Ha! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn? But down let him stoop from his havoc on high! LOCHIEL. False Wizard, avaunt! I have marshall'd my clan, WIZARD. -Lochiel, Lochiel! beware of the day! Lo! anointed by Heaven with the vials of wrath, Rise, rise! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight! Like ocean-weeds heap'd on the surf-beaten shore, 1 An account of the second sight, in Irish called Taish, is thus given in Martin's Description of the Western Isles of Scotland. The second sight is a singular faculty of seeing an otherwise invisible object, without any previous means used by the person who sees it for that end. The vision makes such a lively impression upon the seers, that they neither see nor think of anything else except the vision as long as it continues; and then they appear pensive or jovial according to the object which was represented to them. and the eyes continue staring until the object vanish. This is "At the sight of a vision the eyelids of the person are erected, obvious to others who are standing by when the persons happen to see a vision; and occurred more than once to my own observation, and to others that were with me. that when he sees a vision the inner parts of his eyelids turn so "There is one in Skie, of whom his acquaintance observed, far upwards, that, after the object disappears, he must draw them down with his fingers, and sometimes employs others to draw them down, which he finds to be much the easier way. "This faculty of the second sight does not lineally descend in a family, as some have imagined; for I know several parents who are endowed with it, and their children are not; and vice versa. Neither is it acquired by any previous compact. And after strict inquiry, I could never learn from any among them, that this faculty was communicable to any whatsoever. The seer knows neither the object, time, nor place of a vision, before it appears; and the same object is often seen by different persons living at a considerable distance from one another. The true way of judging as to the time and circumstances is by observation; for several persons of judgment who are without this faculty are more capable to judge of the design of a vision than a novice that is a seer. If an object appear in the day or night it will come to pass sooner or later accordingly. "If an object is seen early in a morning, which is not frequent, it will be accomplished in a few hours afterwards; if at noon, it will probably be accomplished that very day; if in the evening, perhaps that night; if after candles be lighted, it will be accomplished that night: the latter always an accomplishment by weeks, months, and sometimes years, according to the time of the night the vision is seen. "When a shroud is seen about one, it is a sure prognostic of death. The time is judged according to the height of it about the person; for if it is not seen above the middle, death is not to be expected for the space of a year, and perhaps some months longer and as it is frequently seen to ascend higher towards the head, death is concluded to be at hand within a few days, if not hours, as daily experience confirms. Examples of this kind were shown me, when the person of whom the observations were then made was in perfect health, "It is ordinary with them to see houses, gardens, and trees in places void of all these, and this in process of time is wont to be accomplished: as at Mogslot in the Isle of Skie, where there were but a few sorry low houses thatched with straw: yet in a few years the vision, which appeared often, was accomplished by the building of several good houses in the very spot represented to the seers, and by the planting of orchards there. "To see a spark of fire is a forerunner of a dead child, to be 1 The Gaelic appellation of Scotland, more particularly the seen in the arms of those persons: of which there are several Highlands. instances. To see a seat empty at the time of sitting in it, is 2 The lines allude to the many hardships of the royal sufferer. a presage of that person's death quickly after it. BATTLE OF THE BALTIC. Or Nelson and the North, And her arms along the deep proudly shone; By each gun the lighted brand, In a bold determined hand, And the Prince of all the land Led them on. Like leviathans afloat, Lay their bulwarks on the brine, On the lofty British line: It was ten of April morn by the chime: As they drifted on their path, There was silence deep as death; But the might of England flush'd And her van the fleeter rush'd O'er the deadly space between. "Hearts of oak!" our captains cried; when each gun From its adamantine lips Spread a death-shade round the ships, Like the hurricane eclipse Of the sun. Again! again! again! And the havoc did not slack, Till a feeble cheer the Dane To our cheering sent us back;— Their shots along the deep slowly boom: Then ceased-and all is wail, As they strike the shatter'd sail; Or, in conflagration pale, Light the gloom. "When a novice, or one that has lately obtained the second sight, sees a vision in the night-time without doors, and comes near a fire, he presently falls into a swoon. "Some find themselves as it were in a crowd of people, having a corpse, which they carry along with them; and after such visions the seers come in sweating, and describe the vision that appeared. If there be any of their acquaintance among them, they give an account of their names, as also of the bearers; but they know nothing concerning the corpse." Horses and cows (according to the same credulous author) have certainly sometimes the same faculty; and he endeavors to prove it by the signs of fear which the animals exhibit, when second-sighted persons see visions in the same place. "The seers (he continues) are generally illiterate and wellmeaning people, and altogether void of design: nor could I ever