To search and struggle for thine ill,
Ne'er share thy good in peace?
Already do thy mountains feel
Avenging Heaven's ire?
Hark-hark-this is no thunder peal,
That was no lightning fire!"

It was no fire from heaven he saw,
For, far from hill and dell,
O'er Gobbin's brow the mountain flaw
Bears musquet-shot and yell,

And shouts of brutal glee, that tell

A foul and fearful tale,

While over blast and breaker swell
Thin shrieks and woman's wail.

Now fill they far the upper sky,
Now down mid air they go,
The frantic scream, the piteous cry,
The groan of rage and woe;
And wilder in their agony

And shriller still they grow-
Now cease they, choking suddenly,
The waves boom on below.

"A bloody and a black revenge!

Oh, Una, blest are we

Who this sore-troubled land can change
For peace beyond the sea;

But for the manly hearts and true

That Antrim still retain,

Or be their banner green or blue,
For all that there remain,
God grant them quiet freedom too,
And blithe homes soon again!"

THE FAIRY THORN.

AN ULSTER BALLAD.

At Anna Grace's door 'twas thus the maidens cried,
Three merry maidens fair in kirtles of the green;
And Anna laid the rock and the weary wheel aside,
The fairest of the four, I ween.

They're glancing through the glimmer of the quiet eve,

Away in milky wavings of neck and ankle bare; The heavy-sliding stream in its sleepy song they

leave,

And the crags in the ghostly air:

And linking hand in hand, and singing as they go, The maids along the hill-side have ta'en their fearless way,

Till they come to where the rowan-trees in lonely beauty grow

Beside the Fairy Hawthorn gray.

The Hawthorn stands between the ashes tall and slim,

Like matron with her twin grand-daughters at her knee;

The rowan berries cluster o'er her low head grav and dim

In ruddy kisses sweet to see.

The merry maidens four have ranged them in a row,
Between each lovely couple a stately rowan stem,
And away in mazes wavy, like skimming birds
they go,

Oh, never carolled bird like them!

But solemn is the silence of the silvery haze

That drinks away their voices in echoless repose, And dreamily the evening has stilled the haunted braes,

And dreamier the gloaming grows.

And sinking one by one, like lark-notes from the sky,

When the falcon's shadow saileth across the open shaw,

Are hushed the maiden's voices, as cowering down they lie

In the flutter of their sudden awe.

For, from the air above, and the grassy ground beneath,

"Get up, our Anna dear, from the weary spinning wheel;

For your father's on the hill and your mother is

They sink together silent, and stealing side to side, They fling their lovely arms o'er their drooping necks so fair,

asleep:

Come up above the crags, and we'll dance a high- Then vainly strive again their naked arms to hide, For their shrinking necks again are bare.

land reel

Around the Fairy Thorn on the steep."

And from the mountain-ashes and the old Whitethorn between,

A power of faint enchantment doth through their beings breathe,

And they sink down together on the green.

Thus clasped and prostrate all, with their heads together bowed,

Soft o'er their bosoms beating-the only human sound

They hear the silky footsteps of the silent fairy crowd,

Like a river in the air, gliding round.

Nor scream can any raise, nor prayer can any say,
But wild, wild the terror of the speechless three-
For they feel fair Anna Grace drawn silently away,
By whom they dare not look to see.

They feel their tresses twine with her parting locks He staid his houseless wanderings upon the Collon of gold,

side,

And the curls elastic falling, as her head with- There in a cave all under ground he laired his

draws;

heathy den,

They feel her sliding arms from their tranced arms Ah, many a gentleman was fain to earth like hillunfold, fox then.

But they dare not look to see the cause:

With hound and fishing-rod he lived on hill and stream by day,

For heavy on their senses the faint enchantment At night, betwixt his fleet greyhound and his bonny mare he lay.

lies

Through all that night of anguish and perilous

amaze;

It was a summer evening, and, mellowing and still, And neither fear nor wonder can ope their quiver- Glenwhirry to the setting sun lay bare from hill to

ing eyes

Or their limbs from the cold ground raise.

tree,

Till out of Night the Earth has rolled her dewy side, But spread abroad and open all, a full fair sight With every haunted mountain and streamy vale below;

to see,

From Slemish foot to Collon top lay one unbroken

When, as the mist dissolves in the yellow morning tide,

green;

The maidens' trance dissolveth so.

Then fly the ghastly three as swiftly as they may, And tell their tale of sorrow to anxious friends in vain

They pined away and died within the year and day,
And ne'er was Anna Grace seen again.

WILLY GILLILAND.

AN ULSTER BALLAD.

Up in the mountain solitudes, and in a rebel ring,
He has worshipped God upon the hill, in spite of
church and king;

And sealed his treason with his blood on Bothwell
Bridge he hath;

So he must fly his father's land, or he must die the

Dalzell, And his smoking rooftree testifies they've done their errand well.

