MRS. KEVIN IZOD O'DOHERTY
Eva Mary Kelly

T

(1825

MURMURS OF LOVE

From the Irish

HE stars are watching, the winds are playing;
They see me kneeling, they see me praying;

They hear me still, through the long night say-
ing

Asthore mahcree, I love you, I love you!

And oh ! with no love that is light or cheerful,
But deepening on in its shadow fearful;
Without a joy that is aught but tearful,
'Tis thus I love you, I love you.

Whispering still, with those whispers broken,
Speaking on, what can ne'er be spoken,
Were all the voices of earth awoken

Oh how I love you, I love

you

!

With all my heart's most passionate throbbing,
With wild emotion, and weary sobbing,
Love and light from all others robbing -

So well I love you, I love you!

-

With the low faint murmurs of deep adoring,
And voiceless blessing forever pouring,
And sighs that fall with a sad imploring,
'Tis thus I love you, I love you.

With the burning beating, the inward hushing,
Ever and ever in music gushing,
Like mystic tones from the sea-shell rushing,
Oh, thus I love you, I love you.

They pass me dancing, they pass me singing,
While night and day o'er the earth are winging;
But I sit here, to my trance still clinging-
For oh! I love you, I love you!

TIPPERARY

ERE you ever in sweet Tipperary, where the

WERE fields are so sunny and green,

And the heath-brown Slieve-bloom and the Galtees look down with so proud a mien?

'Tis there you would see more beauty than is on all Irish ground.

God bless you, my sweet Tipperary, for where could your match be found?

They say that your hand is fearful, that darkness is in

your eye:

But I'll not let them dare to talk so black and bitter a

lie.

Oh! no, macushla storin! bright, bright, and warm are you,

With hearts as bold as the men of old, to yourselves and your country true.

And when there is gloom upon you, bid them think who has brought it there Sure, a frown or a word of hatred was not made for your face so fair;

You've a hand for the grasp of friendship-another to make them quake,

And they're welcome to whichsoever it pleases them most to take.

Shall our homes, like the huts of Connaught, be crumbled before our eyes?

Shall we fly, like a flock of wild geese, from all that we love and prize?

No! by those who were here before us, no churl shall our tyrant be;

Our land it is theirs by plunder, but, by Brigid, ourselves are free.

No! we do not forget that greatness did once to sweet Eire belong;

No treason or craven spirit was ever our race among ; And no frown or no word of hatred we give—but to pay them back;

In evil we only follow our enemies' darksome track.

Oh! come for a while among us, and give us the friendly hand,

And you'll see that old Tipperary is a loving and gladsome land;

From Upper to Lower Ormond, bright welcomes and smiles will spring

On the plains of Tipperary the stranger is like a king.

JOHN FRANCIS O'DONNELL
(1837-1874)

A SPINNING SONG

Y love to fight the Saxon goes,

MY

And bravely shines his sword of steel; A heron's feather decks his brows,

And a spur on either heel;

His steed is blacker than the sloe,
And fleeter than the falling star;
Amid the surging ranks he'll go
And shout for joy of war.

Twinkle, twinkle, pretty spindle; let the white wool drift and dwindle.

Oh! we weave a damask doublet for my lover's coat of steel.

Hark! the timid, turning treadle crooning soft, oldfashioned ditties

To the low, slow murmur of the brown round wheel.

My love is pledged to Ireland's fight;
My love would die for Ireland's weal,
To win her back her ancient right,
And make her foemen reel.

Oh! close I'll clasp him to my breast

When homeward from the war he comes;
The fires shall light the mountain's crest,
The valley peal with drums.

Twinkle, twinkle, pretty spindle; let the white wool drift and dwindle.

Oh! we weave a damask doublet for my lover's coat of steel.

Hark! the timid, turning treadle crooning soft, oldfashioned ditties

To the low, slow murmur of the brown round wheel.

I

GUESSES

KNOW a maiden; she is dark and fair,
With curved brows and eyes of hazel hue,
And mouth, a marvel, delicately rare,
Rich with expression, ever quaint yet new.
O happy fancy! there she, leaning, sits,

One little palm against her temples pressed,

And all her tresses winking like brown elves; The yellow fretted laurels toss in fits,

The great laburnums droop in swoons of rest,
The blowing woodbines murmur to themselves.

What does she think of, as the daylight floats
Along the mignonetted window-sills,
And flame-like, overhead, with ruffled throats,
The bright canaries twit their seeded bills?
What does she think of? Of the jasmine flower
That, like an odorous snowflake, opens slow,
Or of the linnet on the topmost briar,
Or of the cloud that, fringed with summer shower,
Floats up the river spaces, blue and low,

And marged with lilies like a bank of fire?