaims the foray far and near;
And soon around the castle gate
Full sixty steeds impatient wait,
And every steed a knight upon,
The strong, small-powerful force of Con!

Their lances in the red dawn flash,
As down by Easky's side they dash;
Their quilted jackets shine the more,
From gilded leather broidered o'er;
With silver spurs, and silken rein,
And costly riding-shoes from Spain;
Ah! much thou hast to fear, Mac John,
The strong, small-powerful force of Con!

As borne upon autumnal gales,
Wild whirring gannets pierce the sails
Of barks that sweep by Arran's shore,
Thus swept the train through Barnesmore.
Through many a varied scene they ran,
By Castle Fin, and fair Strabane,
By many a hill, and many a clan,
Across the Foyle and o'er the Bann:—

Then stopping in their eagle flight,
They waited for the coming night,
And then, as Antrim's rivers rush
Straight from their founts with sudden gush,
Nor turn their strong, brief streams aside,
Until the sea receives their tide;
Thus rushed upon the doomed Mac John
The swift, small-powerful force of Con.

116

They took the castle by surprise,
No star was in the angry skies,
The moon lay dead within her shroud
Of thickly-folded ashen cloud;
They found the steed within his stall,
The hound within the oaken hall,
The peerless wife of thousand charms,
Within her slumbering husband's arms

The bard had pictured to the life
The beauty of Mac Donnell's wife;
Not Evir could with her compare
For snowy hand and shining hair;
The glorious banner morn unfurls
Were dark beside her golden curls;
And yet the blackness of her eye
Was darker than the moonless sky!

If lovers listen to my lay,
Description is but thrown away;
If lovers read this antique tale,
What need I speak of red or pale?
The fairest form and brightest eye
Are simply those for which they sigh
The truest picture is but faint
To what a lover's heart can paint.

Well, she was fair, and Con was bold,
But in the strange, wild days of old;
To one rough hand was oft decreed
The noblest and the blackest deed.
'Twas pride that spurred O'Donnell on,
But still a generous heart had Con;
He wished to show that he was strong,
And not to do a bootless wrong.

117

But now there's neither thought nor time
For generous act or bootless crime;
For other cares the thoughts demand
Of the small-powerful victor band.
They tramp along the old oak floors.
They burst the strong-bound chamber doors;
In all the pride of lawless power,
Some seek the vault, and some the tower.

And some from out the postern pass,
And find upon the dew-wet grass
Full many a head of dappled deer,
And many a full-ey'd brown-back'd steer,
And heifers of the fragrant skins,
The pride of Antrim's grassy glynns,
Which with their spears they drive along,
A numerous, startled, bellowing throng.

They leave the castle stripped and bare,
Each has his labour, each his share;
For some have cups, and some have plate,
And some have scarlet cloaks of state,
And some have wine, and some have ale,
And some have coats of iron mail,
And some have helms, and some have spears,
And all have lowing cows and steers!

Away! away! the morning breaks
O'er Antrim's hundred hills and lakes;
Away! away! the dawn begins
To gild gray Antrim's deepest glynns;
The rosy steeds of morning stop,
As if to gaze on Collin top;
Ere they have left it bare and gray,
O'Donnell must be far away!

The chieftain on a raven steed,
Himself the peerless dame doth lead,
Now like a pallid, icy corse,
And lifts her on her husband's horse;
His left hand holds his captive's rein,
His right is on his black steed's mane,

118

And from the bridle to the ground
Hangs the long leash that binds the hound.

And thus before his victor clan,
Rides Con O'Donnell in the van;
Upon his left the drooping dame,
Upon his right, in wrath and shame,
With one hand free and one hand tied,
And eyes firm fixed upon his bride,
Vowing dread vengeance yet on Con,
Rides scowling, silent, stern Mac John.

They move with steps as swift as still,
'Twixt Collin mount and Slemish hill,
They glide along the misty plain,
And ford the sullen muttering Maine;
Some drive the cattle o'er the hills,
And some along the dried-up rills;
But still a strong force doth surround
The chiefs, the dame, the steed, and hound.

Thus ere the bright-faced day arose,
The Bann lay broad between the foes.
But how to paint the inward scorn,
The self-reproach of those that morn,
Who waking found their chieftain gone,
The cattle swept from field and bawn,
Their chieftain's castle stormed and drained,
And, worse than all, their honour stained!

But when the women heard that Anne,
The queen, the glory of the clan
Was carried off by midnight foes,
Heavens! such despairing screams arose,
Such shrieks of agony and fright,
As only can be heard at night,
When Clough-i-Stookan's mystic rock
The wail of drowning men doth mock.

119

But thirty steeds are in the town,
And some are like the ripe heath, brown,
Some like the alder-berries, black,
Some like the vessel's foamy track;
But be they black, or brown, or white,
They are as swift as fawns in flight,
No quicker speed the seagull hath
When sailing through the Gray Man's Path.

Soon are they saddled, soon they stand,
Ready to own the rider's hand,
Ready to dash with loosened rein
Up the steep hill, and o'er the plain;
Ready, without the prick of spurs,
To strike the gold cups from the furze:
And now they start with wingéd pace,
God speed them in their noble chase!

By this time, on Ben Bradagh's height,
Brave Con had rested in his flight,
Beneath him, in the horizon's blue,
Lay his own valleys of Tirhugh.
It may have been the thought of home,
While resting on that mossy dome,
It may have been his native trees
That woke his mind to thoughts like these.

“The race is o'er, the spoil is won,
And yet what boots it all I've done?
What boots it to have snatched away
This steed, and hound, and cattle-prey?
What boots it, with an iron hand
To tear a chieftain from his land,
And dim that sweetest light that lies
In a fond wife's adoring eyes?

“If thus I madly teach my clan,
What can I hope from beast or man?

120

Fidelity a crime is found,
Or else why chain this faithful hound?
Obedience, too, a crime must be,
Or else this steed were roaming free;
And woman's love the worst of sins,
Or Anne were queen of Antrim's Glynnes!

