A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English Tongue

I met her sowin' mushrooms

With her white feet in the grass;
Twas eve-but mornin' in the smile
Of my sweet cailín deas;
An' I kissed her-oh, so secretly

That not a one should know ---

But the roguish stars they winked above An' the daisies smiled below.

The Father in confession, Rose,
Won't count that love a sin
That with a kiss taps at the heart
An' lets an angel in ;

'Twas so love entered into mine

An' made his dwellin' thereIf that's a sin, the Lord forgive Your beauty, Rose Adair!

If springtime never came at all
To chase the winter's frown,
Her smile would coax the flowers up

An' charm the sunshine down;
There's not a perfumed breeze that blows

Or bird that charms the air,

But stole its sweetness from the lips
Of lovely Rose Adair.

The leaves will fall in autumn,

An' the flowers all come to grief,

But the green love in my heart of hearts
Will never shed a leaf!

For the sunshine of your bonny eyes
Will keep it green and fair,

An' your breath will be its breeze-o'-spring,
O, lovely Rose Adair.

PATRICK JAMES COLEMAN

BORN at Ballaghadereen, County Mayo, in 1867. He matriculated at London University, and is now a journalist in America. The following poem is singularly close to the soil, and characteristic of certain phases of Irish feeling.

SEED-TIME

THE top o' the mornin' to you, Mick,
Isn't it fine an' dhry an' still?

Just an elegant day, avic,

To stick the toleys on Tullagh hill.

The field is turned, an' every clod

In ridge an' furrow is fresh an' brown ;

So let's away, with the help o' God,

By the heel o' the evenin' we'll have them down.

As long as there's plenty o' milk to churn,
An' plenty o' pyaties in ridge an' furrow,
By the winter fire we'll laugh to scorn

The frown o' famine an' scowl o' sorrow.

There's a time to work, an' a time to talk ;
So, Patsy, my boy, your pratin' shtop!
By Midsummer Day, blossom an' stalk,
We'll feast our eyes on a right good crop.
Oh, the purple blossoms, so full o' joy,

Burstin' up from our Irish loam,

They're betther than gold to the peasant, boy;
They crown him king in his Irish home!

As long as the cows have milk to churn,
With plenty o' pyaties in ridge an' furrow,
By the winter hearth we'll laugh to scorn

The frown o' famine an' scowl o' sorrow.

III

A year ago we wor full o' hope,

For the stalks wor green by the First o' May,
But the brown blight fell over field an' slope,
An' the poreens rotted by Lady Day.
You'd dig a ridge for a creel in vain ;

But He left us still our dacint friends;
If it comes again we won't complain-
His will be done !—it's the besht He sends !
As long as we've plenty o' milk to churn,
An' plenty o' pyaties in ridge an' furrow,
By the winter fire we'll laugh to scorn

The frown o' famine an' scowl o' sorrow.

An' whin the turf's in the haggard piled,

We'll come, plase God! with our spades and loys; It's busy ye'll be, then, Brigid, my child,

Fillin' the baskets behind the boys.

So shtick thim deep in Ould Ireland's clay-
It's nearly dusk, an' there's work galore ;

It's time enough in the winter to play,
When the crop is safe on our cabin floor.
As long as the cows have milk to churn,
With plenty o' pyaties in ridge an' furrow,
By the winter hearth we'll laugh to scorn
The frown o' famine an' scowl o' sorrow.

PATRICK JOSEPH MCCALL

MR. P. J. MCCALL was born in Dublin, 1861, and educated at the Catholic University School, Leeson Street. His two volumes of poems besides excellent translations from the Irish contain much racy and original verse, chiefly descriptive of peasant life in the County Wexford. There are no literary echoes in his work ; it springs straight from the soil; and though Mr. McCall does not deal in tragedy or romance, he puts before us the humour,

the gaiety, the daily toil, and the half serious, half sportive love-making of the Irish peasant with refreshing fidelity and absence of rhetorical sentiment. His two volumes of vere are: IRISH NÓINÍNS (Daisies), 1894; and SONGS OF ERINN. 1899.

OLD PEDHAR CARTHY FROM CLONMORE

IF you searched the county o' Carlow, ay, and back again,
Wicklow too, and Wexford, for that matter you might try,
Never the equal of Old Pedhar would you crack again'—
Never such another would delight your Irish eye!
Mirth, mime, and mystery, all were close combined in him,
Divelment and drollery right to the very core,

As many tricks and turns as a two-year-old you'd find in him--
In Old Pedhar Carthy from Clonmore!

Old Pedhar, Old Pedhar, Old Pedhar Carthy!