learn that any of them ever made the least gain by it; neither is it reputable among them to have that faculty. Besides, the people of the Isles are not so credulous as to believe implicitly before the thing predicted is accomplished; but when it is actually accomplished afterwards, it is not in their power to deny it, without offering violence to their own sense and reason. Besides, if the seers were deceivers, can it be reasonable to imagine that all the islanders who have not the second sight should combine together, and offer violence to their understandings and senses, to enforce themselves to believe a lie from age to age? There are several persons among them whose title and education raise them above the suspicion of concurring with an impostor, merely to gratify an illiterate, contemptible set of persons; nor can reasonable persons believe that children, horses, and cows, should be pre-engaged in a combination in favor of the second sight."—Martin's Description of the Western Islands of Scotland, pp. 3. 11. Out spoke the victor then, So peace instead of death let us bring: Then Denmark blest our chief, As death withdrew his shades from the day. O'er a wide and woeful sight, Now joy, Old England, raise! By thy wild and stormy steep, Brave hearts! to Britain's pride On the deck of fame that died, ། Soft sigh the winds of Heav'n o'er their grave! And the mermaid's song condoles, Of the brave! YE MARINERS OF ENGLAND. A NAVAL ODE. YE mariners of England! Your glorious standard launch again And sweep through the deep, The spirits of your fathers Shall start from every wave!- 1 Captain Riou, justly entitled the gallant and the good, by Lord Nelson, when he wrote home his dispatches. O! pale grew the cheek of that chieftain, I ween, When the shroud was unclosed, and no lady was seen; When a voice from the kinsmen spoke louder in scorn, Twas the youth who had loved the fair Ellen of Lorn: I dreamt of my lady, I dreamt of her grief, I dreamt that her lord was a barbarous chief: On a rock of the ocean fair Ellen did seem; Glenara! Glenara! now read me my dream!" In dust, low the traitor has knelt to the ground, And the desert reveal'd where his lady was found; From a rock of the ocean that beauty is borne,— Now joy to the house of fair Ellen of Lorn! EXILE OF ERIN. THERE came to the beach a poor Exile of Erin, Sad is my fate! said the heart-broken stranger, Or cover my harp with the wild-woven flowers, Erin, my country! though sad and forsaken, Oh cruel fate! wilt thou never replace me They died to defend me, or live to deplore! One dying wish my lone bosom can draw; Erin! an exile bequeaths thee his blessing! Land of my forefathers! Erin go bragh! Buried and cold, when my heart stills her motion, Green be thy fields,-sweetest isle of the ocean! And thy harp-striking bards sing aloud with devotion, Erin mavournin-Erin go bragh!' LORD ULLIN'S DAUGHTER. A CHIEFTAIN, to the Highlands bound, "Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle, This dark and stormy water?" "Oh, I'm the chief of Ulva's isle, And this lord Ullin's daughter. "And fast before her father's men Three days we've fled together, For should he find us in the glen, My blood would stain the heather. "His horsemen hard behind us ride; Should they our steps discover, Then who will cheer my bonny bride When they have slain her lover?" Out spoke the hardy Highland wight, "I'll go, my chief—I'm ready: It is not for your silver bright, "And by my word! the bonny bird In danger shall not tarry; So, though the waves are raging white, I'll row you o'er the ferry." By this the storm grew loud apace, The water-wraith was shrieking;2 And in the scowl of heaven each face Grew dark as they were speaking. But still as wilder blew the wind, 1 Ireland my darling,-Ireland for ever "O haste thee, haste!" the lady cries, Though tempests round us gather; I'll meet the raging of the skies, But not an angry father." The boat has left a stormy land, A stormy sea before her,When, oh! too strong for human hand, The tempest gather'd o'er her. And still they row'd amidst the roar For sore dismay'd, through storm and shade, One lovely hand she stretch'd for aid, "Come back! come back!" he cried, in grief, "Across this stormy water; And I'll forgive your Highland chief, My daughter!-O my daughter!”— "T was vain: the loud waves lash'd the shore, Return or aid preventing : The waters wild went o'er his child, ODE TO THE MEMORY OF BURNS SOUL of the Poet! wheresoe'er, And fly, like fiends from secret spell, For he was chief of bards that swell And Love's own strain to him was given, With Pythian words unsought, unwill'd,— Who that has melted o'er his lay Nor skill'd one flame alone to fan: Him, in his clay-built cot,' the muse On Bannock-field what thoughts arouse And all their scorn of death and chains? And see the Scottish exile, tann'd With love that scorns the lapse of time, Encamp'd by Indian rivers wild, The scenes that blest him when a child, O deem not, midst this worldly strife, It is the muse that consecrates And thou, young hero, when thy pall Is cross'd with mournful sword and plume, Such was the soldier-BURNS, forgive Farewell! and ne'er may Envy dare THE SOLDIER'S DREAM. OUR bugles sang truce-for the night-cloud had lour'd, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain, I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers WRITTEN ON VISITING A SCENE IN ARGYLESHIRE. AT the silence of twilight's contemplative hour, And lonely the dark raven's sheltering tree: The friend I mourn'd-the brave, the good-Yet wandering, I found on my ruinous walk, Farewell, high chief of Scottish song! 1 Burns was born in Clay-cottage, which his father had built with his own hands. 2 Major Edward Hodge of the 7th Hussars, who fell at the head of his squadron in the attack of the Polish Lancers. By the dial-stone aged and green, |