HOW OFT HAS THE BENSHEE CRIED. How oft has the Benshee cried, Long may the fair and brave We're fall'n upon gloomy days!! Dark falls the tear of him who mourneth But brightly flows the tear, Quench'd are our beacon lightsThou, of the Hundred Fights! 2 Thou, on whose burning tongue Truth, peace, and freedom hung! 3 Both mute, but long as valour shineth, Or mercy's soul at war repineth, So long shall Erin's pride Tell how they liv'd and died. When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round, Oh! remember the smile which adorns her at home. In England, the garden of Beauty is kept That the garden's but carelessly watch'd after all. you roam, When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round, Oh! remember the smile that adorns her at home. In France, when the heart of a woman sets sail, On the ocean of wedlock its fortune to try, Love seldom goes far in a vessel so frail, But just pilots her off, and then bids her good-bye. While the daughters of Erin keep the boy, Ever smiling beside his faithful oar, Through billows of woe, and beams of joy, The same as he look'd when he left the shore. Then remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd, Thro' this world, whether eastward or westward you roam, When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round, Oh! remember the smile that adorns her at home. Who but sips of a sweet, and then flies to the The Lord of the Valley with false vows came; The white snow lay On the narrow path-way, When the Lord of the Valley crost over the moor; And many a deep print On the white snow's tint THE SONG OF FIONNUALA.4 SILENT, oh Moyle, be the roar of thy water, Break not, ye breezes, your chain of repose, Show'd the track of his footstep to Eveleen's door. While, murmuring mournfully, Lir's lonely On Lough Neagh's bank, as the fisherman strays, This moment's a flower too fair and brief, When the clear cold eve's declining, He sees the round towers of other days In the wave beneath him shining; Thus shall memory often, in dreams sublime, Catch a glimpse of the days that are over; Thus, sighing, look through the waves of time For the long faded glories they cover. 3 To be wither'd and stain'd by the dust of the schools. Your glass may be purple, and mine may be blue, But, while they are fill'd from the same bright bowl, The fool, who would quarrel for diff'rence of hue, Deserves not the comfort they shed o'er the soul. 1 "This brought on an encounter between Malachi (the Monarch of Ireland in the tenth century) and the Danes, in which Malachi defeated two of their champions, whom he encountered successively, hand to hand, taking a collar of gold from the neck of one, and carrying off the sword of the other, as trophies of his victory."— Warner's History of Ireland, vol. i. book ix. 2" Military orders of knights were very early established in Ireland; long before the birth of Christ we find an hereditary order of Chivalry in Ulster, called Curaidhe na Craiobhe ruadh, or the Knights of the Red Branch, from their chief seat in Emania, adjoining to the palace of the Ulster kings, called Teagh na Craiobhe ruadh, or the Academy of the Red Branch; and contiguous to which was a large hospital, founded for the sick knights and soldiers, called Bronbhearg, or the House of the Sorrowful Soldier."— O'Halloran's Introduction, &c., part i. chap. 5. 3 It was an old tradition, in the time of Giraldus, that Lough Neagh had been originally a fountain, by whose sudden overflowing the country was inundated, and a whole region, like the Atlantis of Plato, overwhelmed. He says that the fishermen, in clear weather, used to point out to strangers the tall ecclesiastical towers under the water. Piscatores aquæ illius turres ecclesiasticas, quæ more patriæ arctæ sunt et aliæ, necnon et rotundæ, sub undis manifeste sereno tempore conspiciunt, et extraneis transeuntibus, reique causas admirantibus, frequenter ostendunt. - Topogr. Hib. dist. 2. c. 9. 4 To make this story intelligible in a song would require a much greater number of verses than any one is authorised to inflict upon an audience at once; the reader must therefore be content to learn, in a note, that Fionnuala, the daughter of Lir, was, by some supernatural power, transformed into a swan, and condemned to wander, for many hundred years, over certain lakes and rivers in Ireland, till the coming of Christianity, when the first sound of the mass-bell was to be the signal of her release. I found this fanciful fiction among some manuscript translations from the Irish, which were begun under the direction of that enlightened friend of Ireland, the late Countess of Moira. While you add to your garland the Olive of It is not while beauty and youth are thine own, Spain! If the fame of our fathers, bequeath'd with their Give to country its charm, and to home its delights, Ye Blakes and O'Donnels, whose fathers resign'd The green hills of their youth, among strangers to find That repose which, at home, they had sigh'd for in vain, And thy cheeks unprofan'd by a tear That the fervour and faith of a soul can be known, As the sun-flower turns on her god, when he sets, ERIN, OH ERIN. LIKE the bright lamp, that shone in Kildare's holy fane, And burn'd thro' long ages of darkness and storm, Join, join in our hope that the flame, which you Is the heart that sorrows have frown'd on in vain, light, May be felt yet in Erin, as calm, and as bright, God prosper the cause!