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And, so, her lover went to France,

To serve the foe of Ireland's foe;
Yet deep he swore, "Whatever chance,

I'll come some day when south winds blow."
And prouder hopes he told beside,

How she should be a prince's bride,
How Louis would the Wild Geese send,

And Ireland's weary woes should end.

But tyrants quenched her father's hearth,
And wrong and absence warped her mind;
The gentle maid, of gentle birth,

Is moaning madly to the wind, -
"He said he'd come, whate'er betide;
He said I'd be a happy bride:

O, long the way and hard the foe,

He'll come when south-when south winds blow!"

Smerwick.

SONG.

Thomas Davis.

IS war-horse beats a distant bourne

HIS

Till comes the glad new year;
Therefore thy wheel in silence turn,
And only dream him near.

He fights where native monarchs be,
Where Moors no longer reign:

He strikes and cries, "My land, for thee!"
Amid delivered Spain.

O maiden of the moon-pale face

And darkly lucid eye!

For knights wave-washed round Smerwick's base

Fair Spanish maidens sigh!

The moss, till comes the glad new year,

Alone may clothe the bough;

Alone the raindrop deck the breer,

It weeps, and so must thou!

Aubrey de Vere.

Tara.

THE HARP THAT ONCE THROUGH TARA'S HALLS.

HE harp that once through Tara's halls

THE

The soul of music shed

Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls

As if that soul were fled.

So sleeps the pride of former days,

So glory's thrill is o'er,

And hearts, that once beat high for praise,
Now feel that pulse no more.

No more to chiefs and ladies bright

The harp of Tara swells;

The chord alone, that breaks at night,

Its tale of ruin tells.

Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes,

The only throb she gives

Is when some heart indignant breaks,
To show that still she lives.

Thomas Moore.

KING MALACHY AND THE POET M'COISI.

KING MALACHY, shorn of crown and renown,

With nothing left but his mensal board, Hung in the troopless hall his sword,

Cared his own horse in the stable,

And daily sank deeper in joys of the table;
For Brian the King, by force and art,
By might of brain and hope of heart,
Conquered the sceptre and won the crown,
Leaving to Malachy little renown.

In Tara's hall was room to spare,

For few were the chiefs and courtiers there;
Of all who stood well in the monarch's graces,
But three retained their ancient places,

And two of the three had followed Brian,

Had the conqueror thought them worth his buyin'; The third, the poet M'Coisi, alone

Stood true to the empty, discrowned throne.

And many a tale the poet told
Of Tara's splendor in days of old, –
Of Erin's wonderful builders three,
Of Troylane, the builder of Rath-na-ree,
And Unadh, who built the banquet-hall,
And the Gobhan Saer, the master of all;
Of the Miller of Nith, and the Miller of Fore,
And many a hundred marvels more;

Of the Well of Galloon that, like sudden sorrow,

Turns the hair to gray to-morrow;

Of the Well of Slieve-bloom, which, who profanes
On the land around, draws down plagues and rains;
Of the human wolves that howl and prey
Through Ossory's Woods from dark till day;
Of speaking babes and potent boys,
And the wonderful man of Clonmacnoise,
Who lived seven years without a head,
And the edifying life he led;

Of ships and armies seen in the air,

And the wonders wrought by St. Patrick's prayer.

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A

TIMOLEAGUE.

BROAD one night in loneliness I strolled,

Along the wave-worn beach my footpath lay; Struggling the while with sorrows yet untold, Yielding to cares that wore my strength away: On as I moved, my wayward musings ran O'er the strange turns that mark the fleeting life of man.

The little stars shone sweetly in the sky;

Not one faint murmur rose from sea or shore; The wind with silent wing went slowly by,

As though some secret on its path it bore:

All, all was calm, tree, flower, and shrub stood still, And the soft moonlight slept on valley and on hill.

Sadly and slowly on my path of pain

I wandered, idly brooding o'er my woes; Till full before me on the far-stretched plain,

The ruined abbey's mouldering walls arose; Where far from crowds, from courts and courtly crimes, The sons of virtue dwelt, the boast of better times.

I paused, I stood beneath the lofty door,

Where once the friendless and the poor were fed; That hallowed entrance, that in days of yore

Still opened wide to shield the wanderer's head,The saint, the pilgrim, and the book-learned sage, The knight, the travelling one, and the worn man of age.

I sat me down in melancholy mood,

My furrowed cheek was resting on my hand;
I gazed upon that scene of solitude,

The wreck of all that piety had planned:
To my aged eyes the tears unbidden came,
Tracing in that sad spot our glory and our shame.

"And O," cried I, as from my breast the while
The struggling sigh of soul-felt anguish broke,
"A time there was, when through this storm-touched pile
In other tones the voice of echo spoke

Here other sounds and sights were heard and seen, How altered is the place from what it once hath been!

"Here in soft strains the solemn mass was sung;

Through these long aisles the brethren bent their way;

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