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 i LIBKARY OF O.XGHESS. t 
 
 
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 ^UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. f 
 
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LOVE AND LAND 
 
 POEMS: 
 
 MICHAEL SCANLAN. 
 
 CHICAGO : 
 
 THE WESTERN NEWS COMPANY. 
 1866. 
 
,^b -J^^ 
 
 ,d 
 
 Entered according to Act of Coagress, in the year 1866, by 
 MICHAEL SCANLAN, 
 In the Clerk's office of the District Court of the United States for the Northern District 
 of Illinois. 
 
 Tribune Co., Printers. Clarke & Co., Binders. 
 
PATRICK W. DUNNE, 
 
 PEORIA, ILLINOIS. 
 
 Sir: — Permit me, in friendship's name, to inscribe this book to you. 
 
 These Poems have been written during my connection with the Fenian 
 Brotherhood, and to the spirit of nationality which the organization revivi- 
 fied is due whatever merit, if any, they possess. 
 
 I have endeavored to fan that old spirit of our race into a stronger and 
 more concentrated flame — " Hatred to England," v/hich is the strongest 
 manner of expressing " Love for Ireland." To the Irish reader, for whom 
 alone these Poems are written, this will cover a multitude of sins. 
 
 I remember the pleasant summer eves of long ago in Ireland, when the 
 " lads and lasses " used to meet under the spreading trees, and to the music 
 of the harp and fiddle dance the pleasant reels and planxties out beneath 
 the moon and stars — 
 
 Heart and harp-strings timing, 
 Feet and fingers rhyming ! 
 
 Ah ! in all their wanderings over land and sea, at picnics, balls, bazaars, in 
 banquet-hall or greenwood, with the music of Germany or Italy to set the 
 light feet going, they have never known such soul-enjoyment as that they 
 knew on the village greens of Ireland. Why is this } Because they 
 danced their own music in their own land. 'T was partly in the harper, 
 but most in the music and in their own hearts ! 
 
 Indeed, my only hope lies in these two things — I sing of Ireland and 
 for Irish hearts ! Many have struck our country's lyre to grander strains, 
 but none with a more loving hand. 
 
 Having an unwavering faith in the triumph of Irish nationality over our 
 brutal and unmerciful enemy, I have endeavored to instil the same into the 
 
IV DEDICATION. 
 
 following Poems as forcibly and as plainly as I knew how, and if they only 
 add some fuel to the flame that is now burning so brightly, I shall be 
 satisfied. 
 
 The signs of the times are ominous, and if our countrymen will be 
 steadfast in the future as they have been heroic in the past, working with 
 an untiring enthusiasm, not flying the track at seeming disasters, admitting 
 no such things as disasters, as sure as God lives and is just, our country shall 
 take her place — "The brightest among the stars." 
 
 That tall fabric, " British Domination," raised on broken hearts and 
 ruined nations, is crumbling to pieces. England to-day is living on her 
 past greatness, and dare not test her strength with a fourth-rate power ! It 
 is the dwellers in the temple, those who have an inside view of the rent 
 along the walls, and feel the rumbling of the coming storm, that foretell 
 " England's downfall ! " Hurra ! 
 
 England is growing old ; Ireland 's growing young. 
 England is growing weak ; Ireland 's growing strong. 
 
 Fenianism has done more already than most men can see on the surface 
 of things. It is the miner who has been silently and steadily working for 
 years, and whose labor is not felt until the explosion. England fcch that 
 there are men working, and her very uncertainty is as bad as the explosion. 
 
 You, Sir, as one of the men who nurtured this National Brotherhood in 
 its youth, and led it when grown strong, with a heart to feel, a mind to 
 execute, and a purse ever open to our country's cause, deserve the thanks 
 and esteem of every Irishman whose heart beats true to native land. 
 
 It is with these feelings that I inscribe this book to you, and have the 
 honor to remain 
 
 Your Friend, 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Address to the Fenians, 
 
 The Fenian Men, . 
 
 Woman, 
 
 A Plea for Tears, . 
 
 The Emigrant, 
 
 Once my Harp was Tuned to War, , 
 
 The Revelers, . 
 
 The Golden Days of Boyhood Years, 
 
 Past and Present, 
 
 Love comes but once unto the Heart, 
 
 When Dew-Drops fell soft, 
 
 You say I never Sing of You, 
 
 They lie who tell us Love has Wings, 
 
 The Spring-Time in Ireland, 
 
 The Land of Dreams, . 
 
 The Flight of Freedom, 
 
 Let us all be Loving, 
 
 When Night unfurls her Raven Wing, 
 
 The Hudson, Rhine, and Shannon, 
 
 Home Musings, 
 
 The Outlaw's Serenade, 
 
 Bow the Head and Bend the Knee, . 
 
 Look Up, 
 
 Farewell to Summer, 
 
 The Past, 
 
 Build not your Hopes on Life's drear Waste, 
 
 PAGK 
 
 7 
 II 
 
 13 
 
 15 
 17 
 19 
 
 22 
 
 25 
 27 
 
 30 
 32 
 33 
 34 
 36 
 40 
 41 
 43 
 45 
 48 
 
 50 
 52 
 54 
 57 
 58 
 60 
 
 63 
 
C O N T E N TS 
 
 Fleeting Joys of Earth, . 
 
 Captain O'Hay, 
 
 Washington's Name, 
 
 Innishowen, 
 
 Love and Youth, 
 
 Life's Undoing, 
 
 How softly falls Snow, . 
 
 The Beautiful City of Derry, 
 
 When other Lips will fondly Prove, 
 
 The Death of the Favorite, 
 
 The Mariner's Hymn, . 
 
 Sunshine and Shadow, 
 
 When You meet Bright Eyes, 
 
 How False and how Sweet, . 
 
 Have You e'er heard of Old Garryowen ? 
 
 Thro' Tears of Love, 
 
 Castle Mahon, 
 
 The Sea, .... 
 
 Soggarth Ma Chree, 
 
 The Return of Captain McCann, 
 
 Resurgam ! . 
 
 New Words for Old Airs. 
 
 No. 1. Limerick is Beautiful, 
 
 « 2. We '11 Sing of Thee, Dear Ireland, 
 
 «* 3. Old Song (Imitation of a Street Ballad), 
 New Words — Our Native Land, 
 
 ** 4. For Freedom and for Erin, 
 
 " 5. The Minstrel's Lament, 
 
 « 6. Dear Old Ireland, 
 
 « 7. The Tree of Memory, 
 
 « 8. Through the Green Valley 
 
 " 9. Ridgeway, 
 
 " 10. The Dead not Dead, 
 
 "II. The Flag of Green, . 
 
 " 12. Sweet Bells Chiming, 
 
 67 
 69 
 
 72 
 74 
 77 
 80 
 82 
 
 83 
 90 
 
 91 
 92 
 
 93 
 94 
 96 
 
 97 
 102 
 
 103 
 
 105 
 107 
 no 
 "5 
 
 119 
 121 
 
 123 
 
 128 
 
 130- 
 132 
 
 135 
 137 
 140 
 142 
 144 
 146 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 No. 13. 
 
 I Stand upon my Native Hills, 
 
 148 
 
 « 14. 
 
 Nora of Cahirciveen, 
 
 . 149 
 
 " 15. 
 
 Spirit of Liberty, . . . • 
 
 151 
 
 « 16. 
 
 Banish all Care, .... 
 
 • 153 
 
 « 17. 
 
 The Faithful One, . . . . 
 
 IS5 
 
 « 18. 
 
 The Shamrock is the Fairest Flower, 
 
 . 156 
 
 " 19. 
 
 The Raid of the Saxon, 
 
 158 
 
 " 20. 
 
 When the Moon Advances, 
 
 . 160 
 
 " 21. 
 
 Spirit of Wine, . . . . 
 
 163 
 
 " 22. 
 
 The Message to Ireland, 
 
 . 165 
 
 « 23. 
 
 When the Hopes of our Land, 
 
 167 
 
 Star of the Evening, ..... 
 
 . 170 
 
 The Bachelor's Soliloquy, . . . . . 
 
 172 
 
 Our Duty to 
 
 the Dead, ..... 
 
 . 184 
 
 For Freedom and for Logan, . . . . 
 
 187 
 
 The Exiles, 
 
 . 
 
 . 190 
 
 Mabel Graeme, ...... 
 
 201 
 
 Love of Country Universal, .... 
 
 . 207 
 
 The Sword and Cross, . . . . . 
 
 241 
 
 The Road tc 
 
 the Barrel of Beer, 
 
 . 250 
 
 Mulligan, 
 
 . 
 
 254 
 
 Roberts' Appeal, , . . . . 
 
 • a57 
 
ove and €and. 
 
 ADDRESS TO THE FENIANS. 
 
 Sons of the Gael, in Innisfail, and eke beyond the sea, 
 Whose guiding light thro' life has been the star of liberty, 
 Within whose souls the spirit rolls that brooks not gyve nor 
 
 chain. 
 Who walk the path of purity, thro' obloquy and pain, 
 " Fall in ! " with those whose ranks oppose the tyrants of 
 
 the earth. 
 Whether they hail from o'er the sea or boast of kindred 
 
 birth. 
 Who flaunt their flag from ev'ry crag that frowns o'er vale 
 
 and glen, 
 Your motto — *' Golden principle: let vassals worship 
 
 men." 
 
8 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Our blind belief in clan and chief has dwarf'd the nation's 
 
 mind. 
 While others swept futurity, we sadly gazed behind; 
 We closed our ears to the deafening cheers of the nations 
 
 marching on. 
 And groped amidst the tombs until the sons of light had 
 
 gone ; 
 And we were left, of hope bereft, sad, pitiful, alone. 
 Poor mendicants, who lived upon the glories that were 
 
 flown. 
 Our cots, and homes, our fathers' tombs, razed by the 
 
 spoiler's hand. 
 Who made a wilderness of woe out of our Eden land. 
 
 Thank Heaven, at last the clouds have pass'd that fogg'd 
 the nation's mind. 
 
 And light has pierced the prison walls, and dungeons can- 
 not bind : 
 
 From Freedom's camp, with solid tramp, our legions hurry 
 forth — 
 
 The workers from the South and West, the thinkers from 
 the North. 
 
 No clan or creed dissensions breed, no faction's withering 
 blight, 
 
 Can throw its bridge of death across the living waters 
 bright : 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 9 
 
 But despots quake and nations shake beneath their mighty 
 
 tread. 
 Whose voices, hymning "Liberty," might wake the very 
 
 dead. 
 
 Let those v^hose souls some fool controls go kiss the tyrant's 
 
 rod ; 
 We stand erect before all men, and bow alone to God. 
 Let bats and owls, with mystic scowls, mope thro' the 
 
 shadows dun; 
 But we are eagles, and can gaze, unblinking, at the sun ; 
 And, as we tread above the dead, who died for liberty. 
 We swear to die as they have died, or live, like freemen, 
 
 free. 
 Thro' fire and blood, by field or flood, the path to freedom 
 
 lies. 
 We'll track her up tho' at every foot a soldier falls and dies. 
 
 Ho ! men, unite ! arise and smite the foul oppressor down. 
 And trample 'neath your ' rugged feet the sceptre, throne 
 
 and crown ! 
 And fling aside the parricide who to our race belongs. 
 Who thrives upon our country's woes, who fattens on her 
 
 wrongs : 
 And let him hear that round the bier of Liberty there stand 
 Ten million hearts to paralyze the tyrant's bloody hand! 
 
lO LOVE AN D L AN D. 
 
 We cry, at length, in our pride and strength, " Let despots 
 
 do their worst ; 
 They cannot forge a chain so strong the people cannot 
 
 burst." 
 
 Away with speech ; and, brother, reach me down that 
 
 rifle gun ; 
 By her sweet voice, and hers alone, the rights of man are 
 
 won ; 
 Fling down the pen ; when heroic men pine sad in dun- 
 geons lone, 
 'T is the bay'net, bright with good red blood, should plead 
 
 before the throne. 
 No idle fears, no woman's tears, can give our souls relief: 
 Those founts are dried, and, now, we love and hate too 
 
 deep for grief, 
 Each vow, each pray'r, is lost in air ; no deed has back'd 
 
 our word : 
 'Tis muscle, now, must speak, and use, for argument, the 
 
 sword. 
 
 Oh ! land of mine, droop not nor pine ; we'll break thy 
 
 prison bars ; 
 Thy name that 's trampled in the dust we '11 trace amid the 
 
 stars ; 
 For ev'ry heart that 's rent apart for beating true to thee. 
 
LOVE AN D LAN D. II 
 
 We swear by Heaven to quench a hearth in tears of agony. 
 Tho' all our years of love and tears are gone, alas ! in vain, 
 And nought but sad experience and dauntless souls remain. 
 We'll raise the cry of Victory, and press defiant on ; 
 Nor pause upon our march of mind till freedom's goal is 
 won. 
 
 THE FENIAN MEN. 
 
 See who come over the red-blossomed heather. 
 
 Their green banners kissing the pure mountain air, 
 Heads erect, eyes to front, stepping proudly together : 
 Sure Freedom sits throned in each proud spirit there. 
 
 Down the hills twining. 
 
 Their blessed steel shining, 
 Like rivers of beauty they flow from each glen. 
 
 From mountain and valley 
 
 'T is Liberty's rally. 
 So out, and make way for the Fenian Men ! 
 
 Our prayers and our tears have been scoffed and derided, 
 They 've shut out God's sunlight from spirit and mind - 
 
 Our Foes were united, and We were divided. 
 We met, and they scattered us all to the wind; 
 
12 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 But once more returning. 
 
 Within our veins burning 
 The fires that illumined dark Aherlow glen. 
 
 We raise the old cry anew. 
 
 Slogan of Con and Hugh — 
 Out, and make way for the Fenian Men ! 
 
 We have men from the Nore, from the Suir and the 
 Shannon ; 
 Let the tyrants come forth — we'll bring force against 
 force ; 
 Owr pen is the sword and our voice is the cannon — 
 Rifle for rifle and horse against horse. 
 
 We 've made the false Saxon yield 
 Many a red battle field — 
 God on our side, we will do. so again. 
 Pay them back woe for woe. 
 Give them back blow for blow — 
 Out, and make way for the Fenian Men ! 
 
 Side by side for this cause have our forefathers battled, 
 
 When our hills never echoed the tread of a slave. 
 On many green fields, where the leaden hail has rattled. 
 Thro' the red gap of glory, they marched to the grave. 
 And they who inherit 
 Their names and their spirit. 
 
LOVE AN D L AN D. IJ 
 
 Will march 'neath our Banners of Liberty; then 
 
 All who love Saxon law. 
 
 Native or Sassenah, 
 Out, and make way for the Fenian Men ! 
 
 Up for the cause then, fling forth our Green Banners ; 
 From the East to the West, from the South to the 
 North — 
 Irish land, Irish men, Irish mirth, Irish manners — 
 From the mansion and cot let the slogan go forth. 
 Sons of Old Ireland, now. 
 Love you our sireland, now ? 
 Come from the kirk, or the chapel, or glen ; 
 Down with all Faction old. 
 Concert and action bold, 
 This is the creed of the Fenian Men. 
 
 WOMAN. 
 
 There 's nought of earth in woman's love. 
 For 't is a joy o'erflowed from heav'n, 
 
 A spirit from the fields above, 
 
 To tell that man is half forgiv'n ! 
 
 Her eyes that light the waste of time, 
 
14 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 And robe the earth in summer bloom. 
 Her voice that hymns the theme sublime 
 Of life and love beyond the tomb. 
 
 She came when Man disconsolate. 
 
 From Eden's glories had to part ; 
 When Angels shut the golden gate, 
 
 She flew like sunshine to his heart. 
 Since then he 's been her worshiper — 
 
 She 's made the earth so wondrous fair, 
 'T is sweeter rove its fields with her 
 
 Than Eden's bowers and want her there. 
 
 Come, Man, thou thing of sordid birth 
 
 And look into her azure eyes. 
 And feel thou 'rt formed of common earth 
 
 And she is moulded for the skies. 
 Then wear her in your inmost heart. 
 
 For she is sent to cheer and bless. 
 And when her light and love depart. 
 
 The world is but a wilderness. 
 
 Thro' shade and sunshine you will find 
 Beside you still her gentle form. 
 
 That sways in summer's softest wind, 
 But bends not in the winter storm. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Man's crude love must pass thro' flame. 
 From passion's fiery furnace rise ; 
 
 But Woman's love is all the same. 
 On earth below^ or in the skies. 
 
 15 
 
 A PLEA FOR TEARS. 
 
 The tears of love that down the cheek 
 
 Of mourning beauty roll. 
 Are but the silver tongues that speak 
 
 The language of the soul. 
 Words are void and meaningless. 
 
 But w^hen those dev^^-drops shine 
 Upon the cheeks of loveliness. 
 
 Their language is divine. 
 
 Within the bosom some huge grief 
 
 Swells o'er the spirit's chords. 
 And bursting upward finds relief 
 
 In burning, liquid words. 
 The fever'd heart, like arid sand, 
 
 All dead and parch'd appears. 
 Till, touched by the enchanter's wand. 
 
 It blooms neath pity's tears. 
 
l6 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Behold the son of labor stand 
 
 Beside his dying wife ; 
 Old lovers they — still hand in hand. 
 
 Symbolic of their life,* 
 And as her eyes grow cold and dull. 
 
 His tears alone that speak. 
 Like gems rough set, how beautiful 
 
 They shine upon his cheek. 
 
 Then blush not when the heartless chide 
 
 Your falling tears of woe. 
 For beauty is still beautified 
 
 When pity bids them flow. 
 'T is not from common clay they start. 
 
 Their source is in the skies. 
 And angels bear them to the heart — 
 
 Their fount is woman's eyes. 
 
 * In old Irish poetry the lives of man and wife are always spoken of as one. 
 Two lives that flow in one." 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I7 
 
 THE EMIGRANT. 
 
 The apple boughs were dripping dew 
 
 On my pathway — 
 The robin sung the meadows thro' 
 
 His plaintive lay — 
 The vallies never looked so sweet 
 
 As on that day. 
 When from my childhood's blest retreat 
 
 I turned away 
 To breast the wild and searching sleet 
 
 That sweeps the world's highway. 
 
 I turned upon the mountain heath 
 
 To look my last. 
 And gazing o'er the vales beneath 
 
 My tears fell fast ; 
 Bright eyes that sparkled long ago 
 
 Rose soft in view. 
 Sweet voices floated from below. 
 
 That I well knew 
 Were but the echoes of my woe. 
 
 From 'neath the churchyard yew. 
 
 Soon like despair 'twixt man and truth, 
 The mountains gray 
 
l8 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Shut out the valleys of my youth 
 
 Where my soul lay ; 
 I felt, let Time laugh e'er so bright 
 
 Along my way. 
 He never could bring back the light 
 
 Of Life's young day — 
 The soul that thro' the gloomiest night 
 
 Beheld the morning gray! 
 
 How fast the stern and rock-ribbed coast 
 
 Fades from my sight, 
 Soon — soon the green hills will be lost 
 
 In endless night ; — 
 The morn will rise on wings of gold. 
 
 And the sad sea 
 Unto the hills will sing her olc 
 
 Weird melody. 
 Yet / will never more behold 
 
 Thy beauties gra ma chree ! 
 
 I had proud dreams when other times 
 And days were here. 
 
 When Irish songs like sweet bell chimes 
 Fell on mine ear. 
 
 That I would give thee more than words 
 And hot salt tears. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Might take my stand midst flashing swords 
 
 And slender spears. 
 And charge the front of tyrant hordes. 
 
 Paying up old arrears. 
 
 Land of Riagh na gael, adieu ! 
 
 On shore or sea. 
 Where'er I roam, my heart, still true. 
 
 Will turn to thee ; 
 Wherever mountains kiss the skies. 
 
 Or bright streams roll. 
 Thy daisied hills will proudly rise 
 
 Within my soul ; 
 Each river dancing to the sea 
 
 Will sing to my heart of thee. 
 
 ONCE MY HARP WAS TUNED TO WAR. 
 
 Once my harp was tuned to war. 
 
 And glory was my theme. 
 Upon the hills round Glenanar, 
 
 And by the Anner stream ; 
 
20 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 White tented field and gallant knight 
 I prized all else above ; 
 
 But when I saw my lady bright, 
 I changed my theme to Love. 
 
 Like some delicious, drugged wine, 
 
 I drank her passion kiss ; 
 My soul was tossed by hands divine 
 
 Upon a sea of bliss, 
 I trembled 'neath her faintest touch. 
 
 And never, till I strove 
 To sing of War, knew I how much 
 
 My heart was drunk with Love. 
 
 I felt her presence when the night 
 
 Came forth all diadems, 
 Her tresses flashing with the light 
 
 Of countless starry gems. 
 And all things bright and fair below, 
 
 Or in the skies above. 
 Spoke to my heart of her, and so 
 
 I could but sing of Love. 
 
 I fled unto the hills, and said. 
 This treason cannot be ; 
 
 I thought the eyes of heroes dead 
 Frowned angrily on me. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 21 
 
 I tuned my harp to War — the skies 
 
 Were bright with stars above. 
 And then I thought upon her eyes, 
 
 And changed my theme to Love. 
 
 When usquebaugh was flowing strong 
 
 Around the banquet board. 
 The chieftain called the battle song, 
 
 ** The Ormond's flashing aword." 
 And bold I struck the major key ; 
 
 But her fair fingers wove 
 A magic o'er my minstrelsy — 
 
 I could but sing of Love. 
 
 I told how on May eve 1 stopped 
 
 At good St. Mary's Well, 
 And while I drank, some elfin dropped 
 
 Into the cup her spell ; 
 For as I felt the crystal draught 
 
 About my spirit move, 
 And fire my blood, I knew I 'd quafF'd 
 
 The burning kiss of Love. 
 
 And when 1 left the banquet hall. 
 
 Before the midnight hour, 
 I heard my lady's signal-call. 
 
 And flew unto her bower. 
 
22 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 I hung my harp upon the Oak, 
 Within the Druids' grove. 
 
 And though we neither sung nor spoke. 
 We looked whole songs of Love. 
 
 That night when Ormond sought his bee. 
 
 And dreamt of blood and wars. 
 The minstrel with his daughter fled, 
 
 While shone the midnight stars. 
 And now beneath the sunny skies 
 
 Of stately Spain we rove, 
 I look into my lady's eyes. 
 
 And strike mv harp to Love. 
 
 THE REVELLERS. 
 
 Down with the dancing high Spring tide, 
 Down with the bounding tide. 
 
 The fair wind's blowing, 
 
 Let us be going 
 Down to the ocean wide — 
 
 God's beautiful ocean wide ! 
 
 My spirit faints beneath Earth's clay. 
 Its senseless, soulless clay. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 'ij 
 
 Unloose thy barque 
 Ere the night grows dark. 
 Let 's swiftly bear away ! 
 
 We'll rest by the Hills of Day ! 
 
 Where are our early friends all gone. 
 The young, the fair, the gay. 
 
 Who wove bright dreams 
 
 By hills and streams 
 With us at morning gray — 
 
 Friends, dreams, oh where are they? 
 
 Down with the silent fleeing stream, 
 The tireless stream of Time, 
 
 The young and the gay 
 
 Have passed away 
 Like the voice of some village chime. 
 Some village festive chime. 
 
 We danced within the gay green woods 
 That lined youth's fairy shore. 
 And all day long 
 Our joyous song 
 Was '*Fill your glasses o'er. 
 
 Red wine, bright eyes," no more. 
 3 
 
24 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 We knew not Death was standing by 
 As we danced wildly on. 
 
 Nor never missed 
 
 The lips we kissed 
 The morn, at noon were gone. 
 Till we were left alone. 
 
 And now the night grows wild and dark 
 God speedour Barque of Faith ! 
 
 Light be the tolls 
 
 On human souls 
 Levied for sin at death — 
 
 Just dues for sin at death. 
 
 Show us the resting-place, dear God! 
 Show us the resting-place. 
 
 For thro' the gloom 
 
 Of the shrouded tomb 
 We see Thy smiling face, O God ! 
 Thy radiant, smiling face ! 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 25 
 
 THE GOLDEN DAYS OF BOYHOOD YEARS. 
 
 The golden days of boyhood's years ! 
 
 Shall we behold them never, never more. 
 But thro' the mists of fallen tears. 
 
 As they float brightly shining round youth's shore? 
 We stand upon the slope of Time, 
 
 And gaze toward our morning land with sighs. 
 Till sorrow peals her funeral chime, 
 
 And shrouds its beauty from our longing eyes. 
 
 Where are the buoyant, shining hopes. 
 
 That woo'd us thro' youth's fields and meadows gay. 
 That, laughing up the mountain slopes. 
 
 Kept strewing flow'rs upon Life's bright pathway ? 
 Ah ! Phantom Hopes, unreal, untrue, 
 
 'Twas fancy threw a halo round their birth. 
 They glitter'd in the morning dew. 
 
 In the noonday sun they crumbled into earth. 
 
 The bitter wintry winds have killed 
 
 The buds and blossoms in our garden fair; 
 
 Our souls that harbor'd joy are filled 
 
 With dull forebodings trembling round despair ; 
 
 The sunny beams that Heaven sends 
 
 Must shine thro' death to cause this dark eclipse. 
 
26 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 We cannot kiss our early friends 
 
 Until we brush the grave-mold from their lips. 
 
 When o'er the pathway of our youth 
 
 Earth pass'd, clad in the robes of Deity, 
 We flung away our Lamps of Truth 
 
 And followed hers of wild Philosophy, 
 Away into bleak wastes of woe, 
 
 Its beams growing dimmer slowly day by day, 
 Until we wander'd to and fro 
 
 With light enough to lead our souls astray. 
 
 We rest down by Life's sighing streams, 
 
 With some pale phantoms ever standing near. 
 Whose shadows float around our dreams. 
 
 Fringing their brightness with dark clouds of fear. 
 We start in terror and pursue 
 
 Our journey, stumbling over nameless graves. 
 Till, wrecked on the shore of doubt, we view 
 
 Our brightest hopes sink in its misty waves. 
 
 Shall matter rule immortal mind? 
 
 Arise, my soul, unto thy broad domains. 
 Thy flight is upward, unconfin'd. 
 
 Earth cannot bind thee with her leaden chains. 
 Tho' tempests gather 'round thy path, 
 
 A beam from God shines o'er Life's troubled sea. 
 
LOVE AND LAND 
 
 27 
 
 Fear not its wild but harmless wrath, 
 
 Death can take his own, he has no claim on thee. 
 
 Beyond the tomb there is a clime 
 
 Upon whose blossoms falls no shade of Death, 
 Whose leaves ne'er heard the tread of Time, 
 
 Nor trembled 'neath his with'ring, icy breath. 
 There live those early friends of ours. 
 
 Like birds of passage they 're but gone before. 
 And in those green, eternal bow'rs. 
 
 They wait our coming from this Stygian shore. 
 
 PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 Where 's that spirit, bold, unchary. 
 That swept the ancient hills of Eire, 
 That flung the Saxon Gall defiance. 
 Safe in its own strong self-reliance? 
 Promethean lightning fed its flame : 
 Has persecution whipped it tame? 
 
 Where are the men who traced in story. 
 With bright sword-pens, our country's glory ; 
 
l8 LOVi: AND LAND. 
 
 Who watched the fame their Fathers won her, 
 And would not brook their land's dishonor — 
 The motto of their chivalry : 
 ** Man lives not who lives not free'*'' ? 
 
 When Freedom thro' the land went crying, — 
 With Ireland's banner torn, but flying — 
 The sleuth-hound in her traces yelling. 
 And tyrant hordes her death-tale knelling. 
 Our Fathers swoop'd upon her track. 
 And swept the hordes of Satan back. 
 
 Oft by her side, with shouts of thunder. 
 Their lightning blades burst chains asunder ; 
 And field by field they fought the aggressor. 
 Each red hand its land's redressor ; 
 And when a soldier fell and died, 
 Another sword was by her side. 
 
 Theirs was not the hunger pining. 
 The soulless look, the slavish whining. 
 The long, dark road of want and sorrow, 
 The starless night, the hopeless morrow. 
 The slow, sad moping by life's wave. 
 In long, dull marches to the grave. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 2^ 
 
 From castle keep and ivied arches. 
 Fame led them on triumphal marches ; 
 Their spirits full of Erin's story. 
 Bards sang them on to deeds of glory ; 
 
 And on the battle's hottest breath. 
 
 They swept into the fields of death. 
 
 That spirit and the Bard 's departed, 
 Gone with the brave and fearless hearted ; 
 And hunted Freedom 's sadly weeping 
 Around the tombs where they are sleeping ; 
 And never airs her regal form. 
 But in the free, wild mountain storm. 
 
 But better roam the vales and mountains. 
 And drink at Nature's sacred fountains — 
 In her bright eyes independence glowing, 
 Thro' her veins the red blood flowing — 
 Than live in Fashion's gayest bowers. 
 Her fetters hidden 'neath her flowers. 
 
 Oh, Irishmen ! do we inherit 
 
 Our Fathers' names and not their spirit ? 
 
 Are we men, bold and lion-hearted, 
 
 Or statues of a race departed. 
 
 With enough of mechanism given 
 
 To ape the " noblest work of heaven "? 
 
JO LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Out from your dark and hiding places ! 
 
 Be not ashamed to show your faces ; 
 
 Trample local feud and faction. 
 
 The time is calling loud for action. 
 
 You've slept the long, dark night away 
 Awake ! arise ! behold the day ! 
 
 LOVE COMES BUT ONCE UNTO THE HEART. 
 
 Love comes but once unto the Heart 
 
 But once and never more. 
 When Youth sits by Life's smiling tide 
 
 And softly woos him o'er. 
 In after years a joy may come 
 
 As full of peace and truth. 
 But never more that first, wild Love 
 
 Of the palmy days of youth. 
 
 The first young flowers of early spring 
 
 Sleep folded thro' the night. 
 But 'neath the smiles of morning ope 
 
 Their red lips to the light. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Thus sleeps the heart, 'twixt bud and bloom, 
 
 Thro* boyhood's April hours. 
 Till Love laughs in upon its dreams 
 
 Like morning o'er the flow'rs. 
 
 There is a vision haunts the breast 
 
 That never will depart. 
 It will not die, it cannot fade. 
 
 But just as v^^ears the heart. 
 How fond we fold the curtains round. 
 
 Lest other eyes might gaze 
 Upon our hearts, while we look on 
 
 This dream of other days. 
 
 The dove, with death within her breast. 
 
 Will rise on trembling wings. 
 And reach the woodlands, where her mate 
 
 Upon the green bough sings. 
 So will the fond heart journey back 
 
 Across life's sea of tears, 
 With Death upon its wake, to find 
 
 Its Love of early years. 
 
 31 
 
32 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 WHEN DEW-DROPS FELL SOFT. 
 
 When dew-drops fell soft over tree -top and tower. 
 
 And the nightingale sung o'er his zephyr-rocked nest, 
 I plucked the queen rose from her fairy-watched bower, 
 
 And placed it all dewy and fair on my breast. 
 ** There blossom," I cried, "^till the sad dreamy night 
 
 Shall melt into smiles on the lips of the dawn." 
 When morning burst on my dreams of delight. 
 
 The rose was still there, but the odor was gone. 
 
 Sad type of this earth, that, with rosiest bloom 
 
 Leads captive the spirit, that day after day 
 Pursues thy bright phantoms, till close by the tomb, 
 
 Like a sweet dream of boyhood, they vanish away. 
 Look aloft! look aloft! where yon star softly gleams. 
 
 Like the beacon of Hope on the bosom of even ; 
 The spirit's desire — aye, her sunniest dreams. 
 
 Shall be all realized in the glories of Heaven. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 33 
 
 YOU SAY I NEVER SING OF YOU. 
 
 You say I never sing of you. 
 
 And so you think my heart grown cold. 
 But 'tis not to the million view 
 
 Its sacredness should be unroll'd. 
 Ours is that mystic love divine. 
 
 Which can be felt but can't be sung, 
 That glows within the spirit's shrine, 
 
 Where bridal veils are round it flung. 
 
 Thou 'rt throned upon my highest thought 
 
 Thro' all the frettings of the day, 
 To chase from its dominions aught 
 
 Debasing or impure away : 
 As the parch'd earth drinks the dew. 
 
 And meets the morn a rosier bride. 
 So do I rise from dreams of you. 
 
 More fresh, more free, more purified. 
 
 The days seem months, the months are years. 
 
 Until we meet no more to part. 
 But earth seems brighter after tears. 
 
 And so again when heart to heart. 
 
34 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 Our life shall be a sweeter song 
 Than poet ever dreamt or sung ; 
 
 But love shall to the heart belong. 
 And not unto the tripping tongue. 
 
 THEY LIE WHO TELL US LOVE HAS WINGS. 
 
