Another, and another race,
Rise to the battle, and the chace
Descendants of the mighty dead!
Fearless of heart, and firm of hand!
Oh! let me join their spirits fled,
Oh! send me to their shadowy land.
Age hath not tamed Ontara's heart,
He shrinks not from the friendly dart.
These feet no more can chase the deer,
The glory of this arm is flown-
Why should the feeble linger here,
When all the pride of life is gone?
Warriors! why still the stroke deny,
Think ye Ontara fears to die?
He feared not in his flower of days,
When strong to stem the torrent's force,
When through the desert's pathless maze,
His way was as an eagle's course!
When war was sunshine to his sight,
And the wild hurricane, delight!
Shall then the warrior tremble now?
Now when his envied strength is o'er?
Hung on the pine his idle bow,
His pirogue useless on the shore?
When death hath dimmed his failing eye,
Shall he, the joy less, fear to die?
Sons of the brave! delay no more,
The spirits of my kindred call;
'Tis but one pang, and all is o'er!
Oh! bid the aged cedar fall!
To join the brethren of his prime,
The mighty of departed time.
DIRGE OF THE HIGHLAND CHIEF IN "WAVERLEY."
SON of the mighty and the free!
High-minded leader of the brave!
Was it for lofty chief like thee,
To fill a nameless grave?
Oh! if, amidst the valiant slain,
The warrior's bier hath been thy lot,
E'en though on red Culloden's plain,
We then had mourned thee not.
But darkly closed thy dawn of fame,
That dawn whose sunbeam rose so fair;
Vengeance alone may breathe thy name,
The watchword of Despair!
Yet oh! if gallant spirit's power
Had e'er enobled death like thine,
Then glory marked thy parting hour,
Last of a mighty line!
O'er thy own towers the sunshine falls,
But can not chase their silent gloom;
Those beams, that gild thy native walls,
Are sleeping on thy tomb!
Spring on thy mountains laughs the while,
Thy green woods wave in vernal air,
But the loved scenes may vainly smile-
Not e'en thy dust is there.
On thy blue hills no bugle-sound
Is mingling with the torrent's roar,
Unmarked the wild deer sport around--
Thou lead'st the chace no more!
Thy gates are closed, thy halls are still,
Those halls where pealed the choral strain,
They hear the wind's deep murinuring thrill-
And all is hushed again.
No banner from the lonely tower
Shall wave its blazoned folds on high;
There the tall grass and summer flower,
Unmarked shall spring and die.
No more thy bard, for other ear,
Shall wake the harp once loved by thine-
Hushed be the strain thou canst not hear,
Last of a mighty line.
CHIEFTAINS, lead on! our hearts beat high,
Lead on to Salem's towers!
Who would not deem it bliss to die,
Slain in a cause like ours?
The brave who sleep in soil of thine,
Lie not entombed, but shrined, O Palestine;
Souls of the slain in holy war!
Look from your sainted rest! Tell us ye rose in Glory's car,
To mingle with the blest; Tell us how short the death-pang's power, How bright the joys of your immortal bower.
Strike the loud harp, ye minstrel train!
Pour forth your loftiest lays;
Each heart shall echo to the strain
Breathed in the warrior's praise.
Bid every string triumphant swell
Th' inspiring sounds that heroes love so well.
Salem! amidst the fiercest hour
The wildest rage of fight,
Thy name shall lend our falchions power,
And nerve our hearts with might,
Envied be those for thee that fall,
Who find their graves beneath thy sacred wall.
For them no need that sculptured tomb Should chronicle their fame,
Or pyramid record their doom,
Or deathless verse their name;
It is enough that dust of thine
Should shroud their forms, O blessed Palestine!
Chieftains, lead on! our hearts beat high
For combat's glorious hour;
Soon shall the red-cross banner fly
On Salem's loftiest tower!
We burn to mingle in the strife,
Where but to die ensures eternal life.
