by the Northern Saxon, and not always in hate but sometimes in luckless love, could not but in some sort fall under the influence of the Teutonic mind. And thus we find some of the intense "humanness" of the Teuton in the ballads of the Border Scot. The Queen of Elfland, indeed, comes to Thomas of Ercildoune, but the grave opens far oftener than the fairy portal, and "Clerk Saunders " craves to have his troth given back to him or he cannot lie at rest, and the murdered babes upbraid their false mother. Not so in Erin. The ghost comes to Paisten Power, and it is made a wonder of, but the Lianan Shee " (the Fairy-follower), whether Cleena of Desmond, or Aeval of Thomond, or the Shee-women of Cnoc Firinn, these call from the beginning on the men of Erin to come with them into "the Land of Gold," where the colour of the primrose is on the hair, where there is no withering of age, nor chill decay. From Murrough, son of Brian the King, in battle with the Northmen by the shivering reed-beds of Cluantarf, to Paidin the herd-boy coming home from the fair where he has drunk over-much of the brandy strong," these Daughters of the Mist hold out to the sons of the Gael their shadowy fair arms, and the light of the stars glimmers in their eyes of enchantment.

In how many tones has the "Song of the Woods" murmured to us! And yet we have left so many, many woods untrodden : the "Black Forest" of high Germanie; the mysterious pinewoods of the New World; the thickets of olive, grey upon the heights of the Grecian Isles; the myrtle and orange groves of sun-browned Spain: and all of them with their own word for the ear of man, and every man, as when the Spirit breathed, hearing in his own tongue!

ALICE FURLONG.

THE OLD MIRROR

RONDELET

THIS mirror's face

Has long-forgotten splendours glassed;

This mirror's face

Man's pride has shown, and Woman's grace,

And glorious Youth that wanes so fast

No sign remains to show they passed

This mirror's face!

JOHN J. HAYDEN.

THE "MONTH" AND ITS JUBILEE

THE

HE current issue of the Month, which comes in a new dress of becoming colour, reminds us that it is fifty years. since its first number saw the light of day. We congratulate our elder brother on his Jubllee Year, and trust that fifty years hence both English Month and IRISH MONTHLY-then in the green old age their covers typify-will still be hale and hearty to give and receive congratulations. The Month differs from the MONTHLY in that the latter was the life-work and lifelove of a single Editor for forty years of its existence, while the Month has had six editors, whose different personalities gave a difference of outlook. Naturally the functions of the two journals were not identical. The Month has consistently given much of its space to controversial and religious topics, whereas the IRISH MONTHLY has been purely literary.

The Month was first edited by Miss Frances Taylor, who had been one of Florence Nightingale's nurses in the Crimea, and who joined the Church on her return home. After twelve months the periodical became the possession of the English Jesuits, the first Jesuit editor being Fr. Henry Coleridge. Hehas had four successors, the third of whom, the late Fr. John Gerard, was a short time ago succeeded by the present editor, Fr. Joseph Keating.

Cardinal Newman took a kindly interest in the enterprise, which, in spite of his doubts, has been so well justified. Newman feared that the new journal should become "a periodical of light literature," a danger which the writer of the introductory article of the present month tells us "it has successfully avoided," and indeed we may congratulate the Month on fulfilling Newman's desire for "a magazine which, without effort or pretence, in a natural way, took part in all the questions of the day, not hiding that it was Catholic to the backbone, but showing a real good will towards the institutions of the country so far forth as they did not oppose Catholic truth or interests," as he wrote to Father Gallwey, whom Miss Taylor considered to be the real founder."

Several new features are introduced in the current issue. After a lapse of fifteen years poetry once more is admitted into its pages. And "an attempt will be made to collect and store for future use references to valuable 'apologetic' material, which is constantly to be found in the columns of our contemporaries."

AD MULTOS ANNOS.

TIME'S FLIGHT

(A Translation of Horace, Ode 7, Book IV., in the metre of the original.)

GONE is the snow from the mountains, the grass springs fresh in the meadows,

Green are the leaves of the trees.

Earth has renewed her adornment; the rivers with lessening waters

Murmur along by their banks.

Bare-limbed the Nymphs and their sisters the Graces can dance. in the meadows,

Venturing fearless of chill.

Think not thy hopes are immortal, the hurrying year be thy warning

Hours that filch the dear day.

Breezes outblow from the West and the frost has departed; then Summer

Comes in the wake of the Spring.

Summer is gone, and the Autumn outpours her abundance; then straightway

Lifeless the Winter returns.

