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A lad brought up in Highland vale
Who did believe each fairy tale,
Which his grannie oft' to him told,
And of witches and of warlocks bold,
And he himself would often pour
For hours reading wizard lore....

Thou ancient oak! whose myriad leaves are loud
With sounds of unintelligible speech,
Sounds as of surges on a shingly beach,
Or multitudinous murmurs of a crowd;
With some mysterious gift of tongues endowed,...

(Aetat Six)


Now every night we light the grate
And I sit up till really late;
My Father sits upon the right,
My Mother on the left, and I
Between them on an ancient chair,...

Through many a fragrant cedar grove
A darkened water moans;
And there pale Memory stood with Love
Amongst the moss-green stones.

The shimmering sunlight fell and kissed...

The herring loves the merry moon-light,
The mackerel loves the wind,
But the oyster loves the dredging sang,
For they come of a gentle kind.

Now haud your tongue, baith wife and carle,...

And Emer took the head of Cuchulain in her hands, and she washed it clean, and put a silk cloth about it, and she held it to her breast, and she began to cry heavily over it, and she made this complaint:
...

Where is my boy, my boy
In what far part of the world?
The boy I loved best of all in the school? -
I, the teacher, the old maid, the virgin heart,
Who made them all my children....

I love to see the old heath's withered brake
Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze and ling,
While the old heron from the lonely lake
Starts slow and flaps his melancholy wing,...

Oh, I used to sing a song,
An' dey said it was too long,
So I cut it off de en'
To accommodate a frien'
Nex' do', nex' do'
To accommodate a frien' nex' do'.

But it made de matter wuss...

[M. Alfred Austin, poete-laureat d'Angleterre, vient d'arriver a Nice, o' il a devance la Reine. Il etait, hier, dans les jardins de Monte-Carlo. Sera-ce sous notre ciel qu'il ecrira son premier poeme?, Menton-Mondain.]
...

Truly ye come of The Blood; slower to bless than to ban;
Little used to lie down at the bidding of any man.
Flesh of the flesh that I bred, bone of the bone that I bare;...

The yeoman lays aside his soil-stained smock,
And from his herd selects a trusty steed,
And sallies forth to help in hour of need;
Nor dreads the battle's shock.
...

She stands like one with mazy cares distraught.
Around her sudden angry storm-clouds rise,
Dark, dark! and comes the look into her eyes
Of eld. All that herself herself hath taught...

England's Hope and England's Heir!
Head and crown of Britain's glory,
Be thy future half so fair
As her past is famed in story,
Then wilt thou be great, indeed,
Daring, where there's cause to dare;...

England! the time is come when thou should'st wean
Thy heart from its emasculating food;
The truth should now be better understood;
Old things have been unsettled; we have seen...

"I had rather be a kitten, and cry, mew!
Than one of these same metre ballad-mongers."

- Shakespeare.


"Such shameless Bards we have; and yet 'tis true,...

FROM THE GREEK OF PLATO.

Thou wert the morning star among the living,
Ere thy fair light had fled; -
Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving
New splendour to the dead.

FROM THE GREEK.

Eagle! why soarest thou above that tomb?
To what sublime and star-ypaven home
Floatest thou? -
I am the image of swift Plato's spirit,
Ascending heaven; Athens doth inherit...

When Margery chastises Ned,
She calls it combing of his head;
A kinder wife was never born:
She combs his head, and finds him horn.

Cease, daubers! profane not the theme, I implore ye!
But leave him, O leave him alone with his glory!

* * * * *

Man's owl-eyed reason Popish Priests assert...