In vain to fly his enemies he fled his native land; Hot persecution waited him upon the Carrick strand;

His name was on the Carrick cross, a price was on his head,

A fortune to the man that brings him in, alive or dead!

hill;

For all that valley pastoral held neither house nor

And so on moor and mountain, from the Laggan to the Bann,

Save where in many a silver coil the river glanced between.

From house to house, and hill to hill, he lurked an outlawed man.

And on the river's grassy bank, even from the morning gray,

He at the angler's pleasant sport had spent the summer day:

Ah! many a time and oft I've spent the summer day from dawn,

his brow,

death;

And there, his hand upon the Book, his knee upon the sod,

For comely Claverhouse has come along with grim He filled the lonely valley with the gladsome word

And wondered, when the sunset came, where time and care had gone,

Along the reaches curling fresh, the wimpling pools and streams,

Where he that day his cares forgot in these delightful dreams.

His blythe work done, upon a bank the outlaw rested now,

And laid the basket from his back, the bonnet from

of God;

And for a persecuted kirk, and for her martyrs dear, And against a godless church and king, he spoke up loud and clear.

And now, upon his homeward way he crossed the
Collon high,

And over bush and bank and brae he sent abroad
his eye,

But all was darkening peacefully in gray and purple haze,

The thrush was silent in the banks, the lark upon
the braes-
When suddenly shot up a blaze-from the cave's
mouth it came;

At last, when in false company he might no longer And troopers' steeds and troopers' caps are glancing in the same!

bide,

He couched among the heather, and he saw them, The sun shines bright on Carrick wall and Carrick as he lay, Castle gray,

With three long yells at parting, ride lightly east And up thine aisle, Saint Nicholas, has ta'en his away; morning way;

Then down with heavy heart he came, to sorry And to the North-gate sentinel displayeth far and cheer came he,

near

For ashes black were crackling where the green Sea, hill, and tower, and all thereon, in dewy freshwhins used to be, ness clear,

And stretched among the prickly coomb, his heart's Save where, behind a ruined wall, himself alone to blood smoking round,

view,

From slender nose to breast-bone cleft, lay dead Is peering from the ivy green a bonnet of the blue. his good greyhound!

"They've slain my dog, the Philistines! they've ta'en my bonny mare!"

He plunged into the smoky hole; no bonny beast was there

He groped beneath his burning bed, (it burned him to the bone,)

Hath gone in rich farewell, as fits such royal votary; Where his good weapon used to be, but broadsword But, as his last red glance he takes down past black

"I am a houseless outcast; I have neither bed nor
board,

Nor living thing to look upon, nor comfort save the
Lord:

Yet was the good Elijah once in worse extremity;
Who succoured him in his distress, He now will

The sun shines red on Carrick wall and Carrick
Castle old,

And all the western buttresses have changed their
gray for gold;

And from thy shrine, Saint Nicholas, the pilgrim of the sky

And from the thumbscrew and the boot you bore me like the wind;

And, while I have the life you saved, on your sleek flank, I swear,

Episcopalian rowel shall never ruffle hair!
Though sword to wield they've left me none-yet
Wallace wight, I wis,

Good battle did on Irvine side wi' waur weapon
than this."-

Slieve-a-true,

He leaveth where he found it first, the bonnet of the blue.

His fishing-rod with both his hands he griped it as he spoke,

And, where the butt and top were spliced, in pieces twain he broke;

The limber top he cast away, with all its gear abroad, But, grasping the tough hickory butt, with spike of iron shod,

Again he makes the turrets gray stand out before the hill,

Prick jeering grooms and burghers blythe, and troopers in a row;

succour me;

But one has little care for jest, so hard bested is he He now will succour me, I know; and, by His To ride the outlaw's bonny mare, for this at last

is she!

holy name,

I'll make the doers of this deed right dearly rue

the same!

Constant as their foundation rock, there is the bonnet still!

Down comes her master with a roar, her rider with a groan,

"My bonny mare! I've ridden you when Claver'se The iron and the hickory are thro' and thro' rode behind, gone!

He lies a corpse; and where he sat the outlaw sits again,

And now the gates are opened, and forth in gallant show

And once more to his bonny mare he gives the spur and rein;

Then some with sword and some with gun, they ride and run amain;

But sword and gun, and whip and spur, that day they plied in vain!

Ah! little thought Willy Gilliland, when he on
Skerry side

Drew bridle first, and wiped his brow after that
weary ride,

That where he lay like hunted brute, a caverned
outlaw lone,
Broad lands and yeomen tenantry should yet be
there his own;

He ground the sharp spear to a point; then pulled Yet so it was; and still from him descendants not his bonnet down, a few

And meditating black revenge, set forth for Carrick Draw birth and lands, and, let me trust, draw love of Freedom too.

town.

Nine nights I lay in longing and pain,
Betwixt two bushes, beneath the rain,

bright!

Then, Oro, come with me! come with me! come Thinking to see you, love, once again; But whistle and call were all in vain!

with me!

WHITESIDE.

BORN 1806 DIED 1876.