JUSTIN MCCARTHY
(1830-

TO MY BURIED RIFLE

From "Monomia"

EEP, deep in the earth you must lie, my old friend,

DE

Though I once fondly hoped for a test of
your worth.

But alas for our hopes! they are all at an end,
All gone like the smoke you so often sent forth.
Your barrel will soon grow all yellow with rust,-

That barrel whose radiance I used to admire;
But be not ashamed, though down in the dust;
'Twas not my old rifle, but we who hung fire.

Yet call us not cowards: the spirit was strong,

But famine our weakness too sorely had tried ; And our arms had been cramped by the shackles so long

They could only hang powerless down by our side. It may have but needed one brave upward bound,— Our limbs were too feeble to compass it then; For you know that to lie very long on the ground, Corrodes the best metal in rifles or men.

Yet our masters, all crushed as we are, should beware! They have tried us too long; we may rally at length;

There are wrongs that man's patience could never yet

bear;

There are insults that change the slave's weakness to strength;

I know by experience your barrel is strong;

One might overcharge you with safety at first;
But, should he continue to try you too long,
Why, tough as you are, you'd infallibly burst!

A bright day is coming, old rifle of mine,

And trust me its morning ere long will have birth ! God never made nations in serfdom to pine, Men never made rifles to lie in the earth. The summons will come, we shall answer its call, Prepared for our country to do or to die. So till that bright moment, for you and for all, Dear trusty old rifle, I bid you good-bye.

H

IS surely is a happy lot who dwells

In pleasant pastures, far removed from town,
Whose life from sunrise till the sun goes down,

The same unchanging peaceful story tells;

Deep in the rustic lore of fleecy fells;

Proud of the harvest he himself has sown,

The spreading meadows that his hands have mown,

And the great cattle that he buys and sells,

For whom the placid night brings slumbers sweet,
Stirred by no sound of any dancing feet,

Lit by no light of any laughing eyes,

Whose quiet days unmoved by vain desire,
From summer's sunlight to the winter's fire,

Creep slowly on, until at last he dies.

'Tis by its curve, I know,

Love fashioneth his bow,

And bends it-ah, even so !

Oh, girl of the red mouth, love me!

Worlds hang for lamps on high;

And thought's world lives in thy
Lustrous and tender eye-

Oh, girl of the blue eye, love me!

Girl of the swan's neck,

Love me ! Love me!

Girl of the swan's neck,
Love me!

As a marble Greek doth grow
To his steed's back of snow,

Thy white neck sits thy shoulder so,—

Oh, girl of the swan's neck, love me!

Like the echo of a bell,—

Like the bubbling of a well

Sweeter !

Love within doth dwell,

Oh, girl of the low voice, love me!

THE IRISH EXILE

HEN round the festive Christmas board, or by the Christmas hearth,

WHEN

That glorious mingled draught is poured,— wine, melody, and mirth

When friends long absent tell, low-toned, their joys

and sorrows o'er,

And hand grasps hand, and eyelids fill, and lips meet lips once more —

Oh, in that hour 'twere kindly done, some woman's voice would say

"Forget not those who're sad to-night-poor exiles, far away."

Alas, for them; this morning's sun saw many a moist eye pour

Its gushing love, with longings vain, the waste Atlantic o'er,

And when he turned his lion-eye this ev'ning from the

West,

The Indian shores were lined with those who watched

his couchèd crest ;