 They lie who tell us Love has wings 
 
 To fly away when pressed by sorrow. 
 That as he flies he gaily sings : 
 
 "I '11 come, if the sun shines, to-morrow!" 
 For, Nelly dear, do we not know 
 
 That gentle, heav'nly Love reposes 
 Upon the iron couch of woe 
 
 As sweet as in his bed of roses? 
 
 There is a spirit men call Love, 
 
 That owes its birth to sordid passion. 
 That flutters, like a moth, above 
 
 And round the gilded shrine of fashion. 
 This is he that plumes his wings 
 
 And flies the field when pressed by sorrow; 
 This is he that lightly sings : 
 
 " I '11 come, if the sun shines, to-morrow." 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 35 
 
 But Love that from his bower on high 
 Poets have woo'd in spirit vision. 
 
 That brings the glories of the sky- 
 Earthwards on his gentle mission, — 
 
 Grows brighter as the night comes on. 
 Sings sweeter when dull woes invade us, 
 
 And when dark clouds obscure the sun, 
 His pinions closely overshade us. 
 
 Let Fortune, Summer Nymph, depart. 
 
 Let hopes prove false and sorrows lower. 
 They cannot settle roui I the heart 
 
 Where Love has built his rosy bower ; 
 Old Time may steal from Beauty's crown 
 
 The diamond Youth, that beams so splendid. 
 But Love will smooth each wrinkle down. 
 
 And sing of youth when time is ended. 
 
 Then here 's to Love ! that closely knits 
 
 True hearts with bonds that naught can sever ; 
 That at the helm thro' tempests sits. 
 
 And guides us down Life's chequered river ; 
 That stands upon Death's frowning steep. 
 
 And flings his light across the billow ; 
 That sings us to our cradle sleep. 
 
 And softly smooths our dying pillow. 
 
36 LOVE AND LAND 
 
 THE SPRING-TIME IN IRELAND. 
 
 Upon the airy hill tops, behold the Spring-time stand ; 
 Pausing in her pilgrimage of Beauty thro' the land ! 
 Soothing down the cold north-winds with melodies so 
 
 sweet. 
 Changing into dewy tears old Winter's piercing sleet. 
 Beneath her smiles the icy chains melt from the prison'd 
 
 floods. 
 And like freed schoolboys they go bounding, shouting 
 
 thro' the woods ! 
 The birds, like dreams across the soul, flit 'neath the 
 
 blue skies bright. 
 And the gentle flow'rs, like timid maids, come blushing 
 
 into light ! 
 
 Spring need waste but little smiling, little sunshine, to 
 
 beguile 
 The bloom from out the mellow bosom of the old Green 
 
 Isle, 
 Where Winter comes, half smiling, thro' light, soft feathery 
 
 show'rs. 
 Whose noiseless tread upon the hills doth scarcely shroud 
 
 the flow'rs. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 37 
 
 Where beauty lulls the tempests that kiss her magic coast. 
 And the Robin sings his summer hymns in the face of 
 
 Lady Frost, 
 Where the spirit dances in the eye, and the heart is in the 
 
 hand. 
 And the stranger gets the Welcome by the hearths of our 
 
 old land ! 
 
 Heavenly Spring ! had I thy pow'r to call life from 
 
 decay, 
 
 1 'd like to go a-roving thro' some churchyards far away. 
 How softly I 'd come tapping to the tomb where my love 
 
 lies, 
 Singing thro* the cypress boughs : *' Awake, my love, 
 
 arise ! 
 The mists that hung around the hills doth fold and float 
 
 away. 
 Melting like the starless night on the lips of morning gray! 
 The Gael are on the mountain tops, and swear thou shalt 
 
 be queen, 
 And thou shalt yet outshine them all when crown'd with 
 
 shamrock green." 
 
 I would I were within those vales, in youth's clear, cloud- 
 less noon, 
 
 Barefooted and lighthearted, running 'gainst the wild March 
 moon. 
 
3? LOVE AN D LAN D. 
 
 Or skimming up the mountain side wind-footed as the roe. 
 Leaving the earth with all her cares and misty dreams 
 
 below. 
 To feel the winds that «k'alk the hills just loosen'd from 
 
 the sky. 
 And cull the freshness from their lips as they go hurrying 
 
 by; 
 With youth's white soul within my breast, and every link 
 
 unriven — 
 Of the rosy chain of innocence that bound me then to 
 
 Heaven ! 
 
 'T is many a year since I beheld, across the wafers blue, 
 Thy sunny shores, my Fatherland, fade softly from my 
 
 view; 
 Thy daisied hills dissolving into the dreary night — 
 Like doves beneath a raven's wing, they melted from my 
 
 sight ! 
 But the winds as they came piping from thy lips across 
 
 the sea. 
 Kept singing old sweet melodies and memories of thee ; 
 And oft they come a-wooing my spirit in my dreams. 
 And lead me down, a careless boy, beside thy wanton 
 
 streams. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 39 
 
 Now a thousand witching memories are playing round my 
 
 heart — 
 A thousand dreamy memories that never will depart, 
 With their wooing and beguiling, and silver voices sweet. 
 Until they lead my heart away to many an old retreat. 
 They sing of Munster vallies, the Patron and the dance. 
 Till 'neath the spreading oak I see the village maids 
 
 advance ; 
 As the piper tips the chanter, forth the liquid numbers 
 
 roll. 
 And *' The Wind that shook the Barley" comes sweeping 
 
 o'er my soul. 
 
 As the snow beneath this April sun is melting into tears, 
 I feel my spirit thawing out from the frost of dreary years; 
 And Fancy lends her buoyant wings, and with the soft 
 
 west wind, 
 I float aback Life's ruffled stream the dreams of youth to 
 
 find. 
 Love sweeps the dew from moldy lips, and paints them as 
 
 of yore. 
 And many a friend flings ofl^ the shroud to meet me on the 
 
 shore; 
 With shamrocks green and daisies decked, together hand 
 
 in hand, 
 We follow the glad Spring-time through the vallies of our 
 
 land! 4 
 
40 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 THE LAND OF DREAMS. 
 
 The witching hour when Daylight hies 
 
 To rest unto the halls of night. 
 And Evening opes her starry eyes 
 
 And floods the soul with love's own light; 
 I wander thro' a land of dreams. 
 O'er high, green hills, by crystal streams. 
 And all the olden friends I knew 
 Wander, sad and silent, too ; 
 But they are phantoms by the streams. 
 And live but in this Land of Dreams. 
 
 I cannot bear the wild sunlight, 
 
 And mope all through the garish day. 
 Till, summoned by the beauteous Night, 
 
 My spirit leaves her home of clay. 
 And basks beneath those moonlit skies 
 Where, at her call, the dead arise — 
 And there we wander, side by side. 
 Nor Time nor Death cannot divide ; 
 But they are phantoms by the streams. 
 And live but in this Land of Dreams. 
 
LOVE AN D LAND. 4I 
 
 We are all dead throughout the day — 
 Some buried 'neath the earth's control. 
 
 And others buried 'neath its clay — 
 At night we rise up, soul to soul. 
 
 The grave may hide from mortal sight 
 
 The beauty of God's living light. 
 
 But 'neath the spirit gaze of hope 
 
 Its gloomy portals softly ope — 
 
 Andlo! the hills and crystal streams 
 
 Are brighter than our wildest dreams. 
 
 THE FLIGHT OF FREEDOM. 
 
 Freedom, hunted like the hind. 
 And all but soul and honor lost. 
 
 Set sail before the eastern wind. 
 And landed on Columbia's coast. 
 
 And, standing on her rocky steep. 
 
 Waved high her torch above the deep ; 
 
 And to the music of the sea 
 
 Our land was wed to Liberty. 
 
42 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 When tyrants followed on her track. 
 Uprose our Fathers in their might. 
 And hurled those hireling cohorts back 
 
 In many a wild and gallant fight. 
 Ah ! by her side how oft they 've stood. 
 Through many a field of fire and blood. 
 Through the battle's sulphurous breath. 
 Into the very jaws of death. 
 
 Through piercing sleet and blinding hail. 
 
 Through fevered swamps and gloomy gorge. 
 Let 's follow up their crimson trail, 
 
 From Bunker's Hill to Valley Forge. 
 And out upon the driven snow 
 Behold their hot blood redly flow ; 
 And, as their eyes £qq\ death's eclipse. 
 Their country's name upon their lips. 
 
 Nations name them but to bless ; 
 
 Through the earth their deeds are sung. 
 Though planted in the wilderness 
 
 The seed from which this Tree has sprung. 
 Through our country's sunless years 
 'T was nurtured by their blood and tears? 
 Till millions march beneath its boughs 
 And sing unto the dead their vows. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 43 
 
 Columbia, from every steep 
 
 That frowns along thy rugged coast. 
 
 Long may thy fires shine o'er the deep. 
 As beacons to earth's tempest-tost ; 
 
 A thousand barques doth plough the sea, 
 
 Whose guiding light is all from thee ; 
 
 And each within her bosom bears 
 
 A Nation's Hopes, a Nation's Prayers. 
 
 LET US ALL BE LOVING. 
 
 The stream of life is wildly fleeing down the slope of 
 
 time. 
 Bearing on its surging bosom barques from every clime. 
 And we 're but waiting for the voice to bid us bear away. 
 Then let us all be loving the little while we stay. 
 
 Why should we don such frantic airs, as though some fiend 
 
 had given 
 Our spirits power wherewith to mock the majesty of 
 
 Heaven — 
 Poor moonlight phantoms gliding o'er life's surging wave, 
 Boating down in gilded coffins to the silent grave ? 
 
44 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 The vallies of our father-land beneath the summer sun. 
 Burst on the sight like Eden when the gates of light are 
 
 won ; 
 The rivers of our childhood dance wild through meadows 
 
 gay— 
 Where are the friends that roamed their banks with us at 
 
 morning gray ? 
 
 Now stand upon this sunny steep, and bend thine eyes 
 
 beneath. 
 Behold them swiftly gliding to the sleepy shores of death ; 
 Some are passing — some have passed — and we have but a 
 
 day. 
 Then let us all be loving the little while we stay. 
 
 O, war, when shall thy raven wing be folded 'neath the 
 
 palm ? 
 Or when shall life's tempestuous sea melt down to summer 
 
 calm. 
 And nations, hand in hand, go forth beneath the smiles of 
 
 peace. 
 And love reign in the hearts of men, and foul contention 
 
 cease ? 
 
 How slow the world unfolds her heart to the golden light 
 
 of love ; 
 How slow the shadowy vulture yields his sceptre to the 
 
 dove ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 45 
 
 And men forsake the paths of truth to grope 'midst fear 
 
 and doubt. 
 Shutting their souls in the world's broad noon to keep 
 
 Heaven's sunlight out. 
 
 Then burst cold Fashion's chilling bonds, and take thy 
 
 brother's hand. 
 We 're all but travelers journeying unto the better land ; 
 Let 's pitch our tents beneath the palms that skirt life's 
 
 rugged way. 
 And tune our hearts to kindness the little while we stay. 
 
 V/HEN NIGHT UNFURLS HER RAVEN WING. 
 
 FROM THE IRISH. 
 
 ** When night unfurls her raven wing. 
 
 And low to Heaven I bend the knee. 
 Prayer dies upon my burning lip. 
 
 So full is my fond soul of thee ; 
 Or if on wings of Faith I soar. 
 
 Up to the spirit's native skies. 
 Each angel wears thy gentle face. 
 
 Each star reminds me of thine eyes. 
 
46 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 "Like some dark spirit, lorn and lost, 
 
 I roam'd the world's bleak wilderness. 
 The sport of Passion's wanton airs. 
 
 No voice to cheer, no smiles to bless ; 
 Till softly thro' life's clouded sky 
 
 I first beheld thy bright eyes gleam. 
 Then fled all gloom, and Love broke in 
 
 Upon my soul like some sweet dream ! 
 
 " But now the world seems strangely fair. 
 
 On every side new beauties rise, 
 The flowers have donn'd a richer hue 
 
 Since Love lent me his dreamy eyes. 
 The winds that kiss thy fragrant lips 
 
 Die softly at the pearly door ; 
 The birds that hear thy silver song 
 
 Will rouse the sleepy woods no more." 
 
 Thus sung I in my boyhood's days. 
 
 When passion fired my Gaelic blood, , 
 And has old Time, with chilling wings 
 
 And wintry winds, subdued the flood? 
 No ; Time, as o'er my heart he flew. 
 
 But fanned the flame he meant to kill ; 
 The fire once lit on Love's sweet shrine 
 
 Is burning high and wildly still. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 47 
 
 that the Heart must still love on. 
 E'en tho' its love be coldly spurned ; 
 
 And cling to Hopes — old sunny hopes 
 
 That long ago were all o'erturned ! 
 Thus do I sit and dream of thee 
 
 Out in the leaden noon of night. 
 No star to cheer Life's dreary sky. 
 
 But the memory of thy blue eyes bright ! 
 
 1 curse the fate that led me first 
 
 Within the circle of those eyes ; 
 I curse the hope that in my breast 
 
 First falsely flatter'd Love to rise ; 
 Were I beside youth's witching stream. 
 
 And were my heart once free from pain, 
 I 'd — plunge into the surging flood 
 
 To live but in thy smiles again ! 
 
 The hot South wind floats sadly by. 
 
 He is the night flower's lover blest. 
 And soon she '11 ope her odorous lips. 
 
 And soft he '11 die upon her breast ! 
 But I must sigh unto the night. 
 
 And kiss my Love but in my dreams. 
 
 And see her eyes but in the stars. 
 
 And hear her voice but in the streams ! 
 5 
 
48 LOVEANDLAN D 
 
 THE HUDSON, RHINE, AND SHANNON. 
 
 When traitors to their sacred trust. 
 
 With Satan's self to lead 'em. 
 Polluted in the very dust 
 
 Our starry flag of Freedom, 
 Three comrades true sprang into line. 
 
 And manned a glowing cannon — 
 One from Hudson, one from Rhine, 
 
 And one from by the Shannon. 
 
 Along the banks of Rapidan, 
 
 From Fair Oaks to Antietam, 
 Where'er the tide of battle ran. 
 
 We met the foe and beat 'em ; 
 And through the battle's fiercest breath. 
 
 Those three stood by their cannon. 
 For they had learned to laugh at death 
 
 By Hudson, Rhine, and Shannon. 
 
 They were true brothers in one cause. 
 
 For they were sons of Freedom ; 
 They fought for human rights and laws. 
 
 Where'er she chase to lead 'em; 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 49 
 
 As meet and blend, in God's deep sea. 
 
 The Hudson, Rhine, and Shannon, 
 So blent their souls in liberty — 
 
 Brave comrades of the cannon. 
 
 Three soldiers fell in one rich tide ; 
 
 Their hot blood stained the heather. 
 Their comrades laid them, side by side, 
 
 In one red grave together. 
 Soft fall the dews upon their clay, 
 
 True comrades of the cannon. 
 Who sleep in death so far away 
 
 From Hudson, Rhine, and Shannon. 
 
 Comrades ! around our camp-fires bright. 
 
 Here 's to our starry banner. 
 That flies across the brow of night — 
 
 God's choicest blessings fan her ! 
 And, while men worship Freedom's name. 
 
 They '11 man each deck and cannon ; 
 And fight for Freedom all the same. 
 
 By Hudson, Rhine, or Shannon. 
 
50 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 HOME MUSINGS. 
 
 The Mississippi swept in pride beneath 
 
 The hill, upon whose jagged side I stood. 
 But gazing o'er, far o'er the surging flood, 
 
 I saw green Ireland's hills and dewy heath : 
 Wild youth came bounding up the mountain side. 
 
 And many a joy came following in his train. 
 Old hopes went smiling down the silver tide 
 
 That but in Fancy's realms could bloom again ! 
 Like a mother's voice upon my dreaming ear 
 
 I heard the Shannon's soft-lipped murmurings — 
 An old air stealing over Memory's strings 
 
 That but the lorn of heart could feel or hear ! 
 And, sitting down upon the mountain gray, 
 I wept for days and friends long pass'd away. 
 
 How many a heart that once beat time 
 
 To the immortal strains of Love and Liberty, 
 That caught the spirit of those dreams sublime 
 
 Which poets dreamt, O Shannon stream, by thee, 
 Now sleep, "unwept, unhonored, and unsung," 
 
 Far from the valleys of their morning's love, 
 No song of praise falls sweet from Gaelic tongue. 
 
 Nor Keener sways their lone, wild graves above. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 5I 
 
 But out beneath this yellow harvest moon. 
 
 There are Irish Mothers on the hills to-night. 
 Breaking the stillness of night's sleepy noon 
 
 In praise of eyes that once shone soft and bright, 
 Of cheeks that rivaled the apple's blooms. 
 And fine hearts moldering in their foreign tombs. 
 
 As sunny streams from many lands take birth. 
 
 Yet meet and blend their waters in the sea. 
 Thus, tho' our bodies sleep in home or foreign earth. 
 
 Our souls shall meet and blend, O God ! in thee. 
 No corner so obscure in trackless wastes or woods, 
 
 But opens to the searching glance of Him above. 
 Whose ear doth catch above the howling floods 
 
 Man's faintest prayer of penitence or love ! 
 O beauteous Faith! thro' which we feel and know 
 
 When most remote from man we 're nearest heaven, 
 And though we sail Life's sea in joy or woe. 
 
 Our barques by zephyrs or wild whirlwinds driven. 
 When this short, fretting day will end in night. 
 We '11 ride at anchor in some harbor of delight ! 
 
52 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 THE OUTLAW'S SERENADE. 
 
 In Luggelaw, along the lake, 
 
 In lines of light the moonbeams play. 
 Then, dearest, from thy dreams awake. 
 
 And fly unto the hills away. 
 I 've built a bower by the streams; 
 
 I '11 show you where the wild deer flee ; 
 Then rise in beauty from thy dreams — 
 
 If you love me, follow me. 
 
 In vain I sue for balmy sleep — 
 
 I 'm ever haunted by your eyes ; 
 All night I walk the hills and weep. 
 
 And thy spirit, my love, before me flies. 
 And with my thoughts all full of you, 
 
 I bare my heart to the skies above. 
 And the stars of night they rain cool dew 
 
 On my soul's burning love. 
 
 Many a weary league I 've come, 
 
 With Saxon sleuth-hounds tracking me ; 
 
 There 's death around your Father's home, 
 But worse than death away from thee. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. ^^ 
 
 Then, light of my life, come forth, my love. 
 The stars are in the midnight skies ; 
 
 [ once knew light and heaven above. 
 But now^ I feel them in your eyes. 
 
 The wanton day begins to break — 
 
 Come, with the shadows let us fly ; 
 Your father's clansmen soon will wake. 
 
 Then at your feet I '11 fall and die. 
 My dove, you come ! — leap bold and light — 
 
 Now, Rover, fl-y like the mountain wind. 
 You bear the light of my life to-night, 
 
 But death will ride not far behind. 
 
 Now, gallant steed, for the war-horse tramp 
 
 Which you gave on that summer day 
 When we rode thro' the Saxon camp. 
 
 And bore their flag of red away ; 
 And when our journey will be done. 
 
 And the gay green woods once more we '11 see 
 Tossing their plumes in the morning sun. 
 
 We '11 hurra for the hills and liberty. 
 
54 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 BOW THE HEAD AND BEND THE KNEE, 
 
 ** Bow the head, and bend the suppliant knee. 
 All ye that tremble at the despot's breath ; 
 
 But ere we cringe or stoop to tyranny. 
 
 We '11 sleep our own green daisied sod beneath. 
 
 ** 'T is sweeter drink the dungeon's poison dew. 
 
 That never quiver'd in the summer sun. 
 Than live 'neath skies of runniest teint and hue. 
 
 Where freedom's fount doth cold and sickly run." 
 
 Thus sang our fathers' fathers years ago. 
 
 When men had souls, and marched with pride to death. 
 When charging on their foes in vales below. 
 
 Like torrents sweeping from the misty heath. 
 
 The spirit of the mighty past is dead. 
 
 Or to the hero-land of shadows flown; 
 We walk the earth with dull and sluggish tread. 
 
 And dare not call our very souls our own. 
 
 Who meanest live are most afraid to die, 
 
 Tho' the grave is brighter than their hearths and homes 
 Whose fires are quench'd in tears of agony. 
 Their spirits droop like willows over tombs. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 55 
 
 Oh ! ye who bled for land and liberty. 
 
 Whose spirits walk the misty fields of death, 
 
 Ye are not dead — ye live, ye breathe; 't is we 
 Who 're dead that soulless walk your native heath. 
 
 We are not men, we 're common clay — we 're stones, 
 And strown along our tyrants' flowr'y way. 
 
 Whose iron heels do grind our very bones. 
 
 To enrich the land where nought but men decay. 
 
 Oh ! for the spirit of our long-dead sires. 
 
 That burst indignant at the sight of chains 1 
 Oh ! for red war's promethean lightning fires. 
 
 To rouse the sluggish blood within our veins ! 
 
 Hold up your head, you stalwarth son of toil — 
 What work is this you and your brothers do ? 
 
 You sweat to till and sow the stubborn soil. 
 Bat do you reap the golden harvest, too? 
 
 There is a shadow shutting out the sun. 
 
 That robs your cheek of all its ruddy glow ; 
 
 There is a Raven marking, one by one. 
 
 The seed your cunning hands so careful sow. 
 
^6 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 Kind heaven may send its dewy tears and rain, 
 
 And wheat droop brown, and fruit hang juicy red ; 
 
 The Robber comes and takes both fruit and grain. 
 The while vour children ask and die for bread. 
 
 But the day of wrath and reckoning is at hand ; 
 
 Men wake and wonder they 've been duped so long. 
 '* T^e hand that guides the plough should own the landy"* 
 
 And so at last they sing the poet's noblest song. 
 
 I hear the gallant tramp of martial men — 
 Our country's life is in this earnest tread — 
 
 I see them filing through each narrow glen. 
 And gathering, silent, to each mountain head. 
 
 Let tyrants revel while the nation falls. 
 And dance to the lute's lascivious notes. 
 
 But Freedom stalks within their very halls — 
 
 The hunted wolves are crouching for their throats. 
 
 Fall into line — the chase will soon be up — 
 To unearth each tyrant from his golden den. 
 
 And pledge we round in love the sacred cup. 
 The toast is, "Death or Freedom to all Men." 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 57 
 
 The days that poets sang we '11 live to see — 
 The prelude to their birth 's already heard ; 
 
 The world at last is ripe for liberty. 
 As tyrants are for the avenging sword. 
 
 LOOK UP. 
 
 In our journey through life we should never look down. 
 
 But, like the Green Ivy, smile over decay. 
 For when cold misfortune stands ready to frown. 
 
 Bright rainbow-winged joy comes to chase her away. 
 Tho' ills may beset us on life's chequered road — 
 
 Tho' the way be drear, and the night coming on, 
 'T is cheering to know that the better abode 
 
 Will break on the soul when earth's daylight is gone. 
 
 How oft have I caroled when sorrow stood by. 
 
 Fond lays dedicated to Friendship and Love, 
 For while the clouds lowered 'twixt my soul and the sky, 
 
 I knew the bright sun beamed in glory above. 
 'T is true, I have wept over spirits long flov/n, 
 
 When, softly, calm memory whispered me back. 
 Where, thro' the green valleys, in days that were gone. 
 
 Hand in hand we unraveled youth's beautiful track. 
 
58 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 As the tempest-tossed mariner thirsts for repose, 
 
 When the green sloping headlands rise fondly in sight. 
 And in visions of bliss soon forgets his past woes — 
 
 The loud angry sea melts to scenes of delight ; 
 So, as life's ruffled journey draws on to its close. 
 
 And the fetters that bind us to earth are nigh riven — 
 When the spirit is thirsting for endless repose. 
 
 Life's ills are soon lost in sweet visions of heaven. 
 
 FAREWELL TO SUMMER. 
 
 The Summer folded her mantle round her 
 
 And swept the forests bare. 
 The rose on her breast, no thorn to wound her. 
 Sweet clover blossoms and daisies bound her 
 
 Golden flowing hair ; 
 She bore all bloom and beauty with her, 
 
 All things sweet and fair. 
 And left the tree-tops naked, shivering 
 
 In Autumn's icy air. 
 
 When Summer enters and shakes the roses 
 
 From her sunny wings. 
 And by some whispering stream reposes. 
 Some tell-tale stream that half discloses 
 
LOVE AN D LAND. 59 
 
 Her soul's rich murmurings ; 
 When wondrous songs of joy are floating 
 
 From nature's secret springs, 
 No wonder that we love the Summer 
 
 For the joy she brings. 
 
 The gray mists hang, like veils of mourning. 
 
 Around the hill-tops high. 
 The birds, old Autumn's low winds spurning. 
 Are to their Southern woods returning — 
 
 I would to God that t 
 Could flit with the birds and the gorgeous Summer, 
 
 On wings of love I'd fly 
 Back, where the woods are blooming 
 
 Under an Irish sky ! 
 
 How oft thro' the vales we 've gaily bounded 
 
 In beauty's festive reign. 
 And sung till the gray old woods resounded. 
 And we seemed by mocking nymphs surrounded. 
 
 Who threw us back again 
 Our songs of joy ; and the hot winds trembling 
 
 With love's rich passion, pain. 
 Were afaint with the breath of the burning flowers 
 
 That sighed for the cooling rain. 
 
6o LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 A sad farewell to the gorgeous Summer, 
 
 To hills and vales adieu ; 
 The forests tremble, for the yellow comer 
 Comes not to them like the gentle Summer, 
 
 All smiles and skies of blue. 
 But bears decay on his cold features ; 
 
 The flowers doth lose their hue. 
 Drinking, 'stead of sparkling sunshine, 
 
 Autumn's churchyard dew. 
 
 Ere she comes again, should our souls grow weary 
 
 And burst their leaden ties. 
 And fly earth's woodlands cold, uncheery — 
 Her deserts bleak, her mountains dreary. 
 
 Her ever changing skies. 
 Then may they on the buoyant pinions 
 
 That Faith supplies. 
 Soar upward to God's own dominions. 
 
 Where Summer never dies ! 
 
 THE PAST. 
 
 The flowers that blossomed on the hills 
 Are softly gathered to decay — 
 
 The birds that sang within the woods. 
 Like golden hopes, have passed away ! 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 6l 
 
 But oh, my heart ! I do not sigh 
 
 O'er withered flowers or song-birds flown, 
 But for the joyous days gone by. 
 
 And many a friend long dead and gone ; 
 For Spring will come, and birds and flowers 
 
 Will follow in her festive train — 
 But will she ope the moss-grown tombs 
 
 And light the orbs, long dimm'd, again? 
 
 There is no change in aught save Man, 
 
 The hills still wear their sunny looics. 
 And though long years have passed away, 
 
 The same old songs float from the brooks ; 
 But sitting on their sloping banks. 
 
 And gazing o*er the waters blue, 
 I look for many a festive scene, 
 
 And but the churchyard meets my view ; 
 And as the Summer sunbeams dance 
 
 Lightly through the mourning yew, 
 The names deep graven on my heart 
 
 I see them on the tombstones, too ! 
 
 Oh ! blest are they whose sinless souls 
 
 Do early seek the resting place ; 
 As dew-drops to the morning sun. 
 
 So mount they up to God's embrace ! 
 
62 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 While sailing o'er life's glassy tide, 
 
 Our barque by soft-lipped zephyrs driven. 
 The world, with all her golden cares. 
 
 Comes floating 'twixt our souls and heaven ; 
 And when the night comes lowering down 
 
 Around our path, too late we find 
 A shoreless sea frowns dark before. 
 
 And the land of palms lies far behind ! 
 
 We know the soul seeks milder climes 
 
 When wearied of this world of sighs. 
 As summer birds from Northern lands 
 
 Do fly away to Southern skies ; 
 But, pausing in the festive dance, 
 
 'T is sad to hear the slow bells chime, 
 While Death roves thro' the woodlands green 
 
 To pluck the leaves in blooming time — 
 To call upon some hallowed name 
 
 Whose owner slumbers in the bier — 
 To sit and list for evermore 
 
 The light footfall we cannot hear. 
 
 Oh ! many a joy forever fled 
 
 Comes dancing round the genial bowl. 
 
 As Memory opes her gates of gold, 
 And floods her radiance o'er the soul. 
 
L O V E A N D L A N U . 67 
 
 Many an eye long dimmed in death 
 
 Flings ofF its drowsy, dull eclipse — 
 And oft we feel the fragrant breath 
 
 Of Love's first kiss upon our lips ; 
 Old Christmas fires, long quenched in tears. 
 
 Spring from the hearth, and in their rays 
 We tread the hills of youth again, 
 
 In the light of childhood's happy days! 
 
 BUILD NOT YOUR HOPES ON LIFE'S DREAR 
 
 WASTE. 
 
 Build not your hopes on life's drear waste. 
 For Time rides on its simoon breath. 
 And by his side the leveler. Death, 
 
 And soon your hopes will be erased. 
 
 Kings have raised proud pageants gay, 
 To check the untiring tread of Time, 
 But, like some village festive chime. 
 
 Their names and fanes have passed away. 
 
 As to the shore wave follows wave, 
 
 The last succeeding in its course the past, 
 
 
64 LOVEAND LAND. 
 
 The next obliterates the last — 
 So generations follow to the grave. 
 
 The very earth that yields us bread 
 Is all our fathers' withered clay. 
 That felt and laugh'd above decay. 
 
 As we do now above them dead. 
 
 Beneath the yew the bright flowers wave 
 Coquettish in the evening wind. 
 But down beneath the flowers you '11 find 
 
 The fond hearts moldering in the grave. 
 
 And thus the world conceals her woe. 
 And ever seems a fair young bride. 
 Decking her graves with flowers, to hide 
 
 The rottenness and death below. 
 
 We 're born — we laugh — we live — we die ; 
 As swallows cleave the viewless wind. 
 And leave no trace or track behind. 
 
 We 're lost in th' unknown immensity. 
 
 And as the red earth settles down 
 Upon our moldering clay. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 65 
 
 So do our memories fade away. 
 Like petals from the roses blown. 
 
 They plant the cypress overhead ; 
 
 And underneath its waving boughs 
 
 Love will breathe his passion vows. 
 And friends will laugh when we are dead. 
 
 Away in old earth's misty time. 
 
 When Roman pride and Roman lust 
 Trampled nations in the dust. 
 
 Her march barbarity sublime. 
 
 O'er many a ruined shepherd home 
 
 She raised her fanes of bone and blood. 
 And on their summits Glory stood. 
 
 Crying, Rome, eternal Rome ! 
 
 She raised her temples and her throne ; 
 
 Her flag of triumph was unfurled 
 
 Above a wond'ring, ruined world, 
 But in her heart decay was sown. 
 
 Time passed upon his tireless wings — 
 
 He looked, and neath his withering frown 
 Temples and altars tumbled down. 
 
 Like vain and transitory things. 
 
66 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 He read the names upon each stone. 
 And thought of nations crucified 
 To glut their greed, and pomp, and pride ; 
 
 He breathed upon them — they were gone ! — 
 
 Yes, temples, palaces, altars, thrones — 
 All crushed by the Almighty hand. 
 And buried in their graves of sand — 
 
 That once were raised o'er nations' bones. 
 
 Rome, the mighty ! sits in widowhood 
 Amid the ruins of her lust. 
 Her regal head bowed in the dust. 
 
 Like matron 'mid her slaughtered brood. 
 
 If all the glory of the earth. 
 
 The Arch, the Monument, the Urn, 
 To dust and nothingness return. 
 
 Shall man lie down and curse his birth ? 
 
 No ! life and soul to man were given. 
 Not for nghing over tombs. 
 Not to waste o'er garden blooms. 
 
 But to swing the dark earth close to heaven. 
 
 Let princes pile their marble o'er the dead. 
 While man, forlorn, sad and poor. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 67 
 
 Is weary, fainting at their door — 
 A golden pillow makes a restless head. 
 
 Shall the spirit wed herself to earth? 
 
 She must aspire to grander things ; 
 
 'T is not from common dust she springs — 
 Hers is a high, immortal birth. 
 
 Ne'er trail your manhood in the dust. 
 
 Nor pause for coward, craven fear, 
 
 Nor blush nor halt for cynic sneer. 
 But take your stand beside the just. 
 
 Then *' Up?vard " let your motto be — 
 
 And, proud and joyous, let your life 
 
 Flow out in some ennobling strife 
 For God and human liberty. 
 
 FLEETING JOYS OF EARTH. 
 
 Earth's finest joys are fleetest. 
 Her pleasures end in sorrow. 
 The brightest lights of morning 
 Are soonest wrapt in gloom. 
 The kindest and the sweetest 
 
68 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 May flourish till to-morrow. 
 
 Then Death, for his adorning, 
 
 Doth bear them to the tomb. 
 
