Jump to content

The Elocutionist (1815-1830)/Glenara

From Wikisource
For other versions of this work, see Glenara.

GLENARA.

Oh! heard ye yon pibroch sound sad in the gale,
Where a band cometh slowly it weeping and wail?
'Tis the Chief of Glenara laments for his dear;
And her sire and her people are eallto her bier.

Glenara eame first with the mourners and shroud,
Her kinsmen they followed but mourned not aloud;
Their plaids all their bosoms were folded around;
They marched all in silenee—they looked to the ground.

In silenee they reached over mountain and moor,
To a heath where the oak tree grew lonely and hoar,
'Now here let us place the grey stone of her eairn,
Why speak ye no word?' said Glenara the stern.

'And tell me I charge you, ye clan of my spouse,
Why fold ye your mantles? why eloud ye your brows?'
So spake the rude ehieftain; no answer is made,
But eaeh mantle unfolding, a dagger display'd.

'I dreamed of my lady, I dreamed of her shroud,'
Cried a voice from the kinsmen all wrathful and loud;
'And empty that shroud and that eoffin did seem:
Glenara! Glenara! now read me my dream?'

Oh! pale grew the eheek of the ehieftain I ween,
When the shroud was unclosed, and no body was seen;
Then a voice from the kinsmen spoke louder in seorn,
'Twas the youth that had loved the fair Ellen of Lorn.

"I dreamed of my lady. I dreamed of her grief,
I dreamed that her lord was a barbarous chief;
On a rock of the ocean, fair Ellen did seem:
Glenara! Glenara! now read me my dream!'

In dust low the traitor has knelt to the ground,
And the desert reveal'd where his lady was found;
From a rock of the ocean that beauty is born;
Now joy to the house of fair Ellen of Lorn!

Campbell