But, minstrel, why cometh a change o'er thy theme?
Why sing of red battle-what dream dust thou dream?
Ha! "Treason" 's the cry, and "Revenge" is the call,
As the swords of the Saxon surrounded the hall!
A kingdom for Angelo's mind! to portray
Green Erin's undaunted avenger that day;
The far-flashing sword, and the death-darting eye,
Like some comet commissioned with wrath from the sky.
Through the ranks of the Saxon he hewed his red way—
Through lances, and sabres, and hostile array;
And, mounting his charger, he left them to tell
The tale of that feast, and its bloody farewell.
And now on the Saxons his clansmen advance,
With a shout from each heart, and a soul in each lance:
He rushed, like a storm, o'er the night-covered heath,
And swept through their ranks, like the angel of death.
Then hurrah! for thy glory, young chieftain, hurrah !
Oh! had we such lightning-souled heroes to-day,
Again would our sunburst* expand in the gale,
And Freedom exult o'er the green Innisfail!
WARRIORS and statesmen have their meed of praise,
And what they do or suffer men record;
But the long sacrifice of woman's days
Passes without a thought, without a word;
And many a holy struggle for the sake
Of duties sternly, faithfully fulfilled,—
For which the anxious mind must watch and wake,
And the strong feelings of the heart be stilled,-
Goes by unheeded as the summer wind,
And leaves no memory and no trace behind!
Yet, it may be, more lofty courage dwells
In one meek heart which braves an adverse fate,
Than his, whose ardent soul indignant swells,
Warmed by the fight, or cheered through high debate.
*The Irish national banner.
The soldier dies surrounded ;—could he live
Alone to suffer, and alone to strive?
Answer, ye graves, whose suicidal gloom
Shows deeper horror than a common tomb!
Who sleep within? The men who would evade
An unseen lot of which they felt afraid.
Embarrassment of means, which worked annoy,—
A past remorse,-a future blank of joy,—
The sinful rashness of a blind despair,-
These were the strokes which sent your victims there.
In many a village churchyard's simple grave,
Where all unmarked the cypress-branches wave;
In many a vault where Death could only claim
The brief inscription of a woman's name;
Of different ranks, and different degrees,
From daily labor to a life of ease,
(From the rich wife who, through the weary day,
Wept in her jewels, grief's unceasing prey,
To the poor soul who trudged o'er marsh and moor,
And with her baby begged from door to door,)
Lie hearts, which, ere they found that last release,
Had known no nights of rest, no days of peace;
Hearts, whose long struggle through unpitied years
None saw but He who marks the mourner's tears;
The obscurely noble! who evaded not
The woe which He had willed should be their lot,
But nerved themselves to bear.
160. THE POWER OF DREAMS.
STRANGE is the power of dreams! Who hath not felt, When in the morning light such visions melt,
How the veiled soul, though struggling to be free,
Ruled by that deep, unfathomed mystery,
Wakes, haunted by the thoughts of good or ill,
Whose shadowy influence pursues us still?
Sometimes remorse doth weigh our spirits down; Some crime committed earns heaven's angriest frown;
Some awful sin, in which the tempted heart
Hath scarce, perhaps, forborne its waking part,
Brings dreams of judgment; loud the thunders roll,
The heavens shrink blackened like a flaming scroll;
We faint, we die, beneath the avenging rod,
And vainly hide from our offended God.
For, oh! though Fancy change our mortal lot,
And rule our slumbers, Conscience sleepeth not:
That strange, sad dial, by its own true light,
Points to our thoughts, how dark soe'er the night;
Still by our pillow watchful guard it keeps,
And bids the sinner tremble while he sleeps.
Sometimes, with fearful dangers doomed to cope, 'Reft of each wild and visionary hope,
Stabbed with a thousand wounds, we struggle still,
The hand that tortures, powerless to kill.
Sometimes, 'mid ocean storms, in fearful strife,
We stem the wave, and, shrieking, gasp for life;
While crowding round us, faces rise and gleam-
Some known and loved, some pictures of our dream:
High on the buoyant waters wildly tossed,
Low in its foaming caverns darkly lost,
Those flitting forms the dangerous hour partake,
Cling to our aid, or suffer for our sake.
Conscious of present life, the slumbering soul
Still floats us onward, as the billows roll,
Till, snatched from death, we seem to touch the strand,
Rise on the shoreward wave, and dash to land!
Alone we come: the forms whose wild array
Gleamed round us while we struggled, fade away;
We know not, reck not, who the danger shared,
But, vaguely dreaming, feel that we are spared.
Sometimes a grief, of fond affection born,
Gnaws at our heart, and bids us weep till morn;
Some anguish, copied from our waking fears,
Wakes the eternal fount of human tears,
Sends us to watch some visioned bed of death,
Hold the faint hand, and catch the parting breath,
Where those we prized the most and loved the best,
Seem darkly sinking to the grave's long rest.
Lo! in our arms they fade, they faint, they die,
Before our eyes the funeral train sweeps by;
We hear the orphan's sob, the widow's wail-
O'er our dim senses woful thoughts prevail,
Till, with a burst of grief, the spell we break,
And, weeping for th' imagined loss, awake!
161. THE FALLEN LEAVES.
We stand among the fallen leaves,
Young children at our play,
And laugh to see the yellow things
Go rustling on their way:
Right merrily we hunt them down,
The autumn winds and we,
pause to gaze where snow-drifts lie, Or sunbeams gild the tree.
With dancing feet we leap along
Where withered boughs are strown;
Nor past nor future checks our song-
The present is our own.
We stand among the fallen leaves
In youth's enchanted spring,
When Hope (who wearies at the last)
First spreads her eagle wing:
We tread with steps of conscious strength
Beneath the leafless trees,
And the color kindles on our cheek,
As blows the winter breeze;
While, gazing towards the cold gray sky,
Clouded with snow and rain,
We wish the old year all past by,
And the young spring come again.
We stand among the fallen leaves
In manhood's haughty prime,
When first our pausing hearts begin
To love the olden time;"
And as we gaze, we sigh to think
How many a year hath passed,
Since, 'neath those cold and faded trees,
Our footsteps wandered last;
And old companions-now, perchance,
Estranged, forgot, or dead-
Come round us, as those autumn leaves
Are crushed beneath our tread.
We stand among the fallen leaves
In our own autumn day,
And, tottering on with feeble steps,
Pursue our cheerless way.
We look not back-too long ago
Hath all we loved been lost;
Nor forward-for we may not live
To see our new hope crossed:
But on we go; the sun's faint beam
A feeble warmth imparts:
Childhood, without its joy returns ;-
The present fills our hearts!
WEEP not for him that dieth,
For he sleeps, and is at rest;
And the couch whereon he lieth
Is the green earth's quiet breast :
But weep for him who pineth
On a far land's hateful shore,
Who wearily declineth
Where ye see his face no more!
Weep not for him that dieth,
For friends are round his bed, And many a young lip sigheth When they name the early dead:
But weep for him that liveth
Where none will know or care,
When the groan his faint heart giveth
Is the last sigh of despair.
Weep not for him that dieth,
For his struggling soul is free,
And the world from which it flieth
Is a world of misery;
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