 With young hearts proudly dancing. 
 
 With buoyant hopes advancing, 
 We breast life's ruffled waters to reach some earthly bourne. 
 
 But soon those hopes deceiving. 
 
 The heart grows old in grieving. 
 In grieving for the golden days that never can return. 
 
 Summer, with her roses. 
 
 May hide the yew's dark tresses. 
 
 The syren song of pleasure 
 
 May lull the voice of woe. 
 
 But sorrow ne'er reposes. 
 
 Nor yields to love's caresses. 
 
 But fills Her drugged measure 
 
 To revelers below; 
 
 And oft, when tempest driven, 
 
 We touch some sunny haven 
 Where the soul may dream of peace, while without the 
 mad winds rave. 
 
 But o'er the wild waves, sunward. 
 
 Some voice is crying " Onward " — 
 The soul's dream must be realized in fields beyond the 
 grave. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 69 
 
 Faith ! beneath whose glances 
 The grave flings oiF her shadows. 
 That cannot hide the glory 
 Bursting through decay ! 
 
 The fairest hope that dances 
 Laughing o'er life's meadows. 
 At the tomb, like fairy story, 
 Falsely melts away. 
 But, standing by death's river. 
 Thou cheerest the traveler over 
 Where 'neath the sacred palms the living waters roll. 
 
 1 breast those waves, relying 
 On thy bright beams undying — 
 
 O Earth ! fling not thy shadows 'twixt heaven and ray soul ! 
 
 CAPTAIN O'HAY. 
 
 The long day of battle and carnage was over. 
 The spirit of silence came down with the Night 
 
 Who flung her dark mantle of shadows to cover 
 
 The long-gaping wounds and the blood from her sight. 
 
 The hour was past nine, for the taps had just sounded. 
 And we thought of the brave boys who fell thro' the 
 dav. 
 
yO LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 As we marched to the field for to bring in the wounded. 
 And bury the dead on the ground where they lay. 
 
 The light-fingered wind swept the pall from the night, and 
 
 The stars, like the bright eyes of angels, came forth. 
 And the field of the dead by the pale moon was lightened 
 
 As soft as she shone o'er our homes in the North, 
 When bright 'neath the moon on our path shone a cannon — 
 
 The dead round in heaps told the tale of the day — 
 And over its glare, faint and sad, leant a man on ; 
 
 We raised up his head — it was Captain O'Hay. 
 
 Captain O'Hay was a soldier from Erin, 
 
 With a hand made of iron, an eye glancing fire ; 
 His was a spirit that never knew fear in. 
 
 The first to attack and the last to retire. 
 His voice, loud in fight, in the camp was so mellow. 
 
 As he sang the sweet songs of the days that were flown. 
 He won all our hearts — such a free, manly fellow — 
 
 We loved him as tho' he was one of our own. 
 
 As we raised up his head, and his eyes fell upon us. 
 The old fire of battle shone steady and bright : 
 
 ** Why, Perry, and Ditson, and Stanly, and Manus, 
 And Colonel De Burrow, and Captain — all right! 
 
LOVE AND LAN D. 7I 
 
 In sighting this gun I received a stray bullet — 
 
 They 'd picked off" the boys as each stood to his post — 
 My arm here feels stiff and cold; sergeant, just pull it — 
 So — I feared that the day and the battle were lost. 
 
 ** I *m glad that you 've come, for my spirit is pluming 
 
 Her wings for her flight thro' the valley of gloom ; 
 All these long weary hours have I prayed for your coming 
 
 To cheer with your presence the path to the tomb. 
 Blithe comrades in camp and brave soldiers in danger. 
 
 True friends, nay, true brothers, baptized in the grand 
 Red font of Liberty, think of the stranger 
 
 Who fought neath 'your banner and died for your land : 
 
 ** How, oft in the mess when his heart seemed the lightest, 
 When he sang those gay songs, has his soul been in 
 tears. 
 When his mirth was the wildest, his eyes sparkled 
 brightest — 
 'T was the mem'ry and fire of the long-vanished years. 
 How, oft 'neath the rat-tat of musketry's rattle. 
 
 When the cannon belched fire and deatn at his com- 
 mand. 
 Has he prayed that his life would leap out in some battle 
 On his own native hills for his own native land. 
 7 
 
72 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 '* When thro' the green vales the Reveille is sounding. 
 
 And bugle-notes ring in the long-wished-for day. 
 When the men of my land down the hillsides come bounding. 
 
 Who '11 answer the roll call for Captain O'Hay ?*' 
 A dozen bright sabres flew out of their sheathing, 
 
 A dozen bronzed lips kissed them, each shouting ** I !" 
 He looked on his comrades, proud, brave, but unbreathing ; 
 
 His spirit had passed from the earth to the sky. 
 
 We dug him a grave 'neath his own shining cannon, 
 
 And laid him to rest with his sword by his side, 
 Far away from the banks of the soft-flowing Shannon, 
 
 In the strength of his years and the flush of his pride. 
 Brave hearts and true souls, shrined in song and in story, 
 
 Went out, Gettysburg, in thy dark bloody fray. 
 But no spirit took wing o'er the red tide of glory 
 
 As bold as the spirit of Captain O'Hay. 
 
 WASHINGTON'S NAME. 
 
 Let nations grown old in the annals of glory 
 
 Retrace their proud flights through long cycles of years^ 
 
 And cull with fond hand from the pages of story 
 Every name that for honor and virtue appears — 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 73 
 
 Bring them forth, round their brows all their victories 
 gleaming. 
 
 Every deed gathered up from the echoes of Fame ; 
 And as stars disappear in the sun's golden beaming. 
 
 They '11 pale in the light of great Washington's name. 
 
 As we lift up the veil where those heroes lie sleeping. 
 
 And gaze on the trophies their prowess has won. 
 Beside them sit Virtue and Liberty weeping, 
 
 Whose tears dim their glories like spots on the sun. 
 Some spirit hath made it her heavenly duty 
 
 To guard from dishonor one pathway to fame ; 
 Not a shadow or teint dims the soft wondrous beauty 
 
 That shines like a halo round Washington's name. 
 
 When Liberty's trumpet tones leaped from the mountains. 
 
 His sword was the first that encountered the foe ; 
 When the soft light of Peace floated up from her fountains, 
 
 His was the soul felt its earliest glow. 
 The fondest in love and the fiercest in glory, 
 
 Neath his frown wild Ambition slunk back to her den ; 
 And of all that shine down in tradition or story. 
 
 He stands high alone o'er the children of men. 
 
 Earth's proudest and greatest kings, heroes, and sages, 
 That rise for a time o'er man's general doom, 
 
74 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And shine down the light and the spirit of ages. 
 At length will go down to the dust of the tomb; 
 
 But long as a banner to Freedom is flying. 
 No shadow can rest on his sunshine of fame. 
 
 For Glory has crowned him with beauty undying. 
 And time can but brighten great Washington's name. 
 
 INNISHOWEN, 
 
 No wonder I do weep and sigh, as here alone 
 
 I sadly stray thro' forests gray, unlov'd, unknown. 
 
 Oh for the rays of boyhood's days, bright days long flown. 
 
 The waving woods^ and the rushing floods of Innishow'n I 
 
 The woe and tears of dreary years have worn away 
 That sterner part which round my heart thro' manhood 
 
 lay. 
 And, like a child that 's roamed the wild and tired grown, 
 I sit and sigh for days gone by in Innishow'n. 
 
 The mountain streams dance through my dreams in silver 
 
 song — 
 As leaping light the liquid bright laughs down among 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 75 
 
 The dark glens wild where oft, a child, I 've wandered 
 
 thro'. 
 Ere sorrow gave her poisoned wave for summer dew. 
 
 From hill and vale the Clon na Gael have sadly fled; 
 The cold footfall of Saxon Gall disturbs the dead ; 
 How must they feel 'neath Saxon heel ? ochone ! ochone ! 
 The rook finds rest in the eagle's nest in Innishow'n. 
 
 Should Cahir come from his moss-grown tomb to Coul- 
 
 dah's side, 
 And from the height look down beneath, where true men 
 
 died, 
 How would he sigh as days gone by came rushing on, 
 To find how slaves can tread the graves of lions gone ! 
 
 Oh Liberty ! when shall we see thy smiles again ? 
 
 Both night and day we watch and pray, and look in vain. 
 
 How many years, through woe and tears we 've braved 
 
 the storm, 
 In heart and mind we 've kept enshrined thy sacred form. 
 
 'T is true that we were false to thee and to the dead. 
 Else from where first thy youth was nursed thou 'dst never 
 fled — 
 
76 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 That, while we slept, foul tyrants crept and bound the 
 
 chains 
 Which tinged the flood of Gaelic blood within our veins. 
 
 But Liberty, when Tyranny was on thy track. 
 
 The blood and bone of Innishow'n were at thy back — 
 
 From mount and glen came stalwart men, each heart thine 
 
 own — 
 What foe would dare the wolf-dog's lair in Innishow'n ? 
 
 Those were the times when clashing chimes from hungry 
 
 swords 
 Fell on the ears of mountaineers like sweetest words ; 
 When Freedom found her native ground was on the heath. 
 Where men grown bold thro' legends old did play with 
 
 death. 
 
 But long ago by want and woe fond ties were riv'n ; 
 A scattered host on e/'ry coast they're tempest driv'n : 
 But still they bear thro' toil and care the stamp and tone 
 That freemen bore in days of yore thro' Innishow'n. 
 
 Green Innisfail ! one of the Gael, that ne'er may see 
 The golden days when thou shalt raise thy proud head free. 
 Stands by the shore and gazing o'er the deep, wide sea. 
 Thus fills the cup of true love up, and drinks to thee ! 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 77 
 
 LOVE AND YOUTH. 
 
 Love and Youth came tripping o'er the meadows on a day 
 
 When the wild bees were sipping honey dew from the 
 flow'rs. 
 And the long grass scarce bent as they caroled on their way ; 
 
 But it 's fallen long ago 'neath the sweep of the mowers. 
 The flowers flung their spirit to the wanton summer wind. 
 
 And the birds sang their loves in the green swinging 
 boughs. 
 As Love and Youth passed onward and never gazed behind ; 
 
 'T was the holiday of Nature, all odors, songs and vows. 
 
 Sweet spirits twain, from fairy land, that light this earth of 
 ours. 
 Long have I watch'd and waited your journeying this 
 way ; 
 By the cooling streams I 've built you the rosiest of bowers. 
 With winding paths, where shame-faced Love can shun 
 the garish day. 
 Many a dream of beauty and of happiness to come 
 
 Have I had in these summer woods, sweet Youth and 
 Love, of you. 
 When your presence, like a glory, should consecrate my 
 home. 
 And lend eternal blooming, green fields and skies of blue. 
 
yS LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 Then Youth, he lightly smiled and his cheeks were apple 
 red. 
 And his eyes flashed bright as stars, and his teeth shone 
 like the pearls. 
 And his voice was sweeter far than the song-birds overhead. 
 While the summer wind was kissing and tossing his fair 
 curls, 
 And said, **My coi irade. Love, sometimes nestles in the 
 heart. 
 Being rather sentimental, oft he pauses on his way, 
 But * Onward ' is my motto, so adieu, for we must part. 
 No tears, nor sighs, nor sentiment can flatter me to stay." 
 
 So he press'd Love's pouting lips and he kissed his hand 
 to me. 
 And he flung us fond adeos all so heartless and so gay. 
 Then passed along the meadows, singing ** Happy, light 
 and free ; " 
 Treating us together in a cavalierish way. 
 When he paused upon the hill top to take a glance behind. 
 The flow'rs assumed a richer hue, the sunshine seem'd 
 more bright. 
 The music of his silver voice came tripping on the wind, 
 Then, like a dream of morning, he vanished from our 
 sight. 
 
LOVE AND LAND 
 
 79 
 
 Love made my cot his home, but in roaming thro' the 
 bovv'rs 
 Many a time he paused, and oft, when wandering alone, 
 He kiss'd the morning dewdrops from the red lips of the 
 flow'rs. 
 And wept for darling Youth and the days that were gone ; 
 Their journeyings thro' the meadows, the valleys, by the 
 streams. 
 The thrilling of his kisses and the glory of his eyes, 
 Their restings in the woodlands and the rapture of their 
 dreams. 
 Then his tears fell like the summer rain, his soul went 
 out in sighs. 
 
 I watch'd poor Love decaying, growing sadder day by 6iy, 
 
 Till in pity I released him from his bondage and his 
 chains ; 
 His olden glories flash'd and shone around his sunny way. 
 
 The thought of meeting Youth had whipped the hot 
 blocd thro' his veins. 
 I turned me, sad and thoughtful, to my deserted bowers. 
 
 Imprinted deep within my heart the melancholy truth 
 That Love will sigh in sadness in sunny meads and flowers. 
 
 And lives alone upon the lips and in the eyes of Youth. 
 
80 LOVEANDLAND 
 
 LIFE'S UNDOING. 
 
 Our life's undoing 
 Is in pursuing 
 
 Earth's phantom joys unreal, unkind, 
 That, changing, dying. 
 Keep ever flying, 
 
 Like clouds before the winter wind : 
 And while retreating. 
 Still falsely cheating 
 
 Our fancies with their borrowed bloom- 
 Bloom that, ending. 
 Leaves us bending, 
 
 Poor mourners, sadly o'er the tomb. 
 
 From every measure 
 Laughing pleasure 
 
 Flies to meet the am'rous kiss, 
 But leaden sorrow 
 Comes to-morrow, 
 
 A yew-tree for the grave of bliss. 
 And still we follow 
 All those hollow 
 
 Joys that wear the garb of mirth, 
 
LOVEANDLAVD. 8l 
 
 That flutter lightly 
 A moment brightly, 
 Then sink, from where they rose, to earth. 
 
 By stream and fountain. 
 
 By vale and mountain. 
 The world is wooing our souls astray. 
 
 So true her seeming 
 
 We 're little dreaming 
 She 's luring onward but to betray ! 
 
 O ! truant spirit, 
 
 Wo.uld ye inherit 
 The endless glory, seek not below. 
 
 Lift not your voices 
 
 When earth rejoices — 
 She sings of mirth while she 's full of woe. 
 
 A fairer vision 
 
 Of fields Elysian 
 Bursts o'er our spirits from brighter skies ; 
 
 " Eternal blooming. 
 
 No death consuming 
 The cherry lips or the beaming eyes. 
 
 Youth's crystal river 
 
 Flowing bright forever, 
 Undimmed by shadows from death or time ;" 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And shall we follow 
 Earth's phantoms hollow 
 While Faith is preaching these truths sublime ? 
 
 HOW SOFTLY FALLS SNOW. 
 
 How softly falls the virgin snow 
 
 On earth's gray withered breast — 
 Hiding the flowers that far below 
 
 Have stolen to their rest ; 
 Thus, when the bloom of life is past. 
 
 And winter comes below. 
 We sink into our peaceful rest, 
 
 As soft as falls the snow. 
 
 Beneath the sunny smiles of spring 
 
 The white snow melts away. 
 And wild birds from the green boughs sing 
 
 Life's triumph o'er decay ; 
 Thus shall the soul triumphant rise 
 
 As flowers from decay, 
 And blossom 'neath those summer skies 
 
 That will not pass away. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 83 
 
 THE BEAUTIFUL CITY OF DERRY. 
 
 When I was a bachelor, young and hearty. 
 
 Sporting, raking. 
 
 Merry making. 
 
 In gay delights 
 
 I spent my nights. 
 The pride of each frolic and party. 
 I had friends whom I loved and who loved me, 
 In their kindness who never reproved me ; 
 
 I was full of youth's fires 
 
 And wild desires. 
 And gave play to each spirit that moved me ; 
 
 My only care 
 
 Was dance and fair, 
 I was merriest of the merry 
 
 Of all the gay boys. 
 
 For frolic and noise. 
 In the beautiful City of Derry. 
 
 But discontent, like a blight, came o'er me. 
 
 Song and story. 
 
 Gold and glory. 
 
 Mixed in gleams 
 
 Of glowing dreams 
 Were flowing forever before me. 
 
84 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 I resolved to cross o'er the wide ocean. 
 
 To carve out wealth and promotion ; 
 Come back, make amends 
 By enriching my friends — 
 
 'T was a wild but a beautiful notion. 
 So I bid good by 
 To my friends, and I 
 
 Kissed my Love's lips of cherry. 
 And the very next day 
 I sailed away 
 
 From the beautiful City of Derry. 
 
 I worked on many a winding river. 
 
 Vale and mountain, 
 
 Never counting 
 
 The years go by. 
 
 So sure was I 
 In my dreaming that fortune would give her 
 Rich stores of golden treasure. 
 Pour out her soul without measure. 
 
 I spent my whole life 
 
 In labor and strife, 
 And fled the gay smiles of pleasure. 
 
 Still dreaming of home 
 
 And bright days to come, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 85 
 
 When the boys should all dub me Sir Terry, 
 
 And flowing with cash, 
 
 I could cut a big dash 
 In the beautiful City of Derry. 
 
 I went to the land where the ore was growing, 
 
 Where Fortune 's holding 
 
 Her purse at the golden 
 
 Gate that leads 
 
 To the flowing meads 
 Where rivers of gold are flowing. 
 I found the blind goddess so civil, 
 I struck for the root of all evil ; 
 
 My stock in trade 
 
 Was a pick and spade, 
 I 'd have gold or I 'd dig to the devil. 
 
 For at every stroke 
 
 An angel spoke. 
 With bright eyes and lips of cherry, 
 
 '* We wait for you 
 
 O'er the waters blue. 
 Come back to your friends in Derry." 
 
 At length I surpris'd Miss Fortune smiling — 
 With the witch's 
 Smiles came riches 
 
86 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 To bless me at last 
 
 For the barren past. 
 And her years of deceit and beguiling ; 
 And soon o'er the blue waters going, 
 With fair winds merrily blowing. 
 
 The days of my youth. 
 
 Like the breath from the south. 
 Warm, soft round my senses flowing, 
 • By my side on the green 
 
 Was Kitty McQueen, 
 And we danced to the "Humors of Kerry," 
 
 The moonbeams danced too, 
 
 As they used to do 
 In the beautiful City of Derry. 
 
 A gorgeous summer night was shaking 
 
 Her dark locks over 
 • Her ocean lover, 
 
 With pale surprise 
 
 She ope*d her eyes 
 And beheld the morning breaking ; 
 *T was then o'er the blue waves appearing 
 We saw the green hills of old Erin, 
 
 The sun flung its light 
 
 Thro' the shadows of night. 
 And we hailed the bright omen with cheering. 
 
LOVE AND LAN D. 87 
 
 Into the bay 
 
 I sailed that day 
 And I leapt into a wherry ; 
 
 The dream I prized 
 
 Was realized — 
 I was rich in the City of Derry. 
 
 I looked around in wildest wonder. 
 
 Paused and falter'd. 
 
 Things looked alter'd. 
 
 In all the place 
 
 I knew no face, 
 The town seemed all battered asunder ; 
 I asked for my friends in the city, 
 I searched thro' the maidens for Kitty, 
 
 But none heard before 
 
 Of the name that I bore. 
 Till an old man looked on me with pity. 
 
 And he says, with surprise, 
 
 While the tears filled his eyes, 
 ** Why, God bless me ! your name must be Terry, 
 
 That sailed away 
 
 On that long summer's day 
 When we were both bovs in Derry. 
 
 "Many a year your Love sat sighing, 
 Patient waiting, 
 Never mating. 
 
88 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Her heart beat true 
 
 Alone for you. 
 She named your name when dying ; 
 And oft, when the roses were blooming. 
 And the bees thro' the garden went humming. 
 
 The boys used to meet 
 
 At the end of the street 
 And talk with delight of your coming ; 
 
 But the long years pass'd on. 
 
 And they took, one by one. 
 The sad, the serene, and the merry ; 
 
 Some gone o'er the waves. 
 
 And the rest in their graves 
 In the beautiful City of Derry." 
 
 I went to the green, saw the merry making. 
 
 Bright eyes glancing. 
 
 Light feet dancing. 
 
 Dancing, too. 
 
 As we used to do ; 
 They danced on my heart, for I felt it breakinj 
 I saw the maids green garlands twining, 
 I thought of a loved one long pining, 
 
 I looked for her eyes 
 
 To the blue summer skies. 
 And the stars seem'fJ in mockery shining. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 8q 
 
 I asked some sweet girls. 
 
 With long, sunny curls. 
 Were they happy ; they answered me, "very.** 
 
 Oh, maidens, go pray. 
 
 How can you be gay 
 And so many green graves in Derry ? 
 
 I wander away in the shadowy gloaming. 
 Sadly musing. 
 Always choosing 
 The path of glooms 
 Among the tombs. 
 And think — do they know I 'm coming ? 
 I sit on the graves where they 're sleeping. 
 Lone watch in return I am keeping ; 
 And thi? is the meed 
 Of worldly greed. 
 Sorrow, and woe, and weeping. 
 I 'd give all the gold 
 The ocean could hold 
 To kiss my Love's lips of cherry. 
 Be young once more 
 With friends galore. 
 In the beautiful City of Derry. 
 
9© LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 WHEN OTHER LIPS WILL FONDLY PROVE. 
 
 When other lips will fondly prove. 
 
 With soft, seductive tone. 
 How well the heart can truly love. 
 
 Remember him who 's gone. 
 When their sweet voices softly steal 
 
 On the ear like minstrelsy. 
 Believe them not, thro' woe or weal 
 
 They cannot love like me. 
 Whose guileless tongue cannot reveal 
 
 My soul's dear mystery. 
 
 Have we not climbed the mountains high. 
 
 And gazed upon the sea. 
 And where the eagle's wings swept by. 
 
 You pledged your love to me ? 
 But Love, untrue to early vows. 
 
 Has fled his lowly rest. 
 And in the green and topmost boughs 
 
 Has built his gorgeous nest — 
 'Mong silver leaves and golden boughs 
 
 Has built his stately nest. 
 
 Oh, Love, all heavenly at thy birth. 
 How hast thou fallen away 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And grown to be a thing of earth — 
 
 Of cold, material clay ! 
 And thou wast once a joy divine. 
 
 But now, thou earth-controll'd, 
 A god at whose unhallow'd shrine 
 
 True hearts are bought and sold, 
 Whose eyes have but the diamond's shine. 
 
 Whose wings are tipp'd with gold. 
 
 91 
 
 THE DEATH OF THE FAVORITE. 
 
 We sat beside her bed of pain, 
 
 And sad she smiled while we were weeping 
 She said the patting of the rain 
 
 Was but the Angels watches keeping. 
 
 She spoke of things beyond her age 
 
 We stood in awe, for God was speaking; 
 
 Her vision swept his sacred page 
 
 In the light of dawn from heaven breaking, 
 
 She talked in such a sad, sweet way. 
 
 That all night long our tears were falling ; 
 
 She said with us she could not stay. 
 She heard the spirit voices calling. 
 
92 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 Her eyes had caught that wondrous light 
 Which glows when earthly ties are riven. 
 
 Before the soul assumes her flight 
 Unto her native, cloudless heaven. 
 
 And thus we watched her thro' the night. 
 The last dark night of pain and sorrow; 
 
 Her spirit met the morning light, 
 
 And Angels bid her sweet good-morrow. 
 
 THE MARINER'S HYMN. 
 
 Lvfd of the deep ! when the loud winds are roaming 
 
 Like merciless fiends thro' the terrible sea, 
 We behold Thee, enraged, on each white mouthed billow. 
 
 Writhing in terror in presence of Thee. 
 ,When the red lightning tears thro' the midst of disorder. 
 
 Like thy wrath chasing sin thro' her foul seething sphere. 
 From the high throne of faith the soul smiles o'er the 
 billows, 
 
 For she knows, by this terror, great God, Thou art near. 
 
 There are soft, tender flow'rs on the bleak, arid desert. 
 In the bosom of barrenness sweetly they bloom. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 93 
 
 Their long, slender petals with dew overladen — 
 Dew borne on the lips of the burning simoom. 
 
 The Power that doth watch o'er the flow'r of the desert. 
 That guards its poor weakness 'mid billows of sand. 
 
 Is still by our side on the tempest-toss'd ocean. 
 
 His strength is our anchor — our harbor His hand. 
 
 SUNSHINE AND SHADOW. 
 
 In our journey thro' life with our friends by our side, 
 
 Who can change into smiles the cold frowns of the 
 world, 
 Thro' the rapids of strife who can peacefully guide 
 
 Our barque o'er the waters with streamers unfurl'd — 
 Then is life a dream, and its cares are all pleasures, 
 
 Our way lies thro' sunshine, our breath is of flow'rs ; 
 Love strikes the harp to his soft flowing measures. 
 
 And light round the heart trip the gay, laughing hours. 
 
 But, alas ! for the nameless who journey alone 
 
 From the vales of their youth amid sorrow and strife. 
 
 Like a dream of delight smile the days that are gone. 
 While around and before frowns the desert of life ; 
 
94 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 And stricken and weary they faint by the way. 
 
 No soft voice to cheer them, no strong hand to save ; 
 
 And toss'd on the bleak waves in anguish they pray 
 For the presence of death and the rest of the grave. 
 
 WHEN YOU MEET BRIGHT EYES. 
 
 When you meet bright eyes. 
 
 Beware, beware ! 
 For in them there lies 
 
 A snare, dark snake. 
 To flatter the soul 
 From its heavenly goal. 
 
 And smoothen the road to despair — 
 To sorrow, and death, and despair. 
 
 Be they black or blue. 
 
 Or brown or gray. 
 Whatever the hue. 
 
 The devil's to pay 
 If the lightning that 's hid 
 'Neath th' electrical lid 
 
 Is arous'd, and leaps forth on your way 
 Like a lion leaps forth on its prey. 
 
LOVEANDLAND. 95 
 
 The devil doth lure 
 
 Poor souls astray. 
 And plays his game sure 
 Full many a way. 
 But his surest of wiles 
 Is woman's sweet smiles. 
 
 For the soul loves to yield to their sway — 
 Flies to meet them at mischief half-way. 
 
 We forsake the path 
 
 That leads to fame. 
 Incur earth's wrath. 
 
 And woe, and shame, 
 Fling friends to the wind, 
 Leave riches behind. 
 
 When the spirit is drunk with love's flame- 
 Love's magical, maddening flame. 
 
 'T is vain to assay. 
 
 With threat or frown, 
 To keep them at bay. 
 
 Black, blue or brown. 
 All must bend at the shrine 
 Where those lamps of love shine. 
 Must sufi^er, adore, and go down — 
 To the dust at her feet must go down. 
 
g6 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 HOW FALSE AND HOW SWEET. 
 
 How false and how sweet 
 
 Are the pleasures that greet 
 Young voyagers sailing down passion's deep tide ; 
 
 How sweetly they smile 
 
 When they seek to beguile 
 From the haven of peace to the blue ocean wide ; 
 
 They put on such hue 
 
 While the shore stands in view. 
 That we blindly pursue o'er the tide with the wind, 
 
 Till 'neath the dark waves 
 
 We find premature graves. 
 Far, far from the land that lies smiling behind. 
 
 'Tis true, some get back 
 
 To youth's beautiful track. 
 And seek 'neath the palm trees a respite from pain. 
 
 But tho' hot tears may roll 
 
 Out the guilt of the soul. 
 She can never appear in her snow robes again ! 
 
 As roses will bloom 
 
 O'er the mouldering tomb. 
 So false lips may smile o'er the desolate heart ; 
 
 But tho' roses decay. 
 
 And false smiles melt away. 
 The cold shade of sorrow will never depart ! 
 
LOVE AN D LAN D. 97 
 
 How happy are they 
 
 Who keep life's gentle way, 
 As thro' the green woodlands some laughing streams roll ! 
 
 Away from the slime 
 
 Of foul cities, where crime 
 Never tinges the snow-tint of virtue's white soul ; 
 
 The bright crowns are theirs 
 
 That sweet purity wears ; 
 To them is the light of God's countenance given ! 
 
 Who from their low birth 
 
 Travaileth through earth. 
 And keep their soul's bloom for the garden of Heaven. 
 
 HAVE YOU HEARD OF OLD GARRYOV/EN ? 
 
 Father Malone is a pastor of some church in the City of Limerick, and- 
 used to denounce the Fenians, if not to his own satisfaction, at least to that 
 of his Saxon masters. 
 
 Have you e'er heard of old Garryowen ? 
 
 Ochone ! 
 Sure 't is there lives one Father Malone — 
 
 Mavrone ! 
 'T was little they thought. 
 They who conquered and fought 
 
98 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 For the freedom of old Garryosven, 
 
 Ochone ! 
 We 'd be damned for just holding our own — 
 Or preparing to win back our own. 
 
 Sure 't was there that our forefathers died 
 
 With pride, 
 And each man had a sister or bride 
 
 By his side ; 
 And they marched to the grave. 
 All so loyal and brave. 
 While the clear-flowing Shannon beside 
 
 It sighed 
 For the men and the women that died; 
 God rest those for Ireland that died. 
 
 Far away from that land of my own, 
 
 Alone, 
 
 Thinking sadly of days that have flown, 
 
 Ochone ! 
 Sure I cannot control 
 A huge pride in my soul 
 
 That I am a child of thine own. 
 
 Blood and bone^ 
 
 True to thee and thy dead, Garryowen — 
 
 True to Ireland and thee, Garryowen. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Suilish Dhea to each old Irish priest 
 
 Deceased ; 
 Like a pilgrim I face to the East, 
 
 Released 
 From sorrow and pain. 
 And in spirit again 
 I visit their shrines in the East. 
 
 O' Chriast ! 
 Must we go to the tomb for a priest 
 With the heart of a man and a priest ? 
 
 "We'll be damned if we pull down the Red 
 
 'T is said ; 
 " God's vengeance will fall on each head :" 
 
 O ye dead ! 
 Can ye speak from the graves 
 To those British-fed knaves. 
 Ye who trailed in the dust this same Red, 
 
 And bled 
 To raise up the Green in its stead — 
 Our own darling Green in its stead? 
 
 One word with this Father Malone, 
 
 Alone ! 
 
 Whose heart must be molded of bone. 
 
 Or stone. 
 
 99 
 
lOO LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 If he '11 fast a few weeks 
 
 On potatoes and leeks, 
 And go barefoot through old Garryowen, 
 
 Mavrone ! 
 I '11 go bail that he '11 alter his tone 
 When our sorrows reach him and his own. 
 
 O shame on this Father Malone — 
 
 Ochone ! 
 
 He 's a strange bird for old Garryowen 
 
 To own. 
 May the ghosts of the dead 
 Come in troops round his bed — 
 
 The ghosts of the priests that are gone, 
 
 Ochone ! 
 
 On his breast lay the old Treaty-Stone — 
 
 For a nightmare, the old Treaty-Stone. 
 
 May they carry him out in his sleep. 
 
 And creep 
 Through the lanes where God's sufferers keep 
 
 And weep; 
 Where the mother looks wild 
 On the face of her child 
 That hunger has rocked to death's sleep, 
 
 So deep. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. IQI 
 
 Ah ! where were the shepherds to keep 
 This wolf from the Master's sheep ? 
 
 Then in to each workhouse ward. 
 
 Well barr'd. 
 
 Where horror and hopelessness guard 
 
 Each ward; 
 Where husband and wife 
 Are both parted for life. 
 
 To meet in the cold churchyard. 
 
 Oh Lord! 
 
 How they sigh for the green churchyard — 
 
 For rest in the green churchyard. 
 
 Ho! true men of old Garryowen — 
 
 Our own — 
 'T is spirit, and muscle, and bone. 
 
 Alone, 
 That make up a land ; 
 Let the proud and the grand 
 Slink aloof — we can go it alone. 
 
 Yes, alone. 
 Stand true for the old Treaty-Stone, 
 And the glory of old Garryowen. 
 
I02 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 THRO' TEARS OF LOVE. 
 
 Thro' tears of love we 've looked the last 
 
 Upon our household light. 
 The sunshine of our hearts is pass'd. 
 
 We meet in shade to-night ; 
 We sit around in speechless woe. 
 
 So deep, so true our love 
 For her we worshiped here below. 
 
 Whom saints adore above. 
 
 Oh, when did Heaven endow a mind 
 
 So formed to soothe and bless? 
 Or, when was there to death consigned 
 
 Such feast of loveliness ? 
 The very tomb grew beautiful. 
 
 Her presence made it home ; 
 Her absence makes our home so dull. 
 
 It seems more like the tomb. 
 
 She v/as a thing of heavenly birth, 
 
 That left her home above 
 To dwell awhile upon the earth 
 
 And draw our souls to love. 
 An angel came unto our bower 
 
 And looked into her eves. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. lOJ 
 
 He caught the odor from the flow'r 
 And bore it to the skies. 
 
