Fatal day, whereon the latest
Die was cast for me and mine!
Cruel day, that quelled the fortunes
Of the hapless Stuart line!
Phantom-like, as in a mirror,
Rise the grisly scenes of death--
There, before me, in its wildness,
Stretches bare Culloden's heath;
There the broken clans are scattered,
Gaunt as wolves and famine-eyed,
Hunger gnawing at their vitals,
Hope abandoned, all but pride,-
Pride, and that supreme devotion
Which the Southron never knew,
And the hatred, deeply rankling,
'Gainst the Hanoverian crew.
Oh my God! are these the remnants,
These the wrecks of the array,
That around the royal standard
Gathered on the glorious day
When, in deep Glenfinnan's valley,
Thousands on their bended knees
Saw once more that stately ensign
Waving in the northern breeze!
When the noble Tullibardine
Stood beneath its weltering fold,
With the Ruddy Lion ramping
In its field of tressured gold!
When the mighty heart of Scotland,
All too big to slumber more,
Burst in wrath and exultation
Like a huge volcano's roar!
There they stand, the battered columns,
Underneath the murky sky,
In the hush of desperation,
Not to conquer, but to die.
Hark! the bagpipe's fitful wailing,-
Not the pibroch loud and shrill
That, with hope of bloody banquet,
Lured the ravens from the hill
But a dirge both low and solemn,
Fit for ears of dying men,
Marshalled for their latest battle,
Never more to fight again!
Madness, madness!—Why this shrinking?
Were we less inured to war
When our reapers swept the harvest
From the field of red Dunbar?
Bring my horse, and blow the trumpet!
Call the riders of Fitz-James!
Let Lord Lewis head the column !
Valiant chiefs of mighty names—
Trusty Keppoch, stout Glengarry,
Gallant Gordon, wise Lochiel,
Bid the clansmen hold together,
Fast and fell, and firm as steel!
Elcho, never look so gloomy!
What avails a saddened brow?
Heart, man, heart! We need it sorely,
Never half so much as now.
Had we but a thousand troopers,
Had we but a thousand more-
Noble Perth, I hear them coming!
Hark, the English cannons' roar!
God! how awful sounds that volley,
Bellowing through the mist and rain!
Was not that the Highland slogan?
Let me hear that shout again!
Oh for prophet eyes to witness
How the desperate battle goes!—
Cumberland, I would not fear thee,
Could my Camerons see their foes!
Sound, I say, the charge at venture-
'Tis not naked steel we fear,—
Better perish in the mêlée
Than be shot like driven deer!
Hold! the mist begins to scatter!
There in front 'tis rent asunder,
And the cloudy bastion crumbles
Underneath the deafening thunder.
There I see the scarlet gleaming!
Now, Macdonald, now or never !—
Woe is me, the clans are broken!
Father, thou are lost for ever!
William Edmonstoune Aytoun.
To my true king I offered, free from stain,
Courage and faith; vain faith and courage vain.
For him I threw lands, honours, wealth, away,
And one dear hope that was more prized than they.
For him I languished in a foreign clime,
Grey-haired with sorrow in my manhood's prime ;
Heard on Lavernia Scargill's whispering trees,
And pined by Arno for my lovelier Tees;
Beheld each night my home in fevered sleep,
Each morning started from the dream to weep.
Till God, who saw me tried too sorely, gave
The resting-place I asked, an early grave.
Oh thou, whom chance leads to this nameless stone,
From that proud country which was once mine
By those white cliffs I never more must see,
By that dear language which I spake like thee,
Forget all feuds, and shed one English tear
O'er English dust-A broken heart lies here.
THE BURIAL OF THE MINNISINK
ON sunny slope and beechen swell, The shadowed light of evening fell; And, where the maple's leaf was brown, With soft and silent lapse came down The glory that the wood receives, At sunset, in its brazen leaves.
Far upward in the mellow light
Rose the blue hills.
Around a far uplifted cone,
In the warm blush of evening shone;
An image of the silver lakes
By which the Indian's soul awakes.
But soon a funeral hymn was heard Where the soft breath of evening stirred The tall, grey forest; and a band Of stern in heart, and strong in hand, Came winding down beside the wave To lay the red chief in his grave.
They sang, that by his native bowers He stood, in the last moon of flowers, And thirty snows had not yet shed Their glory on the warrior's head; But, as the summer fruit decays, So died he in those naked days.
A dark cloak of the roebuck's skin Covered the warrior, and within Its heavy folds the weapons, made For the hard toils of war, were laid; The cuirass, woven of plaited reeds, And the broad belt of shells and beads.
Before, a dark-haired virgin train
Chanted the death-dirge of the slain ;
Behind, the long procession came
Of hoary men and chiefs of fame,
With heavy hearts and eyes of grief,
Leading the war-horse of their chief.
Stripped of his proud and martial dress,
Uncurbed, unreined, and riderless,
With darting eye, and nostril spread,
And heavy and impatient tread,
He came; and oft that eye so proud
Asked for his rider in the crowd.
They buried the dark chief-they freed
Beside the grave his battle-steed;
And swift an arrow cleaved its way
To his stern heart! One piercing neigh
Arose,—and, on the dead man's plain,
The rider grasps his steed again.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX
I SPRANG to the stirrup, and Joris, and he; I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three; 'Good speed!' cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew ;
'Speed!' echoed the wall to us galloping through ; Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, And into the midnight we galloped abreast.
Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our
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