Page:Irish minstrelsy, vol 2 - Hardiman.djvu/119

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
JACOBITE RELICS.
107

But, while our hearts indignant bleed,
An hour may come,3 o'er Erin's plain,
To bid the inert and drooping steed
Bound with a warrior's weight again.

Our halls the stranger's tread resound,
Or glare white towers upon their site;
The plough hath past each hallowed mound,
Where sages weighed a nation's right.4

Proud Logha's isle no longer now—
'Tis England all5—each taint and blot,
Her plains, her own free mountain's brow.
All blighted, sullied, and forgot.

The Gael no more their native place
Discern, in this degraded land;
Banba no more her sons can trace,6
In failing heart and feeble hand.

An alien race o'erruns her breast,
Endenizened by strange controul;
The stranger is no more her guest,
While exile wrings her children's soul.