 The shadow of death's sable wing 
 
 So shrouds us o'er and o'er. 
 The sunshine that the world may bring 
 
 Can reach our hearts no more. 
 So wrapt our souls in loneliness. 
 
 So tuned to sorrow's tone. 
 No voice can cheer, no light can bless. 
 
 Unless from Heaven alone. 
 
 CASTLE MAHON. 
 
 Oh, for an hour 'mongst the red-blossomed clover — 
 
 And my boy dreams restor'd in their freshness to me. 
 To rove the green fields and the wide valleys over. 
 
 With a footstep as light and a spirit as free ; 
 Where the gray ivied ruins fling out their dark shadows. 
 
 Like a sigh from the soul for the days that are gone ; 
 And the Deel ripples softly along the green meadows 
 
 Far away by the village of Castle Mah6n. 
 
I04 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 How often in soul I go down to that river 
 
 And gaze in its depths till my senses grow dim ; 
 I touch its pure lips, and can feel my soul quiver 
 
 As I catch the green rushes that grow on its brim. 
 'Tis the fountain of youth ; as I feel its embraces. 
 
 The long years of sorrow and exile are gone. 
 And in its depths, smiling, I see the dear faces 
 
 That shone 'round my boyhood in Castle Mahon. 
 
 How bright are the skies of our infancy glowing, 
 
 How green are the fields where in boyhood we roved ; 
 The streams, like our youth, full of purity flowing. 
 
 The distant blue hills — all the haunts that we lov'd — 
 Like a dream of lost Eden, their beauty's still shining ; 
 
 We gaze on their glory, but fate whips us on 
 O'er the wild sea of life, with our hearts ever pining 
 
 For the spirit's lost home in some Castle Mahon. 
 
 No more does the voice of the sweet village maiden 
 
 Fall soft on the heart like the birds' trilling songs ; 
 But sad on the ear comes the night wind, o'erladen 
 
 With the soul-rending keen that to sorrow belongs. 
 Yes, Grief, bent and stricken, mopes 'round heavy-hearted, 
 
 She 's seen the loved vanish away one by one ; 
 The old to the grave, and the young all departed — 
 
 Their names scarce remember'd in Castle Mahon. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. IO5 
 
 All are gone from the land: some for freedom contending, 
 
 On the red field of war and the wide flowing sea, 
 Pour'd out their brave spirits, their latest breath sending 
 
 A sigh on the wings of the battle to thee ; 
 And many went out on the dark sea of shadows 
 
 From the jail to the pest-house of Mary-Le-Bon ; 
 But all heard the Deel singing to the green meadows. 
 
 Far away by the village of Castle Mahon. 
 
 Each night in my sleep the white moonbeams are flinging 
 
 Their light o'er the river, the bridge, and the mill ; 
 I can hear the clear tones of the village maids singing, 
 
 I catch ev'ry note and I feel ev'ry trill ; 
 Then a demon leaps out, with a wild cry of danger. 
 
 And the river, and bridge, and the moonbeams are gone, 
 I awake from my dreams in the land of the stranger. 
 
 Far away from the village of Castle Mahon. 
 
 THE SEA. 
 
 When the broad blue sea is sleeping. 
 And the timid waves come creeping. 
 Like children of the ocean, to kiss the lips of Earth ; 
 
I06 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 When winds tread lightly over 
 
 To fan their sleeping lover. 
 Playing 'round his breathing breast in hush'd and holy 
 mirth ; 
 
 When the distant ships are plodding. 
 
 And their tall masts slowly nodding 
 Like drowsy trav'lers, over the deep immensity. 
 
 And the glowing sun's embraces 
 
 All shadowing effaces — 
 In that hour of dreamy quiet, how beautiful the sea ! 
 
 But when the winds grow frantic. 
 And lash the wild Atlantic, 
 
 Then rise the waves, like lions rous'd, and angrily they 
 roar ; 
 
 White-mouthed they come leaping. 
 Where the infant sobs came creeping, 
 
 With tossing manes they-howl and fling their fury on the 
 shore. 
 
 When the scowling skies are bright'ning 
 With God's anger-looks of lightning. 
 
 And strong-ribb'd ships are toss'd and smash'd by giant 
 hands, then we 
 
 Stand mute with awe and wonder. 
 While God speaks with voice of thunder. 
 
 Gazing on the grandeur and the glory of the sea. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. IO7 
 
 • SOGGARTH MA CHREE. 
 
 They shall be accursed while they live, and deprived of Christian burial when 
 they die. — Bishop of St. Louis. 
 
 It is a crime against humajiity, and a sin against the Church, to attempt revolution in 
 Ireland, to drive the English frofli the land. — Bishop Duggan. 
 
 The Irish are satisfied with the English GoveHunent, and none but murderers and 
 robbers belong to this infidel society called Fenian Brotherhood, etc., etc. — Bishop Cullen 
 
 "The last link is broken 
 
 That bound us to thee. 
 At the words you have spoken,*' 
 
 A Soggarth Ma Chree, 
 Our souls have arisen 
 
 As free as the wind. 
 And burst that black prison 
 
 That dungeon'd the mind. 
 
 The fetters that bound us 
 
 Were love, and not force ; 
 When the tempest beat round us 
 
 We stood on our course 
 O'er the red sea of glory, 
 
 Cross and Shamrock entwin'd. 
 With our green banner gory. 
 
 But flung to the wind. 
 
 Our souls have been sinking 
 'Neath cold prison bars. 
 
I08 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And long to be drinking 
 The light of the stars. 
 
 And now that we 've riven 
 Your mystical chain. 
 
 We will not be driven 
 By mortal again. 
 
 Sure, we never did falter 
 
 At torture or death 
 When the rock was your altar 
 
 And freedom your faith ; 
 When Hessians and Yeomen 
 
 Were hot on your track. 
 We met the black foemen 
 
 And flung them all back. 
 
 We have been your vassals, 
 
 Both spirit and bones. 
 Our homes w^ere your castles, 
 
 Our hearts were your thrones 
 Your lairs w^e have guarded 
 
 From sleuth-hound and laws. 
 And now we 're rewarded 
 
 By selling the Cause. 
 
 Now, Clerics, with Laymen, 
 Take sides — Green or Red : 
 
LOVE AND LAND. IO9 
 
 If you leave us, why. Amen, 
 
 We'll sigh for the dead, 
 And, sad but stout hearted. 
 
 Press on to the goal. 
 For the Priests long departed 
 
 Are with us in soul. 
 
 Whoe'er turn their backs on 
 
 Our Land and our Race 
 To side with the Saxon 
 
 For booty and place. 
 Why, damn them, we'll greet them 
 
 With bright sword in hand. 
 In the red battle meet them 
 
 As foes to our land. 
 
 Come down, my dear Rifle, 
 
 How brightly you shine ; 
 What tyrant can stifle 
 
 That sweet voice of thine ? 
 Ten thousand in chorus. 
 
 With bass in the ranks. 
 And the Green flying o'er us. 
 
 Will be heard, and no thanks. 
 
 Hark! the musketry's rattle 
 Falls sweet on the ear ; 
 
no LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 'Tis the signal of battle — 
 
 Why loiter you here ? 
 You have hands, your friends need 'em. 
 
 To-day is unfurl'd 
 The standard of Freedom, 
 
 With light to the world. 
 
 The streams may be driven 
 
 Aback to their source. 
 The moon high in heaven 
 
 Grow black in its course. 
 Like light summer dew 
 
 The sun drink dry each river. 
 But we will be true 
 
 To our country forever. 
 
 THE RETURN OF CAPTAIN McCANN. 
 
 I sit in the gloaming 
 And wait for the coming 
 
 Of Captain McCann ; 
 I am his mother. 
 We parted each other 
 
 When the summer began. 
 
L O V E A N D L A N IJ> . Ill 
 
 My beautiful Cahir, 
 
 He followed Tom Meagher 
 
 For sake of the Green ; 
 His father at Gorey 
 Fought well for its glory 
 
 With pike and with skian. 
 
 Now summer is dying, 
 
 The dead leaves are flying — 
 
 How they rustle and roll ; 
 The long spectral shadows 
 Lie dark on the meadows, 
 
 Like grief on the soul. 
 These days look so dreary 
 My heart has grown weary 
 
 For others more bright ; 
 But why am I mourning. 
 And Cahir returning. 
 
 My darling, to-night? 
 
 Far away in dear Ireland, 
 His and mv sireland. 
 
 In days that are gone. 
 What a proud Irish matron. 
 At dance and at patron, 
 I gazed on my son } 
 10 
 
112 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 His voice was the sweetest. 
 His foot was the fleetest. 
 
 In concert and chase ; 
 How dark to the foeman. 
 But gentle as woman 
 
 To all of his race. 
 
 Now here is his letter — 
 No son was e'er better 
 
 To mother than he ; 
 As I look o'er its pages 
 It seemeth whole ages 
 
 Since he parted from me. 
 And ah, my dear daughter, 
 What horror and slaughter 
 
 Must Cahir have seen ; 
 How often surrounded 
 By dead and by wounded 
 
 Beneath our own Green. 
 
 ** We've had, since last writing. 
 Such marching and fighting 
 
 Beneath the red sun ; 
 The fights all seem'd blended — 
 Ere one was well ended 
 
 Another 'd begun ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I IJ 
 
 Thro' the swamps and morasses, 
 From the Oaks to Manassas, 
 
 Oft beating and beat, 
 The iirst when the fight came. 
 And then when the night came. 
 
 The last in retreat. 
 
 ** See the wild, reclcless forces. 
 Men, cannon, and horses. 
 
 In panic they go ; 
 And shouting and charging. 
 Our panic enlarging. 
 
 Here gallops the foe ; 
 Each flings down his sabre. 
 Abandons his neighbor 
 
 Himself to preserve. 
 O'er the shouting and yelling 
 Rings tiie voice of McClellan, 
 
 * Bring up the Reserve.' 
 
 ** O'er the dead and the dying 
 See our two banners flying. 
 
 The Green at the fore ; 
 No stain of dishonor 
 Can light on the banner 
 
 Our forefathers bore. 
 To the front we go, cheering. 
 
114 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The Green and Stars rearing. 
 While loud cries the Aid, 
 
 * Back, men, to your places ! 
 
 There 's an end to the races. 
 Here comes the Brigade ! * 
 
 ** We ne'er brought to foeman 
 By insult to woman 
 
 The blush of disgrace; 
 For while that we fought them 
 We never forgot them 
 
 As friends to our race. 
 We Ve kept oar swords' brightness. 
 We've kept our souls' whiteness. 
 
 Thro' battle and raid ; 
 No plunder or booty 
 Could tempt from its duty 
 
 The Irish Brigade. 
 
 ** On the field of Antietam 
 We met and we beat 'em ; 
 
 To-day, as before. 
 The red gap of danger 
 Was filled by the stranger 
 
 From Erin's green shore. 
 When the wild charge was sounded, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. II5 
 
 On the run I got wounded — 
 
 A ball thro' the breast ; 
 I go home to-morrow 
 Strength and spirit to borrow 
 
 From quiet and rest." 
 
 So I sit in the gloaming 
 And wait for his coming — 
 
 And lo, here he comes. 
 Borne slow on the shoulders 
 Of four brother soldiers — 
 
 The low muffled drums 
 Beat sad, like hearts weeping — 
 My darling is sleeping. 
 
 His fine spirit fled ; 
 My brave boy departed. 
 Proud, joyous, true-hearted, 
 
 He 's coming back dead ! 
 
 RESURGAM ! 
 
 The spirit of our race 
 Has attained her native place ; 
 On the red path of the battle-field her banners flowinj; 
 free ; 
 
I I 6 I- O V E AND LAND. 
 
 The vengeance of the Lord 
 
 Leaps along her flaming sword. 
 Tracing on the lurid skies the legend ** Libertie." 
 
 As she beats upon her shield. 
 
 Soldiers spring up from each field. 
 The blood of martyr'd heroes yields a second, stronger 
 birth — 
 
 Let traitors fly her path ; 
 
 Let all beware her wrath ; 
 She holds God's lightning in her hand, to blast men to the 
 earth. 
 
 A.cross our native land 
 
 The tyrant's heavy hand 
 Has ploughed his hellish litanies of sorrow and of ruth ; 
 
 Yet, tho' we sometimes trace 
 
 His dark lines on her face. 
 Her soul stands forth, untainted, in the searching light of 
 truth. 
 
 He has swept the maid and sire 
 
 From their homes, with whips of fire ; 
 He has gloated in their misery, and revel'd in their sighs ; 
 
 And, from the reeking sod, 
 
 He has raised his shouts to God, 
 That the moaning of their breaking hearts might never 
 reach the skies. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. II7 
 
 If in our human breasts 
 
 One stain of mercy rests. 
 Pluck it out for sacrifice upon the altar of our wrath ; 
 
 From beneath the seething waves. 
 
 From unconsecrated graves. 
 The ghosts of all our murder'd dead forever haunt our 
 path. 
 
 The anguish from our souls 
 
 In a crying torrent rolls 
 From the earth unto the heavens, in one ceaseless, shore- 
 less flood : 
 
 Then let thy flaming sword 
 
 Of Justice, angry Lord, 
 Wipe out their long transgressions in their unrepenting 
 blood. 
 
 We've walked the land like slaves — 
 
 Crawling into famine graves — 
 Slinking from the sunlight, like shadows of the dead ; 
 
 We 've kissed the despot's hand. 
 
 When he stamped, with burning brand, 
 The spirit's degradation upon each drooping head. 
 
 Our brutal demon foe 
 
 Has triumphed in our woe ; 
 The rending of our nation's heart is music to his ear : 
 
Il8 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Then, away with woman's cries. 
 With petitions and with sighs ; — 
 The ringing of the Rifle ii the only voice he Ul hear. 
 
 Hosannas to the Lord ! 
 
 Since we drew the shining sword 
 The land is filled with cheering where was nought but 
 tears and groans ; 
 
 And the People, in their might. 
 
 Arise to slay and smite. 
 And light their way to liberty with palaces and thrones. 
 
 And shake such petty things 
 
 As Emperors and Kings, 
 Like spray from off their shoulders, as they rise erect and 
 free ; 
 
 And, to their mighty shout, 
 
 God's lightnings, leaping out. 
 Trace upon the breaking skies the legend ** Libertie." 
 
LOVE AN D LAN D. 1 I9 
 
 NEW WORDS FOR OLD AIRS. 
 
 As the " New Words tor Old Airs " are written chiefly for airs for which 
 no " foreign," that is, English, words have been written, the reader, unless 
 he or she happened to hear them sung at " The Patron Dance or Fair," or 
 perhaps at his or her mother's knee, will scarcely know them by name, 
 being called one thing in the South and another in the North. It is the 
 intention to get them printed in book form, with music and accompani- 
 ments, in a few months. No Air that has heretofore been published with 
 English words will be introduced, if possible. 
 
 JTo. I. 
 
 LIMERICK IS BEAUTIFUL. 
 
 Oh, Limerick is beautiful, as everybody knows ; 
 
 And by that city of my heart how proud the Shannon 
 
 flows ! 
 It sweeps down by the brave old town, as clear in depth 
 
 and tone 
 As when Sarsfield swept the Saxon from the walls of Gar- 
 
 ryowen. 
 
 'T is not for Limerick that I sigh — tho' I love her in my 
 soul — 
 
 That times will change, and friends will die, and man can- 
 not control ; 
 11 
 
120 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 No, not for friends long pass'd away, nor days forever 
 
 flown. 
 But that the maiden I adore is sad in Garryowen. 
 
 Oh, she I love is beautiful, and world-wide is her fame ; 
 She dwells down by the flowing tide, and Eire is her 
 
 name : 
 And dearer than my very life her glances are to me — 
 The light that cheers my weary soul across life's stormy 
 
 sea. 
 
 T is true, she wears no coronet nor gems these latter days ; 
 She has no fleet upon the deep — no ships within her bays — 
 No flocics upon the mountain side — no herds upon the 
 
 plain — 
 No gardens rich with summer bloom — no fields of waving 
 
 grain. 
 
 The fetters of the tyrant are on her limbs — oh, shame! 
 That we but whine who should avenge the insult to her 
 
 fame ; 
 And. crowned with woe, she walks the earth — the sad 
 
 amid the gay — 
 Because she would not sell her love for gems that fade away. 
 
 Yet see her in her sorrow, beneath the summer skies ; 
 What is the diamond's brightness to the lustre of her eyes? 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 121 
 
 And what are earthly diadems to the glories that entwine 
 Her brow, upon whose front the gems of Truth and Vir- 
 tue shine ? 
 
 The Saxon lord, by force and fraud, has wooed her heart 
 
 for years. 
 She 's pined within his dungeon keeps — she 's wept hot, 
 
 bitter tears ; 
 But tho' he crucify her soul, and scourge her thro' the land. 
 She '11 not forsake her old true love to take his bloody hand. 
 
 I loved thee in my boyhood, and now, in manhood's noon. 
 The vision of my life is still to dry thy tears, aroon! 
 I 'd sing unto the tomb, and dance beneath the gallows tree. 
 To see thee on the hills once more, proud, passionate and 
 free. 
 
 ]<(o. II. 
 
 WE'LL SING OF THEE, DEAR IRELAND. 
 
 Air — " Fare you well, lovely Molly." 
 
 ** A song ! " cries each bright-eyed fellow : 
 Now, what shall we sing about ? 
 
 Shall we sing of the bounding billow, 
 Of battles or of rout ? 
 
 Of foreign fields, where Freedom wields 
 
122 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Her sword in the deadly fray ? 
 No, we '11 sing of thee, dear Ireland, 
 Three thousand miles away. 
 
 We '11 sing of the great departed, 
 
 And the valleys where they lie — 
 The brave and the fearless-hearted. 
 
 Who taught men how to die : 
 And every man, of every clan. 
 
 We '11 guard his memory. 
 Who died on the green hills, fighting 
 
 For Ireland's liberty. 
 
 We '11 sing of the sunny meadows. 
 
 And we '11 sing of the flowing streams ; 
 . Of the glens that sleep in shadows 
 
 That haunt us in our dreams ; 
 Of the dancing rills, and the high gretn hills. 
 
 And the fields we ne'er may see. 
 Then here *s to the fields of Ireland, 
 
 With a hearty three times three. 
 
 Let your voices ring out cheering ; 
 
 And drain your goblets dry. 
 To the men who died for Erin, 
 
 And to those who vet will die. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 ^3 
 
 'Neath prison bars, or 'neath the stars, 
 
 In camp or garden gay. 
 We '11 sing of thee, gra gal machree. 
 
 Three thousand miles away. 
 
 7/0. III. 
 
 Old Song.—'''- A sailor courted a farmer's daughter." 
 (Imitation of a Street Ballad.) 
 
 A sailor courted a farmer's daughter, 
 
 By Shannon water, at Tullaman, 
 Where this gay rover, from the briny ocean. 
 
 Into the harbor of true love ran. 
 With fine discoorses he did pursue her ; 
 
 His form was manly and his face was fair ; 
 Till Cupid bound her with chains around her. 
 
 For his flatt'ring tongue did her heart ensnare. 
 
 **Oh! Molly, darling, my heart's adorning," 
 
 Her mother cries, ** this must not be so. 
 For this young lover is but a rover. 
 
 And soon will leave you to grief and woe. 
 When the breeze is blowing, and the tide 'u flowing, 
 
 He '11 sail away with the summer wind. 
 And in the favor of some foreign maiden. 
 
 He '11 soon forget her he 's left behind." 
 
124 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 '* Oh ! mother, dearest, be not hard-hearted, 
 
 For if we *re parted my heart will break ; 
 I feel no sunshine but in his bright eyes, 
 
 I 'd roam the ocean all for his sake. 
 His kiss is sweeter than the wild bee's honey ; 
 
 His breath is fresher than the flowers of May; 
 And I must leave you, tho' sad 't will grieve you ; 
 
 So, fare you well, for J 'm going away." 
 
 ** I '11 buy you, dearest, the jewels rarest, 
 
 All for to grace your fair neck and brow. 
 And silks and satins from o'er the water, 
 
 If you, dear daughter, will break your vow. 
 You 're young and handsome ; you 've got a fortune ; 
 
 And this wild sailor is poor and low ; 
 And you can marry the young squire Harrv ; 
 
 So let this rover to the salt sea go." 
 
 ** What care I for your jewels rarest. 
 
 Or silks the fairest that e'er were spun ? 
 They would but cover my poor heart broken. 
 
 When the words were spoken that made us one. 
 The richest Peeress is poor and cheerless : 
 
 'T is love that makes the fond heart at rest ; 
 So, farewell, mother, I '11 have no other 
 
 Than him I 've plighted, I love the best." 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I25 
 
 **I'll buy you, dearest, the jewels rarest. 
 
 All for to grace your fair neck and brow ; 
 And silks and satins from o'er the water ; 
 
 And you, dear daughter, can keep your vow. 
 You 're young and handsome ; you 've got a fortune ; 
 
 Yet you can marry your love ; and he 
 Can stay at home for to tend and guard you. 
 
 And so reward you for constancy." 
 
 'T was in the springtime, when birds were singing, 
 
 And lightly winging from tree to tree. 
 Their wedding bells from the village steeple 
 
 Chimed to the people a jubilee. 
 When the tide is flowing, and the breeze is blowing, 
 
 And the ships are sailing by sweet Kilkee, 
 They wander down by the rolling waters. 
 
 To talk of love and the stormy sea. 
 
 'New Words. 
 OUR NATIVE LAND. 
 
 Air — " A sailor courted a farmer's daughter. " 
 
 The day is dying. 
 
 The eve is sighing, 
 
 Our barque is flying before the wind ; 
 
126 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The sunset's splendor 
 
 Falls, soft and tender. 
 Upon the green hills we leave behind. 
 
 Our tears are flowing. 
 
 The while we 're going. 
 For love is showing the mountains grand — 
 
 The glens and meadows. 
 
 In lights and shadows. 
 And the pleasant valleys of our native land. 
 
 Oh, skies, grow brighter I 
 
 Oh, winds, blow lighter ! 
 Let not the night or the deep sea hide 
 
 From our fond vision 
 
 That dream Elysian 
 That flings its beauty across the tide. 
 
 Ah ! poor hearts, beating. 
 
 There 'sno retreating ; 
 The winds are cheating with whispers bland ; 
 
 The hills are sinking ; 
 
 Our souls are drinking 
 The last sweet vision of our native land. 
 
 They say the gold land 
 
 Is a brave and bold land — 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 1 27 
 
 (Alas! the Old Land is sad and low — ) 
 
 And the winds that fan her 
 
 Bright starry banner 
 Are never freighted with her children's woe. 
 
 We've read her story 
 
 Of light and glory, 
 'Neath ruins hoary, antique and grand ; 
 
 And we will prove her 
 
 That we can love her. 
 And still be true to our natjve land. 
 
 Each thought we knew, love, 
 
 Was but for you, love ; 
 And, so, old true-love, a fond adieu : 
 
 While night is shading. 
 
 We see thee fading. 
 Like sea nymph dipping 'neath ocean blue, 
 
 But love has painted 
 
 Thy face, sweet, sainted. 
 In hues all teinted by Heaven's own hand; 
 
 And in our spirit 
 
 We '11 proudly wear it, 
 And so be true to our native land. 
 
128 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 JVo. IV. 
 
 FOR FREEDOM AND FOR ERIN. 
 
 Old Song — " St. Patrick was a gentleman." 
 
 Thank God, at last, the day is past for begging and be- 
 seeching. 
 And bugle notes now take the place of orators and speech- 
 
 The busy camp, the soldier's tramp, instead of senseless 
 
 cheering ; 
 And men to dare, to do and die for Freedom and for Erin. 
 Chorus — Then march away 
 With banners gay, 
 Brave hearts that know no fear in. 
 And let our foes 
 Reel 'neath our blows. 
 For Freedom and for Erin. 
 
 We 've talked and prayed, and begged for aid, and — 
 shameful degradation ! — 
 
 Our own withheld their paltry pelf that might redeem their 
 nation ; 
 
 But unsubdued, on field and flood, undaunted hearts ap- 
 pear in, 
 
 To fight our fathers' good old fight, for Freedom and for 
 Erin. 
 
 Chorus — Then march awav, etc. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 129 
 
 'Mid cynic sneer and cov/ard fear we march unswerving 
 
 onward ; 
 Dull matter sinks into the dust, the soul flies ever sunward ; 
 Upon the trail the fighting Gael traced with his blood, we 
 
 steer in. 
 And march to glory, thro' the grave, for Freedom and for 
 
 Erin. 
 
 Chorus — Then march away, etc. 
 
 Let coward slave and heartless knave forget our Isle of 
 
 beauty, 
 And slink aside, like beaten hounds, when Erin calls to 
 
 duty. 
 Too long she 's nursed this brood accursed, who 've nought 
 
 but jilt and jeering 
 For those who toil and those who fight for Freedom and 
 
 for Erin. 
 
 Chorus — Then march away, etc. 
 
 Oh ! brothers, who will dare and do — brave souls, sublime, 
 undaunted, — 
 
 The day of trial is at hand, when souls like yours are 
 wanted ; 
 
 Your rifles shine ; fall into line, the old Green Flag up- 
 rearing ; 
 
IJO LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Send forth the cry — who fears to die for Freedom and for 
 Erin ? 
 
 Chorus — Then march away. 
 
 With banners gay, 
 
 Brave hearts that know no fear in. 
 
 Our foes shall feel 
 
 The avenging steel 
 
 Of Freedom and of Erin. 
 
 jVo. Y. 
 THE MINSTREL'S LAMENT. 
 
 jiir — " Gra gal machree hu ! " 
 
 I sat in the light 
 
 Of the red harvest moon. 
 And wept the long night 
 
 Till the sad, silent noon — 
 The stars rain'd cool dew 
 
 On my desolate head; 
 But, my country, for you 
 
 Were the tears that I shed, 
 Gr^ gal machree hu ! 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 
 I saw the beloved 
 
 Of my bosom laid low, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. IJ 
 
 And stood by, unmoved, 
 
 In the midst of deep woe; 
 I knew they had gone 
 
 Past the region of tears. 
 While thou shouldst live on. 
 In thy sorrow, for years, 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 
 When I thought of thy name. 
 
 Once a light to the earth. 
 And what glory and fame 
 
 In thy bosom had birth, — 
 And now sunk so low. 
 
 While thy glories yet shine, — 
 I blush'd for my woe 
 
 In the presence of thine, 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 
 I will climb thy green hills. 
 
 And I '11 gaze on the sea; 
 I will drink of thy rills. 
 
 And I *11 dream thou art free ; 
 For thy soul will yet rise 
 
 From its gloom and despair. 
 
IJ2 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 As I look in thine eyes, 
 I read Liberty there, 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 Gra gal machree hu ! 
 
 JTo. VI. 
 
 DEAR OLD IRELAND. 
 
 Far from the hills of Innisfail, 
 
 We meet in love to-night. 
 Some of the scattered Clon na Gael^ 
 With spirits warm and bright. 
 
 Why do we meet ? 
 
 'T is to repeat 
 Our vows, both night and day. 
 
 To dear Old Ireland ! 
 
 Brave Old Ireland ! 
 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
 Some left her shores long years ago. 
 
 Some never saw her hills; 
 But, for her glory and her woe. 
 Each faithful bosom thrills. 
 We give no cheers,^ 
 But vow her tears 
 
LOVE AND LAND. IJJ 
 
 Revenge shall wipe away. 
 
 Ah! dear Old Ireland! 
 Brave Old Ireland ! 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
 We 're not the fortune-favored kind. 
 
 But rugged sons of toil ; 
 We *ve got the muscle and the mind 
 That sprung from Irish soil. 
 
 Our toil being done. 
 
 And night come on. 
 We meet to work and pray 
 
 For dear Old Ireland ! 
 
 Brave Old Ireland ! 
 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
 We 've read of how our fathers fought, 
 
 And how our fathers died ; 
 How creeds divided where they ought 
 To muster side by side ; 
 
 We count the cost 
 
 That faction lost. 
 And cast the fiend away. 
 
 For dear Old Ireland ! 
 
 Brave Old Ireland ! 
 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
34 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Let cowards bend in abject prayer ; 
 
 Let tyrants frown and threat ; 
 Be ours the duty to prepare, 
 With sword and bayonet. 
 
 Let babblers cease 
 
 To prate of peace ; 
 God send us war, we say. 
 
 For dear Old Ireland ! 
 
 Brave Old Ireland ! 
 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
 Our fathers died in olden time, 
 
 And left a heritage 
 (And loving Ireland was their crime,) 
 Of blood, and hate, and rage. 
 
 And, by the cross, 
 
 There 's been no loss, — 
 We hate as strong as they, . 
 
 For dear Old Ireland ! 
 
 Brave Old Ireland! 
 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
 Once more we 're on the ** Felon's track; 
 
 Red with our father's blood ; 
 And woe unto the men who slack 
 
 Our spirits' burning flood! 
 
L f ) V E A N D L A N IJ . I J 5 
 
 The Green above — 
 Revenge and Love — 
 Forward ! and march away, 
 l-'or dear Old Ireland ! 
 Brave Old Ireland ! 
 Ireland, boys, hurrah ! 
 
 jTo. vn. 
 
 THE TREE OF MEMORY. 
 ylir — " Captain Magin." 
 
 There 's a beautiful Tree in life's garden we see, 
 
 Bv the soft-sighing fountain of love ; 
 Its roots under ground search the garden all round. 
 
 And birds sing in its branches above ; 
 They sing of the dead and the days that arc lied ; 
 
 Of youth with its ever-bright skies; 
 Till we wander in dreams by the meadows and streams 
 
 In the light of our first lover's eyes. 
 
 As we sit 'neath its boughs we can hear the old vows 
 That were pledged in the twilight's soft gloom ; 
 
 We can feel the soft sighs and gaze into those eyes 
 That are dulled long ago in the tomb ; 
 
 Every throb that we feel, every joy that we steal 
 12 
 
136 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 In this dragon-watched garden of woe, 
 Are the dreams that we braid 'neath its evergreen shade 
 And behold in the fountain below ! 
 
 Every flower must decay, every leaf fade away — 
 
 They all bloom in the shadow of death ; 
 And though glowing awhile in the summer's bright smile. 
 
 They must die in his pestilent breath. 
 This alone, this, of all, flingeth off the dark pall. 
 
 And drinks life from the lips of decay ; 
 For as sweetly it blooms 'midst the mouldering tombs 
 
 As when kissed by the midsummer gay. 
 
 What were love but a bird whose sweet singing we heard. 
 
 As with youth through the vallies he flew — 
 A short thrilling gleam that was passed like a dream. 
 
 With no power in our souls to pursue — 
 Were not memory at hand, with her magical wand. 
 
 To summon the past into sight. 
 Every joy that we feel through her heavenly zeal. 
 
 Thus becoming an endless delight? 
 
 Tired and sad from the strife and tough battle of life, 
 
 As alone o'er the desert we stray. 
 And the spirit flies back over youth's rosy track 
 
 To the vallevs that lie far away : 
 
LOVE AND LAND. Ijy 
 
 For the beautiful dead and the days that are fled. 
 
 And the eyes we shall nevermore see, 
 And the cheeks whose soft bloom is long paled in the 
 tomb, 
 
 'We bless thee, green memory's tree ! 
 
 j<ro. VIII. 
 
 THRO' THE GREEN VALLEYS. 
 
 Air — "Thro' the green valleys." 
 
 Thro' the green valleys 
 
 Come follow, Love, follow. 
 The wild birds are singing 
 
 Thro' woodland and hollow ; 
 The chase horn is sounding 
 
 By Shannon's bright flood. 
 And the red deer is bounding 
 
 Within the green wood. 
 I hear not the chase horn 
 
 By the streams sounding ; 
 I heed not the red deer 
 
 Within the woods bounding ; 
 I see not the soaring 
 
 Of birds o'er the boughs. 
 For my spirit is pouring 
 
 Out love's odor vows. 
 
IjS LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Come away, come away, where 
 
 The bright streams are flowing 
 Thro' the valleys of light 
 
 In the land of Tir Owen ; 
 A thousand bright lances 
 
 Shall come at your call. 
 And harps ring you welcome 
 
 In each castle hall. 
 
 The foot of the Saxon 
 
 Ne'er stepped on our mountains. 
 His dark face of slaughter 
 
 Ne'er poisoned our fountains ; 
 Our maidens' ne'er blush at 
 
 His black ruffian glare ; 
 He never will rush at 
 
 The wolf in his lair. 
 Oh, grand are the hills round 
 
 Your father's high dwelling; 
 The green meads and rivers 
 
 Are fair beyond telling. 
 And lovely each woman 
 
 In cottage and hall. 
 But the flag of the foeman 
 
 Waves high over all. 
 
 Then away, come away, where 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I39 
 
 The bright streams are flowing 
 Thro' the valleys of light 
 
 In the land of Tir Owen ; 
 A thousand tall lances 
 
 Shall come at your call. 
 And harps ring your welcome 
 
 In cottage and hall. 
 
