l!!ill!ill!HII I I > I I il i 111 Illll P'll llli!ll!ll lllH ! I HI I jjiP^^^^^ !!i"! iniiiijijiijipiiiiiii «'■!' l|V!i|!|'iiiif!i I 1^1 i\ u[ I i II i' fr 'ill iliihi I I ,1, III' !| II II I i , I ■I 1 r , H ■' il lltl I Cornell University Library The original of tliis bool< is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 92401 3521 1 94 ^c^j"-*^ y^z«-*< JAMESCLARENCEMANGAN H IS-SELECTED'POEMSjRj»^WTH astvdyby THE-EDITOR-LOVISEIMOGENGVINEY I I Copyright, 1897, By Lamson, WolfFe, and Company. j^ll rights reserved NottoooB 3Preg8 J. S. Gushing & Co. - Berwick & Smith Norwood Maea. U.S.A. The Dedication Dear Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, the new Mangan begs to be yours, partly for the gratification of its editor, one of the many who revere you; much more for the sake of the poor poet who helped to endear your distinguished name when he saluted it, fifty years ago, as that of his kindest friend. What the book has tried to be, you will know best. Far away, in your late southern sunshine, among distances, with the old clear-seeing mood ever upon you, may you read it gently I Editor's Note Many thanks are due the Reverend J. H. Gavin of S. Charles Seminary, Overbrook, Pennsylvania, for the loan of books, prints, and manuscripts, while this edition of Man- gan was in progress. For other favors, and much general furtherance, warm acknowledg- ments are tendered to the Reverend William Hayes Ward, D.D.; to Mr. Theodore Koch, Esq., of Cornell University Library ;' Mr. The- odor Guelich of Burlington, Iowa ; Messrs. Robert Waters of Linden, and Francis Nugent of Peabody, Massachusetts ; Dr. J. J. Man- gan of Lynn; Mr. D. J. O'Donoghue; and Miss Dora Sigerson, now Mrs. Clement Shorter, who, besides, drew the portrait used as frontis- piece. Owing to the courteous permission of Messrs. Houghton, MifBin & Co., the Editor is able to reprint the Study, contributed some five years ago to The Atlantic Monthly, and since greatly revised and enlarged. Auburndale, Massachusetts, January, 1897. Table of Contents Page James Clarence Mangan : a Study ... 3 My Dark Rosaleen, and Other Translations FROM THE Gaelic My Dark Rosaleen ..... Prince Aldfrid's Itinerary through Ireland Kinkora ....... St. Patrick's Hymn before Tara O'Daly's Keen for O'Neill .... The Fair Hills of Eire, O . . . . The Geraldine's Daughter .... A Lamentation for the Death of Sir Maurice Fitzgerald Ellen Bawn ...... O'Hussey's Ode to The Maguire . A Lament for the Princes of Tyrone and Tyrconnell A Love Song ...... A Lullaby The Expedition and Death of King Dathy The Woman of Three Cows A Farewell to Patrick Sarsfield, Lord Lucan • 115 . 118 IZI 123 . 128 . 129 • 131 1 133 • 13s • 137 . 141 . IJO . 152 . 156 • 159 . 162 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page The Ruins of Donegal Castle . . . .166 Sancta Opera Domini . • 171 Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan • 173 Welcome to the Prince • 174 The Song of Gladness • 177 The Dream of John Mac Donnell • 179 The Sorrows of Innisfail . i8z Leather Away with the Wattle, O . 184 Lament for Banba 186 The Dawning of the Day 188 Dirge for The O' Sullivan Beare 190 Translations, Chiefly from the German The Maid of Orleans . . . . . .195 The Fisherman . 196 Mignon's Song . 197 Nature More than Science . 198 The Dying Flower 199 Gone in the Wind 20 2 The Glaive Song 205 Alexander the Great and the Tree 210 Strew the Way with Flowers 213 The Erl- King's Daughter . 215 The Grave, the Grave 218 A Song 219 To Ludwig Uhland . 220 The Poet's Consolation 221 The Love-Adieu 222 TABLE OF CONTENTS A Drinking-Song Swabian Popular Song Holiness to the Lord . The Ride around the Parapet My Home The Fairies' Passage . The Last Words of Al-Hassan And Then no More . Mother and Son Two Sonnets from Filicaja . The Mariner's Bride . To Don Rodrigo Dies Irae .... Original Poems /. Those purporting to be Translations from the Oriental Languages The Karamanian Exile .... The Wail and Warning of the Three Khalandeers Relic of Prince Bayazeed Advice against Travel , Adam's Oath . Night is Nearing To Mihri . The City of Truth An Epitaph Good Counsel . A Ghazel . TABLE OF CONTENTS Page The Time of the Roses .... . 270 The Time Ere the Roses were Blowing . 273 To Amine, on seeing her About to veil her Mirror 275 The Howling Song of Al Mohara 275 Sayings and Proverbs ..... 278 Lament from the Farewell-book of Ahi . z8i Love ....... 282 Trust not the World, nor Time 283 Relic of Servi 286 Jealousy ....... 286 The World: a Ghazel .... 288 The Time of the Barmecides 289 //. Pro Patria Irish National Hymn ..... 295 An Invitation 297 Soul and Country ..... 299 A Highway for Freedom .... 300 302 Hymn for Pentecost ..... 304 ///. Those on Miscellaneous Subjects 309 Twenty Golden Years ago .... 3H 313 Sonnet ....... 316 Curtain the Lamp ..... 316 The Dying Enthusiast .... 318 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page To Joseph Brenan ..... 319 lines on the Death of C. H. . . . 321 The World's Changes .... 323 The Departure of Love .... 326 Bear Up 326 Two Sonnets to Caroline .... 328 Enthusiasm ...... 329 The Lovely Land ..... 330 Fronti Nulla Fides 332 Siberia ....... 332 A Vision of Connaught in the Thirteenth Century 334 The Saw-mill ...... 337 The One Mystery 339 The Nameless One 340 Notes by the Editor 343 James Clarence Mangan A Study JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN : A Study ^^ Not siam •vei-mi Natl aformar r angelica farfalla.^^ Purgatorio ; Canto X. I ON the principle that "it has become almost an honor not to be crowned," the name of James Clarence Mangan may be announced at once as very worthy, very distinguished. He is unknown outside his own non-academic fatherland, though he bids fair to be a proverb and a fire- side commonplace, much as the Polish poets are at home, within it. Belonging to an age which is nothing if not specific and depart- mental, he has somehow escaped the classifiers ; he has never been run through with a pin, nor have his wings been spread under glass in the museums. It was only yesterday that Mangan took rank in The Dictionary of National Biography, in Miles' Poets of the Century, and in a new edition of Lyra Elegantiarum. In AUibone's Dictionary of Authors he has but hasty mention, and a representation as unjust JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN as possible in H. F. Randolph's Fifty Years of English Song. He is absent from the Ency- clopedia Britannica. Even Mr. J. O'Kane Murray's obese volume, The Prose and Poetry of Ireland, has contrived to live without him. Palgrave, Dana, Duyckinck, and the score of lesser books which are kind to forgotten or in- frequent lyres, know him not ; Ward's English Poets has no inch of classic text to devote to him. Nor is Mangan's absence altogether or even chiefly due to editorial shortcomings. The search after him has always been difficult. During his lifetime he published only a collec- tion of translations, and his original numbers were left tangled up with other translations, by his own exasperating hand. A large mass of his work, good, bad, and indifferent, lay hid in old newspaper files, whence some of it has been injudiciously rescued by John McCall, a devoted fellow-countryman ; and what was, for a very long time, the only collection drawn from Mangan's store, bearing a New York imprint, and prefaced by John Mitchel's beau- tiful memoir, has never had a revised issue. In 1884, the Rev. C. P. Meehan brought out a small two-volume reprint of Mangan, better than Mitchel's, and with some freshly-discov- ered songs. The text in all these books is in an imperfect condition. Beyond them, Man- A STUDY gan's work was not accessible in any form, until some of it was put into the Library series brought out by Mr. DuflFy and Mr. McCarthy: cheap volumes, intended for the people. Man- gan is hardly yet a Book. So it is, and so, perhaps, it must be. Our time adjusts merit with supreme propriety, in setting up Herrick in the market-place, and in still reserving Daniel for a domestic adoration. Apollo has a class of might-have-beens whom he loves ; poets bred in melancholy places, under dis- abilities, with thwarted growth and thinned voices ; poets compounded of everything magi- cal and fair, like an elixir which is the outcome of knowledge and patience, and which wants in the end, even as common water would, the es- sence of immortality. The making of a name is too often like the making of a fortune : the more scrupulous contestants are " Delicate spirits, pushed away In the hot press of the noonday." Mangan's is such a memory, captive and over- borne. It may be unjust to lend him the epitaph of defeat, for he never strove at all. One can think of no other, in the long dis- astrous annals of English literature, cursed with so monotonous a misery, so much hope- JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN lessness and stagnant grief. He had no public ; he was poor, infirm, homeless, loveless ; travel and adventure were cut oflF from him, and he had no minor risks to run ; the cruel necessities of labor sapped his dreams from a boy ; morbid fancies mastered him as the rider masters his horse ; the demon of opium, then the demon of alcohol, pulled him under, body and soul, despite a persistent and heart-breaking struggle, and he perished ignobly in his prime. We know nothing of his ancestry ; and can trace to none of its watersheds the stream of tendency in one so variously endowed. There are Mangins buried in the old Huguenot ground in Dublin, from whom Edward Man- gin, a writer of much charm, but unknown to fame (1772-1852), was descended. Was our poet possibly derived from the Manians, or clan of Hy-Many, descendants of Maine Mor, who was in the line of Cairbre LifFeachair, King of Ireland in the third century ? Or we may, with reason, conjecture that Mangan had some Norman blood ; for his features were of a decided Norman cast. He was born at number 3 Fishamble Street, the ancient Vicus Piscariorum of Dublin, on the first day of May, 1803. He was the eldest of four chil- dren, an early-dying family; his brother, the only one who survived him, was destined to fol- A STUDY low him to the grave during the same month. The father belonged in Shanagolden, Limerick, and was a grocer in fair circumstances when his son was born. The house and shop were the property of the mother, Catherine Smith, a comely member of a respectable farmer's family near Dunsay, in the County Meath. The shop seems to have been soon resigned by the elder Mangan to a brother-in-law, whom he beguiled over from London ; and into the recep- tive hands of the new-comer he is said to have delivered his elder son, and all responsibility for him. James Mangan was a nervous, wilful, tyrannous person, of whom his little ones were afraid. He retired from his business on a com- petency, but ran through his new estate from excess of hospitality, made his small invest- ments which failed, and died prematurely of the superior disease of disillusion and vexation. The poet, in a posthumously published auto- biographical fragment, half-fanciful, half-literal, thus describes him, and exalts or debases him into a Celtic type: "His nature was truly noble; to quote a phrase of my friend O'Don- ovan, he ' never knew what it was to refuse the countenance of living man ' ; but in neglecting his own interests (and not the most selfish misanthropes could accuse him of attending too closely to those), he unfortunately forgot JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN the injuries which he inflicted upon the inter- ests of others. He was of an ardent and for- ward-bounding disposition ; and though deeply- religious by nature, he hated the restraints of social life, and seemed to think that all feelings with regard to family connections, and the ob- ligations imposed by them, were beneath his notice. Me, my two brothers, and my sister, he treated habitually as a huntsman would treat refractory hounds. It was his boast, uttered in pure glee of heart, that we would run into a mousehole to shun him ! While my mother lived, he made her miserable; he led my only sister such a life that she was obliged to leave our house; he kept up a continual succession of hostilities with my brothers ; and if he spared me more than others, it was, perhaps, because I displayed a greater contempt of life and every- thing connected with it. . . . May God assoil his great and mistaken soul, and grant him eternal peace and forgiveness ! But I have an inward feeling that to him I owe all my mis- fortunes." Mangan's judgments were gentle. He was never heard to criticise nor blame any one but himself. Yet the experiences of his tragic in- fancy must have affected the fountain-springs of human feeling. Perhaps he remembered his own nameless antipathy, by contrast, when he A STUDY came to render the wistful thought of a dead father in August Kuhn's lonely little wildwood boy: — "I would rather Be with him than pulling roses." An odd moody child, he was sent to school in Swift's forlorn and formal natal neighbor- hood, in Derby Square, ofFWerburgh Street, There was a master there who had baptized him in Rosemary Lane Chapel, and who loved him; and from him he learned, among other things, the rudiments of Latin and French. But at thirteen or at fifteen (it is impossible to know which), he had to enter the bitter work- aday lists of the world, for the support of a family of steadily-sinking fortunes, who, once they found him productive of so many shillings a week, had no mercy for him, and preyed upon him like a nest of harpies. As early as 1817 the talent within him was visibly astir, venting itself in the charades and whimsical rhymes proper to deservedly obscure Diaries and Al- manacs. But before he was sixteen, he had printed some noteworthy verses, with all of the faults, and some of the virtues, of his maturer work, and dark already with settled melancholy. This is a fine imaginative passage from the pen of a child : — JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN " A dream fell on me, fraught With many mingled images ascending Up from the depths of slumber : Gigantical, voluminous, inblending." For seven weary years he toiled at copying, from five in the morning, winter and summer, until eleven at night, through a boyhood which knew no vacations. Mangan shared this hard boyish experience with Samuel Richardson, bound out at thirteen as apprentice to a printer in Aldersgate, and undergoing for seven years an intolerable drudgery. He never uttered, then or after, Mangan's " lyric cry " of protest ; perhaps because he knew that Pamela and her prose were conspiracy-proof, and not to be snuiFed out in him. For three years succeed- ing, the young Mangan was an attorney's clerk, in close air and among vulgar associates, so tort- ured in every sentient fibre of his being that he affirmed nothing but a special Providence pre- served him from suicide. The circumstances of this slavery gnawed into his memory. Isolation of mind was his habit then as afterwards, and long walks at night were his sole relaxation. As he looked back upon the spectacle of his innocent and stricken youth, he was able to record the anguish at which the outer willingness was priced. " I would frequently inquire, though A STUDY I scarcely acknowledged the inquiry to myself, how or why it was that I should be called upon to sacrifice the immortal for the mortal ; to give away irredeemably the Promethean fire within me, for the cooking of a beefsteak; to destroy and damn my own soul that I might preserve for a few miserable months or years the bodies of others. Often would I wander out into the fields, and groan to God for help : De profundis clamavi! was my continual cry. These were the years when first he took comfort, five minutes at a time, in delightful study ; when from pure single-hearted passion he made himself an Oxford out of nothing, and won what is rightly called his "profound and curiously exquisite culture"; when toward the unlovely home, anon removed to Peter Street, and again to Chancery Lane, or the yet un- lovelier office, at 6 York Street, he would go softly reciting some sad verses of Ovid which had a charm for him at school, and keeping his mind alive with bookish reverie : a solitary young gold-haired figure, rapt and kind, upon whom no gladness ever broke, and who was alone in any crowd. His genius led him in- stinctively into scholastic ways. Mr. T. H. Wright, with equal truth and pathos, has thus sung of him : — JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN — "Not with rude Untutored hand Apollo's lyre he smote, Tho' by the Furies oftentimes pursued In dull delirious flight thro' wastes remote." In the parlors of 2 Church Lane, College Green, he found his earliest encouragers; in- tellectual tipplers, like Tighe and Lawrence Bligh, stood ready to be Mangan's colleagues in worldly paths. A friend betrayed his confi- dence in some way, and helped him to a sick- ening foretaste of what his lot was to be. We have no reason to infer, however, that the blow was dealt to so trustful a heart by any of the radiant and erratic Comet Club, of which that interesting person, Samuel Lover, was then a member. Sometime between 1825 and 1835, Mangan had a calamity of the heart. Mitchel's too romantic statement, generally followed, is that Mangan's first love was given to a girl much "above him," according to our strange surveys ; that she encouraged his shy ap- proaches, and he was tremblingly happy ; that for the pleasantest period of his life he was in frequent contact with those who made for him his fitting social environment ; and that at the moment when he feared nothing, he was scorn- fully "whistled down the wind." And the natural inference is that his harsh disappoint- A STUDY 13 ment warped the poet's life, and fastened on him his air of irremediable suffering. There is every reason why Mangan should have had a hard lot, and a heavy heart to carry, without being crossed in his affections. In Grant's Almanack for 1826, is a poem addressed to him, signed by his old friend Tighe, reproaching Mangan for " the dole that hath too long o'er- cast his soul." He was then twenty-three. It hardly follows that the event in question was already past. All adolescent thinkers, whether lovers or not, experience " dole." In the Octo- ber of 1832 died Catharine Hayes, of Re- hoboth (" the quaint old house with the Syrian name"), a young girl, almost a child, to whom he taught German. It has been said that this was she to whom he was engaged, that the breaking of the tie was an amicable affair of mutual heroism, and that the girl perished, shortly after, of consumption. Let us look into the poetic chronology ; for though Man- gan, orally, was a most uncomplaining person, he was not altogether reticent, upon paper. Elegiac Verses on the Early Death of a Beloved Friend first appeared in The Comet, on the tenth of February, 1833. They were unearthed and reprinted by John McCall. Beginning " I stood aloof; I dared not to behold," 14 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN these tender lines were clearly written out of no vital destroying grief. Ten days later, and also in the columns of The Comet, appear from Mangan's pen Two Sonnets to Caroline, adorned later by bantering adjectives : Two Very Inter- esting Sonnets to Caroline. They are a-quiver with something : one knows not whether with strong feeling in the perfect tense, or with that dramatic semblance of strong feeling which Childe Harold had made easy to his contempo- raries. They are not love-poems. The curi- ous circumstance connected with them is that they figure anew in The Dublin University Magazine for January, 1839, ^^ translations from Gellert ! and the elegy for C. H., with six stanzas eliminated, emerges, in the April number following, tagged "from the Irish"; and with a colophon in genuine Gaelic super- added. Furthermore, we have to consider a prose paper by "Clarence" in The Weekly Dublin Satirist, dated October of 1833. It is called My Transformation ; the heroine is one Eleanor Campion ; a bitterly-conceived sketch, ending in burlesque, it aiFords minute descrip- tion of " life's fitful fever." Clearly, Mangan was in a very black Byronic mood indeed circa 1832-3. Little Miss Hayes was in no wise responsible for it; but her dying coincided neatly with the a posteriori suspicions of his- A STUDY 15 toriographers. As we have seen, he reprinted these melodramatic compositions in 1839: a year when he recurred afresh to the pseudo- subjective vein. Amid the clumsy machinery of the dialogue Polyglot Anthology, Mangan produces some rather imprecatory stanzas To Laura, or, as afterwards amended. To Frances, beginning with a plagiarism from Burns: — " The life of life is gone and over," which would seem to indicate that he stood in no awe of his victress ; nor does he fail to men- tion, with his usual mendacity and presence of mind, that the lyric reproach is taken from the Italian. Beautifully does it close : — " Adieu ! for thee the heavens are bright, Bright flowers along thy pathway lie ; The bolts that strike, the winds that blight, Will pass thy bower of beauty by. " But when shall rest be mine ? Alas, When first the winter wind shall wave The pale wild flowers, the long dark grass. Above my unremembered grave." It has been taken for granted by some, since the version entitled To Frances is less inaccessi- ble than the other, that Frances was the true name of the cruel maid : a most unlikely de- 1 6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN duction. A recent writer, " R. M. S.," in The Catholic World for October, 1888, gives a thoughtful vote of accusation to one Frances Stacpoole. Stackpole, too, is the name inde- pendently rescued by Mr. W. B. Yeats from the reminiscences of an aged Anglican Arch- deacon. Says Miss Susan Gavan Duffy, in a private letter to the editor (1896) : " Margaret, not Frances Stacpoole, was the name of the lady beloved by Mangan ; and my Father says you are right in surmising that his blighted- love episode was not so overwhelming a grief as it has been represented to be ; for when it was all over and past, Mangan repeatedly took my Father to visit Margaret, and her mother and sister. Of course there is no doubt that the poet was a wrecked and broken-hearted man, though Margaret Stacpoole may be not in the least accountable for his misery." Charles Gavan Duffy had met Mangan, through Carle- ton the novelist, in 1836. During the very time, therefore, when the poet was still gladly visiting the gentlewomen who kept their kind- ness for him, he was putting together the highly-colored maledictions which could not possibly have represented his real feeling. That he was, in some sense, disillusioned, and thrown back upon himself, is sure. It is pite- ous that he had ever hoped for common domes- A STUDY 17 tic happiness : his fate could neither achieve it nor sustain it, for an hour. He was ineffably unhappy, and in his loneliness poured his un- happiness into verse. It would be unjust to call his attitude a pose ; for he was sincere. Yet he must have expressed a little more than he felt, as did every poet of that melodramatic generation. And there is some evidence that he knew his lack of discipline. Stanzas Writ- ten in Midsummer (1839) he rechristened as Stanzas Which Ought Not to Have Been Writ- ten in Midsummer. They are gruesome pict- ures of — " an undeparting woe Beheld and shared by none : A canker-worm whose work is slow, And gnaws the heart-strings one by one. And drains the bosom's blood, till the last drop be gone ! " We must remember that a poet's despair can- not gracefully charge itself to dearth of beef, unpleasant kinsfolk, and headaches out of a morphine phial. Hence woman, and the love of woman, come in as the causa rerum, irrespec- tive of proof, even with a Mangan. After his rebuff, he worked back into some show of moral courage ^ and indifferentism ; and it is said that no fair face ever appealed to him again. Other, and more mocking faces, walked i8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN by his side ; for his ruin had begun, and the fatal friend of sin clung to him, when the white visions he adored had, one by one, with- drawn. Henceforth it is not so easy to track him ; he seems to have vanished into smoke. His bright hair blanched of a sudden during his first withdrawal from the upper world, and from the fire which burned his fingers. Whatever is known of him has been gathered only with extreme painstaking; his personal history is quite as vague as if he had lived in a hermit's cell eight hundred years ago, when as yet the fine arts of spying and reporting were in the germ. Even to the men who saw him close at hand, he was a stranger. He passed through their company like the ghost of a seance, with Dryden's " down look," with soundless speech and gait ; whence and whither none could discover. Mangan was a loving student of the mediaeval alchemists, and he took for his own the black art of shooting out of darkness into a partial light, and van- ishing as soon. He would disappear for weeks and months at a time, and baffle search. It was evident that he mingled, meanwhile, with those who had snapped all links with human society. Nor is he the only poet in English letters over whose head the tides of A STUDY 19 despair rose and rolled, that he might so sink, and float, and sink again. We have not for- gotten Dr. Johnson's heartfelt lament over Richard Savage, who, not without an inner battle, retired occasionally into chaos, his pen- sion-money in his pocket. " On a bulk, in a cellar, or in a glass-house, among thieves and beggars," says that illustrious friend, "was to be found the author of The Wanderer, the man of exalted sentiments, extensive views, and curious observation ; the man whose remarks on life might have assisted the states- man, whose ideas of virtue might have enlight- ened the moralist, whose eloquence might have influenced senates, and whose delicacy might have polished courts." Into such lowest deeps of partial insanity did Mangan also die, and out of them, ever and again, he was born, humble, active, clean of heart, by some repara- tive miracle, his eyes fixed (they, at least, never wavered) on eternal beauty and eternal good. II It is plain on the face of things that he was going the dark way of the opium-eater. Yet this point has been greatly obscured. As early as 1833, Dr. Wall being the Librarian of 20 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Trinity College, Mangan, through the friendly offices of Dr. Todd, who had been attracted by the poet's verses, obtained employment for which he was fitted, and in an atmosphere which came as near as anything could, to mak- ing him happy. Trinity was then drawing up her vast new catalogues, and appreciated " the admirable scribe's " assiduity, until, alas, he forfeited her regard. At large among rare folios, Mangan copied for his living, and read for love ; losing himself, during the intervals for lunch or exercise, in Matthew Paris, and Calmet's Dissertatio in Musicam Veterum He- braorum. Mitchel's Carlyle-like pen so paints him for us. " The present biographer being in the College Library, and having occasion for a book in that gloomy apartment called the Fagel Library, which is the innermost recess of the stately building, an acquaintance pointed out to me a man perched on the top of a lad- der, with the whispered information that the figure was Clarence Mangan. It was an un- earthly and ghostly figure, in a brown garment: the same garment, to all appearance, which lasted till the day of his death. The blanched hair was totally unkempt, the corpse-like feat- ures still as marble ; a large book was in his arms, and all his soul was in the book. I had never heard of Clarence Mangan before, and A STUDY 21 knew not for what he was celebrated, whether as a magician, a poet, or a murderer: yet I took a volume and spread it on the table, not to read, but, with pretence of reading, to gaze on the spectral person upon the ladder." This striking description of a man who, it is strange to remember, was then only in his early thir- ties, is everywhere corroborated, even by those who did not see, as Mitchel did, what the de- scription implied. Mr. James T. Fields once wrote of his meeting with De Quincey : " When he came out to receive me, at his gar- den gate, I thought I had never seen anything so small and pale in the shape of a great man, nor a more impressive head on human shoul- ders. The unmistakable alabaster shine, which I had noticed in other opium-eaters, was on his face." Mangan, as reported by all who re- member him, as implicated (if one may use that word) in a pathetic posthumous portrait, done in black-and-white, had also " the unmis- takable alabaster-shine." All his fitful recluse habits pointed to the same cause. That he had gorgeous visions, his fixed eyes, " lustrously mild, beautifully blue," his strangely-colored poems, his rapt and reticent personality, were so many witnesses. Nor did he escape the penalties intertwined with stolen dreams. " The Gorgon's head," he wrote, " the triple-faced JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN hell-dog, the handwriting on Belshazzar's pal- ace-wall, the fire-globe that burned below the feet of Pascal, are all bagatelles beside the phantasmagoria which evermore haunt my brain, and blast my eyes." Mangan is looked upon as a drunkard. To what is this singular misconception due ? To his own denial of his real folly, and to his complaint that William Carleton had circulated the statement that he (Mangan) was an opium-eater ; and likewise to the denial of the Reverend Charles Meehan, who knew the poet well, who survived him until the spring of 1890, and had always a posi- tive statement or two to make, concerning him. Every one knows that the opium practice is never admitted by its victims ; secretiveness is its sign-manual. As to the second testimony, it is true so far as it goes. The kind priest never knew Mangan to touch the drug. But then, he knew him rather late. Said Dr. George Sigerson, F. R. U. I., in a recent lecture before the Irish Literary Society : " It has been stated, in a letter given to the public some months ago, that Mangan's writing was ex- tremely irregular and erratic, owing to his drink- ing habits. O'Daly also had said that the ver- sions of the Munster poets were often brought to him in different-colored inks, indicative of different hostelries or public-houses in which A STUDY 23 they were composed. Now the specimens here shown prove that Clarence Mangan wrote a clear, legible, elegant hand, manifest in his earliest and latest manuscripts. The writing in these ver- sions of the Munster poets was all in black ink. Very possibly, they were written in various public-houses, for Dublin offered little open hospitality, while there were no free libraries, and all the squares were closed. In Paris, and in London, many writers have used the coffee- houses. . . . Mangan's handwriting does not present the signs of one whose nervous system is shattered by alcohol." An American physi- cian, a great lover of Mangan, has come to the same conviction, by the process of pure induc- tion. He writes to the present editor (May 17, 1896): "How vain it is to try to see in Mangan the fiery, sensual, besotted look of the alcoholic victim ! Opium, too, explains his strange manner of life to any medical mind, which alcohol certainly does not ; and I should dearly like to see him freed from the stigma of drunkenness, even though by so doing he had to take his unhappy place with Coleridge and De Quincey." One other point has to be dis- posed of. In The Nameless One, Mangan de- plores his own fall into — " The gulf and grave of Maginn and Burns." 24 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN The confession is most inaccurately phrased. It is by poetic license, indeed, that the conse- quences of other drugs are so visited, before all men, on the known scapegoat head of whiskey. But The Nameless One was written in 1842. By that time Mangan had learned intemperance. It is pathologically impossible that a man should be a drunkard and an opium-eater at the same time. The general testimony is that the very smallest quantity of spirits was sufficient to send Mangan on the road to madness. He could never have gratified an appetite for strong drink, did he possess it ; for his physical forces were ruined. He may have begun in his youth, on a few occasional grains of opium, with the intent to deaden the pangs of hunger and dejection. Such things have been. And he must have tasted of liquor in the end, as part and parcel of a resolve to break off at any cost from life-long slavery. Between De Quincey, who struggled successfully, and Coleridge, who struggled hardly at all, stands this lonely Irish poet, who struggled in vain. Sometime be- tween his twenty-eighth and his thirty-fifth year he stopped on his downward course, and entered on a new life. Feeble, but not over- borne, eager for any help, though it were full of danger, he fell presently on the neck of one A STUDY 25 evil, seeking deliverance from another. And whereas, in his former misery, he had cried out in no human ear, he began now to pour forth impotent plaints and promises, after the man- ner of dipsomaniacs. These are too painful to quote. One marvels how his patient and compassionate friends endured him at all ; and that they stood by him even while he evaded and disheartened them, proves that in Mangan, repentant for the moment, survived a spark of the immortal he was, some nameless divine quality which never forfeited reverence. Sigh- ing over him, they may have anticipated the mournful final verdict passed by Stevenson on Burns. " If he had been but strong enough to refrain, or bad enough to persevere in evil ! . . . there had been some possible road for him throughout this troublesome world ; but a man, alas, who is equally at the call of his worse and better instincts, stands among changing events without foundation or resource." It is the one atoning circumstance, in Mangan's favor, that though his attempt was a foregone defeat, it was a brave fight ; he broke himself to pieces in the effort to save his soul alive. His occa- sional regularity of living, and his deepening religiousness, show that some very powerful influence was at work within him. Is it a stretch of fancy to recur to Margaret Stac- 26 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN poole ? She must have refused him prior to 1837, and the refusal was perhaps conditional. It may well have been that she was the witness to his vow of reform ; and that afterwards, while he came and went with other literary men, in her mother's house, she was gazing through tears, in the pauses of his losing bat- tle, on her poor shattered knight. At any rate, the supposition harmonizes with what we know of his restless, ever-remorseful, light-ador- ing, and " gloom-o'erdarkened " spirit. Had his passion indeed ended in the short pang of a rude dismissal, as some of his biographers contend, it would have left him more of a man. A hope of marriage, " subdued and cherished long," eclipsed a thousand times by horrible folly and weakness, and flickering on in con- valescent dreams, would be the explanation both of much of Mangan's poetry, and of the moral turmoil of all his latter years. Love the saviour was not strong enough to save him. The men who guessed nothing of his true heart-history, and who saw him often and near enough to connect his squalor and de- spair with a mere common dissipation, were natural contradictors of that earlier allegation, Carleton's or another's, concerning opium. Still less did they disentangle the thing Clar- ence Mangan was, from the things he kept on A STUDY 27 doing. In the sight of the All Wise, he must have approximated not to the suicide, but to the martyr. He is no subject for biography. Paul Ver- laine is his only parallel, were it not that Mangan had no such intense moods of reli- gious mysticism, and none of bestiality, " No purer and more benignant spirit," — it is John Mitchel, again, who speaks, " ever alighted upon earth ; no more abandoned wretch ever found earth a purgatory and a hell. There were, as 1 have said, two Mangans : one well-known to the Muses, the other to the police ; one soared through the empyrean and sought the stars, the other lay too often in the gutters of Peter Street and Bride Street. ... In his deadly struggle with the cold world he wore no defi- ant air and attitude ; was always humble, affec- tionate, almost prayerful. He was never of the Satanic school, never devoted mankind to the infernal gods, nor cursed the sun." Giv- ing what he could, and asking nothing, genial and gentle to all that lived, he did not lack affection. In his penury, his eccentric habits, his irresponsibilities, he found a distinguished and devoted few to replace his mistaken circle of Church Lane wits : Mr. George Petrie, Dr. Todd, and Dr. Anster, the translator of Faust ; the Reverend John Kenyon of Temple- 28 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN derry. Dr. Gilbert, and especially Charles Gavan Duffy. The Nation paid Mangan in advance for the copy he too often forgot to supply; he had a haven in Trinity Library, and another in the Ordnance Survey Office, where he was at peace awhile among topog- raphers and antiquaries, generally the happi- est-tempered of men. He might have lived with those who would have appreciated and protected him, but he, for reasons, was too shy and too proud. It pleased him better to sit in the liberty of a garret by William, his in- valid brother, sipping tar-water, and, with his delicate smile, watching the other's consump- tion of the single egg, which was all Apollo's vassal could afford to buy him for a certain Christmas dinner ; or to move from lodging to lodging, with his hand-bag and his "large, malformed umbrella," devising how he could redeem his manuscripts, and his Berkleian tar-water, too, left in pawn for the ante- penultimate rent. The poor gifted creature was driven more than once to private beggary. We read of him, at another time, as residing in a hay-loft, and eloquently expostulating with the landlady, a person with a syllogistic eye to conflagrations, because she would allow him no candle to write by ! Nothing very definite ever happened to him. Always suffering, always A STUDY 29 absent-minded and a prey to accidents, he was no stranger to hospitals, and cheerfully as- serted ithat his intellect cleared the moment he entered the ward. Lonely, weak, harassed, scorning precautions, on the ground that there is no contagion "but thinking makes it so," clinging with foolhardy calm to his Bride Street dwelling during the great cholera epi- demic, Mangan perished ; suddenly and quietly, as the shutting of a glow-worm's little lamp, on the twentieth of June, 1 849, his life went out, at the Meath Hospital, Long Lane, whither he had been removed. He was buried in Glasnevin. Three persons are said to have followed his body to the grave. One of these was the Reverend Charles Meehan. The tardily-raised headstone was placed by Mangan's uncle, Mr. Smith. From Mr. Hercules Ellis we have some distressing details of our poet's last days. " For twenty years," he says in a sympathetic preface to his book. The Ballads and Romances of Ire- land, " Mangan labored assiduously in his art, gladly accepting for his works payment lower than that given to the humblest menial; and the return for this devotion of his noble genius to the noblest purposes was a life of privation and wretchedness, and an early death caused by want, and cold, and hunger, and nakedness, and every kind of misery." 30 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN He goes on to say that, on taking up one of the Dublin newspapers, he was much startled by the announcement of the death of Man- gan, of whom he had ever been a warm ad- mirer, though a stranger ; and that he reached the Meath Hospital in time to see his body before burial, "wrapped in a winding-sheet, wasted to a skeleton." From the house-sur- geon he learned that Mangan, alone and ill, in a wretched room, had been discovered by the officers of the Board of Health, and removed, as a probable victim of the cholera, to the North Union sheds. But the attendant phy- sician recognized him, and found him not infected, but merely starved. " He was im- mediately transmitted to the Meath Hospital, where everything that skill and kindness could suggest for the purpose of reviving the expir- ing spark of life was attempted, and attempted in vain. The unfortunate child of genius sank hourly, and died shortly after his admission, exhibiting, to the last, his gentle nature, in re- peated apologies for the trouble he gave, and constant thanks for the attentions and assist- ance afforded him. In his pocket was found a volume of German poetry, ... in his hat were found loose papers. Laboring to the last in his noble art, striving to obtain a morsel of bread by the production of the finest compositions. A STUDY 31 . . . poof Clarence Mangan died ; an honor to his country by his writings, a disgrace to it by his miserable fate." Father C. P. Meehan, whose kind voice, reciting, by request, the Penitential Psalms, was the last sound Mangan heard on earth, also testified, on being questioned many years after, that Mangan died, not from cholera, but from "exposure and exhaustion." Unattended for the moment, it seems that he arose, and got out upon the street, and in his great weakness fell into a pit dug for a house-foundation, and lay there awhile before being rediscovered. Mr. Ellis's account was thought to be sensa- tional when it was published. But there is a grave fear that it .was the truth. The condi- tions, not of one mishap or one moment, which killed Mangan, were those which have visited poets from the earth's beginning, those which the comfortable world, well-clad, well-dined, with its feet on the fender, finds it hard to be- lieve in at all. Whatever nominal and visible cause appeared to end him, amid the terror and confusion of the great cholera outbreak, we may set him down as a victim, foredoomed from his birth, — " who on the milk of Paradise Should have been fed, and swam in more heartsease Than there are waters in the Sestian seas." 32 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN To the tragic testimony of those who stood at Mangan's bedside, may be added an extract from a letter of Miss Jane Barlow to Mrs. Hinkson (Katharine Tynan), since permission has been accorded to quote it here. " The other day I went to see Miss Margaret Stokes, whose ac- quaintance I made lately. She was talking about Clarence Mangan, whose friend her father was, as no doubt you know. In fact, he was his last friend. For Mangan had been lost sight of by everybody for a very long time, when, one morning, as Dr. Stokes was going his rounds in the Meath Hospital, the porter told him that admission was asked for a miserable- looking poor man at the door. He was shocked to find that this was Mangan, who said to him: 'You are the first who has spoken one kind word to me, for many years ' : a terrible saying ! Dr. Stokes got him a pri- vate room, and had everything possible done for him ; but not many days after, he died in Dr. Stokes's arms. Immediately after death, such a wonderful change came over the face that Dr. Stokes hurried away to Sir Frederick Burton, the artist, and said to him : ' Clarence Mangan is lying dead at the Hospital. I want you to come and look at him ; for you never saw anything so beautiful in your life ! ' So Sir Frederick came, and made the sketch which is A STUDY 33 now in the National Gallery. I daresay you have heard all this before." Mr. F. W. Bur- ton, as the painter then was, hurriedly drew the pallid head as it lay back on the pillow, old and weary with its forty-six insupport- able years : hurriedly, because there was some groundless fear of infection ; and from this first small sketch, he made the very touching and striking picture, which Miss Barlow mentions as among the treasures of the Irish National Gallery on Leinster Lawn in Dublin. The original seems to have passed into Father Meehan's hands ; and by him was given to its present possessor, the Reverend J. H. Gavin of S. Charles Seminary, Overbrook, Pennsylvania. The larger and more perfect head was beauti- fully reproduced in Irish Love Songs, published by Mr. Fisher Unwin in 1894. There is no truer relic of its class, in the history of English letters ; not even among death-masks. And it recalls to mind, would one seek its fellow, Severn's heart-breaking little drawing of the dying Keats. A sad redoubled value attaches itself to this memorial of Mangan, when it is remembered that it was his only portrait. He was too secluded and indifferent to wish his features perpetuated, too little famous to attract artists, too poor to pay them. We have to thank Dr. Stokes and Sir Frederick Burton 34 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN alone for the broken reflection of his already vanished spirit. From this famous vignette some half dozen copies have been made ; or, rather, basing themselves upon it, these have endeavored to represent the poet as he lived, with no marked technical success, and all, save one, with a significant misconception. Mr. D. J. O'Donoghue, the best authority on everything pertaining to Mangan, says of these attempts : " They are not Hke him. As they are all deductions, as it were, from the Burton in the National Gallery, they make a curious mistake in assuming that Mangan habitually showed his fine forehead. It was only when he lay dead, with head unsupported, that his forehead was properly seen ; for his long hair, which usually fell over it, had then fallen back." This just criticism cannot be extended to the sensitively-pencilled sketch by Dora Sigerson (Mrs. shorter), which has the tangled locks shadowing the brow, and the studious stoop of Haydon's Wordsworth. "This is the poet and his poetry." Ill In The Nameless One Mangan lends us an in- cidental glimpse of two forerunners to whom he was attached. The mention of Maginn has A STUDY 35 historic interest ; for he exercised on Mangan's genius a pronounced, though superficial influ- ence. It seems ironic to recall to the present generation of readers the Sir Morgan Odoherty of Blackwood s, the star of Eraser's and the Nodes, now cinis et manes et fabula, — the joy- ous, the learned, the amazing William Maginn, LL.D., who, because he reaped a temporal re- ward as the most magazinable of men, has all but perished from the heaven of remembered literature. The coupling of his name with that of Burns was, at the given date, obvious. It is not likely that Mangan would have spoken of the ultimate blight of Maginn's great powers while he lived; and the reference in the poem itself to the age of the author, would tend to fix its composition in the year of Maginn's death, 1 842. Profound feeling, as of a personal loss, premonition, as if called forth by the fate of one familiarly known, hang over these rushing strophes, written as they are in the third person. It is clear that Mangan had an enthusiasm for Maginn, hitherto unnoted. His commentary in the Anthologia Germanica, in the Litter a Ori- entales, and in all the imitative raillery of his Dublin University Magazine work, with its offi- cious instructive foot-notes, testifies how genu- ine, it was. And the midsummer news from Walton-on-Thames, which struck home to 36 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN many who loved wit, and who grieved for might put to no immortal use, hurt also the quiet clerkly figure on the library ladders of Trinity, and added a pang to his opinion of himself. Maginn's is the only influence except, — longissimo intervallo — Hunt's and Lamb's, discernible in Mangan's prose. As for some of his early poetry, it is on Coleridge's head. The Betrothed, beginning "A silence reigns in Venice streets," has the tone and the motion of Christabel. Mangan assimilated later a note of the "paus- ing harp" of 1797. We are told of the knight who won "the bright and beauteous Genevieve" that so soon as the story faltered on his lips, he "Disturbed her soul with pity." "The song of the tree that the saw sawed through," says Mangan, after