Some might lament that I were cold,

As I, when this sweet day is gone,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,

Insults with this untimely moan;
They might lament-for I am one

Whom men love not—and yet regret,
Unlike this day, which, when the sun

Shall on its stainless glory set, Will linger, though enjoy'd, like joy in memory yet.

CHARLES WOLFE.

1791–1823.

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.

Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note,

As his corse to the rampart we hurried; Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot

O’er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,

The sods with our bayonets turning-
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,

And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast,

Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,

With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said,

And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead,

And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed,

And smooth'd down his lonely pillow, That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his And we far away on the billow !

[head,

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,

And o’er his cold ashes upbraid him;
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on

In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half of our heavy task was done

When the clock struck the hour for retiring And we heard the distant and random gun

That the foe was sullenly firing. Slowly and sadly we laid him down,

From the field of his fame fresh and gory: We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,

But left him alone with his glory.

SONG.

IF I had thought thou couldst have died,

I might not weep for thee;
But I forgot, when by thy side,

That thou couldst mortal be!
It never through my mind had pass'd,

The time would e'er be o’er,
And I on thee should look my last,

And thou shouldst smile no more!
And still upon that face I look,

And think 'twill smile again;
And still the thought I will not brook,

That I must look in vain !
But when I speak, thou dost not say

What thou ne'er left'st unsaid;
And now I feel, as well I may,

Sweet Mary! thou art dead!
If thou wouldst stay, e'en as thou art,

All cold and all serene,
I still might press thy silent heart,

And where thy smiles have been!

While e'en thy chill, bleak corse I have,

Thou seemest still mine own;
But there I lay thee in thy grave,

And I am now alone!
I do not think, where'er thou art,

Thou hast forgotten me;
And I, perhaps, may sooth this heart,

In thinking too of thee:
Yet there was round thee such a dawn

Of light ne'er seen before,
As fancy never could have drawn,

And never can restore !

BONNY KILMENY gaed up the glen; But it wasna to meet Duneira's men, Nor the rosy monk of the isle to see, For Kilmeny was pure as pure could be. It was only to hear the yorlin sing, And pu' the cress-flower round the spring ; The scarlet hypp and the hindberrye, And the nut that hangs frae the hazel-tree: For Kilmeny was pure as pure could be. But lang may her minny look o'er the wa', And lang may she seek'i' the green-wood shaw; Lang the laird of Duneira blame, And lang, lang greet or Kilmeny come hame!

When many a day had come and fled, When grief grew calm, and hope was dead, When mass for Kilmeny's soul had been sung, When the bedes-man had prayed, and the deadbell Late, late in a gloamin, when all was still,

[rung, When the fringe was red on the westlin hill,

The wood was sere, the moon i’ the wane,
The reek o'the cot hung over the plain,
Like a little wee cloud in the world its lane;
When the ingle lowed with an eiry leme,
Late, late in the gloaming Kilmeny came hame!

‘Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been ?
Lang hae we sought baith holt and den ;
By linn, by ford, and green-wood tree,
Yet you are halesome and fair to see.
Where gat you that joup o' the lily sheen?
That bonny snood of the birk sae green?
And these roses, the fairest that ever were seen?
Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been ?"

Kilmeny looked up with a lovely grace, But nae smile was seen on Kilmeny's face; As still was her look, and as still was her ee, As the stillness that lay on the emerant lea, Or the mist that sleeps on a waveless sea. For Kilmeny had been she knew not where, And Kilmeny had seen what she could not declare; Kilmeny had been where the cock never crew, Where the rain never fell, and the wind never blew. But it seem'd as the harp of the sky had rung, And the airs of heaven play'd round her tongue, When she spake of the lovely forms she had seen, And a land where sin had never been; A land of love, and a land of light, Withouten sun, or moon, or night: Where the river swa'd a living stream, And the light a pure celestial beam : The land of vision it would seem, A still, an everlasting dream.

*

And oh, her beauty was fair to see,
But still and steadfast was her ee!
Such beauty bard may never declare,
For there was no pride nor passion there;

VOL. II.-P

And the soft desire of maiden's een
In that mild face could never be seen.
Her seymar was the lily flower,
And her cheek the moss-rose in the shower;
And her voice like the distant melodye,
That floats along the twilight sea.
But she loved to raike the lanely glen,
And keep'd afar frae the haunts of men ;
Her holy hymns unheard to sing,
To suck the flowers, and drink the spring.
But, wherever her peaceful form appeard,
The wild beasts of the hill were cheer'd;
The wolf play'd blithely round the field,
The lordly bison low'd and kneelid;
The dun deer wood with manner bland,
And cower'd aneath her lily hand.
And when at even the woodlands rung,
When hymns of other worlds she sung
In ecstasy of sweet devotion,
Oh, then the glen was all in motion.
The wild beasts of the forest came,
Broke from their bughts and faulds the tamen
And goved around charm’d and amazed ;
Even the dull cattle croon'd and gazed,
And murmur'd and look'd with anxious pain.
For something the mystery to explain.
The buzzard came with the thristle-cock;
The corby left her houf in the rock;
The blackbird alang wi' the eagle flew;
The hind came tripping o'er the dew ;
The wolf and the kid their raike began,
And the tod, and the lamb, and the leveret ran;
The hawk and the hern attour them hung,
And the merl and the mavis forhooy'd their young;
And all in a peaceful ring were hurld:
It was like an eve in a sinless world!