ページの画像
PDF
ePub

XXVII.

'Tis over lovely Youth, the pain
Is on thee, that must end in death;
Round thee, still hangs my fatal chain
Thy ringlet I must bear beneath.

Ay

[ocr errors]

gaze upon it: blanched and gray, At day-rise will thy brown locks be;

But in our own heaven far away

Bloom Love and Joy. Oh, come with me.

XXVIII.

"Hear mother, hear a last request,
Build high for us a funeral pile;
Oh, from that narrow cell released,
My spirit shall rejoicing smile;

And when the embers fall away,

And when the funeral flames arise, We'll journey to a home of rest,

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

THE FIRST WALPURGIS NIGHT.

337

THE FIRST WALPURGIS NIGHT.

A DRUID.

'Tis May-'tis May!

The wood is gay,

And the icy winds are far away;

The snow is gone,

The tender lawn

Her welcome sings, as the spring comes on;

The hill tops frore

Now glitter hoar,

All clear, where damp clouds hung before.

Cold and white,

Yon farthest height,

Yet thither, yet thither we go to-night,

We go, as our fathers went before,

The Father of All to bless and adore;

A holy time an ancient rite

And see! and see! - the bursting light

[ocr errors]

Throws off the reek, more red, more bright;

--

Our fathers bowed and worshipped there; As blaze through smoke the conquering fires, The soul is thus made pure by prayer, And still ascends, and still aspires.

DRUIDS.

We go, as our fathers went before,
The Father of All to bless and adore,

On the first of May, to the hill-top hoar:
to the hills away —

Away-away

[ocr errors]

'Tis the holy time-'tis the night of May.

ONE OF THE People.

Have you lost all sense of fear?
Know you not the danger here?
Know you not our conquerors
Hatred and revenge are breathing?
Laws alike and lawless force
Persecute and plague the heathen;

The pass's mountain walls are warded,
'Gainst our midnight worship guarded;
Alas, alas a heavy day

Hath come: our wives, our babes they slay,

Our old religion fades away.

CHORUS OF Women.

Alas, alas! a heavy day;

For fallen are we, and proud are they.

« 前へ次へ »