BLACHAVAS:

THE PILGRIM TO THE HOLY LAND.

BY JOSIAH CONDER.

"Blachavas, with his protopalikar, left his beloved mountains at the age of seventy-six, to visit the Holy City on foot, and actually died at Jerusalem."

Sheridan's "Songs of Greece," p. xxvii.

FAREWELL to the land of my fathers! Farewell
To each snow-crested peak and each deep-shaded dell ;
Where the torrent leaps wild, and loud murmurs the bee,
And the mountains still shelter the brave and the free.

Farewell to my comrades, my palikars brave!
Farewell, trusty musket, and patriot glaive!
Too feeble my grasp, too unsteady my aim,
To my son I abandon the sword of my fame.

Farewell the wild caves of thy desolate shore,
Where the cliffs but re-echo the Triton's dread roar;

But there the free bark the proud Pasha defies,

And the Mainote exults o'er his Mussulman prize.

B

But whither repairs he, the hoary klepht?*
And wherefore the land of his sires has he left?
And why for these weeds and this staff, laid aside
His kilt, and capote, and the sword of his pride?

At the tomb of his Saviour, all holy his vow,
Ere paschal-tide, must the pilgrim bow;

He must light his torch at the self-kindled flame,
And bathe in the Jordan his veteran frame.

The white walls of Akka rise fair from the sea,
And fertile and lovely thy plains, Galilee!

But the Crescent gleams baleful, where once the Cross shone,

And "the Butcher" + succeeds to the Knights of St. John.

Sepphouri's proud towers are still prostrate, her mount
All lonely and sad, and deserted her fount ;

But the rich monks of Nassra § are joyous and sleek,
And the Latins exult o'er the orthodox Greek.

* Literally, robber; a title borne with pride by the guerillas of Greece.

† Djezzar, late Pasha of Acre, whose name, as explained by himself to Dr. E. D. Clarke, signifies the Butcher.

Sepphoris, once the metropolis of Galilee, appears to owe its present neglected state partly to the proximity of Nazareth, which has risen on its ruins. Abandoned by the Latins, the modern village is inhabited chiefly by a few Greeks.

§ Nazareth.

Full often the pilgrim turns, weeping, to gaze

On some column or tower of King Constantine's days, Where the lonely palm waves o'er the mouldering stone, The altar subverted, the Cross overthrown.

But forgotten his woes, and o'erpaid his fatigue,
The rugged ascent and the wearisome league,
When Solyma's towers stand revealed to his sight,
And, bathed in the sunshine, seem glorious with light.

Blachavas has mixed with the holy crowd;
At each consecrate spot, has devoutly bowed;
Has kissed the cold marble with fervour sincere,
And at Calvary's shrine shed the penitent tear.

On Easter's glad morn, with the foremost he came,
To kindle his torch at the heavenly flame;
And he marched at the head of the Christian band
Who have taken their way for Jordan's strand.

Oh! fearful the route that those pilgrims have traced,
The dizzy ascent, and the mountainous waste:
Dark lowers o'er the valley the crag's naked pile,
And the wild Arab lurks in the savage defile.

No fear knew Blachavas, yet thought the old klepht
Of the sword he once wielded, the land he had left;
Of each deep-shaded glen, and each snow-crested height,
The haunts of his childhood, the scenes of his might.

The desert is passed, but nor balsam nor palm
Enlivens the valley* or yields its rich balm;
And dreary the plain where, thro' willowy brake,
The Jordan still seeks the bituminous lake.

But Oh! with what rapture the pilgrims rush in,
To lose in its waters the stain of their sin!
With fond superstition the garment they lave,
Their last sad apparel when dressed for the grave.

Blachavas has bathed, and, the rite to complete,
Those waters have hallowed his winding-sheet.
His step is yet firm, and his heart is still strong,
But that garment of death shall not lie by him long.

How welcome, once more, from green Olivet's height,
Thy towers, O Jerusalem, glowing with light!
Yet kingdoms and seas have those pilgrims to roam;
But there's rest for Blachavas, and dark is his home.

And where would he choose that his dust should repose
But here, where his Saviour once died and arose?
Yet dear is the land which no more he must see;
And his last recollections are, Hellas! of thee.

* The valley of Jericho, "the city of palms,"-once famous for its balsam-trees.

ALLAN LORIMER.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "LIGHTS AND SHADOWS OF
SCOTTISH LIFE," &c.

Ir was on one of those bright, still spring days, when heaven and earth are conjoined in peace that seems too beautiful ever to be broken, and when the hearts of the children of toil and poverty are not only reconciled to their lot, but feel it, in perfect contentment, to be the happiest that Heaven could have bestowed, that Allan Lorimer, a mere boy doing man's work, was levelling, with spade and pickaxe, a rocky mound that, to an agriculturist's eye, somewhat disfigured the small field in which it rose, as it prevented the plough from turning over a fair furrow from hawthorn hedge to church-yard wall, its encircling boundaries. The mid-day hour of rest had come upon him, heedless of its approach, till, resting on his mattock, he saw standing beside him, with her milk-can and basket of oatmeal cakes, his little sister Anna, whose figure at the same stated hour let fall its shadow on the knoll where he had for weeks been working, as duly as the hand on the dial-stone in their own garden. The loving creature sat down before his feet, under the