Coleridge, "Disturbed my spirit with pity. Began to subdue My spirit with tenderest pity." And there is a palpable echo of two famous lines of Shelley, imported into Mangan's ver- sion of Schiller's Bis an des Athers bleichste Sterne : — A STUDY 37 "Fancy bore him to the palest star Pinnacled in the lofty ether dim," and a reminiscence of The Sensitive Plant, in a mention of the darnel and the mandrake as being unfit sister-growths for — "the proud. The hundred-leafed rose." " Lampless " is a favorite word with Mangan, who had admired it, no doubt, in Epipsychidion. But the man who most powerfully swayed his budding art was not any of these. It seems hardly necessary to state that it was Lord Byron, Byron who once bestrode all young minds, "As a god strong, And as a god free." There is nothing more broadly Byronic in the magnific wails of that generation than a certain production of our poet in The Dublin Satirist of the fifth of December, 1835. It is amusing to note that the original author's name is given as Johann Theodor Drechsler, one of Mangan's numerous sawdust dollies. He outgrew this influence, as he did every other. In his noble Pompeii, lingers the last tone caught from the Childe, already merging into something unlike itself. The Hymn for Pentecost, in The Irish 38 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Tribune for the eighth of July, 1848, is modelled naturally on Schiller's and Byron's lines. It is a paean of the year of revolution ; a plea that Innisfail might not swoon on, while all Europe was awakening from " The nightmare sleep of nations beneath Kings." Mangan had some theoretical knowledge of painting and of music. Though the practical sciences had small attraction for him, in psychic experimentalists, from Paracelsus to Lavater, he took deep interest. For the pages of Sweden- borg he had lasting love. It is said of him that even as a boy, his reading could not be prescribed for him. He was a freebooter stu- dent, in spirituals and temporals. Of whatever other comfort he was bereft, he had fabulous revenues in his taste for the best books. Browsing habitually among the stalls of the Four Courts, when he could not command a library, Mangan grew intimate with the fathers of English literature. It is curious that he would not, or could not, appreciate the great- ness of Burke. His choice of contemporaries was fallible. He cried up Godwin's St. Leon, and its author's " forty-quill power," and ap- proved of Contarini Fleming, while the glorious Waverleys left him cold. He admired (may he A STUDY 39 be forgiven for these vagaries !) Mr. Rogers, and he did not spare jibes to so good a man as Mr. Southey. On the other hand, we find him quoting Balzac, Charles Lamb, and the young Tennyson, and affectionately addressing a friend who sought to uplift him as " Thou endowed with all of Shelley's soul," at a time when " Shelley's soul " was still rated below par by the sagacious world which had not known him. Mangan thought, however, that there was " a cloud on Shelley's character." It is pleasant to think of the small blonde sprite of 1811 tripping in and out of the Derby Square school, who may have looked more than once, unawares, on Shelley's boyish self as he went crusading with Harriet through the streets. For whatever Mangan saw or heard, it was from his own contracted orbit at home. He was acquainted with his Dublin " As the tanned galley-slave is with his oar," and it is doubtful if he were ever out of it, except on a dull six weeks' visit to his uncle's farm in Kiltale. Mangan says, however, that he found his "Saw-mill" in Rye Valley, Leix- lip; and he dated some Italian translations from Liverpool, having apparently induced 40 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Pegasus to ford the Irish Sea for the occasion. Certain Italian poets were all his life very dear to him, Petrarca and Filicaja, and Metastasio in particular. IV Deep as was Mangan's hope for the welfare of all humanity, he could not be accredited with anything so specific as a political opinion, even in the seething times of O'Connell, till he proved, when the crisis came, that his heart was with the Young Ireland party. In that season of great intellectual enthusiasm, it was natural that an impressionable mind like his should be swept into the wake of Davis, Duffy, Dillon, O'Hagan, Dalton Williams, Pigot, D'Arcy M'Gee, Meagher, and Mitchel. But while the eyes of these men were fixed on their far-oflF common ideal, the eyes of Mangan were fixed only upon them. They had been kind to him ; his soul was sensitively grateful ; and he made their convictions his by an act of faith in all he knew of — " that bright band That on the steady breeze of Honor sailed." Two among them have written of their uncer- tainty, lasting for years, regarding their con- tributor's political feeling ; and they were very A STUDY 41 careful not to involve his name in their own hopes and perils. We are happy to think of him posing as a rebel and a reformer, although he counts for so little, and looks so oddly mis- placed. He dedicated to his country a great deal of middling verse ; he meant to conse- crate to her new-born aspiration the energies in him which yet survived. Carried away by the warmth of personal allegiance, Mangan offered to become a member of the Irish Confedera- tion, and, later, to follow John Mitchel to prosecution and exile : measures from which his wise leaders, as gentlemen endowed with humor, very gently dissuaded him. Towards 1842, he became touchingly altruistic. He even endeavored to give the benefit of his interest and criticisms to that incomparably well-edited paper. The Nation. Whatever he could get, in the way of blocked out transla- tions from the Gaelic, he took, with eagerness, for his poetic purposes, and obtained, during his last year or two of life, considerable insight into his ancestral tongue. Such an ardor, whether or no its results can be called success- ful, had, in one apart from the common con- cerns of men, a distinctive moral beauty. So Thoreau, wedded to growing leaves and the golden hues of a squirrel's eye, stood forth from his happy woods, and spoke promptly and 42 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN aloud, in the ear of scandalized New England, for John Brown, Like all Irishmen, Mangan was by nature something of a commentator on public affairs. Many were the squibs and epigrams from his boyish pen ; and in The Belfast Vindicator he had all the fun he could out of the eternal English misrule. His highest powers, how- ever, refused to be pressed into service, as the angelic standard-bearers of a cause. Instead of singing The Nation's First Number (one knows not what he could have done, with such a low- flying materialistic title as that !), he heartily shouted it. The Irish National Hymn has emotion and dignity ; A Highway for Freedom is a good song of its kind. But there are a dozen kindred themes from Mangan's pen which nobody of frail endurance would wish to read twice. There is opulent speechifying, but little poetry, in The Warning Voice, The Peal of Another Trumpet (with its motto " Irlande, Irlande, r'e- jouis-toi," from the prophecies of Mademoiselle Lenormand), and in the one strain typical of all. The Voice of Encouragement : A New Tear's Lay. The last begins oratorically enough : — Youths, compatriots, friends, men for the time that is nearing ! Spirits appointed by Heaven to front the storm and the trouble ! A STUDY 43 You who in seasons of peril, unfaltering still and unfearing. Calmly have held on your course, the course of the just and the noble. You, young men ! would a man unworthy to rank in your number. Yet with a heart that bleeds for his country's wrongs and affliction. Fain raise a voice too in song, albeit his music and diction Rather be fitted, alas, to lull to, than startle from slumber. It closes with a lofty abstract image, worthy of Mangan, and of the spirit of Young Ireland. Omenful, arched with gloom, and laden with many a presage, Many a portent of woe, looms the impending era ; Not as of old by comet-sword, gorgon, or ghastly chimera. Scarcely by lightning and thunder, Heaven to-day sends its message. Into the secret heart, down thro' the caves of the spirit, Pierces the silent shaft, sinks the invisible token :' Cloaked in the hall the envoy stands, his mission unspoken. While the pale banquetless guests await in trembling to hear it. Nevertheless, Young Ireland must have found him a most useless person. His known gen- 44 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN ius and admired achievements floated him over these years of profound stress, when he pro- duced next to nothing of any worth ; and when his always gently-remote bearing must have had the value of an anachronism. Fortunately, there were those near at hand to supplant him, the instant he failed. It is not from Mangan that we have Who Fears to Speak of Ninety-Eight, and l^he Rapparees. Best of all, there was Thomas Osborne Davis, a patrician tribune, a most lovable and very perfect character, who made rhymes only as a means to an end, yet out-reached any rival whomsoever in that direction, as in others. With such splendid popular ballads of his as Fontenoy, The Sack of Baltimore, Owen Roe, O'Brien of Ara, nothing of Mangan (least of all The Siege of Maynooth) can compete. Besides, unlike Davis, or his nearest followers, clear-headed young enthu- siasts of culture and breeding, Clarence Man- gan had no very definite idea of what was the desirable thing to say. While in aiming at the Repeal of the Act of Union, they were con- tent to arouse a manly spirit in the long- oppressed peasantry, by dwelling on the antique glories of the isle and the names of her romantic heroes, nothing would serve Mangan, the one anointed poet among them, but prophecy, calamitous preaching, and the A STUDY 45 most prosy insistence on concrete agitation. Worse yet,, he was inconsistent: his theories veered and v^obbled. He begets generalities Continental in application : — March forth, Eighteen Forty-Nine ! Yet not as marched thy predecessor With flashing glaive, and cannon-peal : Of no law, human or divine, Shalt thou be, even in thought, transgressor. Strike with amaze, but not with steel ! Blood enough has flowed. Heaven knows. Even at Freedom's holy shrine ; Not by blowings-up, or blows. Shall conquer Eighteen Forty-Nine. And again, in Consolation and Counsel : — " ' Knowledge is power,' not powder. That man strikes A blow for Ireland worth a hundred guns Who trains one reasoner. Smash your heads of pikes. And form the heads of men, my sons." Will it do to compare such approved utter- ances with " Your swords, your guns, alone can give To Freedom's course a highway " ? Surely, no more drastic urging ever came from Mangan's colleague, the young Speranza 46 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN (Miss Elgee, afterwards Lady Wilde), in the famous Jacta Alea Est. Whether the mood of patience, or that of indignation, at given times, were best for Ireland, is a question apart ; what is certain, is that the man who would encourage her simultaneously in both, cancels his value as a public personage, and may well, on the whole, " go back to his gallipots." It is simple truth to say that Mangan's was a non-conducting mind, up to his very last years. He was " in the sea of life enisled," unwitting of the passions of the human kind. This loneliness of his, this dream-meshed with- drawal, may not have been altogether a con- genital condition ; for indifFerentism is a sure after-growth of the opium garden. Yet he was a born unit. He inhabited a Bagdad of his own, melancholy and fantastic, and with no gates opening on the world of action. No close observer of his earlier life and writing can find in them definite patriotic or religious ardor, or ardor of any sort except the literary. Had Mangan held deep-seated faiths, they could hardly have been in accord, at any rate, with those of The Dublin University Magazine, dur- ing the years he devoted to its enrichment. That able periodical reeked with the bigotry, arrogance, cruelty, and spite of the dominant social element in the Dublin of sixty years ago. A STUDY 47 It was to end such a spirit of faction, i.e., de- nationalization, that Young Ireland (" Protes- tant, Catholic, Dissenter : quis separabit ? ") arose. It endeavored to wake the people from an enchanted sleep, in the great name of Justice. It woke Mangan, among others : he put himself forth, in loyal and honorable energy, as an Irishman, He had all manner of new prospects to befit his new character ; for he proposed to devote himself, " almost exclusively," to the service of his country. Hence much lamentable prosody : the active poet's meat is the contemplative poet's poison. His translations continued to be, in varying degrees, effective ; his original verse became, for the most part, monstrous flat and foggy. He belonged in a cell of his own ; it was an artistic error ever to have left it. Yet in leav- ing it he proved, however feebly, that in his outworn consciousness was the manly spark, albeit he could not, out of his accustomed vaporous abstraction, speak, in the crowd, the efficacious word. He had been too .long a recluse, a bookworm, and a leaf in the wind. Poor Mangan, impotently moralizing towards the last, is not the idler — " full of health and heart Upon the foamy Bosphorus ; " 48 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN but who that loves liberty as well as he loves lyric worth, can be loath to honor him for the fruitless change ? It has been remarked con- cerning Mangan, that though full of personal hopelessness, he was a political optimist. " He always dreamed, mystically enough, after the modern fashion, of a new era just about to dawn upon the world, and of the regeneration of mankind." (And he is a most compensatory singer : " what though," is his ever-recurrent word.) Hungary failed in 1848, Sicily failed, Ireland failed. But there was much healthful havoc. With the final thunder of disparting thrones, dear to Mangan's remote ear, he himself was fated to pass, unconsummated. Mangan, like Cowley, like Southey and Coleridge, like our friend Goldsmith, between his call on the Bishop (in fatal scarlet breeches) and his attacks on medicine and the law, had a yearning for what he is pleased to call "The daedal Amazon, And the glorious O'hi-o; " and, like Byron, he pays a lofty compHment to " the single soul of Washington " ; but the A STUDY 49 possibility of his actually taking passage to Washington's open-doored republic must have looked absurd even to himself. In fact, he never struck at anything, nor "put it to the touch," for the major reason suggested by the CavaUer poet, that he "feared his fate too much." His inertia was due mainly, of course, to the Circean drugs, and partially to his con- stitutional fragility, and a dull submissiveness which he took, perhaps, to be his duty. He had extreme charity for everybody but Clar- ence Mangan. It seems superfluous to say that he made no rebellious clutches at life, had no greed. Thinking once of domestic peace, debts discharged, and acknowledged per- sonal value to a community. Goldsmith sighed in a letter to his brother: " Since I knew what it was to be a man, I have not known these things." Worldly wisdom is not a gift left in Irish cradles. It was Mangan's instinct, as it was Goldsmith's, to "hitch his wagon to a star," and presently to discover, without any change of countenance, that his star had no legs, and so to stand, a spectacle for the laughter of men and gods. He was unfair to himself, we know. And the world was unfair to him, and to his industry. It is his chief negative merit that he was duped and driven to the wall. Such weakness, rather than the "push" which re- 50 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN ceives superstitious reverence, is advanced civ- ilization ; and yet it must not be recommended in hornbooks. Civilized Mangan was, nay, more : unlike " Goldy," he might be called genteel. About the tight coat and the torn stock was an aroma as of wilted elegance, a deceptive aroma of what had never been. His manner had great charm; his voice and smile were winning. With a gliding grace, he wan- dered around the journalist offices of Trinity Street; after prolonged eclipse, the outcast ap- parition alighted again in the doorway, and heads of curious clerks bobbed up from the desks. " He looked like the spectre of some German romance," said his most appreciative contemporary. "He stole into The Nation office once a week, to talk over literary pros- pects ; but if any of my friends appeared, he took flight on the instant. In earlier days, I had spent many a night, up to the small hours, listening to his delightful monologues on poetry and metaphysics; but the animal spirits and hopefulness of vigorous young men op- pressed him, and he fled from the admiration and sympathy of a stranger as others do from reproach or insult." Sir Charles Gavan Duffy also speaks of him, during The Nation years, as "so purely a poet that he shrank from all other exercises of his intellect. He cared noth- A STUDY 51 ing for political projects. He could never be induced to attend the weekly suppers, and knew many of his fellow-laborers only by name." And once more, as late as 1893, in the course of a private correspondence with a clerical friend and admirer: "Some of the pleasantest evenings of my life were spent with Mangan in a room in the office of The Morn- ing Register, I being then sub-editor. Mangan recited verse with singular power : not with the skill of an elocutionist, but with the elan of a man of genius ; and his memory was inexhaust- ible. Great ceremonies, splendid feasts, and distinguished personages have faded away from my mind ; but these nights with Mangan are still fresh and vivid." Sometimes, if Mangan talked at all, he indulged in a soft, desultory, uncanny soliloquy, in the ear of an old friend. " It was easy to perceive that his being was all drowned in the blackest despair. , . . He saw spirits, too, and received unwelcome visits from his dead father, whom he did not love." In spite of destiny he would anon be gay. There was nothing in him of the roisterer, but his speech was full of sudden witticisms, sly fool- ing which drew no blood. He could not for- bear a bit of satire at the expense of his countrymen, as in his charming claim of the discovery of fire, by Prometheus, five thousand 5z JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN six hundred years ago, in Kilkenny! The grimmest poem he wrote has its play upon words, at which melancholy game he takes rank with Heine and Thomas Hood, invinci- bles like himself. "Poor Clarence Mangan, with his queer puns and jokes, and odd little cloak and wonderful hat ! " — so his old desk- mate in the Ordnance Survey Office, Mr. W. F. Wakeman, paints him, not without a hand- some reference to the huge inevitable umbrella. This implement, says Father Meehan, was "carried hke a cotton oriflamme in the most settled weather, and might, when partly cov- ered by his cloak, easily be mistaken for a Scotch bagpipe." Never were clothes so mar- ried to a personaHty; they were as much a part of Mangan as his shining blue eyes, or his quiet, rapid, monk-like step. He had a brown caped cloak in which he seemed to have been born; and the strange antique dismaying hat aforesaid, fixed over his yellow silken dishevelled hair, is set down, to our great satis- faction (in the preface to O' Daly's Poets of Munster), as broad-leafed, steeple-shaped, and presumably built on the Hudibras model! Stooped, but not short ; wan, thin, and bright ; powdery with dust from the upper shelf; equipped with the scant toga precariously but- toned, the great goggles, and the king-umbrella A STUDY 53 of Great Britain and Ireland, — such was Man- gan, so ludicrous and so endearing a figure that one wishes him but a thought in Fielding's brain, lovingly handled in three volumes octavo, and abstracted from the hard vicissitudes of mortality. VI A lecture on Mangan was lately delivered in Glasgow by Mr. W. Boyle. We learn from a newspaper report that after giving the date of birth. May Day of 1803, this gentleman said further : " You will all remember that some four and twenty years before, upon another May morning, another poet, named Thomas Moore, had been born above another grocer's shop in the same old city. . . . To one, the dignified society of all the great and brilliant of his time, the sweetest bowers on the world's sunniest slopes ; to the other, the reeking slum, the evil-smelling taproom, the garret, and the lazar-house. To Moore, the loving admira- tion of all men, high and low; to Mangan the pitying approval of the few, and even in his own city, the all but complete forgetfulness of the many. And yet some of you will be sur- prised to learn that Mangan, in the intervals of his employment as a scrivener, and during S4 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN the active period of a life disturbed by illness, and not more than half as long, composed al- most as many lines of verse as Moore, who devoted all his time and mind and soul to the pursuits of literature." In the matter of mere quantity these two come together, who in all else stand asunder at the poles of the lyric world. Mangan, as may be surmised, made no sustained flights ; but there survive from his pen rather more than two thousand short com- positions, about half of which are translations, or, in some measure too generously acknowl- edged, inspired by poems in another language. We may roughly rate his purely original work (the finer half of which, again, he chose to call translation), as numbering fully a thousand pieces. To reprint Mangan in the bulk would be (and one may count that his first stroke of luck !) difficult. It would amount, moreover, to the sin of detraction. The thinnest duo- decimo, containing at the most thirty-five poems, would adequately show the quintes- sence of his gift, to the few whose senses are quick at literary divination. Slight as is the body of Mangan's poetry hitherto printed as his own, he shows in it conspicuous inequahty. It is hard to believe that the strophes of Enthusiasm, whose opening invocation Clough might have penned, — A STUDY 55 " Not yet trodden-under wholly, Not yet darkened. JNot yet darkened, O my spirit's flickering lamp ! art thou," belong to the same source as certain numbers artfully omitted from this book. But Mangan must have his range : awful when he draws him- self up to the Pompeiian or the Karamanian attitude, and something else when he touches Ireland and the peasants' famine-year, in " Understand your position. Remember your mission. And vacillate not Whatsoever ensue ! " The majority of his fugitive verses were given to The Dublin Penny Journal, from 1 832 to 1 837 ; to The Irish Penny Journal, started in 1 840, for which he wrote much; to The Nation and The United Irishman ; and to The Dublin University Magazine, to which, in his intermittent fash- ion, he was faithful throughout. He is to be traced under various signatures : The Man in the Cloak, Monos, Lageniensis, Vacuus, The Mourner, A Yankee, Terrae Filius, Wilhelm, J. C. M., Clarence, Clarence Mangan, and James Clarence Mangan. " Throughout his whole liter- ary life of twenty years," says his patriot friend Mitchel, "he never published a Hne in any Eng- Ush periodical or through any English bookseller. S6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN He never appeared to be aware that there was a British public to please." Mangan, modest by nature, had schooled himself to the neglect of the critics ; no selfish zeal was able to fire him, and he would not have crossed the street to advance his interests. He says roguishly of one of his home-made German poets, " Selber's toploftical disdain of human applause is the only great thing about him, except his cloak." It is, just to reflect, also, that he kept from the agreeable ways of publicity in London, because his feelings and associations, so far as they were defined, were republican and hostile, and on the side of his country in her storms of fifty years ago. At any rate, he never burned the per- missible candle to Mammon. London, and through her, posterity, are the losers ; there would have been, sooner or later, no doubt of his welcome. He was not uncritical.. He likened his genius to "a mountain stream," and no analysis could be better, on the whole. His home is on untrodden highlands, in rough pre- cipitous places, where only the Munster shep- herd-boys pass with their flocks, and drink of the gushing water, and dream not but that all water tastes the same, the wide world over. Miserable as Mangan was, he had comfort in his art. On this subject, where so many are loquacious enough, he is dumb. We know A STUDY 57 very little of his literary habits, save that he wrote fitfully, and often failed, in his earlier years, to get a farthing's pay. He apologizes for gaps in his various Anthologia, once by pleading that he had mislaid the last leaves of his manuscript, again by saying that he had not of late found a peaceful hour in which to re- sume his task. He belied himself by letting men think that this irregularity was due to too convivial nights. On that subject he gives us an epigram. " Thinkers have always been drinkers, and scribblers will always be bibblers ; Waiter ! I solemnly charge you to vanish, and make yourself handy ! " VII His work, at its worst, has the faults insepa- rable from the conditions under which it was wrought: it is stumbling, pert, diffuse, dis- traught. What Mr. Gosse has named the "overflow," the flux of a line-ending into the next line's beginning, so that it becomes difficult to read both aloud, and preserve the stress and rhyme, — this bad habit of good poets, completely ruins several of Mangan's longer pieces. He had in full that racial luxuriance and fluency which, wonderful to see in their 5 8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN happier action, tend always to carry a writer off his feet, and wash him into the deep sea of slovenhness. Mangan's scholarship, painfully, intermittently acquired, never distilled itself into him, to react imperiously on all he wrote, smoothing the rough and welding the disjointed. Again, his mental strength, crowded back, from the highways of literature, wreaked itself in feats not the worthiest : in the taming of un- heard-of metres, in illegal decoration of other men's fabrics, in orthoepic and homonymic freaks of all kinds, not to be matched since the Middle Ages. He delights in creating oceans of this sort of thing (1835): — " Besides, of course, heroically bearing The speech, half-sneer, half-compliment, of Baring, And standing the infliction of a peel Of plaudits from Lord Eldon and Bob Peel." Or this (1839): — "The wretch, who rescued from the halter, still Will kill, Or he, who after trampling tillages, Pillages villages, Has less of guiltiness than one who when Men pen Such rubbish as the dullest must despise. Cries ' Wise ! ' " A STUDY 59 What he alleges, with truth, in a posthumous fragment, of Maginn, may be reverted to him- self: " He wrote alike without labor and with- out limit. He had, properly speaking, no style ; or rather, he was master of all styles, though he cared for none." The legerdemain he shows in handling our flexible language, is hardly so admirable as it has been said, on excellent authority, to be. His compound rhymes, his unearthly opulent metres, are in- deed extraordinary ; but their effect is often gained by illegitimate means. Mangan has no philological scruples, no "literary conscience," whatever. Does he need a rhyme, he invents a word, chooses one which is archaic, or gives to a known one some grotesque turn ; he has prefixtures and eUsions ever on duty ; his mu- sicianly ear cannot be relied upon to keep him always clear of English sibilations ; he fre- quently loses his sense of the place and time to stop; and when he attempts recognized forms, as in the sapphics (with breath-catching rhymes !) of his own Lurelay, or the alexan- drines of Freiligrath's spirited "Bound, bound, my desert barb from Alexandria!" the result is somewhat fearsome, to say the least. While a poet subdues technical difficul- ties by overriding their laws, success so ob- 6o JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN tained must be ruled out of court. However, a born metrist he was, though a perverse one. From his very first appearances in print, as a young boy, he displays as his essential charac- teristics, imagination, and the greatest verbal dexterity. A good proportion of his poems are informal exhibitions by a virtuoso, a game of all miracles known to writing man. His best burlesque rivals Butler's and Thomas Hood's, which is the same as saying that it attains the front rank. But we cannot endure mediocre burlesque in the author of Dark Rosaleen. His prose, nearly always, is forced, and defaced with tedious puns. The painful mummery of some pages (of which, it is but fair to recall, their author had never the revi- sion, and which should not have been, nor should be reprinted) is not representative of anything but the awkwardness that comes at intervals over Mangan, and stands between him and his angel, " When the angel says, ' Write.' " As an essayist, despite some fine flashes, he is hardly worth preserving. Nor can it be de- nied that the same element of restlessness and strain, a sort of alloy from the frightful pov- erty and degradation nigh it, gets at times A STUDY 6 I even into much of Mangan's golden poetic work. " Hippocrene may be inexhaustible," he says quaintly, " but it flows up to Us through a pump." Did ever the Virgilian distinction spring from a houseless Muse, half-fed ? The marvel, rather, is that the spirit in Mangan so often surmounts the most appalling obstacles known to the human mind. Mitchel, who had unerring literary acumen, detected in him the conflict of " deepest pathos and a sort of fictitious jollity." At times, he says, the poet breaks into would-be humor, "not merry and hearty fun, but rather gro- tesque, bitter, Fescennine buflFoonery, which leaves an unpleasant impression, as if he were grimly sneering at himself and all the world, purposely spoiling and marring the effect of fine poetry by turning it into burlesque, and showing how meanly he regarded everything, even his art wherein he lived and had his being, when he compared his own exalted ideas of art and Hfe with the littleness of all his experiences and performances." Mitchel was thinking, in all probability, of the ruinous but very clever postlude to The Broken-Hearted Song, and the interpolation of Yankee dialect in a lyric raucously beginning. " O hush such sounds ! ' 6z JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN To such spoliations his words apply. But there is a vast deal of facetious excellence in Man- gan. Amid less felicitous drollery, the reader can take pleasure in a snatch of triumphant parody on Moore, and a recurring chorus which is a real gold nugget of comic opera : — " So spake the stout Haroun-al-Raschid, With his jolly ugly hookah in his hand ! " Will it be believed that Mangan was a choice librettist, without his opportunity ? Were he earning his living in the same walk to-day, Mr. W. S. Gilbert might look to his laurels. Some of his nonsense runs for all the world like a Gilbert and Sullivan "topical song," in long rattling declamatory lines, of wit and anima- tion all compact. Behold the exhumed pre- cursor of The Mikado ! The Gilbertian accent is unmistakably prefigured, in Mangan's humor- ous hours. Sundry lines need but to put in an appearance at the Savoy Theatre, and be wel- comed at once as long-lost fathers, by all the six-time A-major presto e staccato tribe modern playgoers know so well : — "As backward he staggered With countenance haggard. And feelings as acid as beer after thunder, 'Twas plain that the dart which had entered his heart Was rending his physical system asunder ! " A STUDY 63 and so on ; for there is no dearth of it. Let us take Metempsychosis as a fair specimen of Man- gan's achievement in this direction. It purports to derive its parentage from John Frederick CastelH, " a very select wag," in Klauer-Klat- towski's Popular Songs of the Germans. METEMPSYCHOSIS I've studied sundry treatises by spectacled old sages Anent the capabilities and nature of the soul, and Its vagabond propensities from even the earliest ages. As harped on by Spinoza, Plato, Leibnitz, Chubb, and Toland. But of all systems I've yet met or p'raps shall ever meet with. Not one can hold a candle to, {videlicet, compete w^ith) The theory of theories Pythagoras proposes, And called by that profound old snudge (in Greek,) metempsychosis. It seems to me a positive truth, admitting of no modi- Fication, that the human soul, accustomed to a lodging Inside a carnal tenement, must, when it quits one body. Instead of sailing to and fro, and profitlessly dodging About from post to pillar without either pause or pur- pose. Seek out a habitation in some other cozy corpus ; 64 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And when, by luck, it pops on one with which its habits match, box Itself therein instanter, like a sentry in a watch-box. This may be snapped at, sneered at, sneezed at ; deuce may care for cavils ! Reason is reason. Credit me, I've met at least one myriad Of instances to prop me up : I've seen upon my travels Foxes who had been lawyers at, no doubt, some former period ; Innumerable apes, who, tho' they'd lost their patro- nymics, I recognized immediately as mountebanks and mimics; And asses, calves et cetera, whose rough bodies gave asylum To certain souls, the property of learned professors whilome. To go on with my catalogue, what will you bet I've seen a Goose, that was reckoned, in her day, a pretty-faced young woman ? But more than that. I knew at once a bloody-lipped hyena To have been a Russian marshal, or an ancient em- peror. (Roman.) All snakes and vipers, toads and reptiles, crocodiles and crawlers, I set down as court sycophants or hypocritic bawlers ; A STUDY 65 And there, I may've been right or wrong, but noth- ing can be truer Than this, that in a scorpion I beheld a vile reviewer ! So far, we've had no stumbling-block. But now a puzzling question Arises. All the afore-named souls were souls of stunted stature, Contemptible or cubbish ; but Pythag. has no sug- gestion Concerning whither transmigrate souls noble in their nature. As Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, Schiller ! These now, for example. What temple can be found for such appropriately ample ? Where lodge they now ? Not, certes, in our present ninny-hammers Who mumble rhymes that seem to've been concocted by their grammars. Well, then, you see, it comes to this : and after huge reflection Here's what I say ! A soul that gains, by many trans- migrations, The summit, apex, pinnacle, or acme of perfection. There ends, concludes, and terminates its earthly pere- grinations ; Then, like an air-balloon, it mounts thro' high Olym- pus' portals. And cuts its old connections with mortality and mortals. 66 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And evidence to back me here I don't know any stronger Than that the Truly Great and Good are found on earth no longer ! As it is not within the scope of this book to amass Mangan's comic poetry, we may cull here perhaps, in passing, three more character- istic samples of it, the last of which, once more, is a fantasia on the jolly German Burschenlied, which Mangan translated in conjunction with Gustav Schwab's almost equally good Bunch's Departure from College. This original epigram celebrates the author's personal appearance. " I, once plump as Shiraz' grape, Am, like Thalbh of thin renown, Grown most chasmy, most phantasmy, Yea, most razor-sharp in shape ! Fact : and if I'm blown thro' town, I'll cut all the sumphs who pass me." A FAST KEEPER My friend, Tom Bentley, borrowed from me lately A score of yellow shiners. Subsequently I met the cove, and dunned him rather gently. Immediately he stood extremely stately. And swore 'pon honor that he wondered greatly ! We parted coolly. "Well," (exclaimed I ment'lly,) A STUDY 67 " I calculate this isn't acting straightly : You're what slangwhangers call a scamp, Tom Bent- ley ! " In sooth, I thought his impudence prodigious. And so I told Jack Spratt a few days after; But Jack burst into such a fit of laughter ! " Fact is," said he, " poor Tom has turned religious." I stared, and asked him what it was he meant. " Why, don't you see ? " quoth Jack. " He keeps the Lent." THE MAKING OF A FRESHMAN Burschen. Very good, very good : he is ripe ! So let him fill up a pipe. So let him fill up a smokified pipe, (Ho, ho ! A smokified pipe.) So let him fill up a mighty old pipe. Fuchs. Ugh ! take it away from me quick ! Ugh, hog-sties ! it makes me so sick, Ugh, hog-sties ! it makes me so smokified sick ! (Ho, ho ! Dim smokified sick.) Ugh, hog-sties ! it makes me so mighty old sick ! Burschen. Then let the cub sneak to his den, And let him not smoke it again ! 68 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN No, let him not smoke with us smokified men, (Ho, ho ! Dim smokified men.) And let him not smoke with us mighty old men. Fuchs. There, now ! . . . I am rid of the spell ; There, now, I again am all well ; There, now ! I am smokified well : (Ho, ho ! Am smokified well.) Hurrah ! I again feel mighty old well ! Omnes. So grows the Wild Fox a Bursch, So grows the Wild Fox a Bursch, So grows the Wild Fox a smokified Bursch ! (Ho, ho ! A smokified Bursch.) So grows the Wild Fox a mighty old Bursch ! For a riotous college-song this passes mus- ter. (Innocent Foxling, never to have smoked before ! Or was there an unholiest substance in that bowl ?) VIII Mangan had not been given for nothing his title to the Erin of song. He atoned to the venerable tongue he could neither speak nor A STUDY 69 understand, by making it articulate in the hear- ing of the invader. Running into twilight fields of his own, as was his wont, he dedicated exquisite work, albeit a trifle schismatical, to the ancient literature of his country, in the day of its last splendid but brief revival. Several scholars, among them the great Eugene Curry of Mr. Matthew Arnold's admiration, furnished Mangan, toward the end of his life, with literal drafts in English of the many ballads taken down from the lips of the peasants, which he was to render for publisher (D'Daly of Anglesea Street and for the Gaelic and Archaeological societies ; and within these outlines he built up structures not untrue to their first design. Mr. J. H. Ingram, editing Mangan's twelve poems for the third volume of Mr. Alfred H. Miles's collection. Poets of the Century, and basing all his facts, if not his judgments, on Mitchel, calls these renditions from the Irish "spirit- less." Some persons may think that there is a breathless grandeur in Mangan's chanting of the hymn of Saint Patrick, At Tarah To-Day, and that a less " spiritless " thing never came into being. It was with such deep-mouthed apostrophes that he was best fitted to cope. He was able to try them again in a translation sacred to war, as the other is sacred to Christian peace: O'Hussey's Ode to The Maguire : rude 70 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN heroic strophes bursting from the heart of the last hereditary bard of the great sept of Fer- managh, as late as the reign of Charles the First, while the courtly lyres of England were tink- ling a cannon-shot away. Quite as good as these, in its province, is the sarcastic rattle of The Woman of Three Cows. My Dark Rosaleen is worth them all, " on a pinnacle apart." It was written by a worthy contemporary of Shake- speare, an unknown minstrel of the Tyrcon- nell chief, Aodh Na Domhnaill (Hugh Roe, or the Red, O'Donnell), who put upon the lips of his lord, as addressed to Ireland, the love-name of " Roisin Dubh," the Black- Haired Little Rose. More exact versions of this symbolic masterpiece have since been made, but the stormy beauty of Mangan's lines does away with considerations of law and order. From an extract such as " Over hills and hol- lows I have travelled for you, Roisin Dubh ! and crossed Loch Erne in a strong wind ; far would I go to serve my flower ; . . . but the mountains shall be valleys and the rivers flow- ing backward before I shall let harm befall my Roisin Dubh," the poet draws the second, fifth, and last stanzas of his noble seven, the fifth of these, the passage about " holy delicate white hands," being a pure gratuity, like a foam-ball on the stream. A STUDY 71 Since My Dark Rosaleen is perfect, its genesis cannot be uninteresting. The original literal English of it is to be found in the Egerton MSS. in the British Museum. The song (it was, rather, a group of traditional songs) fig- ures in James Hardiman's Irish Minstrelsy, or Bardic Remains of Ireland ( 1 83 1 ) . H ardiman's translators, Messrs. Dalton, Furlong, Curran, and others, were learned gentlemen of much disinterestedness, giving their leisure to the work, who yet felt it necessary to condone, quite as if they belonged to the eighteenth century, the " barbarity " of the antique phrases, and to foist upon them modern smoothness and circumlocution. Roisin Dubh may or may not be, as has been claimed for it also, a personal and passionate old love-song. (To the peasantry of to-day it is that only.) The opening and the close seem to bear out strongly the theory held by most scholars, that it is the allegory of proscribed patriots, who dared not directly address their unhappy country. During this war of the northern clans against Elizabeth, as during the Jacobite insurrections, Ireland was, as the gallant song has it of the MacGregors, " nameless by day." The allusions to Rome and Spain refer to aid promised from both quarters. The unadulter- ated " prose poem " follows, in full : — 72 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN rosebud, let there not be sorrow on you on account of what happened you ! The friars are coming over the sea, and they are moving on the ocean ; Your pardon will come from the Pope and from Rome in the east. And spare not the Spanish wine on my Roisin Dubh. The course is long over which I brought you from yesterday to this day. Over mountains I went with you, and under sails across the sea; The Erne I passed at a bound, though great the flood. And there was music of strings on each side of me and my Roisin Dubh. You have killed me, my fair one, and may you suffer dearly for it ! And my soul within is in love for you, and that neither of yesterday nor to-day ; You left me weak and feeble in aspect and in form ; Do not discard me, and I pining for you, my Roisin Dubh! 1 would walk the dew with you, and the desert of the plains. In hope that I would obtain love from you, or part of my desire. Fragrant little mouth ! you have promised me that you had love for me : And she is the flower of Munster, she, my Roisin Dubh. A STUDY 73 smooth rose ! modest, of the round white breasts, You are she that left a thousand pains in the very centre of my heart. Fly with me, O first love ! and leave the country : And if I could, would I not make a queen of you, my Roisin Dubh ? If I had a plough, I would plough against the hills, And I would make the gospel in the middle of the Mass for my Black Rosebud : 1 would give a kiss to the young girl that would give her youth to me. And I would make delights behind the fort with my Roisin Dubh. The Erne shall be in its strong flood, the hills shall be uptorn. And the sea shall have its waves red, and blood shall be spilled ; Every mountain-valley and every moor throughout Ireland shall be on high. Some day, before you shall perish, my Roisin Dubh, No fewer than three times did Mangan try his hand at this truly bardic fragment. The first experiment was a happy one : yet our skilled reviser was not satisfied with it. Since last night's star, afar, afar. Heaven saw my speed; 74 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN I seemed to fly o'er mountains high On magic steed. I dashed thro' Erne ! The world may learn The cause from love : For light or sun shone on me none, But Roisin Dubh. O Roisin mine, droop not, nor pine ; Look not so dull ! The Pope from Rome shall send thee home A pardon full ; The priests are near : O do not fear ! From heaven above They come to thee, they come to free My Roisin Dubh. Thee have I loved, for thee have roved O'er land and sea ; My heart was sore, and evermore It beat for thee ; I could not weep, I could not sleep, I could not move ! For night or day I dreamed alway Of Roisin Dubh. Thro' Munster land, by shore and strand. Far could I roam, If I might get my loved one yet, And bring her home : A STUDY 75 O sweetest flower that blooms in bower, Or dell, or grove ! Thou lovest me, and I love thee, My Roisin Dubh. The sea shall burn, the earth shall mourn. The skies rain blood. The world shall rise in dread surprise And warful mood. And hill and lake in Eire shake And hawk turn dove. Ere you shall pine, ere you decline. My Roisin Dubh ! Accordingly, we find a second version by Mangan in The Poets and Poetry of Munster from which we take the four last verses : — In years gone by, how you and I seemed glad and blest : My wedded wife, you cheered my life, you warmed my breast ! The fairest one the living sun e'er decked with sheen. The brightest rose that buds or blows, is Dark Roisin. My guiding star of hope you are, all glow and grace. My blooming love, my spouse above all Adam's race: In deed or thought you cherish naught of low or mean; The base alone can hate my own, my Dark Roisin. 76 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN O never mourn as one forlorn, but bide your hour; Your friends ere long, combined and strong, will prove their power. From distant Spain will sail a train to change the scene That makes you sad, for one more glad, my Dark Roisin. Till then, adieu, my fond and true, adieu till then ! Tho' now you grieve, still, still believe we'll meet again ; I'll yet return with hopes that burn, and broadsword keen : Fear not, nor think you e'er can sink, my Dark Roisin ! The theme had taken hold of Mangan's im- agination. Last of all, in 1 845 or after, with the right mood of selection upon him, and with the warm consciousness at heart of the docility of the one style he had made his own, the poet fused together the best in the Roisin ballads, and broke into the inebriating music of My Dark Rosaleen. It is, let us say, the most original of them all. The manner, too, is all Mangan's ; its noteworthiest feature being the rich recurrence of words and lines for which Roisin Dubh gives no warrant, and to whose examination we shall return when we come to speak of Poe. Be- A STUDY 77 tween My Dark Rosaken and the preceding lyrics made from Roisin Dubh by the same hand, is a difference : all the difference there can be between things cunningly wrought, and the thing divinely inspired. Of this translation, and of two or three others from a kindred source, Mr. Maurice Leyne wrote in a supplement to The Nation, long ago : " Their beauty can scarcely be exag- gerated. To compare with them any actual remains which we have of the Jacobite poetry would be extravagant. They are what an Irish bard might have written if to the deep vague love of country, the longing, the dreaminess, the allegoric expressions of his art, were added all that modern culture can give of distinct- ness of feeling and sequence of idea. We have other poets who have caught with wonderful fidelity and felicity the Gaelic turns of thought and the structure of the language ; but in Man- gan the very Gaelic heart seems poured out." Mangan, however, was not always a successful conductor of sounds reaching him obliquely, through the stout persons of Irish scholars. Certain numbers, such as O'Hussey's Ode, and Prince Aldfrid's Itinerary, are modelled, with the most astonishing closeness, on faithful un- rhymed renditions in The Penny Journal (1832) and The University Magazine (1834). But no 78 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN critic can set Mangan's flat and passionless Eileen Aroon beside the wonderful strain of Carroll O'Daly, or prefer The Fair Hills of Eire, O, charming as that is, to Sir Samuel Fergusson's "A plenteous place is Ireland for hospitable cheer," which has the advantage, in this instance, of greater literalness. And comparison is least possible between the two native translators, when it comes to the Boatmari s Hymn, yet sung, in vernacular snatches, off the wild western coast. Not only is the Fergusson version a hundred-fold more pleasing, but it is, in equal measure, more Gaelic. It rushes along like the wind scooping the dusky Kerry sails. "Bark that bears me thro' foam and squall! 