“If, when I reach my home to-night,
I see the yellow moonbeam's light
Gleam through the broken gate and wall
Of my strong fort of Donegal;
If I behold my kinsmen slain,
My barns devoid of golden grain,
How can I curse the pirate crew
For doing what this hour I do?

“Well, in Columba's blessed name,
This day shall be a day of fame,—
A day when Con in victory's hour
Gave up the untasted sweets of power;
Gave up the fairest dame on earth,
The noblest steed that e'er wore girth,
The noblest hound of Irish breed,
And all to do a generous deed.”

He turned and loosed Mac Donnell's hand,
And led him where his steed doth stand;
He placed the bride of peerless charms
Within his longing, outstretched arms;
He freed the hound from chain and band,
Which, leaping, licked his master's hand;
And thus, while wonder held the crowd,
The generous chieftain spoke aloud:—

“Mac John, I heard in wrathful hour
That thou in Antrim's glynnes possessed
The fairest pearl, the sweetest flower
That ever bloomed on Erin's breast.
I burned to think such prize should fall
To any Scotch or Saxon man,
But find that Nature makes us all
The children of one world-spread clan.

121

“Within thy arms thou now dost hold
A treasure of more worth and cost
Than all the thrones and crowns of gold
That valour ever won or lost;
Thine is that outward perfect form,
Thine, too, the subtler inner life,
The love that doth that bright shape warm:
Take back, Mac John, thy peerless wife!

“They praised thy steed. With wrath and grief
I felt my heart within me bleed,
That any but an Irish chief
Should press the back of such a steed;
I might to yonder smiling land
The noble beast reluctant lead;
But, no!—he'd miss thy guiding hand—
Take back, Mac John, thy noble steed.

“The praises of thy matchless hound,
Burned in my breast like acrid wine;
I swore no chief on Irish ground
Should own a nobler hound than mine;
'Twas rashly sworn, and must not be,
He'd pine to hear the well-known sound,
With which thou call'st him to thy knee,
Take back, Mac John, thy matchless hound.

“Mac John, I stretch to yours and you
This hand beneath God's blessed sun,
And for the wrong that I might do,
Forgive the wrong that I have done;
To-morrow all that we have ta'en
Shall doubly, trebly be restored:
The cattle to the grassy plain,
The goblets to the oaken board.

“My people from our richest meads
Shall drive the best our broad lands hold
For every steed a hundred steeds,
For every steer a hundred-fold;

122

For every scarlet cloak of state
A hundred cloaks all stiff with gold;
And may we be with hearts elate
Still older friends as we grow old.

“Thou'st bravely won an Irish bride—
An Irish bride of grace and worth—
Oh! let the Irish nature glide
Into thy heart from this hour forth;
An Irish home thy sword has won,
A new-found mother blessed the strife;
Oh! be that mother's fondest son,
And love the land that gives you life!

“Betwixt the Isles and Antrim's coast,
The Scotch and Irish waters blend;
But who shall tell, with idle boast,
Where one begins and one doth end?
Ah! when shall that glad moment gleam,
When all our hearts such spell shall feel?
And blend in one broad Irish stream,
On Irish ground for Ireland's weal?

“Love the dear land in which you live,
Live in the land you ought to love;
Take root, and let your branches give
Fruits to the soil they wave above;
No matter for your foreign name,
No matter what your sires have done,
No matter whence or when you came,
The land shall claim you as a son!”

As in the azure fields on high,
When Spring lights up the April sky,
The thick battalioned dusky clouds
Fly o'er the plain like routed crowds
Before the sun's resistless might!
Where all was dark, now all is bright;
The very clouds have turned to light,
And with the conquering beams unite!

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Thus o'er the face of John Mac John
A thousand varying shades have gone;
Jealousy, anger, rage, disdain,
Sweep o'er his brow—a dusky train;
But nature, like the beam of spring,
Chaseth the crowd on sunny wing;
Joy warms his heart, hope lights his eye,
And the dark passions routed fly!

The hands are clasped—the hound is freed,
Gone is Mac John with wife and steed,
He meets his spearsmen some few miles,
And turns their scowling frowns to smiles:
At morn the crowded march begins
Of steeds and cattle for the glynnes;
Well for poor Erin's wrongs and griefs,
If thus would join her severed chiefs!

A beautiful inlet, about six miles west of Donegal.

Loch Eask is about two miles from Donegal. Inglis describes it as being as pretty a lake, on a small scale, as can well be imagined.

The sands of Rosapenna are described as being composed of “hills and dales, and undulating swells, smooth, solitary, and desolate, reflecting the sun from their polished surface,” &c.

“Clan Dalaigh” is a name frequently given by Irish writers to the Clan O'Donnell.

The “Fairy Gun” is an orifice in a cliff near Bundoran (four miles S. W. of Ballyshannon, into which the sea rushes with a noise like that of artillery, and from which mist, and chanting sound, issue in stormy weather.

The waterfall at Ballyshannon.

The O'Donnells are descended from Conal Golban, son of Niall of the Nine Hostages.

Cushendall is very prettily situated on the eastern coast of the county Antrim. This, with all the territory known as the Glynnes (so called from the intersection of its surface by many rocky dells), from Glenarm to Ballycastle, was at this time in the possession of the Mac Donnells, a clan of Scotch descent. The principle castle of the Mac Donnells was at Glenarm.

The Rock of Doune, in Kilmacrenan, where the O'Donnells were inaugurated.

The Hebrides.

Carrick-a-rede (Carraig-a-Ramhad)—the Rock in the Road lies off the coast, between Ballycastle and Portrush; a chasm sixty feet in breadth, and very deep, separates it from the coast.

The waterfall of Assaroe, at Ballyshannon.

St. Columba, who was an O'Donnell.

“This bird (the Gannet) flys through the ship's sails, piercing them with his beak.”—O'Flaherty's “H-Iar Connaught,” p. 12, published by the Irish Archæological Society

She was the wife of Oisin, the bard, who is said to have lived and sung for some time at Cushendall, and to have been buried at Donegal.

