VII.
Where "stubborn Newre" is streaming—where Lee's green valley smiles—
Where kingly Shannon circles his hundred sainted isles,
They list the call—and woe befall the hapless, doomed array
Who'll rouse their wrath in war's red path to strike in freedom's fray.
VIII.
I see the brave rejoicing—I hear their shouts ascend—
See martyr'd men approving from thrones of brightness bend.
Ye ache my sight, ye visions bright of all our glory won;
The "Battle's Eye"[1] hath found reply—my tuneful task is done.
THE MUSTER OF THE NORTH.
A.D. 1641.
We deny and have always denied the alleged massacre of 1641. But that the people rose under their Chiefs, seized the English towns and expelled the English settlers, and in doing so committed many excesses is undeniable—as is equally the desperate provocation. The Ballad here printed is not meant as an apology for these excesses, which we condemn and lament, but as a true representation of the feelings of the insurgents in the first madness of success.
I.
Joy! joy! the day is come at last, the day of hope and pride,
And see! our crackling bonfires light old Bann's rejoicing tide,
And gladsome bell, and bugle-horn from Newry's captured Towers,
Hark! how they tell the Saxon swine, this land is ours, is ours!
II.
Glory to God! my eyes have seen the ransomed fields of Down,
My ears have drunk the joyful news, "Stout Phelim hath his own,"
Oh! may they see and hear no more, oh! may they rot to clay,
When they shall fail to triumph in the conquest of to-day
- ↑ The literal English of Rosg-Caṫa, or the "Incentive to Battle"—the war-song of the bard.
