THE OLD COVENANTER
Frail crumbling monument! existing yet
'Mid nature's ruins. Grey-grown in the strife
Of thy stern fortune's elements, and, it may be,
The last enduring pillar of a time-razed house,
Thou yet upstandest, by thy scars, to tell
Tales of unholy warfare! There are lines,
Deeper far traced by sorrow's searing hand,
Than can the advent of old age bring on;
And these were won thee, soldier, in thy fight,
For home, thy children, freedom, and thy faith!
Life's fire is quenched, yet there is left a spark
In the sunk eye once strained to watch o'er these.
There is a ling'ring vision of a spot,
Passed o'er and blighted by war's fiery course;
Once the fair home of gladness, now marked out alone
By the wild weeds of ruin! Whilst thou dream'st
Oppression, tyranny, but names unknown,
Unheard, as once, 'neath roofs that sheltered worth,
And in sweet fancy look'st on vanished joys,
Feeling their sunshine melt thy sorrow's snow,
There is reality's stern hand upraised
To wake thee from thy slumber. Sleep no more!
Remembrance must return of those fair flow'rs
Torn from around thee in thy country's cause;
And thou, poor martyr! now, as then thou didst,
Hold to thy heart the only shield can quench,
Can turn away from thee despair's fierce darts!
Oh! thou shouldst gaze on it ev'n now, and find,
As 'twere of old, a chain for thy proud heart;
Lest in these memories it rush to sin,
Hiding the brave man's wrongs in felon guilt:
Crushing thy virtue rather than thy foe'
Thus, in thine armour, down the shortened path
Of thine embittered years, pass on in peace;
There is a time, tho' distant, shall arrive,
When kings and thou shalt stand where worth is rank;
When every sob now grief-wrung from thy breast,
Shall tell thy tale, where truth is masked no more.
This be thy solace when thou look'st around,
Vainly for one yet left to clasp thine hand;
This be thy solace—they have passed in faith
To where the right shall triumph; where the soul,
Freed from its earthly fetters, shall arise to light,
Made the more glorious for its sorrows past
R. A.
'Mid nature's ruins. Grey-grown in the strife
Of thy stern fortune's elements, and, it may be,
The last enduring pillar of a time-razed house,
Thou yet upstandest, by thy scars, to tell
Tales of unholy warfare! There are lines,
Deeper far traced by sorrow's searing hand,
Than can the advent of old age bring on;
And these were won thee, soldier, in thy fight,
For home, thy children, freedom, and thy faith!
Life's fire is quenched, yet there is left a spark
In the sunk eye once strained to watch o'er these.
There is a ling'ring vision of a spot,
Passed o'er and blighted by war's fiery course;
Once the fair home of gladness, now marked out alone
By the wild weeds of ruin! Whilst thou dream'st
Oppression, tyranny, but names unknown,
Unheard, as once, 'neath roofs that sheltered worth,
And in sweet fancy look'st on vanished joys,
Feeling their sunshine melt thy sorrow's snow,
There is reality's stern hand upraised
To wake thee from thy slumber. Sleep no more!
Remembrance must return of those fair flow'rs
Torn from around thee in thy country's cause;
And thou, poor martyr! now, as then thou didst,
Hold to thy heart the only shield can quench,
Can turn away from thee despair's fierce darts!
Oh! thou shouldst gaze on it ev'n now, and find,
As 'twere of old, a chain for thy proud heart;
Lest in these memories it rush to sin,
Hiding the brave man's wrongs in felon guilt:
Crushing thy virtue rather than thy foe'
Thus, in thine armour, down the shortened path
Of thine embittered years, pass on in peace;
There is a time, tho' distant, shall arrive,
When kings and thou shalt stand where worth is rank;
When every sob now grief-wrung from thy breast,
Shall tell thy tale, where truth is masked no more.
This be thy solace when thou look'st around,
Vainly for one yet left to clasp thine hand;
This be thy solace—they have passed in faith
To where the right shall triumph; where the soul,
Freed from its earthly fetters, shall arise to light,
Made the more glorious for its sorrows past
R. A.