The Rock of Clough-i-Stookan lies on the shore between Glenarm and Cushendall; it has some resemblance to a gigantic human figure.—“The winds whistle through its crevices like the wailing of mariners in distress.”—Hall's “Ireland,” vol. iii., p. 133.

“The Gray Man's Path” (Casan an fir Leith) is a deep and remarkable chasm, dividing the promontory of Fairhead (or Benmore) in two.

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THE BELL-FOUNDER.

LABOUR AND HOPE.

In that land where the heaven-tinted pencil giveth shape to the splendour of dreams,
Near Florence, the fairest of cities, and Arno, the sweetest of streams,
'Neath those hills whence the race of the Geraldine wandered in ages long since,
For ever to rule over Desmond and Erin as martyr and prince,
Lived Paolo, the young Campanaro, the pride of his own little vale—
Hope changed the hot breath of his furnace as into a sea-wafted gale;
Peace, the child of Employment, was with him, with prattle so soothing and sweet,
And Love, while revealing the future, strewed the sweet roses under his feet.

Ah! little they know of true happiness, they whom satiety fills,
Who, flung on the rich breast of luxury, eat of the rankness that kills.
Ah! little they know of the blessedness toil-purchased slumber enjoys,
Who, stretched on the hard rack of indolence, taste of the sleep that destroys;
Nothing to hope for, or labour for; nothing to sigh for, or gain;
Nothing to light in its vividness, lightning-like, bosom and brain;
Nothing to break life's monotony, rippling it o'er with its breath:
Nothing but dulness and lethargy, weariness, sorrow, and death!

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But blessed that child of humanity, happiest man among men,
Who, with hammer, or chisel, or pencil, with rudder, or ploughshare, or pen,
Laboureth ever and ever with hope through the morning of life,
Winning home and its darling divinities—love-worshipped children and wife,
Round swings the hammer of industry, quickly the sharp chisel rings,
And the heart of the toiler has throbbings that stir not the bosom of kings;
He the true ruler and conqueror, he the true king of his race,
Who nerveth his arm for life's combat, and looks the strong world in the face.

And such was young Paolo! The morning, ere yet the faint starlight had gone,
To the loud-ringing workshop beheld him move joyfully light-footed on.
In the glare and the roar of the furnace he toiled till the evening star burned,
And then back again through that valley, as glad but more weary returned.
One moment at morning he lingers by that cottage that stands by the stream,
Many moments at evening he tarries by that casement that woos the moon's beam;
For the light of his life and his labours, like a lamp from that casement shines
In the heart-lighted face that looks out from that purple-clad trellis of vines.

Francesca! sweet, innocent maiden! 'tis not that thy young cheek is fair,
Or thy sun-lighted eyes glance like stars through the curls of thy wind-woven hair;
'Tis not for thy rich lips of coral, or even thy white breast of snow,
That my song shall recall thee, Francesca! but more for the good heart below

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Goodness is beauty's best portion, a dower that no time can reduce,
A wand of enchantment and happiness, brightening and strengthening with use.
One the long-sigh'd-for nectar that earthliness bitterly tinctures and taints:
One the fading mirage of the fancy, and one the elysium it paints.

Long ago, when thy father would kiss thee, the tears in his old eyes would start,
For thy face—like a dream of his boyhood—renewed the fresh youth of his heart;
He is gone; but thy mother remaineth, and kneeleth each night-time and morn,
And blesses the Mother of Blessings for the hour her Francesca was born.
There are proud stately dwellings in Florence, and mothers and maidens are there,
And bright eyes as bright as Francesca's, and fair cheeks as brilliantly fair;
And hearts, too, as warm and as innocent, there where the rich paintings gleam,
But what proud mother blesses her daughter like the mother by Arno's sweet stream?

It was not alone when that mother grew aged and feeble to hear,
That thy voice like the whisper of angels still fell on the old woman's ear,
Or even that thy face, when the darkness of time overshadowed her sight,
Shone calm through the blank of her mind, like the moon in the midst of the night.
But thine was the duty, Francesca, and the love-lightened labour was thine,
To treasure the white-curling wool and the warm-flowing milk of the kine,
And the fruits, and the clusters of purple, and the flock's tender yearly increase,
That she might have rest in life's evening, and go to her Fathers in peace.

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Francesca and Paolo are plighted, and they wait but a few happy days,
Ere they walk forth together in trustfulness out on Life's wonderful ways;
Ere, clasping the hands of each other, they move through the stillness and noise,
Dividing the cares of existence, but doubling its hopes and its joys.
Sweet days of betrothment, which brighten so slowly to love's burning noon,
Like the days of the spring which grow longer, the nearer the fulness of June,
Though ye move to the noon and the summer of Love with a slow-moving wing,
Ye are lit with the light of the morning, and decked with the blossoms of spring.

The days of betrothment are over, for now when the evening star shines,
Two faces look joyfully out from that purple-clad trellis of vines;
The light-hearted laughter is doubled, two voices steal forth on the air,
And blend in the light notes of song, or the sweet solemn cadence of prayer.
At morning when Paolo departeth, 'tis out of that sweet cottage door,
At evening he comes to that casement, but passes that casement no more;
And the old feeble mother at night-time, when saying, “The Lord's will be done,”
While blessing the name of a daughter, now blendeth the name of a son.

TRIUMPH AND REWARD.

In the furnace the dry branches crackle, the crucible shines as with gold,
As they carry the hot flaming metal in haste from the fire to the mould;

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Loud roars the bellows, and louder the flames as they shrieking escape,
And loud is the song of the workmen who watch o'er the fast-filling shape;
To and fro in the red-glaring chamber the proud master anxiously moves,
And the quick and the skilful he praiseth, and the dull and the laggard reproves;
And the heart in his bosom expandeth, as the thick bubbling metal up swells,
For like to the birth of his children he watcheth the birth of the bells.