'Tis you in the storm are my castle wall. Tho' the sea should redden from bottom to top, From tiller to mast she takes no drop. On the tide-top, the tide-top, Wherry aroon, my land and store ! On the tide-top, the tide-top, She is the boat can sail go leor." How does Mangan start off with this finest of open-air themes ? " O my gallant, gallant bark ! Oft, a many a day, and oft A STUDY 79 When the stormy skies above are dark, And the surges foam aloft, Dost thou ride In thy pride O'er the swelling bosom of the sea ; Tho' lightning flash And thunder crash. Still, my royal bark, they daunt not thee. Yeo-ho, yeo-ho ! The bar is full, the tide runs high. So ! ready hand, and steady eye, And merrily we go." And at the close, in the apostrophe to the Atlantic crag (which one poet salutes as " Whillan ahoy ! old heart of stone," and the other, more sua, as "Dark Dalan, colossal clifF,") as well as in the whimsical outcry of the fisher- men terrified at the speed of " Wherry aroon," it is easy to decide which translator attains to the sailor-like and singable, and which remains merely literary. I cannot think, that Sir Sam- uel Fergusson ever yielded, in power of in- terpretation, to Mangan, in any single case where they chose to handle the same origi- nals. Despite it, we have not from him, nor could we have had, a Dark Rosaleen. Mr. 8o JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Maurice Leyne, in the illuminating article quoted a moment ago, speaks of Mangan's as a typically Irish temperament : " a tem- perament," according to another sociologist, "which makes both men and nations feeble in adversity, and great, gay, and generous in prosperity." Is he so generic ? It is impos- sible to think of any class or race of Mangans. Like Swaran in Ossian, he "brings his own dark wing," whereas some readers have asked for references, antecedents, certificates. Or per- haps, to say that such a one is Celtic, is to put him back among the indescribables. One Wil- son, a phrenologist, made in the February of 1835 ^ professional examination of Mangan's beautifully-shaped head, with this recorded re- sult. " Constructiveness is hardly developed at all ; on which account he would not have a genius for mechanism or invention generally, but he would possess the power of magnifying, embellishing, and beautifying in the highest de- gree. A tendency to exaggerate and amplify would pervade whatever he undertook." Here we have, disguised as a communication from the physical sciences, a remarkable bit of lit- erary criticism. The verdict is perfectly true, though opium had helped to make it so. Mangan was not least Irish ("Oriental" Irish) in this, that he loved expansions and dilutions. A STUDY and could not forbear yoking quantity with quality. A hypochondriac too odd to be sus- ceptible of classification, he is — "like almost anything, Or a yellow albatross ! " And eccentricity itself is a purely Celtic prop- erty. Strange that his genius is happier on Saxon than on Celtic ground ! IX Mangan's chief passion was for the Ger- mans, then in their aesthetic flowering-time ; he herded by instinct with these contemporaries best fitted to be his guides and friends. Con- stant immersion in the strong stream of their thought (for he read endless German metaphys- ics as well as German poetry), colored his intel- lectual life. He knew no stronger influence. " Meines Herz Richter" he calls John Paul. Mangan's only book published during his life- time was the Anthologia Germanica, which, hav- ing run its course in a magazine, was printed (without its prose passages) at Gavan Duffy's expense, in 1845. Some of the lyrics included have a transmitted truthfulness, as of a ray through clear glass. Even Schiller's great note is echoed, now and then, with absolute iner- 82 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN rancy. There are few finer illustrations of aural sensitiveness in a translator than Mangan gives us in the eleventh and twelfth stanzas of Der Gang nach dem Eisenhammer {The Message to the Foundry). Da ritt in seines Zornes Wut Der Graf ins nahe Holz, Wo ihm in hoher Oefen Glut Die Eisenstufe schmolz. Hier nahrten friih und spat den Brand Die Knechte mit geschaft'ger Hand ; Der Funke spriiht, die Balge blasen, Als gait' es, Felsen zu verglasen. Des Wassers und des Feuers Kraft Verbilndet sieht man hier ; Das Miihlrad, von der Flat gerafft, Umwalzt sich fiir und fiir. Die Werke klappern Nacht und Tag, Im Lakte pocht der Hammer Schlag, Und bildsam von den macht' gen Streichen, Muss selbst das Eisen sich erweichen. At once into a neighboring wood The Count in frenzy rode. Wherein an iron foundry stood Whose furnace redly glowed. Here, late and early, swinking hands Fed volumed flame and blazing brands, While sparkles flew and bellows roared. And molten ore in billows poured. A STUDY 83 Here waves on waves, fires hot and hotter, In raging strength were found; Huge mill-wheels, turned by foaming water, Clanged, clattering, round and round. Harsh engines brattled night and day ; The thunderous hammer stunned alway With sledgeblows blended, which descended Till even the stubborn iron bended. The Maid of Orleans finds its very self again in Mangan's English; so does The Fisher; Riickert's enchanting Das Eine Lied {Nature More than Science), Uhland's Lebe wohl, lebe wohl, mein Lieb, and Alexander and the Tree: these wed literalness to beauty, in their own established metre. Half a dozen times, he so touches the achievement set before him ; nay, rivals it, as he certainly does in the magical simile about " the piping notes of the coppice bird," closely inwrought with Kerner's song of praise to Uhland for his book : a song really as fresh and rushing in Mangan as in the original, and far more prodigal of music. Many pages are simple, spontaneous, choice. But when all is said, the Anthologia is a kaleidoscope, rather than a mirror. The majority of these German poems, being what the Irish ones are not, the children of conventional art, suffer more from Mangan's swervings and strayings. He treats his great victims pretty much as Burns, with 84 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN every justification, treats the floating Scotch ballads : he adjusts, he reverses ; into his old material he infuses a novel substance. In scarcely any instance is he content to keep a poem's given title ; and upon it he can foist foreign matter, with an almost criminal restless- ness. If he need not confess, with the Sir E B L of Bon Gaultier : — "I've hawked at Schiller on his lyric throne, And given the astonished bard a meaning all my own," at least he may well be pardoned for his all- too-generous doings elsewhere : for Clarence Mangan seldom detracts from the Muse he pro- fesses to follow ; his unfaithfulness is in quite another category. Having satisfied you with what exquisite attentiveness he can follow his exemplars, he hastens to show how variously, how cunningly, and how effectually he can run away from them. The single fact of his hav- ing transformed the hard-hearted Kunegund of Die Begrussung auf dem Kynast {The Ride Around the Parapet), into the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne, trumpeting her to and fro with splendid corroborations, is indicative enough of his habits. Mangan takes under protest, though his endeavor is always to make you think him a great assimilator and economist ; but he is a prodigal giver. He hates the niggardly hand, A STUDY 85 as much as Horace does, and he cares not a straw how much of himself he throws away at his game of setting up a poet in whom he has no special interest, and who is often his inferior. This is, indeed, as a severe reviewer named it at the time, a " vicious system " ; and it cannot be justified by the undeniable fact that Mangan imports into his subject an illicit beauty. The Germans who had most verbal compression, who are most set upon a calm statement of things, are those who suffer most from Man- gan's exuberant hullabaloo. Yet sometimes in himself, when he is improvising, and does not feel bound to keep step for step, is a compres- sion very remarkable, and a calm more pro- found than their own. The best known, and certainly the loveliest, of his shorter German translations is Riickert's ghazel, Und dann nicht Mehr. Even here, where he keeps, physically, rather close to his pensive model, he adds metaphor after meta- phor, many a lyrical wail, and a heart-stopping pathos all unwarranted and new ; he seems to blight and then revivify everything he touches. Scores of times, as in Wetzel's Sehnsucht, itself very like Mignon's immortal song of the far-off land and of the spiritual longing to turn thither, Mangan deliberately transposes and varies his theme. He matches Wetzel's gracefiil eight 86 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN lines with twenty-five of his own, melodiously overlapping, and of extraordinary sweetness, in which "Morn and eve a star invites me. One imploring silver star, Wooes me, calls me, lures me, lights me, To the desert deeps afar," with a persistence remote as the " imploring star" itself from good Wetzel's imagination. Still more transformed are the wild and mov- ing measures of The Last Words of Al Has- san, which purport to belong to " one Heyden, a name unfamiliar to our ears," and to be found in WoliFs Hausschatz, " the repertory of an incredible quantity of middling poetry." Mark the artful depreciation of the German volume, as if to fright a possible speculator in Manganese ! If any one hungers for a thorough insight into Mangan's method, he cannot do better than to open the bulky Hausschatz (in all of whose editions, however, Hassan, by Friedrich August von Heyden, does not figure), and read over the six stanzas of stout commonplace which contain the straightforward remarks of a worsted Bedouin. Not a reference in them does Mangan repro- duce, except the profaned Kaaba, the " black- ringleted " unfaithful mistress, the desert wind. A STUDY 87 He throws away Heyden's deserted tents, the captive women, the wounded and weary horses, the scattered sheep and shepherd : all the imagery of war and defeat which carry out a pictorial and romantic tradition. What he substitutes is so utterly alien to these that no human being could refer it to Heyden's Hassan at all, unless Mangan had chosen to indicate the source of his inspiration. Heyden ends : — "Nimm bin dies letze Griissen. Was kativ hat kommen miissen : Nur Allah's Macht besteht ; Gelobt sei der Prophet ! " This is worth while being considered as the sub-structure of "The wasted moon has a marvellous look Amiddle of the starry hordes ; The heavens, too, shine like a mystic book All bright with burning words ; The mists of the dawn begin to dislimn Zahara's castle of sand : Farewell, farewell ! Mine eyes feel dim. They turn to the lampless land, 'Llah Hu ! My heart is weary, mine eyes are dim ; I will rest in the dark, dark land." Mangan's Hassan, moreover, is richly em- broidered with geographical detail. He had a 88 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN fine sense for the uses of proper names, and displayed vague attractions for the region after- wards surveyed by Mr. Matthew Arnold, whose yellow Oxus and star-lighted Aral Sea no reader of this generation is likely to forget. But oLKpifida, unerring nicety founded on fore- thought and research, was not among Mangan's natural virtues. He invents neighborhoods and coasts ; he couples cheerfully towns two thousand miles apart, and even reaches over into another continent for a gem of a substan- tive to deck his languorous Asian lines. But poetry, after all, is so much finer than gazet- teers ! he seems to insinuate. The truth is, Clarence Mangan is no trans- lator at all. He is dominated by his own gen- uine erratic force, which throve under evil conditions, and had no clear outlet ; and he cannot contain the ebullition of his natural speech even in the majestic presence of Goethe. His mind is not serviceable ; he can give an able and courteous co-operation only when the demigod chances to agree with his native fire. The most striking internal evidence that he had not in him the first instinct of the transla- tor, is that he approaches Heine (whose abrupt beauty, if indeed it be conveyable at all, Man- gan in his trustier mood was curiously well fitted to convey into English), in order to A STUDY 89 appraise him as "darkly diabolical," and to deplore his " melancholy misdirection of glori- ous faculties." As it was, Mangan wasted on the dreams of anybody else the time he was forbidden to devote to the inspirations of his own brain. It was his misfortune, his punish- ment also, that with the early loss of enthusi- asm, and " that true tranquil perception of the beautiful," which, as he himself feelingly says of an elder writer, " a life led according to the rules of the divine law alone can confer on man," there came an autumnal decadence : a sinking from the exercise of the creative faculty to that of the critical ; a relinquishment of the highest intellectual mood, which was his birth- right, for that of the spectator, the sceptic, the jaded philosopher. He recanted his belief in his own powers, and having done that, he held a false but consistent way. The things he accomplished in literature have the look of acci- dents and commentaries, as he wished ; the pride of his whole shadowed career was to figure in a mask unworthy of him. In such a spirit of evasion he took to his inexplicable trade of translating : accepting a suggestion, and scorn- fully elaborating it, or ironically referring to the gardens of Ispahan his own roses, whose color seemed too startling for the banks of the LifFey. 90 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN X The question of Mangan's Oriental " trans- lations" is one of keen interest. He is not known to lovers of poetry, because he played tricks masterly as any of Chatterton's, and be- cause, unfortunately for the vindication of his genius, his tricks have never been discovered and explained, when they were suspected ; and some who have written of him have left it to be inferred that he was more of a wiseacre, and less of an organic force, than he was. His obliging labor of transposing the Welsh, Da- nish, Frisian, Swedish, Russian, and Bohemian (for he solemnly pretends to deal in all of these) is pure blague. If Mangan had had the polyglot acquirements of his adored Maginn and of Father Prout, he would have rivalled their gigantic jokes on the general reader. Latin and three of the current European tongues he knew, though not with equal thoroughness, and he quoted Greek, possibly at first hand. He had exceptional opportuni- ties, in the library of Trinity, for linguistic study, and once went out of his way to bear witness that our own tongue is nobler than them all ; but it seems plain that he was no better versed in the eldest literatures than in Gaelic. He was not, of course, absolutely A STUDY 91 gnorant of their nature. In an elegy on Sarsfieldj put into English, Mangan singled out two lines of primitive vehemence touching the slain Jacobite general, Jerome ; and after giv- ing the original Irish in a footnote, he adds : ■'This is one of those peculiarly powerful forms of expression to which I find no parallel except in the Arabic language." So that he would, presumably, have us believe he knew what Arabic was made of, even if he could not parse it. In this same spirit, he once gravely contradicted the dean of Orientalists, Sir Will- iam Jones. And again, in the course of a contemptuous review in The Dublin University Magazine for March, 1838, he breaks oiF with — " Enough of so ungracious a theme." (The theme is Hammer- Purgstall's Turkish Poetry.) " We must see whether it be not practicable to exhibit the Ottoman Muse in apparel some- what more attractive than that which decorates her here ! " The Schlegels, Herder, Riickert, and others whom Mangan read, were full of Oriental influences, direct or indirect. He was a voracious student of De Sacy and Galland, of Fundgruhen des Orients, and of d'Herbelot's Ori- ental Catalogue. During the earlier half of the century, the eyes of scholars were turned often to the East. By 1 830 there was enough of it reflected in German letters, enough even in 92 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN the spurious bulbuls of Lalla Rookh, to supply a man of nimble apprehension like Mangan, — "sagacious of his quarry from afar," with his personal visions. He expressly states somewhere that he dislikes the Orientals for their mysticism. Meanwhile, on a fine mys- tical principle, he approximates them, he has sympathies with them. He has all the sense of awe and horror, the joy in action and the memory of action, the bright fatalism, of a Mussulman. Whenever he puts on a turban, natural to him as was the himation to Keats, mischief is afoot. He did not wear it " for the grandeur of the thing," like a greater poet, poor Collins, who, in his last days, confessed to the Wartons his suspicion that his Oriental Eclogues were, rather, his Irish Eclogues. " Translation's so feasible ! " Mangan exclaims in a jolly passage wherein he blames other bards who do not dedicate themselves, for the hungry public's sake, to that excellent diver- sion. Lamb himself had no more fun out of Ritson and John Scott the Quaker, than Man- gan has out of his poems by Selber, with notes by Dr. Berri Abel Hummer. The nomenclat- ure of some of his puppets is quite too daring. Berri Abel, Ben Daood, and Bham-Booz-eel are bad enough, but Baugtrauter is notorious. A STUDY 93 He declared continually that his " translations " were not rigidly exact, or he refused altogether to gratify the curiosity of his audience. " It is the course that liberal feeling dictates/' he says, with a strict humor worthy of Newman, " to let them suppose what they like." And all the time he is enriching them and cheating himself, adorning the annals of reversed forgery, and cutting off from the circulation of his mother- tongue some of its most original accents. He produced several Ottoman "proverbs," in the September of 1837, which are the everyday saws of our western civilization served with spice. Reduced to their lowest terms, these mystical mouthings grin at one like a bottled imp. " Speech is Silver, but Silence is Golden," they say ; " Enough is as good as a Feast " ; " The Pot calls the Kettle Black " ; " A Bird in the Hand is Worth Two in the Bush " ! Mangan took tremendous delight in throwing dust in devoted eyes. It is within reason that in his roaring stanzas dedicated To the Ingleeze Khafir, Djaun Bool Djenkinzun, the dear and dunderheaded gentleman ad- dressed might miss the point altogether. It would not be so conceivable that he hood- winked also the Trinity Fellows at his elbow, were it not for two considerations. In the first place, nobody was especially well ac- 94 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN quainted with him ; he was intangible. As none could affirm with authority whether he had but one coat in his wardrobe, or where and how he kept his distressing relatives ; so none could track his elusive mental habits, and say, "This knowledge, and not that, has he acquired." Again, specialists do not grow on every bush, even in Trinity. The names of authors whom he cited, Mehisi, Kemal-Oomi, Baba Khodjee, Selim-il-Anagh, Mustafa Reezah, Burhan-ed-Deen, Mohammed Ben Osman, Ben All Nakkash (may their tribe decrease !) were not illuminating ; neither were the mottoes in good Arabic, but somewhat irrelevant to their purpose, with which he prefaced his apocrypha. He attributes one strain to a sixteenth-century Zirbayeh, another to Lameejah, a third to a phonetic nightingale called Waheedi. He ab- stracts from a manuscript in possession of " the queen of Transoxiana " one of the loveliest of his songs, and fathers it upon Al Makeenah, a fighting bard of his fancy. Once he was brought to task for concealing himself under the cloak of Hafiz, whereupon he replied that any critic could discern that the verses were only Hafiz ! His custom was to leave Hafiz alone, with Saadi and Omar, these being per- sons somewhat familiar to the general. The poets he courts are more preciously private to A STUDY 95 himself than ever Cyril Tourneur was, years ago, to the elect. Some of their names stand out memorably bright, and only just beneath those of the splendid phantom Mirza Schaffy, and the Haji-Abdu el-Yezdi, who had some reality so long as Sir Richard Burton lived. The attention of a competent Orientalist may never have been drawn to specifications which would at once throw the unwary off the trail ; but it is likely that they passed with modest minor scholars who would have suspected any- body of this roguery sooner than innocent be- spectacled Mangan. It is as a son of the Prophet that he claims his full applause. Al Hassan is more than equalled by The Wail and Warning of the Three Khalendeers (which Thackeray would have rel- ished had he known it), by The Time of the Barmecides, the vehement Howling Song of Al Mohara, and others, drawn, like these, from the impossible Persian, and many of which are only to be found scattered up and down the capi- tal-lettered yellow pages of extinct provincial journals. It is more than likely that his taste for East- ern poetry, gratified under such ironic condi- tions, was in Mangan a reaction from the little he knew of the bardic antiquities of his own Ireland ; for he appears to have been much at- 96 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN tracted to Vallencey's most tenable theory that the Milesians were the lost tribe of Israel. The all-but-identity of the typical Turkish wail : — " Wulla-hu, wulwuUa-hu ! " with the more melodious Gaelic " Ullu, ullalu ! " fascinated him ; and he used both rather too freely. Working on Shane O'Golain's Lament in 1 848 he took fire, at three o'clock of a Fri- day morning, and resolved to give as good as he got. " I will shortly send you," he writes to his patron, " a funeral wail from the Turkish, on the decease of one of the Sultans. The spirit of the composition closely resembles what we meet with in similar Irish poems." (Marry come up ! so it must, slyest of Mangans.) This was probably the Elegy for Sulieman the Magnifi- cent., a fairly unimpressive production. With his genius for analogies, the " translator " found ancient Irish, at second-hand, as Oriental as need be. Adjurations, apostrophes, superla- tives, monotones, reiterations, vague but bold colors, belonged, as outstanding features, to both languages ; and to all these characteris- tics his own habits of speech and thought were congenial. What Matthew Arnold said of the Celtic A STUDY 97 literature in general, may apply to Mangan's share in it. "It is not great poetical work ; but it is poetry, with the air of greatness invest- ing it." His Eastern fictions, like most of his Western ones, deal usually with a mood of reminiscence and regret, and they have the arch and poignant pathos in which English song is not rich. The mournful echo of days gone by, the light tingeing a present cloud from the ab- sent sun, are everywhere in Mangan's world. He looks back forever, not with moping, but with a certain shrewd sense of triumph and heartiness. He embraces the tragical to-day, like Pascal's crushed and thinking reed of mankind, farce qu'il salt quil meurt, et I'avan- tage que I'univers a sur lui: Punivers n'en salt rien. He delivers a lament as if it were a cheer ; in his strange temperament they blend in one. It is clear to posterity that this look- ing back on rosy hours is a sham, a poet's fantasy. What idyllic yesterday cradled and reared so ill-adventured a soul ? Out of his imagination his " rich Bagdad " never existed ; though it be cherished there as only the soli- tary and disregarded intelligence can cherish its ideal, he is lord of it yet, and can bid it van- ish, at one imperious gesture of relinquishment. Down tumbles Bagdad ! The crash thereof is in the public ears; and who will refuse to be- 98 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN lieve that there was a Clarence Mangan who knew something of the blessed Orient, some- thing, too, of felicity, even though it passed ? XI With his provoking banter, in April of 1 840, he calls attention, in a magazine, to The Time of the Barmecides, a composition of his own, which he had given to the same pages just a year before, and which he had bettered infinitely, meanwhile, by a few discreet touches. Start- ing off with a motto (obviously of his own manufacture), that " There runs thro' all the dells of Time No stream like Youth again," he proceeds to explain the second appearance of his favored lyric. "It was published some months back, but in such suspicious company that it probably remained unread, except by the very few persons who have always believed us too honorable to attempt imposing on or mystifying the public. We now, therefore, take the liberty of reintroducing the poem to general notice, embellished with improvements, merely premising that if any lady or gentle- man wishes to have a copy of the original (or. A STUDY 99 indeed, of any originals of our oversettings), we are quite ready to come forward and treat : terms cash, except to young ladies." With talk of such vain and transparent nonsense, Mangan attempts to parry his rightful praise. He would have us think that to his laborious searching and transcribing, " with the help," as he says, of "punch and patience," we are in- debted for the existence of his finest work. But the punch is direct from Castaly's well, and the patience covers the rapturous drudgery known to all true art. What held him back from acknowledging his own homespun glories was a trait both of shyness and of perversity. He must have been conscious that his rhythms were nothing short of innovations. Nearly everything which bears his name has a voluptu- ous dance-measure which no one had written before: a beauty so novel and compelling, that it is remarkable it has lacked recognition. With characteristic shrinking, Mangan sealed his charter of merit to supposititious ancients and aliens. Perspicacious readers are besought to consider it less likely that in one poet was a voice of such individuality that it breaks forth through a hundred disguises, than that bards resident through the ages in the four zones, Jew and Gentile, " Bold Plutarch, Neptune, and Nicodemus," loo JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN are the co-heirs of the self-same astonishing style. Wits were at work on him, even as on a rebus, long before he died. Some anony- mous writer, aware of a new sound when he heard it, addressed to him an apostrophe not idle, since it shows that the sagacious race of mousers abides always and everywhere, and that, according to a metaphysical truism made famous by President Lincoln's homely adapta- tion of it, no one person can deceive all: — " Various and curious are thy strains, O Clarence Mangan, Rhyming and chiming in a very odd way; Rhyming and chiming ! and the like of them no man can Easily find in a long summer's day." Mangan's shibboleth is the refrain. The re- frain is characteristic, in some shape or other, of all old poetry. It belongs to Judea and Greece, no less than to northern France, to the England of the Percy Reliques, and the Per- sianized Germany of Mangan's study. After a long lapse, it had its first full modern use in The Ancient Mariner., and in the peculiar cadence of all Coleridge's stops and keys. The fact that at divers periods, fashions of thoughts and speech infect the air, is a vindication of many laurelled heads ; for it is a theory which pinches A STUDY loi nobody. Almost on the same morning, within twenty years of Coleridge's retirement to High- gate, Mrs. Browning, Mangan, and Edgar Allan Poe were involuntarily conspiring to fix and perpetuate a poetic accident, destined to its subtlest and not wholly unforeseen collateral development in Rossetti. Among these, Mrs. Browning invented and foreshadowed much, but with a light hand. Poe's ringing of the word-changes is, on the other hand, so bold, that any successor who approximates his man- ner is sure now of smiling detection and dis- couragement. Whatever recalls " Come, let the burial rite be read, The funeral song be sung ! An anthem for the queenliest dead That ever died so young; A dirge for her, the doubly dead, In that she died so young," is all very fine, we say, but it will not do; the thing was done to perfection once : we must let Poe reign in his own kingdom. Let us have a care lest we are letting Poe reign in Mangan's kingdom. The unmistakable' mark of Poe's maturer poetry, the employment of sonorous successive lines which cunningly fall short of exact duplication, belong also to Man- gan, in the same degree. There is this passage JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN of his, for instance, in the reverie of the way- farer beside the river Mourne, who longs for everlasting rest delayed, and who hears, in an- swer, a prophetic voice from the martyred tree in the saw-mill : — " ' For this grieve not ; thou knowest what thanks The weary-souled and the meek owe To Death ! ' I awoke, and heard four planks Fall down with a saddening echo, I heard four planks Fall down with a hollow echo ! " And one verse out of the powerful many which bear the burden of " Karaman ! " will serve to illustrate the point yet more clearly : — " I was mild as milk till then, I was soft as silk till then ; Now my breast is like a den, Karaman ! Foul with blood and bones of men, Karaman ! With blood and bones of slaughtered men, Karaman, O Karaman ! " Were it not for the imperfect rhyme in the Saw-Mill stanza, any critic would attribute all the lines cited to Poe, both for manner, and for perfect mastery of ghastly detail. It happens that the Muse over in Dublin has the advantage of priority. Poe's maiden A STUDY 103 work has not the lovely tautology which has since been associated with his name. Judging by the pains which he took to dissect the rain- bow of his genius in his Philosophy of Composi- tion, he would have us assured that The Raven was his earliest experiment in the values of that saying-over or singing-over which, like a looped ribbon, flutters about the close of so many of his posthumous verses.' Moreover, The Raven was " only that and nothing more." Poe's own thrilling tale of Ligeia, dating from 1838, provided every one of the " properties " essen- tial to the effect of The Raven, and even the same psychological situation. It is not incon- ceivable that the prose was converted into poetry, exclusively for the purpose of trying a rash harmonic experiment on an approved in- strument. At any rate, the element in the great lyric which was not already in Ligeia, is precisely this haunting iteration of sweet sounds. The Raven was first published anonymously in the January of 1845. It spread Hke wildfire in America, and reached London the next year. In a letter to Poe, dated April, 1846, Miss Elizabeth Barrett Barrett says : " Your Raven has produced a sensation, a ' fit of horror,' here in England. Some of my friends are taken by the fear of it, and some by the music." The English parodies of it, which would certify I04 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN that it was popular and familiar, began in 1853. Ulalume appeared in Cohorts Review, in 1 847 ; and it may be considered as the perfect blossom of Poe's acquired tendencies. Lenore, first intoned as A Paan (1831), came out in Mr. James Russell Lowell's journal, The Pioneer, in 1843. ^^ i^ instructive to observe that it has not, there, a single touch of the repetitions which now give it such memorable glamour ; the repetitions were superadded later and on second thought. Now Mangan, from 1839 and 1840 on, bestowed on almost every- thing he wrote the curious involved diction in question. Two poems of his in particular, which have mere extrinsic value, may therefore yield up their opening stanzas as arch-speci- mens. The Winniger fVinehouse, we are told, is " slightly improved from Hoffmann of Fall- ersleben." The Kiosk of Moostanzar-Billah has no history. " Hurrah for the Winniger Winehouse, The sanded Winniger Winehouse ! Eighteen of us meet in a circle, and treat Each other all day at the Winehouse. As thinking but doubles men's troubles, 'Tis shirked in the emerald parlor; Tho' banks be broken and war lour, We've eyes alone for such bubbles A STUDY 105 As wink on our cups in the Winehouse, Our golden cups in the Winehouse, (As poets would feign !) but 'tis glasses we drain In the sanded Winniger Winehouse ! " " The pall of the sunset fell Vermilioning earth and water; The bulbul's melody broke from the dell, A song to the rose, the summer's daughter ! The lulling music of Tigris' flow Was blended with echoes from many a mosque As the muezzin chanted the Allah-el-illah : Yet my heart in that hour was low, For I stood in a ruined Kiosk : my heart in that hour was low For I stood in the ruined Kiosk Of the Caliph Moostanzar-Billah ; 1 mused alone in the ruined Kiosk Of the mighty Moostanzar-Billah." The same emphatic notes occur in The Three Talismans, The tVayfaring Tree, The Saw-Mill, and The Karamanian Exile ; in The Last Words of Al Hassan, and in the very different and very- beautiful Time of the Barmecides ; in The Wail and Warning of the Three Khalendeers, and in My Dark Rosaleen; and something not far from them in Night is Hearing, Twenty Golden Tears ago. The Time ere the Roses were Blowing, io6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN and The Howling Song. Indeed, it is difficult to quote from him at all and not detect the ac- cent associated forever with Poe. Under cover of his spurious OrientaHsm, Mangan allowed himself much autobiographical utterance ; and he found it convenient, as an Oriental middle- man, to introduce, and to fully develop, with- out suspicion froin outsiders, his ornate original da capo. Indeed, one sometimes feels quite certain that he was a practising Mussulman only for the sake of it. In The Dervish and the Vizier, Mangan is his own superexcellent parodist : here he breaks into a ridiculous ex- aggeration of the refrain, in a comic narrative of great gusto. Having once mastered his in- vention, Mangan, in the end, came near being mastered by it. He imported a sort of stam- mering into many of his renderings from foreign languages, to the conceivable amazement of dead authors ; and the catch-word of a stanza was often multiplied until it attained the nu- merical importance of Mozart's triumphant Amens. No one will deny that the Schwertlied itself gains by this vandalism. Poe, in this re- spect, is merely Manganesque. In The Dublin University Magazine, during the years when Poe was attaining his zenith of success, figure successive specimens of the unchanged art of the man who had the start of him by at least A STUDY 107 five years ; for The Barmecides was in print in 1839, and The Karamanian Exile, a finished model of its kind, was contemporary with the as yet cisatlantic Raven, and the predecessor of Ulalume, Lenore, Eulalie, For Annie, and the rest. Coleridge's is too great a name by which to measure, and Mrs. Browning is an influence apart, when one comes to scrutinize the neck- and-neck achievements of Mangan and Poe. Mr. Joseph Skipsey openly implies that Poe fell across Mangan' s experimental measures during his own editorial and journalistic career. The proposition might have more weight, coming from a more cautious pen ; yet it is a practicable guess, did one care to entertain it. The American's thrift and hardihood, his known accomplishment of buccaneering, benefi- cent as it chanced to be in the application, helped him to adopt and bring into notice any reform perishing in obscure hands. Thus he supplemented the octosyllabic cadences of Lady Geraldines Courtship in " The silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain," with a patrician aggressiveness never to be con- founded with common theft. On the other side, no arraignment of this sort can be brought against poor chivalrous Mangan which would io8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN not be a chronological absurdity. Coleridge the forerunner might have pushed his verbal practice farther ; but he lacked the sensational- ism which is a noble ingredient if used spar- ingly and in season, and of which Mangan and Poe, beyond all doubt, were possessed. Now, it is not to be forgotten that one of these two lived and died, as it were, in a hole ; that at no time was he in the current of events, or so placed, withdrawn in the violet shadow of the Wicklow Hills, that he could and would scan even the near English horizon. It was the business of the other to sit in a watch-tower, "Where Helicon breaks down In cliff to the sea." Poe, if it may be said respectfully, was what the Gypsies call a jinney-mengro : one-who-knows- what - is - up - and - cannot - be - gulled. Under circumstances comparatively kind, from an offi- cial chair, and with the bravery which is half the battle, he bequeathed to the soil of Eng- lish literature a hitherto exotic beauty. It is unnecessary to ask whether he learned his lyric latitude of phrase from The Dublin University Magazine. But Clarence Mangan, shrinking like the Thane before the supernatural "All hail hereafter ! " is the true founder, neverthe- A STUDY 109 less, of the most picturesque feature in modern verse. While Poe links himself for good with his immediate predecessors in The Haunted Palace, The City by the Sea, and the opening of Al Aaraaf, and so falls gracefully into his dynastic place, Mangan has wayward secondary leanings, sometimes to the whimsical, affectionate temper of Beranger, sometimes to the bare strength of the Elizabethans themselves, as in his lines where Fate " Tolls the disastrous bell of all our years," a line as unlike as possible to " Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore." He is addicted to compound words ; and in such mongrel usages as " youthhood," "gloom- somely," and " aptliest," he makes straight for the pitfalls dug for the radiant intelligence of Mrs. Browning. Poe is too " dainty, airy, amber-bright," for sophomoric blunders, for wretched puns, for breathless haste, for dactyls maimed and scarred in the wars. He never makes Mangan's lunges ; his every caesural pause is fixed by conclave of the Muses. And there is over all his entrancing work an air of no JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN incomparable self-attentiveness, a touch of sat- isfied completion, as of a coquette bien chaussee. Men gantee. The other's charm is less urban : "A winning wave, deserving note, In the tempestuous petticoat." The two Celts had much, very much, in com- mon ; Poe's Attic taste, sprung from his fortu- nate training, is responsible for most of the difference. To affirm of him, as has often been done, that he worshipped beauty with his whole soul ; that he loved the occult sciences, the phrenologists, and the old mystics ; that his existence was but an affecting struggle with the adversaries of darkness ; even that he was of a frail physique, his forehead high and pale, the lower part of his face sensitive and dejected; — this is to describe Mangan equally well. They had kindred dreams ; they were haunted by the same loathing of the " dishonor of the grave " ; they died, under almost identical circumstances of pain and mystery, in the same year. Their respective sense of humor was unevenly appor- tioned. In point of achievement, too, or of the forces which make achievement possible, they are hardly to be compared. Poe was ever the artist ; his imagination was not only sumptu- ous, but steadfast ; his utterances were fewer, and had finality. In the moral contrast, it is A STUDY III the Irish poet who gains. Poe, with his mani- fold gifts (if we may pervert the terms of Lamb's theological thesis not " defended or oppugned, or both, at Leipsic or Gottingen ") was " of the highest order of the seraphim illuminati who sneer." He nursed grudges and hungered for homage ; he was seldom so happy as in a thriv- ing quarrel. Mangan was a pattern of sweet gratitude and deference, and left his art to prosper or perish, as Heaven should please. In 1803, the year of Mangan's birth, Mrs. Hemans printed her first verses, and Moore, already a popular young minstrel, was commis- sioned to be Admiralty Registrar at Bermuda. The Lyrical Ballads had sunk, softly as a snow- flake, into the earth one twelvemonth before. Mangan's early youth was the flowering-time of Keats, Shelley, and Byron ; and he was writing for penny journals while the new minor notes. Hood's, Praed's, Moore's, were filling the air. He died, not companionless, with Emily Bronte, Hartley Coleridge, and Thomas Lovell Beddoes, in 1 849 : three spirits of lav- ish promise, defrauded and unfulfilled like his own, yet happier than he, inasmuch as they have had since many liegemen and remember- ers. Let him come forward at last in a quieter hour, with his own whimsical misgiving man- 112 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN ner, or with questions pathetically irrelevant, as one whom the fairies had led astray : — "O sayest thou the soul shall climb The magic mount she trod of old, Ere childhood's time ? " He has been, for a half-century, wandering on the dark marge of Lethe. It will not do, as yet, to startle him with gross applause. Otherwise, his gratified editor would like to repeat, introducing Clarence Mangan, the gal- lant words with which Schumann once began a review of the young Chopin : " Hats off, gen- tlemen : a Genius ! " My Dark Rosaleen And Other Translations from the Gaelic MY DARK ROSALEENi(i) (traditional) my Dark Rosaleen, Do not sigh, do not weep ! The priests are on the ocean green, They march along the deep. There's wine from the royal Pope Upon the ocean green; And Spanish ale shall give you hope. My Dark Rosaleen ! My own Rosaleen ! Shall glad your heart, shall give you hope, Shall give you health, and help, and hope, My Dark Rosaleen! Over hills and thro' dales. Have I roamed for your sake; All yesterday I sailed with sails On river and on lake. The Erne at its highest flood 1 dashed across unseen, 1 This impassioned song, entitled, in the original, Roisiti Duhb, or The Black-Haired Little Rose, was written in the reign of Elizabeth by one of the poets of the celebrated Tyrconnellian chieftain, Hugh the Red O'Donnell. It purports to be an allegorical address from Hugh to Ireland on the subject of his love and struggles for her, and his resolve to raise her again to the glorious position she held as a nation, before the irruption of the Saxon and Norman spoilers, [All the notes at the bottom of the page in this booJc are Mangan's own. Fijgures in parentheses refer to the fiUtor's notes at the end of the book.] "5 ii6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN For there was lightning in my blood, My Dark Rosaleen ! My own Rosaleen ! O there was lightning in my blood, Red lightning lightened thro' my blood, My Dark Rosaleen ! All day long, in unrest, To and fro, do I move. The very soul within my breast Is wasted for you, love ! The heart in my bosom faints To think of you, my queen. My life of life, my saint of saints. My Dark Rosaleen ! My own Rosaleen! To hear your sweet and sad complaints. My life, my love, my saint of saints. My Dark Rosaleen ! Woe and pain, pain and woe. Are my lot, night and noon. To see your bright face clouded so, Like to the mournful moon. But yet will I rear your throne Again in golden sheen; 'Tis you shall reign, shall reign alone, My Dark Rosaleen ! My own Rosaleen ! 'Tis you shall have the golden throne, 'Tis you shall reign, and reign alone. My Dark Rosaleen! HIS SELECTED POEMS 117 Over dews, over sands. Will I fly for your weal : Your holy delicate white hands Shqll girdle me with steel. At home in your emerald bowers, From morning's dawn till e'en. You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers, My Dark Rosaleen ! My fond Rosaleen ! You'll think of me thro' daylight hours. My virgin flower, my flower of flowers. My Dark Rosaleen ! I could scale the blue air, I could plough the high hills, O I could kneel all night in prayer, To heal your many ills ! And one beamy smile from you Would float like light between My toils and me, my own, my true. My Dark Rosaleen ! My fond Rosaleen ! Would give mfe life and soul anew, A second life, a soul anew. My Dark Rosaleen ! O the Erne shall run red With redundance of blood. The earth shall roqk beneath our tread, And flames wrap hill and wood, And gun-peal and slogan-cry Wake many a glen serene. ii8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Ere you shall fade, ere you shall die. My Dark Rosaleen ! My own Rosaleen ! The Judgment Hour must first be nigh. Ere you can fade, ere you can die. My Dark Rosaleen ! PRINCE ALDFRID'S ITINERARY THROUGH IRELAND! I found in Innisfail the fair. In Ireland, while in exile there. Women of worth, both grave and gay men, Many clerics and many laymen. I travelled its fruitful provinces round. And in every one of the five I found, Alike in church and in palace hall. Abundant apparel, and food for all. Gold and silver I found in money ; Plenty of wheat and plenty of honey ; I found God's people rich in pity. Found many a feast, and many a city. I also found in Armagh the splendid. Meekness, wisdom, and prudence blended, 1 Amongst the Anglo-Saxon students resorting to Ireland was Prince Aldfrid, afterwards King of tlie Nortliumbrian Saxons. His having been educated there about the year 684 is corroborated by Venerable Bede in his Life of S. Cutbbert. The original poem of which this is a translation, attributed to Aldlrid, is still extant in the Irish language. HIS SELECTED POEMS 119 Fasting, as Christ hath recommended, And noble councillors untranscended. I found in each great church moreo'er. Whether on island or on shore. Piety, learning, fond affection. Holy welcome and kind protection. I found the good lay monks and brothers Ever beseeching help for others, And, in their keeping, the Holy Word Pure as it came from Jesus the Lord. I found in Munster unfettered of any. Kings, and queens, and poets a many, Poets well-skilled in music and measure; Prosperous doings, mirth and pleasure. I found in Connaught the just, redundance Of riches, milk in lavish abundance ; Hospitality, vigor, fame. In Cruachan's ^ land of heroic name. I found in the country of Connall ^ the glorious, Bravest heroes ever victorious ; Fair-complexioned men and warlike, Ireland's lights, the high, the starlike ! I found in Ulster from hill to glen. Hardy warriors, resolute men ; 1 Cruachan, or Croghan, was the name of the royal palace of Connaught. ^ Tyrconnell, the present Donegal, * I20 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Beauty that bloomed when youth was gone, And strength transmitted from sire to son. I found in the noble district of Boyle, (MS. here illegible.^) Brehons, Erenachs,i weapons bright. And horsemen bold and sudden in fight. I found in Leinster the smooth and sleek, From Dublin to Slewmargy's ^ peak, Flourishing pastures, valor, health, Long-living worthies, commerce, wealth. I found, besides, from Ara to Glea, In the broad rich country of Ossorie, Sweet fruits, good laws for all and each. Great chess-players, men of truthful speech. I found in Meath's fair principality Virtue, vigor, and hospitality; Candor, joyfulness, bravery, purity, Ireland's bulwark and security. I found strict morals in age and youth, I found historians recording truth ; The things I sing of in verse unsmooth, I found them all. I have written sooth.* 1 Brehon, a law judge ; Erenach, a ruler, an archdeacon, * Slewmargy, a mountain in the Queen's County, near the river Barrow. 