It was in the battle of Sheriffmoor that young Clanronald fel!, leading on the Highlanders of the right wing. His death dispirited the assailants, who began to waver. But Glengary, chief of a rival branch of the Clan Colla, started from the ranks, and waving his bonnet round his head, cried out, "Today for revenge, and to-morrow for mourning !" The Highlanders received a new impulse from his words, and, charging with redoubled fury, bore down all before them.-See the Quarterly Review, article of "Culloden Papers."
On! ne'er be Clanronald the valiant forgot!
Still fearless and first in the combat he fell;
But we paused not one tear-drop to shed o'er the
spot,
We spared not one moment to murmur "Farewell.' We heard but the battle-word given by the chief, "To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
And wildly Clanronald! we echoed the vow, With the tear on our cheek, and the sword in our hand;
Young son of the brave! we may weep for thee now,
For well has thy death been avenged by thy band, When they joined in wild chorus the cry of the chief,
"To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
Thy dirge in that hour was the bugle's wild call,
The clash of the claymore, the shout of the brave;
But now thy own bard may lament for thy fall,
And the soft voice of melody sigh o'er thy grave,
While Albyn remembers the words of the chief,
"To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
Thou art fallen, O fearless one! flower of thy race!
Descendant of heroes! thy glory is set!
But thy kindred, the sons of the battle and chase,
Have proved that thy spirit is bright in them yet!
Nor vainly have echoed the words of the chief,
"To-day for revenge, and to-morrow for grief!"
THRONE of expression! whence the spirit's ray
Pours forth so oft the light of mental day,
Where fancy's fire, affection's melting beam,
Thought, genius, passion, reign in turn supreme,
And many a feeling, words can ne'er impart,
Finds its own language to pervade the heart;
Thy power,
bright orb, what bosom hath not felt,
To thrill, to rouse, to fascinate, to melt?
And by some spell of undefined control,
With magnet-influence touch the secret soul!
Light of the features! in the morn of youth
Thy glance is nature, and thy language, truth:
And ere the world, with all-corrupting sway,
Hath taught e'en thee to flatter and betray,
Th' ingenuous heart forbids thee to reveal,
Or speak one thought that interest would conceal;
While yet thou seem'st the cloudless mirror, given
But to reflect the purity of heaven;
Oh! then how lovely, there unveiled to trace
Th' unsullied brightness of each mental grace!
When Genius lends thee all his living light,
Where the full beams of intellect unite,
When Love illumes thee with his varying ray,
Where trembling Hope and tearful Rapture play;
Or Pity's melting cloud thy beam subdues,
Tempering its lustre with a vale of dews;
Still does thy power, whose all-commanding spell
Can pierce the mazes of the soul so well,
Bid some new feeling to existence start,
From its deep slumbers in the inmost heart.
And oh! when thought, in ecstacy sublim",
That soars triumphant o'er the bounds of time,
Fires thy keen glance with inspiration's blaze,
The light of heaven, the hope of nobler days,
(As glorious dreams, for utterance far too high,
Flash through the mist of dim mortality;)
Who does not own, that through thy lightning
beams
A flame unquenchable, unearthly, streams?
That pure, though captive effluence of the sky,
The vestal-ray, the spark that can not die;
THE HERO'S DEATH.
LIFE's parting beams were in his eye,
Life's closing accents on his tongue,
When round him, pealing to the sky.
The shout of victory rung!
Then, ere his gallant spirit fled,
A smile so bright illumed his face-
Oh! never, of the light it shed,
Shall memory lose a trace! \
His was a death, whose rapture high
Transcended all that life could yield;
His warmest prayer was so to die,
On the red battle-field!
And they may feel, who love him most,
A pride so holy and so pure-
Fate hath no power o'er those who boast
A treasure thus secure!
ON THE LATE NATIONAL CALAMITY, THE DEATH OF THE PRINCESS CHARLOTTE.
"Hélas! nous composions son histoire de tout ce qu'on peut imaginer de plus glorieux- -Le passé et le présent nous garantissoient l'avenir-Telle étoit l'agréable his toire que nous faisions; et pour achever ces nobles projets, i n'y avoit que la durée de sa vie; dont nous ne croyons pas devoir être en peine, car, qui eût pu seulement penser, que les années eussent du manquer à un jeunesse qui sembloit si vive?"-Bossuet.