 The sad harp is wailing 
 
 The old days of freedom. 
 Of bright swords in battle, 
 
 Of heroes to lead 'em , 
 When thro' ev'ry valley. 
 
 At Liberty's call. 
 The clansmen would rally 
 To sweep out the Gall. 
 The Cromeal and Coulon 
 
 No more the sight blesses ; 
 Base slaves for their masters. 
 To lose their long tresses. 
 The songs of our sireland 
 
 Are banished and banned ; 
 Oh, this is not Ireland, 
 But Sassenagh land. 
 
 Then away, come away, where 
 The bright streams are flowing 
 
140 I-OVE AND LAND. 
 
 Thro' valleys of freedom 
 In Irish Tir Owen ; 
 
 A thousand bright lances 
 Shall come at your call, 
 
 And harps ring wild welcome 
 In each castle hall. 
 
 Js'-o. IX. 
 RIDGEWAY. 
 
 ^»V— "The red hand O'Neille." 
 
 The long, heavy shadow's of morning had passed 
 
 As we roused the green woods with our cheers. 
 The flag of our country waved high in the blast. 
 
 And we hailed the dear emblem with tears ; 
 We gazed on that banner and thought of the dead, 
 
 Our green fields and bright skies of blue. 
 And swore by our sorrows to pull down the Red, 
 
 Or perish, dear Erin, for you. 
 
 We sprang into line at the call of O'Neill, 
 Four hundred brave spirits and true ; 
 
 We fired but a volley, then gave them the stee), 
 And smote them, Red, Orange and Blue. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I4I 
 
 In our bosoms the hate and the vengeance of years 
 Led us on like the fierce mountain flood ; 
 
 We leaped on their ranks, shouting wild thro' our tears. 
 For, like tigers, we thirsted for blood. 
 
 Ho ! bandogs, whom tyrants unleash at command. 
 
 Go back to your masters, and say. 
 The spirit of freedom is sown in the land 
 
 From the hearts of our brothers to-day ; 
 And when the red harvest waves ripe in the sun, 
 
 The reapers of death will be nigh ; 
 'Tis war to the knife, till our battle is won. 
 
 For year after year till we die. 
 
 Ho ! Erin, a niche for this glorious band, 
 
 'Mongst your bravest and best be their place ; 
 No tears o'er the dead, they have died for their land. 
 
 And are shrined in the hearts of our race. 
 When next the green banner is flung to the wind. 
 
 We '11 rally from hill-top and plain. 
 True brothers of freedom, strong, solid, combined. 
 
 To conquer again and again. 
 
142 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Tfo. X. 
 
 THE DEAD NOT DEAD. 
 
 j4ir — <■<■ When Nora left the hills of Down." 
 
 When fond hearts round the festive board 
 
 Beat time unto the march of wine. 
 And when Love's passion vows are poured, 
 
 And woman's eyes flash out divine. 
 Oh, in that hour when pleasure's wings 
 
 Like sunshine round the board are spread, 
 A low voice to my spirit sings : 
 
 ** 'T is thus the quick forget the dead." 
 And then I fill a beaker up. 
 
 Of spirit wine, and, all alone, 
 I drink, as from a chalice cup. 
 
 The mem'rv of the dead and gone. 
 
 When gazing into flashing eyes 
 
 That glow for me, I say, " My Love, 
 I 've seen some brighter, but the skies 
 
 Have set them 'mong the gems above." 
 And when her music lips rejoice 
 
 In songs, to me their silver flow 
 Is but the echo of a voice 
 
 That sang them sweeter long ago. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 1 43 
 
 Then bright as shine those living lights. 
 And sweet as flows each liquid tone. 
 
 Brighter, sweeter, blest the nights 
 
 From lips and eyes long dead and gone. 
 
 O, spirits of the early blest. 
 
 Unseen, your presence haunts us yet, 
 And Beauty sues in vain for rest, 
 
 Our bosoms have no rooms to let ; 
 For Love, old guard, untiring waits 
 
 Outside their portals, lance in hand. 
 And none can pass the mystic gates 
 Unless they come from spirit land. 
 
 Thus Death himself is killed by Love, 
 
 He cannot conquer nor divide. 
 Our souls on earth and those above 
 Are ever marching side by side. 
 
 And so let's fill a cup divine. 
 
 All beaded round with lucent tears. 
 Then pour our souls into the wine 
 
 And drink unto the vanished years. 
 And to the stars that cheered Youth's skies. 
 
 What tho' they light the earth no more. 
 Our spirit gaze can see them rise 
 
 Above the far-off, brighter shore. 
 
144 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 We name their names, O, blessed sound ! 
 
 And many an eye thro' tears looks bright. 
 Let living beauty glow uncrowned. 
 
 We drink unto the dead to-night. 
 
 No. XL 
 THE FLAG OF GREEN. 
 
 ^Ir — " The harp of Desmond." 
 
 Let France unfold her tri-color. 
 And glory in her Fleur de lis, 
 Let her Imperial Eagle soar. 
 
 Drunk with the blood of Liberty ; 
 Let Britain flaunt her cross of red. 
 
 And shout hosanna to her Queen, 
 But we will still defiant tread 
 
 Beneath our own old Flag of Green. 
 Then come beneath our Flag of Green, 
 We own no despot. King or Queen ; 
 With rifles bright and sabres keen, 
 We'll guard our own old Flag of Green. 
 
 Old Flag, proscribed on field and flood. 
 Long hidden in the tomb's dark mold. 
 
 Our mothers' tears, our fathers' blood, 
 Have sanctified each sacred fold ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I45 
 
 Come forth! at last we see the day 
 When honor says thou canst be seen, 
 
 And legions march in proud array 
 Beneath thy shining folds of Green. 
 
 Then come beneath our Flag of Green, etc. 
 
 Fields of fire and deathless fame 
 
 Have seen this old flag waving free ; 
 Hearts grew buoyant at its name. 
 
 For from its folds leaped victory. 
 It 's known defeat, but not disgrace, 
 
 No stain rests on its emerald sheen, 
 For in the battle's firiest face 
 
 The foremost flew the Irish Green. 
 
 Then come beneath our Flag of Green, etc. 
 
 Then fling our old flag to the wind. 
 
 And march to death or Liberty. 
 Who would be free y no chains can bind ; 
 
 Who would be slave ^ no sword can free. 
 Too long have tyrants ruled the earth. 
 
 And human hearts their playthings been. 
 But now we sing Young Freedom's birth. 
 
 And fold her in our Flag of Green. 
 
 Then come beneath our Flag of Green, 
 We own no despot. King or Queen ; 
 
146 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 With rifles bright and sabres keen. 
 
 We '11 guard our own old Flag of Green. 
 
 No XII. 
 SWEET BELLS CHIMING. 
 
 ^«> — "St. Mary's Bells." 
 
 Sweet bells chiming, 
 Young hearts timing 
 
 Music's mystic flow. 
 Bright eyes glancing, 
 Light feet dancing. 
 
 Flitting to and fro. 
 Bashful Lovers, 
 Moonlight rovers — 
 
 Where the fond lips whispered low. 
 Love's pure flame has 
 Burned the same as 
 
 Fifty years ago. 
 
 Loud bells ringing. 
 Censers swinging 
 
 Round the festive shrine ; 
 Two hearts beating. 
 Lips repeating. 
 
 Thine, forever thine. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Love's first blisses. 
 Bridal kisses. 
 
 Crimson blushings ebb and flow. 
 And Love's flame has 
 Burned the same as 
 
 Fifty years ago. 
 
 Death bells tolling. 
 Hot tears rolling 
 
 From sad, weeping eyes ; 
 Farewells taking, 
 Fond hearts breaking 
 
 Forth in sobbing sighs ; 
 Bright lids shaded, 
 Red cheeks faded. 
 
 Faded as the winter snow ; 
 Life's poor flame has 
 Quench'd the same as 
 
 Fifty years ago. 
 
 Sweet bells chiming. 
 Poets rhyming. 
 
 Bright eyes growing old; 
 Some are wedding. 
 Some are bedding 
 
 In the deep, dark mold ; 
 
 147 
 
148 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Joy and laughter. 
 Sorrow after. 
 
 Thus the fleeting shadows go. 
 Men beheld the 
 Same of eld a 
 
 Thousand years ago. 
 
 J\ro. XIII. 
 I STAND UPON MY NATIVE HILLS. 
 
 jiir — ''Come back to Carlow, Robin." 
 
 I stand upon my native hills 
 
 And see the starlight glowing, 
 I hear the fretting mountain rills, 
 
 I feel the night winds blowing. 
 The moonbeams wrap the ruins old. 
 
 And sleep along the river. 
 And flush the vales with liquid gold. 
 
 And all is bright as ever. 
 
 Thus, gazing on my native skies, 
 I feel my wild heart panting. 
 
 Yet tears unbidden fills mine eyes, 
 For something still is wanting ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND 
 
 49 
 
 The friends of Youth ! ah, where are they ? 
 
 No bright eyes cheer my coming; 
 Oh, God ! why must the loved decay. 
 
 Where all things else are blooming ? 
 
 In vain for me the moonbeams glow. 
 
 In vain the streams are flowing, 
 I care not how the night winds blow. 
 
 Nor how the stars are glowing ; 
 I turn from nature's changeless face. 
 
 Rock, mountain, vale, and river. 
 For they who lightened all the place 
 
 Are gone and lost forever. 
 
 JTo. XI Y. 
 NORA OF CAHIRCIVEEN. 
 
 ^/r— " The Hills of Kerry." 
 
 Oh, Nora, dear Nora, you 're going to leave us. 
 
 To better your fortune you tempt the rough main. 
 But think, O mavourneen, how sadly 't will grieve us 
 
 To feel we may never behold thee again. 
 Oh, blame me not, then, that my hot tears are starting. 
 
 Already in fancy the sea rolls between, 
 And the light of our home, like a dream, is departing. 
 
 And may never come back to old Cahirciveen. 
 
150 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 When the bright summer moon thro' the old oak is 
 shining. 
 
 And the note of the harp calls the young and the gay ; 
 When the swains of the village their love-wreaths are 
 twining, 
 
 I '11 think of my darling who's far, far away.- 
 When the lads to the dance will lead each village maiden 
 
 I '11 think of the foot that tripped light o'er the green, 
 I '11 turn from their mirth, for my spirit, o'erladen. 
 
 Will weep for the beauty of Cahirciveen. 
 
 Oh, flatter me not with your speedy returning. 
 
 Few, few that come back from the far happy shore ; 
 Keep the star of your land in your inmost soul burning. 
 
 But kiss the green hills, for you '11 see them no more. 
 Let me fold you once more to my poor heart that 's broken ; 
 
 God guard you; remember the days that have been ; 
 From the far distant land send a sign or a token 
 
 That you '11 never forget us in Cahirciveen. 
 
 Woe, woe to the mother ! alas ! for the daughter. 
 
 And the dreams that were twined for the bright days to 
 come ; 
 
 A token of love has gone over the water, 
 
 A wreath of green laurel from poor Nora's tomb. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 151 
 
 On the wild hills of Kerry the mother is weeping. 
 While the lads and the lasses still dance on the green ; 
 
 'Neath the wild western prairie poor Nora is sleeping. 
 Far away from the village of Cahirciveen. 
 
 jVo. XY. 
 
 SPIRIT OF LIBERTY. 
 
 Air — " The Sword of McCracken." 
 
 Spirit of Liberty, 
 Wake thy grand melody. 
 
 Over the land let thine orisons roll ; 
 
 Make our hearts light again. 
 Make our hearths bright again ; 
 
 Whisper of Courage and Faith to each soul. 
 Sing how our fathers died 
 On the green mountain side — 
 
 Would all our dead had thus perished for thee, 
 Fighting for Native Land, 
 With the red sword in hand. 
 
 Proud were our hearts to-day — Freemen were we. 
 
 Spirit of Liberty, 
 Weeping, we follow thee. 
 
152 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Thro' the bleak wilderness, over the main; 
 
 Wooing thee lovingly. 
 
 Look not reprovingly. 
 Oh, but come back to your first love again. 
 
 Over the desert wide, 
 
 Evermore by thy side. 
 Earth has no light but your beautiful eyes ; 
 
 Fling their red lightning o'er 
 
 Erin's ill-fated shore. 
 Sweep the dull mists from her hills and her skies. 
 
 Many brave hearts and true 
 Beating for land and you. 
 
 Leaped from the hills at thy clarion call ; 
 Many a chieftain bold 
 Swept from his castle old. 
 
 Swept like the blast on the ranks of the Gall, 
 Joying to die for thee — 
 Gods ! we but sigh for thee, 
 
 Suing in sorrow and wooing in chains. 
 
 And never will feel thy smile 
 On our cold hearts the while 
 
 Cowards command or a fetter remains. 
 
 Send up the battle cry ! 
 Up to God's sunny sky — 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I 53 
 
 Hark! the loud bugles blow Liberty's call; 
 
 Sabre and rifle shine 
 
 Down the well order'd line — 
 Ireland's green banner waves high over all! 
 
 Forward, for Liberty ! 
 
 Erin's true chivalry 
 Sweep on their ranks like our fathers of old. 
 
 Strike for the mighty dead ! 
 
 Send Britain's cross of red 
 Down to the dust, for the green and the gold. 
 
 JTo. XVI. 
 BANISH ALL CARE. 
 
 ^ir — " While we live let us live." 
 
 Away with all care, we'll be merry, boys! 
 
 Man wasn't made for sighing and sorrowing ; 
 Heaven itself is flowing with joys. 
 
 Then of its mirth let the spirit go borrowing. 
 Sorrow, poor dame, is a native of earth. 
 
 And ever thro' tombs she goes moping and wandering ; 
 Joy, like the soul, had a sunnier birth. 
 
 And flies round the globe, all her light and smiles squan- 
 dering. 
 
154 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Cynics can preach how men ought to sigh. 
 
 And their days to the dark goddess Sorrow they ought to 
 give ; 
 Teach men to live and they 'II know how to die. 
 
 So ours be the duty to live as men ought to live. 
 Away to the dogs with this sectional crew. 
 
 Who with their tenets would hamper and fetter one ; 
 This world's not much of a world, it is true. 
 
 But the Lord only knows if the next is a better one. 
 
 See how the streams laugh light in the sun. 
 
 Hear the gay birds in the woods piping merrily; 
 Nature's dear face is glowing with fun. 
 
 So let us meet her with song and dance cheerily. 
 Hell is all tears, and Heaven all smiles. 
 
 Let us take sides with the saints and the Deity; 
 Satan can wear his long faces and wiles. 
 
 We '11 laugh at his snares, we 're the children of gayety. 
 Banish all care, ye rollicking boys, 
 
 Man wasn't made for sighing and sorrowing; 
 Heaven itself is flowing with joys. 
 
 So to the skies let the spirit go borrowing. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 155 
 
 7V0. XVII. 
 THE FAITHFUL ONE. 
 
 Air — " 'T is sorrow tests the strength of love." 
 
 Come sit thee down beside me. 
 
 My beautiful, my own ; 
 V^h^n friends deceiv'd, belied me. 
 
 And summer birds had flown. 
 My soul, by rude winds shaken. 
 
 Still fondly turned to thee ; 
 For when by all forsaken 
 
 Thou still wert true to me. 
 
 When evil tongues had wove thee 
 
 My life's-thread crimson dyed. 
 The world's riade breath but drove thee 
 
 Still closer to my side. 
 When darkness brooded o'er me ; 
 
 I heard thy cheering voice ; 
 Thine eyes flung light before me, 
 
 And bade my heart rejoice. 
 
 The summer bees flew round me 
 
 To sip my honey-dew, 
 Misfortune came and found me. 
 
 Alone, my Love, with you. 
 
156 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 I bless the angel sorrow. 
 
 Whose thorns have purified ; 
 
 I 'd wear her crown to-morrow 
 To find thee by my side. 
 
 J<fo. XVIII. 
 THE SHAMROCK IS THE FAIREST FLOWER. 
 
 ^ir — " The Green Laurel. " 
 
 Three maids sat in a garden bower. 
 Where Love's sweet streamlet flows, 
 
 And each was fair as the fairest flower 
 That in the garden grows. 
 Grows, 
 That in the garden grows. 
 
 A knight within the garden bower 
 
 Before the maidens rose ; 
 '* Choose, each maid, the fairest flow'r 
 
 That in the garden grows, 
 Grows, 
 
 That in the garden grows." 
 
 Then one, she chose the Lily Queen, 
 The other took the Rose, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I cn 
 
 But the third, she chose the Shamrock Green, 
 That in the garden grows. 
 Grows, 
 That in the garden grows. 
 
 " The Lily 's fair, with drooping head. 
 
 But when the cold wind blows. 
 She fades and dies in her garden bed, 
 
 While the Shamrock greenly grows. 
 Grows, 
 
 While the Shamrock greenly grows. 
 
 ** And fair, on a pleasant summer day. 
 Blooms the gorgeous blushing Rose, 
 
 But it fades with the summer time away. 
 While green the Shamrock grows. 
 
 Grows, 
 While green the Shamrock grows. 
 
 *• Let France still wear her Lily Queen, 
 
 Let England keep the Rose, 
 But we shall wear the Shamrock Green, 
 
 That in old Ireland grows. 
 Grows, 
 
 That in old Ireland grows." 
 
158 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 So, boys, fill up each empty cup 
 
 To neither King nor Queen, 
 But drink to the Knight, and his Lady bright, 
 
 Who sport the Irish Green, 
 Green, 
 
 Who sport the Irish Green. 
 
 ]^o. XIX. 
 THE RAID OF THE SAXON. 
 
 ^ir — " If ever the foemea cross over our border." 
 
 When Gerald, the Saxon, crossed over the border. 
 
 Loud rang the merry bells down by the Lee ; 
 Three thousand three hundred men, all in good order ; — 
 
 Fair was the sight for their maidens to see. 
 " Adieu, my beloved; I shall see thee to-morrow. 
 
 Down by the dark woods of Funcheon we go. 
 To hunt thro' the glens the wild clans of McCaura. 
 
 Forward for England, boys; ho, tally ho! " 
 
 How pr9ud looked their steeds, on that summer day. 
 prancing ; 
 
 Helmet and sabre shone bright in the sun ; 
 The spirit of war from each fearless eye glancing, — 
 
 Eyes that swept proudly a hundred fields won. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I 59 
 
 Before them is joy, but behind shall come sorrow ; 
 
 Green vales will echo the trumpeter's call. 
 Oh ! bird of the wilderness, fly ! tell McCaura, 
 
 Gerald rides fast for his old castle hall ! 
 
 When they came to the glens, where the mountains frown 
 o'er them. 
 
 Pale grew each cheek, tho' each soldier's eye burned ; 
 They could not forget how their fathers before them 
 
 Entered those glens, but had never returned. 
 ** Oh, wolves ! to the hills where you hide must we foHow ? 
 
 Cravens ! " cries Gerald ; ** e'en let it be so. 
 O'er mountain and moorland, through woodland and 
 hollow, 
 
 Forward for England, boys; ho, tally ho!" 
 
 Then a voice from the hills thundered, " Now, men of 
 Erin!" 
 The '* wolves of the mountain " sprang up from each 
 rock ; 
 They swept down the hills, like the avalanche, cheering. 
 
 Short was the warning and fearful the shock. 
 As the hurricane sweeps thro' the red apple blossoms. 
 
 Burst the wild mountaineers down on the foe ; 
 Their bare-breasted valor 'gainst mail-covered bosoms. 
 Hate in each bright eye and death in each blow. 
 14 
 
l6o LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 When Gerald, the Saxon, crossed back o*er the border. 
 
 Slow swung the solemn bells over the Lee, — 
 A few scattered horsemen, and all in disorder, — 
 
 Sad was the sight for their maidens to see. 
 Thro' the homes of the Pale rings the wild cry of sorrow. 
 
 Weeping for those who went out to Glen Gall : 
 But bonfires of joy light the hills of McCaura, 
 
 Harpers sing loud in his old castle hall. 
 
 Then fill up each glass to our fathers, who cherished 
 
 On the bleak mountain side Liberty's flame. 
 Tho' the Pale is no more, and the Clans have all perished, 
 
 Erin still lives, and her cause is the same. 
 The Saxon has, long ago, crossed o'er the border. 
 
 Steady ! make ready to march on the foe ; 
 In solid battalions, and dressed in good order, 
 
 Forward for Ireland, boys; ho, tally ho! 
 
 JTo. XX. 
 
 WHEN THE MOON ADVANCES. 
 
 ylir — " Maids of Ballyshannon." 
 
 When the moon advances, 
 Queen of Summer dances, 
 And her maiden glances 
 
 Thro' the trees are seen ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. l6l 
 
 When the stars are glowing. 
 And the harp-notes flowing, 
 Set the light feet going, 
 
 Meet me on the green. 
 When the night will lend her 
 Looks and robes of splendor. 
 And the stars that tend her 
 
 Like bright eyes look down ; 
 On the moonlit heather. 
 As we trip together. 
 Little reck we whether 
 
 Princes smile or frown. 
 
 Let Fashion drain her chalice. 
 In banquet hall and palace. 
 Far from green-robed valleys 
 
 And Nature's country mirth ; 
 Give us the wild wood roaming. 
 The dreamy summer gloaming, 
 To list the light feet coming 
 
 That scarcely touch the earth. 
 Heart and harp-strings timing, 
 Feet and fingers rhyming, 
 And Irish Planxty chiming. 
 
 Leaping stops and bars ; 
 
1 62 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Maidens like the graces. 
 Bright and laughing faces. 
 Tripping thro' the mazes 
 
 Out beneath the stars. 
 
 Speak love with a glance or 
 Sigh, and from the dancer 
 Comes a blushing answer. 
 
 Plainer, far, than words ; 
 Love's electric flashing 
 O'er the red cheeks dashing. 
 Thro' the bosom crashing 
 
 On its spirit chords. 
 Then steal away like dreaming. 
 Eyes beside you gleaming. 
 Tresses proudly streaming, 
 
 Like pennants on the breeze ; 
 Well we know the traces 
 To the lovers' places. 
 Hid in the embraces 
 
 Of the dear old trees. 
 
 Bless the eyes that led us 
 O'er the moonlit meadows. 
 Underneath the shadows 
 
 Of the castles tall ! 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 1 63 
 
 Are they gone forever ? 
 Shall we see them never ? 
 Mountain, vale, and river. 
 
 Harper, harp, and all ? 
 While the stars shine o'er us. 
 We'll toast the land that bore us; 
 Tho' they that danced before us 
 
 Sleep beneath the mold. 
 Our hearts, like magic vases. 
 Show their loving faces 
 And the pleasant places 
 
 Of the days of old. 
 
 J<fo. XXL 
 SPIRIT OF WINE. 
 
 ^/> — "Spirit of Wine." 
 
 A spirit divine 
 
 Is the spirit of wine — 
 As its dew is distilled round the desolate heart. 
 
 The raven despair, 
 
 Aud each blue devil care. 
 Must unfold their black wings o'er the wreck and depart. 
 
 The sorrows of years 
 
 Are dissolved in the tears 
 
164 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Of this beautiful spirit that flows from the bowl. 
 
 As she flatters us back 
 
 O'er life's beautiful track. 
 Till we stand in the garden of Youth, soul to soul. 
 Spirit of wine ! beauteous spirit of wine ! 
 
 The cares of the day 
 
 So the spirit outweigh 
 That she flies, like a ivounded bird, close to the earth ; 
 
 She drinks in the even 
 
 The dew drops of heaven. 
 And mounts to the bright sunny skies of her birth. 
 
 Then we pledge in the bowl 
 
 To the friends of our soul. 
 And they answer the summons from sea and from shore ; 
 
 And we spend the long night 
 
 In sweet dreams of delight. 
 For the loved of our youth smile around us once more. 
 Spirit of wine ! beauteous spirit of wine ! 
 
 Come, spirit of wine. 
 
 Fill this spirit of mine 
 With thy dreams of the holy, the good, and the grand ; 
 
 And, tho' weak be my words. 
 
 They will touch some proud chords. 
 For my harp shall but sing of Love, Freedom, and Land, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 165 
 
 Of Love, that doth rise 
 
 From the earth to the skies. 
 That sings at the cradle and weeps by the pall ; 
 
 And Freedom, whose flight 
 
 Leads the nations to light. 
 And our own native Erin, the vanguard in all. 
 
 Spirit of wine! beauteous spirit of wine ! 
 
 TVo. XXII. 
 
 THE MESSAGE TO IRELAND. 
 ^/V — "The Mill on the Lee." 
 
 When you visit the old town of Cair, 
 
 Go see 
 The Miller's young daughter, so fair, 
 
 For me ; 
 You will know her ; the hue 
 
 Of her beautiful eyes 
 Is that clear azure blue 
 Of the far away skies 
 That some spirit hath stolen, that men might love 
 Their light for the Angels above. 
 
 And the maids here — just tell her how bright 
 
 They move. 
 
1 66 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Arrayed in their rich summer light 
 
 Of love ; 
 And their eyes hold that fire 
 
 That can change and control, 
 A fierce tiger desire 
 
 To consume up the soul. 
 And they bloom like the tropical flowers that shun 
 The shadow, to glare in the sun. 
 
 And tell her how deep are the wiles 
 
 They lay. 
 To woo my poor heart with their smiles 
 
 Away ; 
 Tho' their eyes flash the heat 
 
 Of love's fierce passion zone. 
 Yet my heart will not beat 
 One false note to her own. 
 For locked in the old house at Cair is it still. 
 And she keeps the key of the mill. 
 
 Thro' all the long day by my side 
 
 She seems. 
 And I kiss her pure lips, as a bride. 
 
 In dreams ; 
 I breathe the rich air 
 
 Of her breath thro' the night. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 167 
 
 And her rich golden hair 
 Sweeps in tresses of light. 
 And her songs flow so soft and so sweet in dreams, 
 I can't tell her voice from the streams. 
 
 And say, when the mists from the hills 
 
 Will rise, 
 And the lark o'er the meadow thrills 
 
 The skies, 
 I shall come with the spring. 
 Like the voice of the bird, 
 And my spirit will sing 
 Sweetest song ever heard, 
 A melody caught from the skies above, 
 
 And its theme shall be, love, changeless love. 
 
 //o. XXIII. 
 WHEN THE HOPES OF OUR LAND. 
 
 Air — " The English, bad luck to them, whack 'em again ! 
 
 When the hopes of our land 
 Have been dashed from our hand 
 
 Like a beaker of wine. 
 
 Of red beaded wine, 
 15 
 
l68 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And empty 's the cup 
 That our spirits filled up. 
 
 Shall we sit down and whine. 
 But simper and whine ? 
 No ! we'll stand to our post, 
 Tho' the battle be lost ; 
 
 Still our strong hearts remain, 
 Unconquered remain. 
 And if Fortune doth frown, 
 We'll just trample her down, 
 And press forward again, 
 March forward again. 
 
 Let the coward or slave 
 Slink away to his grave. 
 On his spirit the brand 
 Of tyranny's hand ; 
 But let ours be the death. 
 This old banner beneath. 
 
 For our homes and our land. 
 The green fields of our land. 
 What is life, but a chain 
 That doth bind us to pain. 
 
 And whose links are sad vears, 
 Dark, sorrowful years ? 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 169 
 
 Oh, but death is the Fay 
 That can show us the way 
 
 Thro' the valley of tears. 
 
 Past the valley of tears. 
 
 So, dear Eire, fill up 
 The old Liberty cup 
 
 With our heart's crimson tide. 
 
 To Freedom, our bride. 
 Sure, our sires, long ago, 
 'Gainst our black-hearted foe 
 
 Ranged them close by her side. 
 
 Fought and fell by her side ; 
 And to win back her smile 
 For an hour to our Isle, 
 
 Oh, 'twere worth all our years. 
 
 Of heart-burning tears. 
 So we '11 at them once more. 
 Like our fathers of yore. 
 
 With the old battle cheers. 
 
 Red victory's cheers. 
 
lyO LOVE AND LAND 
 
 STAR OF THE EVENING. 
 
 Rise, Star of the Even, rise, beautiful ttar. 
 
 Like the soft eye of Peace o'er the black wing of war ! 
 
 Like the beacon of Faith o'er the sea of despair 
 
 Thy tremulous light skims the dark waves of air. 
 
 And our spirits, like barques, o'er the still waters move. 
 
 Their sensitive sails filled with breathings of love , 
 
 And old music voices, like echoes from heaven. 
 
 All born with thy beams, beauteous Star of the Even. 
 
 Sweet Star of the Even, thro' valley and grove 
 Thy rising is hailed as the signal of Love — 
 When night flings her tresses abroad o'er the earth. 
 And her gems from their settings of ebon shine forth, 
 While the sky is ablaze like a sapharined sea. 
 The village maid gazes alone but on thee. 
 And her heart to her cheek sends its hot blushing tide, 
 For thou art the lamp to light Love to her side. 
 
 Ho ! black eyes all flashings, and blue ones all smiles. 
 The night winds are roaming the sycamore aisles ; 
 There are throbbing hearts waiting beneath the dark trees. 
 Whom nor low winds flow'rodor'd nor bright stars can 
 please. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I7I 
 
 Come forth to their gaze all transfigured, and move 
 Thro' the blue vaulted aisles like their visions of love ; 
 The night airs will fail in your soul-laden sighs. 
 And the stars pale their light in the glow of your eyes. 
 
 Oh, sweet dewy twilights ! oh, heaven-tinct hours ! 
 Will ye never revisit our tenantless bowers. 
 And bring our lost Pleiades back from the skies. 
 With the soft-glowing cheeks and the love-lighted eyes ? 
 Shall we feel the spiced airs of the greenwood no more. 
 While the night wears her dream-woven glories of yore. 
 And our earth-prisoned souls soar away o'er their bars, 
 To roam the blue fields in the light of the stars ? 
 
 Tho' the eyes are long dimmed that shone bright on our 
 
 way. 
 And the hearts that beat fondly are cold in the clay. 
 And the voices whose melodies thrilled the nights long 
 Live but in our souls like the echoes of song — 
 All passed like the odor of flowers on the wind. 
 And left but the mem'ry of beauty behind. 
 As we gaze thro' our tears to their high homes in heaven. 
 In their names we bless thee, sweet Star of the Even. 
 
1^2 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 THE BACHELOR'S SOLILOQUY. 
 
 Scene — The Bachelor's Cottage : Hour — The witching time o' night. 
 
 Dramatis Persona — Maurice O'Day. 
 
 Several others represented through spirit manifestations. 
 
 I sit in my cottage in summer flowers smothered. 
 
 And should be the happiest mortal alive. 
 Its myself that can 't tell why my heart is so bothered. 
 
 Unless being unmarried and passed twenty-five ; 
 All thro' the long nights I rest very unaisy. 
 
 For the colleens' bright eyes do be shining on me ; 
 Sure I 've drove all the girls in the parish half crazv. 
 
 And love ev'ry red lip and light foot that I see. 
 
 I don't like this plucking one rose from the garden 
 
 And wearing it close to your heart all thro' life ; 
 With the light of the parish one woman rewardin' — 
 
 The deuce take the man that invented one wife. 
 While my soul spreads abroad like a sky o'er creation. 
 
 And the stars that shine in it are woman's bright eyes. 
 Must two eyes eclipse the whole stars of the nation ? 
 
 They must be two suns if they light up my skies. 
 
 But talking is dry, and, faith, so is thinking ; 
 Here goes for a cup of Tim Mulligan's Tay ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. lyj 
 
 When the spirit is troubled, there's nothing like drinking 
 
 For driving the blue devils off and away. 
 This is the dew of the night from the mountain, 
 
 The Saxon's red plummet ne'er sank in its light; 
 And here is the crystal from Annes' blessed fountain. 
 
 But it would be a sin to defile it to-night. 
 
 Says my grandfather Tom, *' when you want a good 
 jorum. 
 
 Take whisky and boil till it half disappears ; 
 Then sweeten with honey — pour lemon juice o'er 'em. 
 
 But wather, me boy,'s a producer of tears." 
 And so I fill up and I drink to the Bradys — 
 
 Och ! they were the boys for a fight or a spree — 
 Let me see, I was talking of Love and the Ladies, 
 
 'T is a subject just now more agreeable to me. 
 
 When I feel the bright eyes of a maiden fall o'er me. 
 
 My heart melts like butter in July's hot sun ; 
 But her smiles and bright lips, bursting cherries, restore 
 me. 
 
 And into her arms then my fancy doth run. 
 The worst of all is how they cross my devotions ; 
 
 When angels from Eden smile down upon me, 
 'Tis not heads and pinions that cause my commotions, 
 
 They 're full-blooded, well-bodied angels I see. 
 
