Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

And ranged, as to the judgment-seat,
My guilty, trembling brothers round.
Clad in the helm and shield they came;
For now De Bourgo's sword and flame
Had ravaged Ulster's boundaries,
And lighted up the midnight skies.
The standard of O'Connor's sway
Was in the turret where I lay;
That standard, with so dire a look,
As ghastly shone the moon and pale,
I gave, that every bosom shook
Beneath its iron mail.

XIII.

And go! (I cried) the combat seek;
Ye hearts that unappalled bore
The anguish of a sister's shriek,
Go!-and return no more!

For sooner guilt the ordeal brand
Shall grasp unhurt, than ye shall hold
The banner with victorious hand,
Beneath a sister's curse unroll'd.
O stranger! by my country's loss!
And by my love! and by the cross!
I swear I never could have spoke
The curse that sever'd nature's yoke;
But that a spirit o'er me stood,
And fired me with the wrathful mood;
And frenzy to my heart was given;
To speak the malison of heaven.

XIV.

They would have cross'd themselves, all mute;
They would have pray'd to burst the spell;
But at the stamping of my foot
Each hand down powerless fell!
And go to Athunree! (I cried)
High lift the banner of your pride!
But know that where its sheet unrolls,
The weight of blood is on your souls!
Go where the havoc of your kerne
Shall float as high as mountain fern!
Men shall no more your mansion know;
The nettles on your hearth shall grow!
Dead, as the green oblivious flood
That mantles by your walls, shall be
The glory of O'Connor's blood!

Away! away to Athunree!

Where, downward when the sun shall fall,

The raven's wing shall be your pall!

And not a vassal shall unlace

The vizor from your dying face!

XV.

A bolt that overhung our dome
Suspended till my curse was given,
Soon as it pass'd these lips of foam,
Peal'd in the blood-red heaven.

Dire was the look that o'er their backs

The angry parting brothers threw :

But now, behold! like cataracts,
Come down the hills in view
O'Connor's plumed partizans ;
Thrice ten Kilnagorvian clans
Were marching to their doom:
A sudden storm their plumage toss'd,
A flash of lightning o'er them cross'd,
And all again was gloom!

XVI.

Stranger! I fled the home of grief,
At Connocht Moran's tomb to fall;
I found the helmet of my chief,
His bow still hanging on our wall,
And took it down, and vow'd to rove
This desert place a huntress bold ;
Nor would I change my buried love
For any heart of living mould.
No! for I am a hero's child;
I'll hunt my quarry in the wild;
And still my home this mansion make,
Of all unheeded and unheeding,

And cherish, for my warrior's sake

The flower of love lies bleeding."

[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small]

array!

LOCHIEL, Lochiel! beware of the day
When the Lowlands shall meet thee in battle
For a field of the dead rushes red on my sight,
And the clans of Culloden are scattered in fight.

They rally, they bleed, for their kingdom and crown;
Woe, woe to the riders that trample them down!
Proud Cumberland prances, insulting the slain,
And their hoof-beaten bosoms are trod to the plain.
But hark! through the fast flashing lightning of war,
What steed to the desert flies frantic and far?
'Tis thine, oh Glenullin! whose bride shall await,
Like a love-lighted watch-fire, all night at the gate.
A steed comes at morning: no rider is there;
But its bridle is red with the sign of despair.
Weep, Albin! to death and captivity led!
Oh weep! but thy tears cannot number the dead:
For a merciless sword on Culloden shall wave,
Culloden! that reeks with the blood of the brave.

LOCHIEL.

Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling seer!
Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful appear,

Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight,
This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.

WIZARD.

Ha! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn? Proud bird of the mountain, thy plume shall be torn! Say, rush'd the bold eagle exultingly forth,

From his home, in the dark rolling clouds of the north?
Lo! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he rode
Companionless, bearing destruction abroad;

But down let him stoop from his havock on high!
Ah! home let him speed,-for the spoiler is nigh.
Why flames the far summit? Why shoot to the blast
Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast?

« AnteriorContinuar »