the lines of thought. In youth he possessed a keen sense of humor and a disposition to look always on the "silver lining of the cloud."

In head, heart and soul he was Irish, and his chief aim in life was to serve his native land. His earlier poems were written with that end in view, and not for fame. Having a great deal of serious business on hand, he always wrote in a hurry when the mood took him, and seldom waited to re-read or revise his copy. He did not, like Pope and Edmund Burke, write his compositions over and over several times, but left them as they came gushing from the heart, without a single touch of the linae labor.

After the failure of the Young Irelanders his mind and disposition changed from gay to grave. The happy, humorous young rebel to British injustice in Ireland ever after seemed to mourn his blighted hopes. He did not thrive in exile.

His last literary work was the "Song of the IrishAmerican Regiments," in which his old patriotic fervor seems to burn anew. Two months later and the hand that wrote this was stilled in death.

Sleep well, O Bard! too early from the field

Of labor and of honor call'd away;

Sleep like a hero, on your own good shield,

Beneath the Shamrock wreath'd about with bay;

Not doubtful is thy place among the host,

Whom fame and Erin love and mourn the most.

KATHLEEN.

My Kathleen, dearest! in truth or seeming
No brighter vision e'er blessed mine eyes
Than she for whom, in Elysian dreaming,
Thy tranced lover too fondly sighs.
Oh, Kathleen, fairest! if elfin splendor
Hath ever broken my heart's repose,
'Twas in the darkness, ere purely tender,

Thy smile, like moonlight o'er ocean, rose.

Since first I met thee thou knowest thine are
This passion-music, and each pulse's thrill-
The flowers seem brighter, the stars diviner,
And God and Nature more glorious still.
I see around me new fountains gushing-
More jewels spangle the robes of night;
Strange harps resounding-fresh roses blushing-
Young worlds emerging in purer light.

No more thy song-bird in clouds shall hover-
Oh, give him shelter upon thy breast,
And bid him swiftly, his long flight over,

From heav'n drop into that love-built nest!
Like fairy flow'rets is Love, thou fearest,

At once that springeth like mine from earth— "Tis Friendship's ivy grows slowly, dearest,

But Love and Lightning have instant birth.

The mirthful fancy and artless gesture-
Hair black as tempest, and swan-like breast,
More graceful folded in simple vesture
Than proudest bosoms in diamonds drest.

Nor these, the varied and rare possession

Love gave to conquer, are thine alone;
But, oh! there crowns thee divine expression,
As saints a halo, that's all thine own.

Thou art, as poets in olden story

Have pictured woman before the fall-
Her angel beauty's divinest glory—

The
pure soul shining, like God, through all.
But, vainly, humblest of leaflets springing,
I sing the queenliest flower of Love:
Thus soars the skylark, presumptuous singing
The orient morning enthroned above.

Yet hear, propitious, beloved maiden,
The minstrel's passion is pure as strong,
Though, nature fated, his heart, love-laden
Must break, or utter its woes in song.
Farewell! If never my soul may cherish

The dreams that bade me to love aspire,
By mem'ry's altar! thou shalt not perish,
First Irish pearl of my Irish lyre !

THE PASS OF PLUMES.

[To the pompous preparations of the Earl of Essex, the results of his government in Ireland formed a most lamentable sequel. Rarely, if ever, indeed, had there been witnessed, in any military expedition, a more wretched contrast between the promises and performances of its leader, or a wider departure in the field from the plans settled in the Council. Provided with an army the largest that Ireland had ever witnessed on her shores, consisting of 20,000 foot and 2,000 horse, his obvious policy, and at first his purpose, was to march directly against Tyrone, and grapple at once with the strength of the Rebellion in its great source and centre, the North. Instead of pursuing this course of policy, at once the boldest and most safe, he squandered both time and reputation on a march of parade into Munster, and the sole result of his mighty enterprise was the reduction of two castles and the feigned

submission of three native Chiefs. When passing through Leinster, on his way back to Dublin, he was much harassed by the O'Moores, who made an attack upon his rear-guard, in which many of his men and several of his officers were killed; and, among the few traditional records we have of his visit, it is told that, from the quantity of plumes of feathers of which his soldiers were despoiled, the place of action long continued to be called the Pass of Plumes,-"Thus," says Moryson, in describing the departure of Essex from London, "at the head of so strong an army as did ominate nothing but victory and triumphs, yet with a sunshine thunder happening (as Camden notes for an ominous ill token) this lord took his journey."— Moore's Ireland, vol. iv., p. 112.]

"Look out," said O'Moore to his clansmen, "afar
Is yon white cloud, the herald of tempest or war!
Hark! know you the roll of the foreigners' drums?
By Heaven! Lord Essex in panoply comes,
With corselet, and helmet, and gay bannerol,
And the shields of the nobles with blazon and scroll;
And, as snow on the larch in December appears,
What a winter of plumes on that forest of spears!
To the clangor of trumpets and waving of flags,
The clattering cavalry prance o'er the crags;

And their plumes-By St. Kyran! false Saxon, ere night,
You shall wish these fine feathers were wings for your flight.

"Shall we leave all the blood and the gold of the Pale

To be shed at Armagh and won by O'Neill?
Shall we yield to O'Ruark, to McGuire and O'Donnell,
Brave chieftains of Breffny, Fermanagh-Tyrconnell;
Yon helmets, that Erick' thrice over would pay
For the Sassenach heads they'll protect not to-day?
No! By red Mullaghmast, fiery clansmen of Leix,
Avenge your sires' blood on their murderers' race!
Now, sept of O'Moore, fearless sons of the heather,
Fling your scabbards away, and strike home and together!"

Then loudly the clang of commingled blows
Upswell'd from the sounding fields,
And the joy of a hundred trumps arose,

And the clash of a thousand shields.

And the long plumes danc'd and the falchions rung,
And flash'd the whirl'd spear,

And the furious barb through the wild war sprung,

And trembled the earth with fear;

The fatal bolts exulting fled,

And hissed as they leap'd away;

And the tortur'd steed on the red grass bled,

Or died with a piercing neigh.

I see their weapons crimson'd; I hear the mingled cries
Of rage and pain and triumph, as they thundered to the skies.
The Coolun'd kern rushes upon armor, knight and mace,
And bone and brass are broken in his terrible embrace!
The coursers roll and struggle; and the riders, girt in steel,
From their saddles, crush'd and cloven, to the purple heather

reel,

And shatter'd there, and trampled by the charger's iron hoof,
The seething brain is bursting thro' the crashing helmet's roof.
Joy! Heaven strikes for freedom! and Elizabeth's array,
With her paramour to lead 'em, are sore beset to-day.

Their heraldry and plumery, their coronets and mail,

Are trampled on the battle field, or scatter'd on the gale!

As the cavalry of ocean, the living billows bound,
When lightnings leap above them and thunders clang around,
And tempest-crested dazzlingly, caparison'd in spray,

They crush the black and broken rocks, with all their roots

away