Peace had guarded the door of young Paolo, success on his industry smiled,
And the dark wing of Time had passed quicker than grief from the face of a child;
Broader lands lay around that sweet cottage, younger footsteps tripped lightly around,
And the sweet silent stillness was broken by the hum of a still sweeter sound.
At evening when homeward returning how many dear hands must he press,
Where of old at that vine-covered wicket he lingered but one to caress;
And that dearest one is still with him, to counsel, to strengthen, and calm,
And to pour over Life's needful wounds the healing of Love's blessed balm.

But age will come on with its winter, though happiness hideth its snows;
And if youth has its duty of labour, the birthright of age is repose:
And thus from that love-sweetened toil, which the heavens had so prospered and blest,
The old Campanaro will go to that vine-covered cottage to rest;
But Paolo is pious and grateful, and vows as he kneels at her shrine,
To offer some fruit of his labour to Mary the Mother benign—

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Eight silver-toned bells will he offer, to toll for the quick and the dead,
From the tower of the church of her convent that stands on the cliff overhead

'Tis for this that the bellows are blowing, that the workmen their sledge-hammers wield,
That the firm sandy moulds are now broken, and the dark-shining bells are revealed;
The cars with their streamers are ready, and the flower-harnessed necks of the steers,
And the bells from their cold silent workshop are borne amid blessings and tears.
By the white-blossom'd, sweet-scented myrtles, by the olive-trees fringing the plain,
By the corn-fields and vineyards is winding that giftbearing, festival train;
And the hum of their voices is blending with the music that streams on the gale,
As they wend to the Church of our Lady that stands at the head of the vale.

Now they enter, and now more divinely the saints' painted effigies smile,
Now the acolytes bearing lit tapers move solemnly down through the aisle,
Now the thurifer swings the rich censer, and the white curling vapour up-floats,
And hangs round the deep-pealing organ, and blends with the tremulous notes.
In a white shining alb comes the abbot, and he circles the bells round about,
And with oil, and with salt, and with water, they are purified inside and out;
They are marked with Christ's mystical symbol, while the priests and the choristers sing,
And are bless'd in the name of that God to whose honour they ever shall ring.

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Toll, toll! with a rapid vibration, with a melody silv'ry and strong,
The bells from the sound-shaken belfry are singing their first maiden song;
Not now for the dead or the living, or the triumphs of peace or of strife,
But a quick joyous outburst of jubilee full of their newly-felt life;
Rapid, more rapid, the clapper rebounds from the round of the bells—
Far and more far through the valley the intertwined melody swells—
Quivering and broken the atmosphere trembles and twinkles around,
Like the eyes and the hearts of the hearers that glisten and beat to the sound.

But how to express all his rapture when echo the deep cadence bore
To the old Campanaro reclining in the shade of his vine-covered door,
How to tell of the bliss that came o'er him as he gazed on the fair evening star,
And heard the faint toll of the vesper bell steal o'er the vale from afar—
Ah! it was not alone the brief ecstasy music doth ever impart
When Sorrow and Joy at its bidding come together and dwell in the heart;
But it was that delicious sensation with which the young mother is blest,
As she lists to the laugh of her child as it falleth asleep on her breast.

From a sweet night of slumber he woke; but it was not that morn had unroll'd
O'er the pale, cloudy tents of the Orient, her banners of purple and gold:

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It was not the song of the skylark that rose from the green pastures near,
But the sound of his bells that fell softly, as dew on the slumberer's ear.
At that sound he awoke and arose, and went forth on the bead-bearing grass—
At that sound, with his loving Francesca, he piously knelt at the Mass.
If the sun shone in splendour around him, and that certain music were dumb,
He would deem it a dream of the night-time, and doubt if the morning had come.

At noon, as he lay in the sultriness, under his broadleafy limes,
Far sweeter than murmuring waters came the tone of the Angelus chimes.
Pious and tranquil he rose, and uncovered his reverend head,
And thrice was the Ave Maria and thrice was the Angelus said,
Sweet custom the South still retaineth, to turn for a moment away
From the pleasures and pains of existence, from the trouble and turmoil of day,
From the tumult within and without, to the peace that abideth on high,
When the deep, solemn sound from the belfry comes down like a voice from the sky.

And thus round the heart of the old man, at morning, at noon, and at eve,
The bells, with their rich woof of music, the net-work of happiness weave,
They ring in the clear, tranquil evening, and lo! all the air is alive,
As the sweet-laden thoughts come, like bees, to abide in his heart as a hive.

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They blend with his moments of joy, as the odour doth blend with the flower—
They blend with his light-falling tears, as the sunshine doth blend with the shower.
As their music is mirthful or mournful, his pulse beateth sluggish or fast,
And his breast takes its hue, like the ocean, as the sunshine or shadows are cast.

Thus adding new zest to enjoyment, and drawing the sharp sting from pain,
The heart of the old man grew young, as it drank the sweet musical strain.
Again at the altar he stands, with Francesca the fair at his side,
As the bells ring a quick peal of gladness, to welcome some happy young bride.
'Tis true, when the death-bells are tolling, the wounds of his heart bleed anew,
When he thinks of his old loving mother, and the darlings that destiny slew;
But the tower in whose shade they are sleeping seems the emblem of hope and of love,—
There is silence and death at its base, but there's life in the belfry above.

Was it the sound of his bells, as they swung in the purified air,
That drove from the bosom of Paolo the dark-wingèd demons of care?
Was it their magical tone that for many a shadowless day
(So faith once believed) swept the clouds and the black-boding tempests away?
Ah! never may Fate with their music a harshgrating dissonance blend!
Sure an evening so calm and so bright will glide peacefully on to the end.
Sure the course of his life, to its close, like his own native river must be,
Flowing on through the valley of flowers to its home in the bright summer sea!

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VICISSITUDE AND REST.

