Stripped of his proud and martial dress,
Uncurbed, unreined, and riderless,
With darting eye, and nostril spread,
And heavy and impatient tread,
He came; and oft that eye so proud
Asked for his rider in the crowd.
They buried the dark chief; they freed
Beside the grave his battle steed;
And swift an arrow cleaved its way
To his stern heart! One piercing neigh
Arose, and, on the dead man's plain,
The rider grasps his steed again.-LONGFELLOW.
Our bugles sang truce-for the night-cloud had lower'd,
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky;
And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered,
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw,
By the wolf-scaring faggot that guarded the slain,
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw,
And thrice ere the morning I dream'd it again.
Methought, o'er the battle-field's dreadful array,
Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track;
"Twas autumn-and sunshine arose on the way
To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back.
I flew to the pleasant fields, traversed so oft
In life's morning march, when my bosom was young; I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft,
And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers sung.
Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore
From my home and my weeping friends never to part;
My little ones kissed me a thousand times o'er,
And my wife sobbed aloud in her fulness of heart.
"Stay, stay with us-rest, thou art weary and worn;"
And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay-
But sorrow returned with the dawning of morn,
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.
O'er wrathful surge, through blackening storm,
Majestically calm, would go
Mid the deep darkness, white as snow!
But gentler now the small waves glide
Like playful lambs o'er a mountain's side.
So stately her bearing, so proud her array,
The main she will traverse for ever and aye.
Many ports will exult at the gleam of her mast!
Hush! hush! thou vain dreamer! this hour is her last!
Five hundred souls in one instant of dread
Are hurried o'er the deck;
And fast the miserable ship
Becomes a lifeless wreck.
Her keel hath struck on a hidden rock,
Her planks are torn asunder,
And down come her masts with a reeling shock,
And a hideous crash like thunder.
Her beauteous sides, whose rainbow hues
Gleamed softly from below,
And flung a warm and sunny flush
O'er the wreaths of murmuring snow,
To the coral rocks are hurrying down,
To sleep amid colours as bright as their own.
Oh! many a dream was in the ship
An hour before her death;
And sights of home with sighs disturbed
The sleeper's long-drawn breath.
Instead of the murmur of the sea,
The sailor heard the rustling tree,
Alive through all its leaves-
The hum of the spreading sycamore
That grows before his cottage door,
And the swallow's song in the eaves.
His arms enclosed a blooming boy,
Who listened with tears of sorrow and joy
To the dangers his father had passed;
And his wife-by turns she wept and smiled,
As she looked on the father of her child
Returned to her heart at last.
-He wakes at the vessel's sudden roll,
And the rush of waters is in his soul.
Astounded the reeling deck he paces,
Mid hurrying forms and ghastly faces;-
The whole ship's crew are there.
Wailings around and overhead,
Brave spirits stupified or dead,
And madness and despair.
Now is the ocean's bosom bare,
Unbroken as the floating air;
The ship hath melted quite away,
Like a struggling dream at break of day.
No image meets my wandering eye,
But the new-risen sun and the sunny sky.
Though the night-shades are gone, yet a vapour dull,
Bedims the waves so beautiful;
While a low and melancholy moan
Mourns for the glory that hath flown.
I am monarch of all I survey,
My right there is none to dispute,
From the centre all round to the sea,
I am lord of the fowl and the brute.
O solitude! where are the charms
That sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms,
Than reign in this horrible place.
Society, friendship, and love,
Divinely bestow'd upon man,
Oh had I the wings of a dove,
How soon would I taste these again!
My sorrows I then might assuage
In the ways of religion and truth;
Might learn from the wisdom of age,
And be cheer'd by the sallies of youth.
How fleet is a glance of the mind!
Compared with the speed of its flight,
The tempest itself lags behind,
And the swift-winged arrows of light.
When I think of my own native land,
In a moment I seem to be there;
But alas! recollection at hand
Soon hurries me back to despair.
Now the sea-fowl is gone to her nest,
The beast is laid down in his lair;
Even here is a season of rest,
And I to my cabin repair.
Still my God is in every place:
All His acts are with goodness fraught:
He gives each affliction a grace,
And reconciles me to my lot.
There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin:
The dew on his thin robe was heavy and chill:
For his country he sigh'd, when at twilight repairing
To wander alone by the wind-beaten hill.
But the day-star attracted his eyes' sad devotion;
For it rose o'er his own native isle of the ocean:
Where once, in the fire of his youthful emotion,
He sang the bold anthem of Erin go bragh.
Sad is my fate: said the heart-broken stranger,
The wild deer and wolf to a covert can flee:
But I have no refuge from famine and danger;
A home and a country remain not to me.
Never again, in the green sunny bow'rs
Where my forefathers lived, shall I spend the sweet hours,
Or cover my harp with the wild-woven flow'rs,
Or strike to the numbers of Erin go bragh.
Erin, my country; though sad and forsaken
In dreams I revisit thy sea-beaten shore:
But alas, in a far foreign land I awaken,
And sigh for the friends who can meet me no more.
Where is my cabin-door, near to the wild wood?
Sisters and sire, did ye weep for its fall?
Where is the mother that look'd on my childhood?
And where is the bosom-friend dearer than all?
Yet, all its sad recollections suppressing,
One dying wish my lone bosom can draw:
Erin! an exile bequeaths thee his blessing:
Land of my forefathers! Erin go bragh!
Buried and cold, when my heart stills her motion,
Green be thy fields, sweetest isle of the Ocean:
And thy harp-striking bards sing aloud with devotion
Erin mavournin! Erin go bragh.
And this is thy grave, Macaura,
Here by the pathway lone,
Where the thorn blossoms are bending
Over thy moulder'd stone.
Alas! for the sons of glory;
Oh! thou of the darken'd brow,
And the eagle plume, and the belted clans,
Is it here thou art sleeping now?
Oh! wild is the spot, Macaura,
In which they have laid thee low,-
The field where thy people triumph'd
Over the slaughter'd foe;
And loud was the Banshee's wailing,
And deep was the clansman's sorrow,
When, with bloody hands and burning tears,
They buried thee here, Macaura!
And now thy dwelling is lonely,
King of the rushing horde;
And now thy battles are over,
Chief of the shining sword;
And the rolling thunder echoes,
O'er torrent and mountain free,
But alas! alas! Macaura,
It will not awaken thee.
Farewell to thy grave, Macaura,
Where the slanting sunbeams shine, And briar and waving fern
Over thy slumbers twine;
Thou whose gathering summons
Could waken the sleeping glen;
Macaura, alas for thee and thine,
"Twill never be heard again!-MRS. DOWNING.
A well there is in the west country,
And a clearer one never was seen;
There is not a wife in the west country
But has heard of the Well of St. Keyne.
An oak and an elm tree stand beside,
And behind does an ash tree grow;
And a willow from the bank above
Droops to the water below.
A traveller came to the Well of St. Keyne;
Joyfully he drew nigh;
For from cock-crow he had been travelling,
And there was not a cloud in the sky.
He drank of the water so cool and clear,
For thirsty and hot was he,
And then he sat down upon the bank,
Under the willow tree.
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