2 ** Bade assures us that the Irish were a harmless and friendly people. To them many of the Angles had been accustomed to resort in search of knowledge, and on all occasions had been received and supported gratuitously. Aldirid lived in spontaneous exile among the Scots (Irish) through his de- sire of knowledge, and was called to the throne of Northumbria after the decease of his brotlier Egfrid in 685." — Lingard's England^ vol. i. chap. 3. HIS SELECTED POEMS 121 KINKORA 1 (mac-liag) O where, Kinkora! is Brian the Great, And where is the beauty that once was thine ? O where are the princes and nobles that sate At the feast in thy halls, and drank the red wine ? Where, O Kinkora? O where, Kinkora! are thy valorous lords? O whither, thou hospitable ! are they gone ? O where are the Dalcassians of the golden swords ? ^ And where are the warriors Brian led on ? Where, O Kinkora ? And where is Morrough', the descendant of kings. The defeater of a hundred, the daringly brave. Who set but slight store by jewels and rings. Who swam down the torrent and laughed at its wave ? Where, O Kinkora? And where is Donogh, King Brian's worthy son ? And where is Conaing, the beautiful chief? 1 This poem is ascribed to IMac-Liag, tlie secretary of Brian Boruimlia, wlio fell at the battle of Clontarf, in 1014 ; and the subject of it is a lamen- tation for the iallen condition of Kinkora, the palace of that monarch, con- sequent on his death. The decease of Mac-Liag is recorded in the "Annals of the Four Masters," as having talcen place in 1015. A great number of jiis poems are still in existence, but none of them has obtained a popularity so widely extended as his Lament. The palace of Kinlcora, which was situated on the banlcs of the Shannon, near Killaloe, is now a heap of ruins. 2 Colg n-or, or the swords of Gold, i.e. of the Gold-hilted Swords. 122 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And Kian and Core ? Alas ! they are gone : They have left me this night alone with my grief! Left me, Kinkora ! And where are the chiefs with whom Brian went forth ? The sons never-vanquished of Evin the brave. The great King of Osnacht, renowned for his worth, And the hosts of Baskinn from the western wave ? Where, O Kinkora ? O where is Duvlann of the swift-footed steeds ? And where is Kian who was son of Molloy ? And where is King Lonergan, the fame of whose deeds In the red battle-field no time can destroy ? Where, O Kinkora ? And where is that youth of majestic height. The faith-keeping Prince of the Scots ? Even he, As wide as his fame was, as great as was his might. Was tributary, Kinkora, to thee ! Thee, O Kinkora ! They are gone, those heroes of royal birth Who plundered no churches, and broke no trust ; 'Tis weary for me to be living on earth When they, O Kinkora, lie low in the dust. Low, O Kinkora ! O never again will princes appear. To rival the Dalcassians ^ of the cleaving swords ; ^ The Dalcassians were Brian^s body-guard. HIS SELECTED POEMS 123 I can never dream of meeting afar or anear. In the east or the west, such heroes and lords ! Never, Kinkora ! dear are the images my memory calls up Of Brian Boru ! how he never would miss To give me at the banquet, the first bright cup. Ah ! why did he heap on me honor like this ? Why, O Kinkora ? 1 am Mac-Liag, and my home is on the lake : Thither often, to that palace whose beauty is fled. Came Brian to ask me, and I went for his sake. — O my grief! that I should live, and Brian be dead ! Dead, O Kinkora ! ST. PATRICK'S HYMN BEFORE TARAi At Tara to-day, in this awful hour, I call on the Holy Trinity ! Glory to Him who reigneth in power. The God of the elements. Father, and Son, And Paraclete Spirit, which Three are the One, The ever-existing Divinity ! 1 The original Irish of this hymn was published by Dr. Petrie, in vol. xviii., "Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy." It is in the Bearla Peine, the most ancient dialect of the Irish, the same in which the Brehon laws were written. It was printed from the Liber Hymnorum, preserved in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin, a manuscript, which, as Dr. Petrie proves by the authority of Usher and others, must be nearly twelve hundred and fifty years old. 1 24 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN At Tara to-day I call on the Lord, On Christ, the Omnipotent Word, Who came to redeem from death and sin Our fallen race ; And I put and I place The virtue that lieth and liveth in His Incarnation lowly. His Baptism pure and holy. His Life of toil, and tears, and affliction, His dolorous Death, his Crucifixion, His Burial, sacred and sad and lone. His Resurrection to life again, His glorious Ascension to Heaven's high throne. And, lastly, his future dread And terrible Coming to judge all men. Both the living and dead ; — At Tara to-day I piit and I place The virtue that dwells in the Seraphim's love, And the virtue and grace That are in the obedience And unshaken allegiance Of all the Archangels and Angels above. And in the hope of the Resurrection To everlasting reward and election. And in the prayers of the Fathers of old. And in the truths the Prophets foretold. And in the Apostles' manifold preachings. And in the Confessors' faith and teachings, And in the purity ever dwelling Within the immaculate Virgin's breast, HIS SELECTED POEMS 125 And in the actions bright and excelling Of all good men, the just and the blest ; — At Tara to-day, in this fateful hour, I place all Heaven with its power. And the sun with its brightness, And the snow with its whiteness. And fire with all the strength it hath, And lightning with its rapid wrath. And the winds with their swiftness along their path. And the sea with its deepness. And the rocks with their steepness. And the earth with its starkness ^ ; — All these I place. By God's almighty help and grace. Between myself and the Powers of Darkness ! At Tara to-day May God be my stay ! May the strength of God now nerve me ! May the power of God preserve me ! May God the Almighty be near me ! May God the Almighty espy me ! May God the Almighty hear me ! May God give me eloquent speech! May the arm of God protect me ! May the wisdom of God direct me ! May God give me power to teach and to preach ! May the shield of God defend me ! 1 Properly, "strength," "firmness," from the Anglo-Saxon stark, "strong, stiff." 126 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN May the host of God attend me, And ward me, And guard me Against the wiles of demons and devils. Against the temptations of vices and evils. Against the bad passions and wrathful will Of the reckless mind and the wicked heart ; Against every man who designs me ill. Whether leagued with others or plotting apart ! In this hour of hours, I place all those powers Between myself and every foe Who threatens my body and soul With danger or dole. To protect me against the evils that flow From lying soothsayers' incantations. From the gloomy laws of the Gentile nations. From heresy's hateful innovations. From idolatry's rites and invocations ; Be those my defenders. My guards against every ban. And spells of smiths, and Druids, and women ; In fine, against every knowledge that renders The light Heaven sends us dim in The spirit and soul of man ! May Christ, I pray. Protect me to-day Against poison and fire. Against drowning and wounding, HIS SELECTED POEMS 127 That so, in His grace abounding, I may earn the preacher's hire ! Christ, as a light, Illumine and guide me ! Christ as a shield, o'ershadow and cover me ! Christ be under me ! Christ be over me ! Christ be beside me On left hand and right ! Christ be before me, behind me, about me ! Christ this day be within and without me ! Christ, the lowly and meek, Christ, the All-Powerful, be In the heart of each to whom I speak. In the mouth of each who speaks to me ! In all who draw near me. Or see me or hear me ! At Tara to-day, in this awful hour, I call on the Holy Trinity ! Glory to Him who reigneth in power. The God of the Elements, Father, and Son, And Paraclete Spirit, which Three are the One, The ever-existing Divinity ! Salvation dwells with the Lord, With Christ, the Omnipotent Word : From generation to generation Grant us, O Lord, thy grace and salvation ! [28 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN O'DALY'S KEEN FOR O'NEILL (2) mourn, Erin, mourn ! He is lost, he is dead. By whom thy proudest flag was borne, Thy bravest heroes led : The night-Tvinds are uttering Their orisons of woe. The raven flaps his darkling wing O'er the grave of Owen Roe, Of him who should have been thy King, The noble Owen Roe. Alas, hapless land. It is ever thus with thee ; The eternal destinies withstand Thy struggle to be free. One after one thy champions fall. Thy valiant men lie low. And now sleeps under shroud and pall The gallant Owen Roe, The worthiest warrior of them all. The princely Owen Roe! Where was sword, where was soul Like to his below the skies ? Ah, many a century must roll Ere such a chief shall rise ! 1 saw him in the battle's shock : Tremendous was his blow : As smites the sledge the anvil block. His blade smote the foe. HIS SELECTED POEMS 129 He was a tower ; a human rock Was mighty Owen Roe. Woe to us ! Guilt and wrong Triumph, while, to our grief. We raise the keen^ the funeral song Above our fallen chief. The proud usurper sways with power, He rules in state and show. While we lament our fallen tower. Our leader, Owen Roe ; While we, like slaves, bow down and cower, And weep for Owen Roe. But the high will of Heaven Be fulfilled evermore ! What tho' it leaveth us bereaven And stricken to the core. Amid our groans, amid our tears, We still feel and know That we shall meet in after years The sainted Owen Roe : In after years, in brighter spheres. Our glorious Owen Roe ! THE FAIR HILLS OF EIR£, O (donogh mac con-mara) (3) Take a blessing from my heart to the land of my birth. And the fair hills of Eire, O ! I30 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And to all that yet survive of Eibhear's tribe on earth, On the fair hills of Eire, O ! In that land so delightful the wild thrush's lay. Seems to pour a lament forth for Eire's decay. Alas, alas, why pine I a thousand miles away From the fair hills of Eire, O ! The soil is rich and soft, the air is mild and bland, Of the fair hills of Eire, O ! Her barest rock is greener to me than this rude land ; O the fair hills of Eire, O ! Her woods are tall and straight, grove rising over grove; Trees flourish in her glens below and on her heights above ; Ah, in heart and in soul I shall ever, ever love The fair hills of Eire, O ! A noble tribe, moreover, are the now hapless Gael, On the fair hills of Eire, O ! A tribe in battle's hour unused to shrink or fail On the fair hills of Eire, O ! For this is my lament in bitterness outpoured To see them slain or scattered by the Saxon sword : O woe of woes to see a foreign spoiler horde On the fair hills of Eire, O ! Broad and tall rise the cruachs in the golden morning glow On the fair hills of Eire, O ! O'er her smooth grass for ever sweet cream and honey flow On the fair hills of Eire, O ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 131 Oh, I long, I am pining, again to behold The land that belongs to the brave Gael of old. Far dearer to my heart than a gift of gems or gold Are the fair hills of Eire, O ! The dewdrops lie bright mid the grass and yellow corn On the fair hills of Eire, O ! The sweet-scented apples blush redly in the morn On the fair hills of Eire, O ! The water-cress and sorrel fill the vales below. The streamlets are hushed till the evening breezes blow. While the waves of the Suir, noble river ! ever flow Neath the fair hills of Eire, O ! A fruitful clime is Eire's, through valley, meadow, plain. And the fair hills of Eire, O ! The very bread of life is in the yellow grain On the fair hills of Eire, O ! Far dearer unto me than the tones music yields Is the lowing of the kine and the calves in her fields, In the sunlight that shone long ago on the shields Of the Gaels, on the fair hills of Eire, O ! THE GERALDINE'S DAUGHTER (4) (egan o'rahilly) A beauty all stainless, a pearl of a maiden Has plunged me in trouble, and wounded my heart. 132 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN With sorrow and gloom is my soul overladen, An anguish is there, that will never depart. I could voyage to Egypt across the deep water. Nor care about bidding dear Eire farewell. So I only might gaze on the Geraldine's daughter, And sit by her side in some green pleasant dell ! Her curling locks wave round her figure of lightness, All dazzling and long, like the purest of gold ; Her blue eyes resemble twin stars in their brightness, And her brow is like marble or wax to behold. The radiance of heaven illumines her features Where the snows and the rose have erected their throne ; It would seem that the sun had forgotten all creatures. To shine on the Geraldine's daughter alone. Her bosom is swan-white, her waist smooth and slender. Her speech is like music, so sweet and so free. The feelings that glow in her noble heart lend her A mien and a majesty lovely to see. Her lips, red as berries, but riper than any, Would kiss away even a sorrow like mine ! No wonder such heroes and noblemen many Should cross the blue ocean to kneel at her shrine. She is sprung from the Geraldine race, the great Grecians, Niece of Mileadh's sons of the Valorous Bands, HIS SELECTED POEMS 133 Those heroes, the seed of the olden Phoenicians, Though now trodden down, without fame, without lands ; Of her ancestors flourished the Barrys and Poers, To the Lords of Bunratty she too is allied. And not a proud noble near Cashel's high towers But is kin to this maiden, the Geraldine's pride. Of Saxon or Gael there is none to excel in Her wisdom, her features, her figure, this fair ; In all she surpasses the far-famous Helen, Whose beauty drove thousands to death and despair. Whoe'er could but gaze on her aspect so noble Would feel from thenceforward all anguish depart; Yet for me 'tis, alas, my worst woe and my trouble That her image must always abide in my heart ! A LAMENTATION FOR THE DEATH OF SIR MAURICE FITZGERALD, KNIGHT OF KERRY, WHO WAS KILLED IN FLANDERS, IN 1642 (pierce ferriter) There was lifted up one voice of woe, One lament of more than mortal grief. Through the wide south to and fro. For a fallen chief. In the dead of night that cry thrilled thro' me ; I looked out upon the midnight air. 134 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Mine own soul was all as gloomy, As I knelt in prayer. O'er Loch Gur, that night, once, twice, yea, thrice, Passed a wail of anguish for the brave. That half curdled into ice Its moon-mirroring wave. Then uprose a many-toned wild hymn in Choral swell from Ogra's dark ravine. And Mogeely's phantom women ^ Mourned the Geraldine ! Far on Carah Mona's emerald plains Shrieks and sighs were blended many hours. And Fermoy in fitful strains Answered from her towers. Youghal, Kinalmeaky, Imokilly, Mourned in concert, and their piercing keen Woke to wondering life the stilly Glens of Inchiquin. From Loughmoe to yellow Dunanore There was fear ; the traders of Tralee Gathered up their golden store. And prepared to flee ; For in ship and hall, from night till morning Showed the first faint beamings of the sun. All the foreigners heard the warning Of the dreaded one ! 1 Banshees. HIS SELECTED POEMS 135 " This," they spake, " portendeth death to us. If we fly not swiftly from our fate," Self-conceited idiots, thus Ravingly to prate ! Not for base-born higgling Saxon trucksters Ring laments like these by shore and sea ; Not for churls with souls of hucksters Waileth our banshee ! For the high Milesian race alone Ever flows the music of her woe ; For slain heir to bygone throne, And for chief laid low ! Hark ! . . . Again, methinks, I hear her weeping Yonder. Is she near me now, as then ? Or was but the night-wind sweeping Down the hollow glen ? ELLEN BAWN(5) (traditional) Ellen Bawn, O Ellen Bawn, you darling, darling dear, you. Sit awhile beside me here ; I'll die unless I'm near you ! 'Tis for you I'd swim the Suir and breast the Shan- non's waters ; For, Ellen dear, you've not your peer in Gal way's blooming daughters ! 136 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Had I Limerick's gems and gold at will to meet and measure, Were Loughrea's abundance mine, and all Por- tumna's treasure. These might lure me, might ensure me many and many a new love. But ah ! no bribe could pay your tribe for one like you, my true love ! Blessings be on Connaught ! That's the place for sport and raking; Blessings, too, my love, on you, a-sleeping and awaking ! I'd have met you, dearest Ellen, when the sun went under. But, woe ! the flooding Shannon broke across my path in thunder. Ellen ! I'd give all the deer in Limerick's parks and arbors, Aye, and all the ships that rode last year in Munster harbors. Could I blot from time the hour I first became your lover ; For O ! you've given my heart a wound it never can recover ! Were to God that in the sod my corpse to-night were lying, And the wild birds wheeling o'er it, and the winds a-sighing ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 137 Since your cruel mother and your kindred choose to sever Two hearts that Love would blend in one for ever and for ever. O'HUSSEY'S ODE TO THE MAGUIREi(6) Where is my chief, my master, this bleak night, mavrone F O cold, cold, miserably cold is this bleak night for Hugh! Its showery, arrowy, speary sleet pierceth one thro' and thro', 1 O'Hussey, the last hereditary bard of the great sept of Maguire, of Fermanagh, who flourished about 1630, possessed a fine genius. He com- menced his vocation when quite a youth, by a poem celebrating the escape of the &mous Hugh Roe O'Donnell fi-om Dublin Castle, in 1591, into which he had been treacherously betrayed. The noble ode which 0*Hussey addressed to Hugh Maguire, when that chief had gone on a dangerous expe- dition, in the depth, of an unusually severe winter, is as interesting an example of the devoted afTecdon of the bard to his chief, and as vivid a picture of intense desolation, as could be well conceived. Mr. Fergusson, in a fine piece of criticism on this poem, remarks: "There is a vivid vigor in these descriptions, and a savage power in the antithetical climax, which claim a character almost approaching to sublimity. Nothing can be more graphic, yet more diversified, than his images of unmitigated horror : nothing more grandly startling than his heroic conception of the glow of glory triumphant over frozen toil. We have never read this poem without recurring, and that by no unworthy association, to Napoleon in his Russian campaign. Yet, perhaps, O'Hussey has conjured up a picture of more inclement desola- tion, in his rude idea of northern horrors, than could be legitimately employed by a poet of the present day, when the romance of geographical obscurity no longer permits us to imagine the Phlegrean regions of endless storm, where the snows of Haemus fell mingled with the lightnings of Etna, amid Bistonian wilds or Hyrcanian forests. ' ' — Dublin University Magazine, vol. iv. 138 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Pierceth one to the very bone. Rolls real thunder ? Or was that red livid light Only a meteor? I scarce know; but through the midnight dim The pitiless ice-wind streams. Except the hate that persecutes him, Nothing hath cruder venomy might. An awful, a tremendous night is this, meseems ! The flood-gates of the rivers of heaven, I think, have been burst wide ; Down from the overcharged clouds, like to headlong ocean's tide. Descends gray rain in roaring streams. Tho' he were even a wolf ranging the round green woods, Tho' he were even a pleasant salmon in the un- chainable sea, Tho' he were a wild mountain eagle, he could scarce bear, he. This sharp sore sleet, these howling floods. O mournful is my soul this night for Hugh Maguire ! Darkly as in a dream he strays. Before him and behind Triumphs the tyrannous anger of the wounding wind. The wounding wind that burns as fire. It is my bitter grief, it cuts me to the heart That in the country of Clan Darry this should be his fate! HIS SELECTED POEMS 139 O woe is me, where is he ? Wandering, houseless, desolate. Alone, without or guide or chart ! Medreams I see just now his face, the strawberry- bright, Uplifted to the blackened heavens, while the tempest- uous winds Blow fiercely over and round him, and the smiting sleet-shower blinds The hero of Galang to-night ! Large, large affliction unto me and mine it is That one of his majestic bearing, his fair stately form. Should thus be tortured and o'erborne; that this un- sparing storm Should wreak its wrath on head like his ! That his great hand, so oft the avenger of the op- pressed. Should this chill churlish night, perchance, be para- lyzed by frost ; While through some icicle-hung thicket, as one lorn and lost, He walks and wanders without rest. The tempest-driven torrent deluges the mead, It overflows the low banks of the rivulets and ponds ; The lawns and pasture-grounds lie locked in icy bonds. So that the cattle cannot feed. 140 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN The pale-bright margins of the streams are seen by none; Rushes and sweeps along the untamable flood on every side ; It penetrates and fills the cottagers' dwellings far and wide: Water and land are blent in one. Through some dark woods, 'mid bones of monsters, Hugh now strays. As he confronts the storm with anguished heart, but manly brow. O what a sword-wound to that tender heart of his, were now A backward glance at peaceful days ! But other thoughts are his, thoughts that can still in- spire With joy and an onward-bounding hope the bosom of Mac-Nee : Thoughts of his warriors charging like bright billows of the sea, Borne on the wind's wings, flashing fire ! And tho' frost glaze to-night the clear dew of his eyes, And white ice-gauntlets glove his noble fine fair fin- gers o'er, A warm dress is to him that lightning-garb he ever wore, The lightning of the soul, not skies. HIS SELECTED POEMS 141 Hugh marched forth to fight : I grieved to see him so depart. And lo ! to-night he wanders frozen, rain-drenched, sad, betrayed ; But the memory of the lime-\yhite mansions his right hand hath laid In ashes, warms the hero's heart ! A LAMENT FOR THE PRINCES OF TY- RONE AND TYRCONNELL, BURIED IN SAN PIETRO MONTORIO AT ROME 2 (oWEN ROE MAC AN BHAIRd) O woman of the piercing wail, (7) Who mournest o'er yon mound of clay With sigh and groan, Would God thou wert among the Gael ! Thou wouldst not then from day to day Weep thus alone. 1 A concluding stanza, generally intended as a recapitulation of the entire poem, 2 This is an elegy on the death of the princes of Tyrone and Tyrconnell, who, having fled with others from Ireland in the year 1 607, and afterwards dying in Rome, were interred on St. Peter's Hill in one grave. The poem is the production of The O'Donnell's bard, Owen Roe Mac an Bhaird, or Ward, who accompanied the &mily in their exile ; it is addressed to Nuala, The O'Donneirs sister, who was also one of the fugitives. As the cir- cumstances connected with the flight of the northern earls, which led to the subsequent confiscation of the six Ulster counties by James I. may not be immediately in the recollection of many of our readers, it may be proper briefly to state that it was caused by the discovery of a letter directed to Sir 142 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN 'Twere long before around a grave In green Tyrconnell, one could find This loneliness ; Near where Beann-Boirche's banners wave, Such grief as thine could ne'er have pined Companionless. William Ussher, Cleric of the Council, dropped in the council-chamber on the seventh of May, and which accused the northern chieftains gener- ally of a conspiracy to overthrow the government. This charge is now totally disbelieved. As an illustration of the poem, and as an interesting piece in itself of hitherto unpublished literature, we extract the account of the flight as recorded in the Annals of the Four Masters and translated by Mr. O'Donovan : "Maguire (Cuconnaught), and Donogh, son of Mahon, who was son of the Bishop O'Brien, sailed in a ship to Ireland, and put in at the harbor of Swilly. They then took with them from Ireland the earl O'Neill (Hugh, son of Ferdoragh) and the Earl O'Donnell (Rory, son of Hugh, who was son of Magnus) and many others of the nobles of the province of Ulster. These are the persons who went with O'Neill, namely : his Countess Catherina, daughter of Magennis, and her three sons, Hugh, the Baron, John, and Brian ; Art Oge, son of Cormac, who was son of the Baron ; Ferdoragh, son of Con, who was son of O' Neill ; Hugh Oge, son of Brian, who was son of Art O'Neill; and many others of his most intimate fi^ends. These were they who went with the Earl O' Donnell, namely : CafFer, his brother, with his sister Nuala ; Hugh, the Earl's child, wanting three weeks of being one year old; Rose, daughter of O'Doherty and wife of CafFer, with her son Hugh, aged two years and three months; his (Rory's) brother's son Donnell Oge, son of Donnell; Naghtan, son of Calvach, who was son of Donogh Cairbreach O'Donnell; and many others of his indmate friends. They embarked on the festival of the Holy Cross in autumn. This was a distinguished company ; and it is certain that the sea has not borne and the wind has not wafted, in modern times, a number of persons in one ship more eminent, illustrious, or nuble in point of genealogy, heroic deeds, valor, feats of arms, and brave achieve- ments than they. Would that God had but permitted them to remain in their patrimonial inheritances until the children should arrive at the age of manhood ! Woe to the heart that meditated, woe to the mind that con- ceived, woe to the council that recommended the project of this expedition, without knowing whether they should, to the end of their lives, be able to return to their native principalities or patrimonies." The Earl of Tyrone was the illustrious Hugh O'Neill, the Irish leader in the wars against Elizabeth. HIS SELECTED POEMS 143 Beside the wave in Donegal, In Antrim's glens, or fair Dromore, Or Killillee, Or where the sunny waters fall At Assaroe, near Erna shore, This could not be. On Derry's plains, in rich Drumclieff, Throughout Armagh the Great, renowned In olden years, No day could pass but woman's grief Would rain upon the burial-ground Fresh floods of tears ! O no ! — From Shannon, Boyne, and Suir, From high Dunluce's castle-walls. From Lissadill, Would flock alike both rich and poor: One wail would rise from Cruachan's halls To Tara hill; And some would come from Barrow-side, And many a maid would leave her home On Leitrim's plains. And by melodious Banna's tide. And by the Mourne and Erne, to come And swell thy strains ! Oh, horses' hoofs would trample down The mount whereon the martyr-saint ^ 1 St. Peter. This passage is not exactly a blunder, though at first it may seem one : the poet supposes the grave itself transferred to Ireland, and he naturally includes in the transference the whole of the immediate locality around the grave. 144 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Was crucified; From glen and hill, from plain and town, One loud lament, one thrilling plaint. Would echo wide. There would not soon be found, I ween, One foot of ground among those bands For museful thought. So many shriekers of the keen ^ Would cry aloud, and clap their hands, All woe-distraught ! Two princes of the line of Conn Sleep in their cells of clay beside O'Donnell Roe : Three royal youths, alas ! are gone. Who lived for Erin's weal, but died For Erin's woe. Ah, could the men of Ireland read The names these noteless burial-stones Display to view. Their wounded hearts afresh would bleed, Their tears gush forth again, their groans Resound anew ! The youths whose relics moulder here Were sprung from Hugh, high prince and lord Of Aileach's lands; Thy noble brothers, justly dear. Thy nephew, long to be deplored By Ulster's bands. 1 Caoim, the fiineral-wail, pronounced Keen. HIS SELECTED POEMS 145 Theirs were not souls wherein dull time Could domicile decay, or house Decrepitude ! They passed from earth ere manhood's prime, Ere years had power to dim their brows. Or chill their blood. And who can marvel o'er thy grief, Or who can blame thy flowing tears. That knows their source ? O'Donnell, Dunnasava's chief. Cut ofF amid his vernal years. Lies here a corse Beside his brother Cathbar, whom Tyrconnell of the Helmets mourns In deep despair ; For valor, truth, and comely bloom. For all that greatens and adorns, A peerless pair. Oh, had these twain, and he, the third. The Lord of Mourne, O'Niall's son (Their mate in death, A prince in look, in deed and word). Had these three heroes yielded on The field their breath. Oh, had they fallen on Criffan's plain. There would not be a town nor clan From shore to sea. But would with shrieks bewail the slain. Or chant aloud the exulting ranri^ Of jubilee! 1 Song. 146 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN When high the shout of battle rose, On fields where freedom's torch still burned Thro' Erin's gloom, If one, if barely one of those Were slain, all Ulster would have mourned The hero's doom ! If at Athboy, where hosts of brave Ulidian horsemen sank beneath The shock of spears. Young Hugh O'Niall had found a grave. Long must the north have wept his death, With heart-wrung tears ! If on the day of Ballachmyre The Lord of Mourne had met, thus young, A warrior's fate. In vain would such as thou desire To mourn, alone, the champion sprung From Niall the Great ! No marvel this : for all the dead, Heaped on the field, pile over pile. At Mullach-brack, Were scarce an eric^ for his head, If Death had stayed his footsteps, while On victory's track ! If on the Day of Hostages The fruit had from the parent bough Been rudely torn. In sight of Munster's bands, Mac-Nee's, 1 A compensation or fine. His SELECTED POEMS 147 Such blow the blood of Conn, I trow. Could ill have borne. If on the day of Balloch-boy, Some arm had laid, by foul surprise, The chieftain low. Even our victorious shout of joy Would soon give place to rueful cries And groans of woe ! If on the day the Saxon host Were forced to fly, a day so great For Ashanee,^ The chief had been untimely lost. Our conquering troops should moderate Their mirthful glee. There would not lack on LifFord's day. From Galway, from the glens of Boyle, From Limerick towers, A marshalled file, a long array Of mourners to bedew the soil With tears in showers ! If on the day a sterner fate Compelled his flight from Athenry, His blood had flowed. What numbers all disconsolate Would come unasked, and share with thee Affliction's load ! If Derry's crimson field had seen His life-blood ofFered up, though 'twere 1 B^Uyshannon. 148 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN On victory's shrine, A thousand cries would swell the keen^ A thousand voices of despair Would echo thine ! Oh, had the fierce Dalcassian swarm That bloody night on Fergus' banks, But slain our chief When rose his camp in wild alarm. How would the triumph of his ranks Be dashed with grief! How would the troops of Murbach mourn If on the Curlew Mountains' day Which England rued, Some Saxon hand had left them lorn. By shedding there, amid the fray. Their prince's blood ! Red would have been our warrior's eyes Had Roderick found on Sligo's field A gory grave ; No northern chief would soon arise So sage to guide, so strong to shield, So swift to save. Long would Leith-Cuinn ^ have wept if Hugh Had met the death he oft had dealt Among the foe ; But, had our Roderick fallen too, All Erin must, alas, have felt The deadly blow. 1 Leith-Cuinn, nortliern half of Ireland. Leith-Moga, southern half. HIS SELECTED POEMS 149 What do I say ? Ah, woe is me ! Already we bewail in vain Their fatal fall ! And Erin, once the great and free. Now vainly mourns her breakless chain, And iron thrall. Then, daughter of O'Donnell, dry Thine overflowing eyes, and turn Thy heart aside. For Adam's race is born to die. And sternly the sepulchral urn Mocks human pride. Look not, nor sigh, for earthly throne. Nor place thy trust in arm of clay. But on thy knees Uplift thy soul to God alone. For all things go their destined way As He decrees. Embrace the faithful crucifix. And seek the path of pain and prayer Thy Saviour trod ; Nor let thy spirit intermix With earthly hope, with worldly care. Its groans to God ! And Thou, O mighty Lord ! whose ways Are far above our feeble minds To understand. Sustain us in these doleful days. And render light the chain that binds Our fallen land ! ISO JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Look down upon our dreary state, And thro' the ages that may still Roll sadly on. Watch thou o'er hapless Erin's fate, And shield at least from darker ill The blood of Conn ! A LOVE SONG (8) (traditional) Lonely from my home I come. To cast myself upon your tomb And to weep. Lonely from my lonesome home. My lonesome house of grief and gloom, While I keep Vigil often all night long. For your dear, dear sake. Praying many a prayer, so wrong. That my heart would break ! Gladly, O my blighted flower. Sweet apple of my bosom's tree ! Would I now Stretch me in your dark death-bower Beside your corpse, and lovingly Kiss your brow. But we'll meet ere many a day Never more to part. For even now I feel the clay Gathering round my heart. HIS SELECTED POEMS 151 In my soul doth darkness dwell. And thro' its dreary winding caves Ever flows, Ever flows with moaning swell. One ebbless flood of many waves Which are woes. Death, love, has me in his lures ; But that grieves not me. So my ghost may meet with yours On yon moon-loved lea. When the neighbors near my cot Believe me sunk in slumber deep, I arise (For, oh, 'tis a weary lot, This watching aye, and wooing sleep With hot eyes); I arise, and seek your grave. And pour forth my tears. While the winds that nightly rave Whistle in mine ears. Often turns my memory back To that dear evening in the dell. When we twain Sheltered by the sloe-bush black. Sat, laughed, and talked, while thick sleet fell. And cold rain. Thanks to God ! no guilty leaven Dashed our childish mirth : You rejoice for this in Heaven, I not less on earth ! 152 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Love ! the priests feel wroth with me, To find I shrine your image still In my breast, Since you are gone eternally. And your fair frame lies in the chill Grave at rest ; But true love outlives the shroud. Knows nor check nor change. And beyond time's world of cloud Still must reign and range. Well may now your kindred mourn The threats, the wiles, the cruel arts. Long they tried On the child they left forlorn ! They broke the tenderest heart of hearts, And she died. Curse upon the love of show ! Curse on pride and greed ! They would wed you "high" — and woe! Here behold their meed. A LULLABY (oWEN ROE o'sULLIVAn) (9) O hushaby, baby ! Why weepest thou .' The diadem yet shall adorn thy brow. And the jewels thy sires had, long agone. In the regal ages of Eoghan and Conn, Shall all be thine. O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 153 My sorrow, my woe, to see thy tears, Pierce into my heart Uke spears. I'll give thee that glorious apple of gold The three fair goddesses sought of old, I'll give thee the diamond sceptre of Pan, And the rod with which Moses, that holiest man, Wrought marvels divine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! I'll give thee that courser, fleet on the plains. That courser with golden saddle and reins. Which Falvey rode, the mariner-lord. When the blood of the Danes at Cashel-na-Nord Flowed like to dark wine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! I'll give thee the dazzling sword was worn By Brian on Cluan-tarava's morn. And the bow of Murrough, whose shaft shot gleams That lightened as when the arrowy beams Of the noon-sun shine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And the hound that was wont to speed amain From Cashel's rock to Bunratty's plain. And the eagle from gloomy Aherlow, And the hawk of Skellig ; all these I'll bestow On thee and thy line : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And the golden fleece that Jason bore To Hellas' hero-peopled shore. 1 54 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And the steed that Cuchullin bought of yore With cloak and necklet and golden store And meadows and kine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And Connal's unpierceable shirt of mail, And the shield of Nish, the prince of the Gael ; These twain for thee, my babe, shall I win. With the flashing spears of Achilles and Finn, Each high as a pine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And the swords of Diarmuid and fierce Fingal, The slayers on heath and (alas !) in hall; And the charmed helmet that Oscar wore When he left Mac Treoin to welter in gore. Subdued and supine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And the jewel wherewith Queen Eofa proved The valor and faith of the hero she loved ; The magic jewel that nerved his arm To work his enemies deadly harm On plain and on brine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And the wondrous cloak renowned in song. The enchanted cloak of the dark Dubh-long, By whose powerful aid he battled amid The thick of his foes, unseen and hid. This, too, shall be thine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 155 The last, not least, of thy weapons, my son, Shall be the glittering glaive of O'Dunn, The gift from ^nghus' powerful hands. The hewer-down of the Fenian bands With edge so fine ! O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And a princess too, transcending all Who have held the hearts of men in thrall. Transcending Helen of history, Thy bride in thy palmier years shall be ; Thy bride heroine : O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! Even Hebe, who fills the nectar up For Love, in his luminous crystal cup. Shall pour thee out a wine in thy dreams. As bright as thy poet-father's themes When inspired by the Nine. O hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! And silken robes, and sweet soft cates Shall thou wear and eat, beyond thy mates. Ah, see, here comes thy mother, Moirin ! She, too, has the soul of an Irish queen : She scorns to repine ! Then hushaby, hushaby, child of mine ! My sorrow, my woe, to see thy tears. Pierce into my heart like spears. 156 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE EXPEDITION AND DEATH OF KING DATHY(io) King Dathy assembled his Druids and Sages, And thus he spake to them : " Druids and Sages ! What of King Dathy ? What is revealed in destiny's pages Of him or his ? Hath he Aught for the future to dread or to dree ? Good to rejoice in, or evil to flee ? Is he a foe of the Gall Fitted to conquer, or fated to fall ? " And Beirdra the Druid made answer as thus : (A priest of a hundred years was he.) " Dathy ! thy fate is not hidden from us ! Hear it thra' me ! Thou shalt work thine own will : Thou shalt slay, thou shalt prey. And be conqueror still ! Thee the earth shall not harm ! Thee we charter and charm From all evil and ill; Thee the laurel shall crown ! Thee the wave shall not drown ! Thee the chain shall not bind ! Thee the spear shall not find ! Thee the sword shall not slay ! Thee the shaft shall not pierce ! Thou, therefore, be fearless and fierce And sail with thy warriors away To the lands of the Gall, HIS SELECTED POEMS 157 There to slaughter and sway, And be victor o'er all ! " So Dathy he sailed away, away Over the deep resounding sea ; Sailed with his hosts in armor gray Over the deep resounding sea. Many a night and many a day ; And many an islet conquered he. He and his hosts in armor gray. And the billow drowned him not. And the fetter bound him not. And the blue spear found him not. And the red sword slew him not. And the swift shaft knew him not. And the foe o'erthrew him not. Till one bright morn, at the base Of the Alps, in rich Ausonia's regions. His men stood marshalled face to face With the mighty Roman legions. Noble foes ! Christian and heathen stood there among those. Resolute all to overcome. Or die for the eagles of ancient Rome ! When, behold ! from a temple anear Came forth an aged priest-like man Of a countenance meek and clear ; Who, turning to Eire's Ceann,i Spake him as thus : " King Dathy, hear ! 1 Ccann, head, king. 158 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Thee would I warn ! Retreat, retire : repent in time The invader's crime. Or better for thee thou hadst never been born ! " But Dathy replied : " False Nazarene ! Dost thou, then, menace Dathy, thou ? And dreamest thou that he will bow To one unknown, to one so mean. So powerless as a priest must be ? He scorns aliice thy threats and thee ! On, on, my men, to victory ! " And, with loud shouts for Eire's King, The Irish rush to meet the foe. And falchions clash and bucklers ring, — When, lo ! Lo ! a mighty earthquake shock ! And the cleft plains reel and rock ; Clouds of darkness pall the skies ; Thunder crashes. Lightning flashes. And in an instant Dathy lies On the earth, a mass of blackened ashes ! Then, mournfully and dolefully. The Irish warriors sailed away Over the deep resounding sea. Till, wearily and mournfully, They anchored in Eblana's Bay. Thus the Seanachies ^ and Sages Tell this tale of long-gone ages. 1 Seanachies, historians. HIS SELECTED POEMS 159 THE WOMAN OF THREE COWSi (traditional) O woman of three cows, agragh ! don't let your tongue thus rattle : O don't be saucy, don't be stiff, because you may have cattle. I've seen (and here's my hand to you, I only say what's true !) A many a one with twice your stock not half so proud as you. Good luck to you, don't scorn the poor, and don't be their despiser, For worldly wealth soon melts away, and cheats the very miser. And death soon strips the proudest wreath from haughty human brows : Then don't be stiff, and don't be proud, good woman of three cows ! See where Momonia's heroes lie, proud Owen More's descendants ! 'Tis they that won the glorious name and had the grand attendants : 1 This ballad, which is of homdy cast, was intended as a rebuke to the saucy pride of a woman in humble life who assumed airs of consequence, bang the owner of three cows. Its author's name is unknown, but its age can be determined from the language, as belonging to the early part of the seventeenth century. That it was formerly very popular in Munster may be concluded from the fact that the phrase "Easy, O woman of three cows ! " has become a saying in that province on any occasion upon which it is desir- able to lower the pretensions of a boastful or consequential person. i6o JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN If they were forced to bow to fate, as every mortal bows, Can you be proud, can you be stiff, my woman of three cows ? The brave sons of the Lord of Clare, they left the land to mourning, Mavrone ! ^ for they were banished, with no hope of their returning: Who knows in what abodes of want those youths were driven to house ? Yet you can give yourself these airs, O woman of three cows ! O think of Donnell of the Ships, the chief whom nothing daunted ! See how he fell in distant Spain, unchronicled, unchanted. He sleeps, the great O'Sullivan, whom thunder cannot rouse : Then ask yourself, should you be proud, good woman of three cows ! O'Ruark, Maguire, those souls of fire whose names are shrined in story. Think how their high achievements once made Erin's greatest glory ; Yet now their bones lie mouldering under weeds and cypress boughs, And so, for all your pride, will yours, O woman of three cows ! 1 My grief. HIS SELECTED POEMS i6i The O'Carrolls, also, famed when fame was only for the boldest. Rest in forgotten sepulchres with Erin's best and oldest ; Yet who so great as they of yore in battle and carouse ? Just think of that, and hide your head, good woman of three cows. Your neighbor's poor, and you, it seems, are big with vain ideas, Because, inagh,^ you've got three cows ; one more, I see, than she has ! That tongue of yours wags more, at times, than charity allows : But if you're strong, be merciful, great woman of three cows ! Avran Now there you go : you still, of course, keep up your scornful bearing; And I'm too poor to hinder you. But, by the cloak I'm wearing. If I had but four cows myself, even though you were my spouse, I'd thwack you well to cure your pride, my woman of three cows ! 1 FoRooth. 1 62 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN A FAREWELL TO PATRICK SARSFIELD, LORD LUCAN(ii) (traditional) Farewell, O Patrick Sarsfield : may luck be on your path ! Your camp is broken up ; your work is marred for years. But you go to kindle into flame the King of France's wrath, Though you leave sick Eire in tears. {Och, ochone /) May the white sun and moon rain glory on your head. All hero as you are, and holy man of God ! To you the Saxons owe a many an hour of dread In the land you have often trod. ( Och^ ochone /) The Son of Mary guard you, and bless you to the end ! 'Tis altered is the time when your legions were astir. When at CuUen you were hailed as a conqueror and friend. And you crossed Narrow-water, near Birr. ( Och, ochone /) I'll journey to the north, over mount, moor, and wave : 'Twas there I first beheld, drawn up in file and line. HIS SELECTED POEMS 163 The brilliant Irish hosts ; they were bravest of the brave, But, alas, they scorned to combine. ( Och^ ochone /) I saw the royal Boyne, when his billows flashed with blood ; I fought at Graine Og, where a thousand horsemen fell; On the dark empurpled plain of Aughrim, too, I stood. On the plain by Tuberdonny's well. ( Och^ ochone /) To the heroes of Limerick, the city of the fights. Be my best blessing borne on the wings of the air ! We had card-playing there o'er our camp-fires at night. And the Word of Life too, and prayer. ( Och, ochone /) But for you, Londonderry, may plague smite and slay Your people, may ruin desolate you stone by stone ! Thro' you there's many a gallant youth lies cofEnless to-day. With the winds for mourners alone. ( Och^ ochone ! ) I clomb the high hill on a fair summer noon, And saw the Saxons muster, clad in armor blinding- bright : 1 64 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Oh, rage withheld my hand, or gunsman and dragoon Should have supped with Satan that night ! ( Och^ ochone /) How many a noble soldier, how many a cavalier Careered along this road, seven fleeting weeks ago. With silver-hilted sword, with matchlock and with spear. Who now, mavrone ! lieth low. ( Ochy ochone /) All hail to thee, Ben Edir ! i but ah, on thy brow I see a limping soldier, who battled and who bled Last year in the cause of the Stuart, though now The worthy is begging his bread. ( Ochy ochone /) And Diarmuid, O Diarmuid ! he perished in the strife ; His head it was spiked upon a halbert high ; His colors they were trampled ; he had no chance of life If the Lord God Himself stood by ! ( Och, ochone /) But most, O my woe ! I lament and lament For the ten valiant heroes who dwell nigh the Nore, And my three blessed brothers ; they left me, and they went To the wars, and returned no more. ( Och, ochone /) 1 Ben Edir : the beautiful Hill of Howth, near Dublin. HIS SELECTED POEMS 165 On the bridge of the Boyne was our first overthrow ; By Slaney the next, for we battled without rest ; The third was at Aughrim. O Eire, thy woe Is a sword in my bleeding breast. ( Och^ ochone /) Oh, the roof above our heads, it was barbarously fired. While the black Orange guns blazed and bellowed around ! And as volley followed volley, Colonel MitcheP in- quired. Whither Lucan still stood his ground ? ( Och, ochone /) But O'Kelly still remains, to defy, and to toil. He has memories that hell won't permit him to forget. And a sword that will make the blue blood flow like oil Upon many an Aughrim yet ! (OfA, ochone!) And I never shall believe that my fatherland can fall. With the Burkes,^ and the Decies, and the son of royal James, And Talbot the captain, and Sarsfield above all, The beloved of damsels and dames. ( Och^ ochone /) 1 Colonel Mitchelbume, the Governor of Derry, in the Williamite ser- vice. 2 The five of the De Burgo or Burke family who were loyal to James II. : Lords Clanrickard, Brittas, Bophin, Castleconnell, and Galway. "The son of royal James" is the famous James Fitz James, Duke of Berwick, subsequently Marshal, Duke, and Peer of France. 