'Tis said, when moonbeams are round thee gleaming,

Oft by thy sea-circled base is seen

A fair hair'd form of the gentlest seeming,
And sad her song as thyself, I ween.

But not for thee is she sad, grey Tower—
Her plaint reveals she has loved in vain;
While he who far from her coral bower

Has lured her, comes not to soothe her pain.

Sing on, fond nymph! sing thy song relieving:
Alike on Earth or in Ocean born,

The heart with fondest affection heaving
Thus, ever thus, lives most sorrow, torn!

Ye streams, that ever in grateful numbers
Pour to Loch-duich your tribute due,

I marvel not it so often slumbers,

When lulled by anthems thus sung by you.

Here-through the flow'r-mantled meadow passing,
Ye, lingering, waken your softest song;
There-down the steep, bright as sunbeams flashing,
Ye ceaseless roar, rage, and rush along.

SCUR-ORAIN, chief of a thousand mountains!
Storm-swept and bare though thy forehead be,
The stag delights to live by thy fountains;-
Hark! 'tis the cry of the Chase in thee!

What, though, in fleetness the winds excelling,
The quarry far to the desert flies,—

Ere ends that yell 'mong the rocks far-pealing,
The antler'd Pride of the Forest dies.

Fain would I sing of yon dell roe-haunted,
And thou, Kintail, of the woodlands gay,
Where the cuckoo's first spring notes are chanted
And wild flowers grace even winter's sway.

Nor would Glensheil in my song find wanting
The praises due to its minstrel throng,
But most of all to the charmers haunting
That happy Eden of love and song!

But time forbids. Fare thee well Loch-duich !
-Though thy green banks I no more may see,
While life's warm stream in my bosom floweth,
A memory sweet thou shalt be to me.

ELEGIAC STANZAS.

(An abbreviated free translation of one of the Author's earliest Gaelic productions.)

In vain do spring-time's many charms essay

To chase the gloom in Aray's glen to-day ;

The strains that there once charmed my listening ear

Can ne'er again avail my heart to cheer.

When that fair star, so late my soul's delight,
Hath vanished, never more to cheer my sight,-
When my fond heart, sad-missing joy so brief,
Lies in the dust, enamoured of its grief,-

When for the couch she soon might reach, love-led, The grave becometh Jessie's bridal bed,

Well may

the tears of friendship freely flow,

And life to me be an unending woe.

Insatiate Death! was it to make us see
How all impartial fly thy arrows, we

Are left to mourn her dead, whose graces might
Make even thee ashamed our prayers to slight?

*

Alas for Life! its frail unequal thread
Is, like the gossamer in sunshine spread,
The ready wreck of the first passing blast,
And yieldeth first where it should longest last.

'Tis thus that all too soon in death's cold sleep
Closed Jessie's eyes, while mine are left to weep;
Better it were, than thus be left, to have
My own last sleep beside her in the grave.

Shade of my love! if it indeed be true

That spirits blest, though hidden from our view,
May still be round us—guardian angels rare,
Oh, be it mine to feel thee often near,-

An inspiration ever leading me
To justify thy loving sympathy
By actions such as may alone secure
The conscious favour of thy spirit pure.

Come then, in all thy wonted, loving grace,
Making the grief, now my sole guest, give place
To the sweet hope that, this vain life once o'er,
I'll see thee and be near thee evermore.

MAIRI LAGHACH.

(From the Gaelic of J. McDonald, a Ross-shire bard of the last century.)

Chorus.-Hey, my winsome Mary,—
Mary fondly free!

Hey, my winsome Mary,

Mary, mine to be!

Winsome, handsome Mary,

Who so fair as she?

My own Highland lassie,

Dear as life to me!

Long ere in my bosom
Lodged Love's arrow keen,
Often with young Mary

In Glensmeoil I've been ;

Happy hours succeeded

By affection true,

Till there seem'd neath heaven

No such loving two!

Chorus.-Hey, my &c.

Often I and Mary

Desert haunts have sought,

Innocent of any

Evil deed or thought,—

Cupid, sly enchanter,

Tempting us to stray
Where the leafy greenwood
Keeps the sun at bay.

Chorus.-Hey, my &c.

What although all Albin
And its wealth were mine,
How, without thee, darling,
Could I fail to pine?
As my bride to kiss thee
I would prize far more
Than the all of treasure
Europe has in store.

Chorus.-Hey, my &c.

Fairer is the bosom

Of my loving one
Than the downy plumage
Of the floating swan ;