Part 7 — KING CORMAC'S CHOICE.[104]

Beside the banks of Boyne, where late The dire Dutch trumpets blared and rang, 'Mid wounded kernes the harper sate, And thus the river's legend sang: Who shall forbid a king to lie Where lie he will, when life is o'er? King Cormac laid him down to die; But first he raised his hand, and swore: "At Brugh ye shall not lay my bones: Those pagan kings I scorn to join Beside the trembling Druid stones, And on the north bank of the Boyne. "A grassy grave of poor degree Upon its southern bank be mine At Rossnaree, where of things to be I saw in vision the pledge and sign. "Thou happier Faith, that from the East Slow travellest, set my people free! I sleep, thy Prophet and thy Priest, By southern Boyne, at Rossnaree." He died: anon from hill and wood Down flocked the black-robed Druid race, And round the darkened palace stood, And cursed the dead king to his face. Uptowering round his bed, with lips Denouncing doom, and cheeks death-pale, As when at noontide strange eclipse Invests gray cliffs and shadowed vale; And proved with cymball'd anthems dread The gods he spurned had bade him die: Then spake the pagan chiefs, and said, "Where lie our kings, this king must lie." In royal robes the corse they dressed, And spread the bier with boughs of yew; And chose twelve men, their first and best, To bear him through the Boyne to Brugh. But on his bier the great dead king Forgot not so his kingly oath; And from sea-marge to mountain spring, Boyne heard their coming, and was wroth. He frowned far off, 'mid gorse and fern, As those ill-omened steps made way; He muttered 'neath the flying hern; He foamed by cairn and cromlech gray; And rose, and drowned with one black wave Those twelve on-wading; and with glee Bore down King Cormac to his grave By southern Boyne, at Rossnaree! Close by that grave, three centuries past, Columba reared his saintly cell; And Boyne's rough voice was changed at last To music by the Christian bell. So Christ's true Faith made Erin free, And blessed her women and her men; And that which was again shall be, And that which died shall rise again. He ceased: the wondering clansmen roared Accordance to the quivering strings, And praised King Cormac, Erin's Lord, And Prophet of the King of kings. Aubrey de Vere.