THE PATRIOT'S GRAVE.
131
While slept the right, and reigned the dual wrong,
Unchanged, unchecked, for half a thousand years,
In tears of blood we cried, "O Lord, how long?"
And even God seemed deaf to Erin's tears.
But when she lay all weak and bruised and broken,
Her white limbs seared with cruel chain and thorn—
As bursts the cloud, the lightning word was spoken,
God's seed took root—His crop of men was born!
With one deep breath began the land's progression:
On every field the seeds of freedom fell:
Burke, Grattan, Flood, and Curran in the session—
Fitzgerald, Sheares, and Emmet in the cell!
