John McKillop

THE noble-minded Earl Hugh

Shortsyne laid they fountain-stane,

When, save a fisher’s hut in view,

Thy ruin’d Castle reiign’d alane.

Thy Harbour then was but a creek,

Lash’d round by breaker’s foam, and spray,

Where daring Donald came to seek

A landing for his usquabae.

All ‘round was rock, and bleak and bare :

No flower, or shrub, or tree appear’d :

No music floated in the air :

No voice of humankind was heard.

The sea-mew nestl’d in the cliffs,

The crane, the swallow, and the owl :

Far in the offing stood the skiffs,

Aw’d by by thy stern, forbidding scowl.

Auld Castle Craigs was then thy name,

Aname that well befitted thee,

Unlikely e’er to rise to fame,

Or be a gem beside the sea.

But lo! A change has o’er thee pass’d :

Thy desolation fled away ;

Thy rocks into the deep are cast :

Thy face assumes the smile of day.

As if by magic’s wizard- power,

Thy stately Palaces arise,

Thy streets extend, the Villas tower,

The wondering of admiring eyes.

And in Elysian sweetness lie,

Behind thy walls of princely price,

Thy Gardens smiling to the sky,

In all the bloom of Paradise.

And there thy moving breathing Flowers,

And sensitive, and tempting too,

Recline beneath enchanting bowers,

Or from the vi’lets brush the dew.

Around the Castle rise the larch,

The fir, the beech, the rowan-tree,

The plane, the aspen, and the birch,

The haunt of love and melody.

There whispering lovers wrapt in bliss,

At gloaming meet in youthful glow,

And drink at founts of happiness

Which none but youthful lovers know.

The blackbird whistles from the spray :

And thence the shriller mavis sings ;

Above, the lark salutes the day,

Cleaving the clouds on buoyant wings.

Hid from the vulgar gaze around,

Beneath the boughs the preacher strays,

Collaps’d in triple thought profound,

Pond’ring on Heaven’s mysterious ways.

And there Apollo’s ragged son,

Cloth’d gorgeously in golden views,

Strolls ‘mid the gloom of night alone,

And fondly courts the ficlek Muse.

Immur’d in shade by bower and brake,

Thou hast thy spacious Bowling-green,

Smooth, level,as a sleeping lake,

Where Grecian games afresh are seen.

As from Olympus, from thy hill

Thy sires and blooming maids behold

Gymnastic sports and feats of skill

Perform’d by many stripling bold.

These are delightsome to the view :

But thou hast works surpassing these :

Thy Gaswork by the ocean blue,

Rolling its smoke upon the breeze.

Fed by this fount of gaseous air,

On winter nights, in grand array,

Thy Lamps burn with a brilliant glare, And emulate the light of day.

THE bleak, the dreary winter’s past,

The sun beams out a cheering smile,

Hush’d into peace, the howling blast

Suspends his sweeping power a while.

But ah! What havoc on the sea!

What wrecks along the rippling shore!

How many reft of every joy,

That joy’d in dearest friends before!

See, ‘neath the moon’s pa;e beams at eve,

The widow, wrapt in pensive gloom,

Wide to the winds her sorrows heave,

And point her prospects to the tomb.

The sports of youth no more avail,

The cheering talk of comrades dear ;

Nature around seems dark and pale

Even in the spring-time of the year.

What’s human life?  ‘Tis but a dream!

Its pleasures, visions in the brain,

Which, like the bubbles on the stream,

Soon vanish, ne’er to rise again.

How happy they, how rich, how wise,

Whose views transcend the things of time,

Pierce through the clouds, transfix the skies,

And range in an immortal clime !

Thus rais’d on Hope’s strong pinions high,

Beneath their feet the world they tread,

Convinc’d that for eternity And heavenly pleasures man was made.