174 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The blackguards all say it is time I was married ; 
 
 Of course they would like me well out of their wa). 
 For many's the smooth-flowing match has miscarried 
 
 When the colleens clapt eyes upon Maurice O'Day. 
 Some spalpeens, too, hint of me looking much older; 
 
 There is not a white signal of death yet appears ; 
 I 'm straight as a lance from the heel to the shoulder. 
 
 And can lead in the dance for the next dozen years. 
 
 But let us rove thro' all the gardens of pleasure. 
 
 And sip ev'ry dew-drop and cull ev'ry flower. 
 And drink at Love's fountain from Passion's huge measure. 
 
 In the end all the sweets get unsav'ry and sour. 
 Then custom, the gorgon, cracks whip, and instanter 
 
 We must choose a partner to love as a wife ; 
 We pluck up the first, and are off in a canter — 
 
 A team oft ill-matched for the rough road of life. 
 
 So while one is young and can still have the pick of 
 
 The girls, he had better prepare for life's race. 
 Not snatch up some jade to wed and get sick of 
 
 When the dews wash the blushings of rouge from her 
 face. 
 I know some sweet maidens, young, buxom and bonny, 
 With tongues free from guile and with souls free from 
 s'n. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I75 
 
 With hearts full of love and with socks full of money. 
 And they 're always the better for having the tin. 
 
 There 's sweet Jenny Rogan, the milliner's trimmin'. 
 
 The purtiest maiden from Loughill to Glenn ; 
 The mother runs off with the heads of the women, 
 
 The daughter away with the hearts of the men. 
 There she sits thro' the day, 'mong her ribbons and 
 bonnets. 
 
 Like a Fay, thro' the roses her white fingers play ; 
 And all the young swains writing love-burning sonnets. 
 
 She laughs at their pains, and works, singing away. 
 
 And next, Anna Lone, the old miller's proud daughter. 
 
 The flower of the village, the lads call dear Ann ; 
 Many's the young heart for marriage has sought her. 
 
 But she laughs as she walks o'er the heart of a man. 
 She 's the lone star that's left in the sky of the miller ; 
 
 In the mill race of life death has left him alone ; 
 Could pity grind out the heart of this man-killer. 
 
 We 'd have treble X flour, what we now think is stone 
 
 There's gay Fanny Phaire, who is always coquetting ; 
 
 What soul-snaring demons revel in her eyes ; 
 When she drops down her lids it is like the sun setting, 
 
 When she lifts them again it is like the sunrise. 
 
176 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 She moves 'mid the throng to her subjects dispensing 
 Her smiles like a Queen knighting heroes of old ; 
 
 The sighs from their lips the enamored air censing ; 
 Ah, she is not molded for one heart to hold. 
 
 Yet, damn it, in spite of all, one must admire her. 
 
 She lists to one's vows v^'ith such magical grace. 
 And the passion that burns in your soul seems to fire her. 
 
 And just when you 've got her she laughs in your face. 
 She will not tone down to the slow jog of mortals. 
 
 In harness for life she would surely break thro'. 
 And fly to those spheres where romance guards the portals ; 
 
 But that is the way all those summer birds do. 
 
 There is Kitty Creagh ; well, her face is not handsome. 
 
 But her bust is like Juno's, her ankle sublime ; 
 Her house is her own ; she has good sense, too, and some 
 
 Gold in her locket, which brings her to time. 
 And it matters not much about fair face and stature, 
 
 Looks are skin deep — at least so we are told. 
 But beauty 's a passport that 's given by nature, 
 
 And a ticket that's surer than silver or gold. 
 
 There 's Nora McDonogh and sweet Kenny Geary, 
 A brace of wild ring doves, all billings and coos. 
 
 And either would make this bleak wilderness cheery 
 If one onlv knew which dear charmer to choose. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 177 
 
 Sure, all the night long I could go on thus stringing 
 The bright living jewels around my fond heart. 
 
 Their clear, lustrous eyes such rich floods of light flinging. 
 That shadows, like clouds in the" sun, must depart. 
 
 They 're my Ros'ry each night, and my fond spirit lingers 
 
 Around their dear names when I go on my knees. 
 While the beads slide along thro' my head and my fingers, 
 
 I give each bright angel a kiss and a squeeze. 
 And when I lie down to sleep, all their bright faces 
 
 And soft-swelling forms pass just beyond reach. 
 Not so much like angels, but more like the graces; 
 
 Not heaven nor earth, but a portion of each. 
 
 Sure, the Lord must have smiled when he created woman. 
 
 And bade her go glowing in loveliness forth ; 
 No wonder, of old, that her love, deep and human. 
 
 Drew spirits from heaven to dwell upon earth. 
 Oh, if the angels and saints were all Heros, 
 
 Had enough of the woman to light their cold eyes. 
 Not those snowy-robed beauties, those spiritual zeros. 
 
 We 'd swim the thin air for to reach the blue skies. 
 
 The soul to the face flies to honor her presence. 
 Her eyes to the heart send their magical light ; 
 
 Her breath fills the air with a sweet, holy essence ; 
 The sweep of her hair 's like the passing of night. 
 
I y 8 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 She moves like the sun, chasing shadows before her ; 
 
 Her head in the sky and our hearts 'neath her foot. 
 So what can man do but fall down and adore her. 
 
 From the crown of her head to the tip of her boot ? 
 
 In the palace of art, among statues and painting, 
 
 Ev'ry eye has some fav'rite to sit down before. 
 The pose of the head or the glow of the teinting — 
 
 So each has a beauty to love and adore. 
 Tho' I never could feel this sublime admiration 
 
 For Venus on canvas, or Hebe in stone. 
 Couldn't worship mere clay, lacking soul, animation, 
 
 I would rather have one flesh and blood of my own. 
 
 Let me see ; with bright eyes let us make a beginning. 
 
 And each has his ow^n sweet, peculiar hue. 
 Of the numberless shades that are winning and sinning, 
 
 From the satanic black to the heavenly blue. 
 While each has its own mode of teazing and killing. 
 
 Of flinging its arrows to wound or to kill. 
 It must be confessed thai man is quite willing 
 
 To fall at the shrine of each conqueror still. 
 
 Now, your black eye is one of the best face adorners. 
 Like the glare of the sun, it absorbs our whole sight ; 
 
 The plainest of faces, prude, modest, or scorners. 
 Looks grand in the glow of its wonderful light. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I79 
 
 While the delicate blue, tho' angelic, is trying, 
 
 And requires its surroundings all perfect and true ; 
 
 The dimple, the smile, the soft blushing, the sighing. 
 All must conspire to look well in its hue. 
 
 To the brilliant black beauties that high power is given — 
 
 As for good or for evil their glances are thrown — • 
 To lead us to hell or to lead us to heaven. 
 
 While the blue can but lead us to heaven alone. 
 And Love sits enthroned in the ebon-hued glory. 
 
 But Passion's camp followers stand at his back. 
 While (but this must be only the artist's false story,) 
 
 No devil wears blue eyes, no angel wears black. 
 
 Let the gray and the brown, as their views are inclining. 
 
 Take sides, and the others of varying hue, 
 In the battle where eyes are each other outshining, 
 
 Beneath their great leaders, the Black and the Blue. 
 I never could choose, being a bad judge of teinting, 
 
 I've seen ev'ry hue, and surrendered to all. 
 And I cannot rebuke mother Nature for painting 
 
 Them light as the heavens or black as the pall. 
 
 From the eye to the mouth — see those bold female Catos, 
 Those long rubber lips that will never grow tired. 
 
 While others seem formed just for mashing potatoes ; 
 Look out for the thin upper lip when 'tis fired; 
 
l8o LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Do n't those proud curling lips seem averse to caressing ? 
 
 They '11 love, but it must be when daylight is gone ; 
 But those soft, pouting rubies, that look like a blessing. 
 
 Were formed for caressing and kissing alone. 
 
 Then the neck, not too thick, nor too long, nor too slender. 
 
 Softly w^hite, richly round, full of beauty and grace. 
 Peggy White has a neck — (may the fairies defend her) — 
 
 As fine as e'er carried a blush to a face 
 And the hair, as you please, but I like it best flowing. 
 
 Like a stream, o'er the shoulders and down to the waist, 
 As tho' it knew not, nor cared where, it was going. 
 
 Not careless nor studied, but negligent taste. 
 
 And the bosom ! ah, this is the home where the graces 
 
 Sit throned on the fair hill by Love made divine ; 
 Your eye and your heart may be captured by faces 
 
 But the bust, well developed, is master of mine. 
 Then the waist, just the size of what nature intended. 
 
 For the arm of a lover to entwine it secure, 
 Well rounded, not gross, strength and gracefulness blended ; 
 
 Your wasp waists and beer kegs I cannot endure. 
 
 Now the ankle and foot, those two man-taking minions. 
 Must not be too fast, nor too heavy and slow. 
 
 But like those of Mercury, lacking the pinions, 
 
 Small, graceful, but solid, like some that we know. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 151 
 
 When I see such as these I feel always like bribing 
 The winds just to lift up the petticoat blest ; 
 
 But we need n't go further in looks or describing, 
 The ankle and foot always speak for the rest. 
 
 When you meet such a woman she 's a jewel, and take her, 
 
 She '11 cheer up your heart and will lighten your hearth ; 
 She 's the chef d'ouvre of the great Undertaker, 
 
 The pride of the skies and the glory of earth. 
 And our own loved Erin's their bountiful matron; 
 
 Like joys in her sorrow they come at her call, 
 Like fairies they move at the dance and the patron. 
 
 They blush in the cottage, they bloom in the hall. 
 
 Do n't I sit like a satyr by wood nymphs surrounded ? 
 
 A dozen dear beauties are now within call. 
 And all their bright arrows have struck me and wounded, 
 
 I bear in my bosom the love-marks of all. 
 There they are, like a casket of ripe jewels glancing ; 
 
 ** Take one ! " cries the genii, with horrible glare. 
 And dazzled I stand, o'er their brightness entrancing; 
 
 ** So many jewels ! one only to wear ! ! " 
 
 Let me count off my beads ; by the powers of Moll Kelly, 
 I never once thought of Tom Cair's daughter Nell ! 
 
 Now I'll drink a full cup to the health of dear Nelly, 
 Whose soul's as pure as St. Anne's blessed well. 
 
1 82 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 She will not intrude, her sweet spirit 's so modest. 
 Not e'en in one's thoughts till all others depart. 
 
 Then she glides in, when the fairest and proudest 
 Have passed like a dream, to her place in the heart. 
 
 Her's is the heart that 's not given to roaming. 
 
 And her's is the eye that subdues, not excites. 
 That would weep for one's absence and smile at his coming ; 
 
 Just the thing for a fireside on bleak winter nights. 
 As she trips o'er the fields on a fine summer's morning. 
 
 When dew-drops, like diamonds, shine bright on each 
 spray. 
 In the high halls of light then you 'd swear she 'd been 
 born in. 
 
 And came to the earth just to herald the day. 
 
 She flits round the place, like a sunbeam, disposing 
 
 The milk pans and pails, and the things of the house. 
 Such ankles, such feet, such white arms disclosing ; 
 
 She 's fit for the gods, but will drive home the cows. 
 In short, she is just what she should be — a Woman — 
 
 And that word means beauty and goodness combined ; 
 She deserves, and should have, the whole love of a true 
 man ; 
 
 Her heart is as pure as her soul is refined. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 1 83 
 
 I wish that my bosom was not so expanded. 
 
 But could glow in the light of a pair of sweet eyes. 
 Or that I in some ocean island was landed. 
 
 With dear Nelly Cair for my bride and my prize. 
 But here, as I sit, with a hundred eyes shining, 
 
 I say to them all, stars of brightness, shine on. 
 Let their long, flowing locks round my spirit keep twining. 
 
 My heart holds too many to beat true to one. 
 
 And still, like the child in the garden of daisies, 
 
 I '11 wander delighted from flower unto flower, 
 And when I grow tired in the bright odored mazes 
 
 I '11 rest by the streams in the first fairy's bower. 
 Yes, heart, thro' the garden we '11 still go a roving, 
 
 Untrammeled by fetters, light, airy, and free ; 
 And boat down the river of singleness, loving 
 
 Every fair face from its source to the sea. 
 
 So I fill up the bowl to my soul's restoration ; 
 
 Hurra for the wedding, the dance, and the fair ! 
 To the dogs with old Hymen and his botheration, 
 
 I '11 live my old life, free from sorrow and care. 
 When a man once steps into the marriage dominions 
 
 He fetters his soul to his children and wife. 
 Then his spirit must fling off' her light, airy pinions. 
 
 And drag on the earth o'er the rough road of lite. 
 IG 
 
184 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 OUR DUTY TO THE DEAD. 
 
 Written on hearing Schuyler Colfax speak on the evils of slavery. 
 
 Throughout the North a cry went forth upon the light- 
 ning's breath. 
 And the rummer air was drugged with its heavy wave of 
 
 death. 
 As it wept along a fun'ral song till its arch of wailing 
 
 spann'd. 
 Like the heavy shade of Azrael, the households of the 
 
 land — 
 And as it flings its sable wings unfolding like a pall. 
 It speaks of woe and sorrowing and loneliness to all — 
 It was the cry of Liberty above the Men who died 
 Upon her hundred battle-fields to keep her glorified. 
 
 The Artisan grew pale and wan, and left his work undone. 
 The Farmer left his golden grain to rot beneath the sun. 
 The Matron wept, of hope bereft, the shadow by her 
 
 side. 
 The Maiden flung her gems away to think of him that 
 
 died, 
 And ev'ry hearth throughout the North was robed in hues 
 
 of mourning 
 For those who went upon that march from which there 's 
 
 no returning ; 
 
LOVE AN D LAND 
 
 185 
 
 But a joyous pride for those who died o'ertopped their 
 giant woes. 
 
 For they had fall'n for Freedom's cause and battling Free- 
 dom's foes. 
 
 Dark Slav'ry stood, a thing of blood, and swung his clotted 
 
 whip, 
 Foul murder in his blackened heart and curses on his lip ; 
 Of giant mold, his lash unrolled flung blood drops to the 
 
 skies. 
 His march was over broken hearts, his breath was woman's 
 
 cries. 
 This God outlawed ! he overawed for years this mighty 
 
 land. 
 
 E'en freemen crouched in silence 'neath his uplifted hand 
 
 Till the gleaming sword of an outraged Lord had smote 
 
 him to the earth. 
 Then in the land, and not till then, true Liberty had birth. 
 
 Oh, mighty men of sword and pen, bethink ye how they 
 
 died. 
 On many a fiery battle-field, how many a household's pride 
 Marched to the tomb in youth and bloom, that Freedom 
 
 still might own 
 A land where men could move without the shadow of a 
 
 throne. 
 
I 86 I, O V E AND L A N U. 
 
 The war is done, the fight is won; now shall their cause 
 
 go down ? 
 And have your households given their gems in vain to 
 
 Freedom's crown ? 
 And shall those chains that emptied veins to burst, be 
 
 link'd once more. 
 To fill the land with woman's cries, to flush the land with 
 
 The w^ar is done, the fight is won ! Not yet, my friends, 
 
 't is ye 
 Must raise above the mighty dead the shaft of liberty, ' 
 And stand around the sacred ground where your dead 
 
 brothers sleep. 
 And of its crimson harvest see their murderers do not reap. 
 The dagger still that struck to kill our country, gleams 
 
 once more ; 
 'T is clutched within the same red hand that's foul with 
 
 brother's gore. 
 If on the land the heavy hand of slavery falls again, 
 Then have your sisters wept their tears, your brothers 
 
 fall'n in vain. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 FOR FREEDOM AND FOR LOGAN. 
 
 jlir — "We'll march right down to Washington." 
 
 When Freedom flew 
 Her starry blue 
 O'er treason's black dominions. 
 And fanned the fires 
 Lit by our sires 
 Of old, with eagle pinions ; 
 And from the hills, 
 Like thunder thrills. 
 Rang out the battle slogan — 
 The foremost man 
 That led the van 
 To war, was gallant Logan ! 
 Chorus — Now worse than steel. 
 Let treason feel 
 The people's mighty slogan ! 
 Then three times three 
 For Liberty, 
 And gallant Johnny Logan ! 
 
 Who firmly stood 
 When waves of blood 
 Swept over square and column. 
 
 .87 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And traced his name. 
 With bay'net flame, 
 
 In glory's crimson volume ! 
 On battle-field 
 Our nation's shield. 
 
 His voice was Freedom's slogan ; 
 And Victory- 
 Leaped wild, for she 
 
 Had lent her sword to Logan ! 
 Chorus — Now worse than steel. 
 Let treason feel, etc. 
 
 Hark ! from the graves 
 
 Where sleep our braves 
 With Freedom's sunlight shrouded 
 
 Who flushed the plains 
 
 From throbbing veins 
 To keep her face unclouded ; 
 
 Across our souls. 
 
 Like war song, rolls 
 The old Corps' thrilling slogan — 
 
 Whose cry congealed 
 
 On battle-field. 
 The foe of land and Logan. 
 Chorus — Now worse than steel. 
 Let treason feel, etc. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 189 
 
 Oh, comrades ! who 
 
 Have swept the dew 
 From Southern fields together 
 
 And filled the skies 
 
 With Vict'ry's cries. 
 And marched 'gainst wind and weather ; 
 
 Come hand in hand. 
 
 For native land. 
 Ring out your battle slogan ; 
 
 They never yield. 
 
 On flood or field. 
 Who fight 'neath gallant Logan ! 
 
 Chorus — Now worse than steel. 
 
 Let treason feel 
 The people's mighty slogan ! 
 
 Then three times three 
 
 For Victory, 
 The Union, and for Logan ! 
 
190 
 
 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 THE EXILES. 
 
 Scene — On the Western Prairies — An Irish settlement — Meeting in the 
 evening to talk of Home. 
 
 Soft from the west the evening airs are blowing, 
 
 Kissing the long grass and the maples tall ; 
 'Neath the setting sun the billowy plain is glowing. 
 Within the woods we hear the wild dove's call ; 
 Like tranquil thoughts the streams are flowing. 
 And Freedom flings her halo over all ; 
 Yet sad as in a desert wide we stand, 
 For we are exiles from our Fathers' Land. 
 
 Broad are these acres that our sons inherit. 
 
 And rich the bounty which their beauty yields ; 
 The title deeds are manly worth and merit. 
 
 Heraldries emblazoned broad upon their shields. 
 No tyrant laws to fret the chainless spirit 
 That walks abroad, the master of the fields ; 
 
 Yet, like very slaves and bondsmen do we stand. 
 Bearing the fetters of our Fathers' Land. 
 
 We sit mute watchers, sad and fondly urning 
 
 The sacred ashes of our murdered race, 
 The fires of love within our bosoms burning. 
 
 And hate that tvrannv could not efi^ace. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I9I 
 
 The while our hearts, like wounded doves, are turning 
 And yearning for the only resting place. 
 
 The pleasant valleys and the mountains grand. 
 And the endless beauties of our Fathers' Land. 
 
 And so we sit, like shadows in the shadow. 
 
 And wonder if the hills are still the same. 
 If the lark still sings above the sunny meadow. 
 
 And if each lane still bears its olden name. 
 Does the Banshee flit and cry, poor widow. 
 
 Around the churchyard ? — how we hang our heads for 
 shame — 
 What if the spoiler laid his heavy hand 
 Upon the graveyards of our Fathers' Land ? 
 
 Are the apple boughs across the pathways bending. 
 
 Tempting the school-boys with their ruddy glow ? 
 Sure, Mother Nature placed the fruit, intending 
 
 They should be pulled, and hung the branches low. 
 Somehow, we ne'er see fruit with colors blending 
 Like those that charmed our young eyes long ago. 
 
 Their boughs hang o'er us like the enchanter's wand. 
 Breathing the odors of our Fathers' Land. 
 
 Do the wild bees hum around the red-lipped clover. 
 
 Sipping the sweetness from each honey pool ? 
 Do the winds come wandering the green hills over. 
 
 Fanning the weary with their kisses cool ? 
 
 n 
 
igl LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Does the river sigh lil^e a sweet-voiced lover, 
 Wooing the truants away from school ? 
 
 Do they write their sweethearts' names upon the sand ? 
 So will they vanish from their Fathers' Land. 
 
 When the summer moon is shining brightlv, 
 
 Do the young folk meet on the village green ? 
 Do they dance the pleasant reels and planxties lightly ? 
 
 Or can they dance them grand as we have seen ? 
 
 In our thoughts and dreams we are with them nightly. 
 
 Though many a league of ocean flows between ; 
 
 Ah ! planxties gay, and reels well planned. 
 
 To show the beauties of our Fathers' Land. 
 
 We know the hills are green and grand as ever. 
 
 The lark still warbles and the wild bees hum ; 
 In fancy we can trace each brook and river. 
 
 Where the honeysuckles and the daisies bloom ; 
 And Nature's myriad tongues sing psans to the Giver 
 For her eternal looks of light and gloom. 
 The smiling heavens and the breezes bland. 
 And the living verdure of our Fathers' Land. 
 
 But still we miss some old familiar places ; 
 
 There was a village once between those hills ; 
 Along those blood-red blotches ruin traces 
 
 The ravished hearth place and the cottage sills. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 1 93 
 
 And where the shining flock of Sunday faces 
 Were mirrored in the crystal-flowing rills. 
 The lazy herds, dull, soulless matter, stand 
 Where life and spirit vivified the Land. 
 
 The summer moonbeams still are shining brightly. 
 
 But the village maidens from the green are flown. 
 No more they dance the reels and planxties lightly. 
 
 The harp is mute, the harper dead and gone ; 
 From many a foreign home their sad hearts nightly 
 Send up deep curses to the eternal throne. 
 
 In ev'ry land where roams the unhappy band. 
 Against the spoilers of their Fathers' Land. 
 
 Is there naught left but woman's tears and curses ? 
 
 We 've sighed our souls away on bended knee. 
 And spite of all our prayers the land but getting worse is. 
 
 Our tears but swell her streams of agony. 
 The black processions after funeral hearses 
 Have filled her cup with hopeless misery ; 
 Famine and Death have full command, 
 And stalk their armies thro' the sorrowing Land. 
 
 Some wear their trappings in the house of mourning, 
 
 Riding the people down with iron heel ; 
 Like Neros, fiddling while the towns are burning. 
 
 They dance, 'mid skulls and bones, the devil's reel. 
 
194 LOVEANDLAND. 
 
 Like fiends let loose, for further carnage yearning. 
 They must have corpses new for ev'ry meal ; 
 And round about like hounds of hell they stand. 
 Eating the vitals of their native Land. 
 
 On ev'ry hand are gorgeous temples rearing 
 
 Their tow'ring heads to mock the eternal God, 
 While Man, his living temphyS disappearing 
 
 From the land, or crushed into the sod ; 
 And sleek-faced shepherds preach how Erin, 
 The beloved, but feels His chastening rod ; 
 
 That Famine and Death are from His loving hand, 
 To scourge us, for His glory, from our Land. 
 
 Oh, heartless parricides ! oh, lying preachers ! 
 
 Who wear the garb of heaven and worship hell ; 
 Whose womb has vomited a brood of teachers 
 
 Who cry aloud 'mid death that all is well ; 
 You 've filled the land with beggarly beseechers 
 Who bless the Lord they 've got a Land to sell ; 
 The ancient soul of Erin you 've unmanned. 
 And filled with heartlessness our once great Land. 
 
 Upon the altar steps you stand, unblushing. 
 And preach that evil cometh from the Lord ; 
 
 Up to each cheek we feel the hot blood flushing. 
 To hear you desecrate God's holy word. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I95 
 
 As from their homes our plundered race go rushing. 
 Ye see a Sacred, not a Saxon, sword ; 
 
 That each poor slave doth bear a burning brand, 
 To spread his Faith throughout the stranger's Land. 
 
 Oh, friends, our woes are not from heaven descended. 
 
 Their origin is earthly, not divine ; 
 When God smiled on our race he ne'er intended 
 
 That thro' our valleys we should mope and whine ; 
 Go forth. He said, with brows erect, unbended. 
 The land and all thereon fore'er be thine ; 
 
 To each a bright sword and a strong right hand, 
 ** Be masters, and not servants, in the Land." 
 
 And while we stood erect, with bright swords glancing, 
 
 A line of light along the sounding sea, 
 Our fleets well laden o'er the waters dancing. 
 
 Proclaimed a land unawed, a people free. 
 Upon the mighty march of mind advancing. 
 Leading the nations to the light, till we 
 Beheld the Almighty's glowing hand 
 Tracing His blessings o'er the smiling Land. 
 
 At last we slept beside our shining sabres. 
 
 And while we slept some monks stole them away. 
 
 And preached how men should love and use their neighbors. 
 And taught us how to bend the knee and pray ; 
 
196 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And they were paid for all their cunning labors. 
 For soon we bent, and bowed, and prayed alway ; 
 Oar swords were bartered for the shepherd's wand, 
 The wolf-dogs changed to sheep throughout the Land. 
 
 Then came the Saxon, on his mission slaying. 
 Unto the land where once he lived a slave ; 
 He found us not in arms, but lowly praying. 
 
 Praying to Martyrs and to Saints to save. 
 We bowed our necks unto the butchers, saying, 
 ** Thy will be done," and filled a common grave. 
 Too late we found the shepherd's crook ill-planned 
 To drive the Saxon wild boar from the Land. 
 
 Poor Land ! 't was thus deception brought her 
 
 From her proud attitude to bended knee ; 
 The Saxon monks sang, *' Benedicite, fair daughter,** 
 
 And bound her limbs in chains of slavery. 
 Then gave her up to foreign fraud and slaughter. 
 To Norman lust and Saxon perfidy. 
 
 And Native feud, by foreign cunning planned, 
 O'erflowed the chalice of thy woes, dear Land. 
 
 The hour for action is no time for praying. 
 
 Mere words, at best, are nought but empty air — 
 
 A cheap and pleasant method for defraying 
 The soul's expenses thro' this world of care ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. I97 
 
 But from the skies are thunder-voices, saying. 
 One noble action is a life of prayer. 
 
 Hear this, ye sycophants, who calmly stand 
 Chanting your hymns, while death is in the Land. 
 
 'Tis not by prayers and tears the pilgrim reaches 
 
 The mountain tops, where man can touch the skies ; 
 'T is not thro' flowing bowls nor flippant speeches 
 
 A nation's pathway unto Freedom lies — 
 
 Thro* battle's iron hail, and bloody breaches. 
 
 Marchings, loud hurras, and dying cries. 
 
 The gallop to the grave, the guns well manned, . 
 This is thy road to go, my Erieland. 
 
 And this is the olden path of fame and glory 
 
 That diademed your fearless brow for years ; 
 The source of harper's song, the light of minstrel story. 
 
 Was the glare of battle streaming from your spears ; 
 How their lines were smashed by Hugh the Red and Rory, 
 And like grass went down their bold cavaliers. 
 
 Who now shall wield great Hugh's red battle brand. 
 To whip the scorpions from our Fathers' Land ? 
 
 Oh, for a day upon the hills reclining. 
 
 And gazing on the green vales far below. 
 And fifty thousand rifles, new and shining. 
 
 And fifty thousand Irish hearts I know. 
 
198 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 With fifty thousand crimson bay'nets, signing 
 Petitions with the heart's blood of the foe ! 
 Not British power, nor hell itself, could stand 
 Their headlong charge for Freedom and our Land, 
 
 Oh, for to see the Saxon hirelings flying, 
 
 The hungry land enriched with tyrant blood. 
 The spirit of our race sublime, undying. 
 Defiant stand upon this devil's brood ; 
 And, her countless wrongs for vengeance crying. 
 Stamp and tramp them in the very mud. 
 
 Like God's bright angel over Satan stand, . 
 And hurl their hordes of darkness from the Land. 
 
 Unconquered Ireland ! sad and beauteous nation. 
 
 Thy sons are giants, but like children still ; 
 They have the strength, but lack the application 
 
 To merge their souls into one mighty will. 
 And hurl the fury of this new creation 
 
 Upon the thrones of despots, sm.ite and kill. 
 And sweep their brood with an avenging hand 
 Into the depths of hell from our fair Land. 
 
 Within our hearts a boundless love is glowing. 
 Where'er on earth we lonely exiles roam 
 
 A spirit flies before our vision, showing 
 
 The dreamland, crying, ** thither, thither come.** 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 1 99 
 
 We wander, heedless how or where we're going, 
 Because our weary hearts are not at home ; 
 We- live and die upon a foreign strand. 
 Forever dreaming of our Fathers' Land. 
 
 And shall we sigh and think of home forever. 
 
 And sink unhonored into nameless graves ? 
 And shall we see our own green mountains never. 
 
 And cross but in our dreams the bounding waves ? 
 And roam no more by woodland and by river. 
 But live as bondsmen and expire as slaves. 
 The horizon of our existence spanned 
 By desert wastes, and not by Fatherland ? 
 
 And must the life-tide from the breast of Erin 
 Forever flow and bound thro' foreign veins. 
 Upon the battle fields of Freedom, cheering 
 
 The wav'ring hearts and bursting bondsmen's chains ? 
 Or, paths of progress thro' the wild woods clearing. 
 Wasting its vigor on the dewless plains. 
 
 Then sinking, like Afric rivers, in the sand. 
 That should have beautified our own fair Land ? 
 
 In the hush of night, when all the world is sleeping — 
 The student pondering over olden books. 
 
 The lonely sentinel his watches keeping. 
 
 But thinking of green vales and laughing brooks — 
 
200 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 A form comes in chains before them weeping. 
 In sorrow crowned, yet beautiful she looks, 
 And, pointing to her fetters, doth she stand. 
 The unavenged spirit of our Land. 
 
 Oh, men of purpose grand, and faith unshaken. 
 
 Who march unto the music of the spheres. 
 Whose firm resolve to reach the goal is taken. 
 
 E'en tho' your path be one of blood and tears, 
 Press on, undaunted! lo, the Day is breaking! 
 Already on our flag its light appears. 
 
 And soon its wings of glory will expand. 
 And fling its sunshine o'er our suff'ring Land. 
 
 Sons of the Old Land, each to each a brother, 
 
 Where'er on this broad earth by tyrants hurled. 
 Strike hands in love ! stand true to one and other, 
 
 A link of brotherhood around the world ! 
 Our motto be, ** Ireland, our common Mother ! " 
 And raise and keep the old green flag unfurled. 
 And lead or follow where the true command, 
 Our lives and works be all for Fatherland. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 20I 
 
 MABEL GRAEME. 
 
 Sweet Mabel Graeme! 
 The very name 
 
 Falls warmly o'er the mind. 
 And winter gray 
 Melts soft away 
 
 'Neath mem'ry's summer wind ; 
 And hand in hand. 
 In Erie land. 
 
 We rove the valleys thro'. 
 Among the hills 
 And by the rills. 
 
 And o'er the morning dew. 
 
 Sweet Mabel Graeme ! 
 How soft the name 
 
 Floats down the summer wind. 
 As fancy weaves 
 On dreamy eves 
 
 Her weird spells o'er the mind. 
 When up the sky 
 The moon rides high. 
 
 And stars look on the sea. 
 By wood and stream 
 Her bright eyes gleam — 
 
 Two glories haunting me 
 
202 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The town of Cair 
 Was very fair 
 
 Some twenty years ago, 
 E'er the rime of age 
 Had dulled life's page 
 
 With winter's drift and snow ; 
 But when Youth flings 
 His sunny wings 
 
 O'er hills and valleys green. 
 Their magic light 
 Makes all things bright 
 
 To the eyes of sweet eighteen. 
 
 'T is sweet to rove 
 With those we love 
 
 Beneath the evening skies. 
 When blushes speak 
 Upon the cheek. 
 
 And answer in the eyes ; 
 When pulses beat 
 With flying feet. 
 
 Like Cupids round the heart. 
 And the glaring moon 
 Doth rise so soon. 
 
 And it takes so long to part. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 203 
 
 Oh, stolen hours 
 
 In woodland bowers. 
 
 To youth, and love, and virtue given. 
 When angels ope 
 The gates of hope. 
 
 And flood our souls with light from heav'n, 
 Thro' all the strife 
 Of after life 
 
 You shine like sun rays in a prison ; 
 Upon our barque 
 That cleaves the dark. 
 
 You're the lights on main and mizen. 
 
 But Christian spleen 
 Came in between 
 
 Where death could not divide, 
 And Mabel Graeme 
 In time became 
 
 In love with death, and died. 
 In faction's school 
 Is old men's rule. 
 
 They worship God above 
 By rage and hate. 
 Forgetting that 
 
 Heaven knows no creed but love. 
 
^04 LOVE ANDLAND. 
 
 Oh, Faction ! worse 
 Than Cromwell's curse 
 
 You 've been to our fair land ; 
 Your countless woes 
 Have been our foes 
 
 'Neath Satan's black command. 
 While Christian creeds 
 Dissension breeds 
 
 'Twixt man and man, 'twixt race and race. 
 Each vow, each prayer. 
 Is lost in air. 
 