1 66 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE RUINS OF DONEGAL CASTLE (12) (traditional) O mournful, O forsaken pile What desolation dost thou dree ! How tarnished is the beauty that was thine erewhile, Thou mansion of chaste melody. Demolished lie thy towers and halls ; A dark, unsightly earthen mound Defaces the pure whiteness of thy shining walls. And solitude doth gird thee round. Fair fort, thine hour has come at length. Thine older glory has gone by. Lo, far beyond thy noble battlements of strength Thy corner-stones all scattered lie. Where now, O rival of the gold Emania, be thy wine-cups all ? Alas, for these thou now hast nothing but the cold. Cold stream that from the heavens doth fall ! Thy clay-choked gateways none can trace Thou fortress of the once bright doors ; The limestones of thy summit now bestrew thy base, Bestrew the outside of thy floors ; Above thy shattered window-sills The music that to-day breaks forth Is but the music of the wild winds of the hills, The wild winds of the stormy north. HIS SELECTED POEMS 167 What spell o'er came thee, mighty fort, What fatal fit of slumber strange, O palace of the wine, O many-gated court ! That thou shouldst undergo this change ? Thou wert, O bright-walled, beaming one Thou cradle of high deeds and bold ! The Tara of assemblies to the sons of Conn, Clan Connell's council-hall of old ; Thou wert a new Emania, thou, A northern Cruachan in thy might, A dome like that which stands by Boyne's broad water now. Thou Erin's Rome of all delight ! In thee were Ulster's tributes stored. And lavished like the flowers in May. And into thee were Connaught's thousand treasures poured, Deserted tho' thou art to-day ! How often from thy turrets high. Thy purple turrets, have we seen Long lines of glittering ships, when summer-time drew nigh, With masts and sails of snow-white sheen ! How often seen when gazing round From thy tall towers, the hunting trains The blood-enlivening chase, the horseman and the hound, Thou fastness of a hundred plains ! 1 68 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN How often to thy banquet bright We have seen the strong-armed Gaels repair, And when the feast was over, once again unite For battle, in thy basscourt fair ! Alas for thee, thou fort forlorn ; Alas for thy low, lost estate : It is my woe of woes, this melancholy morn To see thee left thus desolate. O there hath come of Connell's race A many and many a gallant chief Who, if he saw thee now, thou of the once glad face. Could not dissemble his deep grief. Could Manus of the lofty soul Behold thee as this day thou art. Thou of the regal towers ! what bitter, bitter dole What agony would rend his heart ! Could Hugh MacHugh's imaginings Portray for him the rueful plight. What anguish, O thou palace of the northern kings ! Were his, thro' many a sleepless night. Could even the mighty prince whose choice 'Twas to o'erthrow thee, could Hugh Roe But view thee now, methinks, he would not much rejoice That he had laid thy turrets low. HIS SELECTED POEMS 169 Oh, who could dream that one like him, One sprung of such a line as his, Thou of the embellished walls ! would be the man to dim Thy glories by a deed like this ? From Hugh O'Donnell, thine own brave And far-famed sovereign, came the blow ; By him, thou lonesome castle o'er the Esky's wave ! By him was wrought thine overthrow. Yet not because he wished thee ill. Left he thee thus bereaven and void : The prince of the victorious tribe of Dalach still Loved thee, yea, thee whom he destroyed. He brought upon thee all this woe, Thou of the fair-proportioned walls ! Lest thou shouldst ever yield a shelter to the foe, Shouldst house the black ferocious Galls ; Shouldst yet become, in saddest truth, A Dun-na-Gall^ the stranger's own : For this cause only, stronghold of the Gaelic youth ! Lie thy majestic towers o'erthrown. It is a drear, a dismal sight, This of thy ruin and decay. Now that our kings, and bards, and men of mark of might. Are nameless exiles far away. 1 Fort of the Foreigner. I70 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Yet better thou shouldst fall, meseems, By thine own king of many thrones, Than that the truculent Galls should rear around thy streams Dry mounds, and circles of great stones. As doth in many a desperate case The surgeon by the malady. So hath, O shield and bulwark of great Coffey's race ! Thy royal master done by thee. The surgeon, if he be but wise, Examines till he learns and sees Where lies the fountain of his patient's health, where lies The germ and root of his disease ; Then cuts away the gangrened part. That so the sounder may be freed Ere the disease hath power to reach the sufferer's heart, And so bring death without remead. Now thou hast held the patient's place And thy disease hath been the foe ; So he, thy surgeon, O proud house of Dalach's race ! Who should he be if not Hugh Roe ? But he, thus fated to destroy Thy shining walls, will yet restore And raise thee up anew in beauty and in joy. So that thou shalt not sorrow more. HIS SELECTED POEMS 171 By God's help, he who wrought thy fall Will reinstate thee yet in pride ; Thy variegated halls shall be rebuilded all. Thy lofty courts, thy chambers wide. Yes, thou shall live again, and see Thy youth renewed ; thou shalt outshine Thy former self by far, and Hugh shall reign in thee, The Tyrconnellian's king, and thine. SANCTA OPERA DOMINI. (jOHN murphy) Holy are the works of Mary's blessed Son, Holy are His mercies unto every one. Holy is the sun that Ughteth heaven ; Holy is the weather, morn and even ; Holy is the wind that woos the flowers ; Holy are the gentle April showers; Holy is the summer's cheering glow ; Holy is the rain God sends below. Holy are all in His abodes of love. Holy is every Heaven of His above, Holy is the sun and every star : Holy is He who sends their light afar. Holy are the winds that fall and rise ; Holy are the waters and the skies ; Holy is all outspread beneath His eye. Holy are the birds He formed to fly ; Holy are the hazel woodlands green ; Holy are the vineyards in their sheen : 172 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Holy are the fruits they bear and bring, Holy is the earth wherefrom they spring. Holy is the ever-circling Heaven ; Holy is every thought to Jesus given ; Holy is all that He hath made, and sees, Holy are all His ways and His decrees. Holy are the ocean strands and floods ; ' Holy are the dark umbrageous woods ; Holy are the herbs and plants and flowers ; Holy is all creation with her powers ; Holy are the earth's four-corner bosoms ; Holy are the mossy rocks and blossoms. Holy is fire that giveth light and cheer; Holy is all that I have written here. Holy is the sea's voice, calm or hoarse, Holy are the streamlets in their course ; Holy are the healthy moorlands bare. Holy are the fishes, and the air. Holy are the Counsel and the Will, Holy are God's works, and most pure from ill. Holy are His laws. His faith and troth ; Holy are His wrath and patience both. Holy is Heaven with its nine Orders bright. Holy is Jesus, its great Lord and light : Holy is Heaven, above all holiness. Holy is the King the angels bless. Holy are the saints in Heaven that be ; Holy is the adorable Trinity : Holy are all high Heaven's works and words, Holy is love, the saints' love and the Lords' ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 173 KATHALEEN NY-HOULAHAN 1 (13) (traditional) Long they pine in weary woe, the nobles of our land, Long they wander to and fro, proscribed, alas ! and banned ; Feastless, houseless, altarless, they bear the exile's brand ; But their hope is in the coming-to of Kathaleen Ny- Houlahan ! Think her not a ghastly hag too hideous to be seen, Call her not unseemly names, our matchless Kathaleen ! Young she is, and fair she is, and would be crowned a queen. Were the king's son at home here with Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan ! Sweet and mild would look her face, O none so sweet and mild, Could she crush the foes by whom her beauty is reviled ; Woollen plaids would grace herself, and robes of silk her child. If the king's son were living here with Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan ! Sore disgrace it is to see the arbitress of thrones Vassal to a Saxoneen of cold and sapless bones ! ^jlnglice, Catherine O'Holohan, a name by which Ireland was alle- gorically known. 174 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Bitter anguish wrings our souls j with heavy sighs and groans We wait the young dehverer of Kathaleen Ny- Houlahan ! Let us pray to Him who holds hfe's issues in His hands, Him who formed the mighty globe, with all its thousand lands ; Girdling them with seas and mountains, rivers deep, and strands. To cast a look of pity upon Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan ! He who over sands and waves led Israel along. He who fed with heavenly bread that chosen tribe and throng, He who stood by Moses when his foes were fierce and strong, — May He show forth His might in saving Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan ! WELCOME TO THE PRINCE (wILLIAM HEFFERNAn) (I4) Lift up the drooping head, Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ! i Her blood yet boundeth red Through the myriad veins of Erin. No, no, she is not dead Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ! 1 Dark Michael M'Gilla Kerin, Prince of Ossory. HIS SELECTED POEMS 175 Lo ! she redeems The lost years of bygone ages : New glory beams Henceforth on her history's pages ! Her long penitential night of sorrow Yields at length before the reddening morrow ! You heard the thunder-shout, Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ! Saw the lightning streaming out O'er the purple hills of Erin ! And bide you yet in doubt, Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ? O doubt no more ! Through Ulidia's voiceful valleys. On Shannon's shore. Freedom's burning spirit rallies. Earth and Heaven unite in sign and omen -^ Bodeful of the downfall of our foemen. Thurot commands the North, Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ! Louth sends her heroes forth To hew down the foes of Erin ! Swords gleam in field and gorth^ Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ! Up, up, my friend ! There's a glorious goal before us ; 1 This is an allusion to that well-known atmospherical phenomenon of the ** cloud armies," which is said to have been so common about this period in Scotland. 2 Gortb literally means Garden. 176 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Here will we blend Speech and soul in this grand chorus : " By the Heaven that gives us one more token, We will die, or see our shackles broken ! " Charles leaves the Grampian Hills, Meehal Dubh Mac-GioUa Kierin ! Charles, whose appeal yet thrills Like a clarion-blast, through Erin. Charles, he whose image fills Thy soul, too, Mac-Giolla Kierin ! Ten thousand strong. His clans move in brilliant order. Sure that ere long He will march them o'er the border, While the dark-haired daughters of the Highlands Crown with wreaths the Monarch of three islands. Fill, then, the ale-cup high, Meehal Dubh Mac-Giolla Kierin ! Fill ! the bright hour is nigh That shall give her own to Erin. Those who so sadly sigh. Even as you, Mac-Giolla Kierin, Henceforth shall sing. Hark ! O'er heathery hill and dell come Shouts for the King ! Welcome, our deliverer, welcome ! Thousands this glad night, ere turning bedward, Will with us drink " Victory to Charles Edward ! " HIS SELECTED POEMS 177 i THE SONG OF GLADNESS (WILLIAM HErrERNAN) It was on a balmy evening, as June was departing fast, That alone, and meditating in grief on the times a-past, I wandered through the gloomsome shades Of bosky Aherlow, A wilderness of glens and glades. When suddenly, a thrilling strain of song Broke forth upon the air in one incessant flow. Sweeter it seemed to me, (both voice and word,) Than harmony of the harp, or carol of the bird, For it foretold fair Freedom's triumph, and the doom of Wrong. The celestial hymns and anthems, that far o'er the sounding sea Come to Erin from the temples of bright-bosomed Italy; The music which from hill and rath The playful fairy race Pour on the wandering warrior's path. Bewildering him with wonder and delight. Or the cuckoo's full note from some green sunless place. Some sunken thicket in a stilly wood. Had less than that rich melody made mine Irish blood Bound in its veins for ecstasy, or given my soul new might ! 178 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And while so I stood and listened, behold, thousand swarms of bees. All arrayed in gay gold armor, shone red through the dusky trees ! I felt a boding in my soul, A truthful boding too. That Erin's days of gloom and dole Will soon be but remembered as a dream, And the olden glory show eclipsed by the new. Where will the Usurper ^ then be ? Banished far ! Where his vile hireling henchmen ? Slaughtered all in war ! For blood shall rill down every hill, and blacken every stream. I am Heffernan of Shronehill : my land mourns in thraldom long ; And I see but one sad sight here, the weak trampled by the strong. Yet if to-morrow, underneath A burial stone I lay. Clasped in the skeleton arms of death. And if a pilgrim wind again should waft Over my noteless grave the song I heard to-day, I would spring up revivified, reborn, A living soul again, as on my birthday morn. Ay ! even though coffined, over-earthed, tombed-in, and epitaphed ! 1 George I. HIS SELECTED POEMS 179 THE DREAM OF JOHN MAC DONNELL (jOHN MAC DONNELL, USDALLY CALLED MAC DONNELL CLAEAGh) I lay in unrest. Old thoughts of pain, That I struggled in vain to smother, Like midnight spectres haunted my brain ; Dark fantasies chased each other; When, lo ! a figure — who might it be ? A tall fair figure stood near me ! Who might it be ? An unreal Banshee, Or an angel sent to cheer me ? Though years have rolled since then, yet now My memory thrillingly lingers On her awful charm, her waxen brow, Her pale translucent fingers. Her eyes that mirrored a wonder-world. Her mien of unearthly mildness. And her waving raven tresses that curled To the ground in beautiful wildness. " Whence comest thou, spirit ? " I asked, methought, " Thou art not one of the banished ? " Alas, for me, she answered nought. But rose aloft and evanished ; And a radiance, like to a glory, beamed In the light she left behind her. Long time I wept, and at last, medreamed, I left my shieling to find her. (15) i8o JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And first I turned to the thunderous north, To Gruagach's mansion kingly; Untouching the earth, I then sped forth To Inver-lough, and the shingly And shining strand of the fishful Erne, And thence to Cruachan the golden, Of whose resplendent palace ye learn So many a marvel olden. I saw the Mourna's billows flow ; I passed the walls of Shenady, And stood in the hero-thronged Ardroe, Embosked amid greenwoods shady ; And visited that proud pile that stands Above the Boyne's broad waters, Where ^nghus dwells with his warrior-bands And the fairest of Ulster's daughters. To the halls of Mac Lir, to Creevroe's height, To Tara, the glory of Erin, To the fairy palace that glances bright On the peak of the blue Cnocfeerin, I vainly hied. I went west and east ; I travelled seaward and shoreward ; But thus was I greeted at field and at feast : " Thy way lies onward and forward ! " At last I reached, I wist not how, The royal towers of Ival, Which under the clift"'s gigantic brow Still rise without a rival. HIS SELECTED POEMS And here were Thomond's chieftains all With armor and swords and lances, And here sweet music filled the hall, And damsels charmed with dances. And here, at length, on a silver throne Half-seated, half-reclining. With forehead white as the marble stone, And garments starrily shining. And features beyond a poet's pen, The sweetest, saddest features. Appeared before me once again The fairest of living creatures ! " Draw near, O mortal ! " she said with a sigh, " And hear my mournful story. The guardian spirit of Erin am I, But dimmed is mine ancient glory. My priests are banished, my warriors wear No longer victory's garland, And my child, my son, my beloved heir. Is an exile in a far land." I heard no more, I saw no more ; The bonds of slumber were broken : And palace and hero, and river and shore Had vanished and left no token. Dissolved was the spell that had bound my will And my fancy thus, for a season. But a sorrow therefore hangs over me still Despite the teachings of reason. 1 82 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE SORROWS OF INNISFAIL (geoffkiy Keating) (i6) Through the long drear night I lie awake, for the sorrows of Innisfail. My bleeding heart is ready to break ; I cannot but weep and wail. O shame and grief and wonder ! her sons crouch lowly under The footstool of the paltriest foe That ever yet hath wrought them woe. How long, O Mother of light and song, how long will they fail to see That men must be bold, no less than strong, if they truly will to be free ? They sit but in silent sadness, while wrongs that should rouse them to madness. Wrongs that might wake the very dead. Are piled on thy devoted head ! Thy castles, thy towers, thy palaces proud, thy stately mansions all, Are held by the knaves who crossed the waves to lord it in Brian's hall. Britannia, alas ! is portress in Cobhthach's golden fortress. And Ulster's and Momonia's lands Are in the robber stranger's hands. HIS SELECTED POEMS 183 The tribe of Eoghan is worn with woe ; the O'Don- nell reigns no more ; O'Niall's remains lie mouldering low, on Italy's far- off shore ; And the youths of the pleasant valley are scattered, and cannot rally, While foreign despotism unfurls A flag 'mid hordes of base-born churls. The chieftains of Naas were valorous lords, but their valor was crushed by craft : They fell beneath envy's butcherly dagger, and cal- umny's poisoned shaft. A few of their mighty legions yet languish in alien regions. But most of them, the frank, the free, Were slain through Saxon perfidy. Ah, lived the princes of Ainy's plains, and the heroes of green Domgole, And the chiefs of the Mauige, we still might hope to baffle our doom and dole. Well then might the dastards shiver who herd by the blue Bride river ! But ah, those great and glorious men Shall draw no glaive on earth again ! All-powerful God ! look down on the tribes who mourn throughout the land. And raise them some deliverer up, of a strong and smiting hand. i84 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Oh ! suffer them not to perish, the race Thou wert wont to cherish. But soon avenge their fathers' graves, And burst the bonds that keep them slaves ! LEATHER AWAY WITH THE WATTLE, O! (17) (thomas cotter) Last night, while stars did glisten By a hillside near the cove, I sat awhile to listen The sweet bird's pleasant lays of love. A damsel tall of stature With golden tresses long and low. Which, (loveliest sight in Nature !) Down to the bright green grass did flow, And breast as fair as snow in air. Without compare for beauteous show. Stood near, and sang me sweetly : " Come, Leather Away with the Wattle, O ! ' Her eyebrows dark and slender Were each bended like a bow ; Her eyes beamed love as tender As only poets feel and know ; Her face where rose and lily Were both portrayed in brightest glow. Her mien so mild and stilly. All made my full heart overflow ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 185 A tale she told of that Prince bold Whose crown of gold the Gael doth hold. I hearkened, all-delighted, To " Leather Away with the Wattle, O ! " I asked this lovely creature Was she Helen famed of yore, (So like she seemed in feature !) Whose name will live forevermore; Or Dierdre, meekest, fairest. Whom Uisneach's sons wrought direful woe ; Or Cearnaid, richest, rarest. Who first made mills on water go ; Or Meadhbh the young, of ringlets long ? So sweet her song along did flow. Her song so rich and charming Of " Leather Away with the Wattle, O ! " And thus in tones unbroken. While sweet music filled her eye, In accents blandly spoken The damsel warbled this reply : "Albeit I know and blame not Your marvellous poetic lore. You kfiow mine ancient name not, Tho' once renowned from shore to shore ; I am Innis famed, of Heroes named, Forsaken, lost in pain and woe, But waiting for a chorus To ' Leather Away with the Wattle, O ! ' They died in war, for ages. The brave sons of Art and Eoghan, 1 86 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Mute are the bards and sages. And ah, the priests are sad and lone. But Charles, despising danger. Shall soon ascend green Eire's throne, And drive the Saxon stranger Afar from hence to seek his own. Then, full of soul and freed from dole. Without control the wine shall flow, And we will sing in chorus : ' Come, Leather Away with the Wattle, O ! ' " LAMENT FOR BANBA^ (egan o'rahilly) O my land, O my love ! What a woe, and how deep. Is thy death to my long-mourning soul ! God alone, God above. Can awake thee from sleep. Can release thee from bondage and dole ! (Alas, alas, and alas. For the once proud people of Banba !) As a tree in its prime. Which the axe layeth low. Didst thou fall, O unfortunate land ! Not by time, nor thy crime. Came the shock and the blow : They were given by a false felon hand ! 1 Banba [Bani/a) was one of the most ancient names given by the Bardi to Ireland. HIS SELECTED POEMS 187 (Alas, alas, and alas. For the once proud people of Banba !) O my grief of all griefs Is to see how thy throne Is usurped, whilst thyself art in thrall ! Other lands have their chiefs, Have their kings ; thou alone Art a wife, yet a widow withal. (Alas, alas, and alas. For the once proud people of Banba !) The high house of O'Niall Is gone down to the dust. The O'Brien is clanless and banned; And the steel, the red steel. May no more be the trust Of the faithful and brave in the land. (Alas, alas, and alas. For the once proud people of Banba !) True, alas ! wrong and wrath Were of old all too rife. Deeds were done which no good man admires. And perchance Heaven hath Chastened us for the strife And the blood-shedding ways of our sires ! (Alas, alas, and alas. For the once proud people of Banba !) But, no more ! This our doom. While our hearts yet are warm, 1 88 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Let us not oveK-weakly deplore ; For the hour soon may loom When the Lord's mighty hand Shall be raised for our rescue once more ! And our grief shall be turned into joy For the still proud people of Banba ! THE DAWNING OF THE DAYi (o'doran) 'Twas a balmy summer morning. Warm and early. Such as only June bestows ; Everywhere, the earth adorning. Dews lay pearly In the lily-bell and rose. Up from each green leafy bosk and hollow Rose the blackbird's pleasant lay. And the soft cuckoo was sure to follow. 'Twas the dawning of the day ! Through the perfumed air the golden Bees flew round me; Bright fish dazzled from the sea; Till medreamt some faery olden 1 The following song, translated from the Irish of O' Doran, refers to a singular atmospherical phenomenon said to be sometimes observed at Black- rock, near Dundalk, at daybreak, by the fishermen of that locality. Many similar narratives are to be met with in the poetry of almost all countries j but O' Doran has endeavored to give the legend a political coloring, of which, I apprehend, readers in general will hardly deem it susceptible. HIS SELECTED POEMS 189 World-spell bound me In a trance of witchery ! Steeds pranced round anon with stateliest housings, Bearing riders pranked in rich array. Like flushed revellers after wine-carousings : 'Twas the dawning of the day ! Then a strain of song was chanted. And the lightly Floating sea-nymphs drew anear. Then again the shore seemed haunted By hosts brightly Clad, and wielding shield and spear ! Then came battle-shouts, an onward rushing. Swords, and chariots, and a phantom fray. Then all vanished. The warm skies were blushing In the dawning of the day ! Cities girt with glorious gardens, (Whose immortal Habitants, in robes of light. Stood, methought, as angel-wardens Nigh each portal,) Now arose to daze my sight. Eden spread around, revived and blooming; When . . . lo ! as I gazed, all passed away. I saw but black rocks and billows looming In the dim chill dawn of day. I90 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN DIRGE FOR THE O'SULLIVAN BEARE(i8) In Ivera there is darkness, (Darkness, darkness;) In Ivera there is darkness. And the laughing dancer's tread, And joyous music, and the voice of song Are heard no more; the day it weareth long, For O'SuUivan lies dead. Dead in stilFest starkness, (StifFest starkness !) O the false, false traitor Scully, (Scully, Scully!) O the false, false traitor Scully ! He who should have helped his chief. He basely sold him, basely sold the good Great man to whom he owed his life and blood. Perfidy beyond belief! God requite him fully, (Well and fully.) O may all earth's blackest evils, (Evils, evils,) O may all earth's blackest evils Haunt him on life's briary path ! May sickness waste him to and thro' the bone ! And when he stands before God's judgment throne, May that just God, in His wrath. Give him up to devils, (Up to devils!) HIS SELECTED POEMS igi Never will we, O no, never, (Never, never,) Never will we, O no, never Pardon him who thus could sell His generous chief to death and foul disgrace ! May heaven's fair light grow black upon his face ! May the burning marl of hell Be his bed for ever, (And for ever!) Didst thou fall by sword and slaughter, (Slaughter, slaughter.) Had they slain thee in fair slaughter, Tho' thy corpse were one red wound, I would not weep : but ah, the woe to kill, To rack, to butcher thee; and, ghastlier still. Drag thee, like a fish harpooned. Thro' the blood-streaked water, (Thro' the water!) And thy headless trunk was buried, (Buried, buried,) And thy headless trunk was buried Distant from thy fathers' graves; In no green spot of holy 'Christian ground They laid thee, 'neath no consecrated mound. To a pit, by ruffian slaves, Wert thou darkly hurried, (Darkly hurried.) And they spiked thy head so gory, (Gory, gory,) 192 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Yes ! they spiked thy head so gory. As thine were a felon's end, High, high above the jail. Tempest and rain Alone shall wave those long black locks again, Lightning only ever lend Those dimmed eyes a glory, (Lend a glory.) There is keening, there is weeping, (Weeping, weeping.) There is keening, there is weeping Thro' the once glad haunts of song ; Ivera's broken heart is bleeding now ; Funeral gloom has darkened every brow. And the chill day waxeth long, For our chief lies sleeping, (Ever sleeping.) O thou ocean of blue billows ! (Billows, billows,) O thou ocean of blue billows ! From Cork harbor to Bearhaven A curse this blessed night lies on thy flood. For with its wave is blent the pure heart-blood Of that chief whose head, whose raven Locks, the storm-wind pillows. (Storm-wind pillows !) Translations, Chiefly from the German THE MAID OF ORLEANS (schiller) At thee the mocker^ sneers in cold derision, Thro' thee he seeks to desecrate and dim Glory for which he hath no soul nor vision, For God and angel are but sounds with him. He makes the jewels of the heart his booty, Ajid scoffs at man's belief and woman's beauty. Yet thou, a lowly shepherdess, descended Not from a kingly but a godly race. Art crowned by Poesy : amid the splendid Of Heaven's high stars she builds thy dwelling- place. Garlands thy temples with a wreath of glory. And swathes thy memory in eternal story. The base of this weak world exult at seeing The fair defaced, the lofty in the dust ; Yet grieve not : there are godlike hearts in being Which worship still the beautiful and just. Let Momus and his mummers please the crowd ! Of nobleness alone a noble mind is proud. 1 Voltaire. 195 196 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE FISHERMAN (gozthe) The waters rush, the waters roll ; a fisherman sits angling by. He gazes o'er their glancing floor with sleepy brow and listless eye ; And while he looks and while he lolls, the flood is moved as by a storm And slowly from its heaving depth ascends a humid woman's form. She sings, she speaks : " Why lure, why wile, with human craft, with human snare My little brood, my helpless brood, to perish in this fiery air ? Ah, couldst thou guess the dreamy bliss we feel below the purple sea. Thou wouldst forsake the earth and all, to dwell beneath with them and me. The moon, the sun, their travel done, come down to sleep in ocean caves ; They reascend their glorious thrones with doubled beauty from the waves. Ah, sure the blue ethereal dew, the shining heaven these waters show. Nay, e'en thine own reflected face, must draw thee, win thee, down below." HIS SELECTED POEMS 197 The waters rush^ the waters roll ; about his naked feet they move. An aching longing fills his soul, as when we look on her we love. She sings to him, she speaks to him : alas, he feels that all is o'er; She drags him down ; his senses swim : the fisher- man is seen no more. MIGNON'S SONG (goethe) O dost thou know the clime where citron fruits are blooming fair ? The gold-hued orange burns amid the dusky greenery there ; From skies of speckless blue are wafted airlets warm and soft; There sleepy myrtles grow ; there trees of laurel stand aloft. That bright land dost thou know ? Thither with thee, my love, I long to go. And dost thou know the pile, with roof on colon- nades reclining ? The broad saloon is bright, the chambers there are darkly shining; And alabaster forms look down upon me pityingly : " Alas, unhappy child, what ill the world has done to thee ! " 198 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN That dwelling dost thou know ? Thither, protector mine, with thee I'll go. Knowest thou the mountain's brow ? Its pathway clouds and shadows cover : Amid the darkling mist, the mule pursues his blind way over. The dragon and his brood lurk in a thousand cavern- hollows ; The rent rock topples down ; the headlong sweep of water follows. That mountain dost thou know ? Thither our way lies. Father ! let us go. NATURE MORE THAN SCIENCE (ruckert) I have a thousand thousand lays, Compact of myriad myriad words. And so can sing a million ways, Can play at pleasure on the chords Of tuned harp or heart ; Yet is there one sweet song For which in vain I pine and long ; I cannot reach that song, with all my minstrel-art ! A shepherd sits within a dell O'ercanopied from rain and heat : A shallow but pellucid well Doth ever bubble at his feet. HIS SELECTED POEMS 199 His pipe is but a leaf, Yet there, above that stream, He plays and plays, as in a dream. One air, that steals away the senses like a thief. A simple air, it seems in truth. And who begins will end it soon ; Yet, when that hidden shepherd youth So pours it in the ear of noon, Tears flow from those anear. All songs of yours and mine Condensed in one, were less divine Than that sweet air to sing, that sweet, sweet air to hear! 'Twas yesternoon he played it last : The hummings of a hundred bees Were in mine ears ; yet, as I passed, I heard him through the myrtle trees. Stretched all along he lay Mid foliage half-decayed ; His lambs were feeding while he played ; And sleepily wore on the stilly summer-day. (19) THE DYING FLOWER (ruckert) " Drop not, poor flower ! There's hope for thee. The spring again will breathe and burn. And glory robe the kingly tree Whose life is in the sun's return ; 260 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And once again its buds will chime Their peal of joy from viewless bells, Though all the long dark winter-time They mourned within their dreary cells." " Alas, no kingly tree am I, No marvel of a thousand years : I cannot dream a winter by. And wake with song when spring appears ! At best, my life is kin to death ; My little all of being flows From summer's kiss, from summer's breath, And sleeps in summer's grave of snows." " Yet, grieve not ! Summer may depart, And beauty seek a brighter home : But thou that bearest in thy heart The germ of many a life to come, Mayst lightly reck of autumn's storms ; Whate'er thy individual doom Thine essence, blent with other forms. Will still shine out in radiant bloom." " Yes : moons will wane ; and bluer skies Breathe blessing forth for flower and tree. I know that while the unit dies. The myriad live immortally ; But shall my soul survive in them ? Shall I be all I was before ? Vain dream ! I wither, soul and stem : I die, and know my place no more. HIS SELECTED POEMS 201 The sun may lavish life on them ; His light, in summer morns and eves, May color every dewy gem That sparkles on their tender leaves ; But this will not avail the dead : The glory of his wondrous face Who now rains lustre on my head, Can only mock my burial-place. And woe to me, fond foolish one, To tempt an all-consuming ray, To think a flower could love a sun. Nor feel her soul dissolve away ! could I be what once I was How should I shun his fatal beam ! Wrapt in myself, my life should pass But as a still dark painless dream. But vainly in my bitterness 1 speak the language of despair : In life, in death, I still must bless The sun, the light, the cradling air. Mine early love to them I gave. And now that yon bright orb on high Illumines but a wider grave. For them I breathe my final sigh. How often soared my soul aloft In balmy bliss too deep to speak. When Zephyr came, and kissed with soft Sweet incense-breath my blushing cheek, 202 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN When beauteous bees and butterflies Flew round me in the summer beam, Or when some virgin's glorious eyes Bent o'er me like a dazzling dream ! Ah, yes ! I know myself a birth Of that all-wise Almighty Love Which made the flower to bloom on earth, And sun and stars to burn above ; And if, like them, I fade and fail. If I but share the common doom. Let no lament of mine bewail My dark descent to Hades' gloom. Farewell, thou lamp of this green globe ! Thy light is on my dying face. Thy glory tints my faded robe, And clasps me in a death-embrace. Farewell, thou balsam-dropping spring ! Farewell, ye skies that beam and weep ! Unhoping, and unmurmuring, I bow my head and sink to sleep." GONE IN THE WIND (kuckert) Solomon, where is thy throne ? It is gone in the wind. Babylon, where is thy might ? It is gone in the wind. Like the swift shadows of noon, like the dreams of the blind. Vanish the glories and pomps of the earth in the wind. HIS SELECTED POEMS 203 Man, canst thou build upon aught in the pride of thy mind ? Wisdom will teach thee that nothing can tarry behind : Tho' there be thousand bright actions embalmed and enshrined, Myriads and millions of brighter are snow in the wind. Solomon, where is thy throne ? It is gone in the wind. Babylon, where is thy might ? It is gone in the wind. All that the genius of man hath achieved or designed Waits but its hour to be dealt with as dust by the wind. Say, what is pleasure ? A phantom, a mask undefined ; Science ? An almond, whereof we can pierce but the rind; Honor and affluence ? Firmans that Fortune hath signed, Only to glitter and pass on the wings of the wind. Solomon, where is thy throne? It is gone in the wind. Babylon, where is thy might.? It is gone in the wind. Who is the fortunate? He who in anguish hath pined ! He shall rejoice when his relics are dust in the wind. Mortal, be careful with what thy best hopes are en- twined ; Woe to the miners for Truth, where the lampless have mined ! 204 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Woe to the seekers on earth for what none ever find : They and their trust shall be scattered like leaves on the wind. Solomon, where is thy throne? It is gone in the wind. Babylon, where is thy might .? It is gone in the wind. Happy in death are they only whose hearts have consigned All earth's affections and longings and cares to the wind. Pity thou, reader, the madness of poor humankind Raving of knowledge ; (and Satan so busy to blind !) Raving of glory, like me; for the garlands I bind, Garlands of song, are but gathered, and strewn in the wind. Solomon, where is thy throne .? It is gone in the wind. Babylon, where is thy might? It is gone in the wind. I, Abul-Namez, must rest ; for my fire is declined, And I hear voices from Hades like bells on the wind. HIS SELECTED POEMS 205 THE GLAIVE SONG (theodor kornerI) " Glaive that lightenest by my side, What may mean thy bright sheen ? Glaive that lightenest by my side, Wouldst thou woo me as a bride. To the red battle-ground. Hurrah ! Where the thunders of the cannon resound? Hurrah ! Where the thunders of the cannon resound ? " " Gallant master, valiant knight ! I rejoice in thy voice ! Gallant master, valiant knight ! I so shine, so lighten bright, 1 "Korner, as most of my readers are aware, was one of the most enthu- siastic and heroic of those young German patnots who so nobly rose up in the year 18 13, to protect the liberties of their fatherland against foreign aggression. He was gifi:ed with both genius and courage of a high degree; and the character of his short life, which terminated at the early age of twenty-two, is faithfully symbolized by the lyre and sword which stand crossed upon his tomb at Babelow, in Mecklenburgh-Schwerin. The fol- lowing song, which he is said to have written a few hours before his death on the battle-plain of Gadebusch, in August, 1813, has long held rank among the young Germanists as their Marseillaise ; but no translation of it worth looking at, so hr as I am aware, has as yet appeared in English, and perhaps I may not have succeeded better than others in my attempt to trans- pose the spirit of it into that language. To be thoroughly understood and felt it should be heard in the Burschensaal at Jena, where the students sing it in chorus, crossing their swords with each other at the recurrence of each ' Hurrah ! ' " It is needless to add that Mangan never so heard it. 2o6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN I, thy bride and thy glaive, Hurrah ! Because wedded to a hero so brave, Hurrah ! Because wedded to a hero so brave ! " " True ! my joyous brilliant steel, I am brave, am no slave ; True ! my joyous brilliant steel ! And to-day, for woe or weal. Here I plight thee my troth, Hurrah ! It is victory or death for us both ! Hurrah ! It is victory or death for us both ! " " O thy bride delights to hear That glad shout thus rung out ! O thy bride delights to hear That proud peal so clarion-clear ! When, O when dawns the day. Hurrah ! When thou bearest thy beloved away. Hurrah ! When thou bearest thy beloved away ? " " When the drums beat loud to arms Then is born that bright morn ! When the drums beat loud to arms, When the thrilling bugle warms The quick blood in all veins ; Hurrah ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 207 Then I bear thee to the red battle-plains, Hurrah ! Then I bear thee to the red battle-plains ! " " O that glorious day of days, May its noon shine out soon. Shine out soon with blood-red rays ! O that glorious day of days ! May it dawn and expire. Hurrah ! Amid trumpet-blasts and thunder and fire. Hurrah ! Amid trumpet-blasts and thunder and fire ! " " Why so restless, bride of mine ? Why just now startedst thou ? Why so restless, bride of mine. In that iron room of thine ? Thou art restless and wild. Hurrah ! Thou art wild in thy delight as a child. Hurrah ! Thou art wild in thy delight as a child ! " " Wild I am in my delight — Wild and glad, wild and mad ! Wild I am in my delight — Thirsting, burning for the fight, When the glaive and the gun, Hurrah ! Blend the lightning and the earthquake in one. Hurrah ! Blend the lightning and the earthquake in one ! " zo8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN " Quiet thee, my hope, my heart : Bear the gloom of thy room ! Quiet thee, my hope, my heart : Bide a season where thou art. Thou shalt soon be released. Hurrah ! And shalt banquet at the great battle-feast. Hurrah ! And shalt banquet at the great battle-feast ! " " I must forth ! O let us rove, Hand in hand, o'er the land. I must forth ! I burn to rove Through the gardens of my love, Where the roses, blood-red. Hurrah ! Bloom in brilliantest array o'er the dead. Hurrah ! Bloom in brilliantest array o'er the dead ! " " As thou wilt, then, faithful one ! South or north, we'll go forth ! As thou wilt, then, faithful one. Let us follow fortune on Over hill, dell, and heath. Hurrah ! Till I deck thee with my first laurel-wreath. Hurrah ! Till I deck thee with my first laurel-wreath ! ' " O joy ! joy ! Lead on, O lead ! Now are we truly free. HIS SELECTED POEMS 209 O joy ! joy ! Lead on, O lead ! Onward, forward, will we speed To the broad nuptial-plain. Hurrah ! Where we'll wed amid the tempest and red rain, Hurrah ! Where we'll wed amid the tempest and red rain ! " So spake out, in joy and pride. On their way to the fray. So spake out, in joy and pride One young bridegroom and his bride. Up, then, youth of the land ! Hurrah ! Up, and proffer your beloved the hand ! Hurrah ! Up and proffer your beloved the hand. Let her not hang down her head, Her, your bride, by your side ! Let her not hang down her head, By your side, as one half-dead : Let her feel your embrace. Hurrah ! Let her glory shed its rays on your face. Hurrah ! Let her glory shed its rays on your face ! Press her bright mouth unto yours ! Cold it seems, but its beams Are the brave man's warmest lures. Press her bright mouth unto yours ! 210 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN She should not be denied. Hurrah ! Cursed is he who basely turns from the bride, Hurrah ! Cursed is he who basely turns from the bride. Brothers, look ! The morning breaks. Up, arise ! for time flies : Brothers, look ! The morning breaks. The sky reddens, the earth shakes. Are you true men and good ? Hurrah ! Then be foremost at the Bridal of Blood ! Hurrah ! Stand up foremost at the Bridal of Blood ! ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND THE TREE (di la motte FouquE) The sun is warm, the air is bland. The heavens wear that stainless blue Which only in an orient land The eye of man may view ; And lo ! around, and all abroad A glittering host, a mighty horde ; And at their head a demigod Who slays with lightning sword. The bright noon burns, but idly now Those warriors rest by vale and hill. HIS SELECTED POEMS And shadows on their leader's brow Seem ominous of ill. Spell-bound, he stands beside a tree ; And well he may, for, through its leaves Unstirred by wind, come brokenly Moans, as of one that grieves. How strange ! he thought : life is a boon Given and resumed ; but how, and when ? E'en now, I asked myself how soon I should go home again; How soon I might again behold My mourning mother's tearful face. How soon my kindred might enfold Me in their dear embrace ! There was an Indian magian there. And, stepping forth, he bent his knee. " O King ! " he said, " be wise : beware This too prophetic tree." " Ha ! " cried the King, " thou knowest, then, seer. What yon strange oracle reveals ? " " Alas ! " the magian said, " I hear Deep words like thunder-peals. I hear the groans of more than man. Hear tones that warn, denounce, beseech ; Hear, woe is me ! how darkly ran That strain of thrilling speech. ' O King,' it spake, ' all-trampling King, Thou leadest legions from afar. But battle droops his clotted wing, (20) Night menaces thy star ! 212 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Fond visions of thy boyhood's years Dawn like dim light upon thy soul ; Thou seest again thy mother's tears Which love could not control. Ah, thy career in sooth is run, Ah, thou indeed returnest home ; The mother waits to clasp her son Low in her gloomful dome ! Yet go rejoicing : he who reigns O'er earth alone, leaves worlds unscanned ; Life binds the spirit as with chains : Seek thou the phantom-land ! Leave conquest all it looks for here ; Leave willing slaves a bloody throne ; Thine henceforth is another sphere : Death's realm, the dark unknown ! ' " The magian ceased. The leaves were hushed. But wailings broke from all around ; Until the chief, whose red blood flushed His cheek with hotter bound. Spake in the tones of one with whom Fear never yet had been a guest : " And when doth Fate achieve my doom ? And where shall be my rest ? " " O noble heart ! " the magian said. And tears unbidden filled his eyes, " We should not weep for thee ; the dead Change but their home and skies ; The moon shall beam, the myrtles bloom For thee no more ; yet, sorrow not ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 213 The immortal pomp of Hades' gloom Best consecrates thy lot. In June, in June, in laughing June, And where the dells show deepest green, Pavilioned overhead at noon With gold and silver sheen. These be for thee the place, the time. Trust not thy heart, trust not thine eyes : Beyond the mount thy warm hopes climb The land of darkness lies ! " Unblenching at the fateful words. The hero turned around in haste. " On, on ! " he cried, " ye million swords : Your course, like mine, is traced. Let me but close life's narrow span Where weapons clash and banners wave ! I would not live to mourn that man But conquers for a grave," STREW THE WAY WITH FLOWERS (holty) O strew the way with rosy flowers. And dupe with smiles thy grief and gloom ! For tarnished leaves and songless hours Await thee in the tomb. Lo, in the brilliant festal hall How lightly youth and beauty tread ! 