Aye bitter hate or cold neglect,
Or lukewarm love at best,

Is all we've found, or can expect,
We Aliens of the West.

No friend, beyond our own green shore,
Can Erin truly own;

Yet stronger is her trust, therefore,
In her brave sons ALONE.

Remember, when our lot was worse

Sunk, trampled to the dust'Twas long our weakness and our curse In stranger aid to trust.

And if, at length, we proudly trod

On bigot laws o'erthrown,

Who won that struggle? Under God, Ourselves OURSELVES ALONE.

Oh let its memory be enshrined
In Ireland's heart for ever!
It proves a banded people's mind.
Must win in just endeavour ;
It shows how wicked to despair,
How weak to idly groan-

If ills at others' hand ye bear,
The cure is in YOUR OWN.

The foolish word 'impossible'
At once, for aye, disdain !
No power can bar a people's will,
A people's right to gain.
Be bold, united, firmly set,

Nor flinch in word or tone-
We'll be a glorious nation yet,
REDEEMED ERECT-ALONE!

THE OLD STORY

Old as the universe, yet not outworn.'-The Island.

He came across the meadow-pass,

That summer eve of eves;

The sunlight streamed along the grass

And glanced amid the leaves;
And from the shrubbery below,

And from the garden trees,
He heard the thrushes' music flow,
And humming of the bees.

The garden-gate was swung apart-—
The space was brief between ;
But there, for throbbing of his heart,
He paused perforce to lean.

He leaned upon the garden-gate;

He looked, and scarce he breathed;
Within the little porch she sate,

With woodbine overwreathed;
Her eyes upon her work were bent
Unconscious who was nigh;
But oft the needle slowly went,
And oft did idle lie;

And ever to her lips arcse

Sweet fragments faintly sung, But ever, ere the notes could close, She hushed them on her tongue.

'Why should I ever leave this spot,
But gaze until I die?'

A moment from that bursting thought
She felt his footstep nigh.

One sudden lifted glance-but one,
A tremor and a start,

So gently was their greeting done

That who would guess their heart?

Long, long the sun had sunken down,
And all his golden trail

K

Had died away to lines of brown,
In duskier hues that fail.

The grasshopper was chirping shrill-
No other living sound
Accompanied the tiny rill

That gurgled underground-
No other living sound, unless
Some spirit bent to hear
Low words of human tenderness,
And mingling whispers near.

The stars, like pallid gems at first,
Deep in the liquid sky,

Now forth upon the darkness burst,
Sole kings and lights on high
In splendour, myriad-fold, supreme-
No rival moonlight strove,

Nor lovelier e'er was Hesper's beam,

Nor more majestic Jove.

But what if hearts there beat that night

That recked not of the skies,

Or only felt their imaged light

In one another's eyes?

And if two worlds of hidden thought

And fostered passion met,

Which, passing human language, sought

And found an utterance yet;
And if they trembled like to flowers

That droop across a stream,
The while the silentstarry hours
Glide o'er them like a dream;
And if, when came the parting time,
They faltered still and clung;
What is it all? an ancient rhyme
Ten thousand times besung-
That part of paradise which man
Without the portal knows-

Which hath been since the world began,
And shall be till its close.

PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY

'A Protestant King, a Protestant House of Lords and Commons, a Protestant Hierarchy; the courts of Justice, the army, the navy, and the revenue, in all their branches and details, Protestant -and this system fortified and maintained by a connection with the Protestant State of Great Britain.

The Protestants of Ireland will never relinquish their political position, which their fathers won with their swords, and which they, therefore, regard as their birthright.'-Letter of the Dublin Corporation, 1793.

GREAT fabric of oppression

By tyrant plunderers planned,

So giant-vast, so iron-fast,

That were not God's great fiat pass'd
That man's injustice shall not last
Thou might'st eternal stand;

Black fortress of Ascendency,

Beneath whose wasting sway
Sprang crime and strife, so deadly rife-
What rests of thee to-day?

A few unsightly fragments,

The scoff and scorn of all,

Long pierc'd and rent by freedom's power
They rot and crumble hour by hour,
And wait the lightest storm to lour,
In hapless wreck to fall.
What show of faded banners,

What shouts of angry men,
Or doughty threat or sullen fret,
Will raise that pile again?

Vain vain! go seek the charnel

Where haughty Clare lies low;

Tell him how ruin darkens o'er

The cause he sav'd in flames and gore,
How his strong will is needed sore
In this your day of woe-
Rouse bloody Toler, summon all

Clan Beresford to gorge and prey,

And acrid Saurin's heart of gall

And serpent Castlereagh.

And those dry bones shall hearken
And smite with ghastly fear

This isle once more, ere ye restore
Their dead dominion here.

Vain vain! can ye roll backward
The world for fifty years?

From thrice three glowing millions drain
Their strength and substance, heart and brain?
Where thought and daring impulse reign,

Plant old derided fears?

Get their strong limbs your yoke to bear,
Your grasp upon their purse?

Your maddest madman would not dare
So wild a dream to nurse
Awake! awake! your paths to take
For better or for worse.

The better lies before you,

The noblest ever trod;

To meet your brothers face to face,
Quell idle feuds of creed or race,
And take your gallant grandsires' place
To free your native sod.

Make recreant statesmen tremble,

And ingrate England quail,

And win and wear the proudest share
In Ireland's proudest tale.

The worse-'tis yours to choose it—
In helpless rage to stand :

To see the gulf and, trembling, wait-
To writhe beneath o'ermastering fate,
Repelling with a scowl of hate

Your brother's outstretched hand--
In history known as tigers

Whose teeth and fangs were drawn, Whose heart and will were murderous still. When means and strength were gone.