 They never reach the throne of grace. 
 
 Great God ! and when 
 Shall Irishmen 
 
 Rise o'er Creed and Saxon guile, 
 Join heart and hand 
 And nobly stand 
 
 Up for the rights of the Green Isle ? 
 We are all brothers ; 
 From our mother's 
 
 Breast we 've drank the same deep woe. 
 From the same sod 
 We own one God, 
 
 One Fatherland, one common foe. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 205 
 
 While some may bend 
 Where rivers blend 
 
 With fervent prayer their homilies. 
 And others pray 
 Where mountains gray 
 
 Lift them to God's sunny skies ; 
 Where turrets rear 
 Their heads in air. 
 
 Others sing God's praise on high ; 
 But church or grove. 
 All songs of love 
 
 Float from our hearts to one bright sky. 
 
 God send the day 
 When all will pray 
 
 In the light of intelligence, 
 And the Altar give, 
 With the right to live. 
 
 More Faith and less pretence ; 
 When Love shall rule 
 In Church and School, 
 
 And Hate be driven forth. 
 And find no rest 
 In the human breast 
 
 From the South unto the North. 
 * * * * 
 
2o6 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 In dreams I go 
 
 From these hills of snow 
 
 To where the rivers wander down 
 The valleys wide. 
 And sweep beside 
 
 The ancient pleasant town, 
 And I steal away. 
 In the twilight gray, 
 
 Under the linden trees, 
 And I catch the glow 
 Of her robes of snow 
 
 That float on the evening breeze. 
 
 She comes to me 
 Until I see 
 
 Her raven hair and clear blue eyes. 
 Dark locks of night. 
 Sweet eyes of light. 
 
 Sparkling stars and moonless skies ; 
 From ev'ry sigh 
 That wanders by, 
 
 Her voice comes singing to my heart. 
 Then I behold 
 Her wings of gold 
 
 Unfold in glory and depart. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 207 
 
 In the crimson rays 
 Of waning days. 
 
 Far from the homes of men. 
 Our souls were wed, 
 And the angels said. 
 
 From the skies above, ** Amen ! " 
 Here creeds divide. 
 But side by side. 
 
 When bonds of earth are riven. 
 In the skies above. 
 Where all is love. 
 
 She '11 vet be mine in heaven. 
 
 LOVE OF COUNTRY UNIVERSAL. 
 
 Where tropic sun from airless, burning skies 
 
 Glares, tiger-like, upon the arid sand — 
 
 Where his hot breath, cooled by fresh'ning dews. 
 
 Falls, like mother's kisses, on the flow'ry meads — 
 
 Where northern hills upheave their frigid breasts. 
 
 And sleep, unfruitful, in his faint embrace — 
 
 Where'er on this round earth the heart of man 
 
 Beats time unto the ceaseless march of life. 
 
 The first grand passion that o'erflows the soul, 
 IS 
 
208 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And overawes the lesser springs of life 
 That crouch to this high giant monarch, 
 Like spaniels to their master's dreaded feet. 
 Is Love of Country. 
 
 If the sw^arthy son of hot and dewless plains 
 Clings with his clouded ken and lampless soul 
 Unto his lion mother's burning breast. 
 That in her passion-blinded love doth spill 
 His blood upon the myriad-mouthed sands. 
 That gape with maddened, never-ending thirst. 
 And lap huge rivers, with their fiery tongues, 
 That fall like dew-drops on the boundless sea ; 
 If, wrapped in robes that nature fitting gave 
 The polar bear to roam o'er fields of ice. 
 And howl defiance to the cutting winds. 
 The swarthy Esquimeaux doth love his mother. 
 Within whose breast the lamp of life doth burn. 
 Like distant fires that light but warm him not. 
 And as he gallops o'er the moonlit snows 
 While Aurora's handmaids dance along the skies. 
 And the stars shine out in cloudless beauty. 
 Radiant, and cold, and chaste as eyes of Nuns 
 That glow for but burn not with the light of earth. 
 While cold winds sweep across blue fields of ice. 
 The very silence crisping in their breath. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The distant billows struggling in the grasp 
 Of the frigid spectre who looks them dumb. 
 And chokes their howling in her icy arms ; 
 If, with all around a bleak, blank desert. 
 He sings his songs of country that are borne 
 On the fine ear'd atmosphere across the hills 
 Unto the snowy dwelling of his love — 
 Standing on thy eternal hills of beauty. 
 Thy breath, like the fresh warm airs of Eden, 
 Spiced with the odors of immortal flowers. 
 The blue-veined rivers flowing from thy bosom. 
 That fruitful as the garden of the sun 
 Swells voluptuous in the sea's embrace. 
 How should thy children love and worship thee. 
 Green Erieland ! 
 
 Oh, my love, thou art fairer than the dreams 
 That our first mother's world-tired spirit dreamt 
 Of Paradise, when, crowned with sin and toil. 
 She slept upon the bosom of the earth. 
 And as she turned her at the golden gates 
 To look her last upon its fadeless glories, 
 God's angel waved her ofl^ with flaming sword, 
 And shut its beauty from her sighing soul. 
 So we go forth in tears from Erieland, 
 Not by our God, but Satan driven forth 
 
 209 
 
2IO LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 With whips of fire and lying, polished tongues, 
 Famine's slow torture, fraud, and bold deceit. 
 And all hell's black and cunning combinations ; 
 We wander sadly o'er the barren earth, 
 Hewing our pathways thro' the trackless woods. 
 Wringing our bread from labor's stony bosom. 
 Resting along the world's dusty highways 
 And dreaming of thy valleys and green fields. 
 
 But as upon the cross Chris-t's blood did flow, 
 
 And at his God-like presence, man being dead. 
 
 The angels smiled along the high and holy walls, 
 
 And sheathed forever up their flaming swords. 
 
 The golden gates flew musically ope 
 
 So wide that where He entered all the earth 
 
 Who choose his path of light may follow. 
 
 Thus cheating yawning darkness of its prey ; 
 
 And' so, to gain our earcnly Eden land 
 
 And send the devils howling into hell. 
 
 Not blood of heaven, but of man, must flow. 
 
 As Israel's way to the land of promise 
 
 Lay thro' the billows of an ocean red. 
 
 So, children of the Lord and of the Gael, 
 
 Our pathway lies thro' seas of fire and blood. 
 
 Whose crimson waves shall sweep their gilded thrones 
 
 And crowned harlots, with their godless brood 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 21 
 
 That have polluted our fair Christian land. 
 Into the howling sea of endless night. 
 The soul that would be cleansed and purified. 
 Must pass thro' fire to mold it for the skies. 
 Look up, my Land ! your faith was never shaken ; 
 Those are but fiends that stand along your walls. 
 And guard with jealous care the garden's bloom 
 To fat the minions of their cursed race ; 
 The while our mother and her blue-eyed children 
 Cry for bread, and roam dejected thro' the vales 
 Where trees are bending with their luscious fruit. 
 And the earth is groaning with the waving grain, 
 (But watched by fiery fiends with flaming swords,) 
 And so they lie beneath the fruitful trees. 
 And in the yellow fields of ripened corn. 
 
 And die for bread — 
 Call in your legions from the boundless earth, 
 Range their millioned hearts in solid phalanx. 
 Flush the heavens with their shining sabres. 
 And, with angry faces turned unto the foe, 
 Pass along the slogan, *' Home ! Revenge ! " 
 And charge upon them like the lightning bolt 
 That kills before its thunders shake the earth. 
 And from the flashings of the electric sword 
 They '11 fly, like Satan from the glance of God. 
 
212 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 What is this life, that man should hoard it up 
 
 As the miser hoards his heaps of yellow gold, 
 
 And grows old and fades and dies in watching ? 
 
 So poring over ledgers smelling of the tomb. 
 
 And racking our brains o'er loss and profit. 
 
 Weaving webs in dingy holes and corners. 
 
 Like spiders, catching the unwary flies, 
 
 We spend our days ignobly until Death, 
 
 Like housemaid, with his besom comes along 
 
 And sweeps us and our webs into the dust ; 
 
 The while our friends look on with nostrils closed. 
 
 Life so sickens at our foul corruption. 
 
 And angels weep above our lives misspent. 
 
 The clear and holy current of the soul 
 
 Turned aside, black and foetid, breathing death 
 
 To all who lived upon its upas banks, 
 
 That should have sparkled in the living sun. 
 
 Dispensing blessings and being blessed by all. 
 
 He who chains his spirit down to self. 
 
 And moves along with dull material pace. 
 
 Who never links his soul to some great cause 
 
 Where men assay to lift the fallen up. 
 
 To bear the torch of freedom thro' the world. 
 
 And bid creation flourish in its light. 
 
 And the earth rejoice that tyranny was dead. 
 
 And man could walk his own green fields and hills 
 
LOVE AND LAND. ilj 
 
 With not a shadow 'twixt his soul and God — 
 He 's a scar upon the face of Nature, 
 Whose system sickens till she throws him off. 
 He 's galloped to the tomb, flung to the grave. 
 Whose very stomach loaths the foul corruption, 
 His spirit, leaded with his brother's moans. 
 Can never soar above his rotting clay. 
 
 The world, altho' by tyrants trampled down 
 
 And chained to fashion's car with golden links. 
 
 Has a fine eye for discrimination ; 
 
 The good may be forgotten for a time, 
 
 iMay seam their young brows in her holy cause. 
 
 May give their lucre with a lavish hand. 
 
 Then see their wives and children want for bread. 
 
 While those whose souls ne'er felt the smile of God 
 
 Laugh, unpitying, above their ruin. 
 
 Life is short, and death folds up the records 
 
 And bears them to the world's great corridors. 
 
 Where Mind is judge, and Justice is the jury. 
 
 And those who suffered and who toiled that man 
 
 Might have more sunshine thrown into his life. 
 
 Who labored for the happiness of all. 
 
 Forgetting self and its dependencies. 
 
 Eschewing the luring ring of dollars. 
 
 The State's preferment and the smile of Kings ; 
 
214 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Who, while their fellows rioted in ease 
 
 Or pawned their souls for woman's love divine 
 
 And were rewarded with their glowing hearts. 
 
 Saw the moon wasting down the western sky. 
 
 Like a pallid and weary sentinel. 
 
 Courting the silent philosophic hours 
 
 For their honied wisdom that, like balm, 
 
 Can heal the wounded and the broken hearts 
 
 That nightly cry aloud unto the stars ; 
 
 When Justice cries, " this soul ne'er crawled on earth !" 
 
 Then Mind says, '' write it in the world's great heart. 
 
 Among the good, forever and forever ! " 
 
 Those who appear foul with the earth's dark slime 
 
 Of heartlessness and avarice, who, wrapped 
 
 Within their own small spheres, heedless the while 
 
 How ebbed and flowed humanity's great sea. 
 
 Ne'er heard with sympathy the cry of woe. 
 
 Are trampled in the earth from whence they sprung. 
 
 To mope, like blinded moles, thro' endless gloom. 
 
 The clear-eyed student, guided by the light 
 That shines upon the past from mighty minds 
 ■ VVho poured their souls into the jeweled cup. 
 To feed the subtle flame that guides his steps. 
 In searching thro' the valleys where the dead 
 Lie piled promiscuous, but in bulk so vast 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Could they assume material shape and form, 
 Would so o'ertop the earth that her great axis 
 Would unslip its mooring and she drift down 
 Oppressed thro' shoreless space forever more. 
 He little cares that once in Greece, the golden. 
 There lived a merchant, noted for his wealth. 
 Whose great ships fretted ev^ry sleeping sea. 
 And filed inquisitive into each bay. 
 To suck the sweetness of the many lands. 
 Like bees that sip each wild flower on the meads. 
 And sail behonied to their masters' hives. 
 So his great hummers spread their lazy wings 
 And brought their rifled bloom to swell his store. 
 His granaries with grain all overflowed, 
 And yet the beggar hungered at his door ; 
 His rich wines, drugged with the rime of years. 
 Fattened in mouldy indolence, the while 
 The traveler thirsted at his very gates ; 
 Along the ponderous docks his ships were ranged. 
 Easing their bosoms of their luscious stores, 
 A countless horde of bones and muscle toiled 
 And sweltered in the sun, bearing the wines 
 Upon their bended backs, whose cooling kiss 
 Could never touch their eager, burning lips ; 
 Bearing the fruit whose blushing clusters gaped 
 For eating, rotting 'fore their wat'ring teeth. 
 19 
 
2l6 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 His daughter was the fairest maid in Greece, 
 
 Because her father was the richest man. 
 
 Men prize a woman's face when fringed, with gold 
 
 As they prize the paintings of barbarity. 
 
 Not for their worth, but for their costly setting. 
 
 She was the only thing that earth did hold 
 
 On which he did not look with eye of commerce ; 
 
 In the dull material garden of his life 
 
 She was a blossomed-trailing, blooming vine. 
 
 That overtopped its high and leaden walls 
 
 And linked his soul with the great outer world 
 
 She sprung within, drew life from him, the oak. 
 
 Her green leaves and her fruity lips flung out 
 
 Their blessings on the parched hearts of the poor. 
 
 And so the student in the after days. 
 
 In trampling golden idols 'neath his feet 
 
 To find some ray of soul among the ruins. 
 
 Sees black ships rotting in the slimy ooze. 
 
 Where the proud sea beat about the merchant's quays ; 
 
 The windlass creaks in every passing breeze. 
 
 Like age that sighs with pain for quiet rest ; 
 
 The mothed rafters huge have fallen in ; 
 
 The rats are masters of his greatness now. 
 
 And stare, surprised that man should thus intrude 
 
 Within the realms where they have reigned for yeai-s ; 
 
 Thjs huge black spiders, like the olden sprites, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 21 
 
 Weave their webs of fate in counting rooms ; 
 
 Tlie bleak blank ledger library that stared 
 
 Like sightless eyes along the dingy walls. 
 
 Upon whose musty parchments weary eyes 
 
 And tired souls have gazed and fretted till 
 
 They rolled, subdued, into the arms of Death, 
 
 Have lit the Grecian beggars' fires, the last 
 
 And only words of cheer they ever spoke 
 
 To pallid, suffering humanity. 
 
 The Student, tired of commerce, shuts his lamp. 
 
 To leave its damp, dull rottenness in peace 
 
 And push along the silent halls of Death, 
 
 And sighs above the records of the past, 
 
 ** What heaps of matter, and what little soul ;" 
 
 When thro' the loathesome atmosphere there burst 
 
 An angel face, the merchant's daughter fair. 
 
 Haloed with the blessings of broken hearts 
 
 That shone far brighter than the crowns of Queens — 
 
 " Oh, sweet departed of the olden days. 
 
 Fair link of woman's chain that, held by hands 
 
 Of seraphim close by the golden throne, 
 
 And swinging out the high celestial gates 
 
 And down the pathway of the morning star, 
 
 Has trailed unsullied o'er the slimy earth 
 
 From our first mother to the present time. 
 
 Binding our souls unto the soul of God, 
 
2l8 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The chain thro' which his love electrical 
 
 Flashes its balsam o'er our bleeding hearts. 
 
 That break beneath the heel of tyranny — 
 
 Thou com'st to check upon my burning lip 
 
 Its curses o'er the blindness of the past 
 
 And teach me that there is no sky so dark 
 
 But wears her veiled stars, whose brightness flash 
 
 Upon our dazzled vision when angels 
 
 Brush their cloudy veils aside and open 
 
 To our wondering gaze the eyes of heaven; 
 
 Rise from this horror-breathing grave of death 
 
 And take your place among the quenchless stars. 
 
 That woman yet unborn may walk the earth 
 
 In the light of your pure loveliness. 
 
 Was man created by the living God ? 
 
 Why don't he follow in his Maker's steps ? 
 
 Why don't he walk upon the mountain tops. 
 
 With head erect and pushing for the light. 
 
 Not choke within the dusty vales of sin 
 
 With drooping head, as tho' he gazed on hell. 
 
 And chose the path that leads to darkness down ? 
 
 Oh, Commerce, goddess with the golden heart 
 
 And diamond eyes that shine but cannot see. 
 
 Whose wings are shadowing earth and shutting out 
 
 The light that flows from God, the very breath 
 
 Of heaven that should bear joy and love to all. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 21 
 
 Is pressed into your well paid devil's corps, 
 
 To bear new idols to your mammon shrine. 
 
 Lo, at the tinkling of your silver bells 
 
 Your votaries fall upon their supple knees 
 
 To kiss your garment's flowing, fleecy hem. 
 
 Spirit of Freedom ! let us from these halls. 
 
 Musty with foul corruption from the hearts 
 
 Of men who walked the earth and never soared 
 
 Above the level of defiling trade. 
 
 Who'd wear the servile fetters of the slave. 
 
 Give unborn millions to the tyrant's lash 
 
 And sink their country in the very dust 
 
 Rather than change the current of their lives. 
 
 Or drag their idol and her temples down ; 
 
 Leave corruption to black forgetfulness. 
 
 And lead us to the hills bediademed 
 
 With an undying glory that floods the earth. 
 
 Where Leonidas and his Spartan band, 
 
 Falling to save their country from disgrace. 
 
 Flung down their souls to immortality." 
 
 There was more greatness in the single soul 
 Of Washington, more lustre from his name 
 Wraps his land in its radiant flashing. 
 Than in or from the meagre souls or names 
 Of her myriad-numbered merchant sons ; 
 
220 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And if the land, whose flaming stars illume 
 With Freedom's light the nations of the earth. 
 Whose stripes, if wielded by the hands of men 
 Whose souls outstepped geographical lines. 
 Could lash the tyrants of all suffering lands. 
 Will ever fall, which heaven and man forbid. 
 It will be when Commerce feeds her mountain bird 
 With fatting luxuries, and pares his claws 
 And hooked beak, that now can tear and kill 
 When tyrants look with lustful eyes and heart 
 Upon the flocks that roam her boundless plains. 
 And send him out a brainless goose, a prey 
 For the Lions, Bears and Ravens of the earth. 
 And thou, my native Land, what names shine out 
 From that black sky that's overhung thy soul 
 Since the devil blew his Saxon cousin. 
 With airs from hell, across the channel sea ? 
 Not those whose lives were spent ignobly 
 Huckstering with the. Gall, whose heel was on 
 Their country's neck, his long knife in her breast. 
 His hands fresh reeking with their brothers' blood. 
 Selling him gloves to hide his crimson claws. 
 Pocketing the gold that touched his blackened hand. 
 And crouching at his feet, but growing rich. 
 Base worms, that crawled o'er their mother's bones. 
 Or fattened on her throbbing, bleeding breast. 
 
LOVE AND LAN D. . 221 
 
 The poorest harper on the bleakest hill. 
 
 That sang defiance to his country's foe. 
 
 And thanked his God who kept his sight in heaven. 
 
 Which saved his eyes from gazing on thy ruin. 
 
 Is seated high upon the nation's heart ; 
 
 But those sneaking hucksters, base counter rats. 
 
 Who changed their names and trafficked their low souls 
 
 (If God e'er gave them souls,) for Saxon gold. 
 
 The very land spews up their ulc'rous earth ; 
 
 Our martyrs, gazing from their starry thrones. 
 
 Behold them squirming in hell's fiery flames. 
 
 Still serpents, as they were on earth, they hiss 
 
 Their venom towards God's distant sky. 
 
 From the evil days when the native serpent 
 
 Brought the foreign hordes to curse his mother. 
 
 And BrefFni on the threshhold fiercely met 
 
 Their mail-clad warriors, rebuking them 
 
 With cold blue steel, when Irish hearts and men 
 
 Marched to the grave as buoyant as to feast, 
 
 Holding their lives but subject to the call 
 
 Of country, and gave them to her smiling, 
 
 Bravely flung their souls upon the crimson tide 
 
 That bore them swiftly to immortal shores. 
 
 Where the hero spirits proudly welcomed 
 
 y'. nd raised them high among the great and good; 
 
 To rhe time when red hand Hugh, the mighty. 
 
222 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Led his tall spearmen from Tir Owen hills. 
 
 Flinging death and terror 'mid their serried ranks. 
 
 The spirit of our race has followed up 
 
 Their crimson steps and gathered up their fame. 
 
 And blood, and names, and in the highest niche 
 
 Within her inner temple crowning them 
 
 With wreaths immortal. Shamrocks, blood-stained, from 
 
 Her glowing breast. And he that boasts of soul 
 
 That 's flowed from the bounding breast of Erin, 
 
 Who does not vow eternal hate and love. 
 
 Hate to the Saxon, love to his own land. 
 
 Though at Freedom's shrine we bleed forever. 
 
 Is not from Ireland sprung, but a weak branch 
 
 Of the foreign upas, whose roots are fed 
 
 By English earth, and cannot thrive in ours. 
 
 Along the gallows ridges of the later years 
 
 How many a fair head gleams i*pon the walls. 
 
 How many a wolf dog dies, yet with his fangs 
 
 Deep bedded in an English throat ; dying. 
 
 He feels a bloodstained spirit cow'ring at the gloom ; 
 
 While his rejoices, sorrow here doth end. 
 
 But the aggressor feels the beginning 
 
 Of woes that know no ending, once commenced. 
 
 There 's not a spot in all the land but 's flushed 
 
 With the blood of men who died for Freedom, 
 
 And, standing on their unavenged graves. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 223 
 
 Let 's swear that while there beat true Irish hearts 
 
 We '11 hound the Saxon to the bitter end. 
 
 We '11 never yield submission to his law 
 
 Nor trail our stubborn souls beneath his feet ; 
 
 We '11 never take his gory hand in ours. 
 
 Unless to strike the oppressor to the heart ; 
 
 Let our watchword be, ** Eternal hatred 
 
 To Saxon rule and Saxon domination. 
 
 And they who preach submission to his will 
 
 4re traitors to the living and the dead. 
 
 And we will cast them ofF, e'en tho' they were 
 
 Shrined in our heart of hearts." Let 's shape our lives 
 
 So that when from the steep of unborn years 
 
 Posterity will gaze into the past. 
 
 When the frettings and the achings of our day. 
 
 The oppressor and oppressed, will sleep 
 
 Folded to silence in the halls of time. 
 
 Men shall say, *' Those had hero souls, and tho' 
 
 They did not crown their land with liberty. 
 
 They gave their young lives to her sacred cause." 
 
 'Tis not along the flow'ry paths of ease 
 The patriot's life has rippled to its close ; 
 No, they who lead progression's van must bear 
 The brunt of battle, dying in advance 
 Of the heavy columns that, slow but sure. 
 
224 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Are marching on the trail of those who lead. 
 Thus died our leaders in the fiery front, 
 'Gainst despot legions, years and years ago, 
 Yet still our leaden-footed army rests 
 Far in the rear, but nearer than our sires. 
 When our fathers fell upon the march of mind 
 V7e started from their graves ; God send that we 
 May reach the battle-field e're night comes on 
 And finish up the work of centuries. 
 Beneath the bosom of our sufF'ring land 
 Our bravest sleep within their nameless graves ; 
 We must raise a nation for their monument, 
 And write their epitaphs with good red blood. 
 A Spirit from the prison walks the hills. 
 And in the silence of the summer night. 
 When all is hushed beneath the weeping stars. 
 The winds are awed by his pale, mournful face. 
 The stars are list'ning to his woman's voice. 
 And in his hero soul rich melodies 
 Do play along their spirit strings. 
 
 THE VOICE. 
 *' Ireland ! my first, my last, my only love. 
 My soul upon the pinions of the wind 
 Has come to-night to sit upon thy hills. 
 To gaze upon thy more than earthly face. 
 And hold communion with thy sufF'ring soul. 
 
LOVE A ]^D LAND. 
 
 225 
 
 Oh, God, how very sad and fair thou art ! 
 
 I 've heard men say, who left thy shores in youth 
 
 And bore thee mirrored in their loving hearts. 
 
 Who robed thy face in the dreamy tints 
 
 That buoyant fancy to the absent give. 
 
 Who in manhood's years came back to thee 
 
 When thou wert raised like Eden in their thoughts. 
 
 That when they stood upon your living hills 
 
 And gazed upon the golden vales below. 
 
 Thou didst surpass their fancy's wildest flight. 
 
 For thou wert colored fairer than their dreams. 
 
 They should have pined within a living tomb 
 
 And felt the death-dew of the sunless cell 
 
 Like a demon fold them in its cold embrace — 
 
 They should have lain upon the iron couch 
 
 Where creeping torpor takes the place of sleep — 
 
 They should have worn the convict's garb of woe. 
 
 Their locks, that oft were kissed by mountain winds. 
 
 Shorn to the very bone to brutalize, 
 
 (To make their Irish heads like Saxon brutes) — . 
 
 They should have vv'orn the fetters on their limbs 
 
 That once were strong, and lithe, and fleet as hounds^ 
 
 Their very names rubbed out, and ever called. 
 
 In savage gutt'ral, number sixty-four — 
 
 They should have lain in prison six by eight. 
 
 The sicklv liglit come sighing thro' the bars 
 
226 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 As tho' it feared and shuddered at the place — 
 
 They should have heard the step of sentinel 
 
 Fall on their weary hearts like rain-drops 
 
 Dripping thro' tombs upon their coffin lids. 
 
 Until each step upon their souls acute 
 
 Fell like the thunder on the mountains wild — 
 
 They should have had some loved ones by their sides, 
 
 And dare not speak nor look them sympathetic. 
 
 And then they should have come unto your hills. 
 
 Their souls would burst upon their lips, and they 
 
 Would die of rapture on thy throbbing breast. 
 
 My days were spent upon the mountain tops 
 
 That rise and look in at the gates of heaven ; 
 
 1 've stood upon their highest sun-kissed brows 
 
 And felt the winds just loosened from the sky. 
 
 And loved thee for thy hills, 
 I 've roved along the valleys when a boy. 
 And heard the larks sing, soaring o'er the clouds, 
 Like enraptured souls just loosed from earth. 
 And bursting up in joyous melodies. 
 The red fruit dragging at the bended boughs. 
 Eager to leap into thy beauteous lap. 
 The low-thatched cottage, hiding from the eye. 
 So steeped to the lips in the golden corn. 
 
 And I loved thee for thy vales. 
 I 've seen the streams laugh down the mountain side 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 227 
 
 And off among the meadows fair and gay. 
 Like sweet-voiced lovers singing to the flowers 
 That blushed like maids beside their flatt'ring wooers, 
 Bendin:; their heads the while to hear their songs 
 And see their own sweet faces in the streams. 
 
 And I loved thee for thy streams. 
 1 've stood beneath the giant oaks that threw 
 Their long boughs out across the face of night. 
 The soft winds pattered 'mong the leaves of green. 
 The moon dropped thro' like silent silver threads, 
 And falling o'er the harper's locks of snow. 
 Like children toying with the old man's hair ; 
 I heard him play an old lament for thee. 
 And every eye shone bright thro' crystal tears 
 The while his fingers wept along the strings, 
 And as the music died within the soul, 
 ** God be with old times," he mournfully said, 
 ** And the bright eyes that shone beneath the moon. 
 And the light feet that flew along this green. 
 The high hearts that beat immortal time 
 To the music and freedom of Ireland 
 Years and years ago," and all sighed " Amen." 
 " I never sit beneath an Irish oak 
 But I think of every eye that sparkled 
 And every voice that sang or danced our music. 
 And before the mirth begins I feel so sad 
 
228 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 That I must ease my grief-laden soul 
 
 By pouring out that old lament for Eire ; 
 
 In the feast, the patron, the wedding, or the dance, 
 
 The first thought and toast should be * The Dead,' " 
 
 Then he played a planxty, and his fingers 
 
 Laughed like mirth along the strings, the dancers. 
 
 Responding to his sweet-voiced call, flew out 
 
 Like summer bees from out a garden hive. 
 
 Fair were the maidens, and the men looked brave, 
 
 Yet thou wert with bonds and chains defiled. 
 
 But I loved thee for thy music. 
 I *ve read how once upon thy hills of light 
 Thou wert fair, and crowned with diadems. 
 And throned upon the royal hearts of men 
 Who would notlive while country claimed their souls. 
 Of all the nations of that olden time 
 Thou wert the fairest and the bravest one. 
 Thy hills were glowing with thy fleecy flocks. 
 Thy plains were waving with the yellow corn. 
 Thy children fed and owned their fleecy flocks. 
 Thy children sowed and reaped their golden harvest ; 
 Then came the ruthless spoiler to your shores. 
 And hell let loose her poisoned wrath upon thee ; 
 The crown was taken from thy regal head. 
 The flocks were taken from thy mountain sides, 
 Thy children sowed, the spoiler reaped the harvest ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 229 
 
 Then feud and faction rose that should have slunk 
 
 Abashed into thy misty caverns before 
 
 The greater evils which threatened from without. 
 
 Rapine, blood, lust, and extermination ; 
 
 Then thy sons should, like the rugged rocks 
 
 That sentinel thy coast, have ranged their clans 
 
 Along the sea, turn their swords and faces 
 
 To the foe and crush him on the threshhold ; 
 
 But the cursed pride of clan and chieftain 
 
 Surged high and gulphed their love of country. 
 
 Not that they loved the foe, but, blind fools. 
 
 They hated each other more, and so turned 
 
 Their venomed swords upon themselves and thee. 
 
 Wounding thee thro' their own hot bosoms. 
 
 They paved the way for Saxon chains to bind ; 
 
 And thus for pride they killed themselves, and thee 
 
 They handed, faint and helpless, to the foe. 
 
 Who smiled with ruffian lust upon thy face. 
 
 And sang his p^ans o'er thy prostrate form. 
 
 The torture, rack, the gibbet, and the jail. 
 
 These have been thy Saxon luxuries — 
 
 Famine, a spectre issuing from the Throne, 
 
 The many-mouthed monster that devours 
 
 Your golden fields and gaunts ) our children's cheeks. 
 
 In your pallid presence, queen of sorrows. 
 
 Men hide their achings in their silent breasts ; 
 
230 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Death comes unto their beating, breaking hearts. 
 
 And says, be still, and so they ache no more. 
 
 But thou, with thy seven hundred years of blood, 
 
 And tears, and torture, and still, as of old. 
 
 They cry, crucify thee, crucify thee ! 
 
 (Oh, just God, forgive them not their crimes. 
 
 They know well what they say and what they do 
 
 'Tis not thro' blindness they do pierce and slay, 
 
 But with the coolest malice and design. 
 
 To glut the cravings of their savage maws,) 
 
 And how many more lie waiting for thee 
 
 On thy thorn-crowned future God alone can tell ; 
 
 But if thy children read thy stars aright. 
 
 And the flaming signs that light the lurid skies, 
 
 The crown of glory soon will deck your brow. 
 
 Thou art the pity and the wonder of 
 
 This gray-ribbed earth. The nations gazing on 
 
 Thy saddened brow, whose olden glories flash 
 
 The brighter for their fringed clouds of blood. 
 
 Behold thy soul's unbent and high resolve 
 
 To wade thro' woe until this solid earth 
 
 Melts in the glances of an angry God 
 
 Or reach that sunland where great Freedom waits 
 
 To greet and crown your coming. 
 
 I saw thee, like a fruitful matron stand, 
 
 Thy children smiling round thee like the stars 
 
L OVE AND LAND. 
 
 About the summer moon, bright and many ; 
 I saw quick life and plenty springing from 
 Thy mellow bosom ; I beheld thy loved ones 
 Torn crying from thine arras, and the stranger 
 Drawing the life-blood from thy breast to feed 
 His serpent brood, whose poisoned fangs 
 Did turn and strike thee to the very heart. 
 I wandered thro' thy fields of yellow corn. 
 Planted by the hands of thine own children, 
 Heaven smiled upon their labors, and the fields 
 Luxuriant waved their songs to God ; 
 I saw the scowling tyrant issue forth. 
 Who rioted the year in sensual ease. 
 Now, like the fabled serpent of the Nile, 
 To swallow and devour the yellow corn 
 The while the brown-browed toilers looked up 
 To God and died within their ravished fields. 
 Our fathers' fathers hunted on these hills. 
 Fished within the lakes and in the rivers, . 
 Sowed and reaped the harvest of the valley. 
 And now the stranger owns their fields and streams ! 
 If robbers come unto mine household. 
 Soil with ruffian touch my bosom's partner. 
 Flood our lintels with our children's blood. 
 Then pluck me by the beard with gory hands. 
 Shall I, with bended forehead, hide my shame 
 20 
 
 231 
 
232 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Or raise my coward face to heaven and cry. 
 
 Oh, God ! then let my heart break quietly ? 
 
 Or shall I rise, my soul for vengeance crying. 
 
 My heart swelled into madness with the rage 
 
 Of violated rights and love, and, like 
 
 The tiger ravished of its young, leap in. 
 
