Stern scowled the McGregor, then silent and sullen,
He turned his red eye to the braes of Strathfillan,
"Go, Malcom, to sleep: let the clans be dismissed;
The Campbells, this night, for McGregor must rest."

McGregor, McGregor! our scouts have been flying Three days round the hills of McNab and Glenlyon,Of riding and running such tidings they bear,

We must meet them at home, else they'll quickly be here."

"The Campbell may come, as his promises bind him,
And haughty McNab with his giants behind him ;
This night I am bound to relinquish the fray,
And do what it freezes my vitals to say.

"Forgive me, dear brother, this horror of mind ;—
Thou knowest in the battle I was never behind;
Nor ever receded a foot from the van,

Nor blenched at the ire or the prowess of man;

"But I've sworn by the cross, by my God, and by all,--
An oath which I cannot and dare not recall,-
Ere the shadows of midnight fall east from the pile,
To meet with a spirit, this night, in Glengyle.

"Last night, in my chamber, all thoughtful and lone,
I called to remembrance some deeds I had done,-
When entered a lady, with visage so wan,

And looks such as never were fastened on man.

:

I knew her, O brother! I knew her full well:Of that once fair dame such a tale I could tell,

As would thrill thy bold heart; but how long she remained,
So racked was my spirit-my bosom so pained,

"I knew not; but ages seemed short to the while :-
Though proffer the highlands,-nay, all the green isle,
With length of existence no man can enjoy,
The same to endure, the dread proffer I'd fly!

"The thrice threatened pangs of last night to forego,
McGregor would dive to the mansions below!
Despairing and mad, to futurity blind,

The present to shun, and some respite to find,

"I swore, ere the shadows fall east from the pile, To meet her alone by the brook of Glengyle!

A parting embrace in one moment she gave,-
Her breath was a furnace, her bosom the grave;

"Then flitting elusive she said with a frown,
'The mighty McGregor shall yet be my own!'"
McGregor! thy fancies are wild as the wind;

The dreams of the night have disordered thy mind.

"Come, buckle thy panoply, march to the field;
See, brother, how hacked are thy helmet and shield !
Ay! that was McNab, in the height of his pride,
When the lions of Dochart stood firm by his side.

"This night the proud chief his presumption shall rue;
Rise, brother! these chinks in his heart blood shall glue.
Thy fantasies frightful shall flit on the wing,
When loud with thy bugle Glenlyon shall ring."

Like glimpse of the moon through the storm of the night,
McGregor's red eye shed one sparkle of light,-
It faded,-it darkened,-he shuddered, he sighed :
"No!-not for the universe!" low he replied.

Away went McGregor, but went not alone:-
To watch the dread rendezvous Malcom has gone:
They oared the broad Lomond, so still and serene,
And, deep in her bosom, how awful the scene!

Over mountains inverted the blue water curled,
And rocked them o'er skies of a far nether world :-
All silent they went; for the time was approaching,-
The moon the blue zenith already was touching.

No foot was abroad on the forest or hill,
No sound but the lullaby sung by the rill:

Young Malcom, at distance couched, trembling the while;
McGregor stood lone, by the brook of Glengyle.

Few minutes had passed, ere they spied, on the stream,
A skiff sailing light, where a lady did seem;
Her sail was a web of the gossamer's loom;
The glow-worm her wake-light, the rainbow her boom.

A dim rayless beam was her prow, and her mast
Like wold-fire at midnight, that glares o'er the waste.
Though rough was the river with rock and cascade,
No torrent, no rock, her velocity staid;

She wimpled the water to weather and lea,

And heaved as if borne on the waves of the sea.

Mute nature was roused in the bounds of the glen,—
The wild deer of Gairtney abandoned his den,
Fled panting away over river and isle,

Nor once turned his eye to the brook of Glengyle.

The fox fled in terror; the eagle awoke,

As slumbering he dozed on a shelve of the rock,—
Astonished, to hide in the moonbeam he flew,
And screwed the night heavens till lost in the blue.

Young Malcom beheld the pale lady approach,
The chieftain salute her, and shrink from her touch;
He saw the McGregor kneel down on the plain,
As if begging for something he could not obtain.

She raised him indignant, derided his stay,
Then bore him on board, set her sail and away!
Though fast the red bark down the river did glide,
Yet faster ran Malcom adown by its side:—

"McGregor, McGregor!" he bitterly cried :-
"McGregor, McGregor!" the echoes replied.
He struck at the lady; but,-strange though it seem,—
His sword only fell on the rock and the stream;

But the groans from the boat that ascended amain,
Were groans from a bosom in horror and pain:
They reached the dark lake, and bore lightly away,——
McGregor is vanished,-for ever and aye!