-oh, it cannot but thrive, Whose spirit outlives them, unfading and warm. Its devotion to feel, and its rights to maintain; 1 The inextinguishable fire of St. Bridget, at Kildare, which Giraldus mentions:-" Apud Kildariam occurrit ignis Sanctæ Brigidæ, quem inextinguibilem vocant; non quod extingui non possit, sed quod tam solicite moniales et sanctæ Thy star will shine out when the proudest shall fade. mulieres ignem, suppetente materia, fovent et nutriunt, ut a tempore virginis per tot annorum curricula semper mansit inextinctus."-Girald. Camb. de Mirabil. Hibern, dist. 2. c. 34. 1 Mrs. H. Tighe, in her exquisite lines on the Lily, has applied this image to a still more important object. 1 We may suppose this apology to have been uttered by one of those wandering bards, whom Spenser so severely, and, perhaps, truly, describes in his State of Ireland, and whose poems, he tells us, "were sprinkled with some pretty flowers of their natural device, which have good grace and comeliness unto them, the which it is great pity to see abused to the gracing of wickedness and vice, which, with good usage, would serve to adorn and beautify virtue." OH! BLAME NOT THE BARD.2 OH! blame not the bard, if he fly to the bowers, Where Pleasure lies, carelessly smiling at Fame; He was born for much more, and in happier hours His soul might have burn'd with a holier flame. The string, that now languishes loose o'er the lyre, Might have bent a proud bow to the warrior's dart ;3 And the lip, which now breathes but the song of desire, Might have pour'd the full tide of a patriot's heart. But alas for his country!- her pride is gone by, And that spirit is broken, which never would bend; O'er the ruin her children in secret must sigh, For 'tis treason to love her, and death to defend. Unpriz'd are her sons, till they've learn'd to betray; Undistinguish'd they live, if they shame not their sires; And the torch, that would light them thro' dignity's way, Must be caught from the pile, where their country expires. Then blame not the bard, if in pleasure's soft dream, He should try to forget, what he never can heal : Oh! give but a hope— let a vista but gleam Through the gloom of his country, and mark how he'll feel! That instant, his heart at her shrine would lay down Every passion it nurs'd, every bliss it ador'd; While the myrtle, now idly entwin'd with his crown, Like the wreath of Harmodius, should cover his sword. 4 1 " of such celestial bodies as are visible, the sun excepted, the single moon, as despicable as it is in comparison to most of the others, is much more beneficial than they all put together." Whiston's Theory, &c. Young Kitty, all blushing, rose up from her pillow, Had promised to link the last tie before noon; And, when once the young heart of a maiden is stolen, The maiden herself will steal after it soon. As she look'd in the glass, which a woman ne'er misses, Nor ever wants time for a sly glance or two, A butterfly 3, fresh from the night-flower's kisses, Flew over the mirror, and shaded her view. Enrag'd with the insect for hiding her graces, She brush'd him- he fell, alas! never to rise: "Ah! such," said the girl, "is the pride of our faces, "For which the soul's innocence too often dies." While she stole thro' the garden, where heart's-ease was growing, She cull'd some, and kiss'd off its night-fall'n dew; And a rose, farther on, look'd so tempting and glowing, That, spite of her haste, she must gather it too: But while o'er the roses too carelessly leaning, Her zone flew in two, and the heart's-ease was lost: "Ah! this means," said the girl (and she sigh'd at its meaning), "That love is scarce worth the repose it will cost!" BEFORE THE BATTLE. By the hope within us springing, By that sun, whose light is bringing Chains or freedom, death or life- No charm for him, who lives not free! Midst the dew-fall of a nation's tears. Happy is he o'er whose decline The smiles of home may soothing shine, And light him down the steep of years: we find a starry sky without a moon, with these words, Non mille, quod absens. 2 This image was suggested by the following thought, which occurs somewhere in Sir William Jones's works: "The In the Entretiens d'Ariste, among other ingenious emblems, moon looks upon many night-flowers, the night-flower sees but |