The fount, re-appearing,
From the rain-drops shall borrow,
But to us comes no cheering,
To Duncan no morrow!
The hand of the reaper
Takes the ears that are hoary,
But the voice of the weeper
Wails manhood in glory:
The autumn winds rushing,
Waft the leaves that are serest,
But our flower was in flushing
When blighting was nearest.
Fleet foot on the correi,
Sage council in cumber,
Red hand in the foray7,
How sound is thy slumber!
Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble on the fountain,
Thou art gone, and for ever!
"AND art thou cold and lowly laid,
Thy foeman's dread, thy people's aid,
Bredalbane's boast, Clan-Alpine's shade
For thee shall none a requiem say?
For thee, who loved the minstrel's lay,-
For thee, of Bothwell's house the stay,
The shelter of her exiled line,
E'en in this prison-house of thine,
I'll wail for Alpine's honoured pine!
"What groans shall yonder valley fill!
What shrieks of grief shall rend yon hill!
What tears of burning rage shall thrill,
When mourns thy tribe thy battles done,
Thy fall before the race was won,
Thy sword ungirt ere set of sun!
There breathes not clansman of thy line.
But would have given his life for thine;-
Oh! woe for Alpine's honoured pine!
6 correi, the hollow side of the hill, 7 foray, a plundering expedition. where game usually lies.
"Sad was thy lot on mortal stage!
The captive thrush may brook the cage,
The prisoned eagle dies for rage.
Brave spirit, do not scorn my strain!
And when its notes awake again,
Even she, so long beloved in vain,
Shall with my harp her voice combine,
And mix her woe and tears with mine,
To wail Clan Alpine's honoured pine!"
LAY OF THE IMPRISONED HUNTSMAN.
My hawk is tired of perch and hood,
My idle greyhound loathes his food,
My horse is weary of his stall,
And I am sick of captive thrall;
I wish I were as I have been,
Hunting the hart in forest green,
With bended bow, and blood-hound free,
For that's the life is meet for me.
I hate to learn the ebb of time,
From yon dull steeple's drowsy chime,
Or mark it as the sunbeams crawl,
Inch after inch, along the wall.
The lark was wont my matins ring,
The sable rook my vespers sing;
These towers, although a king's they be,
Have not a hall of joy for me.
No more at dawning morn I rise,
And sun myself in Ellen's eyes,
Drive the fleet deer the forest through,
And homeward wend with evening dew;
A blithesome welcome blithely meet,
And lay my trophies at her feet,
While fled the eve on wing of glee,-
That life is lost to love and me!
THE VOYAGE THROUGH THE WESTERN ISLES.
From THE LORD OF THE ISLES.
MERRILY, merrily bounds the bark,
She bounds before the gale;
The mountain breeze from Ben-na-darch
Is joyous in her sail!
With fluttering sound, like laughter hoarse,
The cords and canvass strain;
The waves divided by her force,
In rippling eddies chased her course,
As if they laughed again.
Not down the breeze more blithely flew,
Skimming the wave, the light sea-mew,
Than the gay galley bore
Her course upon that favouring wind,
And Coolin's crest has sunk behind,
And Slapin's caverned shore.
Merrily, merrily bounds the bark
O'er the broad ocean driven;
Her path by Ronin's mountains dark
The steersman's hand hath given;
And Ronin's mountains dark have sent
Their hunters to the shore,
And each his ashen bow unbent,
And gave his pastime o'er,
And at the Island Lord's command,
For hunting spear took warrior's brand.
Merrily, merrily goes the bark
On a breeze from the northward free,
So shoots through the morning sky the lark,
Or the swan through the summer-sea.
The shores of Mull on the eastward lay,
And Ulva dark, and Colonsay,
And all the group of islets gay
That guard famed Staffa round.
Then all unknown its columns rose,
Where dark and undisturbed repose
The cormorant had found;
And the shy seal had quiet home,
And weltered in that wondrous dome,
Where, as to shame the temples decked
By skill of earthly architect,
Nature herself it seemed would raise,
A minster to her Maker's praise!
Not for a meaner use ascend
Her columns, or her arches bend;
Nor of a theme less solemn tells
That mighty surge that ebbs and swells,
8 Coolin. This and the following names belong to various places in the Western Isles of Scotland.
And still, between each awful pause,
From the high vault an answer draws,
In varied tone, prolonged and high,
That mocks the organ's melody.
Nor doth its entrance front in vain
To old Iona's holy fane,
That nature's voice might seem to say,
"Well hast thou done, frail child of clay!
Thy humble powers that stately shrine
Tasked high and hard,—but witness mine!"
Merrily, merrily goes the bark,
Before the gale she bounds;
So darts the dolphin from the shark,
Or the deer before the hounds.
They left Loch Tua on their lee,
And they wakened the men of the wild Tiree,
And the chief of the sandy Coll;
They paused not at Columba's isle,
Though pealed the bells from the holy pile
With long and measured toll;
No time for matin and for mass,
And the sounds of the holy summons pass
Away in the billows' roll.
Lochbuie's fierce and warlike lord
Their signal saw and grasped his sword,
And verdant Islay called her host,
And the clans of Jura's rugged coast
Lord Ronald's call obey,
And Scarba's isle, whose tortured shore
Still rings to Corrievrekin's roar,
And lonely Colonsay;
-Scenes sung by him who sings no more!
His bright and brief career is o'er,
And mute his tuneful strains;
Quenched is his lamp of varied lore,
That loved the light of song to pour;
A distant and a deadly shore
Has LEYDEN's cold remains!
9 Leyden, a sweet poet, and a distinguished oriental scholar. He died in Java, A.D. 1811.
ON THE MASSACRE OF GLENCOE1.
"OH! tell me, harper, wherefore flow
Thy wayward notes of wail and woe
Far down the desert of Glencoe,
Where none may list their melody!
Say, harpest thou to the mists that fly,
Or to the dun deer glancing by,
Or to the eagle that from high
Screams chorus to thy minstrelsy?"
"No, not to these, for they have rest;
The mist-wreath hath the mountain-crest,
The stag his lair, the erne her nest,
Abode of lone security.
But those for whom I pour the lay,
Not wild-wood deep, nor mountains gray,
Not this deep dell which shrouds from day,
Could screen from treacherous cruelty.
"Their flags were furled, and mute their drum,
The very household dogs were dumb,
Unwont to bay at guests that come
In guise of hospitality.
His blithest notes the piper plied,
Her gayest snood the maiden tied,
The dame her distaff flung aside,
To tend her kindly housewifery.
"The hand that mingled in the meal,
At midnight drew the felon-steel,
And gave the host's kind breast to feel
Meed for his hospitality!
The friendly heart which warmed that hand,
At midnight armed it with the brand,
That bade destruction's flames expand
Their red and fearful blazonry.
"Then woman's shriek was heard in vain,
Nor infancy's unpitied plain,
More than the warrior's groan, could gain
Respite from ruthless butchery.
10 The shocking massacre of the clan | sanction the atrocity, his neglecting to
M'Donald was perpetrated in Glencoe,
during the reign of William III.
Though the monarch did not directly
punish the authors of it leaves an indelible stain on his character.
|