214 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Yet, gaze again : the grass is tall Above their charnel bed. In blaze of noon the jewelled bride Before the altar plights her faith : Ere weep the skies of eventide Her eyes are dulled in death. Then sigh no more. If life be brief. So are its woes ; and why repine ? Pavilioned by the linden leaf. We'll quaff the chaliCed wine. Wild music from the nightingale Comes floating on the loaded breeze, To mingle in the bowery vale With hum of summer bees ; Then taste the joys that God bestows. The beaded wine, the faithful kiss ! For while the tide of pleasure flows. Death bares his black abyss. In vain the zephyr's breath perfumes The house of death ; in vain its tones Shall mourn at midnight round the tombs Where sleep our blackening bones. The star-bright bowl is broken there. The witchery of the lute is o'er, And, wreck of wrecks ! there lie the fair Whose beauty wins no more. HIS SELECTED POEMS 215 THE ERL-KING'S DAUGHTER (21) (herder) Sir Olf rode fast toward Thurlston's walls To meet his bride in his father's halls. He saw blue lights flit over the graves ; The elves came forth from their forest caves. They dance anear on the glossy strand, And the erl-king's daughter held out her hand. " Oh^ welcome^ Sir Olf! to our jubilee : Step into the circle, and dance with me." " I dare not dance, I dare not stay : To-morrow will be my nuptial day ! " " Two golden spurs will I give to thee ; Jnd I pray thee. Sir Olf, to tarry with me." " I dare not tarry, I dare not delay : To-morrow is fixed for my nuptial day ! " " fVill give thee a shirt so white and fine Was bleached yestreen in the new moonshine" " I dare not hearken to elf nor fay ! To-morrow is fixed for my nuptial day." " A measure of gold I will give unto thee ; And I pray thee. Sir Olf, to dance with me." 2i6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN " The measure of gold will I carry away, But I dare not dance, and I dare not stay." " Then, since thou wilt go, even go with a blight ! A true-leaver's token I leave thee, sir knight r She lightly struck with her wand on his heart, And he swooned and swooned from the deadly smart; She lifted him up on his coal-black steed: " Nmu hie thee away with a fatal speed!" Then shone the moon, and howled the wolf. And the sheen and the howl awoke Sir Olf. He rode over mead, he rode over moor; He rode till he rode to his own house door. Within sat, white as the marble, his bride; But his gray-haired mother stood watching outside. " My son, my son, thou art haggard and wan ! Thy brow is the brow of a dying man." " And haggard and wan I well may be. For the erl-king's daughter hath wounded me." " I pray thee, my son, dismount, and bide. There is mist on the eyes of thy pining bride." "O mother! I should but drop dead from my steed. I will wander abroad for the strength I need." HIS SELECTED POEMS 217 " And what shall I tell thy bride, my son, When the morning dawns, and the tiring is done ? " " Oh, tell my bride that I rode to the wood With my hounds in leash, and my hawk in hood." When morning dawned with crimson and gray. The bride came forth in her wedding array. They poured out mead, they poured out wine: " Now, where is thy son, O gold-mother mine f " " My son, gold-daughter, rode into the wood. With his hounds in leash, and his hawk in hood." Then the bride grew sick with an ominous dread : " Ah, woe is me ! for Sir Olf is dead." She drooped like a lily that feels the blast; She drooped, and drooped, till she died; at last They rest in the charnel side by side. The stricken Sir Olf and his faithful bride. But the erl-king's daughter dances still Where the moonlight sleeps on the frosted hill. 21 8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE GRAVE, THE GRAVE (mahlmann) Blest are the dormant In death : they repose From bondage and torment, From passions and woes. From the yoke of the world and the snares of the traitor. The grave, the grave is the true liberator ! Griefs chase one another Around the earth's dome ; In the arms of the mother Alone is our home. Woo pleasure, ye triflers ! The thoughtful are wiser: The grave, the grave is their one tranquillizer ! Is the good man unfriended On life's ocean-path. Where storms have expended Their turbulent wrath ? Are his labors requited by slander and rancor ? The grave, the grave is his sure bower-anchor ! To gaze on the faces Of lost ones anew. To lock in embraces The loved and the true. Were a rapture to make even Paradise brighter. The grave, the grave is the great reuniter ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 219 Crown the corpse then with laurels, The conqueror's wreath, Make joyous with carols The chamber of death. And welcome the victor with cymbal and psalter : The grave, the grave is the only exalter ! A SONG (cONRAD WETZEl) When the roses blow, Man looks out for brighter hours ; When the roses glow, Hope relights her lampless bowers. Much that seemed, in winter gloom, Dark with heavy woe, Wears a gladsome hue and bloom When the roses blow. When the roses blow ; Wears a gladsome hue and bloom When the roses blow ! When the roses blow. Love that slept shall wake anew ; Merrier blood shall flow Through the springald's veins of blue. And if sorrow wrang the heart. Even that shall go: Pain and mourning must depart When the roses blow. When the roses blow; JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Pain and mourning must depart When the roses blow ! When the roses blow, (22) Look to heaven, my fainting soul : There, in stainless show. Spreads the veil that hides thy goal. Not while winter breathes his blight. Burst thy bonds below : Let the earth look proud and bright, Let the roses blow, Let the roses blow. O let earth look proud and bright. Let the roses blow ! TO LUDWIG UHLAND ON THE LAST VOLUME OF HIS POEMS (23) (jUSTINUS KEKNEr) As a headlong stream that winter had bound. When spring re-showers her beams on the plains Breaks loose with a fierce impatient sound From its icy chains ; As a tree, despoiled by the axe of the north Of his leaves of green, and fruits of gold, New leaves, new fruits, afresh puts forth. As bright as the old : As riotous wine, whose fiery strength By the walls of the flask was prisoned long. HIS SELECTED POEMS 221 Out-gushes in purple pride at length, A bubbling song : As the pealing of some vast organ floats On the air to the ear of him who has heard. In many long days, but the piping notes Of the coppice bird : So rushes, Uhland ! so streams and rolls The flood of thy song, a flood of fire ! So thrills thro' the depths of all hearts and souls The might of thy lyre ! THE POET'S CONSOLATION (24) (jUSTINUS keener) What tho' no maiden's tears ever be shed O'er my clay bed, Yet will the generous night never refuse To weep its dews. And tho' no friendly hand garland the cross Above my moss, Still will the dear, dear moon tenderly shine Down on that sign. And if the saunterer-by songlessly pass Thro' the long grass, There will the noontide bee pleasantly hum, And warm winds come. 2Z2 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Yes, you at least, ye dells, meadows, and streams, Stars and moonbeams. Will think on him whose weak meritless lays Teemed with your praise ! THE LOVE-ADIEU (uhland) Fare thee well, fare thee well, my dove ! Thou and I must sever; One fond kiss, one fond kiss of love, Ere we part for ever : And one rose, one red rose, Marie, Choose me from the bowers ; But no fruit, ah ! no fruit for me. Naught but fragile flowers. A DRINKING-SONG ( ALOYS SCMREIBEr) Look, look ! this wine is German. Therefore streams it full and flowing, Therefore beams it bold and glowing; Therefore, like a thirsty merman, QuafF the brilliant cup divine : Brother, this is German wine ! Fill, fill a bumper goblet ! Fill it high, and toast our olden HIS SELECTED POEMS 223 Fatherland, and them, the golden Maids and men who aye ennoble it. Fill the purple cup divine : Brother, this is German wine ! Drink, drink to ancient usage : May their memory greenly flourish. Who of yore were first to nourish Flesh and soul with this, and grew sage. Quaffing such immortal wine. Drink the Fathers of the vine ! Toast, toast the resurrection Of our country from her torpor ! We have spurned the French usurper ; Freedom binds us and affection, Me with thee, and mine with thine : Toast our triumph here in wine ! German worth and German wine, German speech and German manners. Be the motto on our banners ! None can tremble, none can pine. While he drinks of German wine. SWABIAN POPULAR SONG Where are they, the beloved. The gladsome, all ? Where are they, the beloved, The gladsome, all ? 224 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN They left the festal hearth and hall. They pine afar from us in alien climes. O, who shall bring them back to us once more ? Who shall restore Life's fairy floral times ? Restore Life's fairy floral times ? Where are they, the beloved, The gallant, all ? Where are they, the beloved, The gallant, all ? At freedom's thrilling clarion-call They went forth in the pride of youthhood's powers. O, who shall give them back to us once more ? Who shall restore Long-buried hearts and hours? Restore Long-buried hearts and hours .' Where are they, the beloved. The gifted, all ? Where are they, the beloved. The gifted, all ? They would not yield their souls the thrall Of gold, nor sell the glory of their lays. O, who shall give them back to us once more ? Who shall restore The bright young songful days ? Restore The bright young songful days ? HIS SELECTED POEMS 225 God only can restore us The lost ones all, But God He will restore us The lost ones all ! What tho' the future's shadows fall Dark o'er their fate, seen darker through our tears, Our God will give them back to us once more. He can restore The vanished golden years ; Restore The vanished golden years ! HOLINESS TO THE LORD (otto runge) There blooms a beautiful Flower, it blooms in a far- ofF land ; Its life has a mystic meaning for few to understand. Its leaves illumine the. valley, its odor scents the wood; And if evil men come near it, they grow for the moment good. When the winds are tranced in slumber, the rays of this luminous Flower Shed glory more than earthly o'er lake and hill and bower ; The hut, the hall, the palace, yea, earth's forsakenest sod. Shine out in the wondrous lustre that fills the heaven of God. 226 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Three Kings came once to a hostel wherein lay the Flower so rare : A star shone over its roof, and they knelt adoring there. Whenever thou seest a damsel whose young eyes dazzle and win, O pray that her heart may cherish this Flower of Flowers within ! THE RIDE AROUND THE PARAPET (25) (ruckzrt) She said : " I was not born to mope at home in lone- liness," The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. She said : " I was not born to mope at home in lone- liness. When the heart is throbbing sorest, there is balsam in the forest, There is balsam in the forest for its pain," Said the Lady Eleanora, Said the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. She doffed her silks and pearls, and donned instead her hunting-gear. The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. She doffed her silks and pearls, and donned instead her hunting-gear. And, till summer-time was over, as a huntress and a rover Did she couch upon the mountain and the plain. She, the Lady Eleanora, Noble Lady Eleanora von Alleyne, HIS SELECTED POEMS 227 Returning home again, she viewed with scorn the tournaments, The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Returning home again, she viewed with scorn the tournaments ; She saw the morions cloven, and the crowning chap- lets woven. And the sight awakened only the disdain Of the Lady Eleanora, Of the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. " My feeling towards man is one of utter scornful- ness," Said Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. " My feeling towards man is one of utter scornful- ness; And he that would o'ercome it, let him ride around the summit Of my battlemented castle by the Maine ! " Said the Lady Eleanora, Said the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. » So came a knight anon to ride around the parapet For Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. So came a knight anon to ride around the parapet : Man and horse were hurled together o'er the crags that beetled nether. Said the lady, " There, I fancy, they'll remain ! " Said the Lady Eleanora, Queenly Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! 228 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Then came another knight to ride around the parapet For Lady Eleariora von Alleyne. Then came another knight to ride around the parapet. Man and horse fell down, asunder, o'er the crags that beetled under. Said the lady, " They'll not leap the leap again ! " Said the Lady Eleanora, Lovely Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Came other knights anon to ride around the parapet For Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Came other knights anon to ride around the parapet j Till six and thirty corses of both mangled men and horses Had been sacrificed victims at the fane Of the Lady Eleanora, Stately Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! That woeful year was by, and Ritter none came after- wards To Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. That woeful year was by, and Ritter none came after- wards ; The castle's lonely basscourt looked a wild o'er-grown- with-grass court ; 'Twas abandoned by the Ritters and their train To the Lady Eleanora, Haughty Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! She clomb the silent wall, she gazed around her sovran- like. The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 229 She clomb the silent wall, she gazed around her sovran- like. " And wherefore have departed all the brave, the lion- hearted. Who have left me here to play the castellaine ? " Said the Lady Eleanora, Said the Lady Eleanora von AUeyne. " And is it fled for aye, the palmy time of chivalry ? " Cried Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. " And is it fled for aye, the palmy time of chivalry ? Shame light upon the cravens ! May their corpses gorge the ravens, Since they tremble thus to wear a woman's chain," Said the Lady Eleanora, Said the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. The story reached, at Gratz, the gallant Margrave Gondibert Of Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. The story reached, at Gratz, the gallant Margrave Gondibert. Quoth he : "I trow the woman must be more or less than human; She is worth a little peaceable campaign. Is the Lady Eleanora, Is the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! " He trained a horse to pace round narrow stones laid merlon-wise, For Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. 230 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN He trained a horse to pace round narrow stones laid merlon-wise. " Good gray ! do thou thy duty ; and this rocky- bosomed beauty Shall be taught that all the vauntings are in vain Of the Lady Eleanora, Of the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne." He left his castle-halls, he came to Lady Eleanor's, The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. He left his castle-halls, he came to Lady Eleanor's. " O lady best and fairest, here am I ! and, if thou carest, I will gallop round the parapet amain. Noble Lady Eleanora, Noble Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! " She saw him spring to horse, that gallant Margrave Gondibert, The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. She saw him spring to horse, that gallant Margrave Gondibert. " O bitter, bitter sorrow ! I shall weep for this to-morrow ; It were better that in battle he were slain," Said the Lady Eleanora, Said the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Then rode he round and round the battlemented parapet. For Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. HIS SELECTED POEMS 231 Then rode he round and round the battlemented parapet : The lady wept and trembled, and her paly face resembled, As she looked away, a lily wet with rain ; Hapless Lady Eleanora, Hapless Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! So rode he round and round the battlemented parapet. For Lady Eleanora von Alleyne; So rode he round and round the battlemented parapet. " Accursed be my ambition ! He but rideth to perdi- tion, He but rideth to perdition without rein ! " Wept the Lady Eleanora, Wept the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Yet rode he round and round the battlemented parapet. For Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Yet rode he round and round the battlemented parapet. Meanwhile her terror shook her, yea, her breath well nigh forsook her; Fire was burning in the bosom and the brain Of the Lady Eleanora, Of the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! Then rode he round and off the battlemented parapet. To Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Then rode he round and off the battlemented parapet ! " Now blest be God for ever ! This is marvellous ! I never 232 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Cherished hope of laying eyes on thee again ! " Cried the Lady Eleanora, Joyous Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. " The man of men thou art, for thou hast fairly con- quered me, The Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! The man of men thou art, for thou hast fairly con- quered me : I greet thee as my loyer, and, ere many days be over. Thou shalt wed me and be lord of my domain ! " Said the Lady Eleanora, Said the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Then bowed the graceful knight, the gallant Mar- grave Gondibert, To Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Then bowed that graceful knight, the gallant Mar- grave Gondibert, And thus he answered coldly : " There be many who as boldly Will adventure an achievement they disdain For the Lady Eleanora, For the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Mayest bide until they come, O stately Lady Eleanor ! O Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! Mayest bide until they come, O stately Lady Elea- nor! HIS SELECTED POEMS 233 And thou and they may marry ; but, for me, I must not tarry : I have won a wife already out of Spain, Virgin Lady Eleanora, Virgin Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! " Thereon he rode away, the gallant Margrave Gondi- bert, From Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. Thereon he rode away, the gallant Margrave Gondi- bert, And long in shame and anguish did that haughty lady languish, Did she languish without pity for her pain. She, the Lady Eleanora, She, the Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! And year went after year, and still in barren maiden- hood Lived Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. And wrinkled eld crept on, and still her lot was maidenhood. And, woe ! her end was tragic : she was changed, at length, by magic. To an ugly wooden image, they maintain ! She, the Lady Eleanora, She, the La^y Eleanora von Alleyne. And now, before the gate, in sight of all, transmog-. rifled, J Stands Lady Eleanora von Alleyne. 1 ;" Before her castle-gate, in sight of all, transmogrifled ! 234 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And he that won't salute her must be fined in foam- ing pewter, If a boor ; but, if a burgher, in champagne. For the Lady Eleanora, Wooden Lady Eleanora von AUeyne ! MY HOME (26) ( CONRAD WETZEL ) Morn and eve a star invites me. One imploring silver star, Woos me, calls me, lures me, lights me To the desert deeps afar. To a lovely orient land, Where the sun at morning early Rises fresh, and young, and glowing; Where the air is light and bland. And the falling raindrops pearly : Therefore am I going, going Home to this my lovely land. Where the sun at morning early Rises fresh, and young, and glowing; Where the airs are light and bland. And the rain is warm and pearly : All unheeding, all unknowing, I am speeding, I am going. Going home to my, to my land. To my only lonely island In the desert deeps afar ; Yet unknowing, and undreaming HIS SELECTED POEMS 235 Why I go, or how, or whither, Save that one imploring star. Ever-burning, ever-beaming, Woos me, lures me, lights me thither. THE FAIRIES' PASSAGE (27) (kopisch) Tap, tap, rap, rap ! " Get up, gaffer Ferryman." " Eh ! Who is there ? " The clock strikes three. " Get up, do, gaffer ! You are the very man We have been long, long, longing to see." The ferryman rises, growling and grumbling, And goes fum-fumbling, and stumbling, and tumbling Over the wares on his way to the door. But he sees no more Than he saw before. Till a voice is heard : " O Ferryman dear ! Here we are waiting, all of us, here. We are a wee, wee colony, we; Some two hundred in all, or three. Ferry us over the river Lee Ere dawn of day. And we will pay The most we may In our own wee way ! " " Who are you ? Whence came you .' What place are you going to ? " 236 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN " Oh, we have dwelt over-long in this land : The people get cross, and are growing so knowing, too ! Nothing at all but they now understand. We are daily vanishing under the thunder Of some huge engine or iron wonder; That iron, ah ! it has entered our souls." " Your souls ? O gholes. You queer little drolls. Do you mean ? " " Good gaffer, do aid us with speed, For our time, like our stature, is short indeed ! And a very long way we have to go : Eight or ten thousand miles or so, Hither and thither, and to and fro, With our pots and pans And little gold cans ; But our light caravans Run swifter than man's." "Well, well, you may come," said the ferryman affably : " Patrick, turn out, and get ready the barge." Then again to the Uttle folk: "Tho' you seem laughably Small, I don't mind, if your coppers be large." Oh, dear ! what a rushing, what pushing, what crushing, (The watermen making vain efforts at hushing The hubbub the while,) there followed these words ! What clapping of boards. What strapping of cords. HIS SELECTED POEMS 237 What stowing away of children and wives, And platters, and mugs, and spoons, and knives ! Till all had safely got into the boat. And the ferryman, clad in his tip-top coat, And his wee little fairies were safely afloat. Then ding, ding, ding. And kling, kling, kling. How the coppers did ring In the tin pitcherling ! OfF, then, went the boat, at first very pleasantly, Smoothly, and so forth ; but after a while It swayed and it swagged this and that way, and presently Chest after chest, and pile after pile. Of the little folk's goods began tossing and rolling. And pitching like fun, beyond fairy controlling. O Mab ! if the hubbub were great before. It was now some two or three million times more. Crash ! went the wee crocks and the clocks ; and the locks Of each little wee box were stove in by hard knocks ; And then there were oaths, and prayers, and cries : " Take care ! " — " See there ! " — " Oh, dear, my eyes ! " " I am killed ! " — " I am drowned ! " — with groans and sighs. Till to land they drew. « Yeo-ho ! Pull to ! Tiller-rope, thro' and thro' ! " And all's right anew. 238 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN " Now jump upon shore, ye queer little oddities. (Eh, what is this ? . . . Where are they, at all ? Where are they, and where are their tiny commodi- ties ? Well, as I live !"...) He looks blank as a wall, Poor ferryman ! Round him and round him he gazes, But only gets deeplier lost in the mazes Of utter bewilderment. All, all are gone. And he stands alone. Like a statue of stone. In a doldrum of wonder. He turns to steer. And a tinkling laugh salutes his ear. With other odd sounds : " Ha, ha, ha, ha ! Fol lol ! zidzizzle ! quee quee ! bah ! bah ! Fizzigigiggidy ! pshee ! sha sha ! " " O ye thieves, ye thieves, ye rascally thieves ! " The good man cries. He turns to his pitcher. And there, alas, to his horror perceives That the little folk's mode of making him richer Has been to pay him with withered leaves ! THE LAST WORDS OF AL-HASSAN (28) (friedrich august von heydzn) Farewell for ever to all I love. To river and rock, farewell ; To Zoumlah's gloomful cypress-grove. And Shaarmal's tulipy dell ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 239 To Deenween-KuUaha's light blue bay, And Oreb's lonely strand ! My race is run ; I am called away : I go to the lampless land. 'Llah Hu ! I am called away from the light of day To my tent in the dark dark land ; I have seen the standard of Ali stained With the blood of the brave and free, And the Kaaba's venerable stone profaned By the truculent Wahabee. Allah, for the light of another sun. With my Bazra sword in hand ! But I rave in vain ; my course is run : 1 go to the lampless land. 'Llah Hu ! My course is run, my goal is won, I go to the dark dark land ! Yet, why should I live a day, an hour ? The friends I valued lie low; My sisters dance in the halls of the Giaour, My brethren fight for the foe. None stood by the banner this arm unfurled Save Kharada's mountain-band ! 'Tis well that I leave so base a world, Tho' to dwell in the lampless land. 'Llah Hu ! 'Tis well that I leave so false a world, Tho' to dwell in the dark dark land ! 240 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Even she, my loved and lost Ameen, The moon-white pearl of my soul, Could pawn her peace for the show and sheen Of silken Istambol. ■ How little did I bode what a year would see When we parted at Sarmarcand; My bride in the harem of the Osmanlee, Myself in the lampless land. 'Llah Hu ! My bride in the harem of the Osmanlee, Myself in the dark dark land ! We weep for the noble who perish young, Like flowers before their bloom ; The great-souled few, who, unseen and unsung. Go down to the charnel's gloom ; But, written on the brow of each, if man Could read it and understand. Is the changeless decree of Heaven's divan : We are born for the lampless land ! 'Llah Hu ! By the dread firman of Heaven's divan, All are born for the dark dark land ! The wasted moon has a marvellous look Amiddle of the starry hordes ; The heavens, too, shine like a mystic book All bright with burning words. The mists of the dawn begin to dislimn Zahara's castles of sand. Farewell ! farewell ! Mine eyes feel dim : They turn to the lampless land. HIS SELECTED POEMS 241 'Llah Hu ! My heart is weary, mine eyes are dim, I would rest in the dark dark land ! AND THEN NO MORE (ruckert) I saw her once, one little while, and then no more : 'Twas Eden's light on earth awhile, and then no more. Amid the throng, she passed along the meadow-floor: Spring seemed to smile on earth awhile, and then no more. But whence she came, which way she went, what garb she wore, I noted not ; I gazed awhile, and then no more. I saw her once, one little while, and then no more : 'Twas Paradise on earth awhile, and then no more : Ah ! what avail my vigils pale, my magic lore ? She shone before mine eyes awhile, and then no more. The shallop of my peace is wrecked on Beauty's shore ; Near Hope's fair isle it rode awhile, and then no more ! I saw her once, one little while, and then no more : Earth looked like Heaven a little while, and then no more. Her presence thrilled and lightened to its inner core, My desert breast, a little while, and then no more. So may, perchance, a meteor glance at midnight o'er Some ruined pile a little while, and then no more. 24Z JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN I saw her once, one little while, and then no more. The earth was Peri-land awhile, and then no more. O might I see but once again, as once before, Through chance or wile, that shape awhile, and then no more ! Death soon would heal my griefs : this heart, now sad and sore, Would beat anew a little while, and then no more ! MOTHER AND SON (handeic tzvelk) " Hie to the wood, and seek thy sister. Son for ever gay ! Hie to the wood, and tell thy sister She bring home her mother's breast-knot. Son for ever gay." " Wandering in the wood I missed her, Golden mother gray ! In the wood I lost and missed her. Where she bides I guess and guess not. Golden mother gray." " Fare to the mill and seek thy brother. Son for ever gay ! Fetch him home to his mourning mother. See, the eve gets dark and darker. Son for ever gay." HIS SELECTED POEMS 243 " Mother now he hath found another, Golden mother gray, Even the holy Virgin Mother ! Stark as death he lies ; none starker, Golden mother gray." " Hence, and find thy staffless father. Son for ever gay ! Green herbs w^ent he forth to gather Mid the dews of morning early. Son for ever gay." " Vainly might I seek my father. Golden mother gray ! Heavenly herbs he now doth gather Where the dews shine bright and pearly, Golden mother gray." " When shall I again behold them. Son for ever gay ? When again shall I behold them. Ah, when fold them to my bosom. Son for ever gay ? " " To thy bosom shall thou fold them, Golden mother gray ! Thou shalt once again behold them When the blighted tree shall blossom. Golden mother gray." " When shall blossom tree that's blighted. Son for ever gay ? When can blossom tree that's blighted ? 244 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Blighted tree may naught and none raise, Son for ever gay." " When the morn shall first be lighted, Golden mother gray ! When the morn shall first be lighted In the west, by western sun-rays, Golden mother gray." " When shall dawn that wondrous morning. Son for ever gay ? When shall break that wondrous morning ? When be seen the western sunrise. Son for ever gay ? " " When the Archangel's trump gives warning, Golden mother gray ! When the Judgment peal gives warning ; When the dead shall every one rise. Golden mother gray." TWO SONNETS FROM VINCENZO DA FILICAJA I Where is thine arm, Italia ? why shouldst thou Fight with the stranger's ? Fierce alike to me Seem thy defender and thine enemy : Both were thy vassals once, tho' victors now. (29) Thus dost thou guard the wreath that bound thy brow, The wreck of perished empire ? When to thee Virtue and valor pledged their fealty HIS SELECTED POEMS 245 Was this thy glorious promise, this thy vow ? Go, then : reject thine ancient worth, and wed Degenerate sloth ; mid blood, and groans, and cries, Sleep on, all heedless of the loud alarms. Sleep, vile adulteress ! From thy guilty bed Too soon the avenging sword shall bid thee rise. Or pierce thee, slumbering in thy minion's arms. II Here on the spot where stately cities rose, No stone is left, to mark in letters rude Where earth did her tremendous jaws unclose, Where Syracuse, or where Catania stood. Along the silent margin of the flood I seek, but cannot find ye ! Naught appears Save the deep-settled gloom of solitude. That checks my step, and fills mine eyes with tears. O Thou whose mighty arm the blow hath dealt, Whose justice gave the judgment ! shall not I Adore that power which I have seen and felt ? Rise from the depths of darkness where ye lie, Ye ghosts of buried cities ; rise, and be A sad memorial to futurity. THE MARINER'S BRIDE (luis de camoens) Look, mother ! the mariner's rowing His galley adown the tide; I'll go where the mariner's going, And be the mariner's bride ! 246 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN I saw him one day through the wicket, I opened the gate and we met ; As a bird in the fowler's net, Was I caught in my own green thicket. O mother, my tears are flowing, I've lost my maidenly pride : I'll go if the mariner's going. And be the mariner's bride ! This Love the tyrant evinces, Alas ! an omnipotent might ; He darkens the mind like night. He treads on the necks of princes ! O mother, my bosom is glowing! I'll go, whatever betide, I'll go where the mariner's going, And be the mariner's bride. Yes, mother, the spoiler has reft me Of reason and self-control ; Gone, gone is my wretched soul. And only my body is left me. The winds, O mother ! are blowing, The ocean is bright and wide : I'll go where the mariner's going. And be the mariner's bride. HIS SELECTED POEMS 247 TO DON RODRIGO AFTER HIS FINAL DEFEAT (from the eomancero general) O turn those eyes, unhappy King, O turn those eyes on ruined Spain ! Behold that glory vanishing That shone so long undimmed by stain: See how her heroes bleed in vain ; See how the conquering Arabs trample Her golden fields, her vineyards ample ; See this, and curse thy reckless reign ! (Alas, most wretched land, Lost for La Cava's lips and hand !) The memories of a thousand years, The lustre of the Gothic name, So wronged, that never blood nor tears Can wipe away the blighting shame; And this, to feed thy guilty flame ! O King, thy woes are but beginning : O King, thou losest by thy sinning Thy soul and body, crown and fame, (Alas, most wretched land. Lost for La Cava's lips and hand !) 248 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN DIES IRAE (30) The day of wrath, the day of woe Shall lay the world in ashes low : As David and the Seers foreshow. What awe must e'en archangels feel When earth shall make her dread appeal To God, her Judge for woe or weal ! The marvellous trumpet's mighty tone Shall thrill the graves from zone to zone, And wake the dead to face the Throne. The whole dark ocean of the Past Shall answer to that earthquake blast, Till Death and Nature stand aghast. The accusing record lies unrolled : And all man thought and wrought of old. And hidden sins and shames, are told. Woe ! when the rended veil shall fall ! When Truth, in Heaven's own judgment-hall. Lays bare the shrinking souls of all. Where then can crime dare turn in trust ? What stay remains for sinful dust. When fear shall prostrate even the just ? HIS SELECTED POEMS 249 Ah, great good God so long withstood ! I clasp Thy Son's redeeming rood : My fount of hope is Jesus' blood. On that dread day, just Judge of men. Let me not wake for Hell's dark den ; But be, O God ! my Saviour then. Original Poems Those purporting to be . Translations from the Oriental Languages THE KARAMANIAN EXILE (31) I see thee ever in my dreams, Karaman ! Thy hundred hills, thy thousand streams, Karaman, O Karaman ! As when thy gold-bright morning gleams. As when the deepening sunset seams With lines of light thy hills and streams, Karaman ! So thou loomest on my dreams, Karaman ! On all my dreams, my homesick dreams, Karaman, O Karaman ! The hot bright plains, the sun, the skies, Karaman ! Seem death-black marble to mine eyes, Karaman, O Karaman ! I turn from summer's blooms and dyes; Yet in my dreams thou dost arise In welcome glory to mine eyes, Karaman ! In thee my life of life yet lies, Karaman ! Thou still art holy in mine eyes, Karaman, O Karaman ! Ere my fighting years were come, Karaman ! 253 254 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Troops were few in Erzerome, Karaman, O Karaman ! Their fiercest came from Erzerome, They came from Ukhbar's palace dome, They dragged me forth from thee, my home, Karaman ! Thee, my own, my mountain home, Karaman ! In life and death, my spirit's home, Karaman, O Karaman ! none of all my sisters ten, Karaman ! Loved like me my fellow-men, Karaman, O Karaman ! 1 was mild as milk till then, I was soft as silk till then ; Now my breast is as a den, Karaman ! Foul with blood and bones of men, Karaman ! With blood and bones of slaughtered men, Karaman, O Karaman ! My boyhood's feelings newly born, Karaman ! Withered like young flowers uptorn, Karaman, O Karaman ! And in their stead sprang weed and thorn ; What once I loved now moves my scorn ; My burning eyes are dried to horn, Karaman ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 255 I hate the blessed light of morn, Karaman ! It maddens me, the face of morn, Karaman, O Karaman ! The Spahi wears a tyrant's chains, Karaman ! But bondage worse than this remains, Karaman, O Karaman ! His heart is black with million stains : Thereon, as on Kaf 's blasted plains. Shall nevermore fall dews and rains, Karaman ! Save poison-dews and bloody rains, Karaman ! Hell's poison-dews and bloody rains, Karaman, O Karaman! But life at worst must end ere long, Karaman ! Azrael ^ avengeth every wrong, Karaman, O Karaman ! Of late my thoughts rove more among Thy fields ; o'ershadowing fancies throng My mind, and texts of bodeful song, Karaman ! Azrael is terrible and strong, Karaman ! His lightning sword smites all ere long, Karaman, O Karaman ! 1 The angel of death. 2s6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN There's care to-night in Ukhbar's halls, Karaman ! There's hope, too, for his trodden thralls, Karaman, O Karaman ! What lights flash red along yon walls ? Hark ! hark ! the muster-trumpet calls ! I see the sheen of spears and shawls, Karaman ! The foe ! the foe ! — they scale the walls, Karaman ! To-night Murad or Ukhbar falls, Karaman, O Karaman ! THE WAIL AND WARNING OF THE THREE KHALANDEERS THE WAIL Ld laha^il Allah !^ Here we meet, we three, at length, Amrah, Osman, Perizad: Shorn of all our grace and strength, Poor, and old, and very sad. We have lived, but live no more; Life has lost its gloss for us. Since the days we spent of yore Boating down the Bosphorus ! La! laha^il Allah! 1 God alone is all-mercifiil ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 257 The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus ! Old time brought home no loss for us; We felt full of health and heart Upon the foamy Bosphorus ! La' laha^ il Allah ! Days indeed ! A shepherd's tent Served us then for house and fold; All to whom we gave or lent, Paid us back a thousand fold. Troublous years, by myriads wailed, Rarely had a cross for us. Never, when we gaily sailed Singing down the Bosphorus. La' laha, il Allah I The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus ! There never came a cross for us. While we daily, gaily sailed Adown the meadowy Bosphorus. La' laha, il Allah ! Blithe as birds we flew along, Laughed and quaffed and stared about; Wine and roses, mirth and song. Were what most we cared about. Fame we left for quacks to seek. Gold was dust and dross for us. While we lived from week to week Boating down the Bosphorus. La' laha, il Allah I The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus! And gold was dust and dross for us. Z58 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN While we lived from week to week Boating down the Bosphorus. La' laha^il Allah! Friends we were, and would have shared Purses, had we twenty full. If we spent, or if we spared. Still our funds were plentiful. Save the hours we passed apart. Time brought home no loss for us; We felt full of hope and heart While we clove the Bosphorus. La' laha^ il Allah I The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus ! For life has lost its gloss for us Since the days we spent of yore Upon the pleasant Bosphorus! La' laha, il Allah I Ah ! for youth's delirious hours, Man pays well in after-days. When quenched hopes and palsied powers Mock his love-and-laughter days. Thorns and thistles on our path Took the place of moss for us, Till false fortune's tempest-wrath Drove us from the Bosphorus. Z«' laha, il Allah I The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus ! When thorns took place of moss for us. Gone was all ! Our hearts were graves Deep, deeper than the Bosphorus. HIS SELECTED POEMS 259 La' laha.il Allah! Gone is all! In one abyss Lie health, youth, and merriment! All we've learned amounts to this: Life's a sad experiment! What it is we trebly feel Pondering what it was for us. When our shallop's bounding keel Clove the joyous Bosphorus. La' laha^ il Allah ! The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus ! We wail for what life was for us. When our shallop's bounding keel Clove the joyous Bosphorus ! THE WARNING La' laha, il Allah! Pleasure tempts, yet man has none Save himself t' accuse, if her Temptings prove, when all is done, Lures hung out by Lucifer. Guard your fire in youth, O friends ! Manhood's is but phosphorus. And bad luck attends and ends Boatings down the Bosphorus I La' laha,il Allah! The Bosphorus, the Bosphorus ! Youth's fire soon wanes to phosphorus. And slight luck or grace attends Your boaters down the Bosphorus ! 26o JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN RELIC OF PRINCE BAYAZEEDi Slow thro' my bosom's veins their last cold blood is flowing ; Above my heart even now I feel the rank grass growing. (32) Hence to the land of naught the caravan is starting ; Its bell already tolls the signal for departing. Rejoice, my soul, poor bird ! thou art at last delivered : Thy cage is crumbling fast, the bars will soon be shivered. Farewell this troubled world, where sin and crime run riot ! For Shahi henceforth rests in God's own house of quiet. ADVICE AGAINST TRAVEL (33) Traverse not the globe for lore ! The sternest But the surest teacher is the heart ; Studying that and that alone, thou learnest Best and soonest whence and what thou art. Time, not travel, 'tis which gives us ready Speech, experience, prudence, tact, and wit : Far more light the lamp that bideth steady Than the wandering lantern doth emit. 1 Prince Bayazeed, son of Suleiman, was put to death in 1 561 by Selim, Shah of Persia. This poem is said to have been written the night before his execution. HIS SELECTED POEMS 261 Moor, Chinese, Egyptian, Russian, Roman, Tread one common down-hill path of doom ; Everywhere the names are man and woman, Everywhere the old sad sins find room. Evil angels tempt us in all places. What but sands or snows hath earth to give ? Dream not, friend, of deserts and oases ! But look inwards, and begin to live. ADAM'S OATH Medreamt I was in Paradise, and there, a-drinking wine, I saw our Father Adam, with his flowing golden hair. " O Father ! " was my greeting, " my heart is faint with care : Tell me, tell me, are the Mooslemin of Aalya sons of thine ? " But the noble senior frowned, and his wavy golden hair Grew black as clouds at evening, when thunder thrills the air. " Nay, the Mooslemin of Aalya I disown for sons of mine ! " Then methought I wept, and beat my breast, and begged of him a sign. " O swear it. Father Adam ! " So, dilating out, he sware : " If the Mooslemin of Aalyastan be kith or kin of mine. Let dust for ever darken the glory of my hair ! " z6z JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN NIGHT IS NEARING Allah Akbar! All things vanish after brief careering : Down one gulf life's myriad barks are steering. Headlong mortal ! hast thou ears for hearing ? Pause, be wise : the night, thy night, is nearing ; Night is nearing ! Allah Akbar! Towards the darkness whence no ray is peering. Towards the void from which no voice comes cheer- ing. Move the countless doomed, none volunteering. While the winds rise, and the night is nearing, Night is nearing ! Allah Akbar ! See the palace-dome its pride uprearing One fleet hour, then darkly disappearing ! So must all of lofty or endearing Fade, fail, fall : to all the night is nearing. Night is nearing ! Allah Akbar! Then, since naught abides, but all is veering, Flee a world which sin is hourly searing : Only so mayst front thy fate unfearing. When life wanes, and death, like night, is nearing. Night is nearing ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 263 TO MIHRI My starlight, my moonlight, my midnight, my noon- light, Unveil not, unveil not ! or millions must pine. Ah, didst thou lay bare Those dark tresses of thine, Even night would seem bright To the hue of thy hair, which is black as despair. My starlight, my moonlight, my midnight, my noon- light, Unveil not, unveil not ! or millions must pine. Ah, didst thou disclose Those bright features of thine. The Red Vale^ would look pale By thy cheek which so glows that it shames the rich rose. My starlight, my moonlight, my midnight, my noon- I'ght, Unveil not, unveil not ! or millions must pine. Ah, didst thou lay bare That white bosom of thine. The bright sun would grow dim Nigh a rival so rare and so radiantly fair. My starlight, my moonlight, my midnight, my noon- light. Unveil not, unveil not ! 1 Kuzzil Ragh, the Red Valley : in all probability the Valley of Roses at Edreen. z64 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE CITY OF TRUTH Once I saw a City wide and fair And the pathways were enamelled all : He shall never die who enters there ! There he drinks of life's elixirs all. All the gates thereof are thirty-two, Wreathed gates, with stately pillars tall ; All the terraces of gold-bright hue ; Rich the vineyards and the gardens all. Silver fountain-waters, bright and still. Into alabaster basins fall ; Musk-scents load the airlets from the hill; There the garden-bowers are roses all. There sweet nightingales, Hke living flutes, Bind the senses and the soul in thrall ; Then the trees droop under brilliant fruits. Citrons, dates, pomegranates, peaches all. This fair City is unseen : it lies Isolated from one earthly ball. Ranking higher far than Paradise : 'Tis the goal the angels covet all, 'Tis the City of the Truth alone, And of Truth's inestimable All. They whom Allah from the first hath known. Known and chosen, here are gathered all. Some drink precious wine, some selsibil ^ ; Some in bower, some in palace hall; All are passed the fear of ail and ill : Ecstasy-inebriated all ! 1 The waters of life. HIS SELECTED POEMS 265 Strangers they to passion and to sin ; Terrors shall no more their hours appal ; Neither storms without, nor strifes within. They are tranquil, they are happy, all. Swords are not for these : their days are free. Free from bitter feud and angry brawl. Free from wrangling speech and sophistry; For the Holy Spirit dwells with all. Loving are their words, and honey-sweet, Unadulterate with envy's gall ; All their lives are peace : and when they meet. Oh, they meet indeed as brethren all ! Here are found no lower, higher ranks : Syrian, Turk, Egyptian, Grecian, Gaul, Swart and fair, Arabians, Persians, Franks, Here are linked in common union all. And as Truth is one, as God is one. So these denizens, both great and small. Are combined as one ; and therefore none Seeks to be the Shah, or slave, of all. Yet our Prophet never tutored them ; Neither needed they Mohammed's call ! In the Truth they saw a lovelier gem Shining through the world alike for all,^ So their sect is mankind ; and their creed Thus is worded : God is all in all ! And His will and wish, where'er they lead Are their bliss, their glory, and their all. 1 The author, Mohammed Niazi VI, lies buried in the island of Lemnos, to which he was banished for not speaking the doctrines of Islam strictly by the card. The peculiar character of his heterodoxy may be inferred from these lines. 266 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Never drank they wine from golden bowls. Never wore the diamond-spangled shawl : Thus the devil could not spy these souls Who were shrouded in seclusion all. Early were they rescued from the abyss Of the snares and spells that oft enthrall Man's affections ; and the Bird of bliss Here sits perched upon the heads of all. They, enraptured, as the holy lyre Sweetly vibrates at their festival. Dread not woman, earthquake, storm, nor fire ; Plagues and genii are excluded all. This securest house, this dome where centre All delights, where perils ne'er befall Soul of guest, the houris shall not enter: Angels form the only tenants all. Many lamps, refulgent from afar. Lured them towards the City's lofty wall, Yet was each a pure celestial star, And the hand of God had kindled all. Friend, wouldst thou too gain this glorious goal When the mourners bear thy funeral pall, Now by prayer and fasting cleanse thy soul ! Slay thy vanities and vices all. Look to God ! and then, though natural dusk O'er thy sunless evening sky must fall. Then, though camphor strew thy head for musk, He will beautify and brighten all ! We are voyagers on ocean dark. Yet can never billow, bolt, nor squall. Damage nor dismay our fragile bark, If the Lord but pilot us through all ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 267 Heavenly light will bright our path at length, And that flood shine like another Dall ^ : God is each one's hope and tower of strength. And the hope and tower of strength of all. O stand up ! The serpent and his mates, But not man, were born to creep and crawl ; Reptile enters not the holy gates. Knowst thou not the saints look heavenward all ? How canst grovel in the mire, content As the brute which wallows in the stall ? Dost thou then imagine earth was meant As a burial-den for soul and all ? Harken to Niazi's warning song ! This is not a poet's idle scrawl : Thou must one day travel too along With the last great caravan of all. May thy road be smooth, and mayst thou see All the star-lamps on the City's wall Also beaconing and beckoning thee ! This is his one prayer for thee and all. AN EPITAPH Rests within this lonely mausoleum After life's distraction and fatigue, Leeh Rewaan, a man to hear and see whom Monks and princes journeyed many a league. Yet not Leeh Rewaan himself; but rather Leeh Rewaan's worn-out and cast-ofF dress : 1 Lake of Cashmere. 268 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN He, the man, dwells with his Heavenly Father In a land of light and loveliness. Shah of song he was ; and fond of laughter, Sweet sharaab,-' and silver-spangled shawls. Stranger, mayst thou quaff with him hereafter Life's red wine in Eden's palace-halls ! GOOD COUNSEL Tutor not thyself in science : go to masters for per- fection. Also, speak thy thoughts aloud : Whoso in the glass beholdeth naught besides his own reflection Bides both ignorant and proud. Study not in one art only : bee-like, rather, at a hundred Sources gather honeyed lore ; Thou wert else, that helpless bird which, when his nest has once been plundered. Ne'er can build another more. (34) A GHAZEL Wonder not thou that the Sultan on earth is alone ! So is the sun that illumines the heavens, alone ; So, tho' a forest of flowers have budded and blown, Always the garden sultana, the rose, is alone : The praise be to God ! 1 Shrub, or sherbet. HIS SELECTED POEMS 269 What is there great among mankind but standeth alone ? Lift up the eyes of thy soul to the Ottoman throne, Turn to the Kaaba,^ and look at its wonderful Stone ; These, like the rose and the Sultan, are also alone : The praise be to God ! ^ # Wonder not thou that the Sultan on earth is alone : So is the moon in the hall of the planets alone ; So tho' a hundred rare instruments mingle in tone. Always the glittering crescent-and-bells is alone : The praise be to God ! What can the poet accomplish unless when alone. What, tho' in harness with one who is bone of his bone ? Never feels Lamyeh himself that his soul is his own, Save when he wanders thro' Brusa by moonlight alone : The praise be to God! Wonder not, then, that the Sultan on earth is alone ! So, on the Balkans, the cedar ariseth alone; So, tho' a many rich brilliants emblazon thy zone, Always the emerald, monarch of gems, is alone : The praise be to God! ''r^ So stands the dome of Sophia for exef alone, Stands without sister since EpKesfS pride was o'er- thrown ; . ^ 1 The Holy House of Mecca. 