CHARLES GRAHAM HALPINE

(1829-1868)

NOT A STAR FROM THE FLAG SHALL FADE

Ο

CH! a rare ould flag was the flag we bore,

'Twas a bully ould flag, an' nice;

It had sthripes in plenty, an' shtars galore'Twas the broth of a purty device.

Faix, we carried it South, an' we carried it far,
An' around it our bivouacs made;

An' we swore by the shamrock that never a shtar
From its azure field should fade.

Ay, this was the oath, I tell you thrue,

That was sworn in the souls of our Boys in Blue.

The fight it grows thick, an' our boys they fall,
An' the shells like a banshee scream;

An' the flag-it is torn by many a ball,
But to yield it we never dhream.

Though pierced by bullets, yet still it bears
All the shtars in its tatthered field,

An' again the brigade, like to one man swears,
"Not a shtar from the flag we yield!

'Twas the deep, hot oath, I tell you thrue,

That lay close to the hearts of our Boys in Blue.

Shure, the fight it was won afther many a year,
But two-thirds of the boys who bore

That flag from their wives and sweethearts dear
Returned to their homes no more.

They died by the bullet-disease had power,
An' to death they were rudely tossed;
But the thought came warm in their dying hour,
"Not a shtar from the flag is lost!"

Then they said their pathers and aves through,
An', like Irishmen, died-did our Boys in Blue.

But now they tell us some shtars are gone,
Torn out by the rebel gale;

That the shtars we fought for, the states we won,
Are still out of the Union's pale.

May their sowls in the dioul's hot kitchen glow
Who sing such a lyin' shtrain;

By the dead in their graves, it shall not be so
They shall have what they died to gain!

All the shtars in our flag shall still shine through
The grass growing soft o'er our Dead in Blue!

Ο

BULMER HOBSON

(Living)

THE DELUGE

NCE Manannan Mac Lir his deep blue mantle

cast

Over the hearts of men, and over all the land; And he came to the land of men, borne on an icy blast. The wind drifted the waves, and the waves washed

on the strand

Till water and earth were blent.

the sea

The pale sky and

Met on the mountain tops, and the trembling stars

were quenched.

And the frightened hosts of men thought to the west

to flee;

But far to the west, and further, all the land was

drenched.

Then the clans of men were drowned, women and warriors strong;

Children tossed on the waves, maidens with loosened hair

Drifted about on the waters; and the sea washed for long

Over the land where the hosts of men once had a dwelling fair.

But Fintan roamed through the flood, and he alone

of men

Watched the rise of the sea, watched it tower and fall,

Ebb, and flow, and fail, and sink from the land again, Leaving the dead in its track, and silence over all. Then he gathered the bodies of men, gathered them one by one

From the desolated land; and he built a mighty pyre,

And he laid them side by side, wife, and father, and

son.

And there in the starlight pale he lit the funeral fire. And the smoke-wreath curled away; and over the moonlit sea

It went, in the dead of night, till it came to the Isles in the West.

And out of the smoke each man took the shape that he used to be;

And there they dwell on the sunset's rim, in the sunset roam and rest.

IN

ULAD

the north is the strength of the wind, of the whirl

wind;

In the south there are murmuring waters;

The east has a caoine for its song;

In the west is strengthless love.

The waters grow troubled and cease soon,
But the wind is a-sway on the hills
Forever, forever.

The caoine sings memories, memories,
Thoughts and deeds that are dead.
Oh, I sing to the wind and the storm
The storm that like Fomor running
Leaps from hilltop to hilltop.

The waters are stirred by the wind,
And love drinks strength from its blowing:
The sorrow of memory shrinks back;
Like a shroud it is dropped and forgotten.

Memory shorn of your sorrow,

Love reborn of the storm,
Water touched by the wind,

The wind is your master, is strongest !