When thou didst die, they say a fairy’s pipe Was heard outside the castle door, And wee folk thick as August corn that’s ripe Came trooping down the moor, And bore thy soul with laughter and with light O’er glen and heathered height.

When

Friends waked thee till the dawn thrice slanted by To quench the tapers round thy bier, And countless decades of the rosary They numbered with a tear; But yet they whispered, “She is now a queen, And clad in rainbow green.”

p. 20They set thy form near blessed Finnan’s side, And wailed the Gaelic death-lament; But they believed thee happy as a bride With long-dreamed joys content Within the land they name with wistful tongue,  “The land where all are young.”

p. 20

p. 21XII A HIGHLAND DAY WITHIN SIGHT OF CULLODEN

p. 21

XII

WITHIN SIGHT OF CULLODEN

The snow-white borders of the grey-green sea Peep through the mist that veils the strait with dew, The sun grows bold and smites the landscape free, The burn, the woods, the rocks of rose-red hue.

The

The world lies warm upon the heart of day, The callants push their boat from off the shore, The white gulls sail and flutter through the bay, The jet-black daws are calling evermore.

The doves fly wheeling past their mountain wall, The whispering pine trees weave a ceiling cool, The rowans redden o’er the foaming fall, The ferns keep guard around the fairies’ pool.

p. 22The distant moorland where the tribesmen bled To win their wandering prince a royal home, Now wraps a deeper purple on their bed, While he sleeps cold below St. Peter’s dome.

p. 22

The waves turn opal in the waning light, The rocks exchange for grey their rose-red bloom, The finite sinks into the infinite, And sea and sky are wedded in the gloom.

p. 23XIII TO THE FIRS

 Prev. P 22/45 next