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XXV.

ON REVISITING DUNOLLY CASTLE.

[See former series, "Yarrow Revisited," &c., p. 104.]

THE captive Bird was gone ;-to cliff or moor
Perchance had flown, delivered by the storm;
Or he had pined, and sunk to feed the worm:
Him found we not: but, climbing a tall tower,
There saw, impaved with rude fidelity
Of art mosaic, in a roofless floor,

An Eagle with stretched wings, but beamless eye-
An Eagle that could neither wail nor soar.
Effigy of the Vanished-(shall I dare

To call thee so ?) or symbol of fierce deeds
And of the towering courage which past times
Rejoiced in-take, whate'er thou be, a share,
Not undeserved, of the memorial rhymes
That animate my way where'er it leads!

XXVI.

THE DUNOLLY EAGLE.

Nor to the clouds, not to the cliff, he flew ;
But when a storm, on sea or mountain bred,
Came and delivered him, alone he sped
Into the castle-dungeon's darkest mew.

Now, near his master's house in open view
He dwells, and hears indignant tempests howl,
Kennelled and chained. Ye tame domestic fowl,
Beware of him! Thou, saucy cockatoo,

Look to thy plumage and thy life !—The roe,
Fleet as the west wind, is for him no quarry ;
Balanced in ether he will never tarry,

Eyeing the sea's blue depths. Poor Bird! even so
Doth man of brother man a creature make
That clings to slavery for its own sad sake.

XXVII.

WRITTEN IN A BLANK LEAF OF MACPHERSON'S

[THE verses

OSSIAN.

or strayed

From hope and promise, self-betrayed.

were, I am sorry to say, suggested from apprehensions of the
fate of my friend, H. C., the subject of the verses addressed to
H. C. when six years old. The piece to "Memory
Memory" arose out
of similar feelings.]

OFT have I caught, upon a fitful breeze,
Fragments of far-off melodies,

With ear not coveting the whole,
A part so charmed the pensive soul ·
While a dark storm before my sight
Was yielding, on a mountain height
Loose vapours have I watched, that won
Prismatic colours from the sun;

Nor felt a wish that heaven would show
The image of its perfect bow.

What need, then, of these finished Strains ?
Away with counterfeit Remains!

An abbey in its lone recess,

A temple of the wilderness,

Wrecks though they be, announce with feeling

The majesty of honest dealing.

Spirit of Ossian! if imbound

In language thou may'st yet be found,
If aught (intrusted to the pen
Or floating on the tongues of men,
Albeit shattered and impaired)
Subsist thy dignity to guard,

In concert with memorial claim

Of old grey stone, and high-born name
That cleaves to rock or pillared cave
Where moans the blast, or beats the wave,
Let Truth, stern arbitress of all,

Interpret that Original,

And for presumptuous wrongs atone ;-
Authentic words be given, or none!
Time is not blind;—yet He, who spares

Pyramid pointing to the stars,

Hath preyed with ruthless appetite
On all that marked the primal flight

Of the poetic ecstasy

Into the land of mystery.

No tongue is able to rehearse

One measure, Orpheus! of thy verse;
Musæus, stationed with his lyre
Supreme among the Elysian quire,
Is, for the dwellers upon earth,
Mute as a lark ere morning's birth.

Why grieve for these, though past away
The music, and extinct the lay?
When thousands, by severer doom,
Full early to the silent tomb

Have sunk, at Nature's call; or strayed
From hope and promise, self-betrayed;
The garland withering on their brows;
Stung with remorse for broken vows;
Frantic-else how might they rejoice?
And friendless, by their own sad choice!
Hail, Bards of mightier grasp! on you
I chiefly call, the chosen Few,

Who cast not off the acknowledged guide,
Who faltered not, nor turned aside;
Whose lofty genius could survive
Privation, under sorrow thrive;
In whom the fiery Muse revered
The symbol of a snow-white beard,
Bedewed with meditative tears

Dropped from the lenient cloud of years.
Brothers in soul! though distant times
Produced you nursed in various climes,
Ye, when the orb of life had waned,
A plenitude of love retained:
Hence, while in you each sad regret
By corresponding hope was met,
Ye lingered among human kind,
Sweet voices for the passing wind;
Departing sunbeams, loth to stop,
Though smiling on the last hill top!
Such to the tender-hearted maid
Even ere her joys begin to fade;

Such, haply, to the rugged chief
By fortune crushed, or tamed by grief;
Appears, on Morven's lonely shore,
Dim-gleaming through imperfect lore,
The Son of Fingal; such was blind
Mæonides of ampler mind;
Such Milton, to the fountain head
Of glory by Urania led!

1824.

XXVIII.

CAVE OF STAFFA.

WE saw, but surely, in the motley crowd,
Not One of us has felt the far-famed sight;
How could we feel it? each the other's blight,
Hurried and hurrying, volatile and loud.
O for those motions only that invite
The Ghost of Fingal to his tuneful Cave
By the breeze entered, and wave after wave
Softly embosoming the timid light!

And by one Votary who at will might stand
Gazing and take into his mind and heart,
With undistracted reverence, the effect
Of those proportions where the almighty hand
That made the worlds, the sovereign Architect,
Has deigned to work as if with human Art!

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