HOW OFT HAS THE BENSHEE CRIED. How oft has the Benshee cried, We're fall'n upon gloomy days!' Dark falls the tear of him who mourneth But brightly flows the tear, Quench'd are our beacon lightsThou, of the Hundred Fights!2 Thou, on whose burning tongue Truth, peace, and freedom hung!3 Both mute, but long as valor shineth, Or mercy's soul at war repineth, So long shall Erin's pride When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round, Oh! remember the smile which adorns her at home. In England, the garden of Beauty is kept By a dragon of prudery placed within call; But so oft this unamiable dragon has slept, That the garden's but carelessly watch'd after all. Oh! they want the wild sweet-briery fence, Which round the flowers of Erin dwells; Which warns the touch, while winning the sense, Nor charms us least when it most repels. Then remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd, Thro' this world, whether eastward or westward you roam, When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round, But just pilots her off, and then bids her good-by. The same as he look'd when he left the shore. Then remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd, Thro' this world, whether eastward or westward you roam, When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round, Oh! remember the smile that adorns her at home. Who but sips of a sweet, and then flies to the The Lord of the Valley with false vows came ; rest; And, when pleasure begins to grow dull in the east, The moon hid her light We may order our wings, and be off to the west; And wept behind her clouds o'er the maiden's shame But if hearts that feel, and eyes that smile, Are the dearest gifts that heaven supplies, We never need leave our own green isle, For sensitive hearts, and for sun-bright eyes. Then remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd, Thro' this world, whether eastward or westward you roam, 1 I have endeavored here, without losing that Irish character which it is my object to preserve throughout this work, to allude to the sad and ominous fatality, by which England has been deprived of so many great and good men, at a moment when she most requires all the aids of talent and integrity. * This designation, which has been before applied to Lond The clouds pass'd soon From the chaste cold moon, And heaven smiled again with her vestal flame; But none will see the day, When the clouds shall pass away, Which that dark hour left upon Eveleen's fame. Nelson, is the title given to a celebrated Irish Hero, in a Poem by O'Guive, the bard of O'Niel, which is quoted in the "Philosophical Survey of the South of Ireland," page 433. "Con, of the Hundred Fights, sleep in thy grass-grown tomb, and upbraid not our defeats with thy victories." 3 Fox, "Romanorum ultimus." On Lough Neagh's bank, as the fisherman strays, This moment's a flower too fair and brief, When the clear cold eve's declining, He sees the round towers of other days In the wave beneath him shining; Thus shall memory often, in dreams sublime, 1 "This brought on an encounter between Maiachi (the Monarch of Ireland in the tenth century) and the Danes, in which Malachi defeated two of their champions, whom he encountered successively, hand to hand, taking a collar of gold from the neck of one, and carrying off the sword of the other, as trophies of his victory."- Warner's History of Ireland, vol. i. book ix. To be wither'd and stain'd by the dust of the Your glass may be purple, and mine may be blue, bowl, The fool who would quarrel for diff'rence of hue, Deserves not the comfort they shed o'er the soul. region, like the Atlantis of Plato, overwhelmed. He says that the fishermen, in clear weather, used to point out to strangers the tall ecclesiastical towers under the water. Piscatores aquæ illius turres ecclesiasticas, quæ more patria arctæ sunt et alte, necnon et rotunde, sub undis manifeste sereno tempore conspiciunt, et extrancis transeuntibus, reique causas admirantibus, frequenter ostendunt.-Topogr. Hib. dist. 2, c. 9. To make this story intelligible in a song would require a much greater number of verses than any one is authorized to inflict upon an audience at once; the reader must therefore be content to learn, in a note, that Fionnuala, the daughter of Lir, was, by some supernatural power, transformed into a swan, and condemned to wander, for many hundred years, over certain lakes and rivers in Ireland, till the coming of 2 "Military orders of knights were very early established in Ireland; long before the birth of Christ we find an hereditary order of Chivalry in Ulster, called Curaidhe na Craiobhe ruadh, or the Knights of the Red Branch, from their chief seat in Emania, adjoining to the palace of the Ulster kings, called Teagh na Craiobhe ruadh, or the Academy of the Red Branch; and contiguous to which was a large hospital, founded for the sick knights and soldiers, called Bronbhearg, or the House of the Sorrowful Soldier."-O'Hallo- | Christianity, when the first sound of the mass-bell was to ran's Introduction, &c., part i. chap. 5. It was an old tradition, in the time of Giraldus, that Lough Neagh had been originally a fountain, by whose sudden overflowing the country was inundated, and a whole be the signal of her release.-I found this fanciful fiction among some manuscript translations from the Irish, which were begun under the direction of that enlightened friend of Ireland, the late Countess of Moira. While you add to your garland the Olive of It is not while beauty and youth are thine own, Spain ! If the fame of our fathers, bequeath'd with their rights, Give to country its charm, and to home its delights, Ye Blakes and O'Donnels, whose fathers resign'd The green hills of their youth, among strangers to find That repose which, at home, they had sigh'd for in vain, And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear That the fervor and faith of a soul can be known, To which time will but make thee more dear; No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets, But as truly loves on to the close, As the sun-flower turns on her god, when he sets, The same look which she turn'd when he rose. ERIN, OH ERIN. LIKE the bright lamp, that shone in Kildare's holy fane,1 And burn'd thro' long ages of darkness and storm, Join, join in our hope that the flame, which you Is the heart that sorrows have frown'd on in vain, 1 Mrs. H. Tighe, in her exquisite lines on the Lily, has applied this image to a still more important object. 2 We may suppose this apology to have been uttered by one of those wandering bards, whom Spenser so severely, and, perhaps, truly, describes in his State of Ireland, and whose poems, he tells us, "were sprinkled with some pretty flowers of their natural device, which have good grace and comeliness unto them, the which it is great pity to see abused to the gracing of wickedness and vice, which, with good usage, would serve to adorn and beautify virtue." OH! BLAME NOT THE BARD." On! blame not the bard, if he fly to the bowers, Where Pleasure lies, carelessly smiling at Fame; He was born for much more, and in happier hours His soul might have burn'd with a holier flame. The string, that now languishes loose o'er the lyre, Might have bent a proud bow to the warrior's dart ; And the lip, which now breathes but the song of desire, Might have pour'd the full tide of a patriot's heart. But alas for his country!-her pride is gone by, And that spirit is broken, which never would bend; O'er the ruin her children in secret must sigh, For 'tis treason to love her, and death to defend. Unprized are her sons, till they've learn'd to betray; Undistinguish'd they live, if they shame not their sires; And the torch, that would light them thro' dignity's way, Must be caught from the pile, where their country expires. Then blame not the bard, if in pleasure's soft dream, He should try to forget what he never can heal: Oh! give but a hope-let a vista but gleam Through the gloom of his country, and mark how he'll feel! That instant, his heart at her shrine would lay down Every passion it nursed, every bliss it adored; While the myrtle, now idly entwined with his crown, Like the wreath of Harmodius, should cover his sword.' 3 It is conjectured by Wormins, that the name of Ireland is derived from Fr, the Runic for a bow, in the use of which weapon the Irish were once very expert. This derivation is certainly more creditable to us than the following: "So that Ireland, called the land of Ire, from the constant broils therein for 400 years, was now become the land of concord."-Lloyd's State Worthies, art. The Lord Grandison. See the Hymn, attributed to Alcæus, Ev pvprov kλadı re {idas pupnow—“I will carry my sword, hidden in myrtles, like Harmodius, and Aristogiton," &c. |