Time's swift courses repair the disasters of heaven, but, ah!-we When we have passed from the earth,—

Gone to the land where the heroes of old still dwell unremembered

Are but as shadow and dust.

Ask not the gods if thy sun of to-morrow will shine, or thy

All that thou giv'st thy soul now thou savest for aye from the

grasping

Hands of thy profligate heir.

Ah! Torquatus, that soul--when the Shades have received thee and Minos

Stately his judgment hath made

Eloquence cannot redeem, nor, alas! can thy virtue nor noblesse,

Naught can restore thee to me.

E. M.

THE BROOCH OF LINDISFARNE

By JESSIE A. GAUGHAN

Author of "The Plucking of the Lily"

CHAPTER IV

SPRINGTIME

THE glamour of spring lay over Ireland. Nature, risen from her wintry couch, opened wide in every glade her dewy violet eyes and habited herself in robes of softest green, taking for ornament the primrose and the golden butter-cup. The vast heart of Mother Earth beat with fresh life. Up from the bottoms of the ponds came the plants and creatures that had wintered there, and the water grew green with pond weed and lily leaves. Water grubs and beetles awoke and lay in wait to prey upon the insects which, merry in the sunshine, flitted to and fro above their haunts. Beside the cottages chickens, new hatched, stood with tiny, irresolute feet, upon the threshold of life. On the hillsides, lambs frolicked gaily, and the trees that in winter had tossed rigidly skyward their sapless limbs, grew supple once more as the current of life surged upwards from their roots. Everywhere there was an awakening and a stirring in those days of gladsome spring.

All the winter through, Dunluce Castle had listened with deafened ears to the crash of the sea that thundered at the base of its rocky peninsula and reverberated in its caves. Now, upon a soft April day of showers in sunshine, it looked out over a gentle sea that, with a light wind ruffling its surface, changed momentarily from flashing silver to still blue-grey, as a sword-blade would if turned in sunlight.

There was a stir in Dunluce Castle, with much burnishing of weapons and harness, and stamping of many horses in its stables, and grooms and servants hurrying to and fro, for its master, Sorley Boy MacDonald, was home, and visitors were with him. Chief of his clan in Ireland was Sorley, Lord of the Glens and Route of Antrim, Master of Dunluce and Dunrainie and Rathlin. Wide was his sway and a word of dread was his name to the English. A valiant Scot he was, who had won

broad acres with his own good sword; a man fearless in the face of danger; a subject of Elizabeth, indeed, but one who nursed towards England an undying hate.

Deeply had English hands wronged him; and no patriot forced from his own to become an outlaw in the land that was his by birthright, no mother weeping at the gallows-foot her only son, no maiden mourning her lover slain by England's order, bore so fierce a grudge to the oppressors of Ireland.

In the sack of Rathlin, Sorley MacDonald had lost wife and daughters, and many of his grand-children. He had not failed to take vengeance, but no toll of English lives could make him forget his loss. Ah! how could he forget, when the very seabreezes of Rathlin that cooled other cheeks, made his burn with fury, passing as they did over the spot where by the shore Drake's victims, in whose ears the sea had ever sounded, slept their last sleep, the salt spray blowing on their graves that lay in long heaving rows like the billows of the ocean?

For eleven years the summer wind softly sighing in the long grass that covered them, sifted those graves with sand. Eleven winters piled them deep with snow, and now it was once more Spring. Sorley was growing old, but his strength was unimpaired. The snow that yields to no summer sunshine had settled thick upon his head, but in his heart still burned the fires of youth.

Within Dunluce on that quiet April day were gathered the Earl and Countess of Clanconnell, Sir Angus MacDonald of Islay, and his brother Coll, sons of Lady Clanconnell by her first marriage, and nephews of Sorley, and Sorley's granddaughter, Grace MacDonald, the darling of the old chief's heart.

In a room in the western fortifications, which gave a wide view over a beautiful bay with high white cliffs and a lovely stretch of sandy beach, sat the Lady Agnes, Countess of Clanconnell. With her was her favourite son, Coll MacDonald, a man of powerful frame and nobly moulded features; like his mother, of tall, commanding presence; like his race, a man of quick, deep hatred, but of strong enduring love.

They were watching Sir Angus MacDonald's galley being rowed, now here, now there, about the bay. Since her Irish marriage Lady Agnes had not met her sons, and now Coll's eyes dwelt often on the face that had first looked upon his with love.

"

Mother," he said at last, "everyone grows old but you.