270 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Bagdad is fallen, and Balbec a ruin unknown, Leaving Stamboul and its mosque in their glory alone : The praise be to God ! Countless are Suleiman's beys, but himself is alone : Princes are slaves at his gate, yet he still is alone. So, altho' streams without number flow into the Done,^ Always that father of rivers himself is alone : The praise be to God ! (35) THE TIME OF THE ROSES Morning is blushing; the gay nightingales Warble their exquisite song in the vales; Spring, like a spirit, floats everywhere. Shaking sweet spice-showers loose from her hair. Murmurs half-musical sounds from the stream. Breathes in the valley, and shines in the beam. In, in at the portal that youth uncloses ! It hastes, it wastes, the time of the roses. Meadows and gardens and sun-lighted glades. Palaces, terraces, grottoes, and shades Woo thee; a fairy bird sings in thine ear: Come and be happy ! An Eden h here. Knowest thou whether for thee there be any Years in the future ? Ah, think on how many A young heart under the mould reposes, Nor feels how wheels the time of the roses ! 1 Danube. HIS SELECTED POEMS 271 In the red light of the many-leaved rose Mahomet's wonderful mantle reglows; Gaudier far, but as blooming and tender. Tulips and martagons revel in splendor. Drink from the chalice of joy, ye who may! Youth is a flower of early decay. And pleasure a monarch that age deposes. When past, at last, the time of the roses. See the young lilies, their scimitar-petals Glancing, like silver mid earthier metals : Dews of the brightest, in life-giving showers. Fall all the night on these luminous flowers: Each of them sparkles afar like a gem. Wouldst thou be smiling and happy like them ? O follow all counsel that pleasure proposes ! It dies, it flies, the time of the roses. Pity the roses ! Each rose is a maiden Pranked, and with jewels of dew overladen : Pity the maidens ! The moon of their bloom Rises to set in the cells of the tomb. Life has its winter; when summer is gone. Maidens, like roses, lie stricken and wan. Tho' bright as the burning bush of Moses, Soon fades, fair maids, the time of your roses. Lustre and odors, and blossoms and flowers. All that is richest in garden and bowers. Teach us morality, speak of mortality. Whisper that life is a sweet unreality. 272 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Death is the end of that lustre, those odors : Brilliance and beauty are gloomy foreboders To him who knows what this world of woes is, And sees how flees the time of the roses ! Heed them not, hear them not ! Morning is blushing, Perfumes are wandering, fountains are gushing. What tho' the rose, like a virgin forbidden. Long under leafy pavilion lay hidden ? Now, far around as the vision can stretch. Wreaths for the pencil of angels to sketch, Festoon the tall hills that the landscape discloses. O sweet, tho' fleet, is the time of the roses ! Now the air, drunk from the breath of the flowers. Faints like a bride whom her bliss overpowers; Such and so rich is the fragrance that fills Ether and cloud, that its essence distils. As thro' thin lily-leaves, earthward again. Sprinkling with rose-water garden and plain. O joyously, after the winter closes. Returns and burns the time of the roses ! O for some magical vase to imprison All the sweet incense that yet has not risen, And the swift pearls that, radiant and rare. Glisten and drop thro' the hollows of air ! Vain: they depart, both the beaming and fragrant; So, too, hope leaves us, and love proves a vagrant; Too soon their entrancing illusion closes : It cheats, it fleets, the time of the roses ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 273 Tempest and thunder and war were abroad; Riot and turbulence triumphed unawed; Suleiman rose, and the thunders were hushed, Faction was prostrate, turbulence crushed. Once again peace in her gloriousness rallies; Once again shine the glad skies on our valleys. And sweetly anew the poet composes His lays in praise of the time of the roses ! I, too, Meseehi, already renowned. Centuries hence by my song shall be crowned; Far as the stars of the wide heaven shine. Men shall rejoice in this carol of mine. Lelia ! thou art as a rose unto me : Think on the nightingale singing for thee ! For he who on love like thine reposes Least heeds how speeds the time of the roses. THE TIME ERE THE ROSES WERE BLOWING! Brilliantly sparkle, Meseehi, thy flowing Numbers, like streams, amid lilies upgrowing ; Yet, wouldst thou mingle the sad and sublime. Sing, too, the time. Sing the young time ere the roses were blowing ! Then was the season when hope was yet glowing. Then the blithe year of the spring and the sowing, 1 From the Persian of Zazem Zerbayeh, who died at Ispahan in 1541, in reply to Meseehi's Time of the Roses. 274 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Then the soul dwelt in her own faery clime ; Then was the time. Then the gay time ere the roses were blowing. Soon, ah, too soon came the summer, bestowing Glory and light, but a light ever showing In the chill nearness, the autumn's gray rime : Gone was the time, Gone the fresh time ere the roses were blowing. Life is at best but a coming and going. Now flitting past us on swift, now on slow wing ; Here fair with goodness, there gloomy with crime. O for the time, for the time ere the roses were blowing ! Coldly, ah, coldly goes truth, overthrowing Fancy's bright palaces, coldly goes mowing Down the sweet blossoms of boyhood's young prime : Give us the time. Give us the time ere the roses were blowing ! 1 am Zerbayeh, the least of the knowing ; Thou art Meseehi, the golden and glowing. O when again thou wouldst dazzle in rhyme. Sing of the time. Sing of the time ere the roses were blowing ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 275 TO AMINE, ON SEEING HER ABOUT TO VEIL HER MIRROR Veil not thy mirror, sweet Amine, Till night shall also veil each star ! Thou seest a twofold marvel there : The only face so fair as thine. The only eyes that, near or far. Can gaze on thine without despair. THE HOWLING SONG OF AL MOHARA My heart is as a house of groans From dusky eve to dawning gray ; {Allah, Allah hu /) The glazed flesh on my staring bones Grows black and blacker with decay ; {Allah, Allah hu .') Yet am I none whom death may slay : I am spared to suffer, and to warn, {Allah, Allah hu /) My lashless eyes are parched to horn With weeping for my sin alway. {Allah, Allah hu !) For blood, hot blood that no man sees. The blood of one I slew. Burns on my hands : I cry therefore All night long, on my knees, Evermore : Allah, Allah hu ! 2/6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Because I slew him over wine, Because I struck him down at night, {Allah, Allah hu I) Because he died and made no sign, His blood is always in my sight ! {Allah, Allah hu!) Because I raised mine arm to smite While the foul cup was at his lips; {Allah, Allah hu!) Because I wrought his soul's eclipse. He comes between me and the light. {Allah, Allah hu !) His is the form my terror sees. The sinner that I slew ; My rending cry is still therefore All night long, on my knees, Evermore : Allah, Allah hu ! Under the all-just heaven's expanse There is for me no resting-spot ; {Allah, Allah hu !) I dread man's revengeful countenance; The smiles of woman win me not : {Allah, Allah hu !) I wander among graves where rot The carcasses of leprous men, {Allah, Allah hu !) I house me in the dragon's den Till evening darkens grove and grot. {Allah, Allah hu !) HIS SELECTED POEMS 277 But bootless all ! Who penance drees, Must dree it his life through. (36) My heart-wrung cry is still therefore All night long, on my knees. Evermore : Allah, Allah hu ! The silks that swathe my hall divan Are damascened with moons of gold ; {Allah, Allah hu I) Musk-roses from my gulistan Fill vases of Egyptian mould ; {Allah, Allah hu !) The Koran's treasures lie unrolled Near where my radiant night-lamp burns ; {Allah, Allah hu I) Around me, rows of silver urns Perfume the air with odors old. {Allah, Allah hu I) But what avail these luxuries .'' The blood of him I slew Burns red on all; I cry therefore All night long, on my knees, Evermore : Allah, Allah hu ! Can sultans, can the guilty rich. Purchase with mines and thrones a draught, {Allah, Allah hu I) From that Nutulian ^ fount of which The conscience-tortured whilom quaffed ? {Allah, Allah hu /) 1 Lethean. 278 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Vain dream ! Power, glory, riches, craft, Prove magnets for the sword of wrath ; {Allah, Allah hu!) Thorn-plant men's last and lampless path And barb the slaying angel's shaft. (37) {Allah, Allah hu /) Oh, the blood-guilty ever sees But sights that make him rue As I do now, and cry therefore. All night long, on my knees, Evermore : Allah, Allah hu SAYINGS AND PROVERBS I SAYING OF KEMALLEDIN KHOGENDI The words of the wise and unknown, quoth Zehir, are buds in a garden. Which flower when summer is come, and are culled for the harem by girls ; Or drops of water, saith Saadi, which silently brighten and harden. Till Caliphs themselves exclaim : " They blind me, those dazzling pearls ! " HIS SELECTED POEMS 279 II SAYINGS OF DJELIM, FROM THE BOOK OF VIRTUE OF SCHINASI I, too, was reared in Djelim's house, and thus his pre- cepts run and are : When folly sells the wisdom's crown, 'tis idly gained and dearly bought ; Oh, foremost man of all his race, born under some diviner star Who, early trained, self-reined, self-chained, can practise all that Lokman ^ taught ! The joys and cares of earth are snares : heed lest thy soul too late deplore The power of sin to wile and win her vision from the Eight and Four.2 Lock up thyself within thyself; distrust the stranger, and the fair; (The fool is blown from whim to whim by every gust of passion's gales.) Bide where the lute and song are mute, and as thy soul would shun despair. Avert thine eye from woman's face when twilight falls, and she unveils. 1 Lokman flourished about a thousand years before the Christian eta. He is the greatest of the Oriental moralists ; even Mohammed speaks of him in the Koran with profound reverence. Lokman' s wisdom, like Solomon's, is supposed to have been of divine origin. , . . The maxims of Lokman are ten thousand in number ; and any one of them, says an Arabian com- mentator, is of much greater value than the whole world. 2 The Eight Signs that are to precede the Day of Doom, and the Four Final Things : Death, Judgment, Hell, Heaven. 28o JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Be circumspect, be watchman-like. Put pebbles in thy mouth each day : Pause long ere thou panegyrize; pause doubly long ere thou condemn. Thy thoughts are Tartars, vagabonds : imprison all thou canst not slay. Of many million drops of rain perchance but one turns out a gem. Ill A SAYING OF NEDSCHATI The world is one vast caravanserai Where none may stay. But where each guest writes on the wall this word : O Mighty Lord! IV THREE PROVERBS I Naught, I hear thee say, Can fill the greedy eye ; Yet a little clay Will fill it bye and bye. II An hour of good, a day of ill : This is the lot of mourning man Who leaves the world whene'er he will. But goes to Heaven whene'er he can. HIS SELECTED POEMS 281 III The steed to the man who bestrides it newly, The sabre to him who best can wield it, The damsel to him who has wooed her truly, And the province to him who refuses to yield it. LAMENT FROM THE FAREWELL-BOOK OF AHI Like a cypress tree Mateless in a death-black valley, Where no lily springeth. Where no bulbul singeth. Whence gazelle is never seen to sally. Such am I, woe is me ! Poor, sad, all unknown. Lone, lone, lone. Like a wandering bee. Alien from his hive and fellows, Humming moanful ditties Far from men and cities. Roaming glades the autumn rarely mellows, Such am I, woe is me ! Poor, sad, all unknown. Lone, lone, lone. Like a bark at sea. All whose crew by night have perished Drifting on the ocean, Still with shoreward motion, 282 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Tho' none live by whom hope's throb is cherished, Such am I, woe is me ! Poor, sad, all unknown. Lone, lone, lone. So I pine and dree. Till the night that knows no morrow Sees me wrapped in clay-vest. Thou, chill world, that gavest Me the bitter boon alone of sorrow. Give then a grave to me, Dark, sad, all unknown, Lone, lone, lone. LOVE From eternity the course of love was writ on leaves of snow ; Hence it wanders like a vagrant when the winds of coldness blow ; And the lamp of love is cold and chill where constancy is weak. And the lily comes to pine upon deserted beauty's cheek. From eternity the might of love was writ on leaves of fire; Hence the soul of love in spiral flames would mount for ever higher. And the vermeil sun of Eden won, leaves hope no more to seek. And the damask rose ascends her throne on happy beauty's cheek. HIS SELECTED POEMS 283 From eternity the fate of love was writ on leaves of gloom, For the night of its decay must come, and darkness build the tomb ; Then the waste of life, a garden once, again is black and bleak. And the raven tresses mourningly o'ershadow beauty's cheek. Ah, the joys of love are sweet and false, are sorrows in disguise. Like the cheating wealth of golden eve, ere night break up the skies. If the graves of earth were opened, O if Hades could but speak. What a world of ruined souls would curse the sheen of beauty's cheek ! TRUST NOT THE WORLD, NOR TIME^ Trust not the world, nor time ; they are liar-mates. {Ta Huiy Wealth borrows wings, and woman goes her way. {Ta Hu !) Into the old house with the ebon gates {Ta Hu!) Who enters is but guest, and must not stay. {Ta Hu !) 1 A passage from Hudayl II., a native of Anatolia; he died in 1628, and lies buried near Constantinople. 2 Tlie iamiliar cty of the dervishes. 284 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Look not upon the sun, for that shall die, (ra Hu /) Love not the roses, for they must decay ; (Ta Hu/) The child is caught by all that dupes the eye : (ra Hu!) The man should gird his loins ; he cannot stay. (r« Hu!) From moon to moon time rolleth as a river. (Ta Hu/) Tho' night w^ill soon o'erdark thy life's last ray, (Ta Hu !) Earth is the prison of the True Believer ; {Ta Hu!) And who in prison stipulates to stay ? {Ta Hu!) Up, dreamer, up ! What takest life to be ? {Ta Hu!) Are centuries not made of night and day ? {Ta Hu!) Call now on God while He will list to thee ! {Ta Hu!) The caravan moves on : it will not stay. {Ta Hu!) Remember Him whom heaven and earth adore ; {Ta Hu!) Fast, and deny thyself; give alms, and pray. {Ta Hu!) HIS SELECTED POEMS 285 Thy bark drifts hourly toward the phantom shore; {Ta Hu!) The sails are up, the vessel cannot stay, {Ta Hu !) As yet the accursing scroll is incomplete, {Ta Hu !) But Scales and Bridge ^ maintain their dread array. {Ta Hu!) Now thou art here, now at the judgment-seat, {Ta Hu!) For death and justice brook no long delay. {Ta Hu !) Ah, (trust Hudayi !) he alone from birth {Ta Hu!) Is guided by the Guardian Four^ alway, {Ta Hu !) He is alone the friend of God on earth, {Ta Hu !) Who visits earth, and doth not sigh to stay. {Ta Hu!) 1 "The scales of Judgment, one of which hangs over Paradise, and the other over Hell. The Bridge is laid over the midst of Hell, and is finer than a hair and sharper than the edge of a svirord ; and those who cannot pass this bridge fall into Hell." — Sale's Prelim. Disc. 2 The Guardian Four are the four caliphs next in succesaon to Mahomet : Omar, Ali, Osman, and Abubekhr. 286 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN RELIC OF SERVI When the mourner sits at the feast of woe The wine is gall, and the lights burn low. How bounded my heart in my younger years Ere grief had unlocked the fount of my tears ! Now dead are the roses of hope in their bloom, And those that I loved are dust in the tomb. And of all that gave Servi pleasure or pain His songs and his sorrows alone remain.^ JEALOUSY (38) " My darling tiny little girl, I'll give thee jewelled shoes and dresses, I'll give thee zones of silk and pearl ; And tell me who has combed thy hair ? I'll give thee kisses and caresses. And say : what youth has combed thy hair ? " " O by my word, O by my truth, O by the life of Ali Shah ! Aminah knows no stranger youth. By all the times that thou hast kissed her. Her hair was combed by Zillalah, Her own beloved sister ! " 1 It is a singular coincidence that we find almost the same sentiment in Schutze : " Und mir ist nichts aus jener Zeit geblieben, Als nur dies Lied, mein Leiden und mein Lieban." HIS SELECTED POEMS 287 " My own, my whitest girl, I vow I'll bring thee sweetmeats sugared newly. And tell me, only tell me now Who over-darked thine eyes with hhlf My white Aminah, tell me truly Who over-darked thine eyes with kohl?" " O by my word, O by my soul, by the soul of Ali Shah ! Myself o'er-darked mine eyes with kohl; 'Twas given me by my own dear mother. My whitest mother Fatimah : 1 had it from none other." " My playful girl, I'll give thee rings. And gold, and gems beyond comparing ; I'll give thee thousand costly things ! And say, who bit those lips of thine ? Come, tell what Kuzzilbash so daring Hath bitten those red lips of thine." " O by my love, O by my life ! 'Twas by a bright red rose this morn Given me by Zayde, my brother's wife. These guiltless lips of mine were bitten. (For brightest rose hath sharpest thorn : This, as thou knowest, is written.) '.' " Thou crafty girl, I know thine art ! Dread thou my wrath : I give thee warning. But if thou wouldst regain my heart Speak : tell me who has torn thy shawl ! 288 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Say what young Galionjee this morning Tore thus in twain thy scarlet shawl ? faithless, truthless, worthless jade ! 1 have tracked thee, then, thro' all thy lying. Away ! No jewels, no brocade, No sweetmeats shalt thou have of me. Away, false girl ! Thy tears and sighing Seem worse than even thy lies to be." THE WORLD: A GHAZEL To this khan, and from this khan How many pilgrims came and went too ! In this khan, and by this khan What arts were spent, what hearts were rent too ! To this khan and from this khan Which, for penance, man is sent to. Many a van and caravan Crowded came, and shrouded went too. Christian man and Mussulman, Guebre, heathen, Jew, and Gentoo, To this khan, and from this khan. Weeping came, and sleeping went too. A riddle this since time began. Which many a sage his mind hath bent to : All came, all went ; but never man Knew whence they came, or where they went to ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 289 THE TIME OF THE BARMECIDES (39) My eyes are filmed, my beard is gray, I am bowed with the weight of years ; I would I were stretched in my bed of clay. With my long-lost youth's compeers ! For back to the past, tho' the thought brings woe. My memory ever glides. To the old, old time, long, long ago. The time of the Barmecides ! To the old, old time, long, long ago. The time of the Barmecides. Then youth was mine, and a fierce wild will. And an iron arm in war. And a fleet foot high upon Ishkar's hill. When the watch-lights glimmered afar; And as fiery a barb as any I know That Kurd or Bedouin rides. Ere my friends lay low, long, long ago. In the time of the Barmecides. Ere my friends lay low, long, long ago, In the time of the Barmecides. One golden goblet illumed my board. One silver dish was there ; At hand my tried Karamanian sword Lay always bright and bare ; For those were the days when the angry blow Supplanted the word that chides. 290 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN When hearts could glow, long, long ago. In the time of the Barmecides ; When hearts could glow, long, long ago, In the time of the Barmecides. Thro' city and desert my mates and I Were free to rove and roam. Our diapered canopy the deep of the sky, Or the roof of the palace dome : ours was that vivid life to and fro Which only sloth derides ! Men spent life so, long, long ago. In the time of the Barmecides ; Men spent life so, long, long ago. In the time of the Barmecides. 1 see rich Bagdad once again. With its turrets of Moorish mould. And the Caliph's twice five hundred men Whose binishes flamed with gold ; I call up many a gorgeous show Which the pall of oblivion hides : All passed like snow, long, long ago. With the time of the Barmecides ; All passed like snow, long, long ago. With the time of the Barmecides. But mine eye is dim, and my beard is gray. And I bend with the weight of years. May I soon go down to the house of clay Where slumber my youth's compeers ! HIS SELECTED POEMS 291 For with them and the past, tho' the thought wakes woe, My memory ever abides ; And I mourn for the times gone long ago, For the times of the Barmecides ! I mourn for the times gone long ago. For the times of the Barmecides ! Original Poems II. Pro Patria IRISH NATIONAL HYMN O Ireland, ancient Ireland ! Ancient, yet for ever young, Thou our mother, home and sireland. Thou at length hast found a tongue. Proudly thou, at length, Resistest in triumphant strength ; Thy flag of freedom floats unfurled ; And as that mighty God existeth. Who giveth victory w^hen and where He listeth, Thou yet shalt wake and shake the nations of the world ! For this dull world still slumbers. Witless of its wants or loves, Though, like Galileo, numbers Cry aloud " It moves ! it moves ! " In a midnight dream. Drifts it down time's wreckful stream. All march, but few descry the goal. O Ireland ! be it thy high duty To teach the world the might of moral beauty. And stamp God's image truly on the struggling soul. Strong in thy self-reliance, Not in idle threat or boast, 295 296 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Hast thou hurled thy fierce defiance At the haughty Saxon host ; Thou hast claimed, in sight Of high Heaven, thy long-lost right. Upon thy hills, along thy plains. In the green bosom of thy valleys, The new-born soul of holy freedom rallies. And calls on thee to trample down in dust thy chains ! Deep, saith the eastern story. Burns in Iran's mines a gem, For its dazzling hues and glory Worth a Sultan's diadem. But from human eyes Hidden there it ever lies ! The aye-travailing gnomes alone. Who toil to form the mountain's treasure. May gaze and gloat, with pleasure without measure. Upon the lustrous beauty of that wonder-stone. So is it with a nation Which would win for richest dower That bright pearl, self-liberation : It must labor hour by hour. Strangers, who travail To lay bare the gem, shall fail ; Within itself, must grow, must glow. Within the depths of its own bosom Must flower in living might, must broadly blossom The hopes that shall be born ere freedom's tree can blow. HIS SELECTED POEMS 297 Go on, then, all rejoiceful ! March on thy career, unbowed ! Ireland ! let thy noble voiceful Spirit cry to God aloud ! Man will bid thee speed, God will aid thee in thy need ; The time, the hour, the power are near : Be sure thou soon shalt form the vanguard Of that illustrious band, whom Heaven and man guard : And these words come from one whom some have called a seer. AN INVITATION (40) Friends to freedom ! is't not time That your course were shaped at length ? Wherefore stand ye loitering here ? Seek some healthier, holier clime. Where your souls may grow in strength, And whence love hath exiled fear ! i( Europe, — Southron, Saxon, Celt, Sits alone, in tattered robe. In our day she burns with none Of the lightning-life she felt. When Rome shook the troubled globe. Twenty centuries agone. Deutschland sleeps : her star hath waned. France, the thundress whilom, now 298 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Singeth small, with bated breath. Spain is bleeding, Poland chained ; Italy can but groan and vow ; England lieth sick to death .^ Cross with me the Atlantic's foam, And your genuine goal is won ! Purely freedom's breezes blow, Merrily freedom's children roam. By the daedal Amazon, And the glorious Ohio ! Thither take not gems and gold : Naught from Europe's robber-hoards Must profane the western zones. Thither take ye spirits bold. Thither take ye ploughs and swords. And your fathers' buried bones ! Come ! if liberty's true fires Burn within your bosoms, come ! If ye would that in your graves Your free sons should bless their sires. Make the far green west your home ; Cross with me the Atlantic waves ! 1 " England leidet von einer todtlichen Krankheit, ohne Hoifnung wie ohne HeUung." — England labors under a deadly sickness without hope and without remedy. — Niebuhk, HIS SELECTED POEMS 299^ SOUL AND COUNTRY Arise, my slumbering soul, arise ! And learn what yet remains for thee To dree or do ! The signs are flaming in the skies; A struggling world would yet be free. And live anew. The earthquake hath not yet been born That soon shall rock the lands around. Beneath their base. Immortal freedom's thunder-horn. As yet, yields but a doleful sound To Europe's race. Look round, my soul, and see and say If those about thee understand Their mission here; The will to smite, the power to slay. Abound in every heart and hand. Afar, anear. But, God ! must yet the conqueror's sword Pierce mind, as heart, in this proud year? O dream it not ! It sounds a false blaspheming word, Begot and born of moral fear. And ill-begot ! To leave the world a name is naught; To leave a name for glorious deeds 300 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And works of love, A name to waken lightning thought, And fire the soul of him who reads, This tells above. Napoleon sinks to-day before The ungilded shrine, the single soul Of Washington ; Truth's name, alone, shall man adore, Long as the waves of time shall roll Henceforward on ! My countrymen ! my words are weak. My health is gone, my soul is dark, My heart is chill; Yet would I fain and fondly seek To see you borne in freedom's bark O'er ocean still. Beseech your God, and bide your hour: He cannot, will not, long be dumb; Even now His tread Is heard o'er earth with coming power; ' And coming, trust me, it will come. Else were He dead ! A HIGHWAY FOR FREEDOM " My suffering country shall be freed. And shine with tenfold glory ! " So spake the gallant Winkelried Renowned in German story. HIS SELECTED POEMS 301 " No tyrant, though of kingly grade, Shall cross or darken my way ! " Out flashed his blade; and so he made For freedom's course a highway. We want a man like this, with power To rouse the world by one word; We want a chief to meet the hour, To march the masses sunward. But chief or none, thro' blood and fire My fatherland lies thy way! The men must fight who dare desire For freedom's course a highway. Alas, I can but idly gaze Around, in grief and wonder; The people's will alone can raise The people's shout of thunder. Too long, O friends ! you faint for fear In secret crypt and byway; At last, be men ! Stand forth, and clear For freedom's course a highway. You intersect wood, lea, and lawn With roads for monster wagons. Wherein you speed like lightning, drawn By fiery iron dragons. So do : such work is good, no doubt. But why not seek some high way For Mind, as well ? Path also out For freedom's course a highway ! 302 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Yes, up ! and let your weapons be Sharp steel, and self-reliance. Why waste a burning energy In void and vain defiance. And phrases fierce and fugitive ? 'Tis deeds, not words, that I weigh: Your swords, your guns, alone can give To freedom's course a highway ! TO MY NATIVE LAND Awake, arise, shake ofF thy dreams ! Thou art not what thou wert of yore. Of all those rich, those dazzling beams That once illumed thine aspect o'er. Show me a solitary one Whose glory is not quenched and done. The harp remaineth where it fell. With mouldering frame and broken chord ; Around the song there hangs no spell. No laurel wreath entwines the sword; And startlingly the footstep falls Along thy dim and dreary halls. When other men in future years In wonder ask how this could be. Then answer only by thy tears That ruin fell on thine and thee. HIS SELECTED POEMS 303 Because thyself wouldst have it so, Because thou welcomedst the blow To stamp dishonor on thy brow Was not within the power of earth. And art thou agonized, when now The hour that lost thee all thy worth. And turned thee to the thing thou art. Rushes upon thy bleeding heart ? Weep, weep, degraded one : the deed, The desperate deed, was all thine own ; Thou madest more than maniac speed To hurl thine honors from their throne. Thine honors fell; and when they fell. The nations rang thy funeral knell. Well may thy sons be seared in soul, Their groans be deep by night and day ! Till day and night forget to roll. Their noblest hopes shall morn decay ; Their freshest flowers shall die by blight ; Their brightest sun shall set ere night. The stranger, as he treads thy sod And views thy universal wreck. May execrate the foot that trod Triumphant on a prostrate neck; But what is that to thee ? Thy woes May hope in vain for pause or close. 304 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Awake, arise, shake ofF thy dreams ! 'Tis idle all to talk of power And fame and glory ; these are themes Befitting ill so dark an hour. Till miracles are wrought for thee, No fame nor glory shalt thou see. Thou art forsaken of the earth. Which makes a byword of thy name. Nations, and thrones, and powers whose birth As yet is not, shall rise to fame, Shall flourish, and may fall : but thou Shalt linger, as thou lingerest now. And till all earthly power shall wane. And time's gray pillar, groaning, fall. Thus shall it be ! and still in vain Thou shalt essay to burst the thrall Which binds, in fetters forged by fate, The wreck and ruin of what once was great. HYMN FOR PENTECOST (41) Pure Spirit of the alway-faithful God, Kindler of Heaven's true light within the soul ! Froip the lorn land our sainted fathers trod. Ascends to Thee our cry of hope and dole. Thee, Thee we praise; To Thee we raise Our choral hymn in these awakening days : HIS SELECTED POEMS 305 O send us down anew that fire Which of old lived in David's and Isaiah's lyre. Centuries had rolled, and earth lay tombed in sleep. The nightmare-sleep of nations beneath kings ; And far abroad o'er liberty's great deep Death's angel waved his black and stilling wings. Then struck Thine hour! Thou, in Thy power. But breathedst, and the free stood up, a tower ; And tyranny's thrones and strongholds fell. And men made jubilee for an abolished hell. And she, our mother-home, the famed, the fair. The golden house of light and intellect. Must she still groan in her intense despair? Shall she lie prone while Europe stands erect ? Forfend this. Thou To whom we vow Souls even our giant wrongs shall never bow : Thou wilt not leave our green flag furled, Nor bear that we abide the byword of the world. Like the last lamp that burned in TuUia's tomb Through ages, vainly, with unwaning ray, Our star of hope lights but a path of gloom Whose false track leads us round and round alway. But thou canst ope A gate from hope To victory ! Thou canst nerve our arms to cope With looming storm and danger still. And lend a thunder-voice to the land's lightning-will. 3o6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Descend then, Spirit of the Eternal King ! To thee, to Him, to His avenging Son, The Triune God, in boundless trust we cling: His help once ours, our nationhood is won. We watch the time Till that sublime Event shall thrill the free of every clime. Speed, mighty Spirit! speed its march, And thus complete for earth mankind's triumphal arch. Original Poems III. Those on Miscellaneous Subjects POMPEII (42) The heralds of thy ruin and despair Thickened and quickened as thy time drew nigh : What prodigies of sound convulsed the air ! How many a death-flag was unfurled on high ! The sullen sun went down, a globe of blood, Rayless, and coloring every heart with gloom. Till even the dullest felt and understood The coming of an overwhelming doom, The presage of a destiny and fall, A shock, a thunder-shock, for thee, for them, for all. The sullen sun went down, a globe of blood Rayless, and coloring every soul with gloom; And men's imagination, prone to brood Over the worst, and summon from the womb Of unborn time the evil and the dark, Launched forth in fear upon that shoreless ocean Whose whirlpool billows but engulf the barque. Conjectural dread, and each fresh-felt emotion, Like spectral figures on a magic mirror. Seemed wilder than the last, and stronglier stung with terror. We shrink within ourselves when night and storm Are darkly mustering; for to every soul Heaven here foreshadows character and form Of Nature's death-hour. Doth the thunder roll, 309 310 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN The wild wave boil, the lightning stream or strike, Flood, fire, and earthquake devastate, in vain ? Or is there not a voice which peals alike To all, from these, conjuring up that train Of scenes and images that shall be born In living naked might upon the Judgment Morn ? If thus we cower to tempest and to night. How feltest thou when first the red bolt broke, That seventeen suffocating centuries might Enshroud thine ashes in time's midnight cloak ? Where wert thou in that moment ? Was thy power All a funereal phantom ? thy renown An echo ? thine the triumph of an hour ? Enough ! I rave : when empires, worlds, go down Time's wave to dissolution, when they bow To fate, let none ask where^ but simply what wert thou! The desolated cities which of yore Perished by flooding fire and sulphury rain. Where sleeps the Dead Sea's immemorial shore. Lie, blasted wrecks, below that mortar plain. (43) They fell, thou fellest ! But, renounced of earth. Blotted from being for eternal years, Their image chills the life-blood : thine gives birth Even while we shudder, to some human tears. Hadst thou less guilt ? Who knows ? The book of time Bears, on each leaf alike, the broad red stamp of crime. HIS SELECTED POEMS 311 TWENTY GOLDEN YEARS AGO (44) the rain, the weary, dreary rain, How it plashes on the window-sill ! Night, I guess too, must be on the wane, Strass and Gass^ around are grown so still. Here I sit, with coffee in my cup : Ah ! 'twas rarely I beheld it flow In the tavern where I loved to sup Twenty golden years ago ! Twenty years ago, alas ! — (But stay : On my life, 'tis half-past twelve o'clock ! After all, the hours do slip away. Come, here goes to burn another block. For the night, or morn, is wet and cold. And my fire is dwindling rather low : 1 had fire enough, when young and bold, Twenty golden years ago.) Dear ! I don't feel well at all, somehow : Few in Weimar dream how bad I am. Floods of tears grow common with me now. High Dutch floods, that reason cannot dam. Doctors think I'll neither live nor thrive If I mope at home so ; I don't know ! Am I living now ? I was alive Twenty golden years ago. 1 Street and lane. 312 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Wifeless, friendless, flagonless, alone, Not quite bookless, tho', unless I choose; Left with naught to do, except to groan. Not a soul to woo, except the muse ; — O but this is hard for me to bear, Me, who whilom lived so much en haut. Me, who broke all hearts like chinaware, Twenty golden years ago ! Perhaps 'tis better time's defacing waves Long have quenched the radiance of my brow ; They who curse me nightly from their graves. Scarce could love me were they living now. But my loneliness hath darker ills : Such dun duns as Conscience, Thought and Co., Awful Gorgons ! worse than tailor's bills Twenty golden years ago ! Did I paint a fifth of what I feel, how plaintive you would ween I was ! But I won't, albeit I have a deal More to wail about than Kerner has ! Kerner's tears are wept for withered flowers, Mine for withered hopes; my scroll of woe Dates, alas, from youth's deserted bowers. Twenty golden years ago ! Yet, may Deutschland bardlings flourish long ! Me, I tweak no beak among them ; hawks Must not pounce on hawks : besides, in song 1 could once beat all of them by chalks. HIS SELECTED POEMS 313 Though you find me, as I near my goal, Sentimentalizing like Rousseau, Ah, I had a grand Byronian soul Twenty golden years ago ! Tick-tick, tick-tick ! — Not a sound save time's. And the wind-gust as it drives the rain. Tortured torturer of reluctant rhymes, Go to bed, and rest thine aching brain ! Sleep ! no more the dupe of hopes or schemes. Soon thou sleepest where the thistles blow : Curious anticlimax to thy dreams Twenty golden years ago ! TO LAURA (45) The charm that gilded life is over ! I live to feel I live in vain. And worlds were worthless to recover That dazzling dream of mine again. The idol I adored is broken, And I may weep its overthrow ; Thy lips at length my doom have spoken. And nothing now remains but woe. And is it, indeed, we sever. And hast thou, then, forgotten all ? And canst thou cast me off" for ever, To mourn, a dark and hopeless thrall ? O perfidy ! In friend or foe, In stranger, lover, husband, wife, SH JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Thou art the blackest drop of Woe That bubbles in the cup of life. But most of all in woman's breast Triumphant in thy blasting power. Thou reignest like a demon-guest Enthroned in some celestial bower. Oh, cold and cruel she, who while She lavishes all wiles to win Her lover o'er, can smile and smile, Yet be all dark and false within. Who, when his glances on another Too idly and too long have dwelt. Will sigh as if she sought to smother The grief her bosom never felt ; Who, versed in every witching art That e'er the warmest love would dare. First having gained her victim's heart. Then turns him over to despair! Alas, and can such treachery be ? The worm that winds in slime along. Is nobler, better far than she Who revels in that heartless wrong ! Go now, and triumph in thy guilt. And weave thy wanton spells anew; Go, false as fair, and, if thou wilt. Again betray the fond and true. Yet this, my last and long farewell, Is less in anger than in sorrow ; HIS SELECTED POEMS 315 Mine is the tale which myriads tell Who loathe to-day, and dread to-morrow. Me, Frances ! me thou never knewest. Nor sawest, that if my speech was cold. The love is deepest oft, and truest That burns within the breast untold. My soul was formed for love and grief; These both were blended at my birth ; But lifeless as a shrivelled leaf. Lie now my dearest hopes in earth. I sigh, when none my sighs return ; I love, but am not loved again : Till life be past this heart must burn. With none to soothe or share its pain. Farewell ! In life's gay giddy whirl Soon wilt thou have forgotten me; But where, O most dissembling girl ! Where shall I from thine image flee? Farewell ! for thee the heavens are bright. And flowers along thy pathway lie ; The bolts that strike, the winds that blight Will pass thy bower of beauty by. But when shall I find rest ? Alas, Soon as the winter winds shall rave At midnight, thro' the long dark grass Above mine unremembered grave. 3i6 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN SONNET Bird that discoursest from yon poplar bough, Outweeping night, and in thy eloquent tears Holding sweet converse with the thousand spheres That glow and glisten from night's glorious brow, may thy lot be mine ! that, lonely now. And doomed to mourn the remnant of my years, My song may swell to more than mortal ears. And sweet as is thy strain be poured my vow. Bird of the poets' paradise ! by thee Taught where the tides of feeling deepest tremble, Playful in gloom, like some sequestered sea, 1 too amidst my anguish would dissemble. And tune misfortune to such melody. That my despair thy transports should resemble. CURTAIN THE LAMP Curtain the lamp, and bury the bowl. The ban is on drinking; Reason shall reign the queen of the soul When the spirits are sinking. Chained lies the demon that smote wfth blight Men's morals and laurels. Then hail to health, and a long good night To old wine, and new quarrels ! Nights shall descend, and no taverns ring To the roar of our revels ; HIS SELECTED POEMS 317 Mornings shall dawn but none of them bring White lips and blue devils. Riot and frenzy sleep with remorse In the obsolete potion. And mind grows calm as a ship on her course O'er the level of ocean. So should it be ! for man's world of romance Is fast disappearing, And shadows of changes are seen in advance. Whose epochs are nearing. And the days are at hand, when the best shall require All means of salvation. And the souls of men shall be tried in the fire Of the final probation ! And the witling no longer or sneers or smiles. And the worldling dissembles. And the black-hearted sceptic feels anxious at whiles. And marvels and trembles ; And fear and defiance are blent in the jest Of the blind self-deceiver ; But hope bounds high in the joyous breast Of the childlike believer ! Darken the lamp then, and shatter the bowl, Ye faithfuUest-hearted ! And as your swift years travel on to the goal Whither worlds have departed, Spend labor, life, soul, in your zeal to atone For the past and its errors : So best shall you bear to encounter alone The Event ! and its terrors. 3i8 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN THE DYING ENTHUSIAST (46) Speak no more of life ! What can life bestow In this amphitheatre of strife All times dark with tragedy and woe ? Know'st thou not how care and pain Build their lampless dwelling in the brain, Even as the stern intrusion Of our teachers, time and truth, Turn to gloom the bright illusions Rainbowed on the soul of youth ? Could I live to find that this is so ? Oh ! no, no. As the stream of time Sluggishly doth flow, Look, how all of beaming or sublime Sinks into the black abysm below ! Yea, the loftiest intellect Earliest on the strand of life is wrecked. Naught of lovely, nothing glorious. Lives to triumph o'er decay ; Desolation reigns victorious : Mind is dungeon-walled by clay : Could I bear to feel mine own laid low ? Oh ! no, no. Restless o'er the earth, Thronging millions go : But behold how genius, love, and worth. Move like lonely phantoms to and fro. HIS SELECTED POEMS 319 Suns are quenched, and kingdonis fall. But the doom of these outdarkens all ! Die they then ? Yes, love's devotion. Stricken, withers in its bloom; Fond affections, deep as ocean. In their cradle find their tomb : Shall I linger, then, to count each throe ? Oh ! no, no. Prison-bursting death ! Welcome be thy blow ! Thine is but the forfeit of my breath, Not the spirit, nor the spirit's glow. Spheres of beauty, hallowed spheres Undefaced by time, undimmed by tears, Henceforth hail ! Oh, who would grovel In a world impure as this. Who would weep in cell or hovel. When a palace might be his ? Wouldst thou have me that bright lot forego ? Oh ! no, no. TO JOSEPH BRENAN (47) Friend and brother, and yet more than brother. Thou endowed with all of Shelley's soul ! Thou whose heart so burneth for thy Mother, That, like his, it may defy all other Flames, while time shall roll ! 320 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Thou of language bland, and manner meekest, Gentle bearing, yet unswerving will ! Gladly, gladly, list I when thou speakest : Honored highly is the man thou seekest To redeem from ill ! Truly showest thou me the one thing needful ! Thou art not, nor is the world, yet blind. Truly have I been long years unheedful Of the thorns and tares that choked the weedful Garden of my mind ! Thorns and tares which rose in rank profusion Round my scanty fruitage and my flowers, Till I almost deemed it self-delusion, To attempt or glance at their extrusion From their midnight bowers. Dream and waking life have now been blended Long time in the caverns of my soul ; Oft in daylight have my steps descended Down to that dusk realm where all is ended. Save remeadless dole ! Oft, with tears, I have groaned to God for pity. Oft gone wandering till my way grew dim ; Oft sung unto Him a prayerful ditty. Oft, all lonely in this throngful city, Raised my soul to Him ! And from path to path His mercy tracked me : From a many a peril snatched He me ; HIS SELECTED POEMS 321 When false friends pursued, betrayed, attacked me. When gloom overdarked, and sickness racked me, He was by to save and free ! Friend ! thou warnest me in truly noble Thoughts and phrases : I will heed thee well. Well will I obey thy mystic double Counsel, through all scenes of woe and trouble. As a magic spell ! Yes ! to live a bard, in thought and feeling : Yes ! to act my rhyme, by self-restraint. This is truth's, is reason's deep revealing Unto me from thee, as God's to a kneeling And entranced saint ! Fare thee well ! We now know each the other ; Each has struck the other's inmost chords ; Fare thee well, my friend and more than brother : And may scorn pursue me, if I smother In my soul thy words ! LINES ON THE DEATH OF C. H. (48) I stood aloof: I dared not to behold Thy relics covered over with the mould ; I shed no tear, I uttered not a groan, But Oh, I felt heartbroken and alone. 