Poetry.

Woe, woe was ours. Chief drew his sword on chief: Religion with her relique and her brand, Made strife between our bosom-bones, and grief And lawless joy abounded in the land; Our glass of glory sank nigh its last sand; Rank with its treason, priesthood with its craft, Turned Scotland's war-lance to a willow-wand. But war arose in Scotland—civil war; Serf warred with chief, and father warred with son, The church too warred with all: her evil star That rules o'er sinking realms shone like the sun— Her lights waxed dim and died out one by one— Woe o'er the land hung like a funeral pall: The sword the bold could brave, the coward shun, But famine followed fast and fell on all— Pale lips cried oft for food which came not at their call.

Much mirth was theirs—war was no wonder then; Dread fled with danger, and the cottage cocks, The shepherd's war-pipe, called the sons of men When morning's wheel threw bright dew from its spokes, To pastures green to lead again their flocks; The horn of harvest followed with its call; Fast moved the sickle, and swift rose the shocks, Behind the reapers like a golden wall— Gravely the farmer smiled, by turns approving all. The ripe corn waved in lone Dalgonar glen, That, with its bosom basking in the sun, Lies like a bird; the hum of working men Joins with the sound of streams that southward run, With fragrant holms atween: then mix in one Beside a church, and round two ancient towers Form a deep fosse. Here sire is heired by son, And war comes never; ancle deep in flowers In summer walk its dames among the sunny bowers. He rose, find homeward by the slumbering stream Walked with the morn-dew glistening on his shoon. The sun was up, and his outbursting beam Touched tower and tree and pasture hills aboon; The stars were quenched, and vanished was the moon; Loud lowed the herds and the glad partridge' cry Made corn-fields musical as groves at noon; Birds left the perch, bee following bee hummed by, And gladness reigned on earth and brightness claimed the sky.

I sing of days in which brave deeds of arms And deeds of song went hand in hand: our kings Heroic feelings had and owned the charms Of minstrel lore—they loved the magic strings More than the sceptre; still their kingdom rings With their gay musings and their harpings high. To noble deeds fair poesie lends wings; She lifts them up from grovelling earth to sky, And bids them sit in light, and live and never die.

Fame, fame—thou warrior's wish, thou poet's thought, Thou bright delusion; like the rainbow thou Glitterest, yet none may touch thee; thing of naught, Star-high with heaven's own brightness on thy brow, Blazoned and glorious I beheld thee grow— Vision, begone,—for I am none of thine. Of all that fills my heart and fancy now, From dull oblivion not one word or line Wilt thou touch with thy light and render it divine. Even be it so. I sing not for thy smiles— I sing to keep down sighs and ease the smart Of care and sadness, and the daily toils Which crush my soul and trample on my heart. Far mightier spirits of the inspired art Are mute and nameless, mid the muse in grief Calls from the eastern to the western airt, On tale, tradition, ballad, song, and chief On thee, to give their names one passage bright and brief. She calls in vain; like to a shooting star Their storied rhymes shone brightly in their birth, And shot a dazzling lustre near and far; Then darkened, died, as all things else on earth.

The sun Behind the mountain's summit slowly sank; Crows came in clouds down from the moorlands dun, And darkened all the pine-trees, rank on rank; The homeward milch-cows at the fountains drank; Swains dropt the sickle, hinds unloosed the car— The twin hares sported on the clover-bank, And with the shepherd o'er the upland far, Came out the round pale moon, and star succeeding star. Star followed star, though yet day's golden light Upon the hills and headlands faintly stream'd; To their own pine the twin-doves took their flight; From crag and cliff the clamorous seamews screamed, In glade and glen the cottage windows gleam'd; Larks left the cloud, for flight the grey owl sat; The founts and lakes up silver radiance steamed; Winging his twilight journey, hummed the gnat— The drowsy beetle droned, and skimmed the wavering bat.

The maiden heard a light foot on the floor, And sidelong looked, and there before her stood Young Eustace Graeme: far from the pasture moor He came: the fragrance of the dale and wood Was scenting all his garments green and good. A sudden flush when tie the maiden saw, Burned through his temples, kindled up his blood— His stifling breath waxed nigh too tight to draw, He bowed, and silent stood in wonderment and awe. The father smiled, the mother smiled. Now why Are her eyes downcast and his white brow glowing? Say, have they vowed while heaven was witness by With all her radiant lights like fountains flowing, To love while water runs and woods are growing, And stars glowed conscious of the compact pure? They never woo'd, nor, love for love bestowing. Met with the moonshine in the green-wood bow'r, Nor looked and sighed, and looked and drank love by the hour. Yet they have met. Though not fools of the flock, On whom love like the tiger gives one bound. And then the heart is rent—a thunderstroke That makes men dust before they hear the sound— A shaft that leaves dark venom in the wound— A frost that all the buds of manhood nips— A sea of passion in which true love's drowned— A demon strangling virtue in his grips— A day when reason's son is quenched in dread eclipse. True gentle love is like the summer dew, Which falls around when all is still and hush— And falls unseen until its bright drops strew With odours, herb and flower, and bank, and bush O love, when womanhood is in the flush, And man's a young and an unspotted thing! His first breathed word and her half conscious blush, Are fair us light in heaven, or flowers in spring— The first hour of true love is worth our worshipping.

"I would not leave old Scotland's mountain gray, Her hills, her cots, her halls, her groves of pine, Dark though they be: yon glen, yon broomy brae, Yon wild fox cleugh, yon eagle cliffs outline An hour like this—this white right-hand of thine, And of thy dark eyes such a gracious glance, As I got now, for all beyond the line, And all the glory gained by sword or lance, In gallant England, Spain, or olive vales of France."