 Howling, to their very midst and die 
 
 With fangs deep buried in their blackened hearts? 
 
 If the brute that lairs in deepest jungle. 
 
 Whose highest instinct is a passion blind. 
 
 Will, to guard the young it oftentimes devours. 
 
 And the sacred precinct of its lustful bed. 
 
 Roar defiance at his swarthy armed foes. 
 
 And crunch their very bones betwixt his jaws 
 
 The while his hot blood spouts along the sand. 
 
 Dying upon the spoilers of his home — 
 
 Shall man, who bears upon his regal brow 
 
 The impress of God's mighty seal, the soul. 
 
 Forswear his manhood, fling the barriers down 
 
 That Nature's finest passions raised 
 
 To guard the loves embow'red in his heart ? 
 
 And shall his coward spirit ope the doors 
 
 That lead into his inner sanctuary. 
 
 And while the spoiler rifles his fair shrine. 
 
 Shall he but hide his craven soul beneath 
 
 That flimsy veil, the fear of death ? 
 
LOVE AND r. AND. 233 
 
 There is no life in this dull matter body, 
 'Tis the electric soul that flashes thro' 
 And lends it beauty, movement, animation. 
 And when dishonor sears the soul to death 
 
 There is no life. 
 I saw that Britain, like a robber, came, 
 A robber so intent upon his plunder prey 
 That all things sacred. Freedom, Faith, and Love, 
 That raised their shadows 'twixt him and booty. 
 Were trampled unrelenting 'neath his feet ; 
 A hooded hypocrite, who drenched the land 
 In blood and lit his path with cottage flames 
 Shouting with fiend voice from devil's heart 
 His long-faced canticles unto the Lord, 
 Preaching his canting slang of light and love. 
 The while his thrones were raised on bleeding hearts. 
 Whose agonizing cries were drowned beneath 
 His murd'rers' voices hymning to the skies. 
 I knew that wasted fields and towns depleted. 
 The beggars whining, and the tears of woman. 
 The people flying from the mourning land 
 As men from cities stricken with the plague. 
 Could never melt his stony robber heart. 
 Why, those were the fruits of this devil's work. 
 His cunning laws, well framed for killing, 
 His years of lying down our country's fame 
 
234 LOVE AND LAND 
 
 Within the estimation of the world, 
 
 His venal press and his lying preachers. 
 
 All shaped their course to bear us down. 
 
 I saw within his soul a horrid joy 
 
 That she, who rose like an accusing angel 
 
 Before the people of the outer world. 
 
 Who hung upon his track like an avenger. 
 
 Oft threat'ning to o'ertop his gilded thrones. 
 
 Was gone with a vengeance from off the earth. 
 
 And left no witnesses to stand before 
 
 The justice-loving world and cry ** Murderer ! " 
 
 Oh, villain — fool! did he not know that blood 
 
 Is ever crying unto the heavens, ** Here ! " 
 
 And so he thought with soulless feet of herds 
 
 To trample down our fathers' crimson graves ; 
 
 His gold, his serried ranks of mailed knights. 
 
 His threats and tortures for seven hundred years. 
 
 Could not from out the bosom of the land 
 
 Erase a single patriot's grave, nor 
 
 Hew his memory from the nation's heart. 
 
 I saw that love, and hate, and deep revenge, 
 
 Unsystematic, flourished in the souls 
 
 And burned in the hearts of mighty men. 
 
 I knew that prayers and tears availed us not 
 
 Against the ordered lines of tyrant hordes. 
 
 While from their blazing ranks came leaden rain. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 23 5 
 
 And we returned nought but empty curses, 
 
 ** The Lord was with their strong battalions." 
 
 I knew the rigid rules of despot force. 
 
 That naked strength of heart, and pluck, and dash, 
 
 Were spray that damped the rocks but moved them not. 
 
 And they who ran their heads 'gainst leaden bullets 
 
 Lost their brains. 
 I knew the land had heart enough and true. 
 To wrest our freedom from the foreign foe. 
 I knew the land had hands enough to pull 
 The trigger or to drive the bay'net home. 
 I cooled that fiery spirit that rebukes 
 Discipline, and I showed how tyrants press 
 Men into the dust by concentration. 
 The bravest man in all their showy ranks 
 Singly could not stand before the spirit 
 And the rage of our humblest peasant heart. 
 Yet their many minds, battalioned into one, 
 Hurled against the disintegrated mass. 
 Fling the atoms high into the air. 
 Nations, to be respected, must be feared : 
 The Rifle is a healthy monitor. 
 A single butcher slays a thousand sheep, 
 While armies move with caution to the glens 
 Where tawny lions show their grinning teeth. 
 I thought the land was ready for the mine 
 
236 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Whose shock would blow their temples to the moon ; 
 
 I came unto the hills and laid me down 
 
 Upon your breast and cried aloud, 
 
 *' Awake ! my Love, arise! the tyrant sleeps 
 
 Upon his downy couch, whose springs of ease 
 
 Are strung upon the nation's broken hearts ; 
 
 God's thunder speaks along the midnight sky ! 
 
 Like the lion, rise, and onward with the storm ; 
 
 Waste not your rage in loud and vain display. 
 
 Let all your venom centre in your arm ; 
 
 Move like the lion when he leaves his lair 
 
 And growls but when his fangs are red with blood ! 
 
 Spring upon the despot while he sleeps and dreams 
 
 Of tortures new for your great tameless souls. 
 
 In all your bleak, black years of agony 
 
 No single ray of pity glowed within 
 
 His heavy soul. Then trample 'neath your rage 
 
 This blue-eyed angel, Mercy, and to the winds 
 
 Fling your chivalry with thieves and despots. 
 
 Speak, look, act, deceive, destroy. 
 
 As either tends to elevate your race. 
 
 Nations have no souls, and trample honor 
 
 In the slime of earth as interest demands ! 
 
 Shall we harass our souls with ancient rules 
 
 When at the shrine of honar country bleeds^ 
 
 Up ! make laws and break them with the Saxon ; 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Deceive and kill him how and where you can.'* 
 
 My Love, you drank the drugged wine too long 
 
 That in the sickly font of peace was stilled. 
 
 Men gazed unruffled on gaunt Famine's form. 
 
 Who shuddering shrank from human blood. 
 
 Whose flow could bring the red glow to your cheeks. 
 
 And though I cried aloud. Arise ! arise ! 
 
 Thy soul was drunken with the drugged wine. 
 
 And like a child unto its mother dead 
 
 Who cries and calls in vain, she will not hear. 
 
 Thou wert dead to the call of Liberty. 
 
 Then arose the tyrant from his golden lair. 
 
 Waxing courageous as he saw no foes. 
 
 Arid bore me from your unresisting breast. 
 
 And chains were placed upon my hands and feet, 
 
 The while strong men looked on in coward fear. 
 
 And I, who never broke a single heart 
 
 Nor made a virgin cheek hang up its crimson. 
 
 Was banished from the green hills and the streams. 
 
 The fireside faces and the haunts of men. 
 
 To feel the breath of God upon my brow, 
 
 Or gaze upon the midnight stars no more. 
 
 To sit beneath the village oaks and see 
 
 The maidens' music motion on the green 
 
 And hear the harper's wild lament no more. 
 
 Ah, God ! to sit within your lampless grave 
 
 237 
 
23 B LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And know the great world swings her merry gait. 
 
 And streams are laughing thro' the meadows green. 
 
 And birds are singing in the tall green woods. 
 
 And I, whose soul is bursting with sweet songs. 
 
 Pine, cheerless, in my songless prison tomb. 
 
 If men within the earth do dream, they feel 
 
 Like Irish souls in Saxon dungeons old. 
 
 Oh, my country ! I do not once regret 
 
 My destiny, since for your sake I suffer ; 
 
 Within my prison cell, in brilliant blood, 
 
 I read the names of all who died for thee ; 
 
 Great Bond died in his dungeon foul, beneath 
 
 The midnight gloom the murd'rers subtle poison 
 
 Stole upon his sense and sent his soul to God ! 
 
 I see Lord Edward hurling words of hate 
 
 From his hot soul upon the Saxon laws ! 
 
 And Tone, who smote his gallant heart to balk 
 
 The sleuth-hounds from their promised meal of blood ! 
 
 And in my dreams I see huge golden steps. 
 
 Whose buttress rests in British dungeon cells, 
 
 Whose tops are crowned with the throne of God, 
 
 And all along they're red with martyrs' blood. 
 
 Whose names are goldened on their polished fronts ; 
 
 Two rows of angels stand along their sides 
 
 To chant the chainless spirit to the skies. 
 
 Singing, ** Courage, look up, this is the path 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 239 
 
 O'er which the martyrs of your land have passed 
 
 From British dungeons to the courts of heaven ; 
 
 Its steps have rung with hero feet unceasing 
 
 Since English murder darkened your fair shores, 
 
 And ev'ry soul that mounted to the skies 
 
 Engraved his sorrows in the golden book 
 
 On which the eyes of God are ever fixed ; 
 
 The seraphim who in His presence glow 
 
 Have noticed o'er His countenance of light 
 
 Of late a fearful, brilliant anger. 
 
 Which blinds the angels joying round His throne ; 
 
 'T is but the portend of the awful storm. 
 
 When empires will be strewn along the earth, 
 
 (As wrecks are strewn along your Irish coast,) 
 
 Whose sins have cried too long for vengeance. 
 
 To man's small compass God works wondrous slow ; 
 
 Years that channel deep the human brow. 
 
 Whose rain-drops groove the flinty rocks. 
 
 Are but the flashing of the swallow's wing 
 
 In the shoreless sea of God's eternal years." 
 
 And thus my only joy is spirit company 
 
 Who walked the patriot's crimson road to heaven. 
 
 'T is sweet to suffer for one's Native Land 
 
 And fall into the ranks of those who died 
 
 To take her from the beggar's place upon 
 
 The world's bleak highways and throne her on 
 21 
 
240 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The hills, where all might worship at her shrine ! 
 
 *T is sweet to list inside the prison walls 
 
 And hear the distant rhymth of marching men, 
 
 Whose mission 'tis to ope your dungeon doors 
 
 And bear you out to sunshine and to life ; 
 
 Their steps growing bolder on the soul each day. 
 
 Moving like war songs thro' the silent night ! 
 
 Oh, God, should they grow tired upon the way 
 
 And halt before they reach our dungeon doors. 
 
 Their souls not metal for the great ordeal. 
 
 File off like vassals to their slavish homes. 
 
 And we corroding in forgetfulness ! 
 
 The time draws nigh when I must leave thee. Love. 
 
 I never knew how fair thou wert until 
 
 I dreamt of you in convict garb and chains. 
 
 I '11 take a long, sad parting with the stars, 
 
 The high green hills, the streams, the vales. 
 
 The glens where wild deer flee, the rocking woods. 
 
 And all thy native decking, my sweet Land ; 
 
 I ope my spirit to your ardent gaze 
 
 And bear your fair face mirrored in my soul. 
 
 To kill the horror of the seething prison. 
 
 When the merry dancers meet on summer eves 
 
 To dance the pleasant music of their land — 
 
 When night hangs out her signal lamp of love. 
 
 The evening star, beneath whose mellow light 
 
LO,VE AND LAND. 24I 
 
 The bashful lovers melt into the groves 
 And feel that earth lies in each other's eyes , 
 When the yellow moon, so like the autumn queen. 
 Looks, like a luscious matron, down the vales. 
 While the reapers hang their bended sickles o'er 
 The cottage doors, and the night is filled 
 With the melody of children's laughter, 
 I will be pining in my Saxon chains. 
 Oh, Ireland ! Queen of broken hearts ! 
 Of ruined homes and scattered households. 
 You 've filled the world with valor and with graves. 
 The bruising of your spirit has o'erflowed 
 The earth with melodies of woe and love ; 
 I kiss thy lips, my Land, and so depart 
 From thee forever ! 
 
 THE SWORD AND CROSS. 
 
 In cot and hall thro' Erin's Isle, 
 
 In happy days forever flown. 
 Ere foreign fraud and foreign guile 
 
 Their discord in the land had sown. 
 Our fathers knelt at Freedom's shrine 
 
 Crowned with the Cross, whose arms outspread. 
 
242 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Seemed pouring blessings pure, divine. 
 Upon each bent but soldier head ; 
 
 Oh, then, in truth, throughout the nation. 
 The Cross was sign of man's salvation. 
 
 When Erin felt the passioned eye 
 
 Of Tyranny with hell ablaze. 
 And from her soul went forth the cry 
 
 Of Virtue, soiled by ruffian gaze. 
 That cry went thro' the land and caught 
 
 The fine ear of our chainless sires, 
 Within whose high domains of thought 
 
 Were glowing Freedom's heavenly fires. 
 It shook like earthquake deep the nation, 
 For virtue was its sure foundation. 
 
 Then soon the supplicants transfused 
 
 Their bended forms to mailed knights, 
 The priest his sacred robes unloosed. 
 
 Shut up his book, blew out his lights. 
 And tore the Cross from oiF the shrine 
 
 And grasped its hilt with soldier hand, 
 And never flashed it so divine 
 
 As in that strife for native land ; 
 
 It preached the vengeance of the Lord, 
 And thus the Cross became a Sword. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 243 
 
 All thro' the battle's crimson haze 
 
 It gleamed like the eye of God, 
 Our sires drank valor from its blaze 
 
 That looked the despot to the sod ; 
 When in the setting sun it burned. 
 
 With Satan's blood for holocaust. 
 The knight into the priest returned 
 
 And offered up the greater Host ; 
 
 He pressed his Sword into the moss. 
 And thus the Sword became a Cross. 
 
 Oh, emblem of infinite good. 
 
 That's hewed the womb of darkness ope. 
 And, bathed in Christ's celestial blood. 
 
 Gave birth to Life, to Love, and Hope, 
 The key that 's ope'd the golden gates 
 
 Whose music thrilled man's suff'ring soul 
 And made him heir to those estates 
 
 Beyond the despot's blind control. 
 
 Thou art the world's great guiding star, 
 A Cross in peace, a Sword in war. 
 
 Oh, thou that 's led the nations out 
 
 Of bondage into liberty. 
 Along the high and starlight route. 
 
 With God's good angels guiding thee. 
 
244 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Until they march, flushed with thy light. 
 
 Soul blent with soul, and hand in hand, 
 Thou 'rt spread abroad a starless night 
 Of shadows o'er our native land ; 
 Humanity's great exaltation. 
 Thou art become our degradation. 
 
 A spirit moving thro' the lands 
 
 To lift the weary fallen up, 
 To bind their wounds with angel hands 
 
 And pour sweet wine into life's cup. 
 Beneath thee, huge, unpitying load. 
 
 Our country sinks with woes oppressed ; 
 Thou 'rt plunged, crowned with the name of God, 
 
 Heart-deep into her throbbing breast. 
 Drinking her blood with vampire lips. 
 With wings outstretched like death's eclipse. 
 
 Thy head, upraised unto the skies, 
 
 Shuts out the sun from her pale face ; 
 Thou dost not hear the ceaseless sighs 
 
 Of strong men dying at thy base. 
 Dying for bread ! Your Altars groan 
 
 Beneath their loads of sordid gold; 
 Oh, eyeless thing ! Oh, heartless stone ! 
 
 Hear you the death-cries on the wold ? 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 245 
 
 Are Altars, raised with cunning plan. 
 Dearer to God than soulfull man ? 
 
 Throughout the Land are temples crowned 
 
 With Thee flushed in thy olden light, 
 While at thy feet poor souls are drowned 
 
 In seas of darkness left and right ; 
 And while her pale-faced children mope 
 
 To find their murdered kindred dead. 
 Your preachers give them Faith and Hope 
 
 When they should give them Drink and Bread, 
 The while the;^ riot in foul ease. 
 Plethoric with life's luxuries. 
 
 O, Crucified ! is this thy shield 
 
 Of man's redemption that has grown 
 So humanized 't will only wield 
 
 In hands of tyranny alone ? 
 ** Behind the Cross the Devil hides," 
 
 Was sung, but now he sits on high. 
 And bold and cavalierly rides. 
 
 And grins his fumes at passers by. 
 And, once atop, will not come down 
 Until his steed is overthrown. 
 
 O, for the old-time soldier-priests 
 
 To change their Crosses into Swords, 
 
246 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 To leave their cups and royal feasts 
 
 And give us work instead of u^ords ; 
 Give us that pure severity 
 
 That preached and practiced what it taught. 
 When hearts were young and souls were free 
 From golden chains ; who spoke and fought 
 Throughout the land with Cross and Sword, 
 Not for Kings, but for the Lord. 
 
 There are two Crosses in the land, 
 
 T'he same in looks but not in birth 
 One is held in Tyrant's hand 
 
 To press men to the very earth, 
 A thing of dull material stone, 
 
 A Devil dressed in holy guise. 
 Whose sacredness is looks alone. 
 
 That fills with awe the wond'ring eyes 
 Of votaries, who can't divide 
 Dead matter from the Crucified. 
 
 Its pampered priests forever cry. 
 
 Patience, submission, humility. 
 And how the passage to the sky 
 
 Leads thro' the sloughs of misery. 
 The passport being a beggar's staff. 
 
 With ragged and filthy indolence. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 The world's good things being but the chaff 
 The Devil flings round to woo the sense. 
 And all who ride or wear good clothes 
 Are galloping fast to the land of woes. 
 
 And so men cultivate the grace 
 
 Of leading servile, slavish lives. 
 Settling down to the beggar's pace, 
 
 'Neath rags alone the spirit thrives ; 
 They drag along their pilgrim ways. 
 
 Killing the body to save the soul. 
 Thro' all their nights and sunless days ' 
 
 They hear the howling billows roll. 
 
 O, beggar of darkness, scoop your grave 
 Have none but you a soul to save ? 
 
 There is another Cross that springs 
 
 From Heaven, but leans unto the earth. 
 The radiant flashing of whose wings 
 
 Has driven the hosts of shadows forth ; 
 In seraph hands a meteor sword. 
 
 It flames across the black midnight. 
 Its sun-tipped point forever toward. 
 
 And leading nations to, the light ; 
 Along whose shaft the electric flow 
 Of God's great glories flash and glow. 
 
 247 
 
248 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 As Satan, howling, flies in fear 
 
 From eye of God, so evil dare 
 Not look upon nor come anear 
 
 This Cross, for Christ is ever there 
 To raise the fallen, trampled down. 
 
 And heal their spirits with a look. 
 To scourge the tyrants with his frown, 
 
 Who melt away 'neath his rebuke ; 
 This is the Cross to mortals given. 
 To cheer the earth and light to heaven. 
 
 Behold, my Land, your children fade, 
 
 Like blighted flowers, before your sight ; 
 Men cannot thrive who live in shade. 
 
 Souls blossom best that drink the light ; 
 Turn from those cold and soulless things. 
 
 Those shapeless forms of stone and wood. 
 Dark evil broods beneath their wings. 
 
 Foul with the curse of human blood ; 
 In vain you cry to hearts of stone. 
 Bat God will hear your faintest moan. 
 
 Away with this ceaseless monotone 
 
 Of grief! arise from your bended knees. 
 
 Why waste your breath? 'tis the sword alone 
 Can hew the way thro' the crimson seas. 
 
 Beyond which lies the promised land, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 249 
 
 A land of homes, and not of graves ; 
 Have Faith! March on! God's mighty hand 
 Will cleave a highway thro' its waves. 
 
 And ere you touch the blooming shore 
 
 The tyrants will be whelmed o'er. 
 
 Look up ! the Sword-Cross floats on high, 
 
 Along the fields by angels trod 
 Its red blade gleams 'twixt earth and sky. 
 
 Its starred hilt in the hand of God ; 
 Tyrants will perish in its glare. 
 
 But men will bloom in its cheering light. 
 Glory to God ! thro' our despair 
 
 This Hope breaks on our aching sight ; 
 Lo, the soul has burst her prison. 
 And, all transfigured, has arisen. 
 
 The earth is throbbing 'neath the seas 
 
 Of peoples marching, heaven inclined. 
 The spheres roil out their melodies 
 
 Unto the mightj march of mind ! 
 Ho ! Priest and Kaiser, stand aside ! 
 
 We halt no more for Cross or Crown, 
 No more shall men be deified ; 
 
 We '11 tramp you and your idols down ; 
 Our Banner is the great Cross-Sword, 
 Our Leader is the mighty Lord. 
 
250 LOVE AND LAND 
 
 THE ROAD TO THE BARREL OF BEER. 
 
 Do you know the road to the Revelers' Inn, 
 
 Where reigns the monarch. Great Barrel 0*Beer, 
 
 With his ghost-blue cousins. Whisky and Gin, 
 The furies of madness, horror and fear ?» 
 
 'T is the same that leads to the pauper's grave ! 
 
 O'er which the blear-eyed shuddering pass. 
 Howling for death to hide them and save 
 
 From the living and hissing serpent grass 
 
 That folds them in its clammy sheen. 
 
 And the threat'ning slimy waves that roll. 
 
 Eager to drown in their foul gangrene — 
 Realities all to the maddened soul. 
 
 Like ghosts of murder, whenever they tire. 
 In those forests of dismal, ghastly trees. 
 
 Whose branches, long serpents of visible fire. 
 In the hands of Titanic monstrosities. 
 
 Scourge them along till the woods resound 
 
 With their terrified howling and pitiful sighs. 
 
 And devils arise from the yawning ground. 
 Grinning hot sulph'rous breath in their eyes. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 25I 
 
 Do you know the road to the Barrel of Beer ! 
 
 'Tis the same that leads to the Drunkard's grave ; 
 From its horror hereafter and misery here. 
 
 Pray to the Lord and the Saints to save. 
 
 T is fenced along with household wrecks. 
 
 And hopes long faded to pale despair. 
 Where the sun drops down in blood-red flecks 
 
 Of hideous light thro' the lurid air. 
 
 With a lavish hand are thickly strown 
 The broken hearts of woman and maid 
 
 Over its pavements ; its bridges are bone. 
 With old faded blossoms interlaid. 
 
 Pale children are there who breathe in sighs. 
 And fill the place with their mournful looks. 
 
 Poor flowers withdrawn from the sunny skies. 
 The pleasant fields, and the laughing brooks. 
 
 In journeying down the valley of years, 
 Where you pass the mile-stone marked 18, 
 
 You strike this road where the gate of tears 
 Is crowned with the sensuous vintage queen. 
 
 On every side hang the luscious fruit 
 And blushing in clusters incarnadine, 
 
252 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 While Mirth is playing Apollo's lute, 
 
 Wooing the soul with the music of wine. 
 
 And sweet is her voice as she trills her song 
 And holds your heart in its wreathed flow : 
 
 ** He who would pleasure and love prolong. 
 Come follow where Mirth and the Sirens go." 
 
 And then from under the leafy bovvers 
 Beauty, and Folly, and Love, leap out, 
 
 Like spirits that burst from the summer flowers. 
 And lead the w^ay down the reveler's rout. 
 
 From the passionate depth of each sensual soul 
 They flood your heart with golden showers. 
 
 Their bacchanal songs thro' the vineyards roll. 
 And youth lends wings to the slow-paced hours. 
 
 And this is the road to the Barrel of Gin ; 
 
 'T is a flowery path while the nymphs caress. 
 But bleaker it grows as you enter in. 
 
 Till they lead you to horror and hopelessness. 
 
 The skies grow duller day after day. 
 
 And fade the flowers to consumptive hues. 
 
 The skeleton trees beghost the way 
 
 Till your spirit is steeped to the lips in blues. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And Folly, that met you upon the road 
 
 And tinkled her bells in your youthful ear. 
 
 Has changed her song to a funeral ode. 
 
 And 'stead of bright glances her eyes rain tears. 
 
 Her once sweet voice croaks discord now. 
 Like children's cries and woman's moans. 
 
 And the song that wooed you under the bough 
 Grates like a saw thro' your aching bones. 
 
 Her locks of light are now golden asps. 
 
 And the torment of hell scowls over her face ; 
 
 Like a graveyard ghoul she wildly clasps 
 Your struggling soul in her foul embrace.^ 
 
 And as she opens her mantle shroud, 
 Lo ! 'tis the ogre Death you behold. 
 
 Visible devils laugh long and loud 
 
 As she chokes you dumb in her skeleton fold. 
 
 Oh, pliant youth, and oh, manhood stern. 
 Shun the road to the Revelers' Inn 
 
 With its quaint facade, 'tis a sculptured urn, 
 Roses without, but dead ashes within. 
 
 ^53 
 
254 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 And this is the road to the Barrel of Beer, 
 And this is the road to the pauper's grave ; 
 
 From its sulphurous air and its gangrene mere 
 Pray to the Lord and the Saints to save. 
 
 MULLIGAN. 
 
 Comrades tried and comrades true. 
 
 Sons of the New Land and the Old 
 Who flung aloft the starry blue 
 
 And matched it with the green and gold, 
 From soul to soul, from man to man. 
 
 We pass the old electric word, 
 Here's to gallant Mulligan, 
 
 The soul of the Twenty-third. 
 
 And raise ye up the Harp and Stars, 
 
 The ragged remnants of their pride. 
 Like old twin vet'rans slashed with scars 
 
 And frowning sternly side by side. 
 And ever marching in the van 
 
 Where bugle notes the spirit stirred — 
 How proud they flashed when Mulligan 
 
 Led the gallant Twenty-third, 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 255 
 
 A thousand hearts beat blithe and gay 
 
 At Freedom's christening of these Flags, 
 But War has swept the best away. 
 
 And worn the Banners into rags ; 
 But 'twas a sight worth woman's tears 
 
 When fifes sang shrill as mountain bird. 
 And we marched along thro' waves of cheers. 
 
 And Mulligan led the Twenty-third. 
 
 When on the fiery field of Mars, 
 
 And fronted by the traitor hordes. 
 His eyes flashed brighter than the stars. 
 
 His presence was a thousand swords ; 
 When death-hail swept the quick and dead, 
 
 And War's red channels overran. 
 Fear looked into his eyes and fled 
 
 Before the gaze of Mulligan. 
 
 Where God's eternal trumpet rolls 
 
 Their fame in perfect melody. 
 His is one of the ransomed souls 
 
 Throned in the smiles of the Deity — 
 They raised the earth above the earth. 
 
 And only camped for a season here 
 Till their souls in some great cause burst forth 
 
 And leaped to their higher native sphere. 
 22 
 
256 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Oh, Erin, to thy far-ofF shore. 
 
 Albeit he never saw thy face. 
 He sent heart-blessings o'er and o'er. 
 
 And pitched his tent among thy race. 
 He would have given his giant soul 
 
 With lavish love to make thee free — 
 But place him on your heroic roll. 
 
 Who dies for Freedom dies for thee. 
 
 God placed his soul above the world 
 
 So high that Envy and Deceit, 
 Who climbed the golden stairs, were hurled 
 
 To spit their venom at his feet. 
 The Husband, Father, and the Friend, 
 
 The Soldier great, but greater Man, 
 O, long until the gods will send 
 
 Another such as Mulligan. 
 
 He wore the Green thro' death and scars. 
 
 So green be the earth upon his bed ; 
 He swept the mists from the clouded stars, 
 
 And they rain their lustre around his head, 
 And till the stars grow old and wan. 
 
 And Erin's harp no more is heard. 
 They '11 halo the fame of Mulligan, 
 
 And sing of the Irish Twenty-third. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 257 
 
 So, comrades tried and comrades true. 
 
 Sons of the New Land and the Old, 
 Baptized in Freedom's crimson dew. 
 
 And of her universal fold. 
 From soul to soul, from man to man. 
 
 Let 's pass the old electric word. 
 Here 's to gallant Mulligan, 
 
 The soul of the Twenty-third. 
 
 ROBERTS' APPEAL. 
 
 Our long years of patient labor, sowing in vexatious soil. 
 Ripened into golden fruitage, smiling payment for our toil ; 
 And we watched in fearless anguish, for we knew the hour 
 
 was nigh — 
 Till a spirit whispered " Onward," then we looked to God 
 
 on high. 
 And, out into the glowing starlight, mute — our lips with 
 
 vengeance sealed — 
 We pressed to cool our fevered spirits on the red-dewed 
 
 battle-field. 
 
258 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 No trumpets thrilled the valleys echoed back in ringing 
 
 cheers. 
 But our hearts beat victor marches to the music of the 
 
 spheres. 
 
 None but God and His good angels heard us marching 
 
 thro' the night. 
 And WQ stood above the tyrant when we met the morning 
 
 light. 
 And from his ruffian head we 'd clutched our nation's sun- 
 gilt Crown, 
 But Freedom seized the arm upraised to strike the despot 
 
 down — 
 Yes, threw her starry ^gis o'er her children's murderer's 
 
 head! — 
 Oh ! false unto the living ! — doubly false unto the 
 
 dead ! — 
 Rebound the chains that, half unloosed, seemed falling 
 
 from the slave. 
 And flung her, crushed and bleeding, back to her dungeon 
 
 grave ; 
 And there rose a wave of wailing, like the night-winds 
 
 thro' the glen. 
 For we wept the tears of woman from the fearless souls of 
 
 men. 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 259 
 
 The curse of prisoned Nations fall upon the hearts of those 
 Who march 'neath Freedom's bannerols, but leagued with 
 
 Freedom's foes — 
 Who sell the People's priceless love for the smiles of titled 
 
 things. 
 And trail the glory of the stars beneath the feet of Kings ; 
 The devil from their hellish hearts looks thro' inhuman 
 
 eyes. 
 And smiles his damned approval of our broken hearts and 
 
 sighs ; 
 And Freedom, throned on Freemen's hearts, puts forth her 
 
 stainless hand 
 To clasp the gory claws of Kings above our mourning land. 
 
 Once again must we re-open our country's ponderous 
 
 tomes. 
 To read each crimson volume in the glare of blazing homes. 
 And see the tyrant, steeped in lust, pollute her dewy lips. 
 While the shadow of our hopelessness enfolds her in 
 
 eclipse ? 
 The tears of shame that sear our hearts stain ghastly every 
 
 page, 
 God change their blighting moisture into a holy rage — 
 A fire of retribution to sire eternal Faith, 
 Whose soul flames out the brightest in the catacombs of 
 
 death. 
 
26o LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 From the dungeon graves of Ireland — sad across the Dart- 
 moor wold — 
 
 Comes the cry of crucifixion, now, as in the days of old — 
 
 Come the ghastly living present, with her red wounds run- 
 ning o'er. 
 
 And the countless spirit legions of the martyred gone before. 
 
 Who traced their faith in sunless days, with life's heart- 
 burning flames, 
 
 To light our souls to Freedom with the lustre of their 
 names. 
 
 Their hot blood's smoke, for holocaust, forever upward 
 rolls, 
 
 God rains it back, like holy dew, ensanguined, on our souls ; 
 
 With the past, for vengeance crying, the dying present 
 sues ; 
 
 We've all — Land, Homes, and Shrines — to gain, and 
 naught but life to lose. 
 
 At Freedom's doors, the Lion's Whelps, driven from the 
 
 mother den. 
 Whose spoors are traced, across the earth, by the blood 
 
 and bones of men. 
 Like carnivores, have jungled where they howl defiance 
 
 nigh. 
 And shall they crunch our brothers' bones, and we stand 
 
 idly by ? 
 
LOVE AND LAND. 261 
 
 Ho, spirits of our Fatherland ! Jehovah's mighty sons ! 
 
 Let your answer be the bugle's blare and the flashing of 
 your guns ; 
 
 Let the rhyme of marching legions thunder vengeance in 
 their ears. 
 
 As you cross, once more, the borders w^ith your old victo- 
 rious cheers. 
 
 Ho, Chivalry of Eireland ! wherever that you be. 
 Let your spirit rise responsive to your country's reveille. 
 And feuds shall pale their fretting fires, and our souls burn 
 
 all in one. 
 With a giant hate, as stars are quenched in the glare of a 
 
 tropic sun ; 
 Our Nation's souls battalioned into one mighty mind. 
 And Kings shall fly before it, like clouds 'fore the angry 
 
 wind, 
 To strike in the name of Freedom, and let all Freemen 
 
 know. 
 Who hates the tyrant is our brother, who loves him is our 
 
 foe. 
 
 Satan's strong, but God is mighty! never fought' a land 
 for hell — 
 
 Building thrones on Nations' ruins — but in lust and mur- 
 der fell : 
 
262 LOVE AND LAND. 
 
 Our foeman feels God's earthquakes rumbling, sjees huge 
 
 rents along the walls. 
 Trembles, as his soul to judgment Heaven, with voice of 
 
 thunder, calls. 
 Forward, sons of the Immortal ! Truth is ours and cannot 
 
 die. 
 We have fought and fronted devils, but our base was in 
 
 the sky. 
 While the shrines of Baal are crumbling, ruin folding 
 
 Babylon, 
 We march forth in youth eternal, flanked by the Father 
 
 and the Son, 
 
00 ^