'Twas light, indeed, too blest for one, Who had to turn to paths of care Through crowded haunts again to run, And leave thee bright and silent there.

No more unto thy shores to come,
But, on the world's rude ocean tost,
Dream of thee sometimes, as a home
Of sunshine he had seen and lost.

Far better in thy weeping hours
To part from thee, as I do now,
When mist is o'er thy blooming bowers,
Like sorrow's veil on beauty's brow.

For, though unrivall'd still thy grace,
Thou dost not look, as then, too blest,
But thus in shadow seem'st a place
Where erring man might hope to rest.

Might hope to rest, and find in thee
A gloom like Eden's, on the day
He left its shade, when every tree,
Like thine, hung weeping o'er his way.

Weeping or smiling, lovely isle!
And all the lovelier for thy tears,

For tho' but rare thy sunny smile,

'Tis heav'n's own glance when it appears.

Like feeling hearts, when joys are few,
But when indeed they come divine —
The brightest light the sun e'er threw
Is lifeless to one gleam of thine!

Thomas Moore.

Blarney Castle

(Blarney)

O, did you ne'er hear of "the Blarney"

That's found near the banks of Killarney? Believe it from me,

No girl's heart is free,

Once she hears the sweet sound of the Blarney.

For the Blarney's so great a deceiver,

That a girl thinks you're there, though you leave her;

And never finds out

All the tricks you're about

Till she's quite gone herself with your Blarney.

O say, would you find this same "Blarney"?
There's a castle, not far from Killarney,

On the top of its wall

(But take care you don't fall)

There's a stone that contains all this Blarney.

Like a magnet, its influence such is,
That attraction it gives all it touches;
If you kiss it, they say,

From that blessed day

You may kiss whom you please with your Blarney.

Samuel Lover.

The Harp that once, thro' Tara's Halls.

(Tara. A place in County Meath, famous in the early history of Ireland as a royal residence.)

THE harp that once, thro' Tara's halls,

The soul of music shed,

Now hangs as mute, on Tara's walls,

As if that soul were fled.

So sleeps the pride of former days,

So glory's thrill is o'er,

And hearts that once beat high for praise,

Now feel that pulse no more.

No more, to chiefs and ladies bright,

The harp of Tara swells;

The chord alone, that breaks at night,

Its tale of ruin tells:

Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes,
The only throb she gives,

Is when some heart indignant breaks,
To show that she still lives.

Thomas Moore.

C

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

(Innisfree, Lough Gill)

I

WILL arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple

I will arise and go now, for always, night and day, I hear lake-water lapping with low sounds by the

shore;

While I stand on the roadway or on the pavements

gray,

I hear it in the deep heart's core.

William Butler Yeats.

On Leaving Ireland 1

WE

E are rounding Moy-n-Olurg, we sweep by its head and

We plunge through the Foyle,

Whose swans could enchant with their music the dead and

Make pleasure of toil..

Oh, Erin, were wealth my desire, what a wealth

were

To gain far from thee,

In the land of the stranger, but there even health

were

A sickness to me!

Alas for the voyage, oh, high King of Heaven,
Enjoined upon me,

For that I on the red plain of bloody Cooldrevin
Was present to see.

How happy the son is of Dima; no sorrow

For him is designed,

He is having this hour, round his own Kill in Dur

row,

The wish of his mind.

The sound of the wind in the elms, like the strings of A harp being played,

The note of the blackbird that claps with the wings of

Delight in the glade.

From Ireland: Historic and Picturesque, by Charles Johnston.