The Book of Scottish Song/Dirge of a Highland Chief

Dirge of a Highland Chief.

[Set to music by R. A. Smith.]

Son of the mighty and the free,
Loved leader of the faithful brave,
Was it for high-rank'd chief like thee
To fill a nameless grave?
Oh, hadst thou slumber'd with the slain.
Had glory's death-bed been thy lot,
Even though on red Culloden's plain,
We then had mourn'd thee not.

But darkly closed thy morn of fame,
That morn whose sunbeams rose so fair:
Revenge alone may breathe thy name,
The watch-word of despair.
Yet, oh, if gallant spirit's power
Has e'er ennobled death like thine,
Then glory mark'd thy parting hour,
Last of a mighty line.

O'er thy own bowers the sunshine falls,
But cannot cheer their lonely gloom;
Those beams that gild thy native walls
Are sleeping on thy tomb.
Spring on the mountains laughs the while,
Thy green woods wave in vernal air;
But the loved scenes may vainly smile—
Not e'en thy dust is there.

On thy blue hills no bugle sound
Is mixing with the torrent's roar;
Unmark'd the red deer sport around—
Thou lead'st the chase no more.
Thy gates are closed, thy halls are still—
Those halls where swell'd the coral strain:
They hear the wild winds murmuring shrill,
And all is hush'd again.

Thy bard his pealing harp has broke—
His fire, his joy of song, is past!
One lay to mourn thy fate he woke,
His saddest, and his last.
No other theme to him is dear
Than lofty deeds of thine:
Hush'd be the strain thou canst not hear,
Last of a mighty line.

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