EXERCISE LII.-THE IRISH DISTURBANCE BILL OF 1833.

O'Connell.

[An example of vehement and empassioned declamation; requiring the utmost power of voice and gesture.]

I do not rise to fawn or cringe to this House,-I do not rise to supplicate you to be merciful towards the nation to which I belong towards a nation which, though subject to England, yet is distinct from it. It is a distinct nation: it has been treated as such by this country, as may be proved by history, and by seven hundred years of tyranny. I call upon this House, as you value the liberty of England, not to allow the present nefarious bill to pass. In it are involved

the liberties of England,-the liberty of the press, and of every other institution dear to Englishmen. The bill, it is true, is mitigated; but, even in its mitigated shape, it contains horrors enough to insult, in the grossest manner, the people of my country. There remain still those clauses which put down the right of petitioning, which put down political agitation,-which make them both, offences not punishable by the ordinary tribunals, but by what I will call revolutionary ones.

Against the bill I protest in the name of the Irish people, and in the face of Heaven. I protest against the power granted to the Lord Lieutenant to prevent meetings, no matter for what purpose they might be convened. All I ask for my country, is, justice; and, so long as the present government are unjust towards her, I laugh to scorn your promised generosity.

I strenuously object to the power granted to the Lord Lieutenant to prevent meetings, because there are grievances to be redressed in my country; and one of the ways to remedy these, is by petitions, emanating from large assemblies. I will dare any one to say that there are not grievances in Ireland.

I treat with scorn the puny and pitiful assertions that grievances are not to be complained of,-that our redress is not to be agitated: for, in such cases, remonstrances cannot be too strong, agitation cannot be too violent, to show to the world with what injustice our fair claims are met, and under what tyranny the people suffer.

There are two frightful clauses in this bill. The one which does away with trial by jury, and which I have called upon you to baptize :-you call it a court martial,-a mere nickname; I stigmatize it as a revolutionary tribunal. What, in the name of heaven, is it, if it is not a revolutionary tribunal ? It annihilates the trial by jury;-it drives the judge from his bench, the man who, from experience, could weigh the nice and delicate points of a case, who could discriminate between the straight-forward testimony and the suborned evidence, who could see, plainly and readily, the justice or injustice of the accusation. It turns out this man who is free, unshackled, unprejudiced,-who has no previous opinions to control the clear exercise of his duty. You do away with that which is more sacred than the throne itself; that for which your king reigns, your lords deliberate, your commons assemble.

I pray to my God that when repeal comes; and come it

now must, ministers can never stay it; they cannot even hope to do so; it may come through peaceful agency, and not through oceans of blood. If ever I doubted before of the success of our agitation for repeal, this bill,--this infamous bill,—the way in which it has been received by the House, the manner in which its opponents have been treated, -the personalities to which they have been subjected, the yells with which one of them has this night been greeted ;all these things dissipate my doubts, and tell me of its complete and early triumph. Do you think those yells will be forgotten? Do you suppose their echo will not reach the plains of my injured and insulted country, that they will not be whispered in her green valleys, and heard from her lofty hills? Oh! they will be heard there :-yes, and they will not be forgotten. The youth of Ireland will bound with indignation; they will say, "We are eight millions; and you treat us thus, as though we were no more to your country, than the isle of Guernsey or of Jersey!"

I have been, all my life, opposed to a certain party of my countrymen in this House. I have contended with them for years. I will not contend with them again; or, if I do, it shall not be in hostility. I appeal to them now. They have a deeper interest in their native land, than in that of party; and they must feel that there is nothing so prejudicial, so destructive, as those bad passions between man and man. Let that hour arrive when mutual prejudices can be overcome, and evil passions set at rest, and Irishmen can then say, in a bold and unanswerable tone, We want justice, and will have equality. Ministers may then legislate for England, but Irishmen will legislate for themselves.

Ministers have greatly assisted in the repeal of the Union; they have given increased energy to the cry; because they have convinced those who before doubted, that justice was not meant to be done for Ireland. To be sure it may be said they are not eight millions,-that they are divided; but then they will be eight millions, when the fears of some, and the unlucky prejudices of others, have been conquered by the force of reason and of truth.

I have done my duty:-I stand acquitted to my conscience and my country:--I have opposed this measure throughout; and I now protest against it as harsh, oppressive, uncalled for, unjust, as establishing an infamous precedent by retaliating crime against crime, as tyrannous, cruelly and vindictively tyrannous.