MARKED ye the mingling of the city's thror.g.
Each mien, each glance, with expectation bright s
Prepare the pageant and the choral song,
The pealing chimes, the blaze of festal light!
And hark! what rumor's gathering sound is nigh?
It is the voice of joy, that murmur deep?
Away, be hushed! ye sounds of revelry!
Back to your homes, ye multitudes, to weep!
Weep! for the storm hath o'er us darkly past,
And England's royal flower is broken by the blast
Was it a dream? so sudden and so dread
That awful fiat o'er our senses came!
So loved, so blest, is that young spirit fled,
Whose early grandeur promised years of fame?
Oh! when hath life possessed, or death destroyed
More lovely hopes, tnore cloudlessly that smiled?
When hath the spoiler left so dark a void!
For all is lost the mother and her child!
Our morning-star hath vanished, and the tomb
Throws its deep-lengthened shade o'er distant years
Angel of Death! did no presaging sign
Announce thy coming, and thy way prepare?
No warning voice, no harbinger was thine,
Danger and fear seemed past-but thou wert there!
Prophetic sounds along the earthquake's path
Foretell the hour of Nature's awful throes;
And the volcano, ere it burst in wrath,
Sends forth some herald from its dread repose:
But thou, dark Spirit! swift and unforeseen,
Cam'st like the lightning's flash, when heaven is
And she is gone-the royal and the young,
In soul commanding and in heart benign;
Who from a race of Kings and Heroes sprung,
Glowed with a spirit lofty as her line.
Now may the voice she loved on earth so well,
Breathe forth her name, unheeded and in vain;
Nor can those eyes on which her own would dwell,
Wake from that breast one sympathy again:
The ardent heart, the towering mind are fled,
Yet shall undying love still linger with the dead.
Oh! many a bright existence we have scen
Quenched in the glow and fulness of its prime;
And many a cherished flower, ere now, hath been
Cropt, ere its leaves were breathed upon by time.
We have lost Heroes in their noon of pride,
Whose fields of triumph gave them but a bier;
And we have wept when soaring Genius died,
Checked in the glory of his mid career!
But here our hopes were centred--all is o'er,
All thought in this absorbed-she was-and is no
We watched her childhood from its earliest hour,
From every word and look blest omens caught;
While that young mind developed all its power,
And rose to energies of loftiest thought.
On her was fixed the Patriot's ardent eye,
One hope still bloomed-one vista still was fair; And when the tempest swept the troubled sky, She was our dayspring-all was cloudless there; And oh! how lovely broke on Fngland's gaze, E'en through the mist and storm, the light of dis tant days.
Now hath one moment darkened future years,
And changed the track of ages yet to be!-
Yet, mortal! 'midst the bitterness of tears,
Kneel, and adore th' inscrutable decree!
Oh! while the clear perspective smiled in light,
Wisdom should then have tempered hope's excess,
And, lost One! when we saw thy lot so bright,
We might have trembled at its loveliness:
Joy is no earthly flower-nor framed to bear,
In its exotic bloom, life's cold, ungenial air.
VIII.
All smiled around thee-Youth, and Love, ard
Praise,
Hearts all devotion and all truth were thine'
On thee was riveted a nation's gaze,
As on some radiant and unsullied shrine.
Heiress of empires! thou art passed away,
Like some fair vision, that arose to throw,
O'er one brief hour of life, a fleeting ray,
Then leave the rest to solitude and wo!
Oh! who shall dare to woo such dreams again!
Who hath not wept to know, that tears for thee
were vain?
Yet there is one who loved thee-and whose soul
With mild affections nature formed to melt;
His mind hath bowed beneath the stern control
Of many a grief-but this shall be unfelt!
Years have gone by-and given his honoured head
A diadem of snow-his eye is dim—
Around him Heaven a solemn cloud hath spread,
The past, the future, are a dream to him!