O Erin! thou broad-spreading valley—thou well-watered land of fresh streams,
When I gaze on thy hills greenly sloping, where the light of such loveliness beams,
When I rest by the rim of thy fountains, or stray where thy streams disembogue,
Then I think that the fairies have brought me to dwell in the bright Tir-na-n-oge.
But when on the face of thy children I look, and behold the big tears
Still stream down their grief-eaten channels, which widen and deepen with years,
I fear that some dark blight for ever will fall on thy harvests of peace,
And that, like to thy lakes and thy rivers, thy sorrows must ever increase.

O land! which the heavens made for joy, but where wretchedness buildeth its throne—
O prodigal spendthrift of sorrow! and hast thou not heirs of thine own?
Thus to lavish thy sons' only portion, and bring one sad claimant the more,
From the sweet sunny lands of the south, to thy crowded and sorrowful shore?
For this proud bark that cleaveth thy waters, she is not a corrach of thine,
And the broad purple sails that spread o'er her seem dyed in the juice of the vine.
Not thine is that flag, backward floating, nor the olive-cheek'd seamen who guide,
Nor that heart-broken old man who gazes so listlessly over the tide.

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Accurs'd be the monster, who selfishly draweth his sword from its sheath;
Let his garland be twined by the furies, and the upas tree furnish the wreath;
Let the blood he has shed steam around him, through the length of eternity's years,
And the anguish-wrung screams of his victims for ever resound in his ears.
For all that makes life worth possessing must yield to his self-seeking lust:
He trampleth on home and on love, as his war-horses trample the dust;
He loosens the red streams of ruin, which wildly, though partially, stray—
They but chafe round the rock-bastion'd castle, while they sweep the frail cottage away.

Feuds fell like a plague upon Florence, and rage from without and within;
Peace turned her mild eyes from the havoc, and Mercy grew deaf in the din;
Fear strengthened the dove-wings of happiness, tremblingly borne on the gale;
And the angel Security vanished, as the war-demon swept o'er the vale.
Is it for the Mass or the Angelus now that the bells ever ring?
Or is it the red trickling mist such a purple reflection doth fling?
Ah, no: 'tis the tocsin of terror that tolls from the desolate shrine;
And the down-trodden vineyards are flowing, but not with the blood of the vine.

Deadly and dark was the tempest that swept o'er that vine-cover'd plain;
Burning and withering, its drops fell like fire on the grass and the grain.
But the gloomiest moments must pass to their graves as the brightest and best,
And thus once again did fair Fiesole look o'er a valley of rest.

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But, oh! in that brief hour of horror, that bloody eclipse of the sun,
What hopes and what dreams have been shattered?—what ruin and wrong have been done?
What blossoms for ever have faded, that promised a harvest so fair;
And what joys are laid low in the dust that eternity cannot repair!

Look down on that valley of sorrows, whence the land-marks of joy are removed,
Oh! where is the darling Francesca, so loving, so dearly beloved?—
And where are her children, whose voices rose music-winged once from this spot?
And why are the sweet bells now silent? and where is the vine-cover'd cot?
'Tis morning—no Mass-bell is tolling; 'tis noon, but no Angelus rings;
'Tis evening, but no drops of melody rain from her rose-coloured wings.
Ah! where have the angels, poor Paolo, that guarded thy cottage door flown?
And why have they left thee to wander thus childless and joyless alone?

His children had grown into manhood, but, ah! in that terrible night
Which had fallen on fair Florence, they perished away in the thick of the fight;
Heart-blinded, his darling Francesca went seeking her sons through the gloom,
And found them at length, and lay down full of love by their side in the tomb,
That cottage, its vine-cover'd porch and its myrtle-bound garden of flowers,
That church whence the bells with their voices, drown'd the sound of the fast-flying hours,

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Both are levelled and laid in the dust, and the sweet-sounding bells have been torn
From their downfallen beams, and away by the red hand of sacrilege borne.

As the smith, in the dark, sullen smithy, striketh quick on the anvil below,
Thus Fate on the heart of the old man struck rapidly blow after blow:
Wife, children, and hope passed away from the heart once so burning and bold,
As the bright shining sparks disappear when the red glowing metal grows cold.
He missed not the sound of his bells while those death-sounds struck loud in his ears,
He missed not the church where they rang while his old eyes were blinded with tears;
But the calmness of grief coming soon, in its sadness and silence profound,
He listened once more as of old, but in vain, for the joy-bearing sound.

When he felt that indeed they had vanished, one fancy then flashed on his brain,
One wish made his heart beat anew with a throbbing it could not restrain—
'Twas to wander away from fair Florence, its memory and dream-haunted dells,
And to seek up and down through the earth for the sound of its magical bells.
They will speak of the hopes that have perished, and the joys that have faded so fast.
With the music of memory wingèd, they will seem but the voice of the past;
As, when the bright morning has vanished, and evening grows starless and dark,
The nightingale song of remembrance recalls the sweet strain of the lark.

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Thus restlessly wandering through Italy, now by the Adrian sea,
In the shrine of Loreto, he bendeth his travel-tired suppliant knee;
And now by the brown troubled Tiber he taketh his desolate way,
And in many a shady basilica lingers to listen and pray.
He prays for the dear ones snatched from him, nor vainly nor hopelessly prays,
For the strong faith in union hereafter like a beam o'er his cold bosom plays;
He listens at morning and evening, when matin and vesper bells toll,
But their sweetest sounds grate on his ear, and their music is harsh to his soul.

For though sweet are the bells that ring out from the tall campanili of Rome,
Ah! they are not the dearer and sweeter ones, tuned with the memory of home.
So leaving proud Rome and fair Tivoli, southward the old man must stray,
'Till he reaches the Eden of waters that sparkle in Napoli's bay:
He sees not the blue waves of Baiæ, nor Ischia's summits of brown,
He sees but the high campanili that rise o'er each far-gleaming town.
Driven restlessly onward, he saileth away to the bright land of Spain,
And seeketh thy shrine, Santiago, and stands by the western main.

A bark bound for Erin lay waiting, he entered like one in a dream;
Fair winds in the full purple sails led him soon to the Shannon's broad stream.

