Now wrap thy cloak about thee-- The hours must sure go wrong, For when they"re past without thee, They"re, oh, ten times as long.
WATCHMAN.
Past three o"clock--past three.
Again that dreadful warning!
Had ever time such flight?
And see the sky, "tis morning-- So now, _indeed_, good night.
WATCHMAN.
Past three o"clock--past three.
Goodnight, good night.
SAY, WHAT SHALL WE DANCE?
Say, what shall we dance?
Shall we bound along the moonlight plain, To music of Italy, Greece, or Spain?
Say, what shall we dance?
Shall we, like those who rove Thro" bright Grenada"s grove, To the light Bolero"s measures move?
Or choose the Guaracia"s languishing lay, And thus to its sound die away?
Strike the gay chords, Let us hear each strain from every sh.o.r.e That music haunts, or young feet wander o"er.
Hark! "tis the light march, to whose measured time, The Polish lady, by her lover led, Delights thro" gay saloons with step untried to tread, Or sweeter still, thro" moonlight walks Whose shadows serve to hide The blush that"s raised by who talks Of love the while by her side, Then comes the smooth waltz, to whose floating sound Like dreams we go gliding around, Say, which shall we dance? which shall we dance?
THE EVENING GUN.
Remember"st thou that setting sun, The last I saw with thee, When loud we heard the evening gun Peal o"er the twilight sea?
Boom!--the sounds appeared to sweep Far o"er the verge of day,
Till, into realms beyond the deep, They seemed to die away.
Oft, when the toils of day are done, In pensive dreams of thee, I sit to hear that evening gun, Peal o"er the stormy sea.
Boom!--and while, o"er billows curled.
The distant sounds decay, I weep and wish, from this rough world Like them to die away.
LEGENDARY BALLADS.
TO
THE MISS FEILDINGS,
THIS VOLUME
IS INSCRIBED
BY
THEIR FAITHFUL FRIEND AND SERVANT,
THOMAS MOORE.
LEGENDARY BALLADS
THE VOICE.
It came o"er her sleep, like a voice of those days, When love, only love was the light of her ways; And, soft as in moments of bliss long ago, It whispered her name from the garden below.
"Alas," sighed the maiden, "how fancy can cheat!
"The world once had lips that could whisper thus sweet; "But cold now they slumber in yon fatal deep.
"Where, oh that beside them this heart too could sleep!"
She sunk on her pillow--but no, "twas in vain To chase the illusion, that Voice came again!
She flew to the cas.e.m.e.nt--but, husht as the grave, In moonlight lay slumbering woodland and wave.
"Oh sleep, come and shield me," in anguish she said, "From that call of the buried, that cry of the Dead!"