Yet in the darkness of his fate, alone
He dweils on earth, while thou, in life's full pride,
art gone!
The Chastener's hand is on us-we may weep,
But not repine-for many a storm hath past,
And, pillowed on her own majestic deep,
Hath England slept, unshaken by the blast!
And war hath raged o'er many a distant plain,
Trampling the vine and olive in his path;
While she, that regal daughter of the main,
Smiled, in serene defiance of his wrath!
As some proud summit, mingling with the sky
Hears calmly far below the thunders and no
Her voice hath been th' awakener-and her name,
The gathering word of nations-in her might
And all the awful beauty of her fame,
Apart she dwelt, in solitary light.
High on her cliffs, alone and firm she stood,
Fixing the torch upon her beacon-tower;
That torch, whose flame, far streaming o'er the
flood,
Hath guided Europe through her darkest hour!-
Away, vain dreams of glory!--in the dust
Be humbled, ocean-queen! and own thy sentence
just!
Oh! there are griefs for nature too intense,
Whose first rude shock but stupefies the soul;
Nor hath the fragile and o'erlaboured sense
Strength e'en to feel at once their dread control.
But when 't is past, that still and speechless hour
Hark! 't was the death-bell's note! which, full and of the sealed bosom, and the tearless eye,
Unmixed with aught of less majestic tone,
While all the murmurs of existence sleep,
Swells on the stillness of the air alone!
Silent the throngs that fill the darkened street,
Silent the slumbering Thames, the lonely mart;
And all is still, where countless thousands meet,
Save the full throbbing of the awe-struck heart!
All deeply, strangely, fearfully serene,
Then the roused mind awakes, with tenfold power,
To grasp the fulness of its agony!
Its death-like torpor vanished-and its doom,
To cast its own dark hues o'er life and nature'
bloom.
And such his lot, whom thou hast loved and left
Spirit! thus early to thy home recalled!
As in each ravaged home th' avenging one had So sinks the heart, of hope and thee bereft,
The sun goes down in beauty-his farewell,
Unlike the world he leaves, is calmly bright;
And his last mellowed rays around us dwell,
Lingering, as if on scenes of young delight.
They smile and fade-but, when the day is o'er,
What slow procession moves, with measured
tread?
A warrior's heart! by danger ne'er appalled.
Years may pass on-and, as they roll along,
Mellow those pangs which now his bosom rend
And he once more, with life's unheeding throng
May, though alone in soul, in seeming blend;
'Yet still, the guardian-angel of his mind,
Shall thy loved image dwell, in Memory's temple
shrined.
Lo! those who weep, with her who weeps no Yet must the days be long ere tine shall steal
A solemn train-the mourners and the dead!
While, throned on high, the moon's untroubled ray
Looks down, as earthly hopes are passing thus
But other light is in that holy pile,
Where, in the house of silence, kings repose;
There, through the dim arcade, and pillared aisle,
The funeral-torch its deep-red radiance throws.
There pall, and canopy and sacred strain,
And all around the stamp of wo may bear;
But Grief, to whose full heart those forms are vain,
Grief unexpressed, unsoothed by them-is there.
No darker hour hath Fate for him who mourns,
Than when the all he loved, as dust to dust, re-
We mouin-but not thy fate, departed One!
We pity-but the living, not the dead;
Aught from his grief, whose spirit dwells with
f thee;
Once deeply bruised, the heart at length may heal,
But all it was-oh! never more shall be-
The flower, the leaf, o'erwhelmed by winter-snow,
Shall spring again, when beams and showers re-
turn;
The faded cheek again with health may glow,
And the dim eye with life's warm radiance burn;
But the pure freshness of the mind's young bloom,
Once lost, revives alone in worlds beyond the tomb.
XIX.
But thou-thine hour of agony is o'er,
And thy brief race in brilliance hath been run,
While Faith, that bids fond nature grieve no more,
Tells that thy crown-though not on earth—is
"The bright day is done,
And we are for the dark."
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