322 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN How feel I now ? The bitterness of grief Has passed, for all that is intense is brief. A softer sadness overshades my mind. But there thine image ever lies enshrined. And if I mourn, (for this is human, too,) I mourn no longjer that thy days were few. Nor that thou hast escaped the tears and woe. And deaths on deaths the living undergo. Thou fadedst in the springtime of thy years : Life's juggling joys and spirit-wasting fears Thou knewest but in romance : and to thine eyes Man shone a god, the earth a paradise. Thou diedst ere the icy breath of scorn Froze the warm feelings of thy girlhood's morn. Ere thou couldst learn that man is but a slave. And this bleak world a prison and a grave. Thy spirit is at peace : peace ! blessed word Forgotten by the million, or unheard. But mine still struggles down this vale of death. And courts the favor of a little breath. Thro' every stage of life's consuming fever The soul too often is her own deceiver. And revels, even in a world like this. In golden visions of unbounded bliss. But he who, looking on the naked chart Of life, feels nature sinking at his heart, HIS SELECTED POEMS 323 He who is drugged with sorrow, he for whom Affliction carves a pathway to the tomb, He will unite with me to bless that Power Who gathers and transplants the fragile flower Ere yet the spirit of the whirlwind storm Comes forth in wrath to prostrate and deform. And if it be that God Himself removes From peril and contagion those He loves. Weep such no more ; but strew with freshest roses The hallowed mound where innocence reposes. THE WORLD'S CHANGES The solemn Shadow that bears in his hands The conquering scythe, and the glass of sands. Paused once on his flight where the sunrise shone On a warlike city's towers of stone ; And he asked of a panoplied soldier near : " How long has this fortressed city been here ? " And the man looked up, man's pride on his brow : " The city stands here from the ages of old ; And as it was then, and as it is now. So will it endure till the funeral knell Of the world be knoUed, As eternity's annals shall tell." And after a thousand years were o'er. The Shadow paused over the spot once more. 324 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And vestige was none of a city there, But lakes lay blue, and plains lay bare, And the marshalled corn stood high and pale, And a shepherd piped of love in a vale. " How," spake the Shadow, " can temple and tower Thus fleet like mist from the morning hour ? " But the shepherd shook the long locks from his brow: " The world is filled with sheep and corn ! Thus was it of old, thus is it now : Thus, too, will it be while moon and sun Rule night and morn. For Nature and life are one." And after a thousand years were o'er. The Shadow paused over the spot once more. And lo ! in the room of the meadow-lands A sea foamed far over saffron sands. And flashed in the noontide, bright and dark; And a fisher was casting his nets from a barque. How marvelled the Shadow ! " Where, then, is the plain ? And where be the acres of golden grain ? " But the fisher dashed off" the salt spray from his brow : " These waters begirdle the earth alway ; The sea ever rolled, as it rolleth now. What babblest thou about grain and fields ? By night, by day, Man looks for what ocean yields." And after a thousand years were o'er. The Shadow paused over the spot once more. HIS SELECTED POEMS 325 And the ruddy rays of the eventide Were gilding the skirts of a forest wide; The moss of the trees looked old, so old ! And, valley and hill, the ancient mould Was robed in sward, an evergreen cloak : And a woodman sang as he felled an oak. Him asked the Shadow : " Rememberest thou Any trace of a sea where wave those trees ? " But the woodman laughed. Said he : "I trow If oak and pine do flourish and fall. It is not amid seas ! The earth is one forest all." And after a thousand years were o'er, The Shadow paused over the spot once more. And what saw the Shadow ? A city again ; But peopled by pale mechanical men. With workhouses filled, and prisons, and marts, And faces that spake exanimate hearts : Strange picture, and sad ! was the Shadow's thought ; And turning to one of the ghastly, he sought For a clue in words to the when and the how Of the ominous change he now beheld. But the man uplifted his careworn brow : " Change ? What was life ever but conflict and change ? From the ages of eld, Hath affliction been widening her range." " Enough ! " said the Shadow, and passed from the spot : " At last it is vanished, the beautiful youth 326 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Of the earth, to return with to-morrow ; All changes have checkered mortality's lot. But this is the darkest ; for knowledge and truth Are but golden gates to the temple of sorrow." THE DEPARTURE OF LOVE (49) Spirit of wordless love, that in the lone Bowers of the poet's musing soul doth weave Tissues of thought hued like the skies at eve Ere the last glories of the sun are flown ! How soon, almost before our hearts have known The change, above the ruins of thy throne Whose vanished beauty we would fain retrieve With all earth's thrones beside, we stand and grieve. But weep not : for the world's chill breath has bound In chains of ice the fountains of our tears. And ever-mourning memory thenceforth rears Her altars upon desecrated ground. And always, with a low despondful sound. Tolls the disastrous bell of all our years. BEAR UP Time rolleth on ; and with our years Our sorrows grow and multiply, Our visions fade ; With late remorse and withering fears. HIS SELECTED POEMS 327 We look for light to days gone by : But all is shade. Our dear fond friends have long been gone, No moon is up in heaven above ; The chill winds blow. The dolorous night of age comes on : The current of our life and love Moves low, moves slow. Yet earth hath still a twofold dower : On desert sands the palm-trees rise In greenest bloom ; The dawn breaks at the darkest hour ; Stars brightliest shine when midnight skies Are palled in gloom ; The deep hath treasures unrevealed Of gold and gems and argosies And gallant ships ; The sword strikes hurtless on the shield ; And from the once plague-laden breeze Health greets thy lips ! Thou, therefore, man, shalt never droop, Shalt never doubt, shalt always trust The power of God : Thou art not heaven's or nature's dupe ! This fleshly hull shall rot in dust, A trodden clod. But wilt thou cower, tho' death draw nigh ? The mouldering frame, the eternal soul. Which, say, is best ? Thou canst not live unless thou die. 328 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Thou must march far to reach thy goal Of endless rest. Bear up, even tho' thou be like me Stretched on a couch of torturing pain This weary day ; Tho' heaven and earth seem dark to thee, And thine eye glance around in vain For one hope-ray ! Tho' overborne by wrong and ill, Tho' thou hast drained even to the lees Life's bitter cup, Though death and hell be round thee, still Place faith in God : He hears. He sees. Bear up ! Bear up ! TWO SONNETS TO CAROLINE Have I not called thee angel-like and fair? What wouldst thou more ? 'Twere perilous to gaze Long on those dark-bright eyes, whose flashing rays Fill with a soft and fond, yet proud, despair The bosoms of the shrouded few, who share Their locked-up thoughts with none. Thou hast their praise ; But Beauty hears not their adoring lays Which tremble when but whispered to the air. Yet think not, altho' stamped as one of those. HIS SELECTED POEMS 329 Ah, think not thou this heart hath never burned With passion deeply felt and ill-returned. If ice-cold now, its pulse no longer glows. The memory of unuttered love and woes Lies there, alas, too faithfully inurned. II For once I dreamed that mutual love was more Than a bright phantom thought ; and when mankind Mocked mine illusion, then would I deplore That ignorance, and deem them cold and blind ; And years rolled on, and still did I adore The unreal image loftily enshrined In the recesses of mine own sick mind. Enough : the spell is broke, the dream is o'er, The enchantment is dissolved ; the world appears The thing it is, a theatre, a mart. Genius illumines, and the wand of art Renews the wonder of our childish years ; Power awes, wealth shines, wit sparkles ; but the heart. The heart is lost, for love no more endears. ENTHUSIASM Not yet trodden-under wholly. Not yet darkened, O my spirit's flickering lamp ! art thou : Still, alas, thou wanest, tho' but slowly, * 330 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And I feel as if my heart had hearkened To the whispers of despondence now. Yet the world shall not enthrall me. Never, never ! On my briary pathway to the grave Shapes of pain and peril may appal me. Agony and ruin may befall me. Darkness and dismay may hover ever; But, cold world, I will not die thy slave. Underneath my feet I trample You, ye juggles : Pleasure, passion, thirst of power and gold. Shall I, dare I, shame the bright example Beaming, burning, in the deeds and struggles Of the consecrated few of old ? Sacred flame which art eternal, O bright essence. Thou, enthusiasm ! forsake me not. Ah, tho' life be reft of all her vernal Beauty, ever let thy magic presence Shed its glory round my clouded lot. THE LOVELY LAND: ON A LANDSCAPE PAINTED BY MACLISE Glorious birth of mind and color ! Gazing on thy radiant face, The most lorn of Adam's race Might forget all dolor! HIS SELECTED POEMS 331 What divinest light is beaming Over mountain, mead, and grove! That blue noontide sky above. Seems asleep and dreaming. Rich Italia's wild-birds warble In the foliage of those trees : I can trace thee, Veronese, In these rocks of marble ! Yet, no ! Mark I not where quiver The sun's rays on yonder stream ? Only a Poussin could dream Such a sun and river. What bold imaging ! Stony valley. And fair bower of eglantine ; Here I see the black ravine. There the lilied alley. This is some rare climate olden, Peopled, not by men, but fays; Some lone land of genii days, Storyful and golden ! for magic power to wander One bright year through such a land ! Might I even one hour stand On the blest hills yonder ! But — what spy I? . . . Here by noonlight 'Tis the same ! the pillar-tower 1 have oft passed thrice an hour. Twilight, s.unlight, moonlight. 332 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Shame to me, my own, my sireland. Not to know thy soil and skies ! Shame, that through Maclise's eyes I first see thee, Ireland ! Nay, no land doth rank above thee Or for loveliness or worth : So shall I, from this day forth, Ever sing and love thee. FRONTI NULLA FIDES Beware of blindly trusting To outward art. And specious sheen ; For vice is oft encrusting The hollow heart Within, unseen. See that black pool below thee ! There heaven sleeps In golden fire. Yet whatsoe'er it show thee. The mirror's deeps Are slime and mire. SIBERIA (50) In Siberia's wastes The ice-wind's breath Woundeth like the toothed steel : HIS SELECTED POEMS 333 Lost Siberia doth reveal Only blight and death. Blight and death alone. No summer shines ; Night is interblent with day ; In Siberia's wastes, alway The blood blackens, the heart pines. In Siberia's wastes No tears are shed, For they freeze within the brain : Naught is felt but dullest pain, Pain acute, yet dead ; Pain as in a dream. When years go by Funeral-paced, yet fugitive ; When man lives and doth not live. Doth not live, nor die. In Siberia's wastes Are sands and rocks. Nothing blooms of green or soft, But the snow-peaks rise aloft. And the gaunt ice-blocks. And the exile there Is one with those; They are part, and he is part ! For the sands are in his heart, And the killing snows. 334 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Therefore, in those wastes None curse the Czar. Each man's tongue is cloven by The north blast, that heweth nigh With sharp scimitar. And such doom each drees, Till, hunger-gnawn. Cold-slain, he at length sinks there ; Yet scarce more a corpse than ere His last breath was drawn. A VISION OF CONNAUGHT IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY ("Et moi, j'ai ete aussi en Arcadie." — And I, I, too, have been a dreamer. — Inscription on a Painting by Poussin. ) I walked entranced Through a land of morn ; The sun, with wondrous excess of light, Shone down and glanced Over seas of corn And lustrous gardens aleft and right. Even in the clime Of resplendent Spain, Beams no such sun upon such a land; But it was ihe time, 'Twas in the reign, Of Cahal Mor of the Wine-red Hand.i 1 The Irish and Oriental poets agree in attributing &votable or unfavor- able weather, and abundant or deficient harvests, to the good or bad qualities of the reigning monarch. Mor means great. HIS SELECTED POEMS 335 Anon stood nigh By my side a man Of princely aspect and port sublime. Him queried I, " O my Lord and Khan ! ^ What clime is this, and what golden time ? " When he : " The clime Is a clime to praise, The clime is Erin's, the green and bland ; And it is the time, These be the days. Of Cahal Mor of the Wine-red Hand ! " Then saw I thrones. And circling fires. And a dome rose near me, as by a spell. Whence flowed the tones Of silver lyres. And many voices in wreathed swell ; And their thrilling chime Fell on mine ears As the heavenly hymn of an angel-band : " It is now the time. These be the years. Of Cahal Mor of the Wine-red Hand ! " I sought the hall. And behold ! a change From light to darkness, from joy to woe. Kings, nobles, all, 1 Ceann, the Gaelic title for a chief. 336 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Looked aghast and strange ; The minstrel group sat in dumbest show. Had some great crime Wrought this dread amaze. This terror ? . . . None seemed to understand. 'Twas then the time, We were in the days, Of Cahal Mor of the Wine-red Hand. I again walked forth ; But lo, the sky Showed flecked with blood, and an alien sun Glared from the north, And there stood on high. Amid his shorn beams, a skeleton ! ^ . . . It was by the stream Of the castled Maine, One autumn eve, in the Teuton's land. That I dreamed this dream Of the time and reign Of Cahal Mor of the Wine-red Hand. ^ "It was but natural that these portentous appearances should thus be exhibited on this occasion, for they were the heralds of a very great calamity that befell the Connacians in this year ; namely, the death of Cahal of the Red Hand, son of Torlogh Mor of the Wine, and King of Connaught, a prince of most amiable qualities, and into whose heart God had infused more piety and goodness than into the hearts of any of his contemporaries." — Annals of the Four Masters, a.d, 1224, HIS SELECTED POEMS 337 THE SAW-MILL My path lay towards the Mourne again ; But I stopped to rest by the hillside That glanced adown o'er the sunken glen, Which the saw-and-water-mills hide, Which now, as then, The saw-and-water-mills hide. And there, as I lay reclined on the hill. Like a man made by sudden qualm ill, (51) I heard the water in the water-mill, And I saw the saw in the saw-mill. As I thus lay still, I saw the saw in the saw-mill. The saw, the breeze, and the humming bees Lulled me into a dreamy reverie. Till the objects round me, hills, mills, trees. Seemed grown alive all and every ; By slow degrees Took life, as it were, all and every ! Anon the sound of the waters grew To a mournful ditty. And the song of the tree that the saw sawed through Disturbed my spirit with pity. Began to subdue My spirit with tenderest pity ! " O wanderer ! the hour that brings thee back Is of all meet hours the meetest. 338 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN Thou now, in sooth, art on the track. Art nigher to home than thou weetest ; Thou hast thought time slack, But his flight has been of the fleetest ! For thee it is that I dree such pain As, when wounded, even a plank will ; My bosom is pierced, is rent in twain, That thine may ever bide tranquil. May ever remain Henceforward, untroubled and tranquil. In a few days more, most lonely one ! Shall I, as a narrow ark, veil Thine eyes from the glare of the world and sun, 'Mong the urns in yonder dark vale, In the cold and dun Recesses of yonder dark vale ! For this grieve not ! Thou knowest what thanks The weary-souled and the meek owe To Death ! " . . . I awoke, and heard four planks Fall down with a saddening echo. I heard four planks Fall down with a hollow echo. HIS SELECTED POEMS 339 THE ONE MYSTERY 'Tis idle ! we exhaust and squander The glittering mine of thought in vain ; All-baffled reason cannot wander Beyond her chain. The flood of life runs dark ; dark clouds Make lampless night around its shore : The dead, where are they ? In their shrouds ! Man knows no more. Evoke the ancient and the past; Will one illumining star arise ? Or must the film, from first to last, O'erspread thine eyes ? When life, love, glory, beauty, wither. Will wisdom's page, or science' chart. Map out for thee the region whither Their shades depart ? Supposest thou the wondrous powers To high imagination given, Pale types of what shall yet be ours, When earth is heaven ? When this decaying shell is cold. Ah, sayest thou the soul shall climb That magic mount she trod of old, " Ere childhood's time ? And shall the sacred pulse that thrilled, Thrill once again to glory's name ,? 54° JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN And shall the conquering love that filled All earth with flame, Reborn, revived, renew^ed, immortal, Resume his reign in prouder might, A sun beyond the ebon portal Of death and night ? No more, no more ! . . . With aching brow. And restless heart, and burning brain. We ask the when, the where, the how. And ask in vain. And all philosophy, all faith. All earthly, all celestial lore. Have but one voice, which only saith : Endure^ adore, THE NAMELESS ONE Roll forth, my song, like the rushing river That sweeps along to the mighty sea ; God will inspire me while I deliver My soul of thee ! Tell thou the world, when my bones lie whitening Amid the last homes of youth and eld. That once there was one whose veins ran lightning No eye beheld. Tell how his boyhood was one drear night-hour. How shone for him, through his grief and gloom, No star of all heaven sends to light our Path to the tomb. HIS SELECTED POEMS 341 Roll on, my song, and to after ages Tell how, disdaining all earth can give. He would have taught men, from wisdom's pages, The way to live. And tell how trampled, derided, hated. And worn by weakness, disease, and wrong. He fled for shelter to God, who mated His soul with song ; With song which alway, sublime or vapid, Flowed like a rill in the morning-beam. Perchance not deep, but intense and rapid : A mountain stream. Tell how this Nameless, condemned for years long To herd with demons from hell beneath. Saw things that made him, with groans and tears, long For even death. Go on to tell how with genius wasted. Betrayed in friendship, befooled in love. With spirit shipwrecked, and young hope blasted, He still, still strove, Till, spent with toil, dreeing death for others, (And some whose hands should have wrought for him, If children live not for sires and mothers,) His mind grew dim ; And he fell far through that pit abysmal. The gulf and grave of Maginn and Burns, And pawned his soul for the devil's dismal Stock of returns ; 342 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN But yet redeemed it in days of darkness, And shapes and signs of the final wrath, When death, in hideous and ghastly starkness, Stood on his path. And tell how now, amid wreck and sorrow. And want, and sickness, and houseless nights. He bides in calmness the silent morrow That no ray lights. And lives he still, then ? Yes ! Old and hoary At thirty-nine, from despair and woe, He lives, enduring what future story Will never know. Him grant a grave to, ye pitying noble. Deep in your bosoms : there let him dwell ! He, too, had tears for all souls in trouble Here, and in hell. Notes by the Editor Note i, page 115. If our dear friend. Master Edmund Spenser, had had his way in the south of Ireland, we should hardly have occasion to be thankful for a contemporary poet in the north, and his Roisin Dubh. In A View of the Present State, Spenser puts in the mouth of Irenaeus a plea for the extermination of the bards, already greatly injured by the penal statutes under Elizabeth. " I have caused divers of them to be translated unto me that I might understand them, and surely they savored of sweet wit and good inven- tion . . . sprinkled with some pretty flowers of their own natural device, which gave good grace and comehness unto them. . . . But they seldom use to choose unto them- selves the doings of good men for the ornaments of their poems ; but whomsoever they find to be most licentious of life, most bold and lawless in his doings, most dangerous and desperate in all parts of disobedience and rebellious disposition, him they set up and glorify in their rhymes, him they praise to the people, and to young men, make an example to fol- low." Had they but sung Gloriana ! 2, p. iz8. The illustrious Colonel Owen Roe O'Neill, nephew of the Earl of Tyrone, had, like most Irish exiles to Spain, seen service in Flanders. He returned home in 1642, and headed the revolt in Ulster. The royalist war was crushed by Cromwell, but O'Neill was already dead (1648). 3, p. 129. Donogh Mac Con-Mara (a name sometimes incorrectly given as Macnamara), a native of County Water- ford, wrote this very lovely lyric in Gaelic, while he was keep- 343 344 NOTES ing a boys' school in Hamburg. He was a great traveller, and had a most adventurous life. He was born in 1738, and dying in 1 8 14, was buried at home. 4, p. 131. The peculiarly eighteenth-century Irish note of this characteristic poem is reason enough for its inclusion. The "marble" brow, the grave genealogical details, and the unavoidable reference to Helen of Troy, are most hedge- schoolmasterly touches. 5, p. 135. Neillidhe Bhan is an anonymous production. Its vehemence and incoherence stamp it as genuinely felt, as well as genuinely conceived. The lover boasts, in the first stanza, how gladly he would " breast the Shannon's waters " to reach the North, and in the third mentions " the flooding Shannon ' ' as the reason of his absence ! 6, p. 137. This O'Hussey is an undiscovered genius. In the Ode for Cuconnaught in the North with Hugh (his same chief, Hugh Maguire) occur some magnificent apostro- phes, which should have adorned Lyra Celtica : — **Thou joy, thou promise, thou sprightly salmon ! Thou beauteous azure ocean-wave ! Thou pourer of panic into the breasts of heroes ! " The close of the avran in the poem translated by Mangan will appeal to every reader, in its concentrated passion. 7, p. 141. "No Irish pilgrim," says a sympathetic writer, " ascends the Janiculum without thinking of Mangan, and mentally repeating, ' O Woman of the Piercing Wail.' " The celebrated poem has an intense monotony, comparable to Homer's catalogue, in its imagination of scenes and circum- stances which might have comforted by corroboration the Lady Nuala O'Donnell, and brought to her side a host of fellow-mourners. From this very Celtic circumstance it draws much of its powerful effect. It was included, long ago, in Gavan Duffy's Ballad Poetry of Ireland (the best anthology of the sort extant), and deeply impressed one of the finest of NOTES 345 English critics. Concerning the book. Lord Jeffrey wrote to Mrs. Empson : " There are some most pathetic and many most spirited pieces, and all, with scarcely an exception, so entirely national. Do get the book and read it. I am most struck with Soggarth Aroon, after the first two stanzas, and a long, racy, authentic-sounding dirge for the Tyrconnell Princes." 8, p. 1 50. Mangan made this translation in the early part of 1847. "I have not been able," he says, "to dis- cover the name of the author. ' ' There seems to be a great deal of Mangan in it, as it stands. In general character, however, it reminds one both of Neillidhe Bhan (Ellen Bawn) and the last three stanzas of the second part of The Coolun, a ballad put into enchanting English by Sir Samuel Fergu- son: — **0 had you seen the coolun Walking down by the cuckooes street ! " 9, p. 152. Eoghan O' Sullivan the Red, an interesting Gaelic poet, cousin to Gaolach (Timothy) O'SuUivan, more celebrated than himself, died in 1784. 10, p. 156. "Dathi, nephew to Niall by his brother Fiachra, was the last pagan king of Ireland, and reigned twenty-three years. His proper name was Fearadhach ; but he was surnamed Dathi, from the rapidity with which he used to put on his armor : ' Daitheadh,' in the Irish lan- guage, signifying swiftness. He pillaged Gaul and carried his arms even to the Alps, where he was suddenly struck dead by a thunderbolt from heaven, thus expiating his sacri- legious cruelty to Parmenius, a man highly distinguished for sanctity, a.d. 428, a.m. 5627." — From Cambrensis Ever- sus, seu Potius Historica Fides in Rebus Hibernicis Giraldo Cambrensi Abrogata, by Gratianus Lucius (John Lynch), 1662. 1 1, p. 162. Sarsfield commanded a division of the loyal U6 NOTES Irish forces, nominally under King James the Second, at the battle of Boyne Water, 1688. "Change kings," he said in the bitter moment of his defeat, " and let us fight it over." He went into exile With the other Irish nobles and gentry, (the first of the never-forgotten "Wild Geese" of popular ballads), entered the service of France, and closed a most chivalrous career by a death on the battlefield of Landen (1693), where Luxembourg was victorious over the Allies. This most remarkable of the Farewells to the Earl, at the time of his going over sea, is full of unique and vehement expressions, which will repay the study of any humanist. 12, p. 166. "Donegal Castle," says Thomas D'Arcy M'Gee, "the chief seat of the princely family of the O'Donnells, stands now in ruins, in the centre of the village of the same name, at the head of Donegal Bay. It was built in the fifteenth century, and shows, even in its decay,, royal proportions." It now belongs to the Lord Arran. Hugh the Red O'Donnell, Earl of Tyrconnell, fired it before leaving for Spain, a.d. 1607, lest it should be defiled by English occupation. The original poem must have been composed by some one perfectly familiar with the castle interior, prior to the Elizabethan wars, but the bard's name has not come down to us. He may even be the same to whom we owe Roisin Dubh. 13, p. 173. Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan and all the poems which follow, in this division, except the Dirge for O' Sulli- van Beare, are relics of the Jacobite insurrections, chiefly of the immortal '45. "The King's son" is, of course. Prince Charles Edward. " The Irish Jacobites claimed the Stuarts as of the Milesian line, fondly deducing them from Fergus." The popular lyrics of that day, which were written in Ire- land, in the English tongue, have the tang of novelty and wildness, but lack, in many instances, the odd exquisite ten- derness of Shule Aroon and The Blackbird. As in Scotland, some of the sweetest of the Jacobite lyrics date from a gen~ NOTES 347 eration or more after the event ; so nothing written under the Georges, who hated "boets," is so good an English poem out of Ireland as its modern successors : Callanan's spir- ited Avenger, or The Wild Geese, and a few other lyrics of Katharine Tynan (Mrs. Hinkson). The Gaelic compositions of the loyalists were very much more numerous, and of superior quality. Mangan translated a great many, among which I have endeavored to choose the best. They cannot for a moment, however, be compared to the simpler, briefer songs floating con- temporaneously about the Highlands of Scotland. Mr. Ed- ward Hayes, in the introduction to his collected Ballads of Ire- land, remarks : " The poets of the last century looked forward more to a religious than to a political deliverer, whence their effusions were more dynastic than national, more Jacobite than Irish. When they sang of Ireland, it was in connec- tion with the fallen dynasty. They longed for the union of Una and Donald, in other words, Ireland and the Stuart. They addressed their country as a beloved female, to disguise the object of their affection. Sometimes it was Sabia from Brian Bora's daughter of that name; sometimes it was Sheela Ni Guira, or Cecilia O'Gara; Maureen Ni Colle- nan, Kathleen Ny Houlahan, Roseen Dhuv ; more fre- quendy Granu Weal, or Grace O'Malley, from a princess of Connaught who rendered herself famous by her exploits and adventures. The poet beheld his beloved in a vision, and wandering in remote places, bewailed the suffering of his country. He rests himself beneath the shade of forest trees, and seeks refuge from his thoughts in calm repose. There appears to his rapt fancy one of those beautiful creatures we have named. Language is not suificiendy copious to de- scribe all her charms. He addresses her, and asks her if she be one of the fair divinities of old, or an angel from heaven to brighten his pathway through life and restore peace to his afflicted country. She replies that she is Erin of the Sorrows, once a queen, but now a slave. After she enumerates all the 348 NOTES wrongs and iniquities which she is enduring, she prophesies the dawn of a brighter day, when her exiled lord shall be restored to his rightful inheritance. This was the style adopted by most of the Jacobite poets of the last century, to express the sufferings of their country and their hope of deliverance from oppression. We question if imagination could originate a style of song more pathetic in its allusions or more powerful in its results." Not every one will agree with Mr. Hayes' estimate. The allegorical style surely seems to readers of to-day a most mistaken, far-fetched, and ineffective device. It led to indescribable sameness and conventionality, exactly what was to be expected of the curious brood of pedants who gave Ireland her Delia Cruscan eighteenth- century literature. Says Mrs. Hinkson very neatly, in her preface to Irish Love Songs: "Some of these were laborers, some peddlers, some hedge-schoolmasters, — all alike touched with genius, wit, fire, and learning (for it was a time when the Irish peasant had the dead languages at his fingers' ends) ; all alike scamps, in a simple and virtuous age, and adding to their scampishness a Voltairean spirit much out of its due time and place." Scotland had also her lesser dash of pseudo- classicism, which went far towards ruining some of her invaluable Prince Charlie songs. Of "the lad that I'll gang wi'," the romantic lad with "phillabeg aboon the knee," we are told in almost the next breath that "you'd tak him for the god o' war." In Egan O'Rahilly's Vision, rendered by Mangan, who reported only what he found, the distressed virgin, the Brightest of the Bright, has crystals for eyes, a mirror for a bosom, crimson glories for cheeks ; and she looked, as was inevitable, like "a daughter of the Celestial Powers." There is no " highfalutin " of this sort in Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan. The ballads under that name are almost as good as the group entitled Roisin Dubh, which are a century and a half earlier. From John Mitchel we NOTES 349 receive an explanatory passage regarding them, and Man- gan's felicitous handling of them. "In these translations, as well as those from the German, Mangan did not assume to be literal in words and phrases. Nor, indeed, in gen- eral, was there any uniform unvarying version of the original poems, to which he could be literal, because they lived, for the most part, only in the memories of the illiterate peas- antry ; and Gaelic scholars, in their researches for authentic originals, usually found three or four different ballads, on the same subject and under the same name, having some lines and verses identical, but varying in the arrangement ; always, however, agreeing in cadence and rhythm, in general scope and spirit. To this scope and spirit he was always faithful." Here is a second Kathaleen, from our translator's pen, in The Poets and Poetry of Munster : — In vain, in vain we turn to Spain : she heeds us not, Yet may we still, by strength of will, amend our lot ; O yes ! our foe shall yet lie low ; our swords are drawn For her, our queen, our Caitilin Ny Uallachain. Yield not to fear : the time is near. With sword in hand We soon will chase the Saxon race far from our land. What glory then to stand as men on field and bawn And see, all sheen, our Caitilin Ny Uallachain ! How tossed, how lost, with hopes all crossed we long have been ! Our gold is gone ; gear have we none, as all have seen. But ships shall brave the ocean wave, and morn shall dawn On Eire green, on Caitilin Ny Uallachain ! Let none believe this lovely Eve outworn or old ; Fair is her form, her blood is warm, her heart is bold. Tho' strangers long have wrought her wrong, she will not fawn, Will not prove mean, our Caitilin Ni Uallachain ! Her stately air, her flowing hair, her eyes that fer Pierce thro' the gloom of Banba's doom, each like a star ; Her songful voice that malces rejoice hearts grief hath gnawn, Prove her our queen, our Caitilin Ni Uallachain ! 3 so NOTES We will not bear the chains we wear, not bear them long ! We seem bereaven, but mighty heaven will make us strong : The God who led thro' Ocean Red all Israel on, Will aid our queen, our Caitilin Ni Uallachain ! A word as to Ny-Houlahan. " Ny " is the correct Gaelic substitute, in a female name, for the tribal " Mac " or " O." As Mr. Conor MacSweeny reminds his countrywomen : "A lady who writes ' O ' or ' Mac ' to her name calls herself ' son ' instead of ' daughter. ' What should we say of a Hebrew lady who would write herself • Esther, son of Judah ? ' I therefore advise every Irish lady to substitute 'Ni' (pronounced 'Nee') for 'O' or 'Mac' ... In Irish we never use ' O ' or ' Mac ' with a woman's name ; and why must it be done in English ? ' ' Among the love-names for Ireland just quoted from Hayes' Ballads are several which have been from the beginning asso- ciated with the most beautiful wild old airs : notably Moirin Ni Chuillionain (Little Mary Cullenan) and Sighile Ni Gar a (Celia O'Gara). To the second version of Roisin, quoted in the introduction to this book, "Since last night's star," etc., belongs also a strangely lovely air in A minor, full of rushing sixteenth notes, which may be found, unharmonized, in The Poets and Poetry of Munster. "The Silk o' the Kine," one of the most touching phrases on the lips of the Irish of bygone rebellion, has been exquisitely celebrated by Mr. Aubrey de Vere. " The silk o' the kine shall rest at last : What drove her forth but the dragon-fly ? In the golden vale she shall feed full &st, With her mild gold horn, and her slow dark eye.** There is no " genuine " Irish Jacobite poetry more quiet, tender, and convincing than that. 14, p. 174. William Heffernan, surnamed Dall, or the Blind, of Shronehill, County Tipperary, wrote this poem just NOTES 351 before Culloden. The Sotig of Gladness, which follows Wel- come to the Prince, has its justification in the extraordinary energy of the close. 15, p. 179. "Shieling," defined as a poor cabin or shelter for a shepherd or fisher, is familiar to ballad-lovers, and occurs contemporaneously with Lochiel's muster of the Camerons : — "Then up the wild Glennevis, And down by Lochy's side. Young Donald left his shieling, And Malcolm left his bride." 16, p. 1 8 2. Geoffrey Keating, born in 1570, died in 1650. 1 7, p. 1 84. " The words to this spirited air are the pro- duction of a violent Jacobite. By leathering away with the wattle, he implies his determination to decide political differ- ences by an appeal to physical force. The watde was a stout cudgel or ailpin." Cotter has the courage to be antiqua- rian and national in his pretty poem ; and yet he cannot leave out the She — "that launched a thousand ships, And burnt the topless towers of Ilium." 18, p. 190. Muircheartach Oge, of the Barony of Beara, called in English Murtagh, or Mortimer, The Young O' Sullivan, was a disaffected chieftain descended from Donal of the Ships, who occupied himself ten years after Culloden in raising troops (the celebrated Wild Geese) for France, the ally of the Stuarts against England. He had served with distinction at Fontenoy, and was received with open arms by the people of the south, on his return to recruit for the French cause. His story, a strange, grimly romantic one, was cut short by his betrayal and assassination in 1756. This is the substance of Mangan's note, too long for incor- poration. The Gaelic manuscript of the poem was found in 3SZ NOTES Castletown about 1825 by Jeremiah Joseph Callanan, who made a close translation of it. Compare with Mangan's more imaginative passage (in the last stanza but one) : — " Dear head of my darling ! How gory and pale These aged eyes see thee High-spiked on the jail ! That cheelc in the summer sun Ne'er shall grow warm, Nor that eye e'er catch light But the flash of, the storm." The caoine is a fine specimen of the terrible Hebraic invec- tive of the race ; the original is supposed to be the composi- tion of The O'Sullivan's old nurse, upon whose lips the lament is placed. The passages in parentheses may be taken to be the customary chorus of women, as at a "wake," re- peating, with swayings of their bodies, the melancholy word and tone of the keener. Mangan has used his favorite re- frain here with ghastly effect. The penultimate stanza, the weak one among the nine, seems to have had no warrant in the original, as it is not in the Callanan transcription. 19, p. 199. Something in the impression of heard music which this lyric leaves, reminds one of Wordsworth's High- land Reaper. It may be worth while to append Rijckert's poem, for the pleasure of comparison. Which is lovelier, it would take Apollo, expert among Sicilian reeds, to decide. DAS EINE LIED Ich weiss der Lieder viele Und singe was ihr liebt. Das ist wohl gut zum spiele, Weil Wechzel Freude giebt ; Doch hatte Lieb' und Friede Genug an einem Liede, Und fragte nicht, wo's hundert giebt. NOTES 353 Jiingst sah ich einen Hirten Im stillen Wiesenthal, Wo klare Bachlein irrten Am hellen Sonnenstrahl. Er lag am schatt'gen Baume, Und blies als wie im Traume £in Lied auf einem Blattlein schmal. Das Lied, es mochte steigen Nur wenig Ton, hinauf, Dann musst' es hin sich neigen Und nahm denselben Lauf. Es freut' ihn immer wieder ; Gern hatt ich meine Lieder, Geboten all dafiir zum Rauf. £r blies sein Lied, und liess es, Und sah sich urn in Hag, Hub wieder an und blies es, Ich schaute wie er lag ; Er sah bei seinem Blasen Die stillen Lammlein grasen, Und langsam fliehn der Sommertag. zo, p. 211. " Batde droops his clotted wing": a line worthy of Keats. 21, p. 215. This poem of Herder's is founded on a fragment of folk-lore very general in Europe, and at its best, perhaps, in the wonderful Breton ballad of Seigneur Nann. All English readers will recall it as nearly identical with Lord Ronald my Son, although this has no direct mention of supernatual interference, nor is its "true love" a fay. 2 2, p. 220. There is no line-repetition in IVenn die Rosen bliihen. It ends : — "Evng nun genesen, Wirst du neu ergluhn Wirst ein himmlich Wesen, Wenn die Rosen bliihn." 354 NOTES 23, p. 220. UHLAND'S FRISCHE LIEDER Wie wenn an Strom, ben lange Ein Winter eingezwangt, Im Lenzhauch mit Gesange Verjiingt die Fesseln sprengt ; Wie wenn nach Jahr und Tagen Ein Baum, einst bliithenreich, Fangt Bliithen an zu tragen Den alten ganzUch gleich j Wie wenn ein Wein, verschlossen Im Fasse Jahre lang, Kommt wieder frisch geHossen, Ein dustender Gesang ; Wie wenn auf dnmal wieder Ein rief ger Dom ertont, Dem Ohr, an Vogellieder, Seit Jahren nur gewohnt, Schien mir^s, ist mir's geworden, Als jiingst nach Jahren lang, Du Haupst von Liederorden ! Frisch tonte dein Gesang. 24, p. 221. Emerson's "Then will yet my Mother yield A pillow in her greenest field, Nor the June daisies scorn to cover The clay of their departed lover,'* is in the same key as these stanzas of Kerner's Sangers Trost» Mangan has somehow missed the simplicity of the ending : — "Blumen, Hain, und Ane, Stern und Mondenlicht, Die ich sang ! vergessen Ihres Sangers lucht.*' NOTES 355 25, p. zz6. The Ride Around the Parapet is placed as the first of a group of five which are called translations, for mere convention's sake. They are, rather, voluntaries of an extraordinary sort on German themes ; elaborate, jocose em- broideries on provided cloth-of-frieze. The Lady Eleanora von AUeyne is a very magnificent presentation, circa 1 840, of the New Woman. Compare "Nun warte bis ein andrer kommt meder, der es kann, Das Fraulein Kumgunde von Kynast ! Ich habe schon Weib und Kinder, und werde nicht dein Mann, Das Fraulein Kumgunde ! " with Mangan's extremely pointed and espiegle enlargement of it: — " Mayest bide until they come, O stately Lady Eleanor, O Lady Eleanora von AUeyne ! Mayest bide until they come, O stately Lady Eleanor ! And thou and they may marry ; but for me, I must not tany : I have won a \yife already out of Spain, Virgin Lady Eleanora, Virgin Lady Eleanora von Alleyne ! " And again, the pleasing specifications about the forfeit, at the close, are hardly to be traced to the plain statement : — " Miiss er rait Geld ach losen wenn er nicht kiisst die Braut, Das Fraulein Kunigunde ! " Besides, the whole much-extended poem is crowded throughout with enriching detail of all kinds, and every new stroke tells. " It is a very fine ballad," Ruckert might say, " by my friend Mangan." 26, p. 234. SEHNSUCHT (cONRAD WETZEl) Kennt ihr das schone Eiland Weit draussen im Meer so wust. Wo der Morgenrothe Reigen, Und der Sonnen Ausgang ist ? 3S6 NOTES O dahin mocht ich ziehen Dahin steht mir mein Sinn ! Dahin wer kann mich ftihren ? Wer weiss den Weg dahin ? 27, p. 235. August Kopisch : Des Kleinen Volkes Ueberfahrt. z8, p. 238. Enough has been said of this fantasia in the Introduction, as also of Riickert's beautiful ghazel which follows it. 29, p. 244. For " Ambi netnici sono, ambi fii servi," this is certainly a clouded rendition. 30, p. 248. This translation of the eternally-translated Dies Irae occurs in Mangan' s rendering of Das Nordlicht von Kazan. 31, p. 253. The Karamanian Exile. See the note on Joseph Brenan. 32, p. 260. Relic of Prince Bayazeed. The second line is almost too reminiscential of Keats' dying saying: " I feel the flowers growing over me." The third and fourth refer to a very ancient custom mentioned by most Oriental poets : the bell rung for the starting of the caravan, and the cry raised of Ar Rahil, Ar Rahil! (Depart, Depart). 33, p. 260. A late corroboration of the known opinion of dear old Roger Ascham, as also of Dr. Johnson. 34, p. 268. Says Thomas Fuller : "Keep a common- place book : for he that with Bias carries all his learning about him in his head, will utterly be beggared and bankrupt, if a vio- lent disease, like a merciless thief, should rob and strip him. ' ' 35, p. 270. In this ghazel, the second line and the line next to the last foreshadow Arnold's great and well-known two : — " Alone the sun arises, and alone Spring the great streams." NOTES 357 36, p. 277. "Dree," to endure, to undergo; a word set down in the dictionaries as "Scotch or obsolete," but in common use with Mangan and other Irish poets, and with most people in Ireland, to this day. 37, p. 278. The recurrent sounds of a, a, a, a, in this concluding stanza of a splendid poem, are atrocious, and show an almost inconceivable carelessness on the part of their author. They are hardly outdone by that musical passage in How we brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix : — " Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit ! " 38, p. 286. Jealousy is very close akin to Victor Hugo's La Voile ; somewhat less so to Mr. Charles De Kay's pow- erful IJlf in Ireland. 39, p. 289. The Time of the Barmecides. Rejected readings : — Line I, " Mine eyes are dimmed, my hair is gray." Line 15, '* And a barb as iiery as any I know." Lines 17, 19, 27, 29, "'Twas a long, long time back, long ago." Line 33, "Whose armor glowed like gold." Mangan was always an admirable reviser. 40, p. 297. This and the following poem were written some time before the first great Irish famine (1847) drove countless immigrants to America. A number of Mangan' s exhortations were proved prophetic by the event, in this as in other matters. 41, p. 304. First printed in The Irish Tribune, in 1848, hence named by the author The Tribune's Hymn for Pentecost. 42, p. 309. A couple of stanzas from a poem by John Ed- mund Reade are worth printing in connection with Pompeii. " O thou Vesuvius ! that risest there. Image of drear eternity, alone Seated in thy own silent fields of air ; Titan, whose chainless struggles have but shown 358 NOTES The annihilating powers are still thine own, Parent of lightnings, and the tempest's shroud, Crowning, or round thy giant shoulders thrown in majesty of shadow, ere the cloud Break on the nether world in fulmined wrath avowed. Grave of dead cities thou ! thy heart is lire. Thy pulse is earthquake ; from thy breast are rolled The flames in which shall penal earth expire ; Thy robes are of the lava's burning fold, Thine armed hand the thunderbolt doth hold. Thy voice is as the trump that calls to doom ; Creator and destroyer ! who hath told What world of life lies buried in thy womb. What mightiest wrecks are sunk in thy absorbing tomb ? " This is the very twin of Mangan's poem, and both echo Byron to the life. 43, p. 310. The fourth line in the fifth verse of Pompeii seemed to have suffered from the printers. There are but two possible readings ; that given in the text, and one only less likely : — "Like blasted wrecks, bestrew that mortar plain," 44, p. 311. From the German of " Selber ' ' ! 4S>P'3i3- From "Cascagni," forsooth. Rejected read- ings (from a shorter version) : — Line i, "The life of life is gone and over." Lines 37, 38, "Go thou, exulting in thy guilt, And weave thy wanton web anew." And the last stanza : — " But where shall I find rest ? Alas, When first the winter wind shall wave The pale wildflower, the long dark grass. Above mine unremembered grave ! ' ' This poem has borne two other titles : T'o Frances, and The Last Reproach. Its author was apparently also under the NOTES 359 Shakespearean shadow in those days. " Less in anger than in sorrow ' ' is popularly supposed to spring from Hamlet, Act I., Scene v., and — "smile and smile Yet be all dark and false wthin," has possibly been heard of before, in the second scene of the same act. 46, p. 318. Written in 1832, in Mangan's twenty-ninth year. Entided variously by him The Dying Enthusiast, The Dying Enthusiast to his Friend, The Dying Enthusiast to his Child. 47, p. 319. This touching poem, addressed to a friend who had not then attained his majority, marks for us one of Clarence Mangan's moods of bitter awakening and self- reproach, — moods often renewed, often outworn, as years passed. He revered Brenan, not without reason. Born in Cork, in 1828, "all of Shelley's soul" got fitly and promptly into the National Movement twenty years later, and suffered for it in Kilmainham Jail. In the October of 1 849, Brenan went to New York, and did some journalistic work there ; his marriage followed, with a sister of his old colleague, John Savage, and presently he moved to New Orleans, attaching himself first to the staff of The New Orleans Delta, then becoming editor of The New Orleans Times. He died in May of 1857, at Shelley's own early age. Joseph Brenan' s verses have never been collected, but they have singular beauty ; one of them, a psean for Char- lotte Corday, is sometimes met with in the anthologies. It is to him, in a measure, that we Americans owe one of our few fine sectional songs : Maryland, my Maryland. The following extract is copied from Fifty Tears among Authors, Books, and Publishers, by Derby, New York, 1884: "James Ryder Randall, who wrote Maryland, my Maryland, when a young man was a schoolmaster in Louisiana, but was born 36o NOTES in Baltimore, Maryland. . . . The editor of The New Orleans Delta, who encouraged young Randall's efforts at poetry, gave him a volume of the poems of James Clarence Mangan, and the weird melodies and wasted life and melan- choly death of the unfortunate Irish poet made an indelible impression on his mind. He was especially struck with the rhythm of one poem, purporting to be translated from the Ottoman, and entitled The Karamanian Exile. One day, while the melody of The Karamanian Exile was running through his brain, Mr. Randall rode to the Mississippi River, seven miles distant, to get his mail. Among it was a copy of the Delta containing an account of the passage of the Massachusetts troops through Baltimore, and of the riot which occurred there, which he read with the deepest interest. Agitated by the thrilling news, indignant at what he consid- ered an outrage on his native city, and anxious about relatives and friends, there was no sleep for Randall that night. For some unaccountable reason, as he kept thinking of these events in Baltimore, the stirring melody of The Karamanian Exile seemed to run through his head ; so much so, that he appeared possessed with its spirit, and in a moment the whole scheme of his Maryland, my Maryland was formed in his brain. He sat down at his desk, and in less than an hour the poem was completed. Next day he read it to his scholars, the most of whom were Creoles, and it fired them to such a degree of enthusiasm that he decided to send it to the Delta for publi- cation. Its success was electrical." The "book of Mangan' s poems" mentioned as given to Mr. Randall must have been Mitchel's edition, printed just before Brenan's death. Up to that very time. The Kara- manian Exile would have been inaccessible, except in news- paper or manuscript form. The author of Maryland, my Maryland is still living. 48, p. 321. " From the Irish." 49, p. 326. Another reading (September, 1835): — NOTES 361 "Spirit of wordless Love, that in the lone Bowers of the poet's museful soul doth weave Tissues of thought, hued like the robes of eve Ere the last glories of the sun have shone ! How soon, almost before our hearts have known The change, above the ruins of thy throne, Whose trampled beauty we would fein retrieve By all earth's thrones beside, we stand and grieve ! We weep not, for the world's bleak breath hath bound In triple ice the fountains of our tears ; But ever-mourning Memory thenceforth rears Her altars upon desecrated ground. And always, with a low despairful sound. Heavily tolls the bell of all our years." The altered version (1841) is much superior to this one ; but neither sonnet has the octette perfect in form, as the sixth, seventh, and eighth lines seem to have changed places. It is singular that Mangan's seeing eye (a "regardful " eye, as he might have preferred to call it) allowed the irregularity to pass uncorrected. 50, p. 332. There is a truly Slavic gloom about this too intense little poem. 51, p. 337. The "man made by sudden qualm ill" is too bad ! We have reason to fear, too, that it was inten- tional. It is not the only grotesque touch in a most original lyric. Cornell University Library PR 4973.A15 1897 James Clarence Mangan, his selected poems 3 1924 013 521 194 II j!l ■ L. Ill i ililiiilillili 't!!il!it!illl|i!ii!! 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