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And the turf-mounds, once girt by ruddy spears,
And the rock-altars of departed years!
Thence, deeply mingling with the torrent's roar,
The winds a thousand wild responses bore;
And the green land, whose every vale and glen
Doth shrine the memory of heroic men,
On all her hills awakening to rejoice,
Sent forth proud answers to her children's voice!
For us, not ours the festival to hold,
'Midst the stone-circles, hallow'd thus of old;
Not where great Nature's majesty and might,
First broke, all-glorious, on our wandering sight;
Not near the tombs, where sleep our free and brave,
Not by the Mountain Llyn*[1] , the ocean wave:
In these late days we meet!—dark Mona's shore,
Eryri's†[2] cliffs resound with harps no more!
But as the stream, (though time or art may turn
The current, bursting from its cavern'd urn,
To bathe soft vales of pasture and of flowers,
From Alpine glens, or shadowy forest bowers,)
Alike, in rushing strength or sunny sleep,
Holds on its course to mingle with the deep;
Thus, though our paths be chang'd, still warm and free,
Land of the bard! our spirit flies to thee!
To thee, our thoughts, our hopes, our hearts belong,
Our dreams are haunted by thy voice of song!
Nor yield our souls one patriot feeling less,
To the green memory of thy loveliness,
Than theirs, whose harp-notes peal'd from every height,
In the sun's face, beneath the eye of light!
