Yes! 'twas an organ peal that soar'd the vocal lift along,

As chorus'd to the high-strung harp his words of mightier

song,

Lest, hapless chance! should rise, above the swelling of the tide,

A remnant of the ambitious love that sought a noble bride.

But I, alas! no language find, of Sassenach or Gael, Nor note of music in the land, my cureless woe to quail. And art thou gone, without a word, without a kindly

look

Of smiling comfort, on the bard whose life thy beauty shook?

Not so it fared with Cormac; for thus the tale is told, That never, to the last, he brook'd desertion's bitter cold. His comrades sorrow'd round him; his dear vouchsafed a kiss

He almost thought he heard her sigh, “Come back again to bliss!"

THE LAST LAY OF LOVE.

This was composed when Ross was dying, and probably when he was aware of his approaching end. He died of consumption, precipitated by the espousals of his mistress to another lover.

REFT the charm of the social shell

By the touch of the sorrowful mood;
And already the worm, in her cell,
Is preparing the birth of her brood.

She blanches the hue of my cheek,
And exposes my desperate love;
Nor needs it that death should bespeak
The hurt no remeid can remove.

The step, 'twas a pleasure to trace,

Even that has withdrawn from the scene; And, now, not a breeze can displace

A leaf from its summit of green

So prostrate and fallen to lie,

So far from the branch where it hung,

As, in dust and in helplessness, I,

From the hope to which passion had clung.

Yet, benison bide! where thy choice

Deems its bliss and its treasure secure,

May the months in thy blessings rejoice,

While their rise and their wane shall endure !

For me, a poor warrior, in blood

By thy arrow-shot steep'd, I am prone, The glow of ambition subdued,

The weapons of rivalry gone.

Yet, cruel to mock me, the base
Who scoff at the name of the bard,

To scorn the degree of my race,
Their toil and their travail, is hard.

Since one, a bold yeoman ne'er drew
A furrow unstraight or unpaid;
And the other, to righteousness true,
Hung even the scales of his trade.

And I-ah! they should not compel
To waken the theme of my praise;
I can boast over hundreds, to tell
Of a chief in the conflict of lays.

And now it is over-the heart

That bounded, the hearing that thrill'd, In the song-fight shall never take part, And weakness gives warning to yield.

As the discord that raves 'neath the cloud That is raised by the dash of the spray When waters are battling aloud, Bewilderment bears me away.

And to measure the song in its charm,
Or to handle the viol with skill,
Or beauty with carols to warm,

Gone for ever, the power and the will.

No never, no never, ascend

To the mountain-pass glories, shall I, In the cheer of the chase to unbend; Enough, it is left but to die.

And yet, shall I go to my rest,

Where the dead of my brothers repairTo the hall of the bards, not unblest,

That their worthies before me are there?

LACHLAN MACVURICH.

THIS bard, known by his territorial designation of "Strathmassie," lived during nearly eighty years of the last century, and died towards its close. His proper patronymic was Macpherson. He was a favourite tenant of the chief of Cluny, and continued to enjoy the benefit of his lease of a large farm in Badenoch, after the misfortunes of the family, and forfeiture of their estate. He was very intimate with his clansman, James Macpherson, who has identified his own fame so immortally with that of Ossian. Lachlan had the reputation of being his Gaelic tutor, and was certainly his fellow-traveller during the preparation of his work. In the specimens of his poetical talents which are preserved, "Strathmassie" evinces the command of good Gaelic, though there is nothing to indicate his power of being at all serviceable to his namesake in that fabrication of imagery, legends, and sentiments, which, in the opinion of many, constitutes all that we have in the name of Ossian.

THE EXILE OF CLUNY.

The brave chief of Cluny, after lingering long on the heights of Benalder, where he entertained his unfortunate prince during some of the last days of the adventurer's wandering, at length took shipping for France, amidst the tears and regrets of a clan that loved him with the fondest devotion. "Strathmassie " seems to have caught, in the following verses, some characteristic traits of his chief, in whom peaceful dispositions were remarkably blended with the highest courage in warfare.

Он, many a true Highlander, many a liegeman,
Is blank on the roll of the brave in our land;
And bare as its heath is the dark mountain region,
Of its own and its prince's defenders unmann'd.
The hound's death abhorr'd, some have died by the
cord,

And the axe with the best of our blood is defiled,
And e'en to the visions of hope unrestored,

Some have gone from among us, for ever exiled.

He is gone from among us, our chieftain of Cluny ;
At the back of the steel, a more valiant ne'er stood;
Our father, our champion, bemoan we, bemoan we!
In battle, the brilliant; in friendship, the good.
When the sea shut him from us, then the cross of our

trial

Was hung on the mast and was swung in the wind: "Woe the worth we have sepulchred!" now is the cry

all;

"Save the shade of a memory, is nothing behind."