Year: 1861

THE BALLAD OF THE SHAMROCK.


nY yrrz JAMES BRIKH.
Nv boz left me just twelve years ago
Twas the black yea. of famine, Of sickness, and
woe, -.E
When the crops died oas and .ae people died
too,
And the land into one great graveyard grew;
And our neighbors' faces were as white and thin
As the face of the moon when she first comes in
And honest men's hearts were rotten with blight
And they thieved and pr owled like the wolves at
Hdgbs;
When the whole land was dark as dark could be-
Twas then that DozAL, my boy, left me.
We were turned from our farm where we'd lived
60 long,
For We couldn't pay the rent, and the law was
strong;
From our low meadow lands. and the aax fields
blue,
And the handsome green hill where the yellow
furze grew,
And the homes. old COW that each evening would
stand
At the little gate lowing to be MIXED BY my
hand;
And the small patch Of garden At the end of the
lawn
Where Donsl gre, sweet flowers for his Colleen
Bawn;
But Donai and had to leave all these,
I 70 live With father and he to cross the seas.
For Donal was as proud as any kings son,
And swors he'd not stand by and see such
wrongs done.
Bat would seek fortune out in the wide, wide
West,
Where the honest can fnd labor and the weary
rest;
And a. .oon as be was able why then he'd send
To rest my poor old head in bis nome across the
And then his young face flushed like a June sky
At dawn,
As he said that he was thinking how lis Colleen
Could come along to help me to keep the house
straight,
For he knew how much she loved him, and she'd
promised him to wait.
think I see him now, as he stood one blessed
day,
With his pale smiling face upon the Limerick
Quay,
And / lying on his breast, with his long curly
hair
Blowing all about my shoulders as if to keep me
there;
And the quivering Of his lip, that he tried to
keep so proud
Not because Of his old mother, but the idle
curious crowd
Then the hoistng of the hor, and the tapping
Of the sail,
And the stopping Of my heart when the Wild
Irish vail
From the mothers and the children, and the
kinsfolk on the quay
Told me palmer than all words that my darling
was away.
Ten years went dragging by, and heard but
now and then
For my Donal, though brave boy, was no
scholar with the pen;
But he sent me kindly words, and bade me not
despair.
And sometimes sent me money, perhaps more
than he could spare:
So l waited and prayed until it came to pass
Thst Father Pat he wanted me one Sunday after
mass,
When wen. a little fearsome, to the back
vessry>roon,
Where his reverence sat a-smiling like . sun
flower in the gloom,
And then he up and told me-God bless him -
that my boy
Had sent to bring me over, and nearly died
for joy.
All day was half-crazed IS wandered through
the house;
The dropping of the sycamore Seeds or the
scramble of mouse
Thrilled through me like gun-shot burst not
look behind,
For the pale face of my darling was always in
my mind.
The pale face so sorrowful, the eyes SO large and
dark,





Massy's park;
And the long chestnut hair blown loosely by the
wind,
All this seemed a. my shoulder, and dare not
look behind,
But / said in my own heart, it is but the second
sight
OF the day when shall kiss him all beautiful
and bright
Then made my box ready to 60 aero ss the sea,
ny boy had sent a ticket, so my passage it was
free,
But oil the time longsd that some little gift
had
To take across the ocean to my own dear lad
pin, or . chain, or something of the kind,
Just TO mind the poor boy of the land he'd left
behind
But was too poor to buy them, so I'd nothing
Jeff TO do