By this the storm grew loud apace, The water-wraith was shrieking;* And in the scowl of heaven each face Grew dark as they were speaking.
But still as wilder blew the wind, And as the night grew drearer, Adown the glen rode armed men, Their trampling sounded nearer. "O haste thee, haste!" the lady cries, Though tempests round us gather; I'll meet the raging of the skies, But not an angry father."
The boat has left a stormy land, A stormy sea before her,- When, oh! too strong for human hand, The tempest gather'd o'er her.
And still they row'd amidst the roar Of waters fast prevailing;
Lord Ullin reach'd that fatal shore: His wrath was changed to wailing.
For sore dismay'd, through storm and shade, His child he did discover:
One lovely hand she stretch'd for aid, And one was round her lover.
"Come back! come back!" he cried, in grief, "Across this stormy water;
And I'll forgive your Highland chief, My daughter!-O my daughter!"-
*The evil spirit of the waters.
'Twas vain: the loud waves lash'd the shore, Return or aid preventing:
The waters wild went o'er his child,
And he was left lamenting.
ODE TO THE MEMORY OF BURNS.
SOUL of the Poet! wheresoe'er,
Reclaim'd from earth, thy genius plume Her wings of immortality:
Suspend thy harp in happier sphere, And with thine influence illume The gladness of our jubilee.
And fly, like fiends from secret spell, Discord and strife at BURN's name, Exorcised by his memory;
For he was chief of bards that swell The heart with songs of social flame, And high delicious revelry.
And love's own strain to him was given, To warble all its ecstacies
With Pythian words unsought, unwill'd,— Love, the surviving gift of Heaven, The choicest sweet of Paradise, In life's else bitter cup distill'd.
Who that has melted o'er his lay To Mary's soul, in Heaven above, But pictured sees, in fancy strong, The landscape and the livelong day That smiled upon their mutual love- Who that has felt forgets the song?
Nor skill'd one flame alone to fan: His country's high-soul'd peasantry What patriot-pride he taught!-how much To weigh the inborn worth of man! And rustic life and poverty
Grow beautiful beneath his touch.
Him, in his clay built cot, the muse Entranced, and show'd him all the forms Of fairy light and wizard gloom (That only gifted Poet views,)
The Genii of the floods and storms, And martial shades from Glory's tomb.
On Bannock field what thoughts arouse The swain whom BURNS's song inspires! Beat not his Caledonian veins,
As o'er the heroic turf he plows, With all the spirit of his sires,
And all their scorn of death and chains?
And see the Scottish exile, tann'd By many a far and foreign clime, Bend o'er his homeborn verse, and weep In memory of his native land,
With love that scorns the lapse of time, And ties that stretch beyond the deep. Encamp'd by Indian rivers wild, The soldier, resting on his arms, In BURNS's carol sweet recalls
The scenes that blest him when a child, And glows and gladdens at the charms Of Scotia's woods and waterfalls.
* Burns was born in Clay-cottage, which his father had built with his own hands.
O deem not, midst this worldly strife, An idle art the Poet brings; Let high Philosophy control,
And sages calm the stream of life, "Tis he refines its founatin-springs, The nobler passions of the soul.
It is the muse that consecrates The native banner of the brave, Unfurling, at the trumpet s breath, Rose, thistle, harp; 't is she elates To sweep the field or ride the wave, A sunburst in the storm of death.
And thou, young hero, when thy pall Is cross'd with mouruful sword and plume, When public grief begins to fade, And only tears of kindred fall,
Who but the Bard shall dress thy tomb, And greet with fame thy gallant shade?
Such was the soldier-BURNS, forgive That sorrows of mine own intrude In strains to thy great memory due. In verse like thine, oh! could he live, The friend I mourn'd-the brave, the good- Edward that died at Waterloo!*
Farewell, high chief of Scottish song!
That couldst alternately impart
Wisdom and rapture in thy page,
*Major Edward Hodge of the 7th Hussars, who fell at the head of his squadron in the attack of the Polish Lancers.
And brand each vice with satire strong; Whose lines are mottoes of the heart, Whose truths electrify the sage.
Farewell! and ne'er may Envy dare To wring one baneful poison drop From the crush'd laurels of thy bust: But while the lark sings sweet in air, Still may the grateful pilgrim stop To bless the spot that holds thy dust.
THE SOLDIER'S DREAM.
OUR bugles sang truce-for the night-cloud had lour'd,
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the
And thousands had sunk on the ground over
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw, By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain,
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw, And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.
Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array, Far, far, I had roam'd on a desolate track: 'Twas Autumn.-and sunshine arose on the way To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back.
« ПредыдущаяПродолжить » |