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'Twas an evening that Florence might envy, so rich was the lemon-hued air,
As it lay on lone Scattery's island, or lit the green mountains of Clare;
The wide-spreading old giant river rolled his waters as smooth and as still
As if Oonagh, with all her bright nymphs, had come down from the far fairy hill,
To fling her enchantments around on the mountains, the air, and the tide,
And to soothe the worn heart of the old man who looked from the dark vessel's side.

Borne on the current the vessel glides smoothly but swiftly away,
By Carrigaholt, and by many a green sloping headland and bay,
'Twixt Cratloe's blue hills and green woods, and the soft sunny shores of Tervoe,
And now the fair city of Limerick spreads out on the broad bank below;
Still nearer and nearer approaching, the mariners look o'er the town,
The old man sees nought but St. Mary's square tower, with its battlements brown.
He listens—as yet all is silent, but now, with a sudden surprise,
A rich peal of melody rings from that tower through the clear evening skies!

One note is enough—his eye moistens, his heart, long so wither'd, outswells,
He has found them—the sons of his labours—his musical, magical bells!

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At each stroke all the bright past returneth, around him the sweet Arno shines,
His children—his darling Francesca—his purple-clad trellis of vines!
Leaning forward, he listens, he gazes, he hears in that wonderful strain
The long-silent voices that murmur, “Oh, leave us not, father, again!”
'Tis granted—he smiles—his eye closes—the breath from his white lips hath fled—
The father has gone to his children—the old Campanaro is dead!

The hills of Else. See Appendix to O'Daly's “History of the Geraldines,” translated by the Rev. C. P. Meehan, p. 130.

Bell-founder.

The country of youth; the Elysium of the Pagan Irish.

Camden seems to credit a tradition commonly believed in his time, of a gradual increase in the number and size of the lakes and rivers of Ireland.

The beautiful hill in Lower Ormond called Knockshegowna, i.e., Oonagh's Hill, so called from being the fabled residence of Oonagh (or Una), the Fairy Queen of Spenser. One of the finest views of the Shannon is to be seen from this hill.

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ALICE AND UNA.

A TALE OF CEIM-AN-EICH.

Ah! the pleasant time hath vanished, ere our wretched doubtings banished,
All the graceful spirit-people, children of the earth and sea,
Whom in days now dim and olden, when the world was fresh and golden,
Every mortal could behold in haunted rath, and tower, and tree—
They have vanished, they are banished—ah! how sad the loss for thee,
Lonely Céim-an-eich!

Still some scenes are yet enchanted by the charms that Nature granted,
Still are peopled, still are haunted, by a graceful spirit band.
Peace and beauty have their dwelling where the infant streams are welling,
Where the mournful waves are knelling on Glengariff's coral strand;
Or where, on Killarney's mountains, Grace and Terror smiling stand,
Like sisters, hand in hand!

Still we have a new romance in fire-ships through the tamed sea glancing,
And the snorting and the prancing of the mighty engine steed;
Still, Astolpho-like, we wander through the boundless azure yonder,
Realizing what seemed fonder than the magic tales we read:
Tales of wild Arabian wonder, where the fancy all is freed—
Wilder far indeed!

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Now that Earth once more hath woken, and the trance of Time is broken,
And the sweet word—Hope—is spoken, soft and sure, though none know how,
Could we, could we only see all these, the glories of the Real,
Blended with the lost Ideal, happy were the old world now—
Woman in its fond believing—man with iron arm and brow—
Faith and work its vow!

Yes! the Past shines clear and pleasant, and there's glory in the Present;
And the Future, like a crescent, lights the deepening sky of Time;
And that sky will yet grow brighter, if the Worker and the Writer—
If the Sceptre and the Mitre join in sacred bonds sublime.
With two glories shining o'er them, up the coming years they'll climb,
Earth's great evening as its prime!

With a sigh for what is fading, but, O Earth! with no upbraiding,

We will speak, despite our grieving, words of loving and believing,
Tales we vowed when we were leaving awful Céim-an-eich,
Where the sever'd rocks resemble fragments of a frozen sea,
And the wild deer flee!

'Tis the hour when flowers are shrinking, when the weary sun is sinking,
And his thirsty steeds are drinking in the cooling western sea;
When young Maurice lightly goeth, where the tiny streamlet floweth

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And the struggling moonlight showeth where his path must be—
Path whereon the wild goats wander fearlessly and free
Through dark Céim-an-eich.

As a hunter, danger daring, with his dogs the brown moss sharing,
Little thinking, little caring, long a wayward youth lived he;
But his bounding heart was regal, and he looked as looks the eagle,
And he flew as flies the beagle, who the panting stag doth see:
Love, who spares a fellow-archer, long had let him wander free
Through wild Céim-an-eich!

But at length the hour drew nigher when his heart should feel that fire;
Up the mountain high and higher had he hunted from the dawn;
Till the weeping fawn descended, where the earth and ocean blended,
And with hope its slow way wended to a little grassy lawn;
It is safe, for gentle Alice to her saving breast hath drawn
Her almost sister fawn.

Alice was a chieftain's daughter, and, though many suitors sought her,
She so loved Glengariff's water that she let her lovers pine;
Her eye was beauty's palace, and her cheek an ivory chalice,
Through which the blood of Alice gleamed soft as rosiest wine,
And her lips like lusmore blossoms which the fairies intertwine,
And her heart a golden mine.

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She was gentler and shyer than the light fawn that stood by her,
And her eyes emit a fire soft and tender as her soul;
Love's dewy light doth drown her, and the braided locks that crown her
Than autumn's trees are browner, when the golden shadows roll
Through the forests in the evening, when cathedral turrets toll,
And the purple sun advanceth to its goal.

Her cottage was a dwelling all regal homes excelling,
But, ah! beyond the telling was the beauty round it spread:
The wave and sunshine playing, like sisters each arraying,
Far down the sea-plants swaying upon their coral bed,
As languid as the tresses on a sleeping maiden's head,
When the summer breeze is dead.

