Vainly sped the withering volley
'Mongst the foremost of our band—
On we poured until we met them,
Foot to foot, and hand to hand.

Horse and man went down like drift-wood
When the floods are black at Yule,
And their carcasses are whirling
In the Garry's deepest pool.
'Horse and man went down before us-

Living foe there tarried none

On the field of Killiecrankie,

When that stubborn fight was done!

IV.

And the evening star was shining

On Schehallion's distant head, When we wiped our bloody broadswords, And returned to count the dead. There we found him, gashed and gory,

Stretched upon the cumbered plain,

As he told us where to seek him,
In the thickest of the slain.
And a smile was on his visage,

For within his dying ear

Pealed the joyful note of triumph,

And the clansmen's clamorous cheer:

So, amidst the battle's thunder,

Shot, and steel, and scorching flame,

In the glory of his manhood

Passed the spirit of the Græme!

V.

Open wide the vaults of Athol,

Where the bones of heroes rest

Open wide the hallowed portals

To receive another guest!

Last of Scots, and last of freemen-
Last of all that dauntless race
Who would rather die unsullied
Than outlive the land's disgrace!

O thou lion-hearted warrior!
Reck not of the after-time:
Honor may be deemed dishonor,
Loyalty be called a crime.
Sleep in peace with kindred ashes
Of the noble and the true,
Hands that never failed their country,

Hearts that never baseness knew.

Sleep!—and till the latest trumpet

Wakes the dead from earth and sea, Scotland shall not boast a braver

Chieftain than our own Dundee !

WILLIAM E. AYTOUN.

The Widow of Glencoe.

I.

O not lift him from the bracken,

D°

Leave him lying where he fell—
Better bier ye cannot fashion :
None beseems him half so well
As the bare and broken heather,
And the hard and trampled sod,
Whence his angry soul ascended
To the judgment-seat of God!
Winding-sheet we cannot give him—
Seek no mantle for the dead,
Save the cold and spotless covering
Showered from heaven upon his head.

Leave his broadsword as we found it,
Bent and broken with the blow,
Which, before he died, avenged him
On the foremost of the foe.
Leave the blood upon his bosom—
Wash not off that sacred stain ;
Let it stiffen on the tartan ;

Let his wounds unclosed remain,
Till the day when he shall show them
At the throne of God on high,
When the murderer and the murdered
Meet before their Judge's eye!

II.

Nay-ye shall not weep, my children!
Leave it to the faint and weak;
Sobs are but a woman's weapon-
Tears befit a maiden's cheek.
Weep not, children of Macdonald !
Weep not thou, his orphan heir—
Not in shame, but stainless honor,

Lies thy slaughtered father there.
Weep not-but when years are over,
And thine arm is strong and sure,
And thy foot is swift and steady
On the mountain and the muir-
Let thy heart be hard as iron,

And thy wrath as fierce as fire,
Till the hour when vengeance cometh
For the race that slew thy sire!
Till in deep and dark Glenlyon
Rise a louder shriek of woe,
Than at midnight from their eyrie,
Scared the eagles of Glencoe :
Louder than the screams that mingled
With the howling of the blast,
When the murderer's steel was clashing,
And the fires were rising fast ;

When thy noble father bounded

To the rescue of his men,
And the slogan of our kindred
Pealed throughout the startled glen !
When the herd of frantic women

Stumbled through the midnight snow,
With their fathers' houses blazing,
And their dearest dead below!
Oh, the horror of the tempest,

As the flashing drift was blown,
Crimsoned with the conflagration,

And the roofs went thundering down! Oh, the prayers-the prayers and curses That together winged their flight From the maddened hearts of many Through that long and woeful night! Till the fires began to dwindle,

And the shots grew faint and few, And we heard the foeman's challenge, Only in a far hilloo :

Till the silence once more settled

O'er the gorges of the glen, Broken only by the Cona

Plunging through its naked den. Slowly from the mountain-summit

Was the drifting veil withdrawn, And the ghastly valley glimmered In the gray December dawn. Better had the morning never

Dawned upon our dark despair! Black amidst the common whiteness Rose the spectral ruins there:

But the sight of these was nothing

More than wrings the wild-dove's breast,

When she searches for her offspring

Round the relics of her nest.

For in many a spot the tartan

Peered above the wintry heap,

Marking where a dead Macdonald
Lay within his frozen sleep.
Tremblingly we scooped the covering
From each kindred victim's head,
And the living lips were burning
On the cold ones of the dead.
And I left them with their dearest-
Dearest charge had every one-
Left the maiden with her lover,
Left the mother with her son.
I alone of all was mateless-

Far more wretched I than they,
For the snow would not discover
Where my lord and husband lay;
But I wandered up the valley,

Till I found him lying low, With the gash upon his bosom

And the frown upon his browTill I found him lying murdered, Where he wooed me long ago!

III.

Woman's weakness shall not shame me-
Why should I have tears to shed?
Could I rain them down like water,
O my hero! on thy head—
Could the cry of lamentation
Wake thee from thy silent sleep,
Could it set thy heart a-throbbing,
It were mine to wail and weep!
But I will not waste my sorrow,
Lest the Campbell women say
That the daughters of Clanranald
Are as weak and frail as they.
I had wept thee hadst thou fallen,
Like our fathers, on thy shield,
When a host of English foemen
Camped upon a Scottish field—