Need we say that Maurice loved her, and that no blush reproved her
When her throbbing bosom moved her to give the heart she gave;
That by dawnlight and by twilight, and, O blessed moon! by thy light,
When the twinkling stars on high light the wanderer o'er the wave,
His steps unconscious led him where Glengarifl's waters lave
Each mossy bank and cave.

He thitherward is wending, o'er the vale is night descending,
Quick his step, but quicker sending his herald thoughts before;
By rocks and streams before him, proud and hopeful on he bore him;

144

One star was shining o'er him—in his heart of hearts two more—
And two other eyes, far brighter than a human head e'er wore,
Unseen were shining o'er.

These eyes are not of woman, no brightness merely human
Could, planet-like, illumine the place in which they shone;
But Nature's bright works vary—there are beings light and airy,
Whom mortal lips call fairy, and Una she is one—
Sweet sisters of the moonbeams and daughters of the sun,
Who along the curling cool waves run.

As summer lightning dances amid the heavens' expanses,
Thus shone the burning glances of those flashing fairy eyes;
Three splendours there were shining, three passions intertwining,
Despair and hope combining their deep-contrasted dyes,
With jealousy's green lustre, as troubled ocean vies
With the blue of summer skies!

She was a fairy creature, of heavenly form and feature,
Not Venus' self could teach her a newer, sweeter grace,
Not Venus' self could lend her an eye so dark and tender,
Half softness and half splendour, as lit her lily face;
And as the choral planets move harmonious throughout space,
There was music in her pace.

145

But when at times she started, and her blushing lips were parted,
And a pearly lustre darted from her teeth so ivory white,
You'd think you saw the gliding of two rosy clouds dividing,
And the crescent they were hiding gleam forth upon your sight
Through these lips, as though the portals of a heaven pure and bright,
Came a breathing of delight!

Though many an elf-king loved her, and elf-dames grave reproved her,
The hunter's daring moved her more wildly every hour;
Unseen she roamed beside him, to guard him and to guide him,
But now she must divide him from her human rival's power.
Ah! Alice!—gentle Alice! the storm begins to lower
That may crush Glengariff's flower!

The moon, that late was gleaming, as calm as childhood's dreaming,
Is hid, and, wildly screaming, the stormy winds arise;
And the clouds flee quick and faster before their sullen master,
And the shadows of disaster are falling from the skies;
Strange sights and sounds are rising—but, Maurice, be thou wise,
Nor heed the tempting cries.

If ever mortal needed that council, surely he did;
But the wile has now succeeded—he wanders from his path;
The cloud its lightning sendeth, and its bolt the stout oak rendeth,
And the arbutus back bendeth in the whirlwind, as a lath!
Now and then the moon looks out, but, alas! its pale face hath
A dreadful look of wrath.

146

In vain his strength he squanders—at each step he wider wanders—
Now he pauses—now he ponders where his present path may lead;
And, as he round is gazing, he sees—a sight amazing—
Beneath him, calmly grazing, a noble jet-black steed.
“Now, heaven be praised!” cried Maurice, “for this succour in my need—
From this labyrinth I'm freed!”

Upon its back he leapeth, but a shudder through him creepeth,
As the mighty monster sweepeth like a torrent through the dell;
His mane, so softly flowing, is now a meteor blowing,
And his burning eyes are glowing with the light of an inward hell;
And the red breath of his nostrils, like steam where the lightning fell;
And his hoofs have a thunder knell!

What words have we for painting the momentary fainting
That the rider's heart is tainting, as decay doth taint a corse?
But who will stoop to chiding, in a fancied courage priding,
When we know that he is riding the fearful Phooka Horse?
Ah! his heart beats quick and faster than the smitings of remorse
As he sweepeth through the wild grass and gorse!

147

As the avalanche comes crashing, 'mid the scattered streamlets splashing,
Thus backward wildly dashing flew the horse through Céim-an-eich—
Through that glen so wide and narrow back he darted like an arrow—
Round, round by Gougane Barra, and the fountains of the Lee;
O'er the Giant's Grave he leapeth, and he seems to own in fee
The mountains, and the rivers, and the sea!

From his flashing hoofs who shall lock the eagle homes of Malloc,
When he bounds, as bounds the Mialloch in its wild and murmuring tide?
But as winter leadeth Flora, or the night leads on Aurora,
Or as shines green Glashenglora along the black hill's side,
Thus, beside that demon monster, white and gentle as a bride,
A tender fawn is seen to glide.

It is the fawn that fled him, and that late to Alice led him,
But now it does not dread him, as it feigned to do before,
When down the mountain gliding, in that sheltered meadow hiding,
It left his heart abiding by wild Glengariff's shore:
For it was a gentle fairy who the fawn's light form thus wore,
And who watched sweet Alice o'er.

148

But the steed is backward prancing where late it was advancing,
And his flashing eyes are glancing, like the sun upon Lough Foyle;
The hardest granite crushing, through the thickest brambles brushing,
Now like a shadow rushing up the sides of Slieve-nagoil!
And the fawn beside him gliding o'er the rough and broken soil,
Without fear and without toil.

Through woods, the sweet birds' leaf home, he rusheth to the sea foam,
Long, long the fairies' chief home, when the summer nights are cool,
And the blue sea, like a syren, with its waves the steed environ,
Which hiss like furnace iron when plunged within a pool,
Then along among the islands where the water nymphs bear rule,
Through the bay to Adragool.

Now he rises o'er Berehaven, where he hangeth like a raven—
Ah! Maurice, though no craven, how terrible for thee
To see the misty shading of the mighty mountains fading,
And thy winged fire-steed wading through the clouds as through a sea!
Now he feels the earth beneath him—he is loosen'd—he is free,
And asleep in Céim-an-eich.

Away the wild steed leapeth, while his rider calmly sleepeth
Beneath a rock which keepeth the entrance to the glen,
Which standeth like a castle, where are dwelling lord and vassal,

149

Where within are wind and wassail, and without are warrior men;
But save the sleeping Maurice, this castle cliff had then
No mortal denizen!

Now Maurice is awaking, for the solid earth is shaking,
And a sunny light is breaking through the slowly opening stone
And a fair page at the portal crieth, “Welcome, welcome! mortal,
Leave thy world (at best a short ill), for the pleasant world we own:
There are joys by thee untasted, there are glories yet unknown—
Come kneel at Una's throne.”

With a sullen sound of thunder, the great rock falls asunder,
He looks around in wonder, and with ravishment awhile,
For the air his sense is chaining, with as exquisite a paining
As when summer clouds are raining o'er a flowery Indian isle;
And the faces that surround him, oh! how exquisite their smile,
So free of mortal care and guile.

These forms, oh! they are finer—these faces are diviner
Than, Phidias, even thine are, with all thy magic art;
For beyond an artist's guessing, and beyond a bard's expressing,
Is the face that truth is dressing with the feelings of the heart;
Two worlds are there together—earth and heaven have each a part—
And of such, divinest Una, thou art!

150

And then the dazzling lustre of the hall in which they muster—
Where the brightest diamonds cluster on the flashing walls around;
And the flying and advancing, and the sighing and the glancing.
And the music and the dancing on the flower-inwoven ground,
And the laughing and the feasting, and the quaffing and the sound,
In which their voices all are drowned.

But the murmur now is hushing—there's a pushing and a rushing,
There's a crowding and a crushing, through that golden, fairy place,
Where a snowy veil is lifting, like the slow and silent shifting
Of a shining vapour drifting across the moon's pale face—
For there sits gentle Una, fairest queen of fairy race,
In her beauty, and her majesty, and grace.

The moon by stars attended, on her pearly throne ascended,
Is not more purely splendid than this fairy-girted queen;
And when her lips had spoken, 'mid the charmed silence broken,
You'd think you had awoken in some bright Elysian scene;
For her voice than the lark's was sweeter, that sings in joy between
The heavens and the meadows green.

But her cheeks—ah! what are roses?—what are clouds where eve reposes?—
What are hues that dawn discloses?—to the blushes spreading there;
And what the sparkling motion of a star within the ocean,

151

To the crystal soft emotion that her lustrous dark eyes wear?
And the tresses of a moonless and a starless night are fair
To the blackness of her raven hair.

Ah! mortal hearts have panted for what to thee is granted—
To see the halls enchanted of the spirit world revealed;
And yet no glimpse assuages the feverish doubt that rages
In the hearts of bards and sages wherewith they may be healed;
For this have pilgrims wandered—for this have votaries kneeled—
For this, too, has blood bedewed the field.

“And now that thou beholdest what the wisest and the oldest,
What the bravest and the boldest, have never yet descried,
Wilt thou come and share our being, be a part of what thou'rt seeing,
And flee, as we are fleeing, through the boundless ether wide?
Or along the silver ocean, or down deep where pale pearls hide?
And I, who am a queen, will be thy bride.

“As an essence thou wilt enter the world's mysterious centre,”
And then the fairy bent her, imploring to the youth—
“Thou'lt be free of Death's cold ghastness, and, with a comet's fastness,
Thou canst wander through the vastness to the Paradise of Truth,
Each day a new joy bringing, which will never leave in sooth
The slightest stain of weariness and ruth.”

152

As he listened to the speaker, his heart grew weak and weaker—
Ah! Memory, go seek her, that maiden by the wave,
Who with terror and amazement is looking from her casement,
Where the billows at the basement of her nestled cottage rave,
At the moon which struggles onward through the tempest, like the brave,
And which sinks within the clouds as in a grave.

All maidens will abhor us, and it's very painful for us
To tell how faithless Maurice forgot his plighted vow:
He thinks not of the breaking of the heart he late was seeking,
He but listens to her speaking, and but gazes on her brow;
And his heart has all consented, and his lips are ready now
With the awful and irrevocable vow.

While the word is there abiding, lo! the crowd is now dividing,
And, with sweet and gentle gliding, in before him came a fawn;
It was the same that fled him, and that seemed so much to dread him,
When it down in triumph led him to Glengariff's grassy lawn,
When, from rock to rock descending, to sweet Alice he was drawn,
As through Céim-an-eich he hunted from the dawn.

The magic chain is broken—no fairy vow is spoken—
From his trance he hath awoken, and once again is free;
And gone is Una's palace, and vain the wild steed's malice,

153

And again to gentle Alice down he wends through Céim-an-eich:
The moon is calmly shining over mountain, stream, and tree,
And the yellow sea-plants glisten through the sea.

The sun his gold is flinging, the happy birds are singing,
And bells are gaily ringing along Glengariff's sea;
And crowds in many a galley to the happy marriage rally
Of the maiden of the valley and the youth of Céim-an-eich;
Old eyes with joy are weeping, as all ask on bended knee
A blessing, gentle Alice, upon thee!

The pass of Kéim-an-eigh (the path of the deer) lies to the south-west of Inchageela, in the direction of Bantry Bay.

The lusmore (or fairy cap), literally the great herb, Digialis purpurea.

The Phooka is described as belonging to the malignant class of fairy beings, and he is as wild and capricious in his character as he is changeable in his form—at one time an eagle or an ignis fatuus, at another a horse or a bull, while occasionally he figures as a compound of the calf and goat. When he assumes the form of a horse, his great object, according to a recent writer, seems to be to obtain a rider, and then he is in his most malignant glory.—See Croker's “Fairy Legends.”

Mialloch, “the murmuring river” at Glengariff.—Smith's “Cork.”

Glashenglora, a mountain torrent, which finds its way into the Atlantic Ocean through Glengariff, in the west of the county of Cork. The name, literally translated, signifies “the noisy green water.”—Barry's “Songs of Ireland,” p. 173.

There is a great square rock, literally resembling the description in the text, which stands near